Suddenly, her hand blooms in warmth; there's a bit of rough leather brushing against it, and the odd callous on any skin that the partial glove doesn't cover up. Shirayuki's mind comes up short; Zen wasn't near her, and his hands didn't feel like this. His hands had the slightest of callouses from handling a sword, and his glove felt less worn down.
It was Obi. Shirayuki stopped and looked up at the man that was quickly becoming her friend, who had even helped her out, as best as he could, when they looked for the whistle for the bird test. Obi hadn't really touched her before, other than when he'd caught her that one day, and that didn't count.
She took a deep breath, thoughts of Zen slowly cooled down; she felt less anxious, though she didn't feel any twinge of conflicting feelings, really. Yet, this was comforting, a little reminder that she isn't alone as she works out exactly what she feels for Zen.
Shirayuki smiled and looked up at her friend, "Thank you." And maybe that was too vague, maybe that wasn't enough to express how much gratitude filled her chest. It cooled her thoughts and gave her time to focus, not let her mind spin in circle after circle, and she realized that she loved Zen or at least liked him like that and wanted to be with him. It's as if her mind was waiting for the anxious debate to cool down, so that the answer that had always been there would be revealed.
Then, there is the sound of hooves hitting the ground, and some horses along with riders heading towards them. Shirayuki wasn't sure if she should feel awkward for Obi's brief comfort on her hand, that had steadied her thoughts, or if she shouldn't, as Zen paused before them, looking a little lost, as if he'd wandered the wrong way on accident and Obi and Shirayuki weren't before him right now, waiting for him to say something, whether it be 'hi,' or something much more conversational.
"Obi?" Finally, Zen's voice breaks the silence, and then the brief warmth across her hand is gone, as quickly and as unexpectedly as it had arrived a few moments before.
"Master?" Obi's voice is quick, and then he's in front of her, hands held up, almost as if he became the human representation of a shield. It's an odd thought, but even odder that he'd stand before her to protect her from Zen, someone who has never meant Shirayuki any harm.
Zen just stares at them, shock taking the last of his words far away from him.
"Run, Miss." And, she doesn't know quite why she listens, despite knowing now that she likes Zen the way he likes her, but Obi's voice is urgent, and she still doesn't know what exactly to say to Zen.
Should she tell him clearly like he'd shown her, how she feels for him? The words feel like little lumps in her chest, and Shirayuki can't even begin to figure out where to take them or how to speak them into existence. It's too difficult, too new, because she wasn't used to being in love, had never liked anyone like this before, let alone confess to someone. It feels impossibly difficult, like a mysterious herb sitting in front of her, that she can't place or find the properties for.
"What did I run away for? I've never felt so stupid in my life." The impulse to listen to the command in Obi's voice had been more instinctual and overwhelming than most feelings, and yet all it really did was give her time to think, though her mind paced itself like a blizzard would.
It was a dizzying whirl of debate over just how to really explain to Zen just how she felt, and all of the anxiety that Obi's hand on hers had erased spiraled right back into her. Just without the confusion of just how she felt, but how could she even begin to articulate just what her heart yearned for? Words and feelings seemed like polar opposites. And the bark of the tree that her hand rested on was not nearly as calming as Obi's hand was, as cool as it was.
"Shirayuki?" Zen's voice seemed to pierce through the quiet of the forest air, and Shirayuki took a deep breath. She hadn't figured out just how to explain it yet, would it help to try to buy her rushing waterfall mind some more time?
"What's the matter?" Zen asked, worried that somehow his own impulses had screwed up their friendship majorly, because whether he loved her or not, he didn't want to impose his own feelings on her; she deserved more than that. She'd always proven her own strength and astounded him in ways that were hard to imagine. A woman like that definitely felt like more than he could ever deserve.
"Nothing. I don't know what to say." Or how to even begin to say it right now. It felt impossible to find the words or even to let them out, despite the fact that they were an answer to what Zen had shown her, a mutual feeling that still seemed hard to define or explain.
Shirayuki's stock pile of energy was running out, and hearing Zen's voice behind her assured her that maybe the situation deserved to be brought to voice.
"Can you please stop running? This is getting a little ridiculous." Zen's exhaustion was clear especially in his voice as he called out to her right now. An almost desperate impulse to get her to pause, to ultimately fix whatever Zen undeniably feels he broke.
"I'm sorry." The words of a confession are still clawing up her throat, leaving scratches that for once she doesn't know to soothe. How do you begin to admit to feelings that are hard to even say out loud? How do you say what feels so private anyway?
"Why are you apologizing? You have nothing to feel bad about. If the tables were turned, I'd be running for sure." Zen's open honesty, that almost vulnerability, shone like a dazzling light in the woods, and what Obi's hand had done for her outside of here, Zen's voice done for her in the woods. A slight smile on his face, and the calm of his voice eased any pent up anxiety from her.
Shirayuki still didn't have the words to say, but she was done stressing over them now. The words will find their voice at some point, whether today or tomorrow. It wasn't worth tearing herself up over them and worrying Zen; Zen chasing her may have startled her at first, but the fact that he wasn't scared to run after her and try to repair things warms her heart up in ways that are hard to even explain.
"It's not about the kiss. I was surprised, but there was more to it." Honesty breeds honesty, and right now, either way, Zen deserves the truth. He's been completely truthful with her from the get go, and she should respond in kind.
"So what was it, was it the part where I asked you to tell me how you felt?" Zen could be so perceptive when Shirayuki isn't anticipating it.
It's awkward, and really the words aren't as easy as they should be to discover, or at least not in a way that should be steadying or easy. How do you confess? It's foolish to both feel like a rejection is waiting on the other line and to know that there isn't one hiding out somewhere. Just, it isn't easy.
"It was." Shirayuki took a deep breath, now or never, "It is."
"It was?" Zen's blue eyes blink as if he knows that there is an answer within those two words as dainty and small as they seem at first, "We don't have to talk about that."
"No, no." Shirayuki's mind is a flurry of mixed emotions. If she backs down now, she half fears that she won't say anything else about it, and it will pile up into a regret in the corner of her mind. It's not like she doesn't want to tell him how she feels either, "Let's talk about it."
Words seem far scarier than Haruka's sword up against her throat, but she can't just let them be unsaid. Shirayuki closes her eyes and tries to imagine the very calm that Obi's hand in hers had inspired and the calm of Zen's relaxed nature and gentle words.
"Shirayuki?" Zen's blue eyes mist up with worry, and Shirayuki doesn't want to leave him worried about her. He deserves to be happy, and besides she isn't in any dangerous situation right now. No cause for worry.
"I was thinking earlier." Shirayuki tries, taking a deep breath, just as Zen takes his place beside her. "In a random moment of calm, and..." Just how to begin? Should she explain that Obi's hand in hers had made her calm, had steadied her, like the acknowledgement that somehow he has her back, will take her side in a heartbeat, consequences to that irrelevant to the other, had somehow allowed her the peace to know that however she feels is okay?
Zen's words and gentle presence once he was telling her that she didn't have to apologize had the very same effect, but either way, it isn't easy to say right now. It's an almost worry, like should she have been holding Obi's hand back then, but she hadn't grabbed his hand, just needed it for comfort. As if, after so little time, Obi already knew what she needed and was willing to help her out with that.
"What were you thinking?" Zen motions ahead, if it helps, we can keep on walking. Shirayuki takes a deep breath and the very first step. Maybe it would help to be in motion, an attempt to fight off any anxiety before it creeps back up again.
"Just, about us. When I was holding Obi's hand, I wasn't scared anymore. I was able to think clearly about you and I, and how things are different now." Shirayuki remembered just the warmth and support of Obi, how his playful teasing turned to sincere encouragement, how he felt like a friend more than anything then, as if Obi wasn't merely an acquaintance who liked to tease her or the guy who shot the arrow at her, but a true friend.
"I'm sorry for overcrossing boundaries the other day." Zen's blue eyes were apologetic, gentle.
"No, no. You don't have to apologize." Shirayuki took another steadying breath, "I needed to know how you felt, and you, you, hadn't thought about it really, when you k-k-kissed me, right?" Or at least that's the way that she remembers it: sudden impulse, a gentle hand pushing stray hair back, and an even gentler kiss, slow and surprising, all at once. Her face turns red, redder than it was before.
"It was." Zen looked embarrassed despite himself, "I should have thanked you or said something, instead of kissing you though."
"You hadn't planned on saying anything then." Shirayuki watched as in front of them the forest cleared out to a small section. "It's okay." Sure, Shirayuki hadn't been planning on having her first kiss happen that way, but she also hadn't ever been the sort of woman to plan that out.
She'd been content with a life of merely friendship before, hadn't thought of falling in love, how it felt, or what it might mean.
"Are you sure?" The apology was still there, and in it, was mainly a concern for her wellbeing, a sign that he truly loved her, not just felt attraction for her that would push him to kiss her that day. It was more than that.
"I am." Shirayuki took a deep breath; this wasn't going how she meant it to at all, "But I want to answer your question."
"I understand if you only see me as a friend." Bursts forth from Zen's lips, and Shirayuki blinks as she slowly looks up into his eyes. He expects heartbreak, not mutual affection.
"But I don't." And that's when the first tear drops, slowly, it falls. She doesn't see Zen as merely a friend, his comfort less like Obi's comfort back outside the forest, but how can a little herbalist like her love a prince? Is it even legal? Or allowed? And beyond that, how can she love him as more than a friend? There might be kissing and surely courting of some sort, and she's never been the type of lady to draw courting from anyone; Raji's concubine proposal definitely didn't count as courting.
Just how does she be more than a friend to Zen? How does this twist from friendship to something more work? What if she hurts Zen? She can't imagine that he'd hurt her; he loves her too much, and from the time since she met him, Zen is willing to help protect her, willing to be there for her, willing to both be her friend, and whatever else she could possibly want from him.
"You don't?" Zen's stopped, and he's tentatively reaching out, wanting to help her wipe the tears that keep falling, but a little nervous to close that gap between them.
"I don't see you as just a friend." Shirayuki takes a deep shuddering breath, "I fell in love with you." From the first day, a seed had been planted in her heart, from the first time that he began to trust her, to when he fought for her, despite the way Prince Raji was, to the slow budding friendship and even the obstacles along the way to just being friends. She'd fallen in love with her gentle friend, who until the other day had not given even a hint of an indication that he'd fallen for her too.
Just, she hadn't considered it. It seemed more like a dream than a reality to be in love with him, to know how hard it would be to work things out, and to also be here with him. Shirayuki had never been the type of woman to fantasize about a prince coming and rescuing her from the mundane, because she kind of liked the mundane. But, she'd also known that if she were to fall in love, it would be with someone who would care for her the way Zen has, even when he was just a friend, even when he hadn't impulsively bore his heart to her in a single moment.
"I've always cared about you and had so much respect for the person you are. I thought I just wanted to be there for you, but now I know it's more than being your friend, and it scares me." Once the words began to be voiced, they couldn't be stopped: an avalanche of feeling, the unspoken realities beneath it all. "I can't just act like everything is the same between us. This is so much bigger than anything I've ever felt before. It almost hurts, and I don't know what to do with it."
"You're right. It's different now." And even though she's been wanting to sit down, and she's never been taller than Zen, he bows before her, takes one knee in a pose often reserved just for greeting nobility, as if out of the two of them, she is the royal one. His head is bowed, as if in even more reverence, even more honor. It's almost apologetic, despite not being an apology at all.
"Shirayuki, my title might not make life easier for you. In fact, it might make things harder for us sometimes, the truth is, situations may arise where I'm forced to choose my duty over you. It's inevitable, and I need you to understand that in the beginning. I don't care that it may not be easy though. Together we can weather the storms, you give me that faith. I swear I will protect you and what we have with my life. It may seem strange, but I'll need your help too. You inspire me like no one I've ever met. You are my strength. I think you're my destiny. So tell me, if I reach out my hand, Shirayuki, will you take it?" It's as if his whole heart has poured itself out before her, like water in a never ending pitcher.
Her heart is fluttering like it can fly, and her chest is warm. It's as if he's lit a candle in her that can't be swayed by the wind or the rain, and so she doesn't even begin to cry again. There are no more tears, though a part of her wants to pull Zen up to her height, but that seems like too much in a moment. More pull than meeting.
So, she kneels before him, taking his hand in hers, a sign that she's here for him as much as he is for her. "Yes, I will take your hand, Zen."
"Shirayuki, thank you." His voice was so new, and so warm. It lit a fire in her heart, and perhaps it wasn't easy to get here and more trials might just be around the corner, but she isn't disappointed, not when Zen's hand comes to rest so gently on her cheek, not when his lips meet hers, and this time she knows what is coming up, this time she responds, gentle and warm and full of the newness, the genuineness, of the feeling that Zen sparks in her, always has in some way sparked in her, however slowly it took to gain strength and however slowly it took for her to come to know it.
It's only after, with tingly knees, that she and Zen stand up, ready to make their way out of the woods.
"We should probably thank Obi." Zen says it so casually, that Shirayuki wonders why he'd been so surprised the moment he first saw her and Obi holding hands.
"We should." Shirayuki's face is still pink from the woods, when they do make it out to Obi. And Zen's hand in hers is as always so very different than Obi's, and yet it is just as comforting.
And Obi's watching them, not worried or distressed, but almost curious, wanting to make sure that everything went well, but trusting them both so much that he figures it probably did.
"Thank you, Obi, for looking after her." Zen's voice is genuine, calm, "And thank you for being her friend." Zen's blue eyes sparkle with friendship, and he half-hugs Obi anyway.
It's only later after the excitement of the day has calmed down, that Shirayuki finally gets to voice her gratitude, "Thank you, Obi." She doesn't have the elaborate words to make it sound beautiful in the way that Zen seems particularly masterful at, but it is the truth in fullness as well.
And Obi's answering smile is enough of a reply that she knows that he understands what she means, and that also, he'll be there to support the both of them always.
