Hoshido chills him.
It is an ironic statement, since it is at least ten degrees warmer than it could ever be in Nohr, but Leo finds himself shuddering as a flower-scented breeze stirs his hair and his horse's mane.
"Pretty." Niles comments as he looks all around at the elegant pagoda roofing of the houses, the pale blossoms gracing the trees, and the clean white stones of the pavements. (So different than when they had marched upon the city, fires eating away at the buildings, smoke and screams rising in the distance, blood pooling like water on the ground.) "Too pretty." The archer adds, frowning.
Odin looks nervous, fiddling with his reins, making his horse toss her head as they ride by Leo's side. "The bright atmosphere of this land conceals a hateful darkness." He rolls his shoulder backwards, as if there's a knot in his neck he cannot be rid of.
Leo notices what his retainers are pointing out. The commoners, bustling about their morning routines, are dressed in bright clothes, their gazes turning acrid when they recognize the black and gold trappings of Nohr. The people pause to make way for them, but several shrink visibly away when they pass as if the Nohrians carry the plague.
And indeed there is something thick and sour in the air, so tangible Leo could practically taste it. And it is equally dangerous. Hate. Fear. But there is also a haughty pride, for not one of the Hoshidans Leo passes lowers their heads.
The unspoken message stays with them all the way to the capital.
You are not wanted here.
O.O
"Welcome to Castle Shirasagi, Prince Leo." Queen Hinoka sits stiffly in layers of royal cloth, hands folded in her lap. Her retainers lurk behind her, faces impassive. "I am glad to see you safe. How was your journey to the capital?"
The throne room is a kaleidoscope of color, the cheery afternoon sunshine filling the chambers like one fills a glass with light. The kimonos of the noble are bright with breathtaking hues, patterns of birds and rivers rippling with every movement.
It's blinding.
"Very pleasant, your Highness." Leo replies, bowing his head low in polite deference. "We met with no trouble."
"Good." Hinoka falls silent, biting her lip, and the retainer on her right, the brown-haired priest, touches her shoulder briefly, reigns in whatever emotions had been troubling her. "How is your family? I regret not being able to attend your brother the king's nuptials."
Leo summons forth memories of Xander, of his wife. "They are doing well, your Highness. They are happily enjoying the married life as we speak."
"And how's…" Hinoka leans forward. "How's Corrin?"
The atmosphere in the room drops. The sunlight suddenly seems too bright, the clothes too gaudy. Leo speaks calmly, perhaps too calmly. "Corrin is fine. He sends his greetings."
Her face clenches, and Leo hears the nobles whisper amongst themselves. Odin shifts behind him, and Niles mutters something unintelligible.
"Well, you are most welcome here." The queen's eyes look like glittering, hard stones, giving Leo the impression that her words contradict her true feelings. "I hope you will find the chambers we prepared for you to your liking."
"Thank you, your Highness." Leo bows again, but when he looks up, Hinoka is standing, already beginning to stride out of the room with no ceremony of dismissal at all. When Leo starts in disbelief, her eyes, those cold glittering stones, whip around to glare straight at him.
Their gazes locked, the two members of royalty stare silently at each other. Her glare is a rapier, twisting and plunging, and his is a broadsword, parrying and deflecting.
Then the queen shakes her head and walks most out of the chamber.
The other lords trickle out of the throne room following the queen's exit, their robes trailing on the ground like the plumage of exotic birds. They refuse to meet Niles' and Odin's outraged eyes.
"The insolent-" Niles begins to rage, but snaps his mouth shut when Leo sharply shushes him.
A soft, pale waif-like girl is standing in the open doorway of the room, the door way that had been left open by Hinoka's impulsive departure. Her eyes are not hard or cold. They are gentle and unbearably sad.
Such a look should not belong on a girl her age.
Leo finds his voice. "Princess Sakura."
She curtsies. "Prince Leo."
O.O
The next few days are uncomfortable. No one is quite relaxed enough with Leo around, from the shifting court nobles to the scurrying palace servants. Any exchanges are abrupt, curt, and withdrawn.
The ambassadorial duties are another form of torture. They speak of borders and regions, of harvest surpluses, of taxes and deficits. Leo speaks clearly and distinctly, pointing at maps and gesturing at documents, and Hinoka nods and agrees and demurs.
They don't talk of Raijinto in Ryoma's gut. They don't talk of Takumi and the broken Fujin Yumi.
Sakura is the only one who attempts to extend a hand of hospitality to him. She shows him the gardens, the cherry trees, the ikebana arrangements tied with twine. She walks him down the gravel paths that wind around the burbling river, past the archery ranges, the training courts.
Leo lauds the beauty of the gardens appropriately, and yet he can't help but glance at her apprehensively and indeed will catch her staring longingly away into the desolate archery range, where there is only a young servant boy sweeping the grounds.
And then she will turn around, noticing the way his eyes are tracking her features, and will shrink slightly, walking away to lead him to another part of the garden.
Leo wonders if this was all somehow calculated.
O.O
One day, as he is in the library, poring over several Hoshidan books on magic, his tongue slow to form the unfamiliar words of the complex language, Sakura slips to the seat by his side to read.
They pore over their respective books together silently for some time, until Leo notices that she is shaking, trembling from some barely contained emotion. He says her name tentatively. "Princess Sakura…?"
She jolts to attention, staring wide-eyed at him, scrambling away from him. "W-what!"
"Forgive me, I didn't mean to startle you." Leo says with some alarm; the wild light in her eyes is unsettling him. "Are…are you well, Princess?"
"I'm f-fine." Sakura flips open to her page again, her fingers trembling and Leo realizes with alarm that he smells the sharp tang of magic forming, of a spell being summoned.
He opens his mouth to shout, he's moving forward, but the Nohrian prince is too slow. "Princess-!"
It happens like a thunderbolt. A snap of magic so powerful that the nearby shelves explode with flying books, splinters of wood, and debris erupting from the ground. There's a ringing in his ears, shouts from down the corridor, and her panicked gasping above his ear. There's a man, someone with angry crimson eyes, screaming Lord Ryoma's name.
Leo's vision is blurred from the impact, but he dimly perceives the timid princess Sakura bending over him with her hands aglow, and the dizzying magnetic pull of her magic, like inertia, is making his head swim.
"It happened today." Sakura whispered. Tears are running down her face. "They both died today."
"Wha..?" He stammers. Leo feels something wet running down his neck. Is it blood? "Who?" He vaguely hears the panicked shouts of Odin, the sharp calls of Niles.
"This is w-wrong…" Sakura is weeping, her hands braced over his chest, the eerie green glow intensifying. "This is so, so wrong…"
Leo has only a moment to realize that she meant her brothers when something hard pushes his chest and he completely blacks out.
O.O
A flickering candle. A heavy tome open to a page on magic circles. A shadow leaning over him. A soft, thoughtful voice.
"Magic stems from both the strength of your mind and the intensity of your feelings, young prince. The emotionless cannot control magic. The emotional cannot control magic. Yet an extremist can wreak havoc unparalleled."
"Because they care too much or too less?"
"No, my prince. Because they CARE."
O.O
They tell him that it was an unprovoked attack from a ninja and a diviner, both sons of feudal lords who had lost their fathers in the defeat of Hoshido. They tell him that one third of the palace had been annihilated by the cumulative force of both his defense magic and the diviner's spirits colliding.
They tell him (eyes averted) that Princess Sakura had saved his life.
O.O
Hinoka visits him once in the infirmary, he thinks. Leo can't really remember. Maybe she had visited him. Maybe she had apologized formally in front of the witnesses. Maybe, when all the other had left, she had stared tiredly at him, finally breaking the thick silence with the words,
"Tell Corrin I send my greetings as well."
Maybe it was all just a fever-induced hallucination.
O.O
Sakura turns at the sound of his footsteps, her eyes clear and focused. She meets his gaze. "You shouldn't be up yet." She says softly. "You'll stretch your wounds."
The princess is sitting on the porch of her antechamber, holding a sprig of her namesake in her hands. She's plucking the petals off one by one, watching them fall lazily to the ground. The prince realizes with a twinge of something akin to guilt and shock that the sakura branch was charred with ash.
Leo sits stiffly next to her, wincing at the painful twinge in his side. "I know." He says. "I wanted to talk with you."
Sakura blinks. "About what?"
He smiles faintly at her innocent ignorance. "To thank you. They said you saved my life."
She ducks her head. "I'm a shrine maiden. It's my duty..." The blush staining her cheeks throbs briefly before fading away. "You shouldn't thank me."
"Of course I should." Leo turns to look down at her, to see her hands fisting in her lap, the pose mirroring her sister's. "Why wouldn't I?"
"You don't understand." Sakura mumbles, and when Leo frowns, she turns crimson and begins to stammer, "I h-hated you, in the library. You were reading so c-calmly, looking so normal, and nothing is normal for m-me anymore. Y-You have all your s-siblings, you have C-Corrin…" She's gasping now, gulping for air. "You have everything."
"Sakura," Leo says abruptly, reaching out to touch her arm, and she shrinks away. He forces himself to speak more gently. "I meant to say, you have things I cannot aspire to ever possess. I admire your fortitude. You insist on showing me your castle, even though I can see your reluctance to do so. You possess a sort of quality that raises you above the other nobility. It is not your title that awes me. It is your strength and inner heart that makes me marvel."
Sakura's eyes are wide, her mouth open, and Leo, feeling a flush of slight embarrassment swamp him, clamps his jaw shut. When she doesn't say anything for a good while, he winces inwardly and stands, preparing to leave. "My apologies." He mumbles, feeling like an imbecile for overwhelming the princess. "With your permission, I'll take my leave."
"W-wait, Leo." A hand tugs at his sleeve, and he looks down in surprise to see her holding on to his tunic with a slightly shaky hand. At the back of his mind, Leo absently registers that the pink strands have grown to a length which can be brushed aside with a sweep of his fingers.
"I'm sorry. I was a bit startled, is all." Sakura's voice is muted by the curtain of silvery rose hair, and Leo resists the urge to move her hair aside. Instead, he awkwardly kneels down to be on equal level with her, folding her small hands in his larger ones. The sakura branch is clasped between their fingers.
"Thank you, Leo." The soft, almost tender, use of his name sends an electric thrill through him. "This means much to me."
"You're welcome, my lady." Leo releases her hand. Sakura holds on to the burnt branch of her namesake, running her hand along the knolls and the buds. He speaks up after a moment of silence. "Is that the flower for which you were named for?"
"Yes." The fair-haired princess turns to carefully place the branch in his hands. "There is a saying in my country: That which goes through fire and still remains whole; consider it divine. This branch is all that remains of a mighty cherry tree in the front courtyard."
"It's beautiful. Almost like it was never hurt in the first place."
"Not quite. It will never grow on its own again, nor will it be able to graft to another cherry tree." Sadness has bloomed in her voice. "Right now, it is a ghost of its former beauty. It's only fate is to be placed in a box of glass and silk, to be looked at and pitied until it fades into dust."
Leo shakes his head firmly. "No." He takes the sprig from her hands and plucks a small, unharmed blossom from its stem. "It is to be held in esteem and placed in a place of true beauty."
He uses his fingers to brush her hair behind her ear, and nestles the flower in a nest of silvery strands. Leo sits back, admiring the lovely effect it has on the princess, who is staring at him with wide eyes. Her eyes brim with tears.
"There." Leo's voice is soft, kind. He's smiling. "Hold your head high, Sakura. I consider you divine."
Her sobs are the sounds of confused and uncomprehending happiness.
O.O
Prince Leo of Nohr returned back to his own country soon after. The assassination attempt made on his life aggravated several members of the Nohrian court to aggression against the Hoshidan kingdom, but the efforts to retaliate were deterred by the same said prince.
When asked by the High King why he'd taken so well to the Hoshidans, the younger prince simply replied, "You can say that I held the branch of a burnt sakura tree in my hands.
O.O
Fin