Disclaimer: If somebody could give me the rights for Valentine's Day, that'd be awesome.
Touch
Adapting was hard, but not as hard as he'd feared. Years of ninja training had an unexpected benefit – a superb balance that Edge had never really appreciated before now. It kept his footing sure, and his own caution kept him from falling up or down stairs, and usually from walking into walls. There'd been a few incidents, but thankfully, nobody had witnessed them. It was embarrassing enough, having to stumble around his own castle. He didn't want or need anybody to know just how hard it was.
That didn't mean that they didn't know. He had a cane now, something that Edge had complained about heartily in the beginning, but had grudgingly accepted and even acknowledged the necessity of. And it was necessary. The first time he'd walked straight into a corner had told him that much.
It was galling to realize that he'd actually rebuilt the castle and still didn't know his way around it.
Though everyone in the castle had noticed, they were smart enough not to offer help that wasn't wanted. With the sole exception of Izayoi, who just grabbed him by the shoulders and steered him to where he needed to go, telling him brusquely where he was at that point in time and giving him directions as she pushed him around. Thankfully, Rydia had put a stop to that. Edge loved his cousin, really, but she was – oh, what was the word? Irritating.
Though having to be led around his own castle was still frustrating, Edge found that it was a lot more tolerable when Rydia was the one doing the leading. Not to mention entertaining. By this point, she knew the castle fairly well, but she wasn't an expert by any means, and more often than not, an excursion to figure out how to get to a specific area ended up in being lost for hours. Luckily, even though Edge didn't know how to get from point A to point B, it was easy enough for him to tell Rydia how to get back to a place that she knew once he knew where they were.
Oh, how he missed visual landmarks.
Next to him, Rydia stopped walking. He paused next to her, one hand lightly clasped around her upper arm, fingers slipping against the soft cotton of her dress. "Something wrong?" he asked lightly.
She hesitated before answering, chagrined, "I think I'm lost. Again."
He chuckled quietly, and was rewarded with a sigh that was likely accompanied by an eye roll. "It's not funny," she muttered.
"Of course it is." Edge smiled at her. "The directionally challenged leading the blind."
"Keep it up and I'll just leave you here," Rydia threatened.
"What? I speak nothing but the truth."
"Unfortunately."
"Would you prefer me to lie?"
"Or maybe I'll just give you back to Izayoi," Rydia mused. "At least she isn't directionally challenged."
"I'd rather have a beautiful, lost guide over my irritating cousin who thinks that blunt force trauma solves problems any day," Edge retorted loftily, hoping to get a laugh out of his wife. He almost succeeded, if the quiet choking sound she made was any indication, but Rydia sadly controlled herself before he could hear a sound that he hadn't heard in far too long.
The silence that fell was anything but comfortable, and Edge was nearly about to break it when Rydia cleared her throat. "And just how would you know?" she asked, evidently trying to be light-hearted, but was unable to disguise the heavy tones. "What if I've been horribly disfigured or – I don't know – fell victim to a horrible accident that left me without a nose or something?"
Edge blinked. "Without a nose?"
She huffed. "You know what I mean."
The ninja paused, then sighed and completely turned to face her, sliding his hands up her arms until he reached her shoulders. "May I?" he asked quietly, uncertain as to what her reply would be. To make sure she knew what he was talking about, he lifted one hand tentatively to touch her cheek; beneath his fingers, she shivered, then nodded.
With her permission granted, he began.
Edge slid the hand still on her shoulder across the hollow where her shoulder and neck met, reveling in the softness of her skin as the cotton ended, and let his fingers dance up her lovely neck. Once both hands were on her cheeks, he slowly explored her face with gentle, calloused fingers, following her elegant cheekbones and tucking flyaway strands of her hair behind her ears, which he then traced with a single fingertip.
She was warm to the touch, her skin soft and inviting, his fingers painting a topographical picture of her features for him. His fingers traveled over her closed eyelids, brushing over soft, long eyelashes, smoothed over the tip of her nose, and caressed her lips with his thumb, parting them gently before he cupped her cheek and dainty jawline with his other hand and bent to kiss her.
"You're just as beautiful as I remember," he whispered against her lips.
He didn't have to see the smile that curved her lips against his to know that it was beautiful.
