Disclaimer: Characters not mine. I just borrowed them and twisted their lives.
Thanks to abyssgirl for beta-ing this, and convincing me to up the rating to T, sorry I forgot about you before.
Edit: Minor changes; grammar, spelling, tenses, etc
Reasons for Love
Roses
The first time Jon gave her a flower, it was a rose. It was also the first time she realized she was allergic to roses.
He gave her orchids from then on.
Fall
She can see most of the courtiers have fallen for her. She just wishes the head of the court feels the same way.
Respect
She treats him with the appropriate respect of a princess due a king, and he hopes against hope that it'll change into something more.
Sunset
Trying to be romantic, he takes her to see a sunset over the Royal Forest. She refuses to watch, telling him the sunsets over the Saren mountains are better.
Dream
He wakes, gasping, from a dream of the very best category, of a kiss that stretched on and on. Jon presses a hand to his heated lips, unaware of what a feminine picture he makes, wishing the kiss had gone for one more on.
Nightmare
She wakes, gasping from a horrific scene what usually happened to daughters of deposed monarchs. Shivering under the sheets, Thayet's very well aware of the exact person she wants to warm her up.
Kiss
Seeing him dozing by the fireplace, looking so tired, she impulsively leans forward and brushes her lips against his. When his eyes flutter open, Thayet blushes in dismay and runs from the room. Jonathan drowsily looks in the direction she went, wondering why she didn't stay.
Buri
Jon bows to the little K'mir, asking if she'd like to accompany him to the state dinner with the Gallans. Seeing the horror in her face, he winks at Thayet. She was right, that was fun!
Proper
She's doesn't quite understand why it's proper for him to take her to dinner with the Tyran count, but not proper for her to sit in a Council meeting. She decides Tortallan definitions of proper are slightly skewed.
Read
Dignity. Poise. Grace.
If only they didn't make her face so hard to read.
Gary
Standing as a witness for Gary and Cythera's wedding, Jon looks into the audience to see the girl he wants to marry, and wonders if proposing is a good idea when he can't figure out if she actually likes him yet.
Origami
He shyly (Jonathan -- shy!) presents her with a carefully folded paper crane. She smiles sweetly, then promptly takes it apart and folds a movable one. Turns out the Saren court wasn't as isolated from the rest of the world as he'd thought.
Name
He despairs of finding a nickname for her. How in Mithros's name do you shorten "Thayet"?
Etiquette
He can't hold her as close as he'd like to for waltzes because etiquette frowns on it.
He can't kiss her during this ball because etiquette forbids it.
He can't ask her for more than three consecutive dances because etiquette states he must let other men have a turn, even if he is courting her.
As Jonathan watches her twirl around the dance floor with Sir Hassern of Hollyrose, he decides he absolutely hates etiquette.
Verse
He can't decide how to write her a poem (she's just so beautiful), so on her birthday Thayet sits through thirty verses on just how indescribable she is.
Proposal
Jon remembers what happened with Alanna, and tells Thayet she can have all the time she wants to 'think about it'.
Her kiss proves that isn't necessary.
Memories
She comes back from the desert full of stories of sun, sand, and the Bazhir. He remembers his own experiences of the Great Southern Desert, and is so very glad her memories will be better.
Heirs
On their wedding night, he presents her with a pregnancy charm. She shakes her head firmly and tells him heirs are more important, even though he can see the fear in her eyes. And that's when he fully realizes what an amazing woman he married.
Suggestions
The first time he makes a highly suggestive comment, he expects her to blush bloody red. When she puts her hand on her hip, cocks her head, and responds with an equally…interesting idea, he blinks, startled.
Damn. He's much too used to Alanna.
Players
They watch Alanna and George finish up yet another play-worthy kiss, as everyone around them explodes into a flurry of applause.
Jonathan shakes his head ruefully, "They're so public…if they weren't my best friends it'd be disgraceful."
"Wishing we could do that?"
"Absolutely."
Delia
On their first wedding anniversary, Alanna presents them with a picture of Delia, drawn by a lovesick knight years ago. Thayet cackles that it better be his drawing skills that are awful, because she truly hopes he didn't have such bad taste in women.
Jon decides something very squishy must grace the bed of his Champion, and soon.
Arrow
Jonathan's not sure how he feels that his wife can out-shoot him. He does know he won't be challenging her to a riding match anytime soon.
Love
He's not sure when the way she looks at him changes from respect to love, but he's certain his eyes show the same.
Stars
The night Roald is conceived, she points out a cluster of stars that looks like a crown. He points out that most people watch clouds instead.
Pineapple
Two months into her pregnancy, he introduces her to the pineapple. Over the next seven months, pineapple imports increase times seven. He can't help but wish (just a little) that he'd introduced her to a less expensive fruit.
Kalasin
When she launches into a speech as to why they should name the baby girl after her mother, he quietly tells her that he never would have thought to argue against it.
Lullaby
When she croons a lullaby to the little prince and little princess, he learns what an amazing voice she has.
When he tries to join in, she learns he can't sing on tune, and kicks him out of the nursery.
Heels
He wants her to wear the new high heels the Carthaki embassy gifted to the banquet in their honour. Thayet replies that they killed her feet, but she will wear them to dinner…if he wears them to bed. Jon wisely decides to drop the subject.
Lianne
As he holds his second daughter in his arms, he swears he'll never let her suffer as much as her namesake did.
Liam
Three children were named for three grandparents. When the fourth one comes, he suggest she name him after her father. Thayet shakes her head furiously, and honours the Shang Dragon instead.
Prayer
They both know how rare it is for royalty to find true love. Looking over the busy nursery, they can only pray their children will be so lucky.
Sarain
She pretends indifference, but he knows part of her heart still rests in Sarain. He decides to open Tortallan borders to any K'mir wishing to flee the war torn country.
Subject
Presiding in a Council meeting, Thayet wonders whatever happened to her one-time declaration of being nothing more than an ordinary, humble subject to Jonathan.
Temper
The first time he loses his temper she stands there and takes it calmly, then ignores him for the next two months. He never yells at her again.
Tears
The first time she cries, he realizes Alanna was right -- she looks like a hag. It's that he doesn't care…that makes him realize with a start how much he really loves her.
Moon
She hates being apart from him, and hates even more that he's in a city under siege. But at least she knows the moon she's staring at is watching over him too.
Ribbons
He only let her tie ribbons through his hair for fun, how was he supposed to know she would dab the ends in glue? Glue rendered immune to his magic by Alanna and Numair.
Jonathan groans as his councilors fight to keep smiles off their faces. This is going be a very, very long meeting.
Blood
Jon once remarks that his mother had crossed Thayet off the list of potential brides because her family had bad blood.
She raises an eyebrow, presses up against him, and asks, "Well, would someone with bad blood do this?"
And what happens next is not bad, not bad in the least.
Manwhore
She lets him know once that she feels weird sometimes, because she's only been with one man, and he's slept with, well…half the court. He replies yes, but he's only loved two women, and isn't that a much better ratio?
She doesn't really think so.
Pet
She loves horses, cats, gulls, even mice, but she won't touch a dog. Holding the puppy squirming madly in his arms, Jon can't help but wonder how he was supposed to know that.
Dress
When he sees how muddy she is after the pink pearl dress incident, Jon laughs, sweeps her up and kisses her -- but whispers in her ear that he was never going to buy her such an expensive dress again.
Rice
He stares at the bowl of white kernels dubiously, not wanting to try something that looks so much like little grubs the colour of dandruff. Seeing at his obvious hesitation, Thayet sighs… time for the final bribe. So she coyly mentions that for every grain he eats, she might just give him a kiss.
So he does, and so she does. And really…they lose count after a certain point.
Intensity
The look they share is so full of feeling, so intense, that she almost moves to stroke his cheek – before remembering he's a table length away, and they're at dinner with the Maren embassy.
She hastily changes her hand into a fanning motion. Damn politics.
Cry
Tangled in sheets on the hard bedroom floor, Jonathan wishes for the umpteenth time that the K'mir had a quieter way of settling disputes.
Empress
When she held the little girl years ago, Thayet had sworn she wouldn't let Kally be pushed to the side by Roald just because she's a girl. And now he's allowed them to push her all the way to Carthak.
Thayet bursts into furious tears, certain that she'll never forgive him, never.
Prig
Alanna's marriage blessing had come with the condition she not let Jon turn into a smug prig. Sometimes, Thayet can't help but wonder if she's succeeded.
Sea
The first time he takes her to the seaside by Pirate's Swoop she's too awestruck to go in the water.
The second time, she cautiously dips a toe in, and then the rest of her body follows.
The third time, he's dragged out of bed at an ungodly hour by an eager Thayet wanting to 'play in the waves'. A little part of him wishes for sleep, but just a little.
Magic
She always saw magic as a device to encircle, to trap, to torture. His little 'experiments' for her show otherwise. Or maybe she's just decided encircling isn't such a bad thing.
Perfect
As she stands out on the balcony, bow raised, poised to shoot, he notices the pale moonlight illuminating her figure, so perfectly, too perfectly. And suddenly, he is very grateful for the howler monkeys.
Reason
She doesn't know whether she agreed to his proposal for love, for ambition, or for the need to help the realm she'd fallen in love with…but as she looks at his chest rising and falling beside her, she's so, so glad she made the choice she did.
Review if you please - or feel the need to comment on my use of italics.