A/N: the amount of new readers and reviews on this story has baffled me beyond comprehension! thank you so much for all of your wonderful support, it makes my heart swell to dangerous sizes :')
I'd like to thank muchacha11 for her truly flawless illustration of this fic; thank you sweetheart because I've never had anyone do that for anything I've ever made before. It really was a milestone moment and I teared up a little, I won't lie! You can find this gorgeous drawing on my tumblr, linked on my profile.
also, lastly- I'm away for the next week because I'm on a community service trip to a poor area of China, so there won't be any new updates for Embers or 1-800-SOS this week. My apologies, dear readers, because I know I'm slow to begin with, and this just postpones everything that much longer. I pulled all nighters to finish this chapter though, so I sincerely hope it will be enough to tide you over until then! I hope this meets your expectations and that you enjoy it, because things are beginning to culminate and I'd hate for you stop reading now ;)
Blaine never showed that night.
"KURT!"
His bones are tired and his muscles ache, but Kurt still finds it within him to follow the shrieking voice and see what Tourneboulle wants. It is mid-morning and Kurt is still fighting sleep as it keeps threatening to claim him.
"Yes, M-Madam?" he asks as he stands meekly in the gap of the ajar foyer doors. His hands are folded behind his back as usual in a stance of subservience- reflexive, first nature behaviour.
"There you are, Kurt," she croons, a devilish smirk on her face. "I needed your oddly feminine talent at altering gowns. Beatrice's hem isn't quite right, and we need it to be perfect for the ball come the end of this week."
The Noblemen's Masquerade Ball- an annual affair at the castle in which every lady or lord that was of age was invited to attend. As long as your family name was listed in the aristocrat registry, you were guaranteed entry into the most lavish ball Villon has the honour to host. This year was extra special, as there would be the presence of a Prince among the ladies and lords.
Of course, Kurt is of aristocratic heritage, and was in all technicality invited to attend, as he, Beatrice, and Clementine all came of age this year. While the girls hosted an opulent party at the manor in light of their coming of age, Kurt celebrated his seventeenth birthday with some stolen fruitcake from the kitchen that he shared with Pav in the stables. He'd stopped his silly habit of wishing over candles years ago and hence opted to forgo the custom.
While Kurt had the royal permission, the royal obligation to attend, it wasn't as if Tourneboulle would possibly let that simply happen. That, and the fact that Kurt had nothing more to his name than worn tunics and servants' breeches, and a masquerade outfit was required for him to go.
"Of course," he mumbles. "w-what would you like me t-to do?"
"Well," she begins, in that same patronizing, phony tone. She looks over at Beatrice who stands on the raised platform, wearing her beautiful silk masquerade gown. "Her dress' neckline needs to be lowered, because it seems as if the Prince has yet to come to his senses. Perhaps a more plunging reveal would do the trick."
Kurt nods mutely at this, knowing how to do the difficult alteration after years of experience. As he sets about doing this with the small sewing kit Tourneboulle's given him, he can't help but stare at the beauty that was Beatrice's gown. The emerald green of the rich silk is a perfect choice for her debut; the fiery rouge of her hair complimenting the earthy tones wonderfully. The embroidery on the bodice is a virtual work of art, made of the highest quality deep green lace. The vines of embroidered thread seemed to have moulded into Beatrice's narrow form- it hugged her so tightly one could not help but be drawn to her tiny waist and curvy bust. Dark jade contour seams led the eyes down to the bodacious skirt that trailed behind her in thick layers of expensive material, making her seem more like a princess than ever. A man would be a fool to not fall for her in this dress.
"It's beautiful, isn't it?" Tourneboulle says smugly as she notices Kurt's obvious awe at the dress. "Wait till you see Clementine's."
"Mother!" Beatrice exclaims, deeply offended.
"You mustn't worry, sweetheart. She may have the prettier dress, but none will look as good as you do in yours."
This seems to appease her slightly and she stops shuffling on the platform long enough for Kurt to start hemming the skirt.
"This ball will be absolutely lovely, darling," Tourneboulle coos. "Think of all the nobles that will be there- you'll finally be around company of the same stature."
Kurt grits his teeth and keeps sticking needles into the dress.
"I still can't believe Prince Blaine hasn't had the good sense to ask either of you two yet." she sighs, frustrated.
"Neither can I," Beatrice replies, flatly. How arrogant.
"No matter, I feel he's been visiting the manor far too frequent for this to come up short." Tourneboulle says, sounding confident. "It should only be a matter of time."
"What if I attract other noblemen with my debut, mother? Should I reject any advances on courtship?"
"Ah, no- string them along. We don't know which of you two Blaine will choose yet, so it would be wise to keep your options open."
Beatrice's eyes darken in competition, but she says no more.
Kurt finishes hemming the skirt and Beatrice gives him the dress to do more alterations to the bust line. She hands it to him wordlessly. The lack of acknowledgement or direct address reminds Kurt that although they may be step-siblings, she will never see him as anything more than a servant, bloodline or not.
"Kurt," Tourneboulle says, right before she leaves the parlor for Kurt to clean up. For a fleeting second, he thought she'd actually thank him for his services. It was a silly thought that was instantly proven wrong. "I invited the Prince to come to the mansion this afternoon. Have tea prepared by three."
He nods silently in lieu of words and she leaves him alone to gather the sewing kit and remains of hem. With a heavy sigh, he closes the clasps of the sewing box and stands up waveringly.
He'll have to talk with him tonight.
Kurt actually serves tea again that night, his hands as unshakable as he could possibly make them to avoid another humiliating debacle. He feels Blaine's eyes on him every now and then, but thankfully the prince has the good sense to ignore him otherwise. If he had so much as uttered an amiable sentence to Kurt, it would have already sparked suspicion in Tourneboulle. No, she thinks that they've never spoken to each other in their lifetimes. It has to stay that way if Kurt wants to keep his limbs.
After serving the tea, Kurt decides to eavesdrop and watches the interaction through a sliver of space between the heavy parlor doors. Beatrice has a coquettish grin on her face as she leans in to talk to Blaine, puffing her chest out in an attempt to get the Prince in a more improper fashion. While her rack is considerable, Blaine remains a polite gentleman as always and never even glances at her breasts. He's far more invested in Clementine's raised topic of kingdom warfare (which Kurt knows for a fact that she had absolutely no interest in) than he ever was in Beatrice's bust. He almost giggles out loud but bites his tongue to stop himself.
"Blaine, darling, I was just wondering if you were taking anyone to the ball next week-end?" Tourneboulle inquires, appearing innocent, but Kurt knows her agenda is positively brimming with intention.
"Actually, madam," he says with that same soft tone, "I'm not taking anyone to the ball. The King advised me to... k-keep my options open, so to speak."
He can practically hear the sisters' hearts drop into their stomachs.
"I'm terribly sorry if you were expecting me to take one of your daughters- oh no, my dears, you mustn't- because if I were taking someone, I'd most certainly be troubled by the decision of having to choose one of you."
There he goes with the sweet talk again.
"That's a shame," Tourneboulle muses, sounding strained. "but I trust my girls will have your hand in at least one dance?"
"You have my word, madam. I would be honoured."
Kurt walks into the stables and momentarily leads a familiar white mare out of the line of sight of the manor windows.
At least he was close this time, Kurt thinks. One time, he'd forgotten to move her in at all and left her out on the outpost. Boy, did Kurt have a fit at that one.
"What k-kept you the other n-night?" Kurt asks when he notices Blaine sitting on a haystack, trying not to nod off. His legs are crossed and he looks as if he's been sitting like that the entire time, waiting for Kurt to arrive. It was the sort of thing Pav did.
If anything, they've become casual friends. It's an odd thing to say because friendship with royalty was not something that was considered casual in itself. Rather, it was the polar opposite- the little library in the manor certainly never held any fairytales that spoke of the unlikely friendship.
He straightens up and beams at Kurt in greeting. "The King wanted to have a serious chat with me," he says. "I'm sorry."
Kurt makes a noncommittal sound, not quite sure why he was apologizing, but he turns towards Blaine anyway. Blaine looks like he's about to open his mouth to say something, so Kurt cuts in before he can get anything out.
"I need t-to t-talk to you."
He can just make out Blaine's face in the dim candlelight of the stable lamps, so he strikes up a match to light a few more in the room. He'd made it a habit of lighting those because of these midnight meetings, too. "What's up?"
Kurt's thought long and hard about how he'd approach this while clearing up the kitchen pots earlier that evening. The words are in his mind, and he's surprised to find that they leave his mouth with more ease than he'd expected.
He climbs onto the haystack where Blaine is perched, crossing his legs as he stares at Blaine boldly. There had been a time where he couldn't even make eye contact with this man, let alone openly confronting him, but his queer actions had made him wary. He wasn't nervous any more; he was defensive. No sane Prince willingly befriends someone of his status. He doesn't know anything about Kurt. He doesn't know about his pitiful stance as the subservient aristocrat. 'Cinderfella', the crueler villagers called him. To this day, he doesn't know what he did to be so alienated in Villon. They pity him but that's all they do- no interventions, no reclaim of status, no respect- nothing. He still doesn't know if Blaine has malicious intent. He doesn't know what Blaine's intention is.
He takes a deep breath and levels his voice.
"W-Why do you come here at night, B-Blaine?" he asks, eyes hard and steely.
Blaine looks a little taken aback, slightly fazed. There's a silent, pregnant moment that follows when this time, it's Blaine that fumbles for words.
"Well, um, we're friends, aren't we?"
Kurt's eyes remain unwavering.
"We w-weren't always."
Blaine's eyebrows are skewed in confusion as he frowns. "I don't know what you're insinuating, Kurt."
Kurt sighs impatiently, temper running short following his exhaustion. He rubs his grubby fingers into his temples before saying, "W-we need t-to stop this m-midnight rendez-vous."
"Oh, did you want to go to bed? Sorry, you must be tired- I'll just come back la-"
"N-no, B-Blaine," he says, annoyed. "these meetings have t-to stop."
"Why?"
The question turns out to be the straw that breaks the camel's back. In a second, Kurt's fuse incinerates and snaps as Kurt goes from agitated to outright hysterical, breaking the restrained and calm persona and unleashing a lifetime's worth of frustrations on a man that didn't quite deserve it. His voice, usually soft and high, becomes scratchy, guttural and crazed.
"Why? Why? B-Blaine, d-do you not see the absolute l-lunacy of-" he gestures his arms wildly between them, "this?"
"I-I don't understa-"
"P-people like you and p-people like me can't be friends! D-Do you know w-what the villagers say about me? They think I'm t-tragic. Th-that I'm a lost cause. They p-pity me and I'm the village s-sob story. The commoners d-don't even t-talk to me! I am the lowest, B-Blaine, and people like you d-don't make friends w-with p-people like me so would you just t-tell me what your d-deal is?"
"I don't see why-"
Kurt is shouting now, frustrated tears prickling his eyes as his words seem to skim right over this stupid man's thick skull.
"You're a P-Prince, B-Blaine! W-When will you start a-acting like one, damn it?"
The air is quiet after those words leave Kurt's mouth. Kurt is breathing heavily after the outburst, chest rising rhythmically as he stabilizes himself. Blaine is glassy-eyed, resolutely staring at a patch of hay.
His rage is not fuelled by the fact that Blaine always visits him when he's ready to drop with fatigue from single-handedly running a cruel woman's household. It's not by the fact that he will most definitely be denied permission to go to a Ball he's entitled to, either. Kurt is losing his marbles over being exasperatingly frustrated by how unwarranted Prince Blaine's behaviour is. He's confused- he can't understand why Blaine does this and it's driving him nuts. He's spent countless nights after a visit from the curly-haired monarch perplexed in his hay bed, mulling over this bizarre habit in vain.
The next words he says are quiet, solemn admittances that Kurt has been bottling up ever since Blaine first decided to address him directly.
"...y-you're out of your p-place. And I'm out of m-mine. I d-don't know what you want f-from me, b-but I don't have anything to give you. I'm a f-footman. A servant. I have n-nothing."
Blaine remains surprisingly quiet and stays still. He appears pensive.
It then settles in Kurt's gut that, despite all these meetings and how friendly Blaine has gotten, he is still the crown prince of Gaveston. He still holds one of the most powerful titles in the nation and is still to be regarded with utmost respect and dignity. Kurt has admonished him before- for leaving the horse out, for coming to visit at inconvenient hours- but he feels that this time, he may have overstepped. He might have just signed his death warrant- who knows? People are unpredictable. They change in the blink of an eye. Kurt's forgotten that and now, he'll face the repercussions.
Blaine watches the bizarre transformation out of the corner of his eye. Within seconds, Kurt has changed from a shouting, delirious fit to concave shoulders, darting eyes and worried lips. The tremble in his hands are back and it's like a trigger has been pulled in him. A dual personality, an alternate being, a different man. When Kurt was shouting at him, his eyes were fierce and alight, exposed, but those same eyes are now dull and diverted again. They don't dare to stray away from his lap. This shaken boy is the Kurt he met during his first visit to the house of Hummel. The man before him was the Kurt he met in the woods.
Instead of taking Kurt's harsh words to heart, he instead digs his arm into his leather shoulder bag and pulls out part one of what he came here for.
Without a word, he holds the roll of parchment out to Kurt. The dim light makes Kurt seem smaller somehow, vulnerable, and his gut twists uncomfortably as he waits for him to take the document from his hands.
"I did some research on you after I heard rumours in the town square."
Kurt looks up, eyeing a face that isn't looking back. Blaine is gazing to his side, steadfastly looking away from Kurt's eyes that were bright with emotion. The fire in his eyes has withered, quelled with intrigue to Blaine's unexpected reaction.
Gingerly, he takes the roll of parchment from his hands, which drop to his lap resignedly. One last glance at Blaine's diverted eyes, a questioning glare that goes unanswered, and Kurt unrolls the scroll to find not one but several pieces of paper. The first one he sees is an official document; he can tell from the gold seal of Villon on the top of the page.
Lord Kurt Eugene Hummel
D.O.B Twentieth of April, 1422
Born in Hummel Manor, the Kingdom of Villon
to her Lady Elizabeth Hummel and Lord Robert Hummel the Third
Son and Heir to the House of Hummel's fortune, title and clan by birthright unless unfit to do so, as signed by the current Lord of the House
Quilled underneath this is his father's messy scrawl of a signature, agreeing to the terms set by the document.
Kurt has never seen these documents before. The only copies that existed in the world were the ones his father withheld, which of course Tourneboulle had never shown him, and those that were kept in the Royal Directory of Villon.
Behind this is a clipping of an old monthly obituary announcement from ten years ago, where he sees his father's name is listed under "Noble Deaths". Below it, after a page break, is a much longer set of columns with names that don't have 'Lady' or 'Lord' before their names.
Last, but not least, is another clipping, this time of a local gossip magazine that was issued in the eleventh month of 1430.
Mysterious widower Lady Tourneboulle announces tragedy
Sadness is upon us today, people of Villon, as it appears that the seemingly sweet boy of the late Lady Elizabeth and Lord Hummel is sick in the mind.
Lord Hummel's second wife and the current Guardian of the boy, Lady Tourneboulle, has made an official announcement regarding the tragedy.
The boy of eight years has been reportedly possessed by evil spirits in the mind after his father's untimely death, causing him to think disturbing thoughts and act in an violent, unpredictable manner. Tourneboulle has retained him under the intention of keeping the public of the kingdom of Villon safe. Until he is of enough mental stability to leave the home, all are asked to stay away from the Hummel grounds and the boy.
News of this also means that it is likely for the Hummel bloodline to die out, should the boy be unable to produce an heir because of his illness. Either way, this means that Madam Tourneboulle, an enigmatic woman, is currently the head of the family as the child is indisposed to do so.
This means danger for one of the oldest families in Villon's noble registry! With luck, we'll find a woman willing enough to lie with him and the heritage may live on yet.
While Kurt reads, Blaine remains unmoving on his haystack. Kurt's eyes are wide and disbelieving when he looks up after reading the last clipping; thoughts racing through his mind at the velocity of light. His skewed eyebrows and baffled, hanging jaw prompt Blaine to start talking again.
"...You didn't tell me you were of noble birth."
Kurt's still a little incapacitated with shock, but he chokes and sputters something out anyway.
"I... I-"
"Had almost forgotten?"
There is anguish in Kurt's face and Blaine immediately wishes he'd bitten those words back, or at least substituted them for something less crude. Kurt shakes his head, his lower lip visibly trembling. Words were beyond him now- they'd been beyond him for a while, actually.
Before Kurt knows it, the emotions throttling inside him become too much as a bolt unscrews loose after ten years of torment. Tears finally surface and pave their course silently down Kurt's face. Droplets find their place on the documents in his quaking hands, but Kurt can't bring himself to wipe them away or even move at all.
Several moments of embarrassing himself under the watchful scrutiny of the Prince of Gaveston go by, and he's feeling more pathetic by the minute.
I know who I am.He's been telling this to himself for years. I know who I am.
It's becoming easier to forget.
I knew who I was.
It takes a stagnant moment and several seconds of debating impulse on Blaine's part before Kurt finds himself liberated of the pieces of parchment and being wrapped in solid arms, crying into a warm, broad shoulder. At this realization, Kurt is unable to stop himself from releasing an audible, wet sob into the fine fabric of Blaine's tunic, gripping his own rough hands around the prince just as tight. He's never been held like this... or has he? Can he truly remember the wholesome, hearty hugs of his father? The soft, delicate hands of his mother? Can he really remember everything he used to have, without it simply being another discoloring memory from better days?
It's been too long. We forget and memories fade away, replaced by the glaring vividness of the unromantic present. We need someone who will remind us to remember.
For now, though, Kurt savors this, as it's the first time he's been held in ten long, lonely years. He marvels at the warmth of having another's body pressed against him- the comforting hand around his shoulders, the steady heartbeat of another's against his chest- and for just a moment, he chooses to forget just who Blaine is and simply accepts that he is in the arms of his friend, being comforted as friends do.
"It wouldn't have mattered if you weren't an aristocrat, you know. I'd still have befriended you. You're a wonderful person." he whispers, his voice so tender it aches to listen.
It's all Kurt can do to not cry harder. He shakes his head into Blaine's shoulders in denial, but the prince only grips him tighter and shushes him. The question as to why remains unanswered, but Blaine is holding him like he'd never let go and his heart is thudding under his thin frame, feeling a closeness that hadn't been felt in much too long a time.
