Kyou Kara Maou : The Pirate Wedding

Summary: Wolfram and Yuuri's second wedding attempt is waylaid by pirates. But – might they still get a child as a wedding gift? Sequel to any of my KKM fanfics so far.

Disclaimer: I have no rights to Kyou Kara Maou, of course.

Please review.

Chapter 11 : Family Men

While Cecilie and Miko ran interference for them, Yuuri and Wolfram snuck off with Manfred to meet their new son before taking back the reins of power. They knocked softly on Dierdra's door before entering, but went in without invitation. Yuuri was at a loss, so hung by the door, while Wolfram went straight to Dierdra, asleep in the bed. Manfred went first to Doria, one of the castle's kitchen women, sitting there with a basket. She and the basket were nearly out the door before Yuuri realized that was the baby she carried out with her.

Wolfram woke Dierdra gently, to ask how she was feeling. She looked completely wrung out – long spring-green wavy hair matted and darkened with sweat, dark rings under her amethyst-blue eyes, which kept falling closed. She told them they took the child with her blessing, signed the adoption papers Manfred had prepared, and fell asleep again in mid-sentence. Yuuri and Wolfram waited by the door for a few moments while Manfred made sure she was comfortable, then they left.

They walked back to Yuuri and Wolfram's room – Manfred explained Doria had taken the baby there to wait for them. The custom was for the adopting parents to spend some time with the mother, inquiring after the childbirth and the mother's plans, before getting her signature on the adoption papers, while the baby was whisked away by a third party. This Wolfram had tried to do, but Dierdra was just too exhausted. Her labor had lasted over thirty hours, ending around midnight last night.

"Wait – that means she went into labor the day before last?" Yuuri asked. "Around 5 o'clock perhaps, the day we sailed for the pirate islands? And ended around midnight…" If so, Dierdra went into labor about the time Yuuri went Maou in bed with Wolfram, and the baby was born the next time they… Yuuri and Wolfram exchanged a look.

"That's right," said Manfred. He was limping a lot more slowly than usual.

"Are you alright, Chichiue?" asked Wolfram. "You must be exhausted, too. Let me get you a wheelchair for the rest of the walk to our room."

"No, I can walk, I've been catching naps between this and that. Unless… you want me to just sign over the papers and let you and Yuuri meet the baby alone."

Yuuri might have been inclined to use the man's exhaustion as an excuse to do just that. But Wolfram took his father in a big embrace, then laid their foreheads together. "No, Chichiue. I want you to introduce us to our son. All three of ours. Don't think for one minute that I'm cutting you out of his life!"

So Manfred came with them. Doria bowed out quickly when they arrived, conveying her and Sanguria and Lazania's best wishes, and offering their services as nanny anytime. The bedroom was already equipped with changing table and diapering supplies. The basket sat on a low rolling table with slightly bowl-shaped top, by the window table and chairs. The table bore milk bottle and hot water to warm it lying ready.

Yuuri and Wolfram made straight for the basket, to gaze at the tiny being within. Mazoku believed in small, womb-like baskets for newborns. He was tucked in with a soft-knitted Bielenfeld blue baby blanket, nestled into an underfilled feather pillow that lined the basket, making a warm little cocoon for him.

Wolfram's face was pure rapture looking at the sleeping newborn, touching the basket in wonder, though not yet the sleeping contents – a well-scrunched cone-headed tired little newborn, as worn out as Dierdra from the long labor of his birth. But he was perfect, with ultra fine hair the greenish cast color of yellow cornsilk. Wolfram laughed softly and bent down a little, studying the basket more closely. Yuuri was a bit surprised at the basket – a rather crude wicker affair.

"Recognize it?" murmured Manfred, coming up behind Wolfram. He enveloped his son in a hug from behind as Wolfram nodded, smiling and tears brimming, and leaned back against his father.

"Surely it's not the same one? That I wove for Efram?"

"No… But he wanted to copy the one you made for him as carefully as he could. Yuuri, it's traditional in Bielenfeld for a father to weave a basket for his first child, and guide their hands, each to weave a basket for the next child. And spend the time talking and thinking about how they each plan to help raise the baby. I told Gwendal and Conrad about it, and they loved the idea. So Conrad helped me weave Wolfram's. Gwendal knitted this blanket for him. I helped Wolfram weave the basket for Efram, and helped Efram weave this one."

Yuuri was delighted by the custom, his smile lighting up even further. "Is that what those baskets are! I noticed them in people's homes when I visited Bielenfeld, displayed on the walls. In fact… those three hanging in your dining room?" Yuuri decided to inquire about the third basket with Wolfram later – now didn't seem the time.

Manfred nodded. "The father keeps them – a reminder of the commitments he made before the baby was born. Wolfram. Are you going to pick up this baby or not?"

Wolfram didn't need more coaxing. He unwrapped Gwendal's blanket, revealing the perfectly formed diapered baby beneath, who groggily started to notice the temperature change. Then he picked him up and cradled him in his arms. The baby arched his back a bit, yawned, and started rummaging for a breast in Wolfram's cravat. "Oh, Yuuri… come here!"

Yuuri had been standing transfixed watching this. He gulped and came closer, touching a tentative finger to a tiny foot, which curled around it. The miniature toes and fingers were just mesmerizing. As he touched the tiny nose, the baby's eyes opened into little crescents, like bottom quarter moons, and his eyes showed. They were definitely aqua-green, the color deep and beautiful. Yuuri took one look into those eyes, and gasped.

Manfred, watching carefully, nodded. Yuuri had clearly seen the same thing he had. The baby started to get more adamant about getting fed, and Wolfram warmed the bottle to feed him.

"Yuuri, here are adoption papers," Manfred said, leaving them on the table. "I think you saw, what I saw? That the baby's a perfect match for being Wolfram's son, but also yours?"

"It's Shinou," said Yuuri in wonder.

"Ouch!" said Wolfram. "You scorched me! You have powerful maryoku for such a tiny person! Chichiue, did Efram and I do that as newborns?"

"Ah, his maryoku may be a bit stronger..." He shot Yuuri a cock-eyed glance to suggest the timing on that scorching wasn't accidental. Mazoku strongly disapproved of discussing the past lives of others without compelling reason. If you recognized a prior acquaintance for yourself, that was between you and him. Telling others wasn't appropriate – especially not Wolfram. Shinou's soul deserved a fresh start in his new life, same as anyone else, with Wolfram to cuddle him as his very own cherished baby, not a god.

"Well," said Wolfram, talking to the newborn as they curled into the armchair with the bottle, "we're going to have to teach Yuuri otousan a few majutsu defense spells, aren't we? Oh, Yuuri, what are we going to name him?"

Yuuri pushed his way into the armchair, too, holding Wolfram holding the baby, and they fed him together.

They look so beautiful together, all three of them, Manfred admitted to himself. Wolfram's face was fixed in the real bishounen smile of which his stage version was a pale imitation, absolutely enthralled with the baby sucking at the bottle, clutched every so tenderly to his chest, his shining yellow-blond head tucked under Yuuri's cheek. Yuuri, grinning lovestruck, shining black hair mingling with Wolfram's blond, held Wolfram close with one arm, while he continued touching his tiny son with his other hand, marveling at the texture of the skin, the perfectly formed fingernails, the vivid color of his hair and eyes.

Manfred smiled sadly and drifted out the door unnoticed.

-oOo-

Bertram, they decided, in Manfred's honor, since it had been his suggestion out in the courtyard, and went with Frieda. Then they laughed in surprise to realize Manfred had long since left.

"Maybe I should go, too," said Yuuri sadly, studying a tiny ear. "Reclaim my kingdom from Lord Wincott and all that."

"Yuuri…" said Wolfram, gazing up into his eyes. "If there's a crisis, they'll come get us. If there isn't… Bertram and Frieda are more important today, aren't they? Instead, would you please go help Greta weave a basket for Bertram? It would mean a lot to me. Once you get started, I think you'll find it means a lot to you, too. Efram can teach you how."

"Ah… if it means that much you, sure. Though, Bertram already has a basket."

Wolfram laughed. "Bertram would be just as happy in a punch bowl. The basket is for the father who weaves it, and the sibling who helps him. It's making it that matters, Yuuri, not the basket itself. This basket goes home with Chichiue, to hang on his wall with the others. It was woven of his promises, not yours."

Thus Yuuri good-naturedly permitted Wolfram to kick him out of their room. He found and recruited Efram and Greta. Luckily Adelbert, son of a von Bielenfeld mother, had already done the legwork to acquire a small mountain of basketry supplies, in order to 'straighten his head out about Frieda'. He and Frieda were on the lawn by Cheri's special flower garden, the baby playing on a shady blanket, while Adelbert soaked assorted colors of reed and grass rope in a cauldron of water.

Yuuri asked whether he should also weave a basket for Frieda, but Adelbert gently said no thank you – as a foster father, it would be an insult to the real father, Adelbert. The giant blond was companionable whenever Yuuri spoke to him, and seemed in no hurry to get the job done, but whenever conversation lapsed, he went back to sketching basket concepts or playing with Frieda.

"This is a meditation, Yuuri," said Efram quietly. "It's really about straightening your head out, like he said. Deciding who you're going to be, what you're going to do, in relation to Bertram and helping Wolfram raise him, your dreams for him, and like that. Cousin Adelbert isn't just weaving a basket – he's reinventing his life." Efram turned to Greta, and spoke cheerfully. "So what kind of basket we should weave, Greta?"

"I never wove a basket before," she answered. Yuuri admitted he hadn't either.

Adelbert murmured, "There's a lot to raising a child that I've never done before." Mesmerized by that insight, he lay down beside Frieda for a bit, staring into a tree.

And Yuuri realized that was part of the point – to do something he wasn't good at, but to be willing to learn and do it as well as he could. Or… maybe there weren't any lessons in this exercise except the ones he made up while he wove the basket. "Ah… Greta, let's make a basket like the one Chichiue Wolfram wove for Efram. I bet that would mean a lot to him. Wolfram and I have never raised a baby before either, and you've never raised a little brother. Let's go with the pattern he wove, to encourage him."

Greta agreed completely. Efram was the one with the actual know-how, but Yuuri and Greta took turns doing the weaving. As Yuuri concentrated on the task, a lot of promises passed through his mind. How he wanted to support Wolfram in raising all these children. How he'd deal with jealousy and squabbles between them. How a foster child differed from the adopted children. In what ways Bertram was Shinou, and what ways he wasn't. How he himself wasn't Susanna Julia. What it meant to be this child's father. What kind of man he'd like to help Bertram become – though Yuuri would likely be gone by then. He thought a lot on that. His dreams for Bertram. Scratch that - Bertram's dreams were his own to discover – rather, how Yuuri could help him find them, and be a positive memory for Bertram even after he was gone. His fervent wish that they were indeed Bertram's dreams, not Shinou's - that Shinou was at last free of his onerous obligations from the past.

When his ideas touched on his relationship with Greta, he talked them over with her, and about how these new children might change her relationship with her fathers. His face hurt from smiling as much as he had this afternoon, as Greta shared her big dreams for her tiny brother and foster sister. Adelbert listened in on those, rapt as well. Efram wryly bit his tongue rather than suggest more realistic prospects for what a nuisance little brothers and sisters could be – it wasn't the time for that.

Other people wandered through, most not staying long – the baby basket-weaving tradition was well known throughout Shin Makoku, though not practiced much any more in most parts. Conrad passed through, clearly moved by memories, giving encouragement to both basket projects. Yuuri's father Shouma sat with them for a while, as clueless as Yuuri when it came to basket-weaving, but adding a few insights he'd had about fathering along the way. Brendan visited a while with Adelbert. Manfred came and gave Efram a hug, complimented Yuuri and Greta on their workmanship, then sat with Adelbert, too.

When Manfred rose to leave, Adelbert roused from a reverie to say, "Manfred… sorry I'm not much use today. You really ought to see Aldrich, though. Promise me?" Manfred waggled a hand 'we'll see' and limped away. Adelbert stared after him in concern. Shouma noticed and left as well, catching up to Manfred, taking the opportunity to get to know him a little better. Yuuri wasn't worried about it – his international executive chameleon of a father would surely be affable and soothing. He realized he hadn't thought much about that - how his father had raised him, what kind of example he'd been.

This custom clearly had very little to do with basket production.

-oOo-

"Ta-da!" said Greta, presenting the basket to Wolfram. He admired it fulsomely before putting it on the windowsill to finish drying. He taught Greta how to hold Bertram, and she chattered about what she'd decided while weaving.

"And Adelbert's still down there?" Wolfram asked thoughtfully. "Well, Greta, are you up for weaving another? Yuuri, shall I have your dinner sent up? This will take us a while."

"Ah… what?"

Wolfram smiled and kissed him. "I'm Bertram's father, too, remember? I haven't woven my basket yet." He kissed Bertram, and left quickly with Greta. Yuuri admitted that made sense – they had agreed to a foster baby today as well, and Wolfram wanted to weave a basket alongside her father Adelbert.

And Yuuri was left alone, holding a newborn. After being terrified for a few minutes, it dawned on Yuuri that Bertram was undemanding, if riveting, company. He'd heard somewhere about babies thriving on skin-to-skin contact. So he stripped his jacket and shirts off in the warm summer evening, and snuggled Bertram to his bare chest, nestled so the baby could hear his heartbeat. Bertram seemed to love it. Wolfram had apparently entertained himself part of the time by healing him – his head was no longer cone-shaped.

"You're going to be a real beauty, Bertram, just like your Chichiue."

Dinner came and went with the new grandmothers Miko and Cheri. Miko gave him a hard time about lying around with no shirt on, but he took it off again to snuggle Bertram as soon as she left. Eventually Wolfram came back with an elegant basket. Yuuri praised their workmanship. The four of them clambered onto the bed for a bedtime story – the fosterlings were with their true fathers tonight. Greta changed Bertram's diaper, and bounced off after kisses all around.

"Alone, at last…" Wolfram said, stripping off the top half of his uniform. "Bertram, you need to control your sexy father. It was very hard to concentrate reading a story, watching you cuddled to his bare breast like that." Wolfram dove into the bed and joined Bertram, with his head on Yuuri's other breast. He kissed both their beautiful naked breasts, then looked up to invite a big kiss from Yuuri on the mouth. "Mmm. I like this idea, skin to skin cuddling with the baby. I must admit, you have very good ideas. I'm so relieved that Maou-on-climax thing was Bertram. It was, wasn't it?"

"Yeah…. But 30 hours labor – that's just terrible. Bertram, tell your Chichiue. We clearly need to make love more often than that. So off to your basket…"

"No way! I haven't cuddled him to my bare breast yet," Wolfram objected.

Yuuri found this argument altogether compelling. He traded places with Wolfram immediately. Although, it was very hard to keep his hands, and lips, from exploring all over both of his favorite blond demons this way. Wolfram murmured objections that sounded a great deal more like encouragement, until he admitted he was ready for Bertram to get nestled back into his basket, after all.

-oOo-

Manfred tried to ask Cheri for a rain check on their tryst that night, but found only the Shibuyas working on the new nursery next to Yuuri and Wolfram's room. They said Cheri had run off to the attics – or was it the basements? – to sift through her stash of baby memorabilia. Unwilling – unable, really – to go hunting for her in either place, he just gave in to the day's misery and limped painfully to his room. Maybe if he fell asleep before she found him, she'd just leave him be.

Climbing into bed in physical agony, having held himself together emotionally by sheer force of will through the day, he had to admit Adelbert was right. He should have gone to see Aldrich. Aldrich was the second best healer in the castle after Manfred, body and soul, as well as his surrogate big brother. Instead he'd stubbornly stuck to doing things that made him feel worse. But he couldn't face getting out of that bed again and limping off to look for Aldrich now. Healer, heal thyself, he thought sourly, knowing full well that he wasn't up to it.

He propped himself up on the pillows, and pulled his plain white sleeping gown up around his chest, for access to his painful hips and legs. He didn't usually need focus practice before even the most difficult healing – but lack of sleep and clamoring misery made healing focus almost unattainable. He brought out his maryoku signature – Cheri's yacht, in full loving detail, blue fire dancing in the rigging on orange sail – and practiced.

Cheri knocked briefly and slipped into the room, since she was expected and didn't want to draw attention in the hall. Manfred almost immediately managed to dash the signature and pull a blanket over himself. But she saw it all. She pursed her lips and drew a chair to his bedside, while Manfred buried his face in his hands.

"I tried to find you to take a raincheck on this evening –" Manfred attempted.

"Don't. Oh, Manfred, please don't start. You're in pain – a lot of pain. Heal it. Let me sit by you and hold your hand, or just be here for you while you do it. And then we'll talk. Don't push me away…"

Manfred dropped his hands and lay back on his pillows, but looked away from her, his beautiful blond-swept face a mask of misery. "I can't, Cecilie. Please go…"

"No!" she screamed, and slammed a lamp off the nightstand. "Why must you always do this?"

"Mind if I come in?" said Aldrich, already closing the door behind him. "Cecilie. Manfred. Adelbert said you should have been looking for me. I can see why. Cecilie, perhaps you could excuse us…?"

"I am not leaving!"

Aldrich nodded. "I see. Well, could you at least give me your seat so that I can see to Manfred for a moment?" Cheri grudgingly stepped away from the chair, to stand at Aldrich's elbow, arms crossed, jaw set. Aldrich sighed and ran a monitoring hand over Manfred's body from head to toe, then back to hover over his head, frowning. He placed his hand along the side of Manfred's face and asked him to take a couple deep breaths, watching carefully. "Well, since you're here, Cecilie, perhaps you could help. Could you please place your hand just like mine on the other side?" Aldrich only had the one hand, so couldn't hold both sides. Cecilie eagerly stepped forward to help.

"Aldrich, what the hell are you doing…" complained Manfred, glaring at him.

"Everyone has their own style. If you're willing to feel better, then cooperate. I'd like you to take ten deep, calm breaths. If you get frazzled, that's fine, just start over counting from one. Let everything else go for now. Do this one thing."

Manfred's head yammered with analyzing Aldrich's technique, his emotions reeling at Cheri's touch, and at first he couldn't either to shut up. But Cheri's hand and Aldrich's – two of the dearest people to him in the world – felt really good cradling his face. It took several false starts, but he finally managed to relax into the comfort of their hands and just breathe.

As Manfred's face relaxed out of its hard stubborn set, Cecilie's heart ached. His beautiful face was still rigidly white about the lips from pain, eyes dark-ringed from fatigue, expression melted from hard stoicism, into misery.

"Good," said Aldrich. "Now I'm going to see to the legs. Cecilie, please place your other hand where mine was – good – and Manfred, keep breathing deeply." He pulled the blanket away and Manfred stiffened. "Just count breaths, Manfred. Cecilie's only looking at your face." Aldrich began on the side of Manfred's good leg, placing his palm directly on the skin of his hip, which ached from over-compensating for his bad leg. The healing fire tendrils branched out from there, lapping around his groin and other hip, but mostly down the good thigh. Aldrich moved his hand and repeated this at knee and on the sole of his foot. Manfred gave a long sigh of relief.

Then Aldrich worked his way up the bad leg, stopping more places. Manfred's face dripped with sweat, and a whimper escaped at times. Then Aldrich pushed his hand under to the small of Manfred's back, and worked there for a minute. By the time he was done, Manfred was breathing much easier, and Cheri saw that the pain lines in his face had softened. That still left a heartbreaking amount of fatigue and misery.

Aldrich sat back and considered, letting Cecilie just hold Manfred's face for a few minutes in silence. "Manfred… I'm going to ask you a question. Now hear me out before you answer, because I know you. The question doesn't mean what you think it does. I'm not asking 'do you think Cecilie should stay', nor 'should you want her to stay', nor 'should she want to stay', nor 'do you think you will fight', nor any other of the thousand variations you come up with when you're feeling like this. Cutting all that out of the equation, if it were possible for a good outcome – now here's the question – do you, want, Cecilie to stay? Or do you want her to leave?"

"Stay," he whispered eventually, eyes closed.

"OK. Just try to relax for a bit. Cecilie, over this way – we need to talk."

In the corner of the room, he spoke to her quietly, though not so quietly that Manfred couldn't hear – this wasn't an attempt to talk behind his back. "Cecilie… when you first sent Manfred packing, back to Bielenfeld, you wrote me a letter. You said you'd give anything to know how to handle him when he got this way. That there had to be something you could do, something better than just kicking him out. I didn't answer – I honestly thought it would be better for you to let go. But it's been 80 years and the two of you… Anyway, do you still want to know? Or… do you want to leave?"

Cheri looked at him levelly, absolutely sure. "I still want to know."

"Next question. What I need to know from you is, can you promise me, that you will say absolutely nothing? I'm not talking about just a few minutes – I mean for the rest of the night, you cannot talk to him. Not even, 'Oh, Manfred," not even 'I love you' – not a word. At all. If you can't do that… it really would be better for you to leave now and try another day."

"I'm not leaving. I won't speak."

"OK. Next item. What I'm about to do is going to make Manfred cry. What I want you to do, is hold him while he cries, until he falls asleep. And not say anything. If you manage this, you still have two options open. One, you leave in the middle of the night, and have the option of starting this evening over some other time, or not. Two, you stay until he wakes up, and then you talk. If you take option two… then I don't think Manfred will get over you for as long as he lives. But… I'm not sure he ever would anyway."

"I'll stay til morning."

Aldrich shook his head. "No. You'll leave that option open. But if you're staying now, then… no-talking time starts now. I'd like you to put your hands on his face again the way you did before, until he starts crying. Then you hold him while he cries. That's it."

Cheri nodded emphatically. She went to Manfred's side and held his face again. That he was willing to cooperate with all this was certain proof that he hurt bad inside, she was sure of that.

"OK, Manfred," said Aldrich. "I want… a neutral shopping list. Just dump a list of things that have happened the past few days, no order, no evaluation, you just say it, and I say, 'next'. I want you to list things that hit you emotionally – positive, negative, mixed, anything. Just – say some big thing, I say 'next', and you say another big thing. Got it? OK. Say a big thing."

"Became Lord Bielenfeld." Next. "Wolfram's wedding." Next. "Efram's mother kicked him out." Next. "Annette committed suicide." Next. "My mother called me a screw-up – oy, that's childish of me -"

"No commentary, Manfred. Just a list, big or small, good or bad. Next."

"Wolfram gave Efram third degree burns." Next. "Yuuri didn't want a Mazoku baby." Next. "Efram's fascinated by gay sex." Next. "I decided to keep the baby." Next. "Dierdra was in labor 30 hours, and the baby was born." Next. "Efram wants to stay here instead of live with me." Next. "The baby…chose Yuuri…" Next. "I gave up my s…" Manfred couldn't say it.

Manfred wasn't crying yet, but tears were pouring down Cheri's face. Who had he shared all this with? No one. Who had he let in? No one. Not only didn't he let anyone help him – Cheri knew most of this, but he was such a consummate actor, she didn't add it up and realize he was reeling. Maybe he didn't either. He carried it off with dark humor and just… kept going, until when she'd try to find out what was wrong… he fractured. Manfred, damn you, why do you do this, love? She held his face tenderly, and said not a word. Eighty years she'd tried to figure this out – this time, she was determined to succeed. Absolutely.

"You gave up your son for adoption. Next."

"My mother dis…" Manfred swallowed, hard. He'd passed it off as a joke twenty times already since it happened yesterday.

"Phoebe disowned you. Next."

"Adelbert has a baby." Next. "Adelbert's staying." Next. "Cheri… was…"

"Cheri was kidnapped. Next."

"Efram ran away." Next. "I couldn't… I couldn't go… I couldn't help…"

"You couldn't go on the rescue mission to save Cheri?" Aldrich asked.

At that, Manfred finally broke down sobbing, and let Cheri hug him tight to her bosom. She stroked his beautiful blond hair, so like hers and Wolfram's. She clasped his back, well toned from 50 push-ups a day, without fail. She bit her lip – oh, it was hard to say nothing!

Aldrich murmured in her ear, "Absolutely not a word until he's had at least four hours of sleep, no matter what he says. If you break this rule…" He sighed. "I'm next door, toward the gallery. Wake me, without fail, or he might harm himself badly. I'll come put him back together again… somehow." And with that, Aldrich brushed a gentle finger down Manfred's tear-drenched cheek, and left.

I won't. I won't let go, and I won't speak, thought Cheri adamantly, sobbing as hard as Manfred. I don't understand, love. I don't understand why I can't speak when you need to talk so desperately. But I'll try anything. I can't bear watching you do this to yourself. I never could. But after you lost the leg and your career… And Conrad and Wolfram got so frightened when we fought… But I've never forgiven myself for sending you away, when you needed me so much. But I couldn't figure out how to help.

-oOo-

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