Chapter Song: La valse d'Amelie (version piano) - Yann Tierson ( watch?v=Dyo4tNwNIvQ)

Chapter 4: Winter Sun

The view from the palace classroom window was fairly ordinary for the building. Unremarkable even. Although it seemed for many of his winter lessons Alfred was unable to tear his eyes from it, finding interest in almost anything outside: a passing bird, stopping on a branch to ruffle it's feathers; The way the wind whipped at the leaves on the trees or made the grass shift and ripple like the waves of the sea; The places where the paint on the palace gate was peeling off slightly, and a few days later, the way it glistened and glinted in the silvery light of the morning with the new glossy coat it had received.

This particular morning, there was still the ghost of last night's moon hanging in the sky, the day clear enough that it's silver form could still be made out, a reminder of the way each day rolled seamlessly into the next. It was odd really to have such a vivid sky during the winter, it promised spring, a prospect not completely out of sight now, in February. And it was a promise filled with fresh, well sought after freedom from the confines of winter's icy grip. Pleasant memories of last spring enveloped him, horse riding out by the stables, climbing the apple tree to pluck the untouched fruit from its highest branches, absentminded contentment brought on by the of the prospect of the further warm, lazy months that lay in wait ahead.

Alfred was brought back to his senses by the unsettling feeling of eyes upon him. Sure enough, when he raised his gaze to the front of the room Mr. Thompson, his tutor, was staring hard at him as if waiting for some sort of answer. His hand was raised as he pointed to some blurry phrase on the blackboard Alfred couldn't really see properly. Beside him he could feel the pressure of his older brother's eyes on him too, not accusing like Mr. Thompson's but more wary of Alfred's clear bewilderment at being addressed. He's always had a short attention span for these theory lessons and he had an inability to concentrate at the best of times, let alone now he had to be cooped up for full day tutoring ever since he'd turned eleven. This idea had seemed exciting to him in the beginning. Like he was finally growing up and would be taught all kinds of important secrets and rare skills in this extra three hours of study. His disappointment had been barely shrouded when he'd realised these longer tutoring sessions merely meant another hour of history study or yet more time to struggle through some stuffy piece of literature from way too many years ago.

"...well?" Mr. Thompson looked irritated now, his eyes harsh and questioning.

"Um..." Alfred was at a loss. Another day he might have briefly filtered in some vague aspect of the lesson and manage to spill out some mumbled excuse that 'he'd got a bit lost at the cholera outbreak in the Capital' or 'he was sorry, he really had a hard time remembering what an oxymoron was and could it possibly be something to do with cows'.

(He'd definitely used this one because Mattie had laughed under his breath and said: "you're an oxymoron, we were talking about the book.")

Mr. Thompson sucked in his breath and slammed his board pointer down angrily on his desk, instead turning to Matthew for an answer. His brother didn't hesitate to name the three children King Leonard the second had had and which of them turned out to betray his own father by selling his battle secrets to other kingdoms.

"At least one of you is paying attention," The tutor looked pointedly at Alfred before re-opening his dusty textbook.

Alfred redirected his gaze to the window with a kind of bitter defiance, resenting both his teacher and his brother at that one moment.

It wasn't his fault Mr. Thompson was so excruciatingly boring.

He couldn't really resent his brother for too long though, he never did.

His attention was caught by the glimpse of a carriage rolling up the winding drive into the palace's front gates, another visitor. That was why Yao wasn't taking his lessons at the moment as usual. The Jack was so consumed with these constant guests and meetings that Alfred only saw him briefly around the palace now. The past few weeks had been the worst and it was for these that Mr. Thompson had been filling in a lot more often, or Miss. what's-her-name or occasionally the jack from another kingdom.

Alfred was unsettled by this sudden burst of official activity at the palace. At first he hadn't really paid the visitors any mind - nor the sudden increase in meetings and consultations Yao was attending. The truth was, the Jack of Spades was always occupied with something - all Jacks were. So perhaps in the beginning Alfred hadn't really noticed the increasing frequency of his absence around the palace or of the growing number of occasions when Alfred would pass his office doors to find them locked shut, the monotonous hum of official voices escaping in muffled bits and pieces from behind the varnished wood. It wasn't really the first thing for an eleven year old boy to notice perhaps, and Alfred would be lying if he said he hadn't adopted a dismissive 'let the adults deal with the official business' attitude during his childhood. Somewhere in his mind he knew he had done this because someday this responsibility would be all his and he'd rather push it as far out of his mind as possible while he still could. Not to say he'd suddenly become stressed over what was to come, no Alfred was still as carefree as any young prince would be and a part of him was excited to finally have a say in the running of things, if daunted by the responsibility.

Something Alfred was faced with now was how truly quiet the palace was most of the time. Perhaps it was a result of this slow in-between stage that occurs when a king chooses a successor who is not yet of age. Mergence period they called it, although Alfred's brother had once told him that commoners referred to it as being in 'Stillwater'. It came from an old idea that the flow of royals and chosen successors was moving like a river and this vacant time was something of a no man's land before the coronation of a new royal which then determined the direction of the new tide. It was a rather poetic if odd way of thinking. Although Stillwater was usually uneventful for a kingdom it was also named such for its flat expanse of opportunity. Everything was a bit tense for people in mergence period. The rules were more lax - particularly in trading - but the slightest shift could cause countless ripples that the court (who mainly took over the running of the country at the command of the Jack) were insufficiently prepared to deal with. It was a funny time, Stillwater. It wasn't just that, all the waiting, the speculation; it put a lot of pressure on the next king. This was something Alfred preferred not to dwell on.

In truth Alfred thought it had got really quiet a couple of years ago, there were a lot of hurried meetings and hushed talk around the time of his tenth birthday almost two years before and then it almost seemed as if the court, the palace, the Jack - all of them - were lying a little low. Keeping to themselves and trying to keep things quiet where they could. Or maybe that was just Alfred's imagination, but it would happen occasionally if there was a scandal, a defeat perhaps. Either way, no one had discussed anything with Alfred. All Alfred really remembered from around the time everyone was all stirred up was the Jack being unusually nice to him, often giving him time away from the palace to play in the gardens or skipping a day's lessons. In hindsight, this may well have merely been a way of getting the young prince out of his hair for a while. Whatever had happened, it had been fairly quiet around afterwards. At least up until now, with all these visitors.

Two men stepped from the carriage now but only one of them was familiar to Alfred. He had been at the palace a few times before that month already. Alfred remembered him immediately because he had a slightly different manner than the other noble men or women that commuted to the palace to meet with the Jack. He had a cheery roughness about him that was uncommon in the haughty lords and ladies of any wealth and status in the kingdom. Alfred had bumped into him and the Jack by chance while crossing the foyer to a music lesson (one that he wasn't looking forward to in the slightest) and rather than bowing or garbling pleasantries as others had done upon encountering the young royal, he nodded his head, smiling in a way that was both friendly and amused. Alfred remembered thinking that he wanted to know what the joke was. He'd shaken his hand too, gripped firmly, staring at the boy intensely for a second before smiling in that amused way once again – even chuckling. His appearance was also rather striking. A maroon cape at his shoulders, dark stubble on his face contrasting with the tanned olive tone of his skin an odd looking cap on his head, Alfred thought he looked like a kind of old world hero – a mysterious Robin Hood and had immediately endeavoured to get to know him further. At least until the Jack had sent him hurrying along to his music lesson.

The other man was a stranger, he had a similar physical appearance to the first minus the amused grin. Instead, he looked incredibly serious – sombre even. He wore a military uniform and some kind of white cloth head dress. Compared to the first he looked as if he hadn't heard a good joke in over a year and something about his countenance immediately unsettled Alfred a little. The man turned his head slowly in Alfred's direction and - although it must have been impossible - he had the sudden nervous sensation that he was looking right at him. He hastily averted his own gaze.

He refrained from looking out the window again until the lesson was over.

"It's not that I hate him- or even history studies really - It's just that he's so boring!"

It was midday and Alfred and his brother were taking a break from classes, winding through the palace hallways away from the stuffy hold of the classroom with its dusty books and screechy black board. Alfred was whining as he usually did after one of Mr Thompson's classes about how he found it so impossible to understand a thing when it's being taught to you by such a dull man.

"I mean, he doesn't even do voices!" Alfred threw up his hands in a combination of exasperation and shock.

"Um, I'm sorry?" Mattie smiled down at his younger brother in slight bemusement.

"In the stories! - He doesn't change the voices for each character or try and make it exciting! It makes it really hard to tell who the good guys and bad guys are!" Alfred spoke to his brother as if this was an issue that had been getting to him for some time.

"Uh, Alfred, I don't think that's really the point of those stories..." Matthew gave his brother an affectionate glance, smiling awkwardly at how naive the boy still was.

"Well, maybe not - but, okay, like, King Leonard was this really big, powerful guy and stuff so you'd think he'd have a deep, growly voice...- like a bear!" Alfred tried to elaborate for his brother, gesturing in a bear like shape as they turned a corner into the 'glass room' (as Alfred referred to it) which lead out into the courtyard.

"You're saying you think king Leonard, victor of the Dread War, leader of the most aggressive army our kingdom ever saw- should have a...a 'bear' voice?" The older boy quirked an eyebrow at his brother, pushing open the door to the neat palace courtyard.

"I'm just saying, I might remember him a bit better if he did," Alfred scowled, following Matthew's lead out onto the immaculate stone slabs on the courtyard patio.

Stepping the short distance from the gaping doorway to the ground outside, the brothers were greeted with the cool winter breeze and the unexpected soft sensation of sun on their faces. The pale White light of the cold season brushing against everything in the square courtyard, from the neatly clipped hedges (which were pruned to the shape of the spades symbol but that Alfred insisted looked more like upside down apples) to the elegant metal table set, patiently awaiting the summer months, and with them the prospects of afternoon tea and languid games of chess as the hardworking summer sun set behind the high stone walls of the paved garden.

"Don't, Alfred. It doesn't suit you," Matthew cocked his head at the younger of the boys.

"What doesn't?" Alfred's brow furrowed to an even deeper set than it had been before.

"Frowning," he replied, smiling softly at the questioning look on Alfred's face.

The younger blond appeared to consider this for a moment before grinning up at his brother, his smile brightening up the sheltered courtyard more than any sun ever had.

"I know," he took Matthew's hand, pulling him towards the stone archway leading to vast expanse of the palace rear gardens, "I don't think frowning suits anybody."

The Spades palace gardens were really something to behold. Even the Hearts royals, whose lands were famed for their fruitful, lush nature, could not help but be captivated by them whenever they visited. Directly behind the palace were first the flawless lawns, stretching across the building's length in a perfect green strip. These lawns eventually gave way to the flower gardens, their richly populated trellis' and beds forming a vivid maze of bright colour and sweet, heady scents. To the left of these was a slight hill, sloping down to where the grass was allowed to grow longer and the formally arranged flower beds to trickle into wild clusters in the soft grasses, currently rippling in the gentle breeze. At the foot of this decline was a winding blue ribbon of a river, which according to Alfred's geography lessons, journeyed a long way across the kingdom, past the palace grounds to tangle through the peasant villages, even reaching the further lying towns and manor estates that felt, to him, so far away. He often wondered about sending a message floating down its flowing waters, just to see how far it would reach and who would pick it up. Just past this river was the rambling - and much less grand - drive of the back entrance (This was used mainly by staff or for deliveries) - and after that the forest seemed to burst into view on the horizon, blooming on the edges of the lawns in all its verdant and mysterious splendour. Beyond that were the equally impressive stables and the orchard but those were both hidden and reached only by winding paved pathways through pleasant gardens and past the old stone side buildings.

Perhaps Alfred took the serene beauty of the place for granted. Or perhaps he had merely seen it one too many times, because he seemed to much more frequently fantasise about the places beyond its guarded boundaries. Still, it remained to be one of his favourite places to spend time.

"The Dread War was the big one, right?" Alfred confirmed vaguely with his brother as he took in the sight of the great outdoors tumbling - almost - freely outwards around him.

"Yes, I guess," Matthew replied, wondering if it was appropriate to refer to a war so tragic, long and bloody as the Dread War as 'the big one', "You really should start paying more attention in history study, you know."

He chuckled lightly but looked at his younger brother in a way that proved the sincerity in his suggestion,

"Ugh, but why?" Alfred moaned, dragging out the 'why' at the end, as if the word was too short to express his utter exasperation at the necessity.

"Well, you know why." Matthew tried to give the younger prince a reasonable look, but he always felt awkward playing the responsible older brother - particularly when it came to the weighty prospect of Alfred's future.

"Oh, I know," Alfred's tone was somewhat irritable as he replied.

There was a moment of quiet hesitation between the two as Matthew contemplated the best way to reassure his brother somehow; he felt guilty pressuring him when he was still so young. Coming up with nothing he instead began walking across the lawn, expecting the younger boy to follow.

"Maybe you should be king," Alfred muttered loudly, remaining rooted where he was.

"Alfred..." Matthew turned to his brother, his shoulders sagging.

"Well, you should, right?" The blond continued adamantly, his voice rising, "y-you know all the stuff in lessons and you're older than me! Besides, I'm sure everyone's just thinking it anyway! How is it fair for me to take the throne then?"

"Nobody's thinking any such thing. If they were, why would they have chosen you for the role?" His brother stated with conviction, taking a step towards the younger boy and putting a hand on his arm, "I'd be an awful king - and anyway, I thought you liked being the favourite, eh?"

Perhaps Alfred would have taken his argument further had they not been interrupted by the Jack's steady footsteps across the even stones of the courtyard behind them. Upon reaching the two princes he gave a short bow, straightening his hair down with his hand as he lifted his head.

"Alfred - your highness, if I could talk with you in the study for a moment," he directed his gaze to the younger of the brothers, a breeze rippling his formal tunic.

"Oh, um, okay." The prince did a poor job at hiding his disappointment at being asked back indoors but decided to oblige. Had he been younger he would have been more likely to protest. Although, in all honesty had it not been for his recent conversation with his brother which would have greatly enhanced the childish nature of the action, he probably would have protested today.

"Excuse me, your highness," Yao gave Matthew a nod before guiding Alfred back into the conservatory and away from both his brother and that puzzlingly pleasant winter sun.

The ageing town physician had told him that this often happened to people who'd undergone great stress or pain; That they'd just... block it all out. As if their mind just retreated into itself to hide from it all. To pretend it wasn't there. He also said that most slowly begin regaining their memory over time. It was actually quite daunting. How would it feel to remember the things his mind went to so much trouble, hiding them away in its deepest recesses, to avoid facing? How would he cope to remember something so horrible that his own body subconsciously went out of its way to forget?

Either way, Arthur did want to remember. But also, he wanted to make up for the lost time and start forming memories to replace the ones he'd forgotten. The odd thing was, he not only wanted to preserve the good memories, but the unpleasant too. Things like bee stings. Maybe it was twisted, but it was the way he seemed to register things nowadays. He couldn't decide if it was a trait he appreciated or despised about himself. It wasn't something in his control, nor was it something he'd ever really seen prominently in anyone else, but then again, he'd never discussed it with anyone else.

This fact was changing now however as he sat on one of the mid branches of a tree side by side with Antonio. Their belts were heavy with the few spoils of the morning (Arthur was surprised at just how much better the bow Antonio had made him was than the worn old thing he'd been using before) and Antonio with an entire wild chicken in the hunting pack he'd slung over a protruding branch above them to relieve his shoulders. The sun had ducked behind a cluster of greying winter clouds for a moment but the soft daylight broke through the trees and splattered the forest floor below their dangling legs. They'd stopped to eat the meagre snacks they'd brought with them but neither of the boys had really touched the bread in their hands.

Perhaps surprisingly, Arthur's shadowy past wasn't a subject they touched on very frequently and the younger boy wasn't really sure how they'd begun discussing it now. The closest they got to bringing up Arthur's lost life was usually by some light remark by Antonio, only to be met with a dry remark from Arthur or a sarcastic comment in a way of deflection. He was still defensive he supposed, from the attitudes he'd met upon first arriving in the village. Occasionally Antonio would ask him a few questions; 'had he ever done this' or 'did he remember ever trying this' and Arthur knew his friend often got curious about the life Arthur had left behind. For the most part Arthur's answers could not sate this desire for information because he simply did not know them - although he admitted to sometimes being so embarrassed that he'd make up some vague mumble about how he remembered something about one thing or the other but he wasn't sure. On Antonio's part, these questions spawned merely from an inquisitive interest and Arthur always appreciated that Antonio was laid back enough to let this curiosity pass over him so quickly and in such good nature when Arthur replied vaguely and with such little clarity. Although it was at other times Arthur just willed his friend to snap and force it out of him, maybe that way he would actually think about what he was asking rather than hiding from it.

Needless to say, Antonio had never pushed him.

"Hey, you remember about a year ago when you had the pox, Toni? Chicken, I mean?" Arthur turned on the rough wood to look at his friend who was leaning against an overhanging branch, twisting little pieces off his piece of bread thoughtfully.

"Sure as hell I remember, couldn't stop scratching the damn things! Ma was near enough gonna tie my hands behind my back to stop me scratching myself raw," He smiled easily at the memory, finally putting the twisted corner of bread into his mouth. They didn't often savour their food in Kattleroot, who knew how long it would be in front of you before another pair of hungry hands snatched it away. Here in the thick of the woods however, Antonio was able to take his time with the food.

"Yeah, well, you know I spent about three days at your house while you had them, Karlos did too, and Finn and Eduard I think. We'd been together the entire time - we even shared a bed, remember?" Arthur ignored the slight heated embarrassing feeling he felt saying that. There was nothing out of the ordinary about two boys sharing a bed. Antonio shared with Finn as it was. They were brothers, but still. It was only in hindsight that it made Arthur flush a little. He wondered if it would be the same a year later, now that the two were real adolescents and carried all the complications that came with growing up. He was being ridiculous though he told himself, of course it would be the same.

"Yeah, I do remember," Antonio wasn't sure where Arthur was going with this and how it related to his memories. He watched in confusion the slight flush and then scowl that crossed his friend's face as he thought before continuing.

"After we'd spent all that time together I was sure I'd end up with the pox too. It was contagious as anything and I was waiting to start getting itchy too, expecting it. I was almost...well...excited," Arthur wasn't looking at Antonio anymore, but down onto the carpet of leaves on the ground. His companion wore a subtle frown but said nothing to the pensive blond, watching the sunlight settle on his fringe of eyelashes, illuminated by his downcast gaze against the reappearing sun. He had to wonder what was going through his friend's head.

"About three more days passed after I'd stayed with you and I still didn't catch the pox. I woke up every morning thinking 'I must have them now' but I never did," Arthur flicked his gaze over to Antonio for a second, smirking bitterly at his own pathetic naivety, "When I realised the pox weren't coming I…I actually cried."

Antonio broke his silence, smiling in cautious and bemused amusement, "You cried? Art, you cried because you couldn't catch my chicken pox?"

It was with a breathy laugh of light realisation that Arthur replied.

"Well, I guess I realised it at that point" He began with a strange tone of surprise, as if the explanation was both for Antonio and himself, " I realised that I would never catch the pox...that I must have already caught them sometime already and not remembered. That now I would never know because that memory was no longer mine. I could never, would never have that experience...That's why I cried."

There was a stretching, thoughtful silence between the two. The only noise coming from the high pitched twitter of the birds and after a few seconds the soft thud of Antonio leaning his head back against the overhanging branch he was propping himself up against.

"I think I understand," replied the brunette after a while, pressing his fingers into the remaining half of his roll but not tearing off any more pieces.

Another silence lingered between them and Arthur wondered whether Antonio really did understand or whether telling him anything was one of those fleeting idiotic acts you indulged in and regretted later.

He laughed tightly and hopelessly with a hint of self contempt, "I guess I must sound pretty weird to you now."

Antonio shifted beside him and gave him a wearily playful look, "ah, hell Arthur, you've always been a bit weird."

He elbowed the blond beside him softly, his tone easy and warm but more subdued than usual. Arthur knew that this was his cue. His cue to elbow the other boy back and call him some name so the two could slip out of the dark depths of their conversation and return to the easy back and forth they usually had. To the banter and the light-hearted ramblings that distracted them from the worries provoked from the mere effort of getting by. This time was different though, Arthur didn't want to take the cue to fall back into the comfort of spending time with Antonio. He felt weak just to have allowed himself the luxury of doing so the whole time they'd been friends. He couldn't do it now.

"Well...It's just that I am really, aren't I?" Arthur carried on, averting his eyes from Antonio's as he did so. He felt disdain for himself as he heard the urgent edge to his voice, anxious to cling onto the string of conversation.

"Well..." The older boy wore a bemused expression, unable to conjure up an idea of what to say. He sensed Arthur's seriousness and his failed attempt at lightening the situation unnerved him a little.

"It's not just the memory loss, it's so many other things too - so many things that don't make sense," Arthur continued to stumble through the words blindly but his thoughts were moving too fast for him to illustrate his means in any level if eloquence, " I have these different ideas from other people, I speak differently - I'm always so tense and- well listen, there is this one really strange thing about me that I've never shared with anyone before."

Arthur had taken a breath before blurting his last statement and he'd leant in further, lowering his voice as if the birds themselves would flutter off to alert somebody of his secret.

Antonio was still fazed by Arthur's disposition and the sense of curiosity he felt was dulled reasonably by his vague sense of alarm. Despite it all he managed to frown thoughtfully and tilt his head in a way which urged the other boy to continue.

"Well, the thing is...It's just...- I know this will sound weird and stupid - but I can sort of...see things that other people don't," Arthur mumbled.

"…Like ghosts?" Antonio was remembering the story his mother had once told him about seeing his grandma after she died, sitting by the fireplace the way she'd always done before she passed away.

"Um no...I don't think so, more like spirits...sort of...faerie things." Arthur felt his cheeks begin to burn and he balled his fists into his shirt.

"Faeries?" Antonio asked trying not to sound sceptical.

Although, the truth was, he had heard about people who could see 'spirits' before. It was just a very rare thing, so rare it was more or less regarded as a myth. He knew there had once been a girl in the village who could do it but she had suddenly died and after that they didn't really talk about it around the village or in Sunday classes anymore. He knew that there were speculations of whether Old Mel possessed 'the sense' but it was yet to be seen if they were true. It was...seen as witchcraft, really. With a glance at Arthur, Antonio knew that his friend knew this too, as well as the fearful attitudes possessed by most of the village – much of the kingdom, probably - to the subject.

"I don't expect you to believe me'," Arthur hung his head, talking to the thin scatterings of leaves below their dangling boots rather than to the person beside him.

"I do," Antonio was surprised by how quickly he cut Arthur off.

Arthur lifted his gaze to meet the other's eyes and couldn't really read him. Despite the conviction in his tone, Antonio now wore an echo of his good natured smile and Arthur couldn't decide whether his friend was sincere or merely humouring him.

"When did you first see that stuff?" Antonio asked, ploughing on despite the scepticism of his friend at his belief and how nervous it made him that Arthur could really be telling the truth.

"Well, I suppose just one time I was out where the river goes by my house and it was quite late, then I just saw this little... person dancing on the water and then a few others and at that point it all felt really familiar. I wasn't afraid; it was like...they were old friends or something," Arthur was unable to hold Toni's gaze as he spoke, and upon trailing off he scowled, the brief look of wonderment in his face dimming,"-you can never tell anyone. I mean, I know you'll probably call me a freak and everything now, but I don't want everybody else laughing at me or God knows what else. N-not that I care what they think! I just have to keep up the little reputation I can and I can't do it with everyone looking down on me. Whatever you want to say or think is up to you."

Antonio opened his mouth, surprised by the hurt look on Arthur's face, as if he had already labelled the boy upon his confession. As if he'd already stood up and pointed at him in front of all the village kids and yelled some obscenity while they laughed at his expense. As if he'd already cast him off as the abnormal boy he clearly felt.

"Arthur," Antonio sighed, smirking when the blond finally looked at him, his expression dismal, "Don't you think if I was going to ever - ever- seriously call you a freak - not in kidding or anything - I would have done it by now?"

Arthur took in what Antonio had said and immediately saw through the boyish humour of it, simply because it was completely true. Most of the other children his age had openly called him something along those lines when he'd first moved to Kattleroot, even some adults had addressed him as such when they thought he couldn't hear. Antonio had never done that. He had never bullied or pitied or been wary of Arthur. He'd just smiled that warm grin at him and accepted him. It's not like Arthur was about to go round acting as if Antonio was some kind of saint simply for not picking on him, but he was better than the others. Even when he teased him, or jostled him or poked fun at him - even when they argued sometimes, which they did, there had been a kind of agreement between them since the very beginning that Antonio had Arthur's back. He had felt protective of Arthur during the first few months of their friendship and despite his kind and fairly docile nature Arthur knew he had knocked a few people around for saying something about him in those early weeks and that he wouldn't hesitate to do it again now. They didn't speak about it because the older boy knew the defensive blond would feel weak if he knew that Antonio felt that way or would 'fight his battles for him'. But Arthur knew nonetheless.

So now, with Antonio's twisted way of cheering him up, making fun of him and reinforcing how much he looked out for him all at once, Arthur decided to take his long awaited cue. To shrug off the draping, heavy blanket of worry that cloaked his shoulders for today and enjoy the stolen peace the two managed to disillusion themselves into when in each other's company.

"Well...you've called me plenty of other things," Arthur grumbled but he too had the edge of a smirk in his tone, his shoulders relaxing.

"Aw, that's only because I love you, Turnip!" Antonio sang this jokily and grinned, his eyes crinkling with his smile now that he sensed his friend's relaxation.

Arthur's shoulders tensed immediately. He always felt funny when the older boy said something like that. His stomach knotting oddly and his mouth suddenly forgetting the words it was about to form.

But then Antonio reached out and ruffled his hair, laughing in a carelessly affectionate, juvenile way.

"You're like... my brother."

And the feeling disappeared almost as swiftly as it came, replaced by something solemn and heavy. Like a glowing candle being snuffed out by clumsy fingers.

And that was just how it was.

A/N:

This chapter comes with huge apologies for lateness! I started University last month and have been swamped with new stuff to deal with so updates fell way behind ! But I hope to post another chapter quickly after this one as I feel this early stuff it still not quite exciting enough, ehh. I'll have to allow for changes in my timetable but from now onwards I should update chapters weekly :)

Thank you to anyone who took the time to read this!