FASH: Merry belated Christmas! Sorry I updated this a bit late, but as you can imagine I've had a lot of running around to do around Christmas, mostly going up to visit family that I can't write around for fear of them seeing what exactly I do with my free time.

""-speech

''-thoughts

The following morning Sena had woken up, had somehow managed to convince Shin to let him go and had tucked the older boy back in bed and told him to go to sleep.

He made sure to thank the powers that be when Shin did as he asked without too much fuss.

Christmas with his family wasn't all too different from the norm, although he did find himself speaking up more than usual to answer his mother's questions about how everything was going. He had half expected that though, since she and his father hadn't been able to stick around for too long on his birthday and they didn't see him very often anymore.

After diner he made his way back to the Shin household, shivering a bit as the cold invaded his personal space, easily slipping through the fabric of his coat and clothes to clutch at his skin.

He arrived at the front door and reached for the handle, thoughts of a warm atmosphere and a pile of several soft blankets already filling up his mind.

The door was opened just as his fingers had touched the metal and he found himself looking up at a rather enraged looking Lady Shin.

"Ma'am? Is something wrong?" He asked cautiously, taking a step back as she stepped out of the house, silently closing the door behind her. "Ma'am?"

"Why yes, something is wrong." She said darkly as she glared down at him. "Do you want to know what's wrong, Sena?" She reached out one hand to grip at his shoulder while the other held on to his jaw, forcing him to keep looking up at her.

"You were sleeping in the same bed as my son!" Her grip on his jaw and shoulder became tighter as she hissed her answer out at him.

"Ma'am, I can explain! Seijuro likes-"

"Seijuro doesn't know what to like! He doesn't know what he's doing is wrong, but you do, and you let it go on! Well not any more." Her hands moved to grip the front of his jacket and Sena felt himself being lifted up off of the ground so that he was eye to eye with the lady of the house.

"I can't do much to you, any sort of discipline I'd like to dish out would be noticed and then I'd be seen as the immoral prat. But as Seijuro's mother I can't allow him to be taken advantage of by the likes of you which is why, effective immediately, you are no longer to share a room." She pulled him a bit closer, staring him down like some sort of poisonous snake that was about to strike.

"And once Seijuro begins to behave himself without your influence, I'm going to send you away and he'll never see you again."

She unclenched her hands and dropped him to the ground, watching with a small amount of satisfaction as he stumbled to try and regain his balance.

She took his hand in her, now familiar, vice-like grip and lead him back inside the house and up the stairs, turning right instead of left at the top, apparently set on having Sena and her son as far away as possible.

But not everything was going her way. Just before she and Sena disappeared down the hallway Shin walked into the main foyer, caught sight of Sena and was bounding up the stairs excitedly before his mother could successfully pull the brunette out of sight.

She rushed down to the end of the hallway and opened the door on the left side, pushing Sena in quickly and locking the door behind him.

Sena rubbed at his hand where she'd been holding him gently, he wouldn't be entirely surprised if he ended up with some light bruises.

'So I guess that sound I heard last night was the door shutting after all.' He slumped against the door, half listening to the voices outside as Lady Shin tried to convince her son that Sena was still at his parent's house.

'It's a bit strange though, that she'd wait until now to toss me into a separate room when she could have just dragged me away last night, unless...' Sena flushed lightly.

Unless someone else had come in to check up on them during the night and had let the fact that Shin and Sena shared a bed slip out in front of the lady of the house.

Sakuraba might have, he was always so interested in Shin's mannerisms and such that it wouldn't surprise Sena if he felt like checking up on his sleeping habits.

"How embarrassing." Sena murmured to himself as he pressed an ear against the door, wondering if the mother and son were still just outside.

They were, and by the sound of things Shin wasn't going to be leaving any time soon.

"Sena? Is internal?" He called out as he began knocking on the door, beginning to sound a little panicky.

Sena, not wanted the older boy to worry about him, answered back.

"Yes Seijuro, I'm inside."

Shin took hold of the handle and tried opening the door, despite the way his mother was asking him to stop. "Sena escape room?"

"I'm sorry Seijuro, but I can't."

"Can't?" Shin parroted, his efforts to open the door put on hold for a moment.

"Cannot. I'm not allowed."

Well, apparently Shin didn't like that answer one bit because it took him all of three seconds to make sense of Sena's reply before banging on the door, harder this time. Sena stepped away from the wooden barrier when he heard it begin to creak, his mouth parting to form words of reassurance that he found he couldn't remember.

Lady Shin was practically having kittens by the sound of it, demanding and pleading that he stop before he injured himself.

When the wood on his side of the door started to splinter, signalling that it wouldn't be too long before Shin managed to break through, Sena decided it was high time he tried to calm the other boy down.

Out of habit, perhaps, the first words out of his mouth were: "Seijuro, sit still and pay attention." But it appeared to work because the door pounding stopped.

"Seijuro, don't worry about me. Go to your room and go to sleep. I'll see you in the morning." He said as calmly as he could.

"The morning? Promise?" Shin asked, for some reason sounding nearly heartbroken that he'd have to be away from Sena for an entire night.

"I promise."

Outside he could hear Lady Shin beginning to lead her son away to the other side of the house. For a moment he wondered if he should feel slightly insulted that she appeared to be under the belief that he was somehow taking advantage of her son. Especially considering that, despite it not really being 'taken advantage of', it was the other way around.

Not that he'd tell her that though, she'd probably destroy him for 'lying' to her.

"Boy, Seijuro really did a number on this door." Sena took a good look at the splintering mess in front of him, the doors in the Shin household were generally quite solid and thick.

"It's a good thing he didn't decide to attack me the first time we met, I might have died." He chuckled to himself nervously before preparing for bed.

That night seemed especially cold and although he tried to tell himself that it wasn't due to the lack of Shin's body heat, he found he didn't quite believe himself.

The following morning almost as soon as he made his was downstairs he found himself being swept up by a pair of familiar arms, pressed back into a familiar broad chest. He felt himself becoming a little uncharacteristically giddy at the embrace, maybe because he'd been unable to get his daily dose of Seijuro-Affection yesterday.

The feeling was quickly stomped down when Lady Shin came into the foyer, paused, positively glowered at him before snappily ordering him to get to breakfast and disappearing back around the corner.

Sena would like to know how she came to the conclusion that he was responsible for the hug he was obviously on the receiving end of. But since he doubted he'd get a plausible answer if he asked he just tilted his head back to catch the other boy's attention.

"Sena." Shin looked quite pleased with himself for some reason and Sena took a moment to ponder why before he felt something press against his forehead.

Shin's lips were pressed against his forehead. Sena wondered if this was an opportune moment to panic.

For Shin to know that he could kiss Sena on places other than his lips meant that Shin must have seen a similar public display of affection. If Shin saw something like a kiss being done in public, then he'd probably assume it was okay for him to do similar things in public instead of, say, a closed room.

This situation had Not Good written all over it.

As Sena stood still, brain working a mile a minute, Shin had gone back to nuzzling his hair. It was only when Suzuna came across them that Sena was able to force his body to slip out of Shin's embrace.

Suzuna flashed them an impish smile. "Well, I was told to gather you two up for breakfast, but if there are other, more interesting-"

"No, we were just on out way!" Sena cut in, trying to ignore the heat in his cheeks as he strode forward, Shin following after him.

The morning lessons went on normally, although Sena kept a careful eye on Shin to make sure he didn't bypass the level of affection he normally showed. Thankfully though, when Shin focussed on something as hard as he had come to focus on his studies very little could distract him. Of course once the lessons were over for the day Shin was back to his normal, infatuated Sena following until the time came for them to go into their separate rooms.

At first Shin couldn't seem to figure out why Sena wanted to go off in the opposite direction that they normally went at the top of the stairs, then he must have remembered what had happened yesterday.

"No." He said stubbornly, pulling Sena along to their old room quite effectively no matter how hard Sena tried to pull himself in the opposite direction.

"But Seijuro, your mother doesn't want me to go in there anymore!" Sena tried to dig his heels into the floor to slow down Shin' progress, but his efforts appeared to not affect Shin at all.

"No." He repeated and Sena desperately tried to think of a solution for this problem.

"Um, can't we just-"

"No."

Sena pouted and wondered who he should thank for teaching Shin that miserable word. Probably himself, but he didn't want to dwell on that.

The brunette's mind was still whirring with thought by the time Shin pulled him into their old room and shut the door, though he couldn't seem to think of anything that might help him. It was strange though, Shin had seemed, well, a little depressed, but over all he'd been willing to be separated from Sena the night before. Maybe it was because Sena had already been inside the other room? Although Shin didn't seem to have any qualms about breaking the door down until Sena had told him to stop.

Shin stubbornly seated himself on Sena's bed and gave him a look, as it to say: I dare you to try and leave.

"Seijuro, you're going to make me get into trouble with your mother." Sena sighed and ran a hand through Shin's hair, smiling slightly when the older boy relaxed at the contact.

"Stay here, okay? And I will see you in the morning, I promise." Sena turned to go leave the room but was suddenly tugged back and practically toppled over into Shin's arms.

"Seijuro, I-" Sena was abruptly cut off when Shin firmly pressed their lips together, far more like a kiss than any of the short pressing together of the lips Sena had bestowed upon him.

And with the kiss came the giddy feeling once more, although Sena tried his best to ignore it.

When Shin finally pulled away Sena found himself to be in a bit of a daze, although he tried to convince himself it was from shock and not for any other reason.

"Well, uh... I'll see you in the morning, I promise... Be a good boy!" He'd managed to say before quickly sprinting out of the room, vaguely wondering if all of his night were going to end similarly to this.

Thankfully Shin grew more accustomed to the idea of sleeping by himself and had only tried dragging Sena back to their old room a couple more times before he became accustomed to saying his goodnights at the top of the stairs.

And time wore on as it was wont to do, with Shin learning more each day, Sena and Sakuraba watching contentedly from the sidelines as Takami worked his magic.

It wasn't until late spring that anything notably interesting happened, when two letters arrived on the same rainy day. One from Lord Rodchenko, inviting the family over to his manor to catch up and repay them for their hospitality on Christmas. The other was from Hiruma, saying that he would be coming back in about a week to check up on everything, as he had promised he would.

Lord Shin, eager to see his cousin again, immediately wrote up a letter saying that they'd be more than happy to impose upon his hospitality and began preparing for the trip. He had decided that it would be best not to bring his son along, fairly certain that he wouldn't be able to handle the sudden journey in a carriage.

And so the Lord and Lady left a couple days later, being sure to remind everyone that if Hiruma arrived ahead of time he should be welcomed with open arms.

Once their carriage had disappeared from sight Sena had felt a little relieved. With Lady Shin gone for several days he didn't need to worry so much about about being glared at for things he couldn't control. And although if Shin noticed him feeling so relaxed he might come to be under the impression that he could be more affectionate than usual, it wasn't as if Sena hadn't grown accustom to his attachment.

'I've probably grown too used to it though.' Sena ran a hand through his hair and glanced at the boy beside him. 'He really doesn't seem to be the affectionate type.' He turned to go back inside.

"You know what we should do?" Sakuraba asked suddenly and Sena jumped a little at the sudden question.

"Uh, no?"

"We should take Seijuro out on a walk! It's not good for him to stay cooped up inside all the time and I don't think he's going to try and run away again." Sakuraba rubbed his chin and nodded to himself. "I'll ask Takami if he wants to come along, you two wait out here!" Sakuraba rushed into the house excitedly, drawing his companion out a few moments later.

"Will we just be making our way around the grounds then, or did you want to venture a little further?" Takami asked as he cast a curious glance up at the rather cloudy sky. "It won't be good if it starts pouring and we end up getting soaked before we can make it back inside."

"A little water isn't going to hurt us Takami, besides, we don't have to go far." Sakuraba responded with a small smile, the back of his hand lightly brushing over Takami's, fingers twitching slightly.

Sena quickly blinked and turned around, grabbing onto Shin's hand as he began leading him away from the house. "Well, let's get moving." He said without turning back, although he was slightly curious to see if Sakuraba had grabbed onto Takami hand as well.

They walked around the property until a light rain began to fall and Takami forced them to turn back around, warning them about catching a chill in an older brother sort of way.

Sakuraba, although a bit downhearted at the weather, made them all promise to go back out on a nicer day.

Sena briefly wondered if this was what having siblings was like before Suzuna came up to them all with a pile of towels and a knowing look, telling them to dry their hair off in the kitchen.

Sena had been drying Shin's hair off with one of the towels when a thought struck him.

"Takami, sir, Hiruma is the one who recommended you for this job, right?" He asked curiously and Takami nodded. "How is it that you know each other?"

"We're distantly related, although I can't recall how, we also grew up in the same town."

Sena's eyes widened slightly. "Really, you don't look or act anything like each other."

Sakuraba let out a soft: "Thank goodness." At that comment and Takami smiled lightly.

"Well, Hiruma was always fairly... Devious, I suppose. And sometimes a bit too smart. I believe his father was trying to get him to become a doctor, but he said that tracking was more fun, and that was that."

"He's a pretty interesting guy." Sena gave Shin's hair one final ruffle before pulling the towel away.

"Interesting is one way to put it, I suppose." Sakuraba spoke up with a nervous smile. "Sometimes it feels like he can see all your secrets. I've only met him once, he makes me skittish."

Takami chuckled lowly and patted Sakuraba's shoulder, leaving his hand there for several moments longer than necessary.

'He can see all your secrets, huh?' Sena contemplated that for a moment and his cheeks went a faint pink. 'I certainly hope he can't. It was embarrassing enough when he was around, telling me to feed Seijuro in that way and saying that it wasn't as if I was kissing him. I can't even begin to imagine how mortifying it would be if he found out that there were times when I've actually kissed Seijuro.'

At least he wasn't alone in the need to hide things from the omnipotent tracker.

Shin, clearly bored just sitting around doing nothing, hand taken the liberty of grabbing onto Sena's hand and starting to drag him away while the brunette was worrying over the Hiruma issue.

"Ah, Seijuro, why are you dragging me around?" Sena asked as he was pulled out of the kitchen and Shin turned to him, his eyes gleaming in a rather predatory fashion.

"Bath."

"Huh? Bath?" Sena cocked his head to the side. "You want to take a bath?"

"Bath. With Sena." Shin replied, watching curiously as Sena's face turned several different shades of red.

"No, we don't need a bath Seijuro, we'll be fine without one. So no."

Shin, apparently not in the mood to take no for an answer, continued pulling him along anyways.

"Seijuro!" Sena whined. "If I didn't know any better I'd think you were a pervert."

"Yaa!" Suzuna exclaimed as she appeared out of thin air beside Sena, nearly giving the boy a heart attack. "What's this I hear about the young master being a pervert?"

"S-Suzuna! Don't sneak up on me like that." Sena managed to say before Shin began tugging his hand once again, moving into the foyer. "Distract Seijuro or something so I can free my hand."

"Why?" Suzuna asked curiously, calmly walking alongside the pair. "The young master probably thinks that if you get to drag him around every once in a while, then he can do the same for you."

Sena opened his mouth to complain but was interrupted by a knock on the door and Suzuna dutifully went over to answer it.

"Elf bro!" She called joyfully upon seeing who was on the other side and Sena could feel a shiver crawl up his spine.

'Elf bro is what she calls Hiruma.'

"Come in, come in! I'll get you a towel so you can dry your hair!" She chirped merrily as Hiruma stepped inside.

Shin, upon seeing Hiruma's familiar face, seemed to grow a bit more serious and he tugged Sena closer to him, resting his chin on top of the younger boy's head and enfolding him in his arms protectively.

"Thanks." Hiruma answered before Suzuna dashed off, his eyes drifting over to land on Shin and Sena, a smirk quickly growing on his face.

"Well, look what we have here. Surely after the months he's been out of the wild he doesn't feel the need to hold onto you like that anymore."

"O-only around you Hiruma, sir." Sena responded back faintly as he wondered what could possibly have gotten into Shin.

"Well, I suppose it makes sense, he may think that I'm here to take him away again." Hiruma responded with ease. "Although if he's that worried he must be especially attached to you. I wonder why that is?" His smirk widened and Sena felt himself shrinking back into Shin's embrace, in response Shin tightened his arms around him even more.

'He can't really see all our secrets, right?'

"Anyways, where's the little monster's parents?" Hiruma asked, thankfully moving away from the previous topic.

"Oh, well, since they thought you'd be coming a little later in the week they went on a little trip." Sena replied and Hiruma cursed lightly.

"I suppose that's what I get for finishing a job early. Mind telling me where they went and how long they'll be gone?"

"They went to visit Lord Shin's cousin. His name was Lord Rod... Something."

"Rodchenko." Hiruma supplied, his eyes narrowing slightly as he said the name.

"Yes, that was his name." Sena responded slowly, curious as to why Hiruma seemed to dislike the aforementioned man. He had half a mind to ask about his abhorrence, but before he could Suzuna came back with another dry towel, Takami and Sakuraba following after her.

'I'll ask him about it later.' Sena told himself, fingers tapping idly on the strong arms encircling him. 'But first things first, how do I get Seijuro to let me go?'