Green isn't his favourite colour.
It is a nice colour, certainly, the colour of his rolling hills and fertile fields. His eyes reflects the ancient forests of his lands, of the deep woods haunted by ghosts and fae, but however personal that colour is, however well it may fit him, it remains his third favourite, coming close to white and red (both his second). The first though, will always remain—
He turns to the horizon, to the far distance where the sea and sky meets.
White.
That is the first colour he sees.
The ground underneath him feels chalky, the texture strange and foreign to the newborn Nation. With wide, curious eyes, he grabs a handful of the white thing in his feeble hands. The rocks cut into his soft hands, unmarked by time and age and struggles (for now), but he doesn't press hard enough to bleed. Letting go of the pebbles, he pushes himself up and looks away.
Green.
That is the second colour he sees.
Grass grows nearly everywhere. At first, he is enchanted. Each strip of blade carries a vibrant hue which glimmers in the sunlight, the dew sliding on it reflecting miniature rainbows, whilst the darker shades among the shrubbery entices exploration and arouses curiosity. What things can I find there? He wonders, but does not move. There is something else which calls to him, and he turns his head to seek the siren call.
He gasps.
The sea.
It is love at first sight.
Once, within the warm afterglow of a well-sated night and the comforting cuddling of a certain affectionate American, Alfred confesses that his first role model, his eternal constant and greatest dream, is the sky.
He looks a bit nervous to say that, summer-sky eyes widening the moment those words left his mouth. Arthur realises that the confession has slipped out unintentionally, and that Alfred now expects him to be angry, or at least upset that those roles are taken by another. Even if that entity isn't exactly alive.
Instead, Arthur finds it oddly endearing. Then again, many things about this young, yet oh so powerful Nation can come off as strangely adorable and cute. Alfred puts too much of his precious, valuable heart in his actions and speech, Arthur thinks.
"Well, the sea is to me what the sky is to you," Arthur says, yawning slightly. He nuzzles into the other's collarbone, "Now get some sleep, git. There's a meeting tomorrow."
He is certain he doesn't imagine the smile he feels against his head.
"Alright, old man. Goodnight."
And with that he's asleep.
"I'm not old…" Arthur grouses quietly, unwilling to let him have the last words, but there is no heat in his tone. He presses a soft kiss against the other's chest, murmuring to his heart, "Goodnight, Alfred."
The sky, huh?
It suits this idiotic, unrealistic, stubborn, wide-eyed, freedom-loving, adorkable Nation.
From the sea, he learns to take.
For a while after he was 'born', he was worried. He does not have people to represent, unlike his brothers, and he fears he may someday disappear, fading into oblivion without leaving a mark of his passing upon this wide, wide world, unbounded as he is to any group or clan yet.
His fairy friends (not those from the apathetic Fae Courts who plays with mortals and delights in their suffering) comforts him. His ears are often filled with soothing promises and hopeful optimism. For their sakes, he tries to believe.
The sea gives to him his first people.
He is elated. Finally! After all this waiting, he has someone to represent, a reason to live, and people who will accept him with open arms. Grinning, he runs up to them and greets them halfway. The humans are bemused, but they smile as they welcome him, as if knowing from the bottom of their hearts that he is meant to be theirs. Already, they have accepted him. Already, he feels as if he belongs.
They do not name him. Or perhaps they do. Whatever they call him and the land has been long-lost in the annals of time. Still, as he grows older, stronger, wiser, he fondly remembers the gentle smile of a woman as she shows him a bell-shaped, bronze pottery. He thinks he still have it somewhere.
The sea also gives him his enemies.
There is Rome, then the Vikings, then France and many others. Foreigners, the lot of them. He bares his teeth at them, and they see him as uncultured, uncivilized, barbaric. All because he does not possess the same culture as them. All because he opposes them.
Well.
Rome cannot keep him. Denmark will not conquer him. France does not possess him.
He grins wickedly from the White Cliffs as they leave; broken, battered, bruised. The sea takes them away as easily as she gives them.
Such a cruel teacher the sea is.
But from the sea, he learns to take.
Now he has people, his own language, a culture which unifies his people. A kingdom, a monarchy, the fertile lands. His flag flies white against a red cross; proudly, unflinchingly.
From the sea, he takes the seeds of an Empire.
Freedom.
As he grows, as he becomes England and Arthur, he becomes weary of the limits the sea imposes on him, of the known world that is the European continent. England yearns to expand his borders, to further his reign and become stronger. Arthur tires of the constant feuds and fighting in Europe.
So he takes to the sea, and she takes him to the New World.
America.
Is a child with wheat blond hair and summer-sky eyes. Innocent, naïve, curious. He picks him over the frog, and for that, England swears to give him everything he never have as a young Nation while Arthur opens his heart and gives him love he never experience, never knew himself capable of.
England sees his future successor in America. Arthur finds family in Alfred.
Here, far into the horizon from his homeland, he finds a place where the sea and sky meets.
He likes the rain.
Drip, drop, drip. The rhythmic sounds lulls him, comforts him in its constancy (when all else shifts and fades, changes and leaves).
A harsh gale heralds a fresh breeze. The wind is new, whispering of future changes (nothing will ever be the same again).
Water falls against his cheeks, against his lips, his tongue. It drops and falls everywhere, a comfortable façade which allows himself to lie as he closes his eyes (and ignores the scent of gunpowder and blood and tears).
If he closes his eyes hard enough, if he concentrates fully on the droplets of water (which surely must have fell from the heavens, and not his eyes), he thinks he can feel the sea falling from the sky.
There is a grove with a lake hidden in the heart of one of his ancient forests.
Occasionally, he would come and sit underneath one of the boughs of the elder trees, facing the mirror-like lake. His expression will be one of contemplation, carefully blank as he peers into the unfathomable depths.
The lake reminds him of the sea when it's calm, so crystal-clear and tranquil and much like a reflection of the—
He looks away.
America is called the Land of Freedom because he is everything England is searching for when he sets out to the newfound continent.
Back home, in his land and kingdom, this kind of freedom in religion, taxes, trades, everything, is unthinkable. In America though, such things are allowed, commonplace, and England teaches his boy, his successor, the means to protect this precious freedom.
America is England's dream realised.
Alfred is Arthur's wish come true.
"Aaaaaarrrthuuuuurrr!"
Arthur's lips curve upwards in a rare, honest smile as he threw his red coat onto the rack and kneels down, opening his arms to welcome the child. Alfred jumps into his embrace without hesitation, burrowing his face against his chest, causing Arthur to laugh freely as the boy hugs him and murmurs how much he misses him into his cravat.
"Welcome home," Alfred smiles into his collar, a warm bundle of contentment and love in his arms.
Arthur returns the smile as he draws the boy closer to him, whispering in his ears, "I'm back."
He has always wanted a home to return to.
No matter how much the sea rages, makes her waves as tall as castles and drowns whole islands until the lands turn into a bed of corals, the sea can never touch the sky.
Always, the sky will remain distant and aloof. So close, yet so very, very far.
On calm days, when the sea is patient enough to rest her waves to the frequent ripples and pulses, the sky is mirrored on her surface. On these days, it is as if the sky is in the sea, which is in the sky, which is—
They are still not close enough to touch.
So the sea gives parts of herself to the sky. Evaporates little droplets off her surface. Condenses into clouds. Let the sky takes these parts wherever the other wills.
And take her, the sky did.
Over hills and further inlands, far away from the places where the sea reigns, to the tops of mountains and the bottoms of valleys, the sky takes the sea to so many places unimaginable, to so many places the sea never thought possible.
And the sea never wants to stop.
Neither does the sky.
But eventually, the sea slips between the sky's fingers and falls away as rain.
When words of dissent reach England's ears from America's lands, he is not surprised.
Instead, he thinks: About time.
England gives America everything. He gives the boy his language, his culture, his people (and his love). Even the colours of his flag and his national flower. He hasn't forgotten the reason for creating the Thirteen Colonies.
If the boy—America—is to be his successor and earn this precious freedom, then he must be able to graduate from a mere colony into a full-fledged Nation. He must be able to fight off his oppressors, his foes, no matter who that may be.
Even if it's England.
Even if it will break his heart.
Arthur, however, worries.
He worries in the way a parent does to their child who stands on the cusps of adulthood (for he loves him then, and he loves him forevermore, but the love he holds in this time is familial, platonic, not yet the passionate fire of a lover). It is easy to fight, to rebel and proclaim another as the great enemy, but what will happen after? There will be a country to be built from scratch, people to govern, laws to set down and impose, and Arthur will not be there to see if all will run smoothly for Alfred. Freedom, Arthur has learnt (from years of conquests and invasions, of fighting and rebelling and warring for the same freedom which Alfred now touts), is not the ability to do as you please, but to compromise on what values to hold, and to that end, choose the chains which will bind you.
Complete and total freedom is unthinkable in this world.
England's chains are the duty he holds to his people. It is their love which binds him to this earth, their blood which are spilled to safeguard his being, their beliefs which spurs him ever onwards. It is more than a debt which can never be repaid, it is duty, that which drives men to greater heights than they ever dreamed (and to abysses deeper than they can imagine falling).
Arthur's chains are similar in that regard. He holds deep love towards his people, feels grateful that they chose him and continues choosing him, and is proud of every great deed they accomplish (of their terrible accomplishments, he will not say). Duty, too, is a concept he is intimately familiar with and never fails to embrace. He can only hope to achieve the magnificence expected from his people, from being the British Empire.
But.
Arthur is a person, despite what he might have made others believe, despite what his enemies say, despite the years that have passed and the years that will come. He is a person, someone with a heart and mind and desires. He does things which are not necessary as a Nation (knitting, embroidering, pirating, drinking…), and feels things which can hinder his duties (affection to the younger colonies, a strange sort of respect to the older ones, an understanding between enemies, even friendship with the oddest fellow). In this, Arthur's chains are different.
It is these chains which causes him to worry.
Have I taught him enough? Arthur, and perhaps even England, wonders as he heads to France (he has frowned at that, displeased with France's influence on his once-charge) for the Treaty of Paris, Have I taught him enough to be his own man, his own Nation; to stand proudly on his own two feet and continue onwards no matter what may come?
He catches a glimpse of summer-sky eyes across the hall filled with representatives from various countries, politicians and the like. In some ways, he feels as if those eyes do not belong here, not among schemers, manipulators, and jaded people (and is not jade a shade of green? A lovely colour, a gem worthy to describe his eyes, and perhaps, more) who smiles at each other like wolves in sheep clothing. Alfred does not feel as if he belongs here, but that feeling, Arthur knows, will pass soon enough. America is a Nation now, just like England (and oh, how he shakes his head and mourns) and so belongs in this realm of politics and power-plays as much as him.
Still, he wonders.
He wonders if it is his chains as Arthur which lends him more lenience towards Alfred, towards America. He concedes the vast trans-Appalachian region, allowing America to become a bit larger than he should have. England reasons, however, that it is for good cause. He considers it an investment; the land will be used to accommodate the growth of America's people, which will create lucrative markets for British merchants without any military or administrative costs to Britain. Perhaps America does not seem like it now, but England had raised him to be his successor, and so it is with good reason England believes his former colony may grow into a respectable Nation, one he may later persuade to become a major trading partner (it will be easy, he thinks, they share much and been through much. Despite the war, despite his independence, he believes America still has chains binding him to England, and if not, at least to Arthur).
It feels as if he's manipulating America (Alfred).
(He is not quite sure what to feel regarding this, and so chooses to dismiss the issue entirely.)
France, of all people, calls him out on this later, after the signing is complete and the representatives are sent home, "Do not say you did it because of a lapse of judgement. I see what you have done there, England. It is like Vergennes say, the English buy peace rather than make it."
"If it is so, then at least I have money to buy it. What of you, France?" His grin is not so much as a smile, but fangs bared, "I may have lost America, but I remain strong. The same cannot be said to you. What have you gain from this war, France? Tobago, Senegal, some small territories in India—minor things, no, compared to what you have lost?" He laughs when his long-time enemy can only grimace, "I can't even begin to imagine the financial losses you've gain from supporting him. Was it worth it, to get back at me?"
France pursed his lips, displeasure evident on his face, "I would have believed that America's—Alfred's—independence would have been a greater blow to you, Arthur."
Ah, so it's like that.
The Englishman chuckles lowly, sardonic as he laughs and walks past his old rival. "It would have been," he says, "if I had not been expecting it."
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