Chapter Text
Hans closed the door behind himself, the latch falling with a finality that reminded him of the last of twelve bells that’d rung out before his near-hanging. He was uncertain how he’d still managed to hear that metallic click so loudly over the drunken revellers in the halls outside the lord’s chambers in Rattay Castle. He leaned his forehead against the wood, swimming in nausea and resentment.
“My lord?”
He closed his eyes hard, like he’d been slapped, and braced himself before turning to see his bride sitting on the arm of the chair Henry usually claimed, between the windows and the wide hearth that dominated one wall of his bedchamber. He swallowed the ire borne of her unknowing invasion of a place that, for all intents and purposes, was now more hers to claim than it could ever be Henry’s.
“Yes, my lady wife?” His voice cracked and he cleared his throat.
Jitka’s head tilted to the side, an eyebrow cocked, like he was a farm animal that’d just done something to indicate poor health. “Are you well?”
“Yes, yes.” He crossed the room and took her hands in his. She’d shed her gloves already, hands just as pale as the rest of her and softer than any skin he’d touched in a long, long time. “It was just a lot of noise, and crowded.” That many people in any corridor would make anybody feel cramped, surely.
“I see.” She shivered, and courtly instinct pulled him forward to wrap his arms around her before he could audit the movement. She stiffened against his chest.
“Is this alright?” He hoped he’d merely surprised her and not disgusted her, or else the rest of the evening was going to be a lot more difficult than he’d already banked on it being.
Body softening against his, she snaked her arms around his waist and held him tightly. “Yes. You are so warm.” There was a pleased little purr in her voice that, were he the man he’d been a year ago, would’ve lit a blaze under his skin.
“That’ll be the wine from the feast.” He laughed tiredly. “I had them put some over the fire for us, if you’d like.” He tried to pull away and found himself a captive.
She nuzzled further into his chest, clearly unwilling to leave the cocoon of the marten-lined cloak still settled across his shoulders. He reached up with one hand and unclasped the brooch holding the furs in place, caught them as they fell from his form, and wrapped the bulky fabric around her. “There you are, snowbird.”
She smiled up at him, cheeks bright with the chill and pleasure at the pet name. His stomach turned over and he turned to the cauldron of mulling wine over the hearth, busying his hands so perhaps his mind would shut up.
“You’re kinder than I was told you would be, my lord.”
Odd, the relief and embarrassment that bloomed in his chest on her behalf. His hands shook, spilling a bit of the wine from the ladle. It hissed on the hearth. “Please, call me my name when we’re here alone.”
“Hans,” she murmured. It sounded wrong, even still, but less oppressive than his title had.
~~
They stood staring at each other from either side of the wide bed, clad in nothing but their lightweight linens. He couldn’t clear his mind of the likeness she bore to a young doe, sighted down the shaft of an arrow. She brushed her fingertips over the brocade coverlet; the sound was too much in his ears.
“You know I don’t expect us to do anything you don’t want to do just yet, yes?” He tried his damnedest to keep the mania out of his voice.
“Hans, we have to.” Jitka blinked at him.
He blanched. “Yes, I am aware,” he snapped, and immediately regretted it. “I am aware.” He sighed and fidgeted with the overlong sleeve of his nightshirt.
“Am I not…?” She frowned and looked down at herself.
“It’s nothing like that, dear lady. You are kind, and beautiful, and cleverer than I could’ve hoped for in a wife.” He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes, then flicked them outwards into the air like he was banishing a thought. “It’s me.” His hands fell to his sides.
Concerned eyes darted to stare below his waist, as though she was suddenly concerned at what strange malady might be hiding beneath his nightshirt, and that was the final straw. He burst into laughter and folded forward onto his elbows, burying his shame-warm face in his hands and balancing there for a moment before rolling onto his back on the bed. Patting the mattress beside himself, he reached up and threw the blankets out of her way. “Come here, please,” he managed through the lingering giggles. “I’ve fucked this all right up.”
Jitka climbed into the bed, gratefully tucking the blankets around herself, and waited for him to collect himself.
“I wasn’t ready for all of this,” he said to the wooden slats holding the damask canopy over their bed. “I knew I’d be expected to marry and to father children; I’ve known that since I was a boy, but I’ve hardly felt like anything but a child myself until the past few months or so. I didn’t think it’d be happening this quickly, and you find yourself in bed with a man ill-prepared to playact at being a proper husband to a fine lady such as yourself.” He tilted his head back to look up at where she’d curled up like a cat against the pillows.
She beckoned to him, body language softening in understanding. “Come sit with me, Hans.”
He dragged himself up the bed until he was beside her. She fiddled with the ribbons at the neckline of her shift as she collected her thoughts and he sat patiently, grateful to not be the only one whose mind felt muddled.
“I am somewhere I have never been, with people I hardly know, and I’m expected to be the Lady of this place tomorrow. I am also on the off foot, here. Moreso than you I’d say, not that it’s a contest.” She reached out and took his left hand in both of hers, running her thumb over his wedding band. “We’re strangers. The only way out of that is through it, together. Yes?”
He nodded. “Agreed.”
“I am never going to expect to be the great love of your life, just as you should not expect to be the great love of mine.” Something flitted behind her eyes, some secret on wild wings that instinct told him she’d never divulged and, instead of fear or resentment, comfort bloomed in his chest that parts of her would remain unknown to him in the same way parts of him could never be hers. “I do, however, expect both of us to uphold our ends of this bargain. To be fair and honest with each other, to be kind and loving parents when that day comes, God willing, and to protect the interests of your title.” She paused. “Our title, now, I suppose.”
Hans felt his throat tighten and swallowed the tears before he could embarrass himself any more thoroughly. “Of course, my lady.”
“Ah-ah,” she chastised softly. “Not my title, not here when we’re alone,” she echoed, smirking fondly.
He smiled back at her, surprised when it wasn’t entirely a chore. “Of course, Jitka.”
The fire crackled behind them, a birch log’s pale paper snapping as it split from its origin and curled into embers. “I don't know anything about you, husband.” She settled deeper into the pillows and wound their hands more comfortably together. “When were you born?”
He blinked, surprised but not displeased with having the reins of the conversation so deftly taken from him. “Summer, the weeks before first harvest. You?”
“Very early in the spring. It snowed the day I was born.” She looked over at the windows to see if the flurries that'd blessed their walk from the church back up to Rattay Castle had persisted. “My father was born in the snow, as well.”
“Perhaps our son might be, too,” Hans offered, voice thin. She smiled softly at him and nodded.
“Perhaps.” She looked at the tapestry hanging on the wall across from the bed, traced the details of the boar hunt with her eyes: hounds, horses, noble gentlemen armed and on the chase. “You…like to hunt, yes? You mentioned that to me.”
His eyes brightened. “Yes, I love to hunt. Partly for the skill required, and partly because I enjoy being out under the sky.” He hesitated, and banked on the goodwill genuine vulnerability would win him. “I sometimes feel cramped or breathless in small places, and I have never felt that way in the forest.”
She squeezed his hand, ever so gently. “I am scared, sometimes, too. Great heights make me feel dizzy. I have never been to the sea, but the idea of how infinite it seems in writings frightens me.” She took a steadying breath. “I am scared of laying with a man I don't know.”
He pulled her hands closer to his chest and dropped the volume of his voice. “I meant it, earlier, Jitka. You've had all choice taken from you by our families deciding this alliance. If you would choose to wait, I would gladly wait with you.”
She matched his volume, avoiding the harsh edge of whispers by simply speaking low enough and close enough to be heard by only him, should there be staff stationed close enough to eavesdrop on whatever they may or may not be doing. “It endangers both of us to do so, Hans.” Her lips pursed in displeasure. “It is the one thing I'm meant to guard above all else, until it is no longer mine to govern. It belongs to you now, my husband. I belong to you. Failing to consummate would put the entire alliance in danger, let alone our marriage, my honor, and your standing.” She looked at him as though he had sprouted antlers.
“I know. But I'll not start our life together out on the foot of you thinking that your opinion doesn't matter to me. It does.” He shrugged. “Even if I can guarantee there will be plenty of times I’m too damn stubborn to listen to you.
“If you'd prefer we proceed as we're expected to tonight, we can. I would not have your honor in question unless it was your own choice to do so.” He swallowed the nausea and prayed it didn't show on his face. “But if you would rather wait a few days, or weeks – because we must do it, I know we must just as well as you do – then I have a cunning plan.”
~~
In the morning, her lady’s maids came to change the bedding and found the requisite red evidence in the linens to assure everyone that the newlyweds had done their ordained duty.
The nick of a penknife on the side of the lordling’s thumb was quickly disinfected and bandaged by his bodyguard, the warm, playful chastisement for his clumsiness a better balm to the wound than the yarrow pressed into it.