A/N: Requested by Anon. Warning: slight QfG spoilers!
"Come on, come on, this way–oh, watch that last step–"
"Tedros, is there any particular reason you've decided to drag me through the castle like a sack of potatoes at six in the morning?" Agatha growled, still half asleep.
Tedros simply laughed and squeezed her hand. "Be patient, we're almost there."
Despite her grumbling, Agatha fought back a smile. She wished she could slip the blindfold off and get a look at Tedros' face–she hadn't heard him this excited since they took back his kingdom from his traitorous "brother" two years ago, and loath as she was to admit it, she missed that crooked, cocksure grin he used to sport at the School for Good. Granted, she had another, far more compelling reason to remove the blindfold. Wherever the "birthday surprise" Tedros had set up for her was located, it sure did involve scaling a lot of steep, winding staircases and bumping blindly into bannisters.
Just as Agatha had grown sick of the routine, she heard a door click open and Tedros ushered her through. "Ok, we're here. Now stand riiiight…there, and don't move…"
"Listen, I appreciate the enthusiasm, but is all of this really necessar–"
Then Tedros untied the blindfold, and the words died in Agatha's throat.
"Surprise!"
After the initial shock wore off, Agatha blinked and looked around the familiar room, dumbfounded.
"Graves Hill," she whispered. I'm back at Graves Hill?
"How…" Agatha started, then trailed off as her eyes rested on Tedros, her only confirmation that she hadn't travelled back through time and landed in Gavaldon, before she was a queen or a hero or a fairy tale character or even knew that magic was real at all.
"Well, not quite Graves Hill," Tedros clarified. "Remember how I've been wanting to get rid of those awful guest rooms in the White Tower?" Tedros smiled warmly. "Decided to put the space to good use."
Agatha glanced around and saw he was right; the layout of the cottage was slightly different than she remembered, the furniture just a tiniest bit off, the once ever-present smell of mildew and wet cat nowhere to be found, and the windows betrayed a gorgeous view of Camelot's sky, clearer and bluer than it had ever been at the graveyard. But still, the resemblance was uncanny, right down to the iron cauldron in the fireplace and the bottled herbs and cloves of garlic on the shelves in the kitchen area.
"Doesn't exactly suit me, but I thought you could use it as a sort of study," Tedros shrugged casually, as if the effort had been nothing at all. "You know, so you can come up to be alone and paint, or read, or write, or…brood. Whatever you want, really. And you'll have the only key," he said, the eagerness in his eyes betraying his nonchalant tone.
"You did all this for me?" Agatha half whispered, spellbound.
"Of course I did–need to make up for all the birthdays we missed fighting wars, don't I?" Tedros said. "Oh, and I know how much you like food, so over here…" Tedros gestured to a glass and metal tube that attached to the wall and extended into the floor, next to a small wooden door that sat a bit lower than eye level. "You've got your own personal delivery system. Just write down your order and send it down to the kitchen through the messenger tube, like so…" he took a piece of paper from a small side table and scrawled something on it, then rolled it up and placed it in the tube's opening. With a small whoosh, the message shot down through the tube and out of sight.
"…then when this bell rings, you open the dumbwaiter and there's your meal." He slid open the door and patted the interior. "Convenient, right? Of course, you'll drive Silkima crazy if you use it for every meal, but I know that being around people overwhelms you sometimes, so it couldn't hurt every once in a while," Tedros grinned. "We're actually planning to outfit the entire castle with the messenger tubes eventually, but since we were already renovating up here, I figured you could test them out first. Let's see, what else…" Agatha half listened to Tedros' explanation of the tower's various features as she looked around at the replica of her childhood home.
It was perfect. Different enough that it didn't evoke memories of Agatha and her true love's short, painful stay in Gavaldon–or her mother's tragic end as that stay abruptly came to a close–but similar enough that it took Agatha back to simpler times, when she'd secretly read storybooks in her bedroom as her mother sang and brewed a pot of lizard and parsnip stew for dinner in the kitchen. Even Reaper seemed pleased with the likeness, trotting past Agatha into the copy of her old bedroom and giving a pleased snuffle as he curled up on her bed. Just like he used to back in Gavaldon.
"So, do you like it?" Agatha snapped out of her reverie to find Tedros grinning expectantly in front of her, arms outstretched and panting slightly from his long winded presentation. Agatha stared at him, speechless, her mouth flopped open like a fish.
Tedros cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his neck. "I mean, I know it's a lot, but, well, this is the first time Camelot's been in a good enough financial state that I could really get you something grand, you know? A big, sweeping, romantic gesture that princesses usually get in storybooks. And I wanted to make it special," Tedros said nervously as Agatha continued to stare, silent. Tedros swallowed and began to sweat. "You know, on second thought, maybe this was a little…creepy. And I, erm, should've asked your permission first. I just, er, remembered how homesick I was when we thought we were going to spend our Ever After in Gavaldon. And I thought you'd like a little piece of home, but if you'd rather not think about it we can board it up and I'll–"
"I love it," Agatha blurted.
Tedros' back straightened. "You do?"
"Tedros, its amazing," Agatha breathed as she studied the picture-perfect likenesses of her old cottage's dark walls, its stout wooden furniture, the witchy-looking kitchen and the odd knickknacks on the shelves. "How did you make it look so…perfect?"
"You're a storybook heroine, remember?" Tedros gave her a crooked smile. "Went back and studied the paintings of your old house in The Tale of Sophie and Agatha for about ten hours, for starters. After that it was just a matter of hiring the right contractors. M helped out a lot with the details, too," Tedros explained. "So, you really like–"
Agatha cut him off with a deep, passionate kiss, which Tedros gladly returned. When they finally broke apart, she bumped her forehead against Tedros' and giggled. "You know if the Royal Rot finds out about this, they're going to say you've built a witch's lair into Camelot Castle, right?"
"Let them," Tedros said, kissing her on the cheek. "I've learned to trust my queen no matter what, and so will the rest of Camelot." Agatha kissed him again and went to light a fire, making herself at home.
"So, did you get anything for Sophie?" Agatha asked absentmindedly as she sat on the couch, marveling at a replica of her and her best friend's favorite throw pillow. It was edited so the dark haired princess was now holding the hand of an elegant blonde witch on the right and a dashing, golden-haired prince on the left.
Tedros snorted. "Sophie? Why would I get a gift for her?"
Agatha turned to him. "It's her birthday too, you know."
Tedros's smile disappeared. "You and Sophie have the same birthday?"
A smile crept onto Agatha's face. "We're twins. Of course we have the same birthday." Tedros gaped at her. "Did you not realize?" Agatha smirked. "She's going to have a fit when she realizes the king of Camelot forgot to pay his respects."
All the color drained from Tedros' face and he sunk to the floor as Agatha laughed.