Co-written with miss mika namariya! We own nothing!

As soon as Kuon had recovered from the shock of having his feelings reciprocated (which took quite a lot of reassurance and several more kisses), he remembered that good news was meant to be shared, and there was no time like the present.

The king and queen were beyond elated. After the hugging and joyful tears and exclamations, Julie dragged Kyoko over to her desk and began sketching wedding dress designs, talking lace types and fabrics and drape and how much train, etc. etc.

Kuu, meanwhile, grabbed his son and continued to weep for several more minutes. Then he demanded to know exactly how it all happened.

"Er," Kuon said, stalling. It only just occurred to the prince that while Kyoko had kissed him and announced that they were True Loves, he hadn't actually proposed. Yet.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU HAVEN'T PROPOSED—" Kuu cried.

"I said yet!" Kuon yelled back, flustered. "Calm down, will you? You look like you're about to pop a vein."

"But you are going to do it, right? Soon?" Kuu asked. "You know, have you considered eloping? Royal weddings are a big hassle if you ask me. It'll take at least six months to plan, but if you elope then I could hold my grandchild by—"

"Mom would literally kill us," Kuon said.

The king heaved a sigh. "Fair point. Alright, then— your proposal," he said, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper, "what did you have in mind?"

LINE BREAK

An indeterminate but definitely way-too-long amount of time later, Kuon sat at his desk. Crumpled-up papers were scattered about him in a wide arc. The prince leaned back in his chair and sighed. He really should have seen it coming. Kyoko knew practically everything that was going on in the palace at all times. There seemed to be nowhere that she didn't have eyes and ears. From the lowest cellars to the ceiling of the highest tower, Kyoko knew it all.

Which made it very hard for Kuon to surprise her with a grand proposal that would sweep her off her feet. Metaphorically, of course— he couldn't never hope to physically sweep the bodyguard off her feet. She was much too grounded.

His first plan had been simple enough. He'd wanted to just propose over dinner — a candlelit dinner. After all, they ate together every night. It just made sense to do it then, just a little more romantically. Hence the candles. The only thing was, he wanted it to be a surprise.

That's where his problems began: Kyoko was impossible to surprise. This was an excellent trait to have in a bodyguard; in a partner… not so much. At least, not when trying to plan a proposal.

She'd walked into the room holding their dinner tray just as he started lighting candles, startling him. He'd knocked over a freshly-lit candle in surprise. It set the carpet on fire, and Kyoko had to put it out with their tea. She'd then spent four minutes lecturing him on fire safety.

Proposal idea one: Failed.

LINE BREAK

Attempt number two went similarly well… if by well, you mean poorly.

Kuon decided that since Sir Hoppington had brought them together in a way, it only made sense to propose next to the pond where they had found him.

Getting Kyoko out to the pond was easy enough. Getting her to focus was the issue. When she wasn't looking for potential danger ("You don't know what's in that pond! Those rocks could be sharp. What if you fell in again?"), she was trying to coax the fairies out to meet him.

They did not want to meet him. They wanted to eat his shoes. Even Kyoko couldn't explain that one.

Kuon walked, barefoot and disheveled, back up to his rooms, still not engaged.

Proposal idea two: failed.

LINE BREAK

The third proposal idea — to slip the ring into a book in the library — was bound to work. After all, threes were a motif in fairy tales.

It failed before it even started.

"No," said Kanae, blocking the door.

"What?"

"Keep your stupid, romantic plots out of my library."

"It's technically my library, since it's the palace —"

Kanae shut him up with a look. "You could literally just ask her. She'd be fine with that." She rolled her eyes. "If anything, she probably thinks you're engaged already."

"That doesn't mean she doesn't get a proper proposal."

"Which is wonderful. Just keep it out of the library."

Kuon knew there was no winning here, and he wanted to stay on the good side of his True Love's best friend.

Proposal idea three: failed.

LINE BREAK

Idea four wasn't anything particularly special to them, but it was romantic — a stargazing session atop the tallest tower. It was a lovely, clear night; millions of stars shone down upon them. He led her up there, ring burning a hole in his pocket, and gestured for her to lie down on the plush blanket he'd spread out earlier that day.

Kyoko took one look at it and shook her head. "No good."

"What?"

"It's not nearly long enough to make a tactical escape rope, and too thick to work as a parachute." She squinted around. "There is a rope over there, though, which would work."

"I thought maybe we could look at the stars," he offered.

"That would help us navigate once we got off the beaten path," she acknowledged, pleased. "But on second glance, this rope isn't long enough — and I don't have enough silks to make it all the way down." She frowned, peering over the edge and calculating the distance. "Eh, I could probably still make it."

He had to physically grab her around the waist to stop her from clambering onto the ledge to test her theory. "NO! No. Let's just — let's just go back inside. Please."

She had frowned up at him in that adorable, serious way of hers. "Alright. We need to get more rope to put up here, anyway."

Proposal idea four: failed.

LINE BREAK

The fifth idea was somewhat spontaneous, and almost worked. Kuon, bored of his paperwork and frustrated by the previous failed proposal attempts, suggested they take a walk through the castle gardens. Kyoko agreed readily, even taking his arm when it was offered. The warmth of her lithe body pressed up against his side helped him remember why he was doing this. The way her eyes lit up as she talked about the fairies that lived in the gardens only strengthened his resolve.

When she let go of his arm for a moment to help a fairy untangle itself from a vine, he knew it was his chance. He got down on one knee, and when she turned around, he opened his mouth.

"Honk!"

Kuon looked around, confused, and saw — a goose. It was a few meters away from them, placidly looking at them. Then he looked back at Kyoko, who had gone deathly pale. She was also holding a pair of long, sharp knives. "Get up," she whispered to him, not taking her eyes off the bird. "Now. And get ready to run."

He stood, confused. He'd never seen Kyoko look so… scared. This was the girl who had fought off pirates and regularly launched herself off of tall buildings. Yet here, facing a goose, she was trembling. Frankly, he didn't blame her. His own father had once abandoned a picnic when a flock of geese decided it was theirs. So Kuon did the only thing he could.

He picked up Kyoko and ran.

Kyoko, as soon as she realized what was happening, put her knives away so no one would accidentally get stabbed. Then, to his surprise, she turned into him and tucked her head into the crook of his neck, still shaking. He tightened his arms around her as he carried her to safety.

They wound up by the stables. He sank down against one of the walls, panting, with Kyoko in his lap. "So," he managed after a minute, "geese?"

Kyoko nodded. He could feel her cheeks burning against his neck. "Changeling thing, I think. Geese eat fairies, so… it's kind of an ingrained fear."

"It's actually kind of a relief." He ran his hand up and down her back in a comforting motion.

She pulled back to look at him, confused. "What is?"

"It's good to know that there's something I can help you with. Aside from, y'know, reaching things on high shelves." He couldn't stop the grin that made its way onto her face.

"I can get things off of high shelves!" she protested.

He loved that she made no move to leave his lap. "Without scaling said shelves or using a lasso?"

She puffed up her cheeks in frustration, looking so adorable that he wanted to kiss her. So he did.

When they broke apart, he had almost gotten up the courage to ask her, but just as he opened his mouth —

"Well, look at these two lovebirds!" Kijima leered at them over the nearby half-wall of the stable. "Gotta say, you took your sweet time getting it together."

"Sir Kijima," Kuon said coldly.

"Whaaaat? You know I'm right." He gave them a lopsided grin. "Seriously though, not the most romantic necking spot. Kinda smells like horses."

His horse, Lady Love, let out an offended whinny behind him. When he turned around to apologize to her, they snuck away.

Proposal idea five: failed (thwarted by goose).

LINE BREAK

Kuon waited a while for attempt number six, instead just reveling in the fact that he and Kyoko were, in fact, an item. This meant that he spent a lot of his time just… being where Kyoko was. Since she was his bodyguard, this wasn't an issue most of the time. But when she was off-duty, it became an issue. Namely because she had other tasks around the castle, and didn't want him putting himself at risk to join her doing them.

"I love spending time with you, I really do, but don't you have anything better to do?" Kyoko asked one afternoon, when Kuon had expressed his intentions to join her on her roof patrol.

"Nope."

"You're a prince. I find that hard to believe."

"Exactly," he said, twining their fingers together. "I'm a prince. I can do basically whatever I want."

"That's… fair." She couldn't really argue with him about that. "But I am going to need that hand."

"Liar," he said fondly. "I have every faith in your ability to do your tasks with one hand."

Again, that was fair. "Fine. But I warn you, you might not find some of these particularly pleasant."

Kuon just shrugged with his free shoulder.

The morning was fairly calm for Kuon; Kyoko just led him around the grounds, talking to nothing that he could see. She assured him that she was checking in with her team. He didn't know what that meant, but he was glad to just hold her hand. The sun shone on her orange locks as she conversed with air, her golden eyes sparkling in the light. And, because he could, he dropped a kiss on top of her head. He was rewarded by Kyoko turning a fetching shade of pink.

Over lunch, they talked about the tadpole shower (which had wound up being closer to Kyoko's idea of cake and friends), and how well it had gone. The eggs were due to hatch any day.

After lunch, Kyoko led him behind a tapestry and into the secret tunnels. His pulse skyrocketed. His mind flooded with possibilities. True Loves, in a dark place, alone. It was the setup for any number of romance tales sung by the raunchier bards. Now, he knew better than to actually expect anything like that to happen. Still, his heart couldn't help but hope. After all, they were True Loves. In a dark place. Alone. Away from prying eyes.

Actually… the secret tunnels might be a good place to propose. There was no one here to interrupt them. He just had to wait for the right moment. And hope that Kyoko didn't question why his pulse was going so fast. "So, what are we doing down here?"

"Patrol, inventory check, maintenance — just the usual. How do you feel about spiders?"

"...Depends on the spider," he answered carefully. He did not put it past Kyoko to have person-sized attack spiders hiding down here somewhere. His grip on her hand tightened.

"They like it down here for some reason, so there's a fair number. Just warning you." She grabbed her lantern off the wall and, with some fumbling given her one-handed state, lit it. She glanced up at him. "Don't want you to get a hairful of webs, after all."

Kuon couldn't tell if she was kidding. He was suddenly feeling a lot less confident about anything romantic happening. Hairful of spiderwebs did not sound very attractive.

Her face broke out into a smile at his expression. "I'm kidding! I keep these tunnels pest-free. It wouldn't be safe otherwise."

He could hear the laughter bubbling under her words, and fell a little more in love with her. "Right. I knew that."

"C'mon." She tugged on his hand and led him into the tunnels. After a few moments of comfortable silence, she said, "You know, we should probably start running escape drills down here."

"Yeah?"

"Mmm-hmm. Especially since we're back from our trip, and we're going to be here for the foreseeable future."

He silently rejoiced at that we. "Makes sense. I should study that map you had."

She looked back at him with a strange expression. "Map?"

"You know, the one that you showed me before we came down here the first time?"

"Oh, I ate that."

He stopped walking. "What?"

She looked back at him, their arms extended between them. "What?"

"What do you mean you ate it?"

"I made it out of edible materials so I could dispose of it. It's not exactly something that you'd want lying around for just anyone to find."

"Well, I guess you'll just have to teach them to me, then." More time with Kyoko was always a win.

"That's… what I suggested?" She used her thumb to subtly check the pulse on the wrist of the hand she was holding. "Are you feeling okay?"

"Yup. Just — it was a good idea. Let's go." He strode forward into one of the side tunnels, only to be immediately yanked back by Kyoko. Seconds later, a giant blade crashed down where he had just been. "I take it back, I'm not okay. Why is there — what was that?"

"One of the traps," she said, as if it should have been obvious.

"One of them?"

"What type of secret tunnels don't have traps?"

Not knowing how to answer that, Kuon changed the subject with all the subtlety his bloodline granted him — which is to say, none. "So, since you saved my life… how about I share it with you?" His free hand fumbled in his pocket for the ring box. Shit. It's in the other side's pocket.

While Kuon struggled to get the ring box out, Kyoko reset the trap. "I'm your guard. You don't need to give me your life force for doing my job."

"That's not what I — never mind," he said with a sigh.

Kyoko, having reset the trap, tugged him further into the tunnels without another word.

Proposal idea six: failed.

LINE BREAK

That night, a very tired, very bedraggled, very pitiful Kuon lay on his fainting couch, an arm draped over his eyes. Pointless. This was pointless. It didn't matter that they were True Loves. Kyoko was never going to understand that he was trying to propose to her. Something was always going to get in the way. Somewhere, fate must be having a great time.

"Is something wrong?" Kyoko asked, gently lifting his arm so she could see his eyes.

No, fate was laughing. "Yes."

"Can I help?"

"Just —" This was nothing like any of the romantic plans he had tried, but Kuon was too frustrated to care. He fumbled for a moment and then shoved the ring box at her. "I've tried doing nice proposals. I give up. None of them worked. Please just marry me and put me out of my misery."

Kyoko blinked down at him owlishly. "Why would you need to propose? Aren't we already engaged?"

Internally, Kuon was screaming. Externally he asked, "That's a yes, right?"

"Well, of course."

"Cool. Give me your hand."

And so Kyoko's finger was finally graced with the engagement ring Kuon had commissioned the day after he met her.

Proposal idea seven: succeeded (technically).