Yours to Command
By: Amber Michelle
Several years post-game. Written for the August 24 theme at 31 Days.
Lehran/Sanaki pairing. I understand some people find that squicky, but I think it makes a lot of sense. There is a little snippet that came before this, but I don't think it's important enough to bother with.
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Lehran was prepared for Sanaki's formal visit to Serenes Forest, present and accounted for at the public hall when she arrived with her knights to greet Tibarn. Even though he knew what to expect, he stared when she slid from her pegasus and stood as tall as Sigrun, and at the length of her hair hanging dark and heavy over her back, almost to her knees. The official greeting was short, and they were invited inside the complex to inspect their accommodations - a three room cottage with a tile roof and a facade of river stones, and stables for their mounts - before a light afternoon repast of cucumber bisque was served to blunt the edge of the summer heat. The stone structure remained relatively cool, but the air blown in through the open shutters was heated, carrying the scent of parched grass and pine.
He sipped mint tea beside Naesala at a round table in the banquet hall, and tried to avoid meeting Sigrun's gaze. Tanith wouldn't acknowledge his presence. And though Sanaki spared smiles for him, he could not steal a moment alone with her. Tanith never left her side, though Sigrun disappeared for a time, and the other herons wanted her attention, then Kilvas, then Ulki. Nealuchi likely wasn't far away and would pounce on her immediately.
He could have joined them. She would never make him compete for her attention. What he wanted to say wasn't special, or confidential; it wasn't even particularly eloquent, but to invite her with so many people listening--
"My lord."
Lehran blinked and looked away from the indigo shine of the empress's hair. "Sigrun." He stepped back. Naesala was nowhere to be found. "Can I help you with something?"
She averted her gaze. "The empress has requested your time tomorrow afternoon." Sigrun's wrist rested on the hilt of her sword, and when she flicked her eyes up to him again they had the same steely glint. "She wants to tour your home. We will inspect the premises first to guarantee her safety - with your permission, of course."
"Of course." He would have ordered the same if their places were reversed.
"I'm sure I don't have to tell you to be careful, not to take any--"
"No." Lehran pulled his wings against his back to keep from flaring or appearing aggressive. The knight took note of that, but he wasn't sure she knew the meaning of such gestures. "No harm will come to her under my roof. You may search, and then depart. The hawks make their rounds every hour on the mark, and you may ask them for news." Sigrun frowned, but it wasn't her opinion that mattered. He pressed his lips together and turned away from her before he could be tempted to say so. "I'll hear it if you linger. Be sure you don't."
Her sharp sigh ruffled his feathers, but she turned away without another word, and Lehran listened to the creak of her armor until it faded into the ambient noise of the chamber. He caught the empress watching him from the corner of her eyes, and bowed in her direction. Then he left. There was work to be done before she arrived.
.
.
The empress was escorted to his home the next afternoon, and her knights departed as promised once they surveyed the area and checked every corner of his garden. Sanaki apologized when they left. It isn't you. There was an attempt on my life last year, and ever since they've been overly diligent. They know you won't hurt me.
Did they? Or were they simply reluctant to voice their discontent? He imagined the topic of "Sephiran" had come up once or twice in the years since their parting.
His home was a large square flat divided with screens into different living areas: one for sleep, one for bathing, places for work and dining. Bunches of herbs and flowers hung from hooks in the wall to dry, soap cured on a rack in the corner. The garden encircled them, broken with a small tributary stream from which he drew his water, crowded with hydrangea and lavender on one side and overtaken with a kitchen garden on the other. Camellia climbed the walls and tangled with the wisteria. Sanaki brushed the edge of a red blossom with her fingers.
It grows wild, she noted. Don't you cultivate it? Why did he choose camellia, when it clashed with the other blooms? Why let the lavender overtake the yard? He explained their uses; the camellia nuts were for oil and food, and the flowers for their scent compounds. The process was somewhat difficult to explain, but her attention never wavered.
They went inside, and he offered her a bowl of strawberries. She ate them in tiny bites, holding the stems between her fingers, and he forgot to take any for himself.
"I wish I'd come earlier," she said. Her lips were pinkened even after she licked the juice away. "I thought I should give you time, but so many things happened-- the senate is only marginally more cooperative. I wish I could get rid of them entirely."
"I thought the same of you." Lehran watched her kiss the juice from her fingers and tried to think of the right words, of anything that would not be an apology for the events of a decade ago, which she'd told him would be unwelcome. "You spoke of punishment..."
It wasn't what he'd meant to say, but Sanaki simply smiled and offered him a strawberry. "You think too much."
That was true. He couldn't stop thinking when he looked at her. How did ten years make such a difference? She was just a child when he left - a precocious, beautiful, somewhat imperious child, but he only had himself to blame for the last. He told her many times not to accept less than her due as empress, not to allow his colleagues to make her believe she was a simple child. You are the Apostle--
The strawberry was tart, only just ripe and hardly sweet at all. He turned away, angled his wings so she could walk beside him, and guided her by the elbow into the living area. There were cushions arranged around a low table on the floor, but they paused by the window instead. It arched over their heads like a frame. "Now that you've seen Serenes in the daylight, what do you think of it?"
"Everything was in ruins the last time I was here." Sanaki spread her hands on the stone sill, leaning out to look up at the wisteria dangling from the eaves. Green clusters hid among the leaves, close to blooming. "I don't know why, but I didn't expect everything to be built of stone."
"We don't want to cut the trees down." Lehran reached past her shoulder to untangle a curl of vines, careful of the bracts. "Stone is easy to quarry, and it doesn't hurt anything."
She turned her back to the window and leaned on the edge. "You can barely lift me."
"Stone is easy for hawks to quarry," he said, and Sanaki laughed. "The hall was built first, but I've had time to settle in. Ten years."
"Yes."
He watched her profile, but she made it look like his decor had all her attention. "Time passes slowly here." Lehran let the vines twirl out of his grasp. "I didn't realize."
She pulled hair over her shoulder and combed her fingers through it, eyes on the dappled shadows shifting on the opposite wall, catching tangles and working them out until it was a smooth, glossy river long enough she had to stretch her arm full length to reach the ends. It was so stubborn when she was younger - so fine, always knotting at her neck. How she'd hated it when he had it cut. She was always angry with him afterward, but he couldn't stand to see her face twist and redden when it was combed. Lehran had always had long hair, but it fell into place like every strand knew where it belonged, even after he lost the essence of his heritage. He never understood why hers wouldn't cooperate.
Sanaki's hair was dark, but it shined red in the sun like dusk. He pulled a strand free and twisted it around his finger.
"Lehran."
His feathers ruffled. He let the curl slip away, and he stared at his empty hand for a moment. "Sanaki."
She faced him and twisted her rope of hair around her hands. "I don't know what to call you anymore."
"Whatever you want," he said, clasping his hands behind him. Her eyes were gold, bright, like her foremother's. Even if he'd wanted to deflect her attention it would have been hard to turn away from the line of confusion between her brows and the quick flash of her teeth biting her lip. It was stained dark with berry juice. "I am yours to command."
.
When it was time to take her back she begged him for another handful of berries and bar of his soap because, she told him, he smelled good. An empress can't use plain soap, she told him, holding the cake to her nose to breathe in. All they give me is rose. I can't stand it. What do you put in this?. Honey, Lehran said. Honey, rosemary, lavender, nettle. Of course he harvested everything himself - he couldn't expect a hawk or a raven to do it correctly. They always crushed the leaves or got themselves stung, and then he'd have to take the time to heal them. You'd think they'd never set foot in a wood before.
Sanaki seemed to find that amusing. She teased him for his prejudices all the way to the public complex, where her knights waited in the cottage set aside for her visit. He escorted her to the door, and left before he could be invited in and asked to face Sigrun or Tanith. It was enough to know they were reluctant to let her visit him without a guard.
They couldn't be blamed. He'd never raised a hand to Sanaki, and never would, but her knights would never forget what happened in the tower.
There was a thatch of strawberry vines north of the lake where he'd met her the first time, over a month ago. Blackberry twisted around the branches there, hanging down in thorny, straggling curtains that fed a community of scarlet-faced tanagers living high in the trees. He listened to them sing the next morning as he picked the unblemished clusters of berries, flaring his wings to shoo the birds away.
She was full of questions about wings, and herons, and bird tribes. Why do your feathers fluff out like that? How do you reach back to groom them? How do you sleep? Sanaki barely said a word about herself. But you already know Begnion, she said, and I know nothing about you. How was it that Leanne and Naesala could mate? Would their children always end up like that? Did herons mate for life?
Not that he knew of. Lehran's generation was an odd one, however, and he was the only one left to remember it. The young ones, Leanne and Reyson, were too new and too different to be a true measure of their ancestors' habits.
"I tried," she'd said the other night, leaning back on her elbows and letting the grass part and bend around her. "Because I have to eventually. That suitor I mentioned wanting to drive away - he was one of them, and I suppose he thinks he's entitled to my attention now. I made it clear I do not intend to marry, but he won't listen."
"He is not the only one, I suppose?" Lehran spread his wings and let them relax, reaching over to pull her hair free of a stalk of grass. "Your predecessors didn't marry often, either. You've broken so many traditions they must think you will consider changing that one as well if they press you."
"Not likely. Though I do intend to be different," Somehow, in the course of their conversation, she'd neglected to explain further.
He couldn't have watched that quietly. Merely hearing she'd taken lovers left him tense, and his protests knotted up in his throat because he couldn't let them out - it was her right and responsibility. He told her so. As the last living descendant of Altina, it was doubly important she produce a family, or the peace she worked so hard for in Begnion would shatter upon her death. They couldn't easily turn to Micaiah now the Apostolic tradition was broken.
She didn't say it, but he knew why she was vacationing in Serenes. The diplomatic mission was a smokescreen; she and Tibarn signed the treaty that morning, the stipulations already discussed and agreed upon. Her knights only kept their distance, he suspected, because their presence would remind her of what she must return to later.
Leanne brought Sanaki to him that afternoon, when the sun had dipped low enough to be hidden behind the canopy and cast long shadows. The empress was in white again, a plain dress and a light cloak, clasped at the neck with gold filigree. They were talking with their heads tilted together, and Sanaki was hardly watching where she placed her feet because her attention was riveted to her guide. They fell silent when he approached, and Leanne's smile was too wide to be entirely innocent.
You're thinking too hard about it, she said in the old tongue, relinquishing Sanaki's hand. Only beorc hesitate and worry about every little thing, and before they know it time has taken their choices away.
"I am often accused of that," Lehran said. Consider her position. It isn't that simple.
"Yes it is." She turned to the empress. "I'll take those orders to your knights. Have fun."
Sanaki gave her a piece of parchment folded and sealed with her insignia, and Leanne saluted her as the knights did, taking to the air with a smooth leap and a few strong beats of her wings. The branches stirred in her wake.
"It was bad enough when they did that amongst themselves," Sanaki said when she took his arm. "Even when half the conversation is in a language I can understand, I can't. How cryptic do you herons have to be?"
Lehran laughed, just a short, soft sound. "It isn't cryptic at all." What would Kilvas say? Something shocking, probably. Any laguz would be straightforward, he thought, but he'd not counted himself as one of their number for so long. He smoothed her hand at his elbow and said, voice modulated to be neutral, "She just told me I should stop avoiding the issue and claim you before someone else does."
Sanaki stumbled. "She what?" His shoulders shook, and she yanked on his arm. "I can't believe--!"
"Kilvas hasn't told you how brazen she is when she wants--"
"I don't want to know!"
"That makes two of us." Lehran let himself laugh, and pulled her more quickly down the path, waiting for her color to fade from pink back to white. He could see why the raven poked fun at her so often. "I'm sorry. It's what he would have said."
Sanaki covered her mouth, but her eyes crinkled and gave her away. "Since when do you take your cues from Kilvas?"
He led her through the garden gate and held his door open for her. "Something must have tainted the water."
Bees hummed outside the arched window while they sat on the ledge, shaded by the wisteria, while he showed her the stitch Leanne used to sew lace and embellishments onto her clothes. Of course she didn't need to know how, but she wanted to - herons seem to make everything beautiful, she said, even something as simple as a side seam. How do you enclose it like that? How do you made those ridges, those folds, why does your coat flare out like that? Why do you know this?
"We do everything for ourselves," he said. "If you harvest the grain with your own hands, and gather the fibers to weave together into cloth, you gain a stronger appreciation for where your possessions are from and how they are used."
"Then--" Sanaki reached for the bolt of fabric he cut their sample from and unrolled a length over her knees. "You made this? You wove it?" She held it up to the light, close to her face. But it's so smooth, she said softly, like silk, and fingered the edge, lowering the fabric to look at him.
Lehran held his arms out and let her examine his sleeves. "I've had nothing better to do. The loom is out back, under the arbor," he said when she looked around the room. "This is time-consuming. I'd rather do it outside."
She sat back. "You were dressing down in Begnion."
He smiled. "No. I was glad to let someone else do the work for me."
"I imagine." She leaned forward, propping her chin on her fists. "I never thought I'd see you so domestic."
He didn't dignify that with a reply. The fabric went back to its chest, and she commanded he show her how to make yogurt. The process didn't charm her nearly as much, but Sanaki didn't let that discourage her. You always told me not to leave milk out overnight, she said, and now you're telling me that's how this is done? She liked it well enough when he drizzled it with honey and served it with wedges of fruit, however. He had to explain why milk was fine when he couldn't eat meat or eggs, and the skeptical lift of her eyebrow was ruined by the way she devoured the berries he'd collected, one by one, with two slender fingers she licked clean after every bite in defiance of better manners.
Lehran didn't eat very much; he didn't need to. Everything was for her. When her curiosity was satisfied he asked her how the time passed in Begnion. What sort of proposals did she develop, how often did she speak with her sister, what were relations between the provinces like without the senior senators? Was Oliver really one of her advisers, and if so, how on earth did she keep him in line? What possessed her to make such a silly decision?
"You don't like Duke Tanas?" Sanaki smiled behind her hand. "But he likes you so very much. He begged me to bring him along." His feathers molted and ruffled, and she laughed, sliding closer to him, and reached to smooth them with her fingers. He snapped the wing away and her eyes widened. "I'm sorry, did I--?"
"It's fine." Lehran took a deep breath and relaxed against her hand, his face turned away. He felt the feathers shift to accommodate her fingers. "Not many people do that." Altina, Ashunera. Reyson - only to help in the most extreme circumstances.
Sanaki stroked his flight feathers, and moved her fingers up to the soft layers at the arch. "They're bent out of place here."
He let her nudge them back, spreading his wing when she asked him to, and listened to speculation regarding the senate and what should be done with the body. Should it be disbanded, or restructured? She wanted to avoid the problem she and her grandmother had by rewriting the balance of power completely, but the distant areas of Begnion still needed representatives, and assurances their concerns would be considered by the government. The priesthood was a mess, and she frankly didn't want to bother with it. Tanith was drowning in applications from hopeful pegasus knights. Sigrun was less a commander now and more of an adviser, because nobody was right for his former position. Who was there to trust, besides her knights?
They talked well into the night. The moon had risen and set before she realized what time it was and trailed off into silence. Instead of sending her home, Lehran found an extra robe and allowed her use of his bathing area, and then his bed. The forest wasn't dangerous, but the trek back to the hall was long, and tiring for someone unaccustomed to the walk.
"Wait," she said when he turned to leave. "What are you going to do?"
He looked back, shrugged. "The nights are pleasant this time of year. I'll--"
"No." Sanaki sat up. "There's room for both of us."
Lehran watched the neckline of his robe slip over her shoulder and jerked his eyes away. "No, I don't think..."
"I'll feel better if you're here." He heard her shift, and pull the quilt aside. "I don't like staying in strange rooms alone."
When put that way, he couldn't say no. The room was pitch dark after he snuffed out the light, disturbed by the sounds of the wind and scraping branches, and the calls of night hunters. He lay on his side, wings curving over the edge of the futon, against the floor, and Sanaki curled against him. Her hands wove into his hair, and she wouldn't let go.
When she was very small and still afraid of the dark, she used run all the way to his rooms and crawl between his sheets once he'd gone to bed. He would wake up to find her little hands tangled in his hair and her face pressed against his neck. Then she would comb it out, doing her royal best to manage it without pulling too hard. We have to do something about these tangles, Sephiran. You really must take better care of yourself, she'd said, picking apart knots the size of her own fists.
Lehran wrapped his arms around her waist and told himself this was no different. She was taller, shapelier, and smelled like his herbal soap. The slits in the back of his robe, made for wings, bared the arch of her back. He spread his hand over the curve and felt the shallow ridges of her spine under warm, smooth skin.
The sky was pale before he fell asleep.
.
.
Heat had already blanketed the forest when he woke up, and the sunlight was diffused and hazy through the vines and his curtains. He could smell the spice of wisteria - they'd bloomed finally, and he heard the drone of bees and the whisper of humming birds' wings. The quilt was gone, probably kicked to the floor by one of them during the night, and Sanaki was behind him. He could hear her breathing, and felt her fingers tugging on his hair.
"I can't believe it gets so tangled," she said when he looked back, smoothing a handful. "What did you do?"
"What did I do?" He reached back and pulled her under his wing, back onto the cushion, and sat up when she'd clambered over his legs. "My hair only tangles in your presence, my lady."
Sanaki's smile spread wide and she covered it with her hands. His sleeves were too long and folded over her fingertips. "I'm told women complicate life in general," she said, draping her arms over his shoulders to gather his hair. "This is just a metaphor."
"One you planned carefully," Lehran said, pressing his nose to her throat, "unless I am mistaken, and your knights are outside, ready to demand I return you." Beneath the fading rosemary scent was the powdery musk of her skin, and his own scent, like a ghost.
She combed his hair back, nails scratching his scalp and dancing over his ears. "Has it worked?"
He tilted his head back to look up at her. She wasn't smiling, she didn't look away-- her hair fell like a curtain, clinging to his arms when he put them around Sanaki to draw her into his lap. "I won't play games with you." He hooked his fingers into the robe and pulled it down, over her shoulders. "If you intend to leave me after this, I will put an end to it right now."
"Does that mean you'll come back with me?" Sanaki lowered her arms, shrugged out of his robe, and worked the fastenings of his shirt loose. "I do not play games, Lehran."
His eyes slid closed and he rested his head over her heartbeat, where her chest began to curve and round. "I want you forever."
Her lips caressed the point of his ear. "I can give you my life."
Lehran's throat constricted. "I won't suffer another man to touch you." He tasted her skin, holding her tightly by the hip, marking her with his nails. Never again. He would never step aside or turn away from what was his. "Even if the empire burns without an heir--" his other hand traced the seam between her legs, the way already slick, and he gritted his teeth, pressing his fingers inside and curling them to make her gasp. "--you belong to me."
She buried her face in his neck and her thighs clamped around his waist almost painfully. "I accept your terms." Her fingers clenched in his hair. "Lehran--"
"Sanaki." He nudged her chin up and claimed a kiss. "I am yours to command."