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Ness didn’t mean to keep you a secret from Kaiser. You were a creature of good luck, a blessing, something to be shared. Confirmation that the tales his grandmother told him as a little boy were indeed true. He always believed so.
Even when the other knights teased him for clinging to silly old superstitions. Even when Kaiser nodded disinterestedly on their daily walk to the training yard, focused more on the glint of his armor in the bright sun.
So when he spotted you in the castle gardens on that fateful afternoon, Ness couldn’t help but gasp, releasing a breath of air that had perhaps dwelled in him since he was a little boy.
Something light and irreplaceable bubbling in his chest as you danced from purple flower petals to his leather covered palm. Your little translucent wings shining like dewdrops, so delicate against the sharp metal encasing his fingertips.
Your soft, radiant skin adorned only with remnants of silken petals, your movements uncaring yet captivating as you placed your bare feet and legs upon his gauntlet, settling into his palm as if it was a perfect flower. Your smile warm and ethereal, eyes twinkling as you looked up at him, a sun shower upon his heart.
Ness had intended to only see you in the gardens. Thought he could be content with seeing your adoring face only in the soft spring sunlight, where you belonged.
But the castle was full of too much ambition and cruelty, his dreams soon turned to nightmares of your shimmering wings being so easily ripped away from your ethereal flesh. A mere trophy in the eyes of the undeserving, the vile. He had to protect you.
A flower pot next to his simple bed soon becoming your home. He had intended to tell Kaiser the first time, yet his fingers immediately closed around your body, clutching you to his chest when the blonde man entered into their shared quarters. A weak smile on his lips that Kaiser paid no mind to as he settled onto his own bed.
Guilt blooming in Ness’s stomach each and every time he hid you from Kaiser. Teeth worrying his bottom lip, words stuck in his throat as you clung to his thumb, a soft little kiss against his calloused skin a soothing balm.
His hands trembling, twitching to take hold of the dagger strapped to his side when he walked into the room to see Kaiser looking down on that little pot of daisies he had picked for you.
You were nestled amongst the white petals, looking up at Kaiser curiously. His blue eyes narrowed and haughty. Ness’s throat clenched, gentle smile turned to something sharp and ugly as he quickly approached his side of the room.
“These are unbecoming, Ness.”
An irritated scoff before leaving the room.
Ness’s fingers curling around you yet again, keeping you against his trembling bare palm. That strange, guilty feeling that had bubbled in his stomach the first time he hid you from Kaiser vanished.
The corners of his lips twitching into something deeper than his usual mild smile, not quite as pure as your radiant beam yet still lovely.
You were only for him.