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It had all started with a simple, but overused question. “Conrad, when is Wolfram’s birthday?”
“We Mazoku don’t tend to make note of our birthdays, Your Majesty. Our lives are too long for that,” Conrart had helpfully reminded Yuuri, only for the young king to roll his eyes.
“It’s Yuuri, nazukeoya. Yuu~ri,” Yuuri objected, a small pout on his face, “and it just doesn’t feel right that you guys plan to get me presents every year, but you don’t even remember your own so that I can get you all something.”
“Yes, Yuu~ri,” came the practiced, but teasing response of someone who had just recently earned the title of ‘experienced godfather.’ Conrart’s fingers went to his chin in thought. “If I recall, he was born sometime in the spring…”
“The spring?!” Yuuri blurted out, eyes wide with horror, his whining starting up again. “That ended months ago! I don’t wanna wait~”
“You can certainly give him a gift, Yuuri. It wouldn’t be unusual for someone to buy their fiancé a gift, yes?” Conrart had helpfully supplied, and Yuuri’s brain had promptly short circuited.
That had, as was previously mentioned, started it all. Yuuri had been labouring over the idea for a stupidly long time, because really, what would a rich, pretty boy like Wolfram want? He already had everything, and if he didn’t have it, he only had to say the word to get it. It was because of this that, as Yuuri sat in his bedroom on Earth, what he was writing down on the paper that was meant to contain an essay that was due in a few days was in fact a lot of gift ideas, some legible, some scribbled out.
After all, if Wolfram could have just about everything in Shin Makoku, it had to be something that could only be gotten on Earth, right?
Something that suited a Mazoku’s sense of what was aesthetically pleasing…or maybe something that Wolfram would get good use out of…
Naturally, though, Yuuri was a student, and students don’t tend to be in possession of a lot of money… OK, it wasn’t so much that students didn’t have a lot of money as much as it was that, even if his family was somewhat well off, Yuuri just wasn’t given that much to begin with compared to his classmates. It was something about teaching him responsibility with money, but Yuuri always ended up just blowing his way through the small amount he was given within a relatively short period of time, at which point he would moan about something he wanted within earshot of his big brother, and the item in question would either magically appear in his room courtesy of his own personal fairy godbrother, or simply be put in his hands along with an admonishment about spending his money carefully that both of them knew to be an encouragement to rely on the eldest brother more in disguise.
Wolfram liked jewellery. Yuuri knew that much, or rather, he liked practical jewellery. That was where Yuuri’s mind had wandered. Some sort of brooch or another jabot chain, ‘jabot’ being a word that Yuuri had only recently learned, and still struggled to remember. He wondered briefly if such things could be found in Japan where even the word ‘jabot’ was a general unknown…and Wolfram had given him a brooch back when he’d been coronated. Perhaps he could reciprocate. A brooch for a brooch. Something with a chain, definitely. Chains were fancy, and Wolfram liked them.
Three months, Yuuri thought determinedly. He wouldn’t spend his money for three months, and then he would have enough money to purchase something from the nearby jewellers. Wolfram wouldn’t have to know that he was planning anything. Life would go on as normal, Yuuri would blindside his fiancé with a gift, Wolfram would be ecstatic, and everybody would be happy.
The following three months, however, taught Yuuri some very important things. The first lesson was that three months of his pocket money, saved up every week, was roughly equal to the amount of pocket money the average high schooler would save in a month. In fact, it was so small that, when he’d bragged about how much he’d saved to his friend Sato at school, he’d been teased, and when he brought it up to Murata later, his best Earth friend had only laughed at him for his efforts, but despite coming from a somewhat wealthy household, Murata hadn’t even offered to help him out with his money troubles, not that he was welcome to.
The second lesson that Yuuri had learned was that pretty gemstones that didn’t exist in Shin Makoku—he’d checked, though it had admittedly been part of his research for one of Günter’s upcoming lessons—could be exceedingly cheap. A quick search online for stones that Wolfram might like had surprised him to the extent that he had walked down to the local jeweller earlier than expected to see if he could get something that Wolfram might like after convincing himself that it didn’t matter that he was buying a rich pretty boy something cheap, because the sheer lack of availability in the other world would no doubt drive the value right up, and to Yuuri, it was fairly expensive, anyway. It’s all about perspective, right?
The third lesson was that, even if the gemstone was cheap, the completed jewellery, itself was… Well, it wasn’t expensive, per se… It was just that it was well out of his price range, even after three months of saving up. He had the feeling that your average working person could afford this easily, but Yuuri was a student with a budget that was restricted more than the average teenager his age, and even a part-time job wasn’t enough to get him anywhere fast, and really, asking his brother for money would just be cheating. He was buying the gift, not Shouri.
Perhaps his slight depression on the matter came through somewhat, maybe not to most of his retainers, but certainly to Wolfram who seemed to spend most of his time watching Yuuri. Naturally, he couldn’t help but confront Yuuri with it before bed, after a particularly long day.
“You’ve been awfully depressed these past few days,” Wolfram remarked bluntly. Straight to the point, as always. “Did something happen on Earth?”
“Ah…” Yuuri could hardly think of what to say. He couldn’t just tell Wolfram of his plans! That would ruin the whole thing! Curse his horrible poker face! “I’ve just been thinking, is all…” he said vaguely, crawling beneath the cool covers.
“About what?”
Damn it… Of course, he would ask…
“Silly stuff…” Yuuri told him with an embarrassed chuckle. “Just… I’ve been working hard to earn money!” Ah! He didn’t have to lie! “Because I’m a student, you know? And I don’t have much, so I got a job, but it’s not paying well, so I’ve been thinking…”
“A job?” Wolfram asked, raising a perfectly sculpted eyebrow. “Doing what?”
“Selling snacks at a movie theatre.”
Wolfram balked, mouth agape. “A king, doing a lowly job like that?!”
“Well, I’m not a king on Earth, am I?!” Yuuri protested, but it didn’t look as though it had helped the situation. “And besides, there are no lowly jobs!”
Wolfram didn’t seem to be listening, regardless. “What do you even want, anyway, that you would take a job like that…?!”
Yuuri panicked a little, averting his gaze. “Just…you know…stuff! Sometimes, there are things you want, and then you realise that you don’t have the money for it, and it’s annoying!”
“Things you can’t get here?” Wolfram looked like he didn’t believe him.
“You’ve been to Earth! There’s stuff there that you can’t get here! You know that!” Yuuri protested.
“It can’t be worth taking a job like that…” Wolfram muttered, pointedly ignoring how Yuuri spluttered indignantly.
“It’s a perfectly respectable job!”
With impeccable timing, however, the next day brought to light the fatal flaw in his plan, courtesy of Günter’s lessons, and he found himself to be rather thankful for his overdramatic teacher for once. The lesson had been on the items in the treasure room, and on the royal regalia, and Günter was tilting Yuuri’s crown up on the table for him to look at the engravings on the inside.
“And so, on His Majesty’s own magnificent crown, the seal of Shinou is still beautifully carved into the inside, just there at the edge of the daemonium can you see? This way, even though the crown now belongs to His Majesty, one can never forget where it came from,” Günter told him, pointing to the same symbol that Yuuri saw all over the walls of Shinou’s tomb. Nevertheless, that word caught his attention, and he found himself raising his hand as though he was in school. Günter noticed rapidly, for things about Yuuri rarely seemed to escape his notice. He seemed jubilant that a question was to be asked of him. “Yes, Your Majesty?”
“What’s daemonium?” Yuuri asked, lowering his hand. Was there a name for this sort of metalwork that he was unfamiliar with?
Günter looked a little shocked, though he didn’t seem to be put out in the slightest by the question. He blinked owlishly, and Yuuri could almost see the lightbulb switching on in his head. “Could it be that daemonium doesn’t exist on Earth?”
Ah… So, daemonium was a thing…
“Never heard of it,” Yuuri admitted, and Günter’s expression only seemed to brighten further.
“Well, Your Majesty, it tends to be the metal of choice used in Mazoku jewellery. Anything else would easily wear away over a Mazoku’s lifetime, but daemonium lasts the test of time, and it even has the added benefit of helping to lessen the sickening effects of houseki and houryoku, so it’s also used in houseki containment procedures,” Günter explained, picking up the fibula that held Yuuri’s purple mantle together, showing him the golden metal that held the large gemstone in place. “And, as you can see here, it comes in a variety of colours depending on inclusions to the metal, but pure daemonium is a silver colour, just like your crown, here…”
Yuuri’s hand went up again. “Question two.”
“Yes, Your Majesty?” Günter responded, eyes sparkling with delight.
Yuuri lowered his hand. “I did a bit of research leading up to this lesson-”
“As expected of His Majesty…!” Günter swooned, and Yuuri did his best to ignore him.
“And I started to look at some of the gemstones you mentioned… Is it really true that black gemstones don’t occur here?” It was actually fairly curious, in Yuuri’s opinion. He’d tried to wrap his head around why that would be, but he was no geologist.
“Yes, this is true, Your Majesty. There are no true black gemstones in Shin Makoku,” Günter informed him. “Volcanic glass is available, but it is not considered to be precious, and some gemstones seem to be black at first glance, but are a different colour when held up to the light.”
“Eh… So, if there was a stone like that, it’d be really expensive, probably…” Yuuri mused. Günter nodded.
“If such a thing was found on Shin Makoku soil, it would immediately be sought out for His Majesty,” Günter assured him, and Yuuri laughed awkwardly.
“Well…I’m not so bothered by that, honestly… I guess I’m not too interested in that sort of thing…” Yuuri admitted sheepishly. Perhaps that wasn’t expected of a king, but true to form, Günter could spin anything into a positive trait.
“Of course! His Majesty is far above hedonism and material objects!” the advisor gushed, already stuck in his own delusional little daydream, it seemed. Whatever was running through his head, it would be going right in his diary. Yuuri had no doubt about that.
Thus, with another Günter-related trauma under his belt, Yuuri went on his merry way, as one does, and spent the next while planning what it was that he was going to do about this gift of his. It got to the point where he glazed over at his desk and Gwendal had to yell at him a few times.
Anyway… Chains.
Chains, despite being his initial idea, were becoming less of a priority, because as Yuuri found, Wolfram’s uniform wouldn’t accommodate such a thing, and there was a risk of them getting caught on something. Bummer. In addition to that, round brooches were both popular amongst nobles—particularly Wolfram who had so many of them in that style—and incredibly useful for keeping jabots out of the way, it seemed, which was evidently a pressing concern for Wolfram.
The moment Yuuri emerged from the bath and got a change of clothes a month or two later, he switched his computer on, and really, Shinou bless the internet. For a fairly cheap price, Yuuri found himself with an oval stone of black tourmaline, already perfectly cut for the job. It was semi-precious, but holding it up to the light to see nothing but a completely opaque black stone was enough to confirm to Yuuri that the purchase would be appreciated…and that it would probably skyrocket to ‘precious’ status the moment he went back, so that was probably fine, right…?
Yes, definitely, and as he said earlier, it was all about perspective. As such, after a day of rest to let his maryoku return to normal, Yuuri dropped the little velvet bag containing the stone into a waterproof plastic bag, tucked it securely into his pocket, and clutched it tightly the whole way to Shin Makoku, anyway, despite the pocket being zipped, anyway.
It had been an entire operation in and of itself to escape Wolfram’s hawk-like gaze and sneak out with his hidden guards in tow, just to see the jeweller in the castle town who generally handled all work for the Maou. Normally, the older gentleman would come to the castle, himself, but Yuuri couldn’t risk Wolfram finding out and asking why he would call a jeweller, obviously.
Even so, despite having dealt with royalty for the grand majority of his centuries-long career, suddenly finding the king standing in his little shop in a hooded cloak just before closing time seemed to nearly give him a heart attack. Yuuri did his best to smile gently, despite his nerves, and approached the elderly man at the counter.
“Good evening, sir,” Yuuri started, and as he saw the man pull himself up from the chair with great difficulty, his eyes hidden behind thick, droopy eyebrows, Yuuri held out a hand to stop him as he went to bow. “Don’t worry about that! I’m here on business. I’ll pay extra for your secrecy.”
“Y-yes, Your Majesty. Thank you… H-how may I aid you this fine evening…?” the man inquired curiously, stroking his long beard with a shaking hand.
“I require a bezel to be made for a brooch,” Yuuri told him, reaching into his pocket for the stone. “Something that would fit this.” The little velvet pouch emerged, and the stone dropped onto Yuuri’s hand.
The jeweller peered closely at it, and his tick eyebrows shot up into what should have been his hairline, had he had any hair. The stone evidently wasn’t helping in preventing this poor man from having a heart attack.
Thus, the process started, showing Yuuri bezel after bezel, from plain to ornate to Yuuri’s favourite, and he couldn’t help but point it out. “Would it be possible to integrate certain designs with this? The Bielefeld family’s winged lion, perhaps? Just there, maybe? Maybe with his initials on either side…”
The jeweller nodded avidly. “I wouldn’t have it any other way. You don’t require the stone to be resized?”
“No, the stone is about the size of what he regularly wears, anyway,” Yuuri mused, regarding the stone carefully.
“I imagine you’ll want to leave the back open so that its darkness can be seen… What about an engraving on the back, Your Majesty? A personal message, perhaps?” the elderly jeweller asked tentatively.
Yuuri was surprised. That hadn’t even thrown him for a loop. It was like he knew what he wanted from the beginning, so long had be planned this.
Two months of painstaking work on the quiet on the part of the jeweller, and many more on Yuuri’s part, had led to this point, and it was only now that Yuuri’s heart felt like it was about to leap out of his throat. Here, now that he was standing outside their bedroom door, an ornate wooden box from the jeweller clutched tightly in his hands.
Yuuri had a sneaking suspicion that he’d done something wrong with the design. That Wolf wouldn’t like it, or worse, that he’d only say he liked it for the sake of pleasing Yuuri, and then he’d wear it even though he wouldn’t want to… Heck, maybe the stone would even be troublesome for him…and yet, he walked in, anyway.
Yuuri’s breath hitched for just a moment. Wolfram was lingering by the desk in the corner of their room, his golden hair shimmering in the warm, bright lights of the lamps that illuminated their shared bedroom, and those beautiful eyes, green like the bottom of a lake, lit up as he entered, just happy to see him, and it literally took Yuuri’s breath away.
This is why he wanted to do this…
“Yuuri,” Wolfram greeted with that angelic smile of his, his gaze fixed purely on Yuuri’s face as he made his way closer. The box in Yuuri’s hands suddenly felt a little weightier, and…
This is a confession, isn’t it…? My poor heart…
“Did big brother keep you late again? I haven’t seen you all day.” Suddenly, Wolfram frowned slightly. “Actually, I haven’t seen much of you at all, lately. You’ve been kept busy, haven’t you?”
Well, the truth was, he had been busy with more than the box in his hands. “Part Gwendal, part Günter, actually,” Yuuri admitted. “When I’m not in the library studying, I’m in the office figuring out how I'm going to carry out my duties to Shinou at the festival next month, and appropriately accompany the dignitaries from Svelera, now that they’ve suddenly decided that they just have to visit…”
Wolfram winced. “They’re waiting for you to slip up… We’ll figure something out. I’ll pop in tomorrow to see if I can help out.”
Yuuri’s heart warmed. He didn’t think he deserved this man. “Thank you, and you’re right. We’ll sort it out, you’ll see.” Yuuri’s smile brightened as a thought occurred to him. “Hey, maybe I can cancel my lessons to devote more time to this.”
Wolfram snorted as he finally reached Yuuri’s side. “Actually, that’s not a bad idea. With a bit more time on your hands, we’ll manage.” Wolfram finally glanced down, inclining his head at the box. “What’s that?”
So, he’d noticed all this time… Yuuri’s heart, which had momentarily calmed, began to quicken again, and he felt heat rush to his cheeks that had nothing to do with the flames burning in the fireplace. His mouth dry from nerves, he swallowed and slowly raised his hands, holding the ornate box out to Wolfram, the gold leaf that accentuated the designs glowing beautifully in the light of the fire.
“It’s…for you,” Yuuri shakily admitted. “A-a gift, I mean, a-and that’s not weird or anything, because y-you’re…!” He was babbling and he was going to shut up…
…And besides, Wolfram looked pleasantly surprised, which was already a win in Yuuri’s books. In fact, he seemed to be downright breathless with happiness.
“For me? Yuuri, you don’t have to do this kind of thing,” was what he said, but the expression on his face told Yuuri that Wolfram was happily drinking up the attention, and Yuuri was glad of it, because he certainly didn’t give him enough of it. “How long have you been working on this? You really shouldn’t have!” Wolfram was positively beaming as he gently took the box in his hands.
“Y-yeah… This is something I’ve been working on for months…” Yuuri told him sheepishly, allowing Wolfram to take him by the arm and lead him to the bed, a process which felt like an eternity to Yuuri who just wanted him to open the box and scream at him about how it wasn’t right in some way, already.
They sat down on the soft bed, the springs soundlessly bending to accommodate their weight, and Wolfram shifted so that the shadows cast by the canopy of the bed didn’t obstruct his view.
“This box is from the royal jeweller, isn’t it? Did you commission this?” Wolfram asked curiously, his fingers hovering around the latch as he clearly drew the whole process out on purpose.
“Y-yeah…but if it’s not to your liking we can change it…or you don’t even have to…” Yuuri’s voice trailed off, and even he was aware of how depressed he probably looked. Wolfram’s gaze met his and those normally sharp eyes softened.
“If it’s something that you put this much hard work and effort into, I’ll love it,” Wolfram assured him, quickly adding, “and I’ll wear it with pride.”
Looking away again, slender fingers flipped the latch, and slowly, carefully, the lid was lifted. Wolfram’s smile softened further, a light blush dusting his cheeks. His obvious happiness aside, he looked almost amused by what he saw, and lifted it out of the box to examine it.
Yuuri waited with bated breath as Wolfram held the brooch up to the light. It was about the same size as the one he often wore to keep his jabot out of the way when he wasn’t using the chain. The black tourmaline, still in its original oval shape, was set into a bezel with a thin, understated border of delicate filigree, just enough to make it look a bit fancier, but not enough to make it seem feminine or over the top, in Yuuri’s opinion. At the top of the brooch, worked into the filigree, was a winged lion with the tail of a snake—the symbol of Wolfram’s family—and his initials worked in on either side, too small to see unless it was inspected closely.
“It’s beautiful,” Wolfram said, holding it up to the light to get a better look at the stone—no doubt to see what colour it really was when the light shone through it. Dark green or brown masquerading as black, he probably thought. “Thank you so mu-”
Wolfram blinked, a confused expression passing across his features, and peered closer at the stone, tilting it up and down in front of the light. His mouth opened, then shut, then opened again, and his eyebrows knitted together as he studied the brooch closely. Yuuri couldn’t help but think that he must have noticed how the light hadn’t passed though as he’d expected it, and he seemed to be trying desperately to comprehend exactly what he was seeing.
“I brought it from Earth. The stone, I mean,” Yuuri hurriedly told him, eager to just get whatever yelling was going to come his way over and done with. Wolfram turned to face him with a stunned expression. “It’s black. Properly black. Should be the only one of its kind, here.” Then, in a tiny voice, he added, “I hope that’s OK…”
The silence that ensued was almost painful as Wolfram just stared, lips parted, but not quite gaping in shock, although he may as well have been if the clear expression of shock was anything to go by. His eyes quickly glanced back at the brooch in his hands, though his head didn’t turn away from Yuuri, and then he looked back at his fiancé again.
“B-but, Yuuri…” came Wolfram’s quiet shaking voice, “C-can I even wear this?! It’s…black!”
“Well, I mean…” Yuuri’s voice was barely audible, and little more than a mumble. “I’d have thought that the only one who could wear such a thing other than myself…would be my fiancé…right…?”
Yuuri could see that Wolfram was already being swayed more than he’d probably like to admit, based on his face flushing deeply at that last embarrassing statement. His hand, still holding the brooch, was shaking slightly, and for a moment, Yuuri wondered if he really had gone too far with it.
“This is why you’ve been sneaking around and getting those silly jobs, isn’t it?” Wolfram finally asked, his voice quiet. “All of that…for me…?”
The words flowed out in Yuuri’s trembling voice before he could stop them. “If it was within my power, I…I’d do anything… I’d give you the world…”
Wolfram stared at Yuuri for a second, and miraculously, his whole countenance changed, returning to that haughty demeanour that Yuuri knew and loved so well, though the adorable blush remained in place. “Hmph. I don’t need the world. I just need my wimp.”
“Maybe you could wear it to balls or something…” Yuuri suggested offhandedly, rapidly seeking to dispel the embarrassment of the whole situation. “Then, nobody would be able to suggest that I don’t…”
Yuuri trailed off, the words abandoning him as always, and as usual, the implication alone seemed to be enough for his beautiful fiancé. Something about his smile changed—something that Yuuri couldn’t quite put his finger on—but he was clearly happy, and for that, Yuuri could only ever be thankful. It was partially up to him to keep Wolfram smiling as he always should, after all.
“Yes, I fully plan to do that,” Wolfram told him proudly, looking back at the brooch and closely inspecting the filigree with a great amount of fascination. His hands had stopped trembling, yet he still handled it as though it were some sort of great treasure. Yuuri supposed that it was, but at the same time, it wasn’t unlike the reverence that Wolfram seemed to hold for any object, big or small, expensive or cheap, that Yuuri gave him.
“Thank you,” Wolfram said sincerely, his eyes twinkling with joy. “This is the best gift you could have given me.”
Finished admiring the front, Wolfram absentmindedly turned it over in his hands and carefully regarded the bezel on the back, admiring how the gemstone could be seen from both sides, its authenticity easily provable. As he’d expected it would, Yuuri’s breath suddenly caught as Wolfram’s eyes locked onto the elegant letters on the back.
Perhaps the engraved message had been so quick to come to Yuuri because he was naturally a blunt person. Wolfram was the poetic one, and honestly, Yuuri felt by now that Wolfram didn’t expect him to wax poetic as often as he did inside his own head where nobody could hear his embarrassing thoughts…but really, what else could he have written that would make Wolfram smile as brightly as he was right now?
My heart belongs to you.