Author's Notes: The characters and situations here in are not mine. This story is meant solely for entertainment purposes. No infringement is intended.
This is for Meredith Paris, who, instead of asking for Jeb/Az because she knew Ainsley would have a serious problem with that (hee!), provided the following prompts: "on a cold day, there was nothing better than keeping themselves under the blankets", a Cain/DG pairing and post-Eclipse fun. It's a little different (read: angstier) than I intended it to be, but I hope you like it anyway, darling. I wubs my Statler THIS much.
Credit to Alamo Girl and SpikesSweetie for their thoughts on the Cain-vs-Wyatt debate. And cookies to whoever can find the inference you so know is in here somewhere (though this does NOT take place in the RBFOD 'verse.) :)
For six months, she did not sleep in her room.
For six months, she did not sleep through the night.
She caught naps on the couch in her office, or shared a room with her sister. Nobody noticed the change in her routine, for life post-Eclipse was anything but routine, and there were more important things to worry about than the princess's sleeping habits.
Had they asked, she would have been able to come up with a litany of excuses and explanations as to why she chose anywhere but her chambers to search for respite. People are dying, she'd say, and I have to figure out a way to stop that from continuing. Sleep isn't a priority right now.
She'd never tell them the truth. She'd never tell them that it hurt too much to be in her room, because it hurt too much to be alone. She'd never tell them that every time she passed by the bedroom, she expected to see a fedora and duster tossed haphazardly across the window seat, and him waiting for her with rolled-up shirt sleeves, sitting on the edge of the bed. She'd never admit that the blankets still smelled like him, and that if she succumbed and cocooned herself in their confines, she'd never get up again, choosing to hold steadfastly to the fleeting safety when it was impossible to hold on to him.
It was a ridiculously obvious statement, but everything had changed for her after the Eclipse. Strangers had slowly become family. A foreign land had slowly become home. A friend had slowly become more.
She'd been surprised when he elected to stay with her after the regime's fall. She'd expected him to bid her goodbye, wish her luck, and head back east with his son and daughter-in-law. He'd not offered much explanation, merely saying he knew where he could be of most use, and he'd stay as long as she needed him.
She'd realized a few months in that she'd need him forever.
It was ironic that this realization--not being dropped in a strange land, finding out she had been murdered by her sister, or learning she had more in common with Harry Potter than she'd ever thought possible--was the one that brought her to her knees. It was as though a switch had been flicked somewhere, and suddenly, he was no longer just Cain, friend and self-appointed princess protector. She started to see elements of Wyatt seep through; he was the man who enjoyed a good laugh and a glass of whiskey at the end of the day. He was the man who was raised as the son of a farmer and a schoolteacher. He was the man who'd been suspended from his graduation ceremony after a senior prank went slightly haywire. He was the man who started to drop his guard around her, who trusted her enough to let her in. Cain always kept his emotions close to the vest, but Wyatt let his eyes do more of the talking, never wavering beneath her increased scrutiny.
He was the man who walked her to her room each night, always taking the lead, always guarding and guiding her. He was the man whose opinion she sought out most actively, whom she trusted above all others. He was the man she thought of first in the morning. He was the man who always gave her a half-smile and a 'til tomorrow, Princess, after she said goodnight, my friend, and before she shut her door. He was the man who refused to walk away until he heard the turning of her lock and convinced himself of her safety.
He was the man who refused to walk away, period. He was the man who had unwavering faith, who refused to be beaten into submission, regardless of everything he'd been through. He believed in her when she gave him no reason to, when she didn't believe in herself. He'd never lost focus, and was silently strong, especially in her darkest hours when she needed him most.
He was the man whose hand at the small of her back, whose smile, whose embraces, somehow made the world make sense, even in the most confusing and trying of times. He was the man who made all the clichés ring true. He was the man she never knew she'd always wanted.
Over time, it had become tradition that they'd regroup at the end of the day in the palace kitchen, and she'd make the OZ versions of club sandwiches or macaroni and cheese. At first, her sister and friends had joined them, but when the conversations became marathon sessions extending into the wee hours of the morning, one by one, the rest of the group eventually left them alone. After a few weeks, no one else even bothered to show up at the unspoken but designated hour, knowing the princess and the tin man were happy in their shared solitude.
She'd noticed one night that he couldn't quite look her in the eye, and her heart had dropped to her stomach, shattering into a thousand pieces and skittering across the kitchen floor as she believed him finally ready to leave her. She'd swallowed around her fear, put her hand on his and told him she understood, thanking him for staying as long as he had.
His head shot up at her words, and he stared at her, eyes and mouth agape, as if she had sprouted a third head. He was outwardly amused when he demanded to know just what the hell she was rattling on about, but she'd seen the darker tint to his eyes, betraying that his outward relaxation carefully hid something much deeper.
She'd felt the blush threaten, and tried to pull away in embarrassment. But he'd held steadfast--as he always had--and laced his fingers with hers as he haltingly tried to find the words to explain. He'd finally slid off his stool, and tugged lightly on her hand, pulling her up. She'd stood in front of him, open and willing, and he'd understood her silent acquiescence as encouragement--as he always had.
Their first kiss was at half past midnight on a Tuesday, with only the humming of the refrigerator as company.
They started meeting in her room each night after that, not for any salacious reasons, but because the O.Z. was descending into an exhausting and unending state of flux. Their days were much busier as the weeks turned to months and fall colors drained into winter white. He insisted she at least try to get some sleep, and she in turn insisted he stay.
She'd always felt a special kind of warm safety with him, and when he finally gave in to her--as he always had--and stayed the night, the increased heat soaked into the blankets, and she wrapped herself tightly within the wool and his woodsy, protective scent.
She'd never been an early riser, but found herself waking before the suns to just watch him sleep. He kept one hand on her waist at all times, as if he could only rest when he knew she was next to him, not gallivanting to Ozma only knew where. She rested her head on his chest or shoulder, watching his eyelids flutter as he dreamed, his face and soul no longer belying the horrors he'd endured.
She still said goodnight, my friend, and he still answered with 'til tomorrow, Princess. So much had changed, and yet, not much had.
She learned to love the safety of the silence, the stillness in which they could both just be. It was during those times that she was not a princess and he was not a member of the Royal Guard. It was during those times that she was not an Other Sider with a penchant for chaos, and he was not an Ozian who worshipped order almost as much as he adored her. It was during those times that she felt like she could finally breathe; when he whispered into her hair or ran his fingers beneath the fabric of the shirt she'd stolen from him, rubbing the small of her back, the rest of the world just faded into the background, absorbed by the rippling of the lake onto the pebbly shore and the symphony of the crickets' midnight songs.
She realized later that she'd always lived her life with one foot out the door, ready to cut and run whenever and wherever the wind beckoned her. Now, the complex simplicity of falling in love with Wyatt Cain, with wearing his shirt to bed, with huddling beneath the blankets with him as the snowflakes danced around outside her window, made her realize just how much she wanted to embrace the idea of finding her place, of finding home.
It had all started to come undone when the ever increasing rebel faction had declared war on the crown. She'd woken to a thunderstorm and had instinctively curled toward his side of the bed, panicking when she did not feel him next to her. She'd run her hand over the sheet, further concerned when their coolness indicated he'd been long gone. She'd thrown on her jeans beneath his shirt and let her feet lead her to her mother's office, never concerned with just how she knew where he was. He'd been there with Glitch and Jeb, hunkered over a map and piles of correspondence.
Her mother had asked him to take a company of men and help fortify their defenses in the east. He'd silently asked his princess's permission, and left the next day. Their tears had mixed together as they said their goodbyes, and she'd had to turn away as he mounted his horse, for she knew her heart could not take watching him leave. She'd shut the bedroom door--once hers and now theirs--and moved in with her sister that night.
The tranquility of the night became too much to bear after he left. She wished for any noise--the humming of a fan, the running of water, even the click of a guard's boots as he patrolled the corridors. The silence became deafening when he was not there to help her break it. She felt smothered in his absence, unable to breathe until she could exhale a sigh of relief.
Communication had been sparse, given both the likelihood of interception and his distance from the castle. But he'd sent a few short notes, assuring her he was safe, and ordering her to watch her back, for things were going to get a lot worse before they'd get better. She couldn't decide if it was easier or harder to hear from him--hope always came with the post, and when no letters came for weeks at a time, faith showed its fleeting and fickle side, breaking her again just as she'd finished rebuilding.
Spring had eventually yielded to summer, and when he finally came back to her, she could not tell it was him walking through the late July haze. She was sitting on the swing in the gazebo when he'd returned, and she'd blinked away both the sunlight and her tears when she saw the telltale fedora--more worn and worse for wear, but beautifully still atop a gloriously alive Wyatt Cain.
She'd discarded her scouting reports, letting the wind scatter the pages to the water's edge and not caring as the ink bled from the parchment, rendering them as useless as she'd felt during his absence. She'd sprinted through the tall grasses toward him, her feet sprouting wings as she flew to him. He'd had enough time to drop his pack and open his arms before she leapt into him, her thankful tears staining the leather of his vest.
That night, they brought the blankets from her room, now slightly musty and definitely underused, and hid themselves from the world in the gazebo. She closed her eyes and breathed in her surroundings, memorizing the feel of him beneath her fingers. Finaqua welcomed him home as well, the lapping of the waves on the shore a low fanfare harmonizing with the wind, the crickets and her grateful, loving words.
She didn't feel the chill of the next morning, for even though she'd shunned them, the blankets had not forgotten her--had not forgotten them--and warmed her with a heat comparable to those of the twin suns.
It was the first of many mornings shared beneath those blankets. The complex simplicity of their relationship faded into the lightening sky of dawn, leaving only him, only her, only them in love.
On a cold day, there was nothing better than keeping themselves under the blanket.
On a warm day, there was nothing better than keeping themselves under the blanket.
On any day, at any given moment, there was nothing better than being together.
FIN
