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When Hubert’s knock comes at the dressing room door, the place is nearly empty. Most of the lamps have been extinguished, and the one Dorothea’s kept lit is low. The vanities and costume stands cast looming shadows that dance in the flicker of light. Dorothea finishes hanging up the dress in her arms before calling out, “come in!”
She knows it’s him, of course. Even if they hadn’t established half-a-dozen standard knocking patterns between them, she’d know it. The quality of his entrance, his gait, have become familiar to her by now. And who else would steal by this late in the night?
He slips into the room, closing the door noiselessly behind him. He’s still dressed in the attire he’d worn to the performance earlier in the evening, and Dorothea lets her gaze linger over him appreciatively. Hubert does clean up nicely when he bothers, despite all his protestations to the contrary. Dorothea, selfish as always, doesn’t hesitate to enjoy the rare sight to its fullest.
“I didn’t realize you were still working,” he says, in lieu of greeting.
“It’s the rush of performing. Might as well get ready for the next show while I’ve still got energy to spare.” She clears some stacks of paper off of an armchair, then tilts her head towards Hubert. When he doesn’t take her up on her silent offer, she sprawls in it herself, arranging her skirts so that she can drape her legs over the side.
Hubert glances around the dim room, probably coming to some judgmental conclusions about the mess that still abounds. Wisely, he doesn’t voice any of them. “I see I’ve been remiss in not bringing you flowers,” he says instead, nodding towards one of the vanities over Dorothea’s shoulder.
Dorothea doesn’t bother looking — she knows exactly how many bouquets are piled on the table surface, and she’s dreading dealing with them. She sighs instead, leans back and raises a dramatic wrist to her forehead. “Don’t even joke about that, Hubie.”
“Then I’ll get to the point. Is what I witnessed tonight truly finished?”
She frowns. Then drops her hand back into her lap to get a better look at him. “Sorry?”
Hubert arches an eyebrow, as if he’s not the one being obtuse. “Your opera.” Dorothea stares, the general cheer from a job well done having evaporated in an instant. As always when it comes to her, Hubert ignores the warning signs. “I am aware that I was not deeply involved in the production of it, but I must admit to some bewilderment regarding the final product.”
It’s not that Dorothea is bad at receiving critique. Despite the stereotypes, it would be impossible to survive as a diva without a certain willingness to improve one’s own flaws. Yet somehow, tonight is different. Hearing this sort of thing from Hubert, of all people, feels a bit like her heart is being ripped out of her chest. What little skill she can muster up, whatever self she possesses, she’s used it all in service of Edelgard’s vision. How can he, of all people, question that?
Frustration bubbles up before anything else, her voice clipped when she speaks. “I’m sorry, was it not up to par? Do you truly think that people will come away from it thinking worse of Edie?”
Unfortunately, Hubert is never bothered by her tone. It’s a horrible personality trait. “I didn’t say I disliked it.”
“You haven’t said you liked it either,” Dorothea snipes back.
There is silence for a moment. Hubert has looked away, and in the low light, Dorothea can’t quite make out his expression. She’d lean forward, but she refuses to give him the satisfaction.
His words come stilted, chosen carefully. “The work was less truthful than I thought it would be.”
It surprises a laugh out of her — more like a scoff. “Have you accosted me in the middle of the night so that I can teach you the definition of propaganda, Hubie? Of course it’s not truthful. A good story never is.”
“I can hardly be accused of accosting you when you allowed me entrance,” he responds, his tone still oddly monotone. “As for a story, I was unaware that telling a good one would involve taking liberties with my relationship with Lady Edelgard.”
When the penny drops, Dorothea can’t stop herself from scoffing again, this time louder. “Is that what this is about?” She looks away, wishing she had something in her hands to fiddle with. “I’m fully aware that you and Edie have the most complicated, most special, most unromantic relationship in the world, but there wasn’t quite time to fit it all in the script. My sincerest apologies. If you don’t want me to write you into a love story, next time don’t behave so abhorrently that only a love story could salvage your character arc.”
In the quiet of the room, Hubert’s exhale is audible. Tight. Frustrated, maybe? She can’t tell for certain. “None of that was my concern. I was… worried. I was unsure whether you were just telling a story, or if you truly believed there was something there.”
“You’ve called me an idiot enough times for daring to think there’s anything romantic between you two. A girl can take a hint.” Perhaps it’s uncharitable — Hubert has certainly never actually said she’s an idiot to her face — but she knows how to read between the Vestra lines. Speaking of which, she furrows her brow. “What do you mean, you were worried?”
Hubert ignores her question and strides closer to the chair she’s in. The lamp light reaches his face now, and from below, it makes him look ghostly. “Why did you write yourself out of your own opera?”
“Good goddess, Hubie. It’s sweet when Edie gets in these horribly sentimental moods, but it just makes you look stupid.” Hubert doesn’t have enough of an ego to react to the barb, but Dorothea rolls her eyes anyway, for the full effect. “I have a good enough reputation. I don’t need an opera to ensure it. And in the interest of being quite honest, it was rather easy to write myself out. I was hardly a major player.”
“Is that so?” Hubert’s lips curl up at the ends, but he’s obviously unamused. “I’ve watched you lead an army into battle. I’ve seen what your magic can do. That isn’t easy to forget.”
It’s maddening, the way he’s refusing to understand this. Despite it all, Dorothea doesn’t actually think he’s stupid. Why can’t he see what she does?” “The public didn’t see any of that. And the public doesn’t need to know any of that happened. There’s nothing about me that’ll make them love Edie more, and that’s supposed to be the point of all of this. Isn’t it?”
“Dorothea.” His hand flexes and releases by his side. “I’ve never had a desire to be in the public eye, and you are a celebrity. I would think that our roles would’ve been reversed. I’m just trying to understand.”
“I didn’t care what they thought of me, okay?” Dorothea snaps, finally. “I don’t care. I don’t need it. But I need them to love you. Because once they do, they’ll follow Edie to the end of the earth too.”
The words hang in the air between them. Somehow, despite this all being in the abstract, Dorothea feels horribly vulnerable. She’s shown far too much of her hand. Her next breath comes out with a little shudder. “Goddess, I wish you’d just bought me flowers.”
Hubert shuts his mouth, his expression pinched. After a long moment where he’s clearly trying to figure out how to respond, he murmurs, “I shall keep that in mind for next time.”
There’s not a trace of irony in the sentence. That’s enough to send a trickle of guilt down Dorothea’s spine. With a sigh, she shakes her head. “No, don’t. I didn’t mean that.” She swings her legs down to sit in the chair properly and closes her eyes. “I know you and Edie aren’t in love, but it makes such a good story if you are. Or, at least, if you’re in love with her. People can be convinced to support anything if love is the motivation.”
All this is merely justification, if she’s really being honest about it. At the end of the day, it had been a selfish choice. Being kissed, held, worshipped every night. Oh, of course it wasn’t real -- Dorothea knew that better than anybody else. But that only bittered the sweetness by a little, and so she enjoyed it anyway. She could close her eyes and imagine sometimes that it was really Hubert holding her. That she was the one who had stolen Hubert’s heart, the one that Hubert would keep for the rest of their lives. It was a dangerous indulgence, which is why she’d kept it so close to her chest. To admit it would mean having to put a stop to it.
“I don’t think you should rewrite the script. That was not my intention in broaching this topic.”
Dorothea’s eyes flutter open, and Hubert is still standing next to her. Is he even closer than before? She can’t recall. One of his arms is held halfway between them, like he’d been reaching for her — she blinks, and he returns it to his side.
“Good, because I wasn’t going to.”
This time, when Hubert smiles, there’s some humor to it. “As you said, it’s a good story. I would not dream of arguing that point. I was surprised by my outsized role, but if you feel so strongly about it, I can no longer deem it disproportionate.” The candle in the lamp has burned low, or perhaps Hubert has shifted his weight. Something about the play of light over his face seems softer now. “My other point still stands. You were missed.”
Dorothea knows he’s made her blush and turns away, hoping that the darkness will play to her favor. “I can’t imagine why. I was on stage nearly the whole night.”
“You know what I mean.”
He delivers the line with such a deadpan that she can’t help laughing out loud. “You’re far too blunt, Hubie. Hasn’t anyone ever told you that’s going to get you in trouble one day?”
“I’m not sure I could have ever expected a trouble-free life,” Hubert responds pleasantly. “I certainly have no recollection of desiring one.” With that, he offers her one gloved hand, held at the perfect height. “May I escort you home?”
“I was in the middle of something when you came in, you know.” She knows it weakens her retort to take his hand and get to her feet, but she finds herself standing by him anyway.
“It did seem that way,” he agrees, and the way he turns to the door makes it clear that there’s nothing more to be said on the topic.
From the moment she falls in step with him, Dorothea knows she’ll be too greedy to resist his company. She tells herself it’s guilt over snapping at him, over assuming the worst. That’s why she lingers at her door, tilts her head in invitation, feels a swell of something when he walks into her small apartment. But the feeling that washes over her is more than just relief — she can’t not know that, no matter how much she tries to pretend.
But anyone would admit she pretends marvelously. Her hands don’t even tremble when she pours him a glass of whiskey and invites him to sit. And she doesn’t light up too obviously when he acquiesces.
“Do you want to know a real reason I decided to write myself out?” She’s aware she might not share this if she were completely sober. But she’s warm, and it feels nice to sit here, and as long as she keeps talking, the night feels like it might not end. The avarice doesn’t taste so bad when tempered by smooth rye.
“You’re well aware that I’m at a loss,” Hubert says, setting his cold glass carefully on a coaster, as if any of the furniture in this little apartment is worth protecting. “Are you going to share a secret of yours, Dorothea?”
It would take someone much stronger, much smarter, to resist being asked in that tone. Dorothea leans forward conspiratorially over the makeshift coffee table. “It was too strange! I couldn’t bear to write lines for myself, let alone actually watching someone play as me. It makes me shiver just thinking about it.”
“Ah, I see.” The sarcasm radiates from him in waves. Dorothea hides her grin behind her glass. “As opposed to the rest of us who enjoyed the show in blissful comfort, I suppose.”
“Oh, that’s your own fault for coming,” Dorothea says, leaning back in her chair with a flippant wave of one hand. “I tried to save you. Why do you think you didn’t get an invite?”
“I appreciate your concern. A more unambiguous warning might serve you better next time.”
“The kid who played you has been worried for months that you’re going to assassinate him over the portrayal. Should I give him the bad news?”
When Hubert gets tipsy, it’s only revealed in the little things. His facial expression skew slightly more dramatic — now, Dorothea can see it in the way he wrinkles his nose. “Don’t be ridiculous. Both he and the source material served their purpose. The strangeness would be constant whoever took the role on. After all, it— ah, never mind.”
“After all?” Dorothea leans forward, eyes wide. “Come on, Hubie, you can tell me anything. I’m your dearest friend, aren’t I?”
Hubert looks at her, one hand at his chin, nearly covering his mouth. Whatever calculation he does in his head, it must come out in Dorothea’s favor. “A certain amount of my discomfort — an amount that was not insignificant — stemmed from envy.”
Dorothea blinks. When she connects the dots, it hurts, everything in her clenching tight. But she knows how to handle this. Knows how to drag a smile onto her face no matter what’s going on underneath. “I knew it!” she coos, setting her whiskey down so she can clasp her hands together. “Oh, I knew it.”
“You knew?” She’d never thought Hubert’s face could light up before now. But that’s the only way to describe his expression now. Tentative, almost eager. “I suppose I’ve been obvious.”
“Oh, please. You’ve been obvious for years. You’re so annoying.” Dorothea gets to her feet, takes both of their glasses so that she can refill them at the table. It gives her something to do with her hands, a reason to turn her back on a face she doesn’t want to resent. “Does she know?”
“... what?”
Dorothea frowns to herself as she pours. “Edie, does she know?”
“Know what?”
If he didn’t sound so genuinely confused, she’d snap at him. As it is, she turns back to him, her brow still furrowed. “That you love her, of course. Isn’t that what we’re talking about?”
Hubert has gotten to his feet, his face completely devoid of the emotion it had shown earlier. “Dorothea,” he starts, and his tone alone implies that she’s missed something, that she’s being ridiculous.
A lick of irritation flashes through her and she latches onto it. Anything other than the widening chasm of sorrow forming in her gut. “Hubert!” she responds in kind, lifting her chin. “You just told me you were jealous of your on-stage counterpart.”
“And why would that be?” Hubert asks, quiet but no less intense.
“Because you’d like to kiss Edie, of course.” It hurts to say it out loud. But Hubert’s face is unreadable, even as he refuses to break eye contact. It’s not often that Dorothea can’t get a handle on him these days, and she hates that one of those rare moments is happening now. What could he possibly be upset about? There’s no other explanation, unless—
“Wait.”
“Oh?” He still sounds wary.
Her heart is going to beat out of her chest. She rounds the corner of the table to place it between them, palms flat against the surface so that it doesn’t show. What’s it? She doesn’t know. Goddess, she wishes she didn’t have that second drink. “Wait.”
“I really don’t know,” Hubert is advancing towards her as he speaks, and Dorothea can’t look away, “how many times I must remind you that my affection for her Majesty is not romantic in nature.”
“Okay. Right. Fair. But that would mean—” Dorothea breaks off. It was easier before, to say that Hubert loved Edie. It was easier to hurt herself speaking it out loud. Now, she finds she can’t give voice to her thoughts, not when she hasn’t dared to give them any room to breathe for so long.
Hubert comes to a rest at the other side of the table. “Yes. Is that really so impossible to believe?”
He’s being so blunt, not giving her any room to squirm away. And she shouldn’t want to, only— only it’s impossible, it’s too much being offered to her on a silver platter. She knows how this works. She’s got to find the catch.
“But you’re immune to me,” is what she blurts out.
“Excuse me?”
“What I mean is, you’ve never looked at me.” Oh, fuck, she’s blushing. She can feel it. “That was the whole— back at Garreg Mach, back when we first met, you were always different because you didn’t look at me. Not in the way men do.”
Hubert bristles at that. She can’t blame him for it. “If you mean that I’ve never ogled you—”
“But you haven’t! That’s just the truth!” Dorothea’s never been afraid of Hubert — and it’s not fear that’s gripping her now, but something near it. He’s close. At once, she wants him closer and a thousand miles away. “And now, what? I’m supposed to believe that you suddenly want me?”
“You’re not supposed to do anything. I have shared something which I believe to be true. You may respond in whatever way you’d like.” Even when Hubert is deadpan, there tends to be something behind his words, whether he’s sly or smug or just plain bored. Right now, though, he’s wooden, impenetrable. “I am well aware,” he continues, “that I am not entitled to your trust. To whatever extent we have fraternized over the years, I hope it has been by choice on your part.”
“Hubert!” The shock in her voice is genuine, instinctive. “Of course— of course it’s been by choice. Don’t be silly.”
He raises one eyebrow, and Dorothea feels a new wave of heat rush to her cheeks. Right. Maybe silly isn’t the word to use in this particular situation. Not when he’s laid his cards out so cleanly; not when she’s still avoiding baring herself in return. Despite it all, the fear is still paralyzing.
“It’s been you. For ages, I’ve wanted you.” She wrenches the words from her heart, forces them out past her lips. “Only… I thought I would be a fool to hope for anything more. And it would be so— so horrible to lose you.”
She’s trembling. It’s something she realizes only when Hubert closes the distance between them to put one gloved hand in hers. With his fingers to clutch to, the shaking stills. He looks guarded, but that light is back in his eyes, the one Dorothea can now recognize is hope. “You have never been in any danger of that.”
Her heart skips, and for once, she doesn’t scold herself for it. “You make it sound so simple.”
“I do not seek to minimize your struggles. But the fact remains that matters like this are simple for me.” Hubert tightens his grip on her hand, just for a moment. “I’m not a romantic. I have little with which to entice you. All I can offer is a love with no conditions. It’s hardly sufficient, but—“
Hubert breaks off with a surprised little sound when Dorothea surges up to press her lips to his. It’s as gratifying as it’s always been, to throw him off-kilter. And like this— how many times has Dorothea dreamed of this? Her arms thrown around his neck, his lips warm against hers. His hands only stutter in the air briefly before coming to cup her cheeks with a practiced tenderness.
She nearly bats him away, out of pure instinct. But there’s no audience here whose view of her face will be hindered by his gesture. No one to perform for, aside from the man she’s kissing, who’s kissing her back because he loves her. He loves her.
“You really do love me,” Dorothea murmurs against his cheek when they pause for air. She can’t help her voice rising at the end, making the words more question than statement.
Hubert scoffs — no, laughs, softly against her ear. “If words will not suffice, there must be more I can do to convince you.”
She very nearly comforts him. Almost insists that there’s nothing more she could ask of him. But he’s here in her arms, offering her anything she wants, and Dorothea is no stranger to selfishness.
“Hmm.” The hum is thoughtful, teasing. She takes a step back and lets her eyes drag over him. Every glance she’s stolen, every double take she’s tried to hide — now she lingers. When she finally looks at his face again, there’s a redness in his cheekbones. He’s blushing, under her gaze. Wonders never cease. “I can think of a few things.”
Hubert clears his throat, and Dorothea can feel her lips tugging into a grin. “I place myself in your hands.” And it is that easy, after all.