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It had started small.
Flayn had found him polishing his armor again in the training area, watched him for a moment, before asking, “Would it not be easier to do that with your hair tied back?”
The question had surprised him, but she was right. Every time he reached over to grab the oil from where he sat cross-legged on the floor, his long, ginger tresses would slip from his shoulder and get in his way. It was becoming rather troublesome. After so many years evading the Empire, maintaining it had simply become a hassle.
“Ah, yes, I suppose so,” Ferdinand had replied, setting the gauntlet he had been working on back on the cloth in front of him. “I am afraid I did not think to bring a cord to tame it. Rather silly of me, don’t you think?”
Flayn had merely hummed and walked over to stand a few feet away, appraising him with an amused look. He would be a liar if he claimed not to have felt a flutter in his chest at her attention.
“If you will allow it, Ferdinand, I could braid it for you? As a thank you for the embrace,” Flayn had said after a few moments, a smile playing on her lips.
Goddess, the embrace...It had only been a week since she had requested a true embrace, out of fondness rather than a need to protect. It made him nervous, thinking about the fact that he had accepted her request and hugged her to him in the academy courtyard—right below Seteth’s office window at that!—but if he was being honest with himself, he had wanted to hold her as much as she seemed to want to be held.
“I-I would not wish to trouble you!” he had stammered out.
“It would be no trouble at all,” Flayn had insisted, then hesitated. Her face fell a little before allowing, “But if it would cause you any discomfort…”
Ferdinand could not bear to see her disheartened on his account.
“You could never cause me discomfort!” The words had left his mouth before he realized what he was saying. Then he really had blushed.
And a dusting of pink had appeared on her cheeks as she giggled, “Very well then,” and moved to stand behind him. With her petite stature, it had been nothing at all for her to bend only slightly to part his hair into three and begin overlapping the long bunches into a plait.
Ferdinand had picked up the oil rag and pulled a breastplate into his lap, but he had been far too distracted by her delicate hands tugging on his hair, fingers occasionally brushing his scalp or his neck to focus. It would be no exaggeration to say he had polished the same square foot of metal twenty times until she had stepped away, announcing that it was done.
The next time she had offered to style his hair was for a less practical reason.
They had been on a military campaign, on their way to the Hrym territory to follow a lead on the whereabouts of his father. He had been...well, suffice it to say he had been agitated and stressed for the four-day march there.
Ferdinand had decided to take his lunch alone, trudging nearly a quarter of a mile past the edge of the camp before sitting among the wildflowers that bloomed in the Harpstring Moon. Cornflowers, if he was not mistaken.
Still, Flayn had found him. It had only been ten minutes or so after he had unwrapped his sandwich, smooshed from the journey, that she had appeared.
“May I join you, Ferdinand?” she had asked timidly. Had anyone else come after him, he knew he would have sent them away, insisting he wanted time with his own thoughts. With Flayn though…
“I would be very happy if you would,” he had answered with a nod, his voice cracking.
After several minutes of eating in silence, Flayn had spoken up again, quietly. “I dearly hope we find your father, Ferdinand.”
Swallowing thickly, he had only nodded.
“I...I do not know what I would do if my father were in his position,” Flayn had murmured, plucking one of the flowers nearby and rolling the stem between her fingers. “I could not bear the thought of losing him to such violence.”
Yes, her father. In an act of great trust, the most secretive members of the church were slowly letting their masks fall away. The first secret revealed had been the true relationship between Flayn and the archbishop’s advisor. It had not come as much of a surprise, admittedly. The protectiveness Seteth showed toward Flayn and all matters pertaining to her was a sight to see and Ferdinand had to admit that he was intimidated. He had far too many fond feelings and affectionate thoughts about Flayn not to fear the hypothetical displeasure of her father.
“Seteth is strong. Even should he become separated from us, he would survive,” Ferdinand had asserted, setting the empty cloth that had held his food on the ground beside him. As a bearer of a Minor Crest of Cichol, Ferdinand could not help but feel a sense of kinship to the man who bore the Major Crest. “My father...he is not a warrior. He is a noble and a politician above all else. He wields a quill better than a sword.” Indeed, he could not remember the last time he had seen the duke lift a weapon at all.
Flayn had frowned, staring at the flower as it spun in her fingers. “I suppose all we can do is hasten to Hrym and pray that we are able to rescue him.”
“Yes. He is an imperfect man...but he is my father, and I would see him safe if I am able.”
“And so we shall,” the young woman beside him had said with an air of finality, as though all it took was her saying it to make it so. The steady confidence of a woman beyond her years.
He had opened his mouth to say more, but Flayn reaching out to tuck the blue wildflower behind his ear had stopped him short. She had smiled, shifting her gaze from the flower to meet his eyes. “These flowers complement your appearance quite well, do they not? It is only fitting that their beauty be matched with your own.”
If he had only guessed at the source of his fondness for Flayn, he knew for certain now with the natural way she said those few words. Heat that had nothing to do with the noon sun above began creeping across his face as he reached down to pluck a flower of his own and hold it out to her. “And yet they are far from the most beautiful sight before me.”
Her blush did nothing but accentuate it.
Still, they had a hard time meeting each other’s eyes after that, and Flayn had distracted herself by plucking a few handfuls of the cornflowers and weaving a crown of them. When she was done many minutes later, she had offered it to him, but he had only taken it from her hands to gently place it on her verdant hair.
“They complement your appearance quite well,” he had echoed.
It was only on the walk back that Flayn had blurted something out about how the flowers were nicknamed “bachelor buttons” where she grew up and Ferdinand had the crazy thought that he would give up his bachelor status for her.
He still had the flower she had tucked into his hair pressed between the pages of his diary.
Now, Ferdinand found himself in a blissful daze every time Flayn came to mind. The Empire had been defeated mere weeks ago, and while the loss of his homeland was an ache that would no doubt take years to heal, it was overwhelmed by the joy he felt from the new secret he shared with Flayn.
When she had come to him before they departed for Enbarr requesting a kiss, his heart had nearly stopped dead in his chest. He had not dared hope that she would share his feelings, but to find that she not only reciprocated but was overjoyed at the thought of entering a courtship with him…
Biting on his lip to restrain a grin, Ferdinand reached back to finger the ribbon Flayn had tied his hair back with. It was a scorchingly hot day in the Blue Sea Moon, and when Flayn had met with him in the greenhouse this morning while everyone else was at breakfast, she had remarked how uncomfortable he must be with his hair so long in this heat. When he had admitted that it was rather muggy, she had laughed and taken a strip of blue ribbon from her pocket. Her favorite, she had told him as she tied it in a neat bow at the nape of his neck. “For he who is my favorite,” she had repeated as she pressed a kiss to his cheek.
While he appreciated the gesture, she had also unintentionally given him another gift: information. It was Saint Cethleann Day. Her day, the army now knew. And Ferdinand was not about to commit a gaffe and not buy his beloved something for her birthday. So here he was, assessing and reassessing the wares of the merchant who peddled in feminine accessories.
His eyes kept drifting to what he knew best: opulent jewels, the finest lacey ribbons, intricate gold brooches. If the blue ribbon in his hair was any indication, though, he knew Flayn’s tastes were more modest.
A movement in the corner of his eye drew his attention and when he turned his head, he stiffened immediately. Seteth was standing not a foot away from him, eyes narrowed in a critical gaze. Ferdinand was suddenly awash with admiration for the professor to have not only endured the man’s strict demeanor for so many months, but to then fall in love with him. Who wouldn’t respect a person who could be the recipient of that glare and not quake in their boots?
“G-Good day to you, Seteth! How may I help you?” Ferdinand rushed out, trying to save face. Surely he had not discovered…?
“That is a curious question,” Seteth responded cooly, eyes shifting to something just over Ferdinand’s shoulder. “Perhaps you will answer one of my own. Where did you acquire that ribbon?”
Goddess have mercy on my soul . Ferdinand’s mouth went dry as he searched for an answer, eventually landing on, “Ah, i-it was lent to me by a friend. The heat is rather oppressive today, is it not?” He cursed himself even as he said it. Commenting on the weather? An amateur’s attempt at changing the conversation.
“Indeed,” Seteth deadpanned, crossing his arms. “I admit that I am interested in learning why you would be wearing something of my daughter’s.”
It had been folly to think they would be able to hide anything from this man. How could he have been so foolish?
“Ah.” Ferdinand swallowed, steeling himself for his certain banishment from the monastery. “We are friends, you see. It was merely a gesture of kindness, I assure you.”
Seteth snorted softly, releasing Ferdinand from his glare and turning his attention to the merchant’s booth before them. “You are a poor liar, Ferdinand von Aegir.”
Ferdinand decided it was probably best to remain silent.
After a moment, Seteth nodded towards a cluster of accessories at the end of the table. “Flayn’s favorite flowers are forget-me-nots. Delicate and precious, as she is.”
A generous gesture to give Ferdinand just the hint he needed to find the right present, punctuated with a hidden warning.
Taking in a steadying breath, Ferdinand said quietly, “Yet they thrive in both times of adversity and peace, beautiful and strong.”
That took Seteth by surprise, if the way his green eyebrows raised at him were any indication. They stood there, assessing each other for the tensest moments of Ferdinand’s life, before Seteth chuckled under his breath.
“For returning my shield, I will offer you a chance. Pray you do not squander it.”
With that, the man—the saint—turned on his heel and left, cape snapping from the movement.
Ferdinand let out the breath he’d been holding in a whoosh. Did he just get...approval? Permission ? Surely not. He must have been hallucinating, naturally.
Still, as he turned back to the frazzled merchant and pointed to a brooch inlaid with the blue flowers, he could not help but smile at the idea of Flayn’s face when he told her what had just happened.