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The tent was silent and still – too silent and too still, for the man it contained. Ferdinand von Aegir had been neither still nor silent a day in his life. So likely that was what was so strange about the whole thing.
That and the stink of blood that hung heavy in the air.
The lack of chatter and motion and the thick, acrid stench of blood.
Hubert hadn’t moved in several long minutes, sitting on the ground with his back against the tent pole, facing the cot upon which Ferdinand lay. He’d been counting heartbeats – his own, of course, his knees drawn to his chest, wrists against his knees, fingers hanging limp. His heart beat slowly, evenly – not like on the field, out there, turning with his vision smeared ink-black with magic just in time to see the arc of scarlet blood curve through the air, impossibly vibrant against the smoke and the trees and the noise. There his heart had nearly burst in its panic, skittering rabbit-like against his ribcage. It had shown itself, messy and alive and so very desperate, in his magic. Where Hubert had been stationed there now was nothing but a smoldering crater, the trees incinerated with a burst of raw power that had burned them to bits.
His was not the only heartbeat in the room but to count Ferdinand’s would drive him to madness.
And so he sat. He sat and he waited and he thought, turning the details of the past several hours over and over again in his head while he swallowed against the taste of ash and blood that still lingered in his mouth. His gloves were sticky with it, with Ferdinand’s blood of all things. He should take them off. But if he did and the blood – there had been so much of it, you see – had seeped through the fabric and stained his skin and Hubert had to see what Ferdinand’s blood looked like on his fingers, he’d—
The gloves stayed on and Hubert sat and looked at them and breathed in Ferdinand’s blood with every beat of his own wretched heart.
The battlefield was a terrible place for an epiphany. Though, Dorothea might say that this had been a long time coming, and she’d be right. She was often right, despite the clever way she tended to misdirect everyone’s perceptions. She’d be a talented spy. Perhaps Hubert should speak to her about a potential future with—
He lifted his eyes, hesitant, seeking out the motion of Ferdinand’s chest. He watched carefully, three very long seconds in which his brain convinced him he was seeing nothing—
But no, no, there it was, the steady lift and fall of Ferdinand’s chest. Breathing. He was breathing.
Of course he was breathing – Lindhart had been there, summoned by a hoarse shout from Hubert himself, appearing out of the smoke with terror in his normally sleep-warm eyes. He’d flung himself into the mud right there at Ferdinand’s side and Hubert had nearly separated Lindhart’s hand from his arm when he’d shoved Hubert back away from Ferdinand’s side.
Shameful. Disgraceful. H e’d nearly cost Ferdinand the best white mage on the entire continent because he’d let his emotions take over his sensibilities.
But who could blame him, with Ferdinand’s head already tipped back, mud in those long, impractical waves of hair, his eyes dim. Certainly not the rest of the Strike Force – Lady Edelgard had been at Hubert’s side in an instant, her expression stricken, and Hubert was forcibly reminded of mere months earlier, when he’d casually and sardonically brought up the possibility of eliminating Ferdinand from the chess board all together , convinced he’d be nothing but a thorn in their sides when the ir plans all finally came together. She’d rolled her eyes at him then, told him that she couldn’t afford the political blow back and that his jokes were not nearly as funny as he thought they were.
I t hadn’t quite been a joke, back then.
Fast forward a year or two and Hubert and his Emperor stood shoulder to shoulder on a battlefield, watching Lindhart force Ferdinand back to the light, feeling abruptly wrong-footed, off-kilter, as if they’d had a limb severed off that they hadn’t even realized properly they’d possessed.
So many instances in which a single decision might have separated Ferdinand and Hubert from each other forever. Were Hubert to believe in the goddess, he might say that this was clear evidence of her hand guiding their destinies. For so long Hubert had imagined his place only half a step behind Lady Edelgard – he’d never, not once, not even in the dreams that Bernadetta would be horrified to learn that he did indeed still have did Hubert imagine that there might be someone else there along with him, matching him stride for stride. A mirror image, a twin reflected across the boundary. Light and dark, day and night, and gods damn it all, if the blasted man would only wake .
If he would only wake so that Hubert could explain to him everything he’d realized as he’d watched Ferdinand fall.
It would no doubt be an abysmal conversation. Ferdinand loved everyone and everything with the ferocity of his entire being, that to try and carve out the biggest piece for himself would be ludicrous. Laughable, even. Especially for Hubert, who shied away from the sun, to hesitantly step into its light alongside so many others.
And there were others – there wasn’t a soldier in the army who hadn’t let their eyes linger a bit too long on General von Aegir.
And yet…
And yet hope stung, hard, in the swollen hollow of Hubert’s throat, because while Ferdinand was polite and cheerful to all, while he remembered birthdays and anniversaries and favorite flavors of everything from tea to hard candies, it was Hubert that Ferdinand came back to at the end of the day. It was Hubert’s tent that Ferdinand had fallen asleep in more than once, talking strategy late into the night, his boots removed and his jacket slung over the back of a chair. It was Hubert that Ferdinand sought out at mealtimes, still splattered with muck from walking the camp perimeter, offering Hubert a mug of hot coffee with a mischievous smile on his face.
Won it off a few of the men in a quick game of cards, he’d said and honestly, it was a bit ridiculous that it had taken the sight of Ferdinand’s blood to squeeze Hubert’s heart dry with the cold epiphany’s truth when he’d nearly kissed him right then and there all over a mug of coffee.
Thank you , Hubert remembered saying, earnest honesty on his lips like the sweet sting of poison and Ferdinand’s answering smile could have powered their camp for days. It had certainly bolstered Hubert himself, who’d carried that smile with him like something precious, taking it out to examine it when he had a private moment as though he could burn its details into the inside of his skull.
Hubert let out a shuddering breath and stood, pushing himself up to his feet. The few steps from his position to the edge of the cot was an impossible expanse, but cross it Hubert did, standing over Ferdinand, still too still, too silent, too pale beneath the thin medical blanket. His bandages were still clean – the bleeding had stopped, finally. Ferdinand’s eyes moved restlessly behind his eyelids. Hubert had been told that that was a good sign.
There were hundreds of tasks to be completed. Hubert couldn’t let his guard down for a single moment.
And yet.
He reached out, remembered at the last second his gloves were still covered in blood and let his hand fall before he made contact with Ferdinand’s hand. Ferdinand’s hands, which were bare, his fingers rough with equestrian’s callouses, fingernails short and clean. He imagined those hands reaching for him – curling around his own magic-blackened skin, or perhaps warm and heavy on the back of his neck. Perhaps a comforting presence at his hip. Perhaps against his cheek, just moments before he—
Hubert had never been in love before. Was this how it was supposed to go?
Behind him, the flap to the tent rustled.
“How is he?” Lady Edelgard’s voice was quiet, somber. She came to stand beside him, just close enough to brush his arm as Hubert straightened, standing at the attention that his Emperor deserved.
“He remains unconscious,” Hubert said. He hadn’t spoken for a few hours – his words felt swollen and fat on his tongue. “Yet I’m told that Lindhart declared him stable before Caspar dragged him off to rest.”
“Good,” Lady Edelgard breathed. They stood there for a long moment, looking down at Ferdinand.
“We nearly lost him today,” his Emperor said finally and Hubert closed his eyes.
“We did,” he replied.
Another long stretch of silence. She reached for him, taking his hand in hers. Hubert recoiled, horrified.
“My Lady, no, my gloves, they’re still—”
“His blood is on my hands too, Hubert,” Edelgard said, her voice fire-tempered steel.
So even here, he had failed – his entire job as her blade in the night was to keep that very thing from happening. Soak in the blood so that her hands remained clean. He’d failed not only Ferdinand but Lady Edelgard as well.
“Stop that,” Edelgard said, squeezing his hand. Hubert clenched his jaw, but did not protest.
They stood there together, looking down at the cot, neither one of them speaking.
“I didn’t realize it would—” Edelgard broke off, frowning slightly. “That it would be so...”
“Nor did I,” Hubert said, very softly, when she did not continue.
Edelgard considered Ferdinand. “Perhaps we should tell him that,” she said. “When he wakes.”
Hubert opened his eyes, following Edelgard’s gaze to Ferdinand’s still face.
“Perhaps we should,” he agreed. “When he wakes.”
“When he wakes.”
Edelgard didn’t move away. Neither did Hubert, decision made, consequences be damned.
The conversation would happen. If anyone deserved to know how much he was cherished, it was Ferdinand von Aegir.
Now all there was for it was for Ferdinand to wake.