"Exotery"
They had a tradition, the two of them, of going outside on the rare summer's day when Roy had finished his paperwork. He'd have an alchemic text, she her guns; she'd clean her weapons as he honed his. They'd always sit together, back to back but for each time the same tree, a thin and aged willow. He'd be able to feel her every tremor and breath through the slight wood; he'd know whenever she moved onto the next gun, when she set her burden down to tilt her head back and watch the clouds.
He'd be able to feel it when, on as the summer days dripped into fall days and the wind shifted to blow chill from Central, she began to shiver. When he felt her trembling, he'd set down his book, and without looking find her hand upon the ground and curl his fingers about it.
She would down in a breath and whisper, breathe, that it wasn't seemly – it wasn't proper – that anyone could see them out there, and was he really willing to give everything up for that? But even so, her trembling hand would turn upwards, and she'd slide her fingers between his and grip, fiercely.