Uuuuuugh.
So, between my computer crashing, my Advisor in college deciding to FAIL, my sister's cat getting pregnant, and a whole slew of other things, I FINALLY got this chapter out! Yay!
Aaaaand, this is the end of the pre-written stuff…. I'm on writier's block from here out. Help me out please. T_T Encouraging reviews and even helpful suggestions are greatly appreciated.
I've gotten quite a few reviewers commenting that they liked how historical I try to keep things. :3 I'm glad you all can appreciate my nerd-dom. LOL.

Anyway, onward!
Don't own, don't sue, etc.


"Romano! Thank heavens you're back," Hungary was yelling loud enough to be heard even though the door was still shut tight. Romano was too busy trying to shake his brother awake and too petrified with worry to appreciate her lung capacity. "You've got to help me look for little Ita, I can't find him anywhere and I don't think—Ó, istenem." She cut herself off, blinking in surprise once she'd torn the door open.

"Hungary I don't know what to do! I think he froze himself to death." Romano was nothing short of frantic, his brown eyes wide and pleading. Elizaveta didn't allow her shock or horror to paralyze her. She took one look at the Italies, wrested Feli into her arms and out of the carriage with one swift motion, and was already marching back to the house before Lovino remembered to breathe again. He almost tripped over his own feet trying to scramble after her.

"Calm down, Romano. He's not dead, he's just far too tired," was what she said, but he thought she was moving awfully quickly for someone who was telling him to be calm. Feliciano looked so fragile and small, cradled in her strong arms. "Ó, te idióta fiú, Feli... What are you thinking, going off on your own when things are like this? I worried over you all day! Even Austria kept asking me where you were." She babbled to his sleeping form, climbing the front steps with ease despite her extra burden. Romano tried to rush ahead and get the door for her, but she already had it open before he could reach it. He felt the old bitter resentment beginning in the depths of his soul, and quickly quashed it. He could be jealous of the strength of others and stew over his own uselessness when Feli was safe for certain.

Hungary wheeled through the many corridors and empty rooms of Austria's house, racing towards the Italies' shared room on the second floor of the East wing. Romano followed her all the way, listening to her mindless crooning and scolding to distract himself from the stiffness of his legs. The trip from the Empire's hideout had not been an extremely short one, after all. And running through the mansion after sitting all day made him feel like he might trip and lay splayed and panting at the first uneven floorboard or wrinkled carpet. Somewhat miraculously, he managed to avoid that fate.

"Just look at you, covered in rime! What were you doing, rolling on the ground? Honestly, Feli sometimes I wonder how you—Roderich!" she interrupted herself mid sentence to call, and Romano jumped about three feet in the air. "I found them both!" He had no idea what clue she had been looking for to start shouting, nor how she expected to be heard; they were a floor and two wings away from the Main hall where Austria most likely was. Nevertheless, her voice resounded through every part of the house, clear as the peal of a bell. The sound of an extra pair of footsteps, probably Austria running to catch up, was soon to follow. Romano stared. "What?" she snapped at his slack-jawed look without pausing in her stride. He shut his mouth and kept walking.

"Where was he?" Austria blurted when he finally found them, just as they'd made it to the correct door. Unlike his supposed servant, he was panting quite heavily. Elizaveta's brow was lightly furrowed with concern, but she had not so much as broken a sweat.

"Ask Romano, they pulled up in the carriage together." She never stopped moving as she talked, shifting Feliciano in her arms as she needed to turn the door knob. Once inside, she laid the small form on his bed and started finding and sorting what she needed with soldier-like efficiency. Fresh clothes and blankets and bandages were produced from, what seemed to Romano's frazzled mind, absolutely nowhere. And then she set to stripping Feli's shirt off without so much as a by-your-leave to anyone else in the room. "Please don't stand there like brainless fools. Romano, light the hearth and make some hot coals for the bedwarmer. Roderich, boil some water." Maybe if they'd been in their right minds, and not so frantic over the state of the too-thin, shivering form on the bed, they'd have protested her bossiness. As it was, they couldn't move to complete her demands fast enough. They scrambled to find the tools they needed, Austria storming back the way he'd come and Romano sifting through the untidy room for bellows, poker and shovel. Hopefully the last embers hadn't quite died yet.

About twenty minutes later found Lovino standing alone and worried in the hall, kicked out of Feli's room by an irate Hungary after he'd nearly set himself on fire. Usually, Elizaveta was kind enough to understand his complete inability to do even the easiest of household chores, and to realize that he was also tired from traveling and therefore clumsy. Right now, she was apparently not in the mood to be understanding. It was a fact that only made Romano more certain that Feli wasn't ok at all, and that he'd been somehow irreversibly damaged by the war or the cold. He was hyperventilating, completely convinced that his fratellino was dying, by the time Austria was kicked out behind him.

"—and I'll fix you up later. God. Seriously, Roderich? How did you manage to—" Her usually pleasant voice faded out as Austria pulled the door closed. His hands were positioned awkwardly and he had handled the knob with nothing but the crook of his wrist.

"What happened?"

"I forgot to use a potholder." The older nation looked nothing like the imperious man who'd ordered him around not three weeks before. Austria slumped next to Romano on the hard-wood floor, seeming disoriented. His palms looked red and raw even in the dim light of the hallway, and he was staring at them as if they had somehow betrayed him. He'd never been a very absent-minded person, and to Romano he'd always seemed so put-together and dignified that the simple explanation was hard to believe.

"… Really?" he found himself asking despite his usual wariness of the man. He was met with a heated glare for his inquiry.

"Apparently," Austria grumbled before balling both hands into fists and folding his arms across his chest. Lovino winced with sympathetic pain. He knew it must have hurt something awful to fold the tender skin that way, but the only sign of weakness Roderich allowed himself was a sharp inhalation of breath. He seemed determined to pretend that his airheaded mistake with the boiling pot had never happened. Well, so much the better. Romano didn't like feeling any sympathy for the man who'd taken him away from Spain anyway. "I take it that the Empire didn't listen to my suggestion?"

"What are you—oh." It took a moment for the meaning to register. He'd been so worried about Feli that he'd completely forgotten the original purpose of his journey. He remembered with a jolt the letter tucked into his meager luggage, which he'd unthinkingly left in the carriage. And that made him remember the second letter. Suddenly it felt hot and painful against his skin. He only just resisted patting it to ease the feeling. It wouldn't have been a good idea with Austria's eyes so carefully trained on him. "No—I mean, yes, right. He didn't listen." Romano floundered, flustered by the change of subject and his own paranoia. As soon as he was dismissed, and he could be sure Feli was fine, he resolved he would rush to the attic and read Spain's missive. No matter what it might say. Then he could burn the evidence and have done with all of it. "He sent a letter back to explain. I left it in the carriage."

Austria didn't seem nearly as worried over his Empire's disobedience as Romano had thought he'd be. He simply shook his head, sighing.

"Leave it." He commanded, but the words sounded tired. "It probably says nothing I don't already know." Ordinarily, Romano would agree. Austria ruled enough of the Empire's affairs on his own to know the situation for its entirety. But he seriously doubted that Roderich knew of Ludwig's suspicions—the dry and dismal fact that the Empire was falling into a decline with nothing but death at the end to meet him. If he had known, he'd probably have the teen whisked away to be protected and carefully watched, regardless of any protests, threats, or the official hierarchy of their respective states. Of course, if Romano could predict Austria's reaction, there was no reason to think that the Empire couldn't. In all likelihood, he'd written nothing so damning as the hard reality in his letter.

"…Probably," he assented, finally, but his tone was bitter and caused Austria to look at him in speculation. He decided to keep his mouth shut; the Empire's business was his own. And besides, if he said something to Austria, Feli might hear of it later, and he wasn't really sure how his little brother might take that sort of thing. Especially now when he was apparently delirious from the war. Worse—Austria might get it in his fool head to force the Empire back here, and then Feli would have to watch the person he loved slowly, painfully, slip away. It was the very situation he'd been working to avoid! So when Roderich raised a questioning, aristocratic brow, Romano looked away. Even if he was half-tempted to leak the truth out of spite.

"Was he… Was he well?" Austria finally broke the silence to ask, though it obviously hurt his pride to do so. He almost appeared to be fighting with himself—his disinterested air contradicted by his earnest voice. Lovino couldn't school his features in time to hide his wince. Of course the elder nation caught it, and of course he would press insistently on. "What happened, Romano?" His tone was hardened steel. The Italian cursed his luck and tried to figure out a way to lie without arousing further suspicion.

"You've got him fighting as a foot-soldier on the front lines, what do you think happened?" The best lies were half-truth, Romano had learned. He twisted more contempt into his expression and pretended he was indignant on the Empire's behalf. Surprisingly, the emotions weren't that hard to force. "He's cut up and exhausted. Why you had him out there in the first place, I have no idea." Austria's face was white, his lips pressed into a thin line.

"I didn't put him there, Romano." The admission seemed to have drained something from him, and his shoulders sagged, his perfect posture ruined.

"Didn't you?" He was going for imperiously disbelieving, but really only wound up sounding curious. Honestly, he'd figured as much himself—the Empire didn't look like he was fighting for anyone's sake but his own, and enjoying it as much as such a thing can be enjoyed. Even so, Lovino hadn't known what else to make of the situation. Austria's usual arrogance and influence made him seem capable of bullying the Empire out of any stupid decision he could possibly make, so why...?

It wasn't a sin to be nosy, right? Maybe Feli would know. He could say several rosaries later if it came to that.

"If I had any say in what that obstinate fool did, don't you think he'd be in this house with the rest of us?" It was something that troubled Austria deeply, if the weary annoyance in his expression were to be believed. "It's bad enough that he's technically above me, but if I try to force him to do anything or persuade the Emperor that the dolt should be with me, he'll just get Prussia to speak on his behalf." When he said white-haired nation's name, it sounded like a curse. Romano had to stop himself from cringing away from the pure venom his captor exuded. "And when I try to convince Gilbert that the Empire needs to be at least away from battle, if not near to me, he acts serious for about a day and then comes back to tell me some nonsense about all of us growing up fighting in wars and it building character. I don't know if he's talking to Ludwig about it, failing to convince him of anything and just feeding me excuses or….." He trailed off suddenly and eyed Romano again, as if he'd been speaking to himself and only just realized he had an audience. "No. I didn't put him there." Romano nodded, eyes wide, and they sat there in uncomfortable silence for a time.

"…'cut up and exhausted', you said?" It was not anything Austria would have allowed himself to press for normally. Perhaps the pain in his hands was troubling him more than he was ready to admit. Romano gnawed his cheek and tried to determine the best answer.

"He tried to hide it, but he had bandages up his back and on his hands, bags beneath his eyes." And that was as much as he dared to say without Roderich catching wise. The musician turned away and actually cursed with so much fury that he half-feared he'd said the wrong thing after all, and that Austria would be setting out to drag the Empire home before the day was out.

"I told him to stay out of harm's way as much as he could. Of course I knew he wouldn't listen but Gilbert promised…" He sighed, looking utterly defeated again. "He's so stubborn. I suppose I should have known he'd end up like that. It was stupid to hope he'd listen to that buffoon any more than he'd listen to me." He shook his head, made a move as if to cover his face with one hand before wincing and thinking better of it. Lovino very nearly felt sorry for him. Maybe. A little bit. He could at least understand the kind of hurt that came with worrying over your loved ones from afar.

"For what it's worth, he also seemed happy where he was. And I think there are others there, to take care of him if you can't. They're only human, but they're good people. He'll be ok on his own." It hurt to say. Because, honestly, he wasn't thinking of the Empire. He was thinking of Antonio. When he'd left, he'd left Spain freshly wounded and crying, and it had nearly killed him inside. What he told Austria was merely a modified version of the mantra he'd created to stop himself going insane with worry.

Roderich's gaze flashed to him, intent violet in the dim light, staring as the last words hung in the air. It was almost as if he were just seeing Romano for the first time. Then he breathed again, a slow, drawn out exhalation, and slumped further against the wall at his back.

"I am sorry, Romano." It was the last thing he'd ever expected to spill from the bastard's mouth, and he was astonished out of all powers of speech to hear it now. "This burden we carry, it makes things so complicated. If I did not have to worry about land and economy, if I could pretend for a day that we were nothing but human, I would not keep you here." He swallowed, emotional despite himself. Romano thought he must have been dreaming up all the other things he might do if they were normal, and not nations at all. Whatever was in those dreams must have hurt him, for he sat hunched over, cringing away from what he couldn't have. That, or he'd just jostled one of his still-clenched fists. "But the truth of it is we are nations, and I cannot help you. I am sorry for that." He was watching some shadow play of a time past, or perhaps one that had never happened at all. Romano didn't know. And he didn't care, because at that moment, a wave of anger washed over him stronger than he could bear.

He didn't want to hear that Austria was sorry. "Sorry" couldn't make anything better. It couldn't make them age like normal people, or erase the hurt and disorientation that came when bosses and governments changed, or take away the scars from war and border disputes. It didn't banish the shadows that haunted Antonio's face when anyone said the world "colony", or fix the mess that had sprung up and separated Feliciano and Ludwig. It couldn't send Romano home. Just who did Austria think he was to apologize for all of it, anyway? He wasn't some kind of god, picking and choosing their fates, deigning that they should exist as nations. And maybe he was just trying to make up for his actions against them in the last war, but if so it was an empty, feckless attempt. He apologized for keeping Romano, but not for taking him. Lovino hadn't forgotten the raw, jealous hurt in Roderich's eyes that day either—he was smart enough to know that he'd been used as a pawn to get back at Spain. Maybe for the failed union of the Hapsburg house. Maybe for something else he was too stupid and forgetful to know about. Perhaps Austria felt regret for that now, but it mattered very little. His apology mattered less.

Romano was seething, so full of anger that he couldn't speak. He bit his lips and held his breath and tried his hardest not to explode into a tear-filled, insensible tirade that could only start with Austria and dissolve into useless railing against the whole world. He wanted to scream, to lash out at everything and not worry about repercussions or what anyone else would think. But even like that, with his emotions running high and his blood roaring in his ears, he was too frightened to do so. Only three years, three years in this accursed place, and he'd conformed to its rules, grown used its oppression. He was ineffably angry with Austria for reducing him to such a sniveling state, and equally irritated with himself for falling to it. He'd never been this cowardly and subservient to Spain, not even in the beginning. Why was he so quiet here in Austria's house? Why bother bowing down to the powers that held him? Why not fight tooth and nail for even the semblance of independence? He glared, took a deep breath, made up his mind to tell Austria in no uncertain terms exactly what he could do with his apology—

"Romano, please take these down to the washroom," Hungary opened the door to demand, before tossing Feli's clothes at him. He had to scramble to catch the fabric before it hit him in the face. All of it was cold and wet, the frost having melted in their slowly warming bedroom. His hands were numb within seconds of holding it, and it only brought his fear for his brother closer to the forefront of his mind.

"Is Feli alri—"

"Yes, dear. He'll be just fine. Let him rest." She smiled warmly, and waved him off with a pointed look. "Now, Roderich let me see your hands. I've got Feli wrapped up enough that he should be—" She stopped to gasp. Perhaps she'd only just gotten a good look at the burns. Romano had better sense than to stay and find out. He was already storming in the opposite direction, toward the laundry and the solace of his own company. Feliciano would be fine. Hungary had said it, so it must be true. It had to be. Just like Antonio had to be fine. He made it out of earshot and started running, barely pausing to throw his brother's clothes into the washroom before turning and racing up the servants' stair to the attic. Feliciano was asleep, and Roderich and Elizaveta occupied. There would be no better time than this to read Spain's letter.

He ignored the mess of lost artifacts and old keepsakes around him and headed straight for the tiny window toward the back. It didn't let in that much light, but it would be enough to read by. He had to get this over with and stop stewing about it. Feli was right. Maybe it was not knowing anything that was the worst. If Spain was hurt or even… even if he didn't want Romano anymore, then at least he would know. Besides, hearing his little brother talk had set the guilt roiling uneasy in his stomach. Feli had begged him for a scrap of news, anything at all, about his loved one. Now Romano had information of his own, held in his sweating palms… what kind of monster would he be to waste that opportunity now?

Even with these arguments running though his head, it didn't stop him from hesitating, ever so briefly, before he tore the fine paper. He picked up the too-thin slip inside with uncharacteristic reverence, heart racing. He held his breath, opened his eyes and read.

Carísimo Lovi,

¿Cómo estás, mi cariñito? As for me, I am alright. I know you have been very worried about me, (You're probably denying it right now. So cute, Lovi!) but I am doing well enough if you discount how much it hurts to be away from you. I didn't think it was possible to go on living when one's heart is so far away but apparently it is.

I know it was cruel of me not to write you before now, and believe me I've been trying. I tried sneaking letters through the trade routes for months, but somehow Austria's people always found them. Gilberto finally got fed up with me pining after you; he said he would make sure you got this letter as long as I didn't put anything "seditionist" in it. (I think Austria's been using big words on him again.) If he keeps his promise, it might make up for holding you at sword-point.

Maybe.

Not really. No, sorry, Gil I'm still mad at you.

Anyway, he's waiting on me to finish writing so this has to be quick. Te amo, mi pequeño tomate. I promise I will come for you as soon as I can. (And that's not a seditious statement because everyone already knows it.)

Mantente seguro, mi corazón. No hagas nada estúpido.

~Antonio Fernandez Carriedo

"I wasn't worried, bastard." he grumbled to no one, crumpling the expensive scrap of paper with little ceremony. If the jerk were here in front of him right now, he'd complain. He'd ask why half of the way-too-short letter seemed to be written to Prussia and not to him. He'd decry all the soppy nicknames, snort at Antonio's silly, melodramatic pining, and call Spain out for being completely ineffective at espionage. But Antonio wasn't here, and that was the problem. Romano didn't see the point in wasting his breath on the dust of Austira's attic. He'd just have to wait until Spain came to get him and complain then. Because even if the letter was completely stupid and incomprehensible, he'd gotten enough out of it to know that Spain was really, really coming. Spain was coming and he was ok and he still, he still said he lov—

There was no one to see him smooth the parchment back out over his knee, clutch the precious few words reverently to his chest and pretend like he wasn't crying in relief.


Again, Warnings to all—I speak English (mostly) Spanish (Kind of) and Japanese (barely). Any other languages are a shot in the dark. -_- I try my best to use common sense, google, and babelfish to come up with a credible translation for everything else. If you see a mistake, please point it out! I'm sure there are many.
1. Ó, istenem-(Hungarian) Oh my god.

2. Ó, te idióta fiú-(Hungarian) Oh, you stupid boy

3. Spain's letter: (Obviously, it's all in Spanish…)

Carísimo Lovi- Dearest Lovi

¿Cómo estás, mi cariñito?- How are you, my little affection? (Spanish endearment. It doesn't work well in English…)

Te amo, mi pequeño tomate.- I love you, my little tomato.

Mantente seguro, mi corazón. No hagas nada estúpido.- Stay safe, my heart. Don't do anything stupid.