Let the record be known that Namor was innocent. He left Fen with clear instructions: "she wants company, so introduce her to the others and let her speak about her inventions." If Juana's retelling of her afternoon with the girl was anything to estimate by, Shuri should have been neck-deep in conversation with the new guards. While he hadn't intended to return to the catacombs until the next day, Attuma insisted he needed to see the flint knife now to start new weapons production. In hindsight, Namor wondered if that was an excuse.

The water had felt warmer, and some part of his brain imagined what Shuri would be up to once he arrived to her new accommodations—if she was trying to spy around his office or was deep in debate with the guards, but he was honest to Chac busy with things far superior to care.

By the time he'd seen her bare legs, moving in hypnotic, measured strokes, the momentum of the whirlpool sending him upwards was too strong to stop.

Shuri scrambled up the steps, almost jamming a toe against uneven rock. There was a rush of voices and footsteps outside. Namor stilled, water up to his waist and his dark hair pressed against his forehead. Water dripped from the jade in his ears and nose.

The beginnings of a fight crawled up her face as her hands fiddled with the Kimoyo beads. There was a beat of silence, him looking at her, her looking at him. And then —

"What god possessed you to—"

"You backstabbing liar—"

"You would call me a liar when it is your word that you failed to— "

"Princess, we heard a—"

More silence. The guard cleared her throat, and Shuri and Namor turned to her in unison.

"Out! " they both shouted.

She fled and Shuri felt only a twinge of guilt, her mind too preoccupied to keep up with her racing heart. Namor's breathing (why is he breathing, he doesn't need to breathe!) was too loud. Her eyes traced a bead of water as it rolled down his face with each heave, slid around his neckpiece, fell onto his abdomen, dipped into his golden belt, and finally joined the rest of the water flowing around him and his staff.

Shuri spoke first, her voice frosty. But it wasn't exactly because she was mad. No, she felt shy. Like he'd breached a boundary and she was scared what he would see on the other side because she herself didn't know what was there. So she lashed out.

"Why so surprised? You wanted this—"

His eyes lifted, incredulous. His lips opened with the signature of an impending growl, but nothing came out. Finally, his jaw seemed to work again. "That's not what — you — I was told you would be occupied for another hour — "

Oh. The anger left her as easily as it came. Her palms rested on the floor behind her, propping her body up. Her neck craned to watch another bead of water slide down his cheek.

"Shuri." Her name rolled off his tongue like sweet honey, damnit, had he never said her name until now? His broad shoulders were dryer now with only a thin sheen of water remaining. The muscles on his neck and arms pulsed. He spoke slowly, in even tones. "What reason drove you to enter these waters?"

"I was bathing, genius!"

"Bathing," he murmured, voice raspy. He was talking again. Why was he talking again? And why did his voice make her shiver more than the damp air breezing by her skin?

Shuri looked down. Her fingers must have missed her Kimoyo beads because in place of a Black Panther suit were semi-translucent underclothes. One hand lurched up as she struggled to find the right Kimoyo bead, her fingers shaking and head all fuzzy and blasted headache and stupid bed and stupid water-king that always found reasons to get mad—

If Namor seemed like he was constantly wound up and easy to anger, that was because he only got angry to protect his subjects. And threats to Talokan were plenty, even for an isolated water nation — climate change, war, disease, predatory water animals, just to name a few.

Shuri's patience and sympathy for everything but him was becoming a concerning pattern. He was impressed, of course: if the Black Panther was too cowed by the Feathered Serpent God, then their nation did not deserve their rich vibranium and a place alongside Talokan.

He didn't trust her to not escape, or throw another wrench in his plans, but he trusted her, despite his jests, to not kill him. Because no matter how much he'd broken her, she was Shuri and she was sympathetic. If not for him, then at least what his existence represented and his people.

But for a fleeting moment, when he had seen her eyes widen in shock, her half-naked body shivering and the wound he'd given her months ago faded into her dark skin, he thought of her mother. How easily humans fell to water. He could not save her mother, but he could save her. He needed her to be alive.

Namor marched out of the water, droplets flying around them. Staff forgotten behind in the lake, he observed quietly as Shuri scrambled with her beads. Silence was his natural nature. Hundreds of years could not be filled with a constant stream of speech but she had a way of pulling more words out of him. There was so much he wanted to utter at that moment but something in her face silenced his voice. Instead, his body moved of its own volition in the space between one heartbeat and the next.

Shuri's frantic movements were halted by a large pair of hands pulling her up to her feet. He was wet, always wet. She tried to crane her head up to steal a glimpse of his face.

He pulled her flush against him.

Her initial desire to jerk away disappeared at the feel of his thick arms coiling around her, his golden wrist cuffs digging into the small of her back.

"You're shivering," he murmured into the crook of her neck. She swore she felt his lips touch the top of her ears. The usual spectrum of emotions Namor ignited in her—anger, annoyance, mild amusement—came to a screeching halt. There was only a dark void, dark as the eyes he often had around her. "I wished—your comfort—"

A wisp of something foreign ignited in the void.

"I—it's okay." She swallowed. Her arms hung limply at her side. She should be clawing at his back with the intent to kill, the way she had done the last time he was this close, was around her, enveloping her like he had any business being everywhere in her eyes and nose and ears.

"Your trip to the Americans, did you find your answers?" She felt his warm nose and cool jade skid across her cheek, like it was normal to be in this room, him cradling her like some sort of, some sort of…

"No. I'm unsure." Whether this was an answer to his question, or to her trail of turmoiled thoughts, she didn't know. Finally, "I'm tired." I want to go home. I want to go back to Haiti and disappear. I want my brother back and I want to leave the Black Panther behind.

Namor straightened and tightened his grip, dragging her with him. She was almost standing on his feet. Her small breasts pressed into his chest below his golden collar. One of his hands left her spine to press the back of her head into him. Her left cheek met his chest. She stared at the hammock in this room as though it was the only thing in the world that could keep her from drowning. Water dripped from her curls and into her eyes.

Like her body had done in the water, it melted into him. Only her thin top separated her chest from his. She felt every movement ripple through his body and into hers.

"Tell me the rest of your terms. Consider if the Black Panther can trust the Feathered Serpent God and I will—request your presence tomorrow and explain our arrangement."

Say my name again, her traitorous mouth almost said.

Shuri lifted a hand to his chest and pushed him away. Or herself back, because he was a solid rock, body sculpted from the sun itself and—

Breathe. She couldn't see his expression before, but now his usual, mildly-interested expression graced his bejeweled face. The foreign feeling in her stomach quivered again. She was too tired and drained to muster up the confidence of a Princess but willed her body to form a passable neutrality.

"Giving up your room was unnecessary, but thank you."

Whatever spirit had ahold of him for the past few minutes was gone, because he was smirking again. "I do not need your thanks, woman."

"Then what do you need?"

His lips twitched in the start of a smile. "Your terms. Had you spoken of your want to bathe —"

"It's a universal need. I'm human, in case that requires repeating."

"—Fen would have prepared a suitable location and…clothes earlier." His voice hitched on the word clothes. With a start, Shuri remembered where she was, who she was with, and what she was wearing.

She whirled around. Not that it helped, considering she was just as naked in the back, but she was out of the strength required to not crumble when facing him right now.

"Don't touch me, don't look at me, don't breathe in my direction."

She heard his footsteps—wet and squeaking and solid—move towards the archway. She squeezed her eyes, willing him to leave, but he stopped.

"I hear you breathing."

A chuckle. "Not in your direction, I assure you."

A sense of normality returned and Shuri embraced it. "The last time I communicated a human need, the guards and Fen almost passed out. I didn't want to bother them."

"Not them, me. You should have communicated this to me."

She grimaced, extending damp hand to clutch her wrinkled tracksuit to her chest. She braved a look at Namor. The water-king was looking at one of the artifacts on the wall, a curious look on his face.

"So I can tell the fishboy about my personal needs but sleep is where Talokanil draw the line?"

Namor flinched. Good. He should feel as disoriented as she did.

"A bed," he said slowly, "is a personal need. Is the Black Panther not satisfied?"

It hadn't escaped her that they had resumed using their titles—nicknames, Shuri laughed internally, the elf—like it could widen the space between them after meeting so close.

"No. Not until you tell me what's going on." The reminder cut through the thick air. They were not friends. They were allies born of political need and moral imperatives.

"Tomorrow." He left through the archway, and that moment she finally identified the feeling swirling in her gut.

Comfort.

Namor didn't think twice about what possessed him to act the way he did. He was close with the gods, meditating often and going to land for rain rituals. His temper flowed from earth and mud. His flexibility and submission flowed from water and their god of rain, Chac.

He saw Shuri constricting, so he could not do anything but flow around her.

If she was to stay for a month, she needed some way to keep her fire at bay. Atzi wanted the engineers to meet her, and keeping her busy with her inventions was one way to do it. He wondered, not for the first time, what connection she had with her gods and ancestors. Having the mantle of the Black Panther thrust on her without solidifying the connection to the god that granted it could be part of the problem.

He made a mental note to request her to accompany him to his ancestors. Chac favored Talokan, but water looked fitting on Shuri.

A grin tugged at his lips. Very, very fitting.

Bucky wrestled through the collapsed doorway, giving Nakia privacy to update Okoye and speak to her son outside. The annexed capital city of Sokovia was still recovering, and it hadn't improved substantially since he was last here with Zemo. The area with the memorial was still beautifully morose, but deeper in the city, disorder reigned. People lived in the streets. Dilapidated neighborhoods and crushed buildings hosted a small trickle of humanitarian workers.

"Why can't we ask the wizards to help? One whoosh," Sam made a circle movement with his arms, "and they'll find him. Boom, done."

"Sorcerer. Calling them wizards is like calling you an eagle."

"Easy now, Buck."

"You heard them—legal problems, busy with restoring their temple. Wanda destroyed it in Nepal."

At the mention of their old acquaintance, the two quieted their banter. Nakia joined them from outside, observing the them carefully. Sam held up an old DVD boxed set, covered in soot and ash.

"No sign of him here."

Nakia nodded slowly. Bucky had begun to recognize it as a tick—she was running through options in her head.

"We can see if he comes back here," Sam said, "but if he's not at Wanda's childhood home, where else would he be in a city like this?"

"Don't ask me, I wasn't part of that fight." At that time, Bucky was the Winter Soldier, committing terrible crimes far away from here.

Sam chuckled. "Neither was I. Was busy tracking down your ass, actually, at Steve's command."

Nakia spoke. "What about one of the other Avengers? Can you ask? Unless your friend we left on Cape Verde—" Bucky opened his mouth to protest John being called a friend but decided against it, not wanting to interrupt her train of thought, "was lying, there must be some reason why he was spotted here. It's never a coincidence."

Sam replaced his goggles, his wings extending in preparation for another flight out of the caved in roof. He'd done about three circles around the whole city so far, with no leads. "Yeah, a pastel evil version of an android Tony and Ultron cooked up. Not so sure sentiment's driving him."

At this, Bucky had to disagree. "He got his memories. Memories change a person."

Sleep did not come easy to her that night. It hadn't come easy for many months, even years. What was new, was the culprit of her insomnia this time: the freaking bed.

Fen told her she'd made it after Shuri injured Namor. He'd slept on this at least for some nights, however Talokanil slept. What did he think in those days fresh from the loss of battle? Did he curse her to the heavens for forcing him to yield? Did he toss and turn, plotting ways to get his revenge? Was that what was happening now — revenge for clawing his face, burning his back, and stamping on his pride?

Okay, not pride. The masochistic bastard had a mural illustrating his defeat in the next room for everyone to see.

She, however, did not remember her defeat at his hand at all. It couldn't be called that, because it was before she was the Black Panther and there had been no combat. Just him leaping and flying over their aircrafts like it was a game of hopscotch and then throwing water bombs into the palace. Her memories were hazy between the glass of her Dragon Flyer cracking and Griot announcing the Queen's terminated heart-rate.

It was not him specifically, she decided. Without her mother and brother, there were few people on this planet gave the kinds of hugs that kindled warmth and comfort.

She would not forget the momentary kindness of the water-king, because that's all it was: a momentary lapse, an outlet for the grief she was still healing from. Where he drew his warmth from and how was none of her business.