AN: Hey everyone, sorry for the delay. As I mentioned last week, things have been hectic recently. I'm hoping to be able to keep a regular schedule in the coming weeks, but we'll see how that goes... So until everything settles down, thanks for your patience and sorry for the weird update schedule.

Day 3:

It was two days before they let him see her. Every time Noctis walked by in a hurry on his way somewhere with Ignis dogging his steps, Cor stopped them. Each time they told him the same as they had the last time: Reina was still unconscious and Regis was still with her. Nothing changed.

On the third morning, Clarus was conscious enough to complain. Not that he was well. The doctors had him in a back brace and heavily medicated—they had tried to do something similar to Cor, but either he was more stubborn or he was more intimidating and the end result was a stiff bandage on his knee, a crutch, and a bottle of pain pills that he hadn't touched. But Clarus was lucid enough that he couldn't lay around while Insomnia was short on leadership. He dragged himself out of bed and demanded a wheelchair.

And people said Cor was mulish.

Cor pushed Clarus up, himself—half because it felt better than sitting around the infirmary all day and half because he wanted to get up there as badly as Clarus did. They made a bit of a spectacle: Cor, leaning on the wheelchair for support while Clarus held Cor's crutch across his lap. Mostly Cor tried to ignore any need for the crutch. In practice, it was difficult to go without both medication and the crutch, so he chose the lesser of two evils.

They found a bunch of attendants outside the royal quarters. Probably they were supposed to be inside, but no one had come along to let them in. Or Regis was in such a difficult mood that they didn't dare go any closer.

Idiots. That was exactly when Regis needed someone nearby.

They went in. Clarus winced and clutched at the crutch with the slightest bump, but he held on—white-faced and tight-lipped.

Reina was laid up in Regis' bed; he stood beside her, speaking to Noctis who stood by the door. They both turned when Cor pushed Clarus in.

"Clarus. How are you feeling?" Regis asked.

"My back is broken and I may never walk again; they have me drugged to the teeth and it still bloody well hurts," Clarus said sharply. And then, "I thought I'd find you senseless with grief and making a fool of yourself."

"Thank you, Noctis," Regis said. "I agree with your assessment. Please update me if anything changes drastically."

Noctis bowed and walked past Clarus and Cor, and through the door. He gave them both a once-over before leaving.

"No, Clarus," Regis said. "As you can see, I am very much in possession of my faculties. Though you may find I have made an uncharacteristic choice."

Cor found his eyes wandering toward the bed, where Reina lay. She was so still and so damn pale against the black of the bedspread. Closed up here with all the light blocked out by shutters and Reina looking like that—it looked as if she was already gone.

Already. No. She wasn't going anywhere. Not now. Not ever. Not while Cor was still alive.

He lost track of the conversation. He limped over to the windows and threw the blinds open. The early morning light poured in and struck the bed. Reina flinched. Probably he should have felt bad about that, but all he registered was relief at that miniscule sign that she was still alive. In the light, she looked a little less deathly pale. She was still wearing the ring.

"You let her keep it?" Cor asked, heedless of the conversation he was interrupting.

Both of them looked to him, then back to Reina.

"She will not relinquish it," Regis said.

That didn't make any sense. She was unconscious.

Regis leaned forward and smooth his hands over hers. She gave no sign of life until he grasped the ring and tried to remove it—then her hand closed into a fist.

"No," she mumbled, though her eyes never opened.

"Why should she be so insistent on keeping it?" Clarus asked.

"She isn't," Cor said, before he could stop himself. They were both looking at him again. "But she doesn't want Regis to have it."

"Indeed." Regis released the ring but not her hand.

It was just possible that she would have let someone else take it—but who knew if she could even recognize the difference. At least they knew she was conscious enough to keep trying to protect Regis.

When everything was settled between Regis and Clarus, something like the political process began to take place in Regis' sitting room. Clarus stayed for as long as he could manage—they even had a cot brought up and a doctor standing by to administer to him, but eventually he was taken across the hall to rest in one of the spare rooms.

Cor was allowed to stay. More importantly, he was allowed to stay at Reina's side. No one had much use for a soldier right now and the doctors would only turn down his offer of help. He knew because he'd tried that already. He was tired of lying in a bed and staring at the ceiling.

He took up Regis' vacated chair and tossed his crutch over the foot of the bed—Reina was too short to need that part, anyway. He sat forward with his elbows on his knees and stared at the tile floor because he could only stand looking at her like this for so long.

Cor didn't usually talk to people. Gods knew he was no good at that. He sure as hell never wasted time talking to no one at all, but shit. There were so many things he wanted to tell her; now he was afraid he would never have the chance. Something about the quiet room and the knowledge that she was never going to remember this pulled the words out, anyway.

"I'm sorry I let this happen."

Fuck the fact that Regis and Clarus and everyone else were just outside the door. Maybe she was aware of something. She was sure as hell aware of Regis trying to take the ring back. So if she could hear him, somehow, then… Well. He was dropping this here, either way.

"I know you don't think I did anything wrong. But it is my job to protect you. Even if you don't think you need it." His knee hurt. He ran his hand over it unconsciously and continued. "Even if it wasn't—even if you had never summoned me for this and chosen me to accompany you… this would still be what I need to do. For reasons I can't explain, I need to protect you."

She neither moved, nor gave any indication that she heard him. Why was he doing this anyway?

Cor shook his head.

"I could—should—lie and say it's just my place. I protected your grandfather and your father and now… but it isn't. And it isn't only now, Gods damn it. When Drautos—" Shit. Everything that slime had touched was now tainted. Cor swallowed the taste of bile and continued. "—when Drautos said you were in danger with only one Kingsglaive at your side a few weeks back, I went myself because I could never trust anyone else with your safety. I should have been the one who went in the first place. Maybe then, you wouldn't have gotten—"

He stopped himself. Self-pity was getting him nowhere.

"And now… well. I don't understand what happened any more clearly than anyone else. But you were only gone for a day and you came back ten years later. You're all fire and fury… and I've never seen anything like it. You would have taken care of that riot in the city yourself without your Kingsglaive guard or me or anyone else, but I would still be at your side—if you will let me… I would always be at your side, if you will let me."

"Cor…"

His head snapped up at the sound of her voice. Her eyes were still shut, her chest still rising and falling at that same steady rate. He might have imagined it, but—

"Reina?" He shifted—pain shot up his leg—and sat on the edge of the bed to take her hand in his. "Can you hear me?"

He held his breath while he waited for some sign, some confirmation—anything to tell him he hadn't imagined the whole damn thing. Which would be worse? Knowing she had heard every stupid confession he had just made, or knowing she hadn't?

He couldn't decide.

She didn't speak again.

Cor sighed. Just a wish playing tricks on his brain. He squeezed her hand and prepared to move back to his chair.

She squeezed back.

He froze.

"You can hear me."

It was stupid. Stupid that he said it, stupid that he thought it, stupid that he wished it.

She squeezed his hand again.

He lurched forward and gathered her up in his arms as hastily as he dared and as gingerly as he could. He leaned over and cradled her against his chest. She was so small. It was easier to forget when she was commanding the Lucii, dispatching daemons, and single-handedly winning the war against Niflheim in one night. Now she lay motionless in his arms and it was impossible to forget that she was over a foot shorter than him and half his weight. Small wonder he had impulses to protect her.

Reina's head tilted toward his and he could feel her breath against his ear. Intentional. Probably. Probably not, but he wanted to believe.

Cor held her as long as he dared. Then he pressed his lips to her hair and let her go as gently—more gently—than he had gathered her up in the first place. He still wasn't certain if she had heard him or not.

But he knew, at least, that he wanted her to.