A Dream for this Kingdom

Spoilers for Chapter 74: Role and Duty

Heine and Viktor were sharing a glass of their usual favourite in the shadows of Viktor's office; the fire had burned low, and so had the conversation.

'Tell me, Heine. Do you think that friendships can be… planned?'

Heine blinked, and set his glass down. 'All right, all right. Forgive me for being so inattentive that you had to regain my attention with such a nonsensical statement. And what is this — a poor attempt to wax lyrical over a glass of wine?'

'Ouch. What — friends are allowed to be random, aren't they?'

'With you as king, it seems that anything is allowed in this kingdom.' Heine considered for a moment. 'Well, what exactly is your question?'

'I'll try.' Viktor stared at the fireplace for a moment. 'I was wondering if you thought friendships could be… wrought of planned circumstances, so to speak? If fate had a hand in it, or other powers, even.'

'I think that some friendships are dependent on the ability to comprehend rhetoric nonsense. But that's just my opinion.'

'Cold!'

Heine ignored Viktor's theatrics and took up his glass again. 'I was merely answering your question. And you have no right to pass judgement on a response to a question that is inherently absurd.' He sighed. 'To answer your question properly… no, not really. Many psychologists state that the idea of…' Heine gestured vaguely, '…kindred sprits and such is an unrealistic.'

'Oh come on, Heine — don't turn it into a lesson. I'm sure you have some sentiment in your soul somewhere.' Viktor smiled and got up, standing beside the window to look out at the violet-stained view of Wienner. 'Think about it. Fate, destiny… Surely that has to make you feel something — '

'It makes me feel as though you've been reading too much poetry.'

Viktor gave him an unimpressed look. 'You're quite impossible.'

'And you are too.' Heine put his arm over the back of the chair and said, 'What are you even trying to say?'

'Nothing of much consequence. I just… I just thought it kind of sounded like our friendship, in a way. You know? We can read each other like open books, and we know each other inside out, and we happened to meet despite being from two different worlds. What are the chances of that?

Heine paused. Then said, 'True. And considering how inept I am at maintaining friendships of any sort… if there were something special holding ours together, maybe I wouldn't be surprised.'

A soft smile touched Viktor's face. 'Mm.'

The fireplace crackled in the background. Heine absently traced a six-point star on the armrest of the chair. 'Heh.'

'What?'

'Nothing, I was just thinking about how my… being Kvel comes up even in the little things. What was the word… Ah, bashert. It means destiny. In the Kvel faith, it's believed that God orchestrates all events, and foreordains all meetings through His divine will.'

'…That's nice,' Viktor said. 'I know you don't like talking about your heritage, but I like to hear about it. And you hadn't told me of the Kvel people in Glanzreich, all those years ago…' Viktor shrugged. 'Then who would have?'

'Someone else. There are millions of us, after all.'

'Hilarious, very funny.' Viktor opened the curtains further, spilling starlight across the carpet like powdered diamonds. 'I think you need to give yourself more credit. On a different note, it's nice to think that God may have had a hand in bringing us together.'

A glittering landscape of 1.3 million lights was framed in the window, framing the two of them. Only shining so brightly because of everything Viktor had done to make it so. And if Heine voiced the thought aloud, as he often did — Viktor would give him the same reply — that he couldn't have done anything if it wasn't for Heine. A cause-and-effect circle, endlessly circling the face of a battered old pocket watch.

Heine wouldn't have been inclined to believe in providence before he met Viktor. But now that he had… it was hard to stay cynical. No, if there were ever a reason to him believe in providence — it was undoubtedly Viktor.

'Maybe the reason we met was to… I don't know…'

'Change each other's lives?'

'I was going to say something a little less self-centred, like, "change the kingdom."'

'One and the same, are they not? One can only change a kingdom by understanding it through empathy with its people. Or rather…' Viktor took up his glass, and clinked it against Heine's with a smile. 'Empathy with a person. And for that matter, we have one other thing in common. We both share a dream for this kingdom.'

'That we do.' And Heine cracked the faintest of smiles in return.

The End

A/N: Reviews welcome, and thanks for reading!