Sophie Hatter was one confused young woman.
Well, at least, that's what it felt like, every time she looked at him.
At present, she was maliciously taking some weeds to task out in the generous, circular garden that surrounded the generous, circular tent that she, Markl, and (with much persuasion and bribery) Howl had set up as an in-limbo equivalent to their moving castle. Calcifer always laughed whenever he came home from a flight to see 'the yurt'* standing proud in the middle of their magically enhanced pasture, although it seemed to offend Howl that his long-time friend and fire demon would refer to their grand estate as a nomad's home. Sophie thought it rather fitting, and had told him so (a trait she had inherited from her days as an old biddy), which had promptly set poor Howl into a seven-day sulk. She'd no idea why he would have such a problem with the concept.
Anyway, the tent was indeed generous, with lovely vanilla-scented velvet tapestries and lavender-smelling cotton sheets hanging as walls that made Sophie nearly melt every time she came home (Home!) from Market Chipping, or Porthaven, or wherever she and Markl had gone for the day, collecting new accoutrements for their new 'mobile home' in their ten-league boots.
Howl had grand plans, he would tell them, at least whenever he arose from his sulks or his bathroom (which, besides the hearth, was the only thing he had bothered to re-conjure), for a new moving castle that could go anywhere, any which way, they could think of.
"Even up?" Markl had inquired excitedly one morning.
"Especially up," Howl had whispered dramatically, winking at Sophie across the table and spreading some equally dramatic blueprints over the breakfast she'd slaved over for an hour while he'd been in the bathroom dying his hair again. It had been a funny sort of deep indigo, that day, but had promptly changed back to blond when Sophie had made a rather insensitive comment. That hadn't been any better.
Even so, Howl seemed in no hurry to build this castle-in-the-air, and continually found pleasure in gussying up and watching his 'family' slave over the generous, circular garden.
Which, was what brought Sophie here, spraying a frighteningly potent weed-venom that she'd somehow made while cooking a while back (during one of her, ahem, tantrums—although she'd never admit that she'd been unreasonable) and avoiding his gaze. Howl lounged in the grass near the tent-flap entrance, 'admiring her green thumb,' but really just not working.
Lazy sod, she thought grudgingly as she turned and tossed the venom-spritzer in the grass and folded her arms. That funny feeling settled into her stomach again, as she looked at him.
"Hello, Sophie," he said warmly, his bright, green-blue eyes crinkling at the edges. He was in an extravagant blue and silver suit this morning with wavy blond hair, sitting atop a small rug in the grass.
Sophie rolled her eyes but walked over to him, flopping tiredly on the grass beside him. "Hi, Howl."
"Your hair looks good in the sunlight," he said almost absently, bringing a long-fingered hand to loop around a lock of silvery hair.
"Does it?"
"I think," he continued with a half-smile on his face, "a bit of your color is coming back in; the roots are a bit pinkish, did you notice?"
"Hmm," she grunted noncommittally. Surely he was just fishing for a compliment. Why else would he dress so ridiculously every day? He no longer worked, after all, since they'd found Prince Justin and basically ended the stupid war, just the two of them. And Markl, if Sophie was feeling bighearted.
Speaking of, Markl came swooping around to the left of the tent with a small kite in his hand, Heen trotting along behind him huffing and puffing as an old lapdog should. "Sophie! Howl! Come fly a kite with me!"
"Oh, but I mustn't—" Sophie began to protest, but Howl was up in a millisecond and had dragged her up with him.
"Just a moment, Markl!" he declared, and traced the outline of a huge rectangular prism that materialized into a beautiful, silvery blue box kite. He promptly handed it to Sophie and wrapped an arm around her waist, propelling her over the short garden fence to join Markl in the field of long grass beyond.
"I haven't finished the gardening, Howl!" Sophie hissed as they walked.
"You work too much Sophie," he said pleasantly. "No one's told you, 'You have to finish gardening before supper, or else'!"
Well, that was true. Here she had been, slaving away when no one had forced her to do it in the first place, and getting angry at poor Howl when he'd told her to do nothing of the sort, and being just as sulky as Howl on a green slime day, and—
"Oh."
Howl barked a big-bellied laugh despite his tall, wiry frame. It made Sophie's chest hurt.
"I shall venture to do no more work from now on, then. How does that suit you?" She cocked a silvery eyebrow at him, making him laugh some more.
"And then who will do the work, hmm?" Sophie suggested as Howl launched the kite to join Markl's lesser red one in the sky, and wanted to add, 'Not you, surely!' But, she didn't
"Why, Markl will, of course!" He smiled and nudged the young boy's shoe with his shiny, knee-high boot.
"What?" Markl asked absently, staring enviously up at the magnificent silver kite, "What am I going to do?"
Sophie laughed. "You're going to become a mighty sorcerer!"
"That's right!" Markl proclaimed, nearly letting go of his red kite as he rested his fists on his hips. "Whoops!"
Howl calmed the wind while Markl went to chase after his little kite, Heen shuffling huffily behind him. Sophie looked up into Howl's face as he watched Markl run back toward them, looked and saw something, some sort of emotion flit behind his eyes as he smiled.
"You love him," she murmured.
"Why, of course." He looked mildly offended, but blushed all the same. "I'm all he has…" he trailed off, uncharacteristically. Howl was, after all, very calculating and always had entire conversations planned before they happened. Suddenly he looked back to her, the same emotion steeping into his voice as he said, "We're all he has."
"My, what a strange family we make," Sophie exclaimed as she tugged the kite-spool from his hands and coaxed it higher into the sky.
"Indeed," he murmured, never taking his eyes off of her.
Later, they all gathered around a round coffee table, sitting cross-legged on cushions conjured spontaneously and digging into the meal that Howl had insisted he cook. It was just spaghetti, but Howl had been proud so she didn't dare comment. Howl had even set place cards and poured wine seating himself next to her for the first time, asking her if the meatballs were too rare or if the pasta too gummy or if the wine too old or the bread too—
"Howl, this is lovely," she said, making him smile like a child on his birthday, and took a liberal bite of the overcooked meatball.
"Briddy gud," Markl admitted through a mouthful of pasta. "T's de occashun?"
"Oh, no occasion. But tell me, Markl, what are the magical properties of a rhombus?"
Calcifer snorted in the hearth, producing a flurry of sparks which made Howl scowl darkly. But, Markl never noticed and instead inquired as to what the duff a rhombus was.
"It's a diamond, Markl," Sophie answered, peering at Howl suspiciously, "perched on its side."
"Oh!" the boy exclaimed, and began rattling off his answer, successfully distracting himself from the unanswered question.
Sophie wasn't fooled, though, especially when she realized Howl was no longer speaking or making eye contact with her, but also paying no attention to Markl, who continued to proclaim his magical prowess. He had a pinkish tinge on his cheeks and was pushing food around his plate with a spoon.
After dessert they took a stroll around to a nearby stream, watching the sunset, with cherry pie on delicate scalloped plates, chatting about nothing in particular, until Sophie decided to voice the thoughts she'd been thinking lately (darn that stupid old biddy that still lurked in the back of her mind!).
"I think I'd like to go out to seek my fortune. I never really found it, you know."
Howl, who had been lounging back on his elbows, sat bolt upright and swung his head around to face her. "What?"
"I mean," Sophie faltered, "I've finished with my job here, haven't I? You're off to make another castle, you have your heart… I want to do something, do you understand?"
Howl was silent for a while, just staring at her with wide eyes, and then made an apparently full recovery, wide smile and all. "Of course, Sophie."
And that was that.
And, of course, Sophie didn't realize that night while crawling into her single futon-bed next to Howl, who was facing away from her on his fluffy futon, unlike how he slept every night, that she had made a grave error. In her wording or just speaking her mind (confound it all!), it wasn't clear, but by the next morning she surely would.
The next morning Sophie woke to a pile of dirty laundry that she'd never seen before, and an grand order for breakfast from Howl who spent not one or two, but three hours in his bathroom. Markl was confused as well, but went off to Porthaven on his own to gather some sea air for the current spell he was working on. Calcifer didn't say anything, which was quite suspicious because he was never short on words. Or complaints, more specifically.
Sophie sighed resignedly and began a breakfast of waffles and omelets and bacon and hash browns and French toast and sausage links and eggs sunny side up. Sweating and exhausted already, Sophie waited for Howl to emerge from his steamy hidey-hole, but only saw him for five minutes when he wolfed down some French toast and sausages, and then swooped out the door to God knows where, leaving Sophie with much more food than she could stomach.
She fed most of it to Calcifer, and threw out the rest.
The chores continued throughout the next week, sending Sophie into a much fouler mood than she'd had at the beginning of the week when she wasn't even being forced to do them.
And she wondered why she was even putting up with this.
With that, Sophie threw down her mending and stormed over to the door of the bathroom where Howl had been for an hour already. She banged on the door for only a moment until it was wrenched open and replaced by a pale chest, still wet from the bath, rising rapidly from adrenaline. She had beat on it only once before noticing his presence.
"What? What's wrong, Sophie?" Howl breathed, one hand fisted in a white towel around his hips and the other combing through his still wet, still black hair in an anxious motion.
"You! You're wrong. Terribly wrong! What right do you have to give me chores all day when you sit in a bathtub or make grand schemes or—"
"What's wrong with your chores?" he said flatly. "You never had a problem doing them before."
"Well, I was old and a busybody!"
"I don't really see how that's changed, Miss Nose."
"And stop calling me that! My name is Sophie Hatter. Sophie."
"Fine. Sophie. Now, what do you want?"
Sophie finally deflated. "Why are you giving me all these chores, Howl?"
He didn't say anything.
"You don't care about me at all, do you?" Her lip trembled pathetically. This wasn't turning out how she'd planned at all. "I'm just here to be your maid. That's all Sophie's ever good for! Cleaning! Mending! Cooking…"
She looked up at him with watery eyes, watching his face become impassive as he pulled the towel a little tighter around himself.
"Aren't you going to say anything?"
Nothing.
"I'm going to leave, Howl. Tomorrow."
Suddenly she saw the shift behind his eyes, the sorrow falling back into place, as it had been when she first met him. He turned and slammed the door in her face, leaving her to her mending.
She slumped in the chair in front of the hearth, and put her head in her hands.
It was only seconds until she felt warm fingers at her shoulder, pushing her to sit up and taking her hands away from her face.
Howl was standing in black trousers and a white linen shirt, unbuttoned completely, as if he'd just hastily thrown something on. Which, she supposed, he had.
He pulled her to her face and cupped her jaw with one hand.
"Sophie," he murmured.
"What?" she blubbered.
"I went about this the wrong way." He sighed. "I approached it as I would've before I met you. It was childish of me."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"I dumped you with things to do because… because you said you wanted to leave. You said you were finished with your job here, and so I thought, 'I can keep her here with me if I keep her working.' Because, if your job isn't done with, Sophie, then you won't leave. That's just one thing about you."
"What?"
"I know. And now you probably want to leave more than you wanted to in the first place."
"Howl, why couldn't you just tell me you didn't want me to go?"
He brushed her tears away with his thumbs then slid his hands down to hers to give them a squeeze. "I was a coward."
"But, I love you!" she said. "You know I love you, Howl."
"Then why do you want to leave?" he suddenly whined, frustrated apparently, and looked away in embarrassment.
"I don't!"
"What?" It was his turn for confusion.
"You never told me how you felt about me, Howl! I thought it would be better to move away and move on than spend forever just pining after a man who never returned the feeling!"
"Oh, Sophie. I'm so sorry. I… I'm just no good at these sorts of things. I do. I do love you. So much!" He wrapped her into a fierce hug and buried his nose in her hair. "I'm sorry, Sophie," he mumbled into her silvery hair.
She just hugged back.
Later, Howl cooked again, and it wasn't much of an improvement on his last venture, but Sophie enjoyed it more because he sat next to her, making conversation and not asking for reassurance, and his eyes shone with a new light now that he knew all was well. Sophie expected the same light shone from her eyes, because Markl peered suspiciously over his big bowl of stew at them, eyes narrowed as he watched their chatter in silence.
And that night, she crawled into bed, nestled warm and safe into her duvet, and rolled over to see Howl facing her as well. He smiled, beatifically, in the darkness, and reached an arm out for her. She slipped her hand in his, and suddenly he yanked her toward him, dragging her futon all sixteen inches to bump into his. He rested a hand in her hair and pulled her ever closer, nuzzling her nose.
Sophie brought her lips to his in a chaste but perfect kiss, all the same.
They fell asleep in each other's arms, tangled around their own sheets as they subconsciously tried to get as close as possible.
Sophie Hatter was no longer a confused young woman, by any means, she was a happy one.
And she knew right where she belonged.
Even if it was in a yurt.
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*.org/wiki/Yurt