Like so many things, it begins with a touch.
He stumbles upon her in the entrance hall a breath before sunrise. The stone-walled chamber has grown cold during the long night. Her skin is pale, lashes frosted with tears that have stopped falling. She stands looking at the main doors, waiting for them to open, waiting for ghosts.
Her companions are dead, bar the two that sleep in rooms nearby. During the days she has put on a brave face; he has been impressed by her strength of character. Now, standing unnoticed in the doorway, it is her fragility that strikes him now.
It is her weakness that stirs the love he has been sheltering in his heart. He has been in awe of her composure and energy, intoxicated by her wilfulness and righteousness. Long now has he watched her when she moves, longed for the warmth of her skin and the ever sweet sound of her voice. This feeling is different. He cannot breathe with the sharpness of it.
In the way a castle that was once magnificent is beautiful in its ruination, so she stands in her grief. He sees her as she is, as she was, and his whole being yearns to be with her however she will be once the bitter shock of loss leaves her.
So lost in her dreaming, she does not hear him approach. It is frightening to think how easily an enemy could harm her like this. It is with trepidation that he reaches for her wrist, exposed just below the cuff of her woolen garments, and first feels her pulse against his fingertips.
"What is it?"
She turns sharply, eyes wide and voice filled with fear. Her body shifts into a battle stance, ready to fight, ready to take on the world that has done nothing but take away her few joys.
"Don't," he says gently, aching at the sight of her. "It's all right. It's all right to..."
"It's not."
Her words are blunt, more than he expects. She turns back to the door, blinking away the flakes of ice on her lashes, and shakes her head.
"It's not all right."
It is she that reaches for his hand, squeezes his fingers tightly, and allows herself to lean against him. Her frame is delicate beneath these casual garments, and trembling.
"I know," he replies in a whisper, brushing some hair out of her face with a tenderness he had not known himself to possess. "I'm-"
"Don't be sorry. Not you as well. I couldn't bear it."
"As you wish."
She does not stir again until the first fingers of dawn have begun to creep through the windowpanes. He has grown used to the rhythm of her breathing, the scent of her skin, and fluttering of her fingers against his hand as she thinks. She is turning to leave in silence and he panics, reaching after her.
"I won't leave you!" He takes a step back, raising a hand to his mouth as if afraid of spilling poison. "I won't... I couldn't..."
She reaches the threshold to another room and pauses, glancing over her shoulder with a flicker of her usual warmth in her eyes. He feels his heart melt at the sight and wonders if he shall ever be able to speak to her again without losing himself.
"I know," she assures him. "Thank you."
The morning blooms into an afternoon like those before. He watches as she acts with her usual resolve and manages to find his own. Still, he remembers her touch and burns with a need to express how it felt just to watch her standing alone in the moonlight. Her perfect example of saving face is all that keeps him functioning as usual. Another unforgiving day in Ishgard, scavenging for what little hope there is.
His hope is to save her, though he does not know the means. His hope is to carry her through the storm.
~x~
Like nothing she has ever known, it begins with a touch.
Her nights of standing alone and waiting for nothing have come to an end. It has been weeks since she felt the need to do so and longer since she has cried. Grieving is becoming easier, more rational. There is room in her mind for other things, even for boredom that the long days and nights of snow bring. Above all else, she has found room for doubt.
She doubts that he meets her wandering the corridors through coincidence. She doubts that he doesn't go looking for her. She doubts that he just so 'happened' to make an extra serving of stew, or an extra large mug of cocoa, big enough to share. She doubts that he hasn't realised how often he reaches for her hand, or her hair, or touches her cheek upon parting.
Most of all, she doubts herself for not stopping him.
It gets worse each time. She's all too aware of the strength in his fingers, now, of the slope of his shoulders, the way his hair brushes the nape of his neck. Why she knows these things eludes her, she cannot remember ever making the decision to touch him back other than to hold his hand on that first night. But the memories are tangible and keep her from resting at night.
She has never known anyone like him. When her days are dark, he seems to shine twice as bright. When conversations become too difficult she has found herself yearning for him to stroke her hair, or to squeeze her shoulder in that reassuring, firm, yet tender way he always does. Once, while they debated with his father and brothers, he reaches towards her behind the cover of the tablecloth and rests his hand on her thigh. She has to leave the room for fear of reciprocating, drawn to him like lightning to a church spire.
Weakness. She knows it for what it is. She is grieving, it is natural for her to seek comfort. She tells herself this as she leaves her room at night and begins to pace the corridors, knowing that he will find her. This is healing, nothing more. He is consuming her thoughts because she is allowing him to. A guilty pleasure, an unobtainable fantasy. Surely he knows the same. He's intelligent enough, and insightful. She has admired this about him since they met.
This night, she finds him waiting in a corridor lined with portraits and tapestries. He is leaning against a wall, arms folded over his broad chest and eyes alight with expectation. For her, she realises. Not for her deeds or her skills, not for her reputation or her qualities, but just for her, as she is. She feels stripped naked by his gaze, a real person beneath the praises the world heaps on her. No one is supposed to see, let alone touch. She can barely bring herself to look in a mirror when she feels so open.
"A storm is coming," he whispers into the shadows, a usual masquerade at conversation. She draws herself to him, hands on his forearms, and rests her head on his shoulder. "A fierce one. The men are embarrassing themselves by collecting blankets."
"You shouldn't mock them," she says. "They care so much about you."
"Mm. And I for them."
"You care for everything," she continues, pressing herself into the darkness that shrouds them both and feeling heat rise to her cheeks as he cups a hand to her face. "The people, the mountains, even the storms."
"Some things are easier to care about than others," he confesses, and she reads his meaning too clearly. Too late, in too deeply, she fails to move away and save face.
"But you shouldn't care for it all," she protests, her voice too soft for her words.
"I cannot help it," he answers, and she feels his words in a hot caress of breath against her cheek. "I do not wish to tame my heart."
"You shouldn't-"
"The only one who could do that is-"
She doubts that the kiss lasts a lifetime. Regardless, it feels as if aeons pass while their lips touch. This had not been the plan, for either of them. This she knows with certainty. Time has brought them together like frightened animals in the dark. He is tender with her, giving her the chance to lead, and she pours herself into the kiss wholly. His hands are firm at her waist. They do not try and stop her when she turns to flee, confused, terrified, exulted and gasping for breath,
She does not need to hear him say that he loves her. Words mean little for them now. As she bolts herself into her room to keep herself from him she can feel love tightening the back of her throat, as if he has left it there.
Her hope is to be rid of this weakness. Her hope is to keep him from the harm she must bring.
~x~
The promised storm arrived a few days late and breaks just before nightfall.
Even a hero can do nothing to counter the elements and so she feels no shame in taking refuge in her room. The winds batter mercilessly at the windowpane, flurries of snow and ice rattling against the glass. Unable to sleep since long before the clouds gathered, she is trying to think of nothing when the cold becomes too much.
A nightdress is a foolish thing to wear in Ishgard; she has been telling others this all day. The thought had slipped her mind when she prepared for bed, as coherent thoughts so often do these recent days. Her skin is painful with the chill and so she slips out of bed to crouch by the hearth, fingers trembling weakly as she gathers the means to light a fire. The storm howls outside, laughing at her efforts, at what she has been reduced to. It is loud enough that she does not hear the doors slamming open and shut one by one in the corridor, only the thudding of her own as a heavy hand strikes it.
"The storm has arrived, friend! I have blankets, kindling. Are you in need of anything?"
He has come for her. She can do little more than get to her feet and stand in front of the empty hearth, facing the closed door and wondering how his eyes are shining on the other side. She wonders if he knows just how much she is in need, of warmth, of care, of him, of everything.
Her silence carries. Panicked, he pushes the door open and rushes into the room, one hand held aloft with a candelabra and the other arm looped under a crate of supplies. She knows, now. His eyes are bright with relief upon seeing her safe and well. He checks her over, eyes spanning from her bare feet on the stone to the way her hair is ruffled from the pillows.
This night, it starts with a kiss.
He leaves his burdens on the table by her door, letting the heavy wood fall closed behind him as he crosses the room in great strides and takes her into his arms. She stumbles away from the failed fire and would fall back against the window were it not for him crushing her to his chest and pressing his mouth to hers with the heat and ferocity she could not kindle in the hearth.
Her hand is in his hair, her nails at his shoulder, and he presses a palm to the small of her back to keep her close. His lips scorch her neck and ears, her cheeks, her forehead, anywhere he can reach while she does the same to him, tasting his skin with desperation. A finger slips between the buttons of her nightdress and she helps him to loosen them, trembling and pushing his shirt upwards to touch his abdomen, his chest, feeling more understood, more equal than she can ever remember feeling before.
She can feel scars and hopes he can feel hers, far too busy in learning the taste of his tongue to speak. Dizzy, electric heat keeps her standing through will alone, her legs weak and trembling. A gasp slips from her kiss-swollen lips as he presses against her, a firm heat urgent at her thigh, her stomach in knots.
Doubt has fled. She needs to tell him, she feels, to find some sense in the molten fire running through her. He raises his voice first.
"I-"
A heavy fist pounds on the door and cuts him short. Frozen together, they clutch onto the moment slipping away as a sombre but caring voice is raised from the hall.
"Haurchefant! Is everything okay with our guest? Do you need-"
"Fine!" he calls back, voice almost obscenely loud in comparison to the soft noises she now knew it to be capable of. He closes his eyes and rests his forehead to hers. "She was having some trouble lighting the fire."
"Ah? Should I take the other supplies to-"
"No! Sorry, father. I'll be right out. "
"If you're sure."
"Yes, it's no trouble!"
His voice shakes through this lie and she reaches for his face. Once they are left alone again, he presses his lips to the corner of her mouth and speaks in a whisper like a man broken.
"I fear we cannot weather the storm much longer."
"No."
Silence falls, broken only by soft breaths and the hasty, ashamed sounds of clothes being refastened.
"They're waiting for you," she says, taking a step away from him and raising a a hand to her own cheek, feeling the heat there.
"I can come back."
"No. You shouldn't."
"Not even for one night?"
"No."
She can see his heart struggling. Or perhaps it is just the feel of her own. She reaches for him again with apology in her eyes.
"I could not have you for one night," she explains. "If I were to have you, I would have you for always."
"Then you have me for always."
He replies without hesitation, curling a strand of her hair around one finger and giving her a pained smile.
"You can't," she forces herself to say. "I can't. They need us. Your men. Our friends. Everyone. There's no time for..."
"I understand. I have not been hoping. I just..."
"Thank you."
"For what, my dear one?"
She has to turn away, shaking her head in response. She listens to him take up the candelabra and the supplies once more, waiting for the sound of his foot on the threshold. Instead, he raises his voice.
"Smile for me tomorrow. I do not think I can bear it if you can't."
~x~
Like a harsh dawn after a dark night, it begins with a smile. Breakfast is served to the men, the Count is careful to speak only of the weather and life resumes its course. He does not reach for her behind the table and she stays in her room at night.
Someone asks her if she has come to terms with her grief. She does not know how to tell them 'no' without insulting the memories of her dear friends. Now, she grieves for someone living, for an 'if' instead of a 'was'.
Their hope is that the end will justify the means. Their hope is to remain strong for one another, lest they both crumble.
Their hope is that some day, in a brighter future, the gods might choose someone else to spread their light through the world.