Corrin didn't remember how it started. Not the conversation, nor the path they were on as a result. All she could recall were Leo's words the night she had run into him on her way back from a late night cup of tea in the kitchens, which she had been drinking as an excuse to not have to go back to her rooms and attempt sleeping. He himself had just returned from a trying meeting with Xander, similar to the one she'd had earlier, in preparation for the next day's campaign. They had been growing closer as people for a while, drawn to the similarities and differences in one another's perspectives, their bond made stronger by the mutual trust engendered in the heat of battle. Yet this was the first time she had ever heard Leo sound afraid.
"I have to be untouchable," he had said, his voice weary. "All the time. I have to do what no one else can do...what no one else will do. Do you know what that's like?"
Before, Corrin would never have imagined that Leo could feel like the rest of them, alone and afraid and small. She realized he was no longer the stiff, calculating younger brother she remembered, the boy who had planned campaigns, mastered impossible spells, commanded entire armies before the age of sixteen. Neither brother now, nor in possession of his usual commanding exterior, all that was left was the boy who wanted so badly to be made of stone, but wasn't. In the end, he was human. So was she, and she felt that more keenly now than she ever had. Her heart went out to him. She wanted to offer comfort however she could. More than that, she wanted such words to be true.
But they weren't true, and would not be again for a long time, not until this war ended, and maybe even after that. She could bring herself neither to lie to him nor to keep silent when he so clearly desired her words to stave off the nightmares that still clung to the edges of his voice. So she did neither, but wet her lips and spoke the truth, her own voice shaking as well.
"It's tearing my soul in half. My path. I know it's the only one I could have chosen. I could have never left you and Xander and the rest...but I still wonder if it was the right choice, every day, every hour, every life that is lost. I know you can't value such things as much as I do...but I know it must take a little from you every time someone dies by your hand, every time you're unable to prevent cruelty from happening at someone else's."
"That's the price of peace, Corrin," Leo had interrupted tiredly (some part of her brain noted Corrin in place of sister). "Every life that's lost is not wasted, but goes towards a common end. A single life, even thousands of lives - all of them are insignificant compared to the big picture. Even your life and mine weigh very little in the balance."
"I don't believe that," Corrin replied with feeling. "I can't believe that. No life is ever worthless."
She had tried to look him in the eye then, but evasively he looked away, past her, as if literally seeing things she could not.
"No, Leo, listen. I know you know it deep down. It's not naïveté to remember, when you take a life, what it is you hold in your hand. No one should have the power to end a life without respecting what they're taking. It's responsibility."
"I take responsibility."
"Not completely. You take responsibility for the consequences of your actions, but not always the actions themselves. You can't just understand stuff like that intellectually. You need to feel it. The weight of it. Let it hurt you. You're so scared of being weak, but Leo, doesn't it hurt so much more to be cold?"
"It doesn't." He shook his head. "It doesn't feel like anything."
Stubborn as always. If he was really as numb as he seemed, then why express doubt? Still, she didn't contradict him aloud, merely shook her head in return and smiled quietly to herself.
"What?" he demanded.
"Nothing. I'm just thinking."
"Thinking what?"
"Thinking I'm glad to have you," said Corrin. "I'm glad you can do the things none of the rest of us want to. I'm glad one of us is that strong. I'm also glad you hurt, too, even if no one can see it. And I'm glad you tell me about it sometimes. Please...tell me in the future as well, whenever you need someone to listen."
"I can't promise that," he had said, not meeting her eyes.
But nights later, when she ran into him wandering the halls of the castle alone past midnight, he seemed unable to keep from again telling her things he never would have said before. In the mornings, though, it was as if nothing out of the ordinary had taken place. By day he was his normal, frighteningly intelligent self, and smirked and condescended to them all as usual. But Corrin could see the hollows under his eyes growing more pronounced as sleep proved impossible, and at night the hollowness reached his voice, and again and again he reached out for her in these moments as if drowning.
She made sure she was always on hand when these episodes happened, even if it meant losing sleep herself. Not that it was ever easy for her anyway. Often these support sessions took a pragmatic turn, and Leo would pull out some tome or the other, or lead the way to the library for a late-night campaign meeting with just the two of them. They would devise strategies for the next day's battle, and in between Corrin would learn about Leo's mother whom she had never met, about her pride and her coldness, so unlike her son's because it was natural instead of being of necessity. Sometimes he would talk about how much he missed his father the way he used to be, or how Camilla had never seemed to look after him the way she did the others. Sometimes Corrin would talk, about how it felt to look into Takumi's face when they met across a battlefield strewn with casualties from both sides, or how she worried she'd never be enough to lead them to victory and the cost of peace would never be repaid.
Sometimes, on rare occasions, they didn't talk at all.
One night in particular, she had been thinking and pacing and, passing Leo's chambers without realizing it, been arrested by the sound of uneven breathing and what sounded like a muffled sob.
Corrin paused, debating whether to continue on as if she hadn't heard anything, not knowing if he'd want her there or not. Eventually she knocked, and when she did the sounds died away completely. She waited, uncertain. Had he been asleep? Was there someone else already in the room, or had she interrupted a nightmare?
Biting her lip, Corrin pushed lightly against the door which was already slightly ajar. She passed through the immaculate study that served as an entrance room, hesitating at the door to Leo's bedchamber before opening it without knocking a second time.
He seemed asleep, but she knew better. The rise and fall of his chest was too fitful, and she could see his eyes move restlessly beneath their lids.
"Bad dreams?" Corrin whispered.
Leo didn't respond at first. Then he nodded, brow creased like he was in pain. She could see sweat, or tears, glisten on his cheeks as her eyes adjusted further to the darkness of the room.
"Should...do you...should I stay?"
For a few moments, Corrin was sure she'd made a mistake, that he, mortified she had caught him in this moment of ultimate weakness, would never trust her again. She turned to leave.
"Stay," he croaked.
Corrin closed her eyes. Pressed her lips together. She nodded silently, and shut the door.
She turned to go to him and nearly tripped over a pile of books lying near the end of the bed. He didn't move even then, not until she sat down beside him did he sit up and lean his forehead against hers. One hand felt its way blindly to her wrist, his grip desperate, almost crushing. She felt, more than ever, like a lifeline.
Corrin felt her face growing hot, and she wasn't sure if she should pull away or not. Leo wasn't himself at the moment, she knew, and she also knew he wouldn't forgive her if she allowed him to reveal even more of the things he kept so closely guarded when he had the presence of mind to do so.
"Leo..."
She started to put distance between them, but his grip tightened, and she was forced to remain where she was, half pressed against his chest. She could feel his breath on her cheek - damn it, damn! - her pulse picking up, thrumming nonstop, insistent, impossible to ignore. She had been fighting against this with all her strength, knowing that they could never quite get there. Not all the way. He could never lower the last of his walls, she believed, and she could never forget when he had been, for all she knew, her blood brother.
Yet the walls were gone. Corrin could find no trace of them in the stillness which lay all around, broken only by their breathing in counter tempo to one another. She could not even remember what it was like to think of Leo as a younger brother, only recall the tension that had been far more present than absent in the last weeks, growing in intensity. She couldn't speak it, couldn't even think it. She hadn't thought he would ever let her in this far, hadn't even imagined that this Leo existed.
What would he feel tomorrow, if she let him continue? What would happen to their carefully crafted relationship of mutual ease and the deliberate barrier between themselves and any mention of forbidden affection? Corrin knew the consequences would be dire, knew he would never forgive her, and yet...
Yet when had Leo ever done anything without careful planning and consideration? When had he ever, even at his most uninhibited, not been both aware of his actions and determined to carry them through to the end? He, of all people, could be counted on to have uncanny timing and control over his own affairs, however much it seemed otherwise. He may have pretended in public that their newfound support system had never existed, but privately he had never wavered, had never seemed to regret speaking the depths of his mind, no matter how often he claimed it was the last time. No matter what he did, regrets never seemed to be a part of the equation.
Now, his hands shook but did not falter as they moved to cup either side of her face, thumbs tracking gentle circles against her skin. His eyes opened and found hers, purple embers to living fire. Usually so sharp, now hazy and clouded with emotion, their expression was divided between still-present vulnerability and desperation warring with self control. She thought for a moment he would pull back. In hindsight, perhaps he was giving her the chance to pull back.
Cradling her face in his hands, Leo slowly and deliberately pressed his mouth to hers. His entire body went still, his last tremors dying away completely.
Corrin uttered a soft cry, trying desperately not to move but unable to keep from making a sound.
Leo had no such compunction. He kissed her deeply, greedily, drinking her in, his lips insistent in their pursuit of a response. She battled the instinct to lean into him, fighting to keep her hands still at her sides as his tongue swept over the seam of her lips, hesitant at first, then demanding.
Her body had gone limp at the first touch, but now her strength gave out completely. She sagged against him, his hands cupping her face the one thing left keeping her upright. His mouth against hers seemed the string from which her entire being hung.
As it turned out, her self control was abysmal. Her heart and body betrayed her as one, back arching, hands fisting in the loose material of his nightshirt as she kissed him with the fervor she had been holding back. The first sound passed Leo's lips when Corrin's teeth grazed against them, not a growl as she expected but a ragged sob that wrenched her heart.
His chest heaved with the effort it took not to break down. Leo felt what was left of his sanity dissolving into Corrin's small hands stroking his hair, the small noises she made when he held her closer against him, one arm winding about her waist to pull her onto his lap. Damn, he'd been waiting a long time for this, said a voice at the back of his head that cared little for his total loss of dignity, only that it had led them to their current position.
So long he had wanted her. Not that desire had awakened all at once with the knowledge that she wasn't actually his sister, because even then nothing much had changed in the way he looked at her (and a good thing, too, or Leo would have been too disgusted to allow himself to go further with such thoughts). But it had been shortly after, surely. Perhaps at the opera house in Cyrkensia, or just before then. He wasn't sure exactly when he'd begun to think of her as forbidden to him, only that by that time it had already been too late.
Corrin pulled away with a gasp, but her lips remained in reach, hovering only centimeters above his. He supposed that would have to do for now. He was afraid, though, that she would try to talk if their mouths were not otherwise occupied, and knew he couldn't discuss anything right now, while he could still almost smell the iron tang of their blood, feel the weight of responsibility closing in on him. He had never told her what it was he dreamed of on nights like this. His throat still felt raw from screaming their names, all of them, Elise and Xander and Camilla and Odin and Niles and Azura and Corrin and so, so many others. In his dream, the same dream as always, he had failed them all. They, his family, had relied on him to devise a strategy that would keep them safe, and paid for their trust in blood, gallons of blood, oceans of their blood on his hands.
His arms ached with the weight. He needed to hold her, living, breathing against him, breathing life into his lungs, bleeding desire rather than pain into his mouth. He needed her to wash over him, wash him clean with her kindness, her incomparable purity of intent and spirit. His hands didn't feel so prematurely tainted when they were skimming over Corrin's sides, pressing her closer to him, clutching her for support while she made him forget everything he had ever been that wasn't tied to this moment.
It was more than that, though, or he'd have felt wrong about this, like he was using her as a distraction or worse. He meant to do something right this time. Something to make up for all the ways in which he'd failed to appreciate her. Whatever she needed, he intended to be there as a bulwark, as much her life raft as she was his. Co-dependency aside (which itself was a thing that needed to be addressed; he knew it wasn't healthy for either of them), he intended to make this work, had gone into it with the intention of starting something which would end in as much joy as could be theirs at a time like this.
For now, though, all of that could wait. Leo opened his eyes to see Corrin, extremely out of breath and visibly flushed, still straddling him, though looking more embarrassed about the fact by the minute. He fought a chuckle at this, knowing that his abrupt change of mood would doubtless confuse and discomfit her no end. It felt like a beginning, this moment.
Corrin released a shuddering breath as Leo's arms enfolded her with more gentleness than she'd expected, if she could ever have expected anything like this from him. He'd never touched her much before, not being one for physical displays of affection, but now he did, she barely escaped reveling in the feeling. She'd imagined it before, she couldn't lie to herself about that - imagined a lot more, in fact - but the reality was something solid, more comforting than dreams.
It was a reality that would carry them both through the next day and the one after that, each day bringing them closer to the end of the path, and the beginning of a time free of the ravages of war and responsibility.
hey, I'm not 100% happy with this but? I wrestled with it long enough so here it is, warts and all. this is largely based off of Corrin and Leo's supports as well as his supports with other characters; basically this is me experimenting with their dynamic/individual characterization in preparation for some other stuff. I was going to upload a cover image but oh my gosh I don't care anymore. title is a reference to Coeus, the Titan god of rational intelligence/the universe.