Look.
She saw him first. That's what it all comes down to, she saw him first sitting in the shadows of the forest, and there was something in her wide white eyes that made him say no, no, you can't be it.
They exist in a world of shadow and shape, and their eyes, ink black and milky white, glare jointly from their self-imposed dusk-colored blinders, long bangs and waxy paint misdirecting, distracting, hooding the wary bird-watchfulness they maintain.
But she saw him first, and he thinks that if she looks at him for too much longer he'll say the yes they both see waiting on the tip of his tongue.
Taste.
He kissed her, first, little more than a brush of salt and blood, lips dry and cracked and dusty, and she didn't know what to do with her tongue.
He tastes of an unmerciful sun and an endless sky, long lazy rooftop days and something rough and grating, and he tastes like a hot wind. When he pulls away she's left with a gritty breeze-tang in her mouth and the next time it blows her against him. The fragile curl of his ear feels like a strangely delicate shell between her lips and she can taste the roar of a scouring ocean.
Listen.
There's a susurrus of disturbance through the clans, mouth to ear to hand to paper to eye to mouth again, passed along like a wind, like a flame. Walls and moats and towers are made with paper and ink and treaties but they can't stand against the two.
She's pregnant, now, and there's three heartbeats when they're together. He lays his head against her stomach and listens to it kick with a smile, more triumph than love but more love than she expects or feels she has any right to deserve. And enough pride for an army of eagles.
Know.
The wedding is a rushed, haphazard affair of traditions and the kimono only has to be let out twice as the ceremonies fly by in a mere three months. The bride and groom sit solemnly in the center of attention, secret, private glee locked behind their impassively blank eyes more securely than any eye could hope to reach or any tool could attempt to crack.
They sleep chaste as twins the night after it's all blown over, their unborn child between them both as a badge of honor, as a trophy, as a blind promise of a victorious future.
It works.