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There’s a soft, barely-there pattering of footsteps outside their door. It’s nervous, rapid, uneven in its uncertainty — tap, tap-tap-tap, tap-tap, tap, tap-tap… — and it’s honestly starting to drive Tolys crazy. He’s trying to finish going through some documents, some letters upon letters working out the terms of a proper union between him and Feliks, and he knows it’s important, he knows , he insisted on revising everything several times over himself–
But he really would prefer to fall into his bed, cocoon himself in soft sheets, and curl up against Feliks’s warm body than slouch over a desk, a half-used-up candle shedding light on words that had been blurring together for the past few hours.
Back to the point, the tap-tap-tapping outside the door is not helping in any way, shape, or form. On the contrary, it keeps drawing Tolys’s attention away from his papers, being the only sound in the otherwise still night. It’s only made worse by the fact that Tolys knows exactly who the cause of the noise is and he really doesn’t have the patience for the demon child tonight.
“Is that Gilbert outside?” a soft, sleepy voice murmurs and something hot bursts in Tolys, if just for a moment — the demon child woke Feliks, somehow. Tolys turns and lets out a small sigh, trying to relax his shoulders. Feliks had propped himself up on one elbow, his free hand rubbing at his eyes. His blond hair is mussed and tousled and he’d certainly have some sort of fit if he were to see it, but Tolys finds it rather endearing — Poland, such a fearsome warrior and powerful kingdom, looking like a newborn calf swaddled in blankets and drowning in pillows.
“Tolys?” He blinks, remembering the question, and furrows his eyebrows slightly with a curt nod. The demon child hadn’t been hanging by the door for very long, but long enough that he should’ve gotten fed up and left — it’s how he’d been acting over the few weeks since he’d started living at the castle, and Tolys has no idea what had possessed him even more than he already is to suddenly gain patience.
He frowns when Feliks kicks back the covers and slides off the bed, running his hands through his hair and down his nightgown to make them lay properly. He shivers when the duvets fall away from him but he hugs himself and steps over to the door. Tolys suppresses a groan at the creak of it opening.
“What are you doing here so late, Gilbert?” Feliks asks in Latin because the demon child has only recently started learning Polish, peeking through the opening he had made. Tolys can see the tiniest bit of light from his candle slip outside, and he briefly wonders how Gilbert found his way through the darkness of the castle without a light of his own.
The demon child murmurs something too quiet for Tolys to hear, but Feliks nods his head slowly and pushes the door open further, enough for the boy to step through. His white hair is tangled, and his red eyes are bloodshot with heavy bruising underneath them. He’s chewing on his lip and twisting his fists in the fabric of his nightshirt and he’s staring at the ground and Tolys is conflicted — this is the demon child ( he is no more a demon than Feliks or Tolys himself, but that is what people call him anyway ), the one he and his people have fought countless times because the boy thinks himself to be above others… but he is a child nonetheless, one born and raised in war and bloodshed much like any other of Them, and Tolys remembers being so young and sleep eluding him because there were wounds on his body and dark thoughts in his mind. He looks closer and– yes, there is still a wad of bandages on his side, barely concealed by loose fabric, and his knees tremble slightly.
Feliks puts a hand on Gilbert’s shoulder and the boy flinches just a bit, but allows himself to be guided to the bed and climbs on it with only a trace of a pained grimace. He sidles over to the middle of the bed on his hands and knees, nearly drowning in the soft bedding. Tolys watches the boy fumble for a moment before turning to Feliks with a raised brow. His partner smiles shamelessly and tilts his head towards the bed, sitting down on its edge, and Tolys shakes his head with a small chuckle before putting out his candle and getting up, stretching with soft pops of his joints. Documents could wait until morning.
He drops onto the bed, eliciting a small squeak from Gilbert as he falls face-forward into a pillow, but the boy quickly composes himself and finds his footing again. Feliks is already snug under the covers, lifting them up to invite him in, and the demon child dives under, hugging a piece of a blanket to his chest. Tolys slips under right after and the boy is now curled into a ball between Feliks and him and Tolys quietly mourns the distance from his partner but Gilbert is already looking more comfortable with half-lidded eyes and sinking into the bedding so he lets it go.
Feliks moves closer and starts running his hands through his silver hair, gently untangling it, careful to not tug too much and Gilbert sighs quietly. Tolys simply buries his face in the sheets, drowsiness cocooning him in a warm blanket of its own and dragging down his heavy eyelids.
He’s gone by the time Feliks’s voice permeates the night’s silence in a soft lullaby about a white knight’s escapades.
Feliks is just about done with everything, but especially with Russia and Prussia and Germany and Austria. France and England are rather high on his “Never Want To See Again” list as well. He believes he’s perfectly justified in his hatred — he gets his independence back after over a century and then, only three decades later, he’s traded back into the hands of one of his worst enemies like a piece of meat without even as much as a heads-up or apology.
Snip snip .
He secures the fresh bandage around his left forearm, biting his lip when he tugs a bit too aggressively. A spot of red is already seeping through the gauze, despite his best efforts to layer white on white so much the blood would never become visible. Though, he supposes the cut is deep, almost enough to be able to look right through it to the other side.
He grits his teeth and pulls the wrapping tighter.
This is the last wound he thinks is worth redressing this night. There is a large burn on his right hip, his soles are a mess of cuts and blisters, and a hole in the back of his neck is seeping with blood, but he had already cared for those in the morning, and he hopes to make his supplies last longer if possible, so he leaves them be. He will focus on those injuries the next sunrise, just as he will turn back to his forearm and chest and back in the evening, and he will rinse and repeat until he is rebuilt and they become just another addition to his collection of rough, bumpy scar tissue.
He rolls up the leftover bandages and lays them in his medkit, next to the near-empty bottle of antisceptic that he knows won’t be enough for a proper disinfection in the morning. He wonders if Erzsi will be willing to share some supplies — God knows she’s the only one that might even consider giving him something of her own without laughing in his face for asking.
He snaps the box closed with more force than necessary.
His feet burn as he moves to put away the medkit and his steps are quick and light to minimize the knives cutting them. The wooden cane he had been grudgingly provided with is a near-blessing but it doesn’t stop the shaking of his body, the missed and stumbled steps as he uses any support possible to carefully limp out of the bathroom and to his bedroom. At the very least, his feet aren’t bound in the leather shoes he has to wear whenever he leaves the hall.
There aren't many things that can make him leave the hall.
He pushes open the door to the bedroom he's been given and hobbles over to the bed. It's not nice by any means, something he wouldn't have even looked at two centuries ago with its beige sheets and lonely pillow, but these days, it looks like a bed made of clouds, like what one would sleep on in Heaven. He chuckles humorlessly at how his standards have dropped over the years and wonders if the others feel the same.
The bed is cold and he loves and hates it at the same time. It's lonely ( he drove Tolys away with his greed ) and it's depressing but easier on his body, somehow soothing in its solitude. He certainly doesn't want anyone to see him like this if he can help it, after all. He can't afford to show weakness, no matter how much he yearns for a comforting voice.
Tap, tap-tap-tap, tap-tap, tap, tap-tap…
He stills and his heart shudders in his chest because he recognizes the pattern of footsteps, though he hasn't heard it in… how long? Four centuries? It's heavier now, with more weight behind it, but familiar nonetheless. He never expected to hear it by his door ever again.
Memories of stifled sobs and comforting whispers play in his mind's eyes, reaching for the small pocket of softness hidden deep inside him, covered in obsidian walls and steel locks.
He pushes the imaginary vault deeper inside, shrouds it in shadows, and crushes the thoughts that try to chase it as his blood burns brighter, hotter. The demon child doesn't deserve his kindness.
And yet, he makes no move to continue getting ready for sleep, frozen sitting on the edge of his bed, staring at the door. He tightens his grasp on his cane until his knuckles turn white and furrows his brows deeply, mouth curling downwards and eyes narrowing in that cat-like way Tolys always chuckled at.
The tapping stops, turning into the soft squeaks of a shoe sole twisting into the floor. There's a small, bitter chuckle, and Feliks finally hops back up onto his feet. The sounds outside stop as he moves towards the door, the heavy tapping of his cane and suppressed wheezes of his breath the only things permeating the air. He stops by the door, shifting his weight to his toes and walking stick, leaning some on the wall. He curls his fingers around the handle, takes a deep breath, smoothing out his face as best as he can, and presses down, the door opening with a soft click .
Green eyes meet red and one pair is narrowed, cold in a way that's simultaneously the opposite but the exact same as the burning under his skin, while the other is wide, the expression of a child caught with a hand in the cookie jar — or, in his experience, a foot in a stirrup.
Prussia looks… not well , but not necessarily bad , either. He's fairly clean, hair and skin as white as paper — his hair's not quite the silver it used to be, more matted and dishevelled, but it's still better than Feliks expected from someone he remembers having to wrangle into baths by force. His night clothes are wrinkled, and it looks like he had played with the edge seams too much and worn some of the fabric down, but there is no blood staining them, no large bump of bandages under them, so he doesn't seem to be in too bad of a state. He's a bit unsteady on his feet though, with large bruising under his eyes, so mostly, he just looks tired , as though he hasn't slept in days.
Maybe he hasn't. Feliks can't say his own sleep has been very restful, lately. There is a stab of concern and sympathy in his heart that he squashes down with vengeance.
"What the hell do you want?" he bites out in Polish because there is a furious prickling in the back of his head and needles in his wounds and weights on his eyelids, and that is all far too much for him to even think about picking out the corresponding words in English or Latin or any other language he shares with Prussia that doesn't turn his tongue into lead.
Prussia gapes a few seconds, lips slightly parted and eyes blinking slowly, gaze raking up and down over Feliks's body.
Right. They haven't seen each other since the albino's trial, and he had been far too focused on his sentence to pay attention to the frail Nation grinning like a madman at the punishment finally being served.
"You done ogling? We're not in a museum," Feliks griped, leaning his left shoulder on the doorframe to cross his arm over his chest, cautious of his forearm. Prussia snaps his mouth closed, straightening up and pulling down his shirt to neaten it. Feliks raises his brow, and says, voice hard: "Do I have to ask again? The fuck do you want to be coming to my room in the middle of the fucking night?"
Prussia shifts his weight from one foot to the other and cracks his knuckles once, twice, before he stops at Feliks's glare. He's deliberately looking anywhere but the blond's face, red eyes darting around here and there. Feliks wants to tap his foot impatiently but settles for drumming his fingers on the head of his cane.
Finally, Prussia glares at the floor, crossing his arms and hunching his shoulders, ducking his head slightly; defensive, Feliks notes, which he hasn't seen in the other since they'd lived together. The albino grumbles something unintelligible under his breath and the only thing keeping Feliks from smacking him with his cane is the fact that he needs it to stand.
"You'll have to speak up," he snaps because he would really prefer to be in bed right now rather than deal with the demon child. Prussia raises his glare at him for half a second before dropping it again, scuffing the floor with his shoe.
"I can't… I can't sleep, okay?" he spits, Latin words drenched in venom. "I haven't really slept since coming here."
This feels like a cruelly twisted caricature of the past. It wasn't entirely uncommon, back then, when they were younger and still got along, for Prussia, annoying but adorable little Prussia, to crawl into Feliks and Tolys's bed whining about bloody nightmares and cruel humans and healing wounds. But that was long gone, having come to an end about half a century after they started living together, and now it's just a collection of tear-stained, infuriating memories Feliks buried deep, deep inside him.
And tonight, Prussia stands before him in much the same way except not. He's taller than Feliks, for one, having somewhat caught up in physical age by the time he had been allowed to leave Poland again. His glare is filled with a proper fire, when, as a child, it was more of an annoyance or bitterness. Feliks's own expression is twisted this time as well, as opposed to the softness he had used in these situations in the past. And, of course, most importantly — neither of them has power here, neither of them has proper control, which Feliks deigns to push to the back of his mind because the headache that thought alone gives him rings with wrong wrong wrong and he knows , but he's in enough pain already.
Feliks scoffs, baring his teeth. By the way Prussia blanches for a split moment, he can guess they're still speckled with blood leftover from a coughing fit he had had earlier today.
"And that's my problem how , exactly? We're not kids anymore." They haven't been in a long time, if ever. But the point is — Prussia has no business coming to his room if he can't sleep unless he's looking for a fight to release some stress but, loathe as he is to say it, Feliks is in no condition to be fighting, which the albino must've realized the moment he opened the door. There is no good reason for the demon child to still be standing before him.
Prussia purses his lips, runs a hand through his hair — Feliks blinks at the crimson left on his fingers. Seems the other man has some sort of wound on the back of his head, currently hidden from Feliks's view. He's not particularly surprised, though he wonders why there don't appear to be any bandages, as far as he can see.
Finally, Prussia pinches the bridge of his nose with a world-weary sigh as though it was Feliks who decided to knock on his door in the middle of the night.
"You're right," he grits out. "I don't know why– this is stupid. Don't know why I thought coming to you would be a good fucking idea. Guess I really am losing my mind."
"Sure seems like it," Feliks agrees sweetly with a nod, earning himself a scowl that he returns with vengeance. He huffs and shakes his head before speaking again, every word poison on his tongue: "Now, since we established what an idiot you are, I'd like to get ready for bed, so off you go, Diable Krzyżacki ."
And oh, isn't this interesting ? Did Prussia, oh so powerful and unflappable Prussia just… flinch , at an insult from the old days? He almost took a step back before catching himself! Feliks lets his eyes trail downwards and yes, the albino's hands are shaking, just ever-so-slightly, unnoticeable unless one looks for it. He would've thought the other has long since moved on from this, considering the taunts of demon spawn and Hell born and other such wordings follow him just about wherever he goes.
Perhaps it's just the fact that Feliks had never partaken in hurling those types of insults at him before. If such words did come out of his mouth, they were usually laced with affection and teasing — he prides himself on using much more creative insults than a lie born of human fear. In fact, when Prussia was still Gilbert to him, he'd often enough end up comforting the boy about humans tossing the taunts around and at him.
Feliks hasn't wondered about how Prussia sees him, one who's rubbed his back through nightmares and dressed his wounds for enough time for it to become habit, but who's been on the opposite side for even more, in a long time.
"Did I touch a nerve?" he calls out after a few seconds too many of silence. Prussia growls, curses him out in German that slides off of Feliks as easily as water ( he's become master at ignoring words in languages he hates ), and turns, stomping away — not loud enough to carry, but enough to send the message.
Feliks slams his door in much the same way. He doesn't have the time or energy for demon children these days and he never should have.