Disclaimer: I just really enjoy watching the show. ConYu
"It wasn't like that."
Conrart blinked and looked over at the young man who had spoken. "Your majesty?"
Black eyes shifted from gazing at the courtyard far below to study Conrart where he sat, going through his few pages of remaining work. There was a hint of annoyance, of irritation, in those eyes, but a solemnity Conrart didn't understand was most prevalent. "Yuri."
After a moment Conrart inclined his head. "Yuri."
Yuri looked out the window again, a scuffed baseball rolling in his loose grip as he lounged, almost boneless, in the chair he'd dragged over.
"Yuri?" They hadn't spoken in more than an hour by the time Yuri had made that one, confusing statement, leaving Conrart completely unable to answer it. "What wasn't like what?"
With a sigh Yuri closed his eyes, letting his head loll back at an awkward angle. It was a vulnerable pose, and Conrart's heart smote him to see it. He had nearly lost this trust… by all rights he should have lost it. Yet Yuri never treated him differently now than he had before Conrart was sent to gather the boxes, never acted the slightest bit wary or uncertain of him.
He was a little more prone to silence, and would spend hours just sitting in the same room as Conrart while Conrart carried on with his duties… as long as Gunter and Gwendal allowed him to, anyway.
"What Wolf said."
Having the sense to realize this was going to take a lot longer than he'd originally thought, he set his quill down and moved the papers away so he could rest an elbow on the desk to see Yuri properly when he twisted in his chair. "What he said when, Yuri? I have not seen Wolfram since lunch yesterday."
"When he was telling you about the box opening. After I closed it."
"The box was opened twice?" Conrart frowned—while he could well imagine Yuri glossing over certain parts of his adventures, finding them pointless in the retelling, something like that would have been highlighted in Josak's.
"No. Well, not with a key, at least."
Knowing he would probably already understand if he had never broken the promise to stay with Yuri, at his side… was a pain he would have to live with. Yuri had grown closer to the others in his absence—his relationship with Wolfram, especially, seemed closer. And Wolfram had been affected as well, losing a bit of his bratty self-indulgence in favor of looking after Yuri as best as he could while being little if any more mature than their young king.
Still, admitting the lack was galling, something he hated when once he would have known what Yuri was thinking or planning with too few hints for anyone else to understand. "I'm afraid I don't follow, your majesty."
A grimace twisted Yuri's features briefly. He opened his eyes, but didn't look at Conrart. "The ground had been split apart when the box opened, and more changes happened when it closed… or was relocked, or whatever. I was dangling by the fingers of one hand on unstable ground."
Oh, yes—that retelling had nearly given him a heart attack. "Yes?" he asked when Yuri stopped without explaining the reason behind this slow-moving conversation.
"Wolfram said I wouldn't let go of your arm because I knew the humans might have been able to retrieve it and use it later."
His stomach twisted every time he thought about his missing arm being… well… being, in a way. Having a replacement helped a lot, he was sure, but knowing his arm had been cut off was one thing. He could live with it. What always bothered him was the fact that a displaced part of his body had been fought over, lugged around, and the cause of words between Gwendal and Wolfram. While he was nowhere in the vicinity.
It was also rather disgusting to think about the state it must have been in at the point in time Yuri was talking about. Flesh, human or mazoku, was still flesh, and didn't last all that long once no longer living. Yet… yet Yuri had carried it, protected it from loss, and seen to a more or less proper 'send-off'.
"It wasn't that. It wasn't like that. I couldn't let it fall. Not because the fate of countries—or even the entire world—rested on someone who would have used it not getting it… but because it was a part of you. I couldn't lose it."
Conrart shook his head slightly, keeping his frown slight. "But you intended to bury it, and instigated Gwendal and Gunter to dispose of it properly."
Yuri smiled sadly. "Because that was best, wasn't it? It's not like I could drag your arm along with me everywhere, and as long as it was near me it was also near the boxes, and it's location was known for some other bold attempt at theft. But at that moment, I couldn't drop it. I was exhausted, barely able to move, but that thought remained. I couldn't drop it. I couldn't let go." He got to his feet slowly, languidly. He approached Conrart's desk, bending so one hand was flat on the desk and the other curled around the armrest.
Before that hand curled around his armrest, though, it lightly brushed Conrart's hair out of his eyes, cool fingertips barely touching the skin of his temple before leaving.
"So. That said," Yuri tilted his head, and Conrart suddenly understood what he'd said, what he'd been saying. He wanted to keep even that decaying bit of Conrart with him more than he'd wanted to free his hands so he could pull himself up. That… "I would think," Yuri went on while Conrart was lost in thoughts, smiling faintly when Conrart started, "that you could start calling me Yuri… at least when we're alone, if nowhere else."
Conrart reached up, mindless with hope, want, uncertainty. Yuri's eyes closed when Conrart's fingers brushed his cheek, shivered when those fingers traced the shell of his ear before slipping through the warm hair at the back of his head.
When those dark eyes reopened, Conrart's world was washed clean of doubt, uncertainty and most of the pain he'd felt since his arm had been lost. There was so very much held there, too much to speak of—and most of it improper to speak of, anyway, as long as Yuri and Wolfram remained engaged. "Yuri," he whispered, getting to his feet with utter and glad gracelessness as he gathered the suddenly again-awkward young king into his arms, the forbidden thoughts and hopes now betrayed as his heart was allowed to speak. "Yuri Yuri Yuri Yuri."