Untitled

He rolled over on his bed and sighed deeply. At this point in his life, Oswald thought he would be the happiest man alive. A lifetime of betrayal made him seek true love, and amazingly he found it through Gwendolyn (though he had to jump through major loops to get her father to agree, and she still hated Oswald's guts at first). He felt so lucky to have such a beautiful, sweet, strong-willed woman to love him back.

However, being married to the enemy's daughter, needless to say, was pretty awkward. After learning how easily Odin can renege on his word by selling his daughter to different people back and forth Oswald was not too fond of him, but for Oswald to also be from Ringford, the nation Odin happened to be at war with! Oswald was never one to be bothered by other people's opinions, of course; it did make him self-conscious about how Gwendolyn felt about it, though.

He shifted his weight and sighed again (remembering Brom's comment that sighing too much will one day throw out his back). When he thought about all this he couldn't help but sneer at himself. He recognized that he was being a big loser about this, but he couldn't help but feel conflicted about the situation. Sure, he had the girl of his dreams, but his behavior nowadays disturbed him. In his life before Gwendolyn he never had to worry about anyone but himself. He was now in a life that was completely unfamiliar to him, and found himself unsure of how to act.

"Oswald?"

He sat up and rubbed his eyes. A quick glance outside his balcony showed a high moon, signaling that it was much too late for people to be calling for him. "Yes?" he responded. When no answer reciprocated, he got out of bed. He grabbed his white button-down shirt and black pants off the corner of the bed and quickly threw it on before opening the door.

"Hello?" he called out, but no one was there. Irritated, he walked back into his room and shut the door. Not even in a place as regal as the Demon Lord Odin's castle is immune to Ding-Dong-Ditch, he thought to himself. He was slightly disappointed, though; the voice had sounded like Gwendolyn's.

He thought about that. What would he have done if it was her? He sneered again and slumped back to bed face down, not even bothering to take off his clothes. I'm being a loser again, he thought to himself. How much longer could he go on denying that despite the fact that he had Gwendolyn, he still wanted her? With that thought, he closed his eyes and tried to sleep, but was interrupted a few minutes later.

"Oswald!"

One eye reluctantly peeled open. "Yes?" he replied, straining his voice as to not hide his irritation.

"Up here!"

The voice came from above his canopy. He slipped out of bed and peered over the hanging fabric. There, sitting on the edge of the canopy, was a familiar blue bird. "It's you!" he cried out.

"Hello, again," the little bird said as it flew off the canopy and landed on the outstretched finger Oswald offered. "How are you?"

"I'm fine, Little Bird," he said, petting the bird's smooth head with his other hand.

"That is good to hear," the bird said, hopping up Oswald's arm to settle on his shoulder. "I knew you would be good to Gwendolyn. I just had to see for myself."

"I remember when I first saw you down in Endelphia," Oswald said, thinking back to that fated night in the Netherworld where he saw a glimpse of the bird. "You saved my life, you know. Had it not been for you, I would not have found any hope of finding a new purpose in my life."

"Oh, blah blah blah," the bird chirped, nuzzling against Oswald's smooth cheek. "You're okay, Oswald."

Oswald chuckled. He was laughing more and more these days, he realized. He reached his hand up to his shoulder to urge the bird to hop down. He looked at the bird's beady little eyes. "I just wanted to say thank you," he said quietly. "Thank you…Gwendolyn…"

The bird suddenly squawked loudly and bit Oswald's finger. He cried out in surprise and shook the bird off his hand. "Watch it!" he said angrily, putting his wounded finger to his lips.

"You watch it!" the bird said, gliding in circles around his head before perching on the headrest of the bed. "Although, I have to admit, that's the first time someone has ever mistaken me for Gwendolyn. The poor girl had always felt like my shadow."

Oswald crinkled his nose in curiosity. "Shadow? You're…not Gwendolyn?"

"My name is Griselda," the little blue bird said proudly, her next sentence said with even more pride. "Gwendolyn is my little sister."

"Griselda," Oswald repeated, recognizing that name. Gwendolyn was a great warrior herself, but her older sister Griselda was known to be even more irrefutable (though he could not recall anyone mentioning she had a penchant for biting people's fingers). He immediately felt a pang of regret. "You died when we invaded Ragnanival."

"And I died in my beloved sister's arms, which I could not ask for anything more," Griselda said. She flew off the bed and perched herself on the balcony ledge. Oswald followed and stared at the stars with her. "Do not feel guilty, Oswald. I do not hold you responsible."

"I know," Oswald said. His voice was pained.

"Neither does she," Griselda added.

He closed his eyes; that comment had hit home. "I know," Oswald said rather unconvincingly. He could not help but worry how much of Gwendolyn's prejudices had to be put aside in order for her to love him. Had he truly won her heart, or was there still a small part of her that hated him for being from the country that took her sister away? That question burned inside him for so long that it had become a distance between him and Gwendolyn.

"She loves you, Oswald," Griselda said quietly. "Like you, she has never loved like this until she met you."

He groaned and ran his hands through his hair. "But there's still…" he paused for a moment, realizing the passion he was feeling now had never been there the times he spoke with Myris about the same subject. "…There is still this strange tension between us. I don't like it. I don't know what it is, but it doesn't feel good." He sighed heavily and stared into space. He did not want to ask himself this question, much less Griselda. "Could it be that we are falling out of love?"

Griselda squawked and pecked at Oswald's head. "Fool! That is not the case!" Oswald braced his head to shield from the abuse until Griselda perched on his shoulder. He lowered his defenses and peered at her.

"Areyou falling out of love?" she asked curiously.

Oswald shook his head. Of all the things he was unsure about, there was no doubt in his mind that he loved Gwendolyn, with all his heart. "I love her," he said.

"I know you do," Griselda said sweetly. "And I know she does, too. You are just too shy! A brute like you shouldn't have too much trouble being assertive."

"B-Brute?" Oswald said, offended yet much deserved to the comment. He sighed and leaned over the balcony ledge. "But you're right. You are absolutely right. Brom said the same thing, that I should be more assertive."

"What is this tension you are feeling with her?"

Oswald shook his head. "I have no idea," he said despairingly. "We talk like we normally do, and things seem fine, yet…I feel there is something unspoken somewhere. It is as if there is something we want to say, but do not care to say because we do not know what it is or how to define it. That is how it is for me, anyway. I always leave feeling like I didn't say what I wanted to say." He groaned in frustration again, feeling that familiar feeling of "big loser." Why did his feelings have to be so complicated?

"What do you want to say?"

"I don't know! That is the problem," he said, sighing for the hundredth time that night. "I don't what this feeling is. I want to tell her about it, but I am afraid she will not care."

"No, she will care!" Griselda chirped, flapping her wings excitedly. "I think you want to be close to her but are afraid she does not feel the same, and that is why you do not want to ask. But I know she would care. Once you tell her, I'm sure that feeling will go away. I'm cheering you on, Oswald! You should tell her."

"You know…you're right!" Feeling the momentum, Oswald clenched his fist and looked into the sky with a gleam in his eye. Whatever this strange feeling was, he knew he needed Gwendolyn to know. "I will! I will tell her!"

"Hurrah, Oswald! Tell her!"

"I will tell her tonight!!"

"Tonight, hurrah!"

"I will tell her I would like to have dinner and speak with her tomorrow!"

Griselda squawked and nipped at the hopeless man's ear. "Fool! You call that progress!"

Oswald rubbed his ear and stared at her helplessly. "The stories I had heard about you were a lot more decorous than what you've proven to me," he said, to which Griselda chirped dismissively. "What else do you want? I can't ask her a question like that right now…it is too late into the night. We both need sleep."

Griselda groaned. "'Tonight' is when things like this happen, Oswald; don't you know that?" She flew off his shoulder and hovered over the edge of the balcony. "Come with me! Let's go see what she's doing."

"What?" Before he could argue, Griselda flew above his head and hovered over the edge of the balcony above him. Gwendolyn's room, he thought. He has always thought of the irony of how his nights ended with thoughts of being with Gwendolyn and yet she slept in the room directly above him. "Get back down here!" he whispered roughly.

"Climb up!" she said cheerfully. "She's awake!"

"Sh-she is?" He hesitated for a moment. Curiosity getting the best of him, he quickly cursed his temporary insanity before proceeding to climb the balcony. He was a practiced warrior so pulling his own weight usually came effortlessly to him; this time, each movement he made was apprehensive. (What would someone think if they saw some strange man in an unbuttoned shirt and casual pants climbing up to their Princess Gwendolyn's room? They would think of him a lecher!) Nevertheless, Griselda's encouragement pushed him forward.

"You know, Griselda," Oswald said, taking hold of another ledge, "that time I saw you in Endelphia…what were you doing down there?"

Griselda nestled in Oswald's hair. "The first time Gwendolyn saw you, you spared her life. I wanted to see who you were, what kind of person you were. I wanted to make sure someone like you kept on living."

Oswald hoisted himself onto another ledge. "I again give you my heartfelt thanks," he said, "even though I thought you were Gwendolyn this whole time."

Oswald paused for a moment to catch his breath. Silence befell the both of them.

"I'm dead, so don't even think about it."

"I didn't mean it like that!" Oswald blushed at her implication. Taking hold of the final ledge, he pulled himself up and peered into his wife's room.

"See, there she is!" Griselda cried.

"Shh!" he hushed, but did not dismiss her observation. Indeed, there sat his beautiful wife, dressed in her blue night robes, sitting at her vanity. She was brushing her long hair smooth. It was strange for Oswald to see Gwendolyn like this. They had met on the battlefield, and both of their hands are stained with much blood. He loved her very much, and never wanted her to feel as though she were an object (as her father treated her), but with such a lack of emotional passion in his history he could not help but feel desensitized to violence and insensitive to romance. But now he noticed her hair, her hands, how blue was such a good color on her. He felt he was falling in love with her all over again. He flushed.

"Gwendolyn!" Griselda cried out suddenly.

"Griselda,shh!!" Oswald slinked lower, praying Gwendolyn didn't hear. The prayer was not answered, and she looked up from what she was doing and peered towards the door. Fortunately, just like Oswald, she thought the voice was someone at the door.

"Um…yes? Who is there?" she asked hesitantly. Oswald understood her confusion; there were not many who called her by just her first name. Even Myris and Brom, her closest friends in the castle, referred to her as Princess Gwendolyn. He could only think of two people who called her by her first name only: her father Odin and himself.

"That wasn't funny!" Oswald whispered, watching Gwendolyn cautiously open her door to check outside, just as Oswald had done before. Griselda just giggled.

Feeling discouraged, Oswald began to climb back down. "I'm going back to my room," he said.

"No, Oswald!" Griselda flapped in his hair. "You have to tell her tonight! This is the best opportunity! You want to move forward with her, do you not?"

Oswald hesitated. He thought of Griselda's words. He yearned for Gwendolyn yet at the same time was completely terrified of her. How could you want to be with someone so badly that you are literally paralyzed to act upon it? He thought of the kiss he gave her to awaken her from her cursed sleep, and his resolve to act for her from here on out. Had any of that changed? He did not have to search too deeply for that answer. He remembered that, and realized that resolve had not changed. Not one bit.

He smiled up at Griselda. "I do."

Without any encouragement from his friend, Oswald whispered out to his wife. "Over here!"

Gwendolyn quickly spun around and spotted Oswald's head poking out from the edge of the balcony. She hurried and leaned over the edge, seeing Oswald hanging over the ledge like a lunatic. "What in the world are you doing, Oswald?" she asked, not sure how to react to such a sight.

"I just wanted to see you," he said. He hoped she did not find it too strange to see him hanging off the side of her balcony in the middle of the night. "You look beautiful," he said, not noticing how bizarre that comment was in such a position.

"Oh…You look…well, too, Oswald," Gwendolyn blushed. She was always very shy when he complimented her. He found it to be very endearing. "But, what happened to your hair?"

"Uh," Oswald used a free hand to smooth out his hair which Griselda had mussed. She was no longer there. He took a quick glance around but did not see her anywhere. "Nothing," he said, looking up at his wife. Her hair was getting tangled from the wind, but she could not look more beautiful to him.

"Gwendolyn," he said purposefully, "I want to tell you something."

"Oh?" Gwendolyn's brow furrowed in curiosity. "Well…" She hesitated for a moment, as if contemplating a decision. A thought quickly entered Oswald's head: how humorous would it be if she were to tell him they could discuss it over dinner tomorrow? Thankfully, she reached her hand out to him, ushering him to grab it. "…Come on up and we can talk about it."

Oswald's feelings were not something he completely understood yet. He looked at her outstretched hand. He wanted to come closer. But he didn't. It was like a dare of sorts. But what was the dare? Was it to touch her? He was scared, but what was so scary about this beautiful woman? What was so scary about wanting to be close to someone? Because he did not quite know the answer to these questions, the feeling haunted him. This feeling remained untitled, but perhaps, tonight, Gwendolyn could define it. Perhaps she could title this feeling for him.

He felt a breeze blow threw his hair. He could swear a tiny voice was entangled in the wind, saying

Though it is fate that had brought you two together, I am so happy it is you, Oswald.

Oswald reached out. He grabbed her hand, hoisted himself up, and entered Gwendolyn's room.

fin

Author notes:

It's quite fun to imagine Oswald's ineptitude at love and romance, though it was hard to keep him in character at times (he's not completely hapless and he's got some balls when it comes saying how he feels, but I don't see him as a total romantic goof either). But that is exactly why I liked writing for Oswald; he's not one-dimensionally written. To Gwendolyn he gets to the point without saying too much, but in introspect he thinks so much more. I like that about him.

To support the juxtaposition, I made the story humorous as opposed to sappy/angst. Griselda is totally OOC, but she's only alive in the game for like, two seconds, so who knows what she was like, really. I figure being dead could give her a sense of irony about things.

Thank you for reading!