Chapter Text
Darkness filled the halls of the castle, subdued only by the torches that were placed on the stone walls every few feet. Far above, a bell chimed twelve times, its ringing rumbling across the castle and sending a guard at every story to put out the blazes in the torches. Thirty minutes later and the castle was still, apart from the heavily-breathing guards – one put at the foot of every stairwell – that were struggling to stay conscious, their hands resting on their full bellies.
Halls only barely lit by the dim moonlight now, it was easy to miss the cloaked figure that progressed swiftly across the passageway.
It roamed down a stairwell, skipping above the sleeping guard at its end. If you were standing to the side of the single torch still burning by the guard you could see the figure was a man in his twenties, his eyes blue and steel-like. He didn’t hover by the light, however, hurrying towards the next stairwell and hopping over the guard at its end.
Four stories lower, he entered the dungeons which were located two floors beneath the entrance to the castle.
He didn’t care much for the dungeons. They were pitch black and humid, and he could feel the moss on the stone where his fingers fluttered across the walls as he sneaked towards the exit.
No one guarded the door that exited the dungeons and the long stairway leading to it, since the door could only be opened from the inside, and the chilly torture rooms were currently unattended. As he broke free from the stuffy room and into the cold night, he crouched and silently placed a thin rock between the wooden door and the wall to make sure he would have a way back inside.
He stood up and faced the castle’s fence, taking his shoes off and throwing them over to the other side.
It was a ten feet tall stone wall, but he knew exactly where to place the tips of his fingers and the pads of his feet – he will replace his leather boots on his feet once he lands on the other side of the wall and cleans the mud off his feet – to make it to the top of the fence. He climbed up swiftly, sitting at the top for just a split second, watching the fast-asleep city and locating the small cabin that was his destination, before landing on his feet and groping the ground for his boots.
There was a short walk through the thin forest to get to the front of the castle, where he burst out of the woods with his back to the guarded gates. He hurried past Builders Hood – a street of stone houses with bourgeois tenants – next to which were the market and the poor neighborhoods.
A chill went down his spine as he crossed the market. He liked visiting it during daytime – although he, of course, had no interest in purchasing anything from it – but now, with the streets dark and deserted, the empty vegetable carts at the corner of his eye moved and twitched when he wasn’t looking, and the splash of stomped berries on the brick pavement looked like blood.
He moved on quickly. In front of him was a network of wooden shacks and huts, each one more rickety than the other. He padded silently through the night, counting the doors. The moonlight stroked his face, leaving a spark in his eyes.
He recognized the house immediately, like he did every other night, although he refused to stop counting, just to make sure; the magnitude of the disaster if he knocked on the wrong door and someone recognized him was unthinkable.
On top of the precautions, he had to knock a secret rhythm on the door. This wasn’t particularly necessary – just something the idiot on the other side of the door made him do, to make him feel ridiculous. It worked.
“Who’s there?” Asked a voice from inside the house now.
“Let me in or I’ll break your neck,” he answered dryly. He couldn’t hear the other man smile, but he could hear the bolt being unlocked inside. Finally, a soft light colored his face yellow and he entered what was, in a sense, his home.
“Dean,” he greeted the man.
“Cas.” Dean locked the door and turned to embrace him with a kiss. “How’d it go?”
“As expected.” Castiel sighed and sat by the flimsy dining table. Everything in the room was made of wood, apart from the windows – those were just two symmetrical holes in the wall, covered tightly with thick curtains which Dean had nailed into the wall years ago so that Castiel could walk around inside the house safely.
“Is Sam sleeping?”
Dean glanced toward the bedroom. “He better be. Got school tomorrow.”
“Right,” said Castiel, recalling the late hour.
“What did he think about the candy?” He asked as Dean sat beside him. The jar still rested on the kitchen counter, half-full of colorful sugary beans which Castiel looted from the royal kitchen.
“Well, he didn’t like that I finished half the jar before he got home.” Castiel smiled softly, and Dean took his hand. “But when he did taste them, he loved ‘em. He said lemon was is favorite.”
“Tell him my favorite flavor is blueberry,” Castiel requested.
They sat in silence; Dean rubbed circles around Castiel’s knuckles. Castiel tried to clean his mind of thoughts, concentrate on the weary-looking furniture or the small spider climbing the wall; but the subject couldn’t be avoided.
Dean was the first to address it.
“So… How is she?”
He was getting married. Not to Dean, of course – even in his father’s time being with a man was considered odd and unnatural – not to talk about Dean being a simple soldier without royal blood – but when his father died and left his sister, Castiel’s aunt, to rule, things changed.
The queen didn’t have any children, and Castiel couldn’t see her ever getting married. He was left the only heir to her throne, obligated to continue the legacy with his own offspring. And since he never showed interest in the princesses and noblewomen his aunt kept sending his way, Amara had finally decided to find Castiel a wife, whether he liked it or not.
Her name was Celeste, princess of Middleton, and she was beautiful. He’s only seen her once, from a fair distance, but it was hard to deny: it seemed as though if Castiel was doomed to marry a woman, that clumsy, wide-eyed redhead was a decent wife for him.
For that exact reason, he figured Dean might unknowingly appreciate him sparing some details.
“She’s ginger, and quirky,” he concluded shortly. Dean’s fingers stopped moving, and he looked up.
“You know I can always tell when you’re hiding something from me,” he said, lifting an eyebrow. “You do that thing with your face.”
“What thing?” A furrow between Castiel’s eyes deepened.
“That.”
Castiel sighed, pulling his shoulders up. “She was great. She started giggling after she slipped over her dress climbing up the stairs, and forgot her name while introducing herself to the queen. It’s like they cloned me and gave me a pair of breasts.” He fell silent and looked at Dean, who slowly assessed the situation.
“So, what, you thought… I’d be jealous or something?” The corners of his lips pulled down, and Castiel suppressed a sigh. He knew Dean all too well to be able to tell exactly how things would play out.
Instead of giving in to frustration, though, he freed his hand from Dean’s fingers and placed it on his cheek.
“I just don’t want you to think that this is going to change anything, that’s all.”
Dean didn’t answer, and Castiel’s fingers stroked his face tenderly.
“How is Sam doing in school?” He asked, gently changing the subject.
“Not bad,” Dean answered, reluctant, but playing along. “Told me one of his friends’ dad went away this week. Didn’t ask, but I saw he was wondering when I’m gonna go too.”
“If you go,” Castiel cleared his throat. His hand had dropped away from Dean and was now resting in his lap.
Dean traced the patterns of the wooden table with the tips of his fingers. “We’re in war, Cas, and I’m a soldier.” He let out a deep breath, but quickly enough, the ends of his lips pulled up.
“Would you have missed me if I were gone?”
Castiel pouted. “This is not a laughing matter.”
He watched dozens of soldiers being sent to the battlefront every day. Most of them did come back – Amara had a flawlessly skilled and forceful army – but the odds weren’t worth the risk in Castiel’s opinion. He himself has been training for wartime from a young age, but unlike others, he wasn’t keen to go into battle.
Dean, on the other hand, looked at the matter as one big joke – as he did best. “C’mon,” he said and tugged at Castiel’s arm, pulling him closer. “Would you?”
“I refuse to cooperate with this,” Castiel insisted, but the softening of his voice as Dean’s lips fluttered across his cheek weakened his argument. He grimaced and pulled Dean into a kiss before pushing him away.
“I should leave.”
“Will you come back tomorrow?” Dean asked as Castiel stood up, stealing another hasty kiss before they parted.
“The day after,” Castiel promised. The next day he would meet his future bride, and he assumed his aunt wasn’t about to let him out of her sight.
He left Dean’s cabin with a heavy heart, his mind on the frisky redhead he was bound to wed.
He wondered how hard it could be to hide a lover for about sixty years.
~
The spacious rooms of the castle were much more welcoming at daytime than during the night.
There were no curtains in the assemblies room, and through the glass windows the sun shone brightly on the queen and her companions while they waited.
At last, the heavy wooden doors opened and through them entered a well-dressed procession. The princess was second to enter, her long green dress dragging across the floor after her.
With a clutter, the princess’ escorts bowed before the queen and took their seats, the princess being last to approach the queen and her nephew.
“Forgive us, your highness” she uttered as she bowed lightly. “The structure of the place is a bit… Perplexing.”
“We got lost,” one of her guards explained, and she nodded abashedly. Castiel hid his smile behind a palm that conveniently covered his mouth.
“Well, then,” Amara said, her voice rumbling quietly across the silent room, and the discussion began.
Traditionally, the Queen or the King travelled with their daughter to negotiate the details of the marriage with the prince’s parents.
Celeste represented her own. She spoke in front of the Queen, and Castiel had no interest in the conversation. He nodded apathetically at any question he was asked; it didn’t matter to him whether the Middleton king was to transfer Amara two hundred thousand or four hundred thousand coins of gold to fund the wedding, or in which consistency the princess was to return to Middleton and assist her mother’s ruling once the king passed away. He didn’t care for the money, nor for the company of his future wife. His mind was elsewhere; he examined the princess’ eyes, green as the open lands’ grass, and they reminded him of another pair of eyes. He looked at her dress, her cleavage, the thin sunflower heels that were only visible since her dress folded as she was sitting down. Finally, his eyes fixated on the thin strings of flames flowing from the top of her head. He tried to imagine waking up in the morning to the sight of her hair spread across the sheets – but instead of the chiseled walls of the castle he saw a ceiling made of logs, and rather than the princess’ face he saw freckles and morning stubble.
He couldn’t shake the small cabin out of his mind.
The long morning hours passed faster than Castiel had imagined they would. To his interest and his aunt’s surprise, Celeste hardly argued against Amara’s negotiations, and by noon the discussion ended. The queen stood up, and the whole room rose with her.
“We’ll give you two a few moments to get to know one another,” she said, and it wasn’t long before the prince and the princess were left alone.
“So… Do you want to move to the sofa or something?” The princess asked, her tone awkward. “I don’t really know what to do in these situations.”
Now that he paid attention to her voice, he noticed for the first time how pleasant it was.
“Sure.” Castiel’s voice carried away in the big empty room. They stood up, their heavy chairs screeching against the floor, and sat on a cushioned sofa at the side of the room, as far apart as they could in the small space.
“So… What do you like to do?” She asked.
“Um,” Castiel answered wittily. His brain fired answers at him, but they were all useless. Go to the cliff with Dean. Go to the market with Dean. Chase rabbits with Sam. Burn my food while Dean tries to teach me how to cook.
“Uh… I like to go outside,” he said eventually. “Take trips around the forest with D- uh, friends.” He stammered, trying to cover up for his mistake, but the princess’ eyes lit.
“You have friends?” She stared at him with such enchantment that Castiel’s chest tightened. She seemed lonely – as lonely as he would’ve been if he didn’t have Dean and his brother.
“I- um- not really,” he stuttered. He tried to breathe, but his throat felt tight. He barely even opened his mouth and he already messed up; it would be utterly impossible to keep his relationship with Dean secret for years-
“Look, Celeste-“
“Call me Charlie,” she said, smiling at him. He was about to blurt out an excuse to escape the room and never meet her again, but her comment baffled him.
“W-what?”
She looked down, her perfectly clipped fingernails digging into her palms. She was nervous, he only now noticed. He wondered why.
“My parents named me Celeste, and that’s what everyone back home calls me. I know it’s stupid, but… I’ve grown to hate that name. It’s a name people expect things from, want something from. So when my dad sent me on trips outside the kingdom, I started changing my name… Finding new clothes, and going out on the streets without being recognized…” She looked at him. “Don’t tell anyone, please.”
Castiel nodded bewilderedly – he was well trained at keeping secrets, but this one was oddly forlorn for a respected royalty.
“So, um, how is it to have friends?” She asked after a moment – whether it was genuine interest or a poor attempt to break the awkward silence, he couldn’t tell, but he was reluctant to follow that direction of the conversation.
“I train with the knights,” he explained. “It creates somewhat of a profound bond. You could say I made a friend there.” That wasn’t a complete lie – preparing for war with dozens of other men was an unusual experience; it wasn’t how he met Dean, though.
Charlie stared at him expectantly, her eyes bright with interest, and he continued hesitantly.
“Most times it’s wonderful. But sometimes… It gets tiring. When we fight, I have nowhere to go. Sometimes when I can’t see him, I stay in my room for days. That’s when I realize how useless I actually am. He has a job, a house, a brother to take care of. He works every day to make sure his brother has dinner. I would get ten times his dinner even if I sat in my room and stared at the walls for days.”
He’s never shared these thoughts with anyone before, and he fretted the princess’ reaction. She, on the other hand, seemed sunken in her own memory lane.
“I feel like that all the time,” she said, her voice distant.
“Don’t you have friends at all?” Castiel wondered quietly. She seemed smart, and she was beautiful – surely someone she met found a loyal friend in her, didn’t they? She shook her head, though, her expression composed.
“I’ve always felt different, and now I know I was.” She let out a short, bitter laugh, but cut it off instantly, looking up at Castiel as if she said too much.
“How do you mean?” He asked, his voice still tender. He didn’t look away from her eyes.
“I was a weird kid,” she said, her tone apologetic, accompanied with half a faint smile. Her expression clarified she didn’t think he could understand, but Castiel spent his childhood years mocked and pushed aside for many reasons, and being utterly uninterested in the opposite sex was the cherry at the top.
“Me too,” he answered, his voice heavy with sore memories. He smiled at her, placing a reassuring hand on hers.
Hesitantly, she smiled back.
~
One of Castiel’s favorite places in the kingdom was the cliff. It was an hour’s ride on a horse away from Amara’s castle and it was desolate, the only place Castiel felt truly forgotten in.
The only place he didn’t feel the need to look behind his back when he was with Dean.
“Do you ever wish we could walk around in public together?”
Dean looked at him.
He was lying on his stomach, his head propped atop of his forearms, watching the extensive valley. He was dangerously close to the edge of the cliff, placed in his favorite spot from which he could see the most of the kingdom. He could watch a candy-sized couple kiss down Builders Hood, but even the sharpest eye couldn’t see him kiss Dean from down there.
“How do you mean?” Dean asked. Castiel tried to explain.
“I mean – what if I didn’t have to hide my identity when I went to meet you? What if we could just stroll down the streets holding hands and buying vegetables at the market? Or draw the curtains when we wanted the sunlight to come in?”
“We can’t do that, Cas.” Dean’s fingers fluttered back and forth across his spine, and he sounded sad.
“I know, but – what if we could?”
Dean looked into his eyes, and Castiel sat up.
“That’d make life way easier,” he replied, following Castiel’s motions and placing his palms on the grass behind him to support himself. He didn’t care for the view as much as his lover did; all he was interested in was right beside him on that cliff, something he wasn’t sure Castiel would understand and therefore he was reluctant to share with him.
Castiel flipped a plucked flower between his fingers, his expression somber. He plucked another flower out of the ground, and tied the two stems together. Dean watched him quietly, a delicate smile sneaking onto his face.
“What?” Castiel mumbled without looking up. He plucked more and more flowers, somehow seeming both absent-minded and concentrated in his work at once.
“Just recalled something,” said Dean, his small smile still intact as he continued to watch Castiel’s movements. “I hardly think of the old days anymore,” he chuckled.
“What about the old days?” Castiel asked abstractedly, but his lips started curving up as well, following Dean’s train of thoughts.
Dean let out a sigh, watching the clouds. “Things seemed better as a fifteen years old boy falling in love for the first time,” he wondered aloud.
Castiel snorted. “Have I aged that much in five years?”
“Nothing seems as pretty as the past,” Dean hummed.
Castiel deserted his handiwork for a moment in favor of squinting and touching Dean’s hair. “Oh, wait, I see a gray hair.”
“Shut up.” Dean laughed and pushed his chest gently.
Castiel resumed his work. A few moments later, he held up a wide green-and-white ring.
“Flower crown.” He placed it on Dean’s head. “It suits you.”
He watched his creation, smiling with satisfaction. The daisies matched Dean’s white shirt, and as simple as his appearance was, he seemed almost majestic to Castiel.
“Now we’re both princes,” he added, and Dean leaned forward to kiss him.
“I love you, you know?” There was something dispirited in Dean’s eyes.
Castiel smiled. “Not so bad being in the present now, huh?”
“Not as long as we’re here, no,” Dean mumbled. He planted little kisses on Castiel’s lips, his cheeks, down his neck. His lips barely brushed Castiel’s skin, but the touch felt heavy somehow.
“I love you. I love you, I love you.”
Castiel swallowed, his fingers resting in Dean’s hair. What he hoped was just superstition was rumbling deep in his stomach, and he pulled Dean closer.