Prince of Fire Emblem: The Promise

[volleygenius]

Bunta let Lissa have the rest of their return trip to be as quiet or as talkative as she liked. She had a lot to digest, he imagines, between the arrangement itself and how her interactions with people were about to change with the addition of a ring to her finger. It's simpler for him. He pledged his life to the royal family a long time ago; this is just a new spin on an old loyalty.

For the remainder of the day, the second ring from Ishimitsu's store has stayed hidden in his pocket, out of sight until the sun is nearly set on the horizon, and the moon and stars are beginning to appear. That feels about right.

To call it a plan was an overstatement. He got a whim in the jeweler's and acted on it, and once it was in his pocket he thought of a good use for it, and that was that. He got it for her, at some point was going to give it to her, and he was going to make it count for something when he did.

So, rounding his way through the castle, he finally finds Lissa and gives her a casual salute of greeting.

"Yo. Can I borrow you for a minute? There's something you should see up top of the west tower."

Comments

[didntaxyou]

"It better not be the same things I see up there every day," she warned, almost by reflex, but she follows easily enough. The joke's a bit absent-minded. Her mind is still a bit absent. Seiichi's talking about formals and if Bunta's friend Dorothea knows, well, who else knows by now?

[volleygenius]

"There's definitely something new up there," he baits as he leads the way up.

The tower's rooftop offers a quiet, private retreat from the business within the castle walls. It has a small garden and a few outdoor chairs, a telescope for stargazing, and a balcony circling the edge for looking out over the kingdom. The lower half of the sky is golden yellow and pink from the setting sun.

"Pretty," he comments absently on opening the door and stepping outside. There's just a slight breeze, too, tickling his skin with a refreshing coolness that contrasts with the warm feeling of the sun's rays.

[didntaxyou]

It's pretty the way something you see every day is, but his comment makes her look at it more carefully. The way the colors complement each other in the sky, the way the breeze keeps the temperature at a certain level...

"My brother would probably get more out of it than me," she said. He was the one with the eye for these things.

[volleygenius]

"Would he?" He says as goes to the balcony and rests his arms against the railing, gaze set outward at the landscape.

"You don't like pretty sunsets?"

[didntaxyou]

"He'd paint it and make it into something permanent," she said matter-of-factly. "It's not about whether I like it... he'd just do something worthwhile with it."

She shrugs and squeezes in next to him. There's no self-pitying in what she says; it's just how she sees it.

[volleygenius]

"I see. Why can't it be about whether you like it?" He asks conversationally.

[didntaxyou]

"I don't know?" She frowns. "I'm not anybody important. And I don't do anything earth-shattering. And I guess I kinda wish Seiichi was still interested in the things he liked before he got sick."

[volleygenius]

Change is hard. Maybe Yukimura will still go back to how he was before one day. Or, maybe, this is the new normal. He went through a lot, and it wouldn't be surprising if it had a more lasting effect on his psyche than it ever did on his body.

Maybe it's especially hard when that change has meant a brother whose interests have shifted from painting and orchestra to making sure his most-important-person-who-thought-she-was-nobody-important sister's future and happiness was protected, no matter what might happen to him. The illness has given him a taste of his own mortality, his own potential to be powerless. It had to be terrifying for him. He was taking that feeling and acting constructively on it, whether Lissa liked what that meant or not.

Without directly addressing any of her words, he reaches his hand over to her far shoulder and gives her a little tug into a sidelong hug.

[didntaxyou]

And she doesn't fight it, just sort of rests her head in the nearest convenient spot, puts her arms wherever they land, and sniffles. There wasn't a lot of time or room for crying over Seiichi-- she'd gotten more of a cry over Bunta and Jackal leaving, and now... after all that...

[volleygenius]

He hears that sniffle. Been a rough time, huh Lissa? For a couple of minutes, it's fine like this. Everyone needs a space for being sad. She should know that it's safe to make hers next to him. He gazes out at the fiery colors in the sky, and the looming darkness above it working to slowly extinguish whatever portrait of nature Yukimura might have been able to preserve with some paints and a canvas.

"Nothing gets to last forever," he observes.

[didntaxyou]

"Well, that's not fair," she muttered into his sleeve, choking back a laugh and a sob both.

"And the king shouldn't be included in that."

[volleygenius]

But he is, and Lissa knows it.

"Well, it's a shame to say goodbye to things we love, right? Look out there," he points out at the sunset, now a bit dimmer from when they first came outside, the orange and pink a bit paler as a light blue-purple begins to infuse itself into the palette. "In a few more minutes, this pretty moment will be gone forever. Even if we see another one tomorrow, it won't be exactly the same."

[didntaxyou]

She can't help equating the sunset with her brother, and shakes her head furiously.

"He's already made it pretty clear I don't have to say good-bye to him," she said, just a little bit wry, and little bit more stubborn. "He won't let you go and he won't let me go, either. Throwing us both in the same pocket was probably real convenient for him!"

It's not a path she wants to go too far down, thinking about how much Seiichi has changed, or worse-- how much he might continue to change.

"A new one isn't necessarily better," she muttered, petulant.

[volleygenius]

Him as a whole, maybe not, but the vision of him that she has in her head may be a different story. It's a little ironic that it's her brother she's assigned a refusal to let go to.

After a moment, he breaks into a grin and shifts around behind her, wrapping both his arms around her middle and squeezing in a playful bear hug.

"Well, I'm not letting you go either! Sounds like you're doubly stuck."

[didntaxyou]

"HEY!"

Her feet kick uselessly in the little bit of air Marui lifts her into, and one half-hearted fist comes down on his shoulder.

"Surprise attacks are cowardly!" she complained, unable (or unwilling) to do more than that.

[volleygenius]

"It's your own fault for being wide open," Bunta cheerfully counters.

[didntaxyou]

"Sorry I don't expect to be kidnapped in my own home," she managed, reaching behind her head to pinch him wherever her hand happened to land.

"Can't a girl just have a moment where she's not on guard??"

[volleygenius]

Bunta winks one eye shut with the pinch to his shoulder, still all grin.

"That's rude! You make it sound like you wouldn't want to come with me." He says, and now it's like a game to just... keep her off her feet. He wobbles a bit, falling back a step.

[didntaxyou]

"It's the principle of the thing!" she hollered, squirming a little and throwing her weight all to one side to make him wobble worse. "Try asking nicely!"

[volleygenius]

"Whoa--!" He resituates his feet to stabilize himself, but no before a small stagger. All the while, he's alert. How he would shift himself, shift her, in the unlikely but nonzero chance he really does lose his balance, so that he would be the one to break her fall and not the other way around.

"Dear Princess... I'm asking you nicely... how could you possibly not want to come with me." It is not at all said like a question.

[didntaxyou]

"No titles!" Take a bop on the head, and anyway:

"Didn't I already?" she asked, gesturing vaguely at the dimming sky. "You used up your get-Lissa-to-follow-you allowance for the day already!"

[volleygenius]

Yeah, he asked for that. Being a pest is part of the job description.

"Whaaaat? Why should I only get one a day? I'm special!"

He does set her down, though, because there was in fact a reason for bringing her up to this rooftop sunset.

"Besides that... you should always listen when I invite you somewhere."

His eyes are practically daring her to challenge him on that.

[didntaxyou]

She'd been looking for something snappy to say when he set her down. It was honestly a quicker end to the game than she expected and derailed her thought process.

Lissa does look directly into his eyes, and smiles with a wink.

"It's better than me sneaking along, I'll give you that much."

[volleygenius]

Bunta allows a small sound of amusement for the joke, but his expression doesn't falter.

"Maybe."

He slides his hand into his pocket, curling his hand around the velveted box resting there. It's unexpectedly a little nerve-wracking. Not from fear of her reaction-- from the meaning of what he's about to do.

He can do it, though. No one is better at taking care of people than him. Yukimura was banking on that fact when he asked him to take this on. There was a reason he wanted him to do it and not Sanada or Yanagi or Niou, all of whom were older friends and, generally speaking, better fighters in a solo situation.

He can do this.

"Do you remember what I wanted for my ring?"

[didntaxyou]

"I remember it basically amounted to a dog collar," she said bluntly.

Her hands twist together behind her back for lack of anything else to do with them. There's something momentous in his voice, but Lissa brushes it off. It's probably just part of the next joke.