Note: Written for a prompt. Warning for fictional (o noes!) incest.


When it started, she was drawn to the mysterious pirate captain like a moth to a flame. She watched when the others clowned around and, as time passed, she became certain she was falling in love. When Butz and Galuf discovered Faris's true sex, she was so very confused. Princesses were expected to marry princes or bestow favors on handsome knights, not fall for dashing pirate captains who were really women.

Why this confusion only served to stoke the attraction between them, she didn't know. Not then. More time passed and the odd, wary circling she and Faris did around each other led to awkward, too-tense silences when the guys were asleep or doing their own thing. At the time she wondered if it would eventually degenerate into a fight over something inconsequential, but that never held up to how protective Faris seemed to be towards her. Then, when Syldra died...

Butz and Galuf left them alone together in the Walse inn and hoped Lenna would be able to offer more support that they could. Her captain was so distraught over Syldra's death that she thought nothing of brushing away the hair and placing a feather-light kiss on Faris's forehead. The warm body in her arms tensed and she wondered if she'd gone too far.

"Don't do anything you'll regret," Faris admonished in a voice that sounded a little too hoarse. Lenna clung to this reaction as a possibility that the attraction was mutual, settled to face the older woman, and pressed on.

The words were said with her lips so close to Faris's that it was a wonder she made any sense. "What makes you think I'd regret this?"

Faris clutched her close moments before responding with a kiss that made Lenna weak in the knees and wanting more. One kiss turned into two into three into four, until status no longer mattered. The older woman's work-calloused fingers felt marvelous between her legs, and Lenna never hesitated to return the favor with equal zeal.

They became so close after that, yet hid their affair from Butz and Galuf's eyes. Stolen kisses and nighttime caresses were what she lived for, even as a knot of foreboding in her stomach made its presence known each morning. The more she thought on it, the more Faris matched up with vague memories and her parents' tales of Sarisa. Even as she brought up the subject, Faris automatically denied it and Lenna hoped she was wrong.

Then they ran into her father and Faris admitted to being Sarisa. The night after their father's death, she wrapped an arm around her captain's thin waist and waited until Faris pulled away. "We shouldn't do this," her sister whispered as explanation, and that was the end of their nightly visits.

It was when they were in Regole that she found an opportunity to be alone with her captain again. Butz and Galuf had gone out to drink, leaving them alone to deal with whatever this was between them.

"I miss you," Lenna whispered into the dark, hoping Faris was awake. The dry, humorless chuckle was assurance enough that at least her sister was listening now.

"Never left your side."

Of course she'd resist. Lenna took hold of what courage she had and left her bed to crawl into Faris's. She wrapped her arm again around her sister's hip and pressed her forehead against the slender shoulder. "I miss this. Us."

"We can't-"

"Why not? We didn't grow up together," she said, hoping that reason would work when nothing else could. "Not really. We can't have children together. No one knows. No one has to know. Can't we continue what we had before?"

Faris remained silent, but the easing of tension in her shoulders was a promising sign. They remained together in this awkward pose until Lenna's hand slid up her captain's waist. Faris's hand stopped it before it went any further and she sighed. "You make a tempting argument, Princess."

"I know best," Lenna teased. To her delight, her tall, beautiful captain nudged her back onto the bed into a position more suitable for ravishing.