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It starts with an assignment just like any other. The Thorn Princess is tasked with exterminating a drug cartel. This is a great honor; to be of such use to the nation! To humanity itself! There are days when it weighs on her, all the killing she does, but this kind of scum shouldn’t have been born to begin with, and Yor is all too happy to fix that mistake. So, she dons her work dress and hones her weapons and takes the bus to the warehouse complex that according to Shopkeeper is where the ring is headquartered.
She arrives on time; the sun is completely gone, the sky a bright cloudy gray. The warehouses are quiet.
Too quiet.
And that sharp, rusty smell—
A tiny part of her wants to press herself against the wall, even after all this time. An ingrained wariness from when she was much smaller and much weaker. But she is strong now, and she remembers her training. Remembers Shopkeeper’s calm, steady words: You have nothing to be ashamed of, so walk with your back straight and your chin up. Do not skulk like some common thief.
And so, she walks. Winds a path between the bodies, deeper and deeper into the compound. The deaths are inconsistent. It looks like what killed them had used whatever means available at the time, to great success. Despite the various methods of killing, however, there’s a certain… elegance that marks each of them. A brutal efficiency found in someone who doesn’t really enjoy the bloodbath, and simply does what is necessary.
This is the work of one person, she realizes, and she rather admires them for this.
As she gets closer to the center of the compound, she begins to hear the sound of fighting, growing and echoing in the empty space. She presses on, keeping her footsteps quiet, her thorns ready in her hands.
Finally, she arrives at the central warehouse. Its doors are open. Bodies litter the floor.
And in the very back, pinned to a wall, is one man fighting half a dozen others. He manages to hold them off, but only just. His movements are lagging, fatigue visible in every line of his body—even in the dim light. He slips—one of the six men raises his hammer high—
Yor moves before she can think it through. She takes off on a sprint, leaps at the final step, and descends on the obvious criminals. One down, then two, quick jabs through their forehead. Her ally—ally? How could she be so sure?—quickly recovers to take advantage of the chaos, taking down two men while she eliminates another pair. It takes ten seconds, maybe less, before they are the only ones standing.
“Are you alright?” she asks, turning to— “Loid?!”
“Yor,” Loid replies, his jaw falling slack. “What—what are you doing here?”
As they clean the place up, they talk. It feels, oddly, like they’re at home, doing housework together. They go room to room, covering each other as they empty every drawer and pour gasoline onto every available surface, chatting all the while. It should not be this comfortable, Yor thinks, working with her husband after finding out that he’s—well, whatever he is, which he still hasn’t said. For all the words escaping his mouth, he hasn’t said much at all.
At the end of their thirty-minute circuit around the complex, these are the things Yor knows to be true:
One, Loid is here to do the same thing that she is here for.
Two, he didn’t know there would be someone else doing that same job, which means he’s not working for Garden. When she pointed that out to him, he laughed. He said, “Yor, I didn’t even know that Garden was real.”
Three, he doesn’t tell her who he’s working for, carefully wording his sentences so that there’s no hint other than that he is working for something bigger than himself.
Four, she doesn’t know her husband at all. He isn’t really a psychiatrist. That, he finally admits, is just a cover.
“A cover,” Yor says slowly. “That’s something spies have.”
Loid looks at her evenly. “It sounds bad when you say it like that.”
“So… you’re a spy?” Her hand tightens around her stiletto, an involuntary motion. She’s killed spies before. She has. Did Loid know them? Were they his colleagues? “From the west?”
He’s quiet for a long, long time. Finally, he says:
“I am. Yor, please—it’s not like that.” He raises a hand, as if halting her. As if trying to calm an animal. “I have no ill will against Ostania. I promise you, I’m just trying to prevent a war from ever happening again.”
“How do I know if that’s true?” she asks, though already she lowers her stilettos. Already, she feels relief loosening that tight knot in her chest.
He hesitates, jaw tightening minutely before he finally says, “Remember Anya’s classmate that she punched, Damian? His father is a very reclusive politician—his faction is far-right, pro-war. My mission is to make prolonged contact with him and gather intel.”
That sounds awfully inefficient. “Why not just kill him?”
Loid gives her a thin smile. “If only it’s that simple. The situation requires a more subtle approach. Has your organization considered killing him?”
She shakes her head. “I don’t know. I’m not—I don’t decide who dies. But… I have been sent to kill people who endanger the peace of the country before.” Spies from the west, she thinks again, though she can’t quite say it.
“I understand,” he says, and he sounds like he really does. Like he knows who she’s killed, and that he doesn’t hold it against her. “It seems that while our goals aren’t exactly in line with each other, they are at least orthogonal.”
Yor makes a little sound of acknowledgment. She doesn’t really know what ‘orthogonal’ means. Loid never tries to belittle her, but she would be the first to admit that she’s not as educated or refined as he is.
“We don’t have to be enemies, Yor.”
She makes another mm sound, because she’s not sure if she should trust him. After all, he’s a spy. He has said so himself. It makes him a good liar, a good killer. He could be saying all these things now, only to sneak into her room later and put a bullet in her brain.
And yet.
Maybe it’s just the part of her that’s lonely, that longs to have someone who understands her perfectly and wouldn’t flinch at the blood on her hands. Maybe she’s just relieved his secret is greater and worse than hers. Maybe it’s the fact that when his back had been against that wall, one against six, she immediately clocked him as an ally.
Or maybe she’s just being terribly gullible again.
Regardless, she says, “I don’t want us to be enemies.”
He tosses the last canister of gasoline and takes a matchbook out from his pocket. Slowly, as if he’s giving her time to back off, he takes her hand. Flips it palm-up. Places the matchbook there. “I’m glad to hear that.”
“I wouldn’t hold it against you,” he says quietly as they walk the long walk home, “if you want to put an end to our arrangement.”
“How do you mean?” Yor asks. Her mind is slow, tired. She had barely fought anyone, but the cleanup had been extensive, even with Loid’s help. They both smell like chemical fire, like bitter, choking smoke. She wants to take three showers and sleep for a week.
“A fake divorce for our fake marriage?”
She has considered it. She doesn’t know how Garden would react to her being married to a spy. Not well, she imagines. But maybe… maybe Garden doesn’t have to know, yet. She hasn’t even made up her mind.
“It’s a standing offer,” he says, when she fails to respond in a timely manner. “It’s always been on the table, of course—but more so than ever, you should consider it.”
“Do you want us to separate?” she asks. If she was Loid, she would want to divorce her. She’s not exactly the perfect wife, much less the perfect mother for a child that goes to Eden Academy.
“What?” he asks, stunned. “No, of course not. I… my mission requires a mother figure for Anya, and as I have said before, no one is better for the job than you.”
“But you didn’t know about this, when you said that.”
“That is true,” he concedes. “But does it matter?”
“Shouldn’t it? I—I mean, you’re the one who asked me if I wanted us to separate… Loid.” She realizes—belatedly—that Loid is probably not his real name. She doesn't know why it didn't click before. He already admitted that his whole life as she knew it was a cover. A mission.
But then, she has never needed to be anyone but herself. Thorn Princess is her code name, yes, but she gets to shed it at the end of the day, when she gets home. Meanwhile, he doesn’t get to stop being Loid Forger—no, he has to be Loid Forger at all times, except perhaps on nights like these.
The man who isn’t really Loid Forger chuckles. “I simply meant… you might not want to share a house with a spy, all things considered.”
She considers this, then asks, “Will you pry into my work?”
“No,” he replies. “That is, my mission with Anya is my top priority. As long as your work doesn’t interfere with it, it is outside of my purview. However…” He hums, and when he continues he speaks carefully. “I do not need to pry to obtain information on your work. When you work late, I’ll know. If you come home with an injury, I’ll be more likely to notice. And I may promise not to pry now, but that can change.”
How much of what he says can she trust? How much does she want to take on faith? He seems like he’s trying to be transparent—he pretty much just told her not to trust him—but how does she know he’s not hiding something else?
Yor weighs her distrust against the drawbacks of separation. People would talk. She would once again be at risk of being reported to the Secret Police for suspicious activity. She would, once again, be lonely.
She keeps coming back to that. She’s so terribly lonely, and here is someone who knows what she is, and he’s married to her already, and he doesn’t want to stop being married to her. She cannot trust him entirely, but she can trust him with her secret the same way he can trust her with his.
And so, Yor makes a decision.
“Alright… I promise to tell you if I have to kill your target.”
He smiles. It’s different from all the smiles she’s seen before. Slightly muted, as if his face isn’t used to it. Which is silly, of course. She’s seen Loid smile widely before. She’s even seen him laugh a couple of times.
But how much of those had been real?
“I appreciate it,” he says, voice low and lovely. “I’ll continue to rely on you, Yor.”
“Ah—likewise, Loid. Is—is that okay? Or would you prefer another name, when it’s just us?”
“Loid is fine.”
She looks at the profile of her husband, his lovely features. Even in the dark of the night, his eyes are keen, bright. She doesn’t know him, she reminds herself. She doesn’t even know his name. “Loid, then.”
The day after, over breakfast, Anya barely eats a bite of her pancakes as she watches both of her parents with wide eyes, mouth hanging open. Yor wonders if Anya notices anything—the girl is very perceptive, after all—and if so, what does she see? They had agreed the night previous to not mention any of this to Anya. There’s no reason to disturb their normal, daily life, and this whole assassin-and-spy business is wholly inappropriate for a child anyway. Yor had started killing at a young age, but even then she hadn’t said anything to Yuri about it. Besides, it was a different time, then. A desperate time.
Anya deserves better.
“Eat your breakfast, Anya,” Loid says, and if not for the quick glance he throws at Yor, she wouldn’t be able to tell that he, too, is concerned about their daughter.
Anya takes a mouthful of pancake and syrup, chewing slowly—but doesn’t stop staring.
Yor tries, very much, to act normal, but she can’t quite bring herself to be as calm as her husband. A wide, completely unnatural smile is on her lips, which gets even wider when Loid tilts his head a little bit toward her as if in question.
“Mama.”
“Nothing! Nothing’s going on, Anya!” Yor exclaims.
Anya blinks. Once, twice. “Anya is done with breakfast.”
“Ah. I—I see. Well done!” She collects the empty dish, using this precious opportunity to escape and hide in the kitchen, scrubbing the dish with much more attention than it really deserves.
It’s silly, she knows. There’s no way Anya could have figured out that her father is a spy and her mother is an assassin and that they only discovered this about each other last night. The whole scenario itself sounds outlandish, the kind you could find on Spy Wars.
Anya loves Spy Wars, though, and children have quite the creative logic—oh no. Surely, Anya couldn’t—
“Mama?” Anya calls from the entryway.
Yor puts the dish on the rack. Dries her hands on her apron. “Yes, sweetie?”
Anya extends both her arms, a plea for a hug. Without a thought, Yor scoops the girl up, cradling her to her chest. “I love you,” Anya says into Yor’s shirt.
“Oh,” Yor says, her throat suddenly tight. “I love you too, Anya.”
“Will Mama and Papa get along when Anya’s at school?”
“We always get along, Anya,” Loid says, and Anya leans out from Yor’s embrace into his arms like a little monkey moving tree to tree. “Come on, now, you need to go to school. Midterms are coming up, right? We can’t have you be late.”
The three of them get into the car, Anya sitting on her mother’s lap in the front. Yor walks her from the sidewalk all the way to the school gate, and when Anya asks her once again to get along with Loid, she can only nod, waving the girl away. Anya is soon joined by Becky, the two girls chattering among themselves as they grow smaller and smaller.
Sighing, Yor turns around, and—to her surprise—finds Loid waiting for her in the car.
“Is something wrong?” she asks. She doesn’t know how these drop-offs are supposed to go; it’s usually just Loid and Anya, since City Hall is in the other side of the town.
“I’ll drive you to City Hall.”
“But that’s too much trouble—I can just take the bus from here, it’s no problem—”
“I have time before my shift starts,” he says. “Besides, I’d like to talk to you for a little bit.”
“Oh.” Quietly, she climbs into the passenger seat and buckles herself in. “Is it about this morning? I’m sorry, I’m not very good at lying… and I got nervous, because it looked like Anya knew something about us. I—”
His hand covers hers on her lap; she tenses for half a second before noticing that she’s been clenching her fists so tightly, her nails are digging into the skin of her palm.
She relaxes her grip. Breathes. “Sorry,” she says again.
“It’s alright. I think she might’ve overheard us talking when we came home, but we didn’t say anything too obvious, so you don’t need to worry.”
Yor doesn’t remember what they’d said to each other last night. Something about the oil fumes clinging to their clothes, probably? At some point, she’d promised to do both of their laundry, but had that been before or after they got home? It’s difficult; they’d talked so much, last night, and all she can remember clearly is the very end, when they had wished each other good night, voices hushed so as to not wake their daughter.
“It’s alright,” Loid says again. His thumb swipes over her knuckles one last time before he pulls away to shift gears. “If Anya really found out, she would not be able to shut up about it. You know how much that girl loves Spy Wars.”
Laughing a little, Yor says, “I suppose you’re right.” She stretches her fingers on her lap, trying not to think of how it felt when his hand covered hers. “Maybe she didn’t even overhear anything. Anya is pretty sharp at reading the room, and—well, so much changed last night.”
“You’re right, she is. That’s what I wanted to talk to you about, actually.”
She braces herself. This is it, she thinks. He will throw her out now, because clearly it’s not working out for him.
“I think we should go on dates again. Ah, not—not like last time. I promise I won't be untoward.” His fingers tap on the steering wheel absently. “But it would give us an excuse to have time away from home, so we can talk about work without the risk of Anya overhearing us.”
“Oh,” Yor says, relaxing into her seat, face burning for a reason she can’t quite name. “That’s… a good idea. Yes, you’re right, we should do that.”
Loid gives her a quick smile. “That’s settled, then. Is Friday night good for you?”
“I think so, yes.”
“I look forward to it.”
Yor ducks her head. Fiddles with her hair. “M—me too, Loid.”
Friday afternoon, Loid takes her to a restaurant where the lights are tastefully dim and the tables are ensconced in little booths. “So we’re not easily overheard,” he tells her, though she notices—now that she knows what he is—that he scans the whole room before ducking into their booth in the far corner, and that he sits with his body angled slightly outward so he could see the entrance, and that he casually runs his hand under their table, his lips twitching a little as he finds something.
Yor remembers Anya’s favorite show, then, and so scribbles on a napkin: are we bugged?
Wiping his hands with a handkerchief, Loid says, “No, it’s just old bubblegum.”
“Oh,” she replies, making a face. She supposes even fancy restaurants can’t escape those. “Do you need to wash your hands?”
“I suppose I should. I’m sorry—I’ll be back soon.”
Left alone, Yor is left to peruse the menu on their table, trying not to grimace at how there are no prices listed. She’s never been to a restaurant like this; growing up, she had neither the money nor the time for dates, and even with Loid, she’s only gone to open restaurants where the guests can all see each other and the prices are right there on the menu. She supposes she’s glad for the privacy of the booths, because she knows she definitely doesn’t look like a refined wife on a date with her husband.
At the same time, however, she’ll be alone with Loid, in close quarters. The mere thought of it makes her feel odd and squirmy, somehow.
Sliding into the seat across from her, Loid asks, “Did you decide on what to order?”
“I’ll have the… pork chop, I think.” She only chooses it because it’s one of the few recognizable dishes on the list, and because she guesses it would be cheaper than the beef or chicken, but Loid doesn’t need to know that.
“The pork chop is good here,” he confirms, waving a server over.
When they’re done ordering, she asks, “Have you been here before?”
“Yes,” he says. “Though Loid Forger hasn’t. He prefers to have dinner at home, as you know.”
The use of third person stops her in her tracks. She doesn’t know what to make of it, the way he implies that he isn’t really Loid—even though she supposes he isn’t. “And what do you… um, well, you, prefer?”
“Me?” he asks, then hums in thought. “I’m not sure, actually. In-house, I suppose. Easiest to monitor what goes into the food when you cook it yourself, and your own residence is a known, controllable environment.”
“That makes sense,” she says, because it does. It isn’t what she thought Loid would say—she’d expected something about the warmth of a home, or something like that—but it fits this half-stranger before him perfectly nonetheless. “Is poisoning a common risk for you?”
“I wouldn’t say it’s common, but once it happens, it’s difficult to counteract, so I have to be alert at all times. How about you?”
“Ah, I’m resistant to poisons,” she replies easily. “It’s part of our training.”
“Really?” he asks, leaning forward. “How did you achieve it? If you don’t mind me asking, of course.”
“They give us a cocktail to drink every week. I don’t really know what’s in it, though, but it’s very bitter.”
“Every week? That’s less frequent than I thought it would be.”
“Oh, it was every day at first, and it hurt terribly, too. It doesn’t hurt at all, now. It’s just like medicine.”
He chuckles. “Only you would call a cocktail of poison ‘medicine’, Yor.”
Her face grows hot. “I’m sorry.”
“No, don’t,” he says quickly. “It’s not a bad thing. You’re right, anyway—it’s like medicine, to prevent you from being sick.”
“Yes!” she exclaims. “I’ve always thought of it like that.”
“So I suppose, since you can’t be poisoned, you have no problems eating outside?”
Yor grimaces. “Not at all. I… I’m not good at—that is, I never know what to do or say in public. Not like normal people, you know? My co-workers, they think I’m weird. If they see me right now… I don’t think they’ll believe that I’m on a date with you. Not that this is that kind of date, of course.”
“Yor,” he says, lifting his hand off the table and resting it back down. “You’re doing very well.”
She lifts her gaze from her knuckles, then immediately ducks her head back down when the warmth of his gaze scorches her. “I am?”
“Dates are for getting to know each other, and I’m enjoying getting to know you better.”
“I see.” He is kind. Why is he still kind to her? “I—I enjoy getting to know you, too.”
“Maybe it helps,” he adds, and there it is again, that little half-smile that doesn’t look like Loid at all, “that I’m not exactly normal myself.”
At this, she laughs. “No, I suppose not.”
The rest of the date goes smoothly, after that. Loid is a very good listener, attentive and responsive. Together they talk about their work some more, though both of them are careful not to mention details like names and dates. He asks her why she doesn’t use guns. She tells him she doesn’t like the noise. He agrees that the noise is a drawback, but he likes the easy lethality of it. She says she doesn’t need a gun to be lethal, and he laughs.
“What?” she asks, self-conscious again.
“No, no. I remember that night, after your friend’s party. You kicked one of the people chasing us and he went flying.”
She remembers. He laughed then, too, and called her amazing. And then, she realizes: “They’re not your patients, aren’t they?”
“I threw a grenade at them, Yor,” he says, then pauses. Clears his throat.
“Ah… ah, yes, you did.” She still keeps the ring. He must never find out. “So, who were they?”
He tells her, then, about the antiques smuggling operation. It had been thirty against two. (“Two?” she asks, and he replies, “I had someone else with me.”) They had gotten out of it by the skin of their teeth, and then they had to go and stash the valuables they had liberated. It's why he arrived at the party late and drenched in blood.
“Still, you were very kind to me,” she says. “You even defended me from Camilla’s accusation.”
“Well, of course. I wasn’t lying. I find it admirable that you sacrificed your body for a greater cause.”
Yor shifts in her seat, uneasy all of a sudden. “That’s… well, it’s not… what Camilla thought it was. When she said massage, it was more like I gave those men acupuncture. With, you know.”
He blinks. Blinks again. “Ah.”
“I didn’t mean to lie to you.”
“I understand,” he says, and he does, doesn’t he? He understands her best, even now. Perhaps better than ever. “My sentiments are unchanged.”
To say that everything changed ever since they found out about each other would be inaccurate. If anything, they’re both of them trying their very best to keep the routine going as usual. It’s what Anya deserves, after all. Despite the fact that she’s part of Loid’s mission, it looks like he really cares for the girl, for which Yor is glad. It makes it possible for her to continue seeing Loid as a partner, a co-parent. A husband.
And so they go through the same motions every day, the same chores: cooking, cleaning, herding their daughter into doing her homework, laundry.
Well, she supposes laundry’s a little different now. They used to do their own laundry separately, for obvious reasons, but now that the truth is out in the open there’s no point. It’s more efficient this way, too; she’s always felt a little guilty running the washing machine only half-full. It also means she knows exactly when he’s been in a fight. The smell of gunpowder clings to his clothes. Sometimes, she finds some blood on them, too, and for the rest of the day she’ll wonder if any of it is his.
It rarely is, but she wonders anyway.
That’s another thing that’s different: she finds her mind wandering toward him a lot more. She thinks about his work, thinks about his hands wrapped around a gun. One date night, she asks him all the questions she has about all sorts of guns and listens as he explains the differences, the types of rounds, the benefits and drawbacks of each. The next Friday, he drives them to the edge of the city where no one can hear them and they shoot targets all night.
He’s a better shot than she is, which is expected. She knows how to use a gun—she can shoot a close target well enough—but she hasn’t used it since the basic training Garden gave her. What she doesn’t expect is the odd heat that blossoms low in her belly as he stands behind her, hands steady and warm under her wrists.
“Breathe in,” he tells her, and she does, and she holds it as his hand creeps forward, his pointer finger resting over the one she has over the trigger. “Good,” he says. “Don’t lock your elbows—yes, just like that. Breathe out, and—”
The gun fires. The can seventy paces away topples.
“Oh!” Yor exclaims.
“There you go,” Loid says, breath hot against her ear. She can almost hear the smile in his voice. He steps back, releasing her from his hold.
“Thank you,” she says, glad that it’s too dark for him to see the blush dusting her cheeks.
“Of course,” he replies. “Next time, you can teach me how to use your stilettos.”
The final change—the biggest one, arguably—is that they say it a lot. Next time, next week, next Friday. Next date night. It’s like an anchor in their day-to-day, a point of time they both look forward to. It’s not like they hate their life otherwise—on the contrary, Yor has never been happier, and even Loid seems to be having less stomach problems—but there’s something in their Friday evenings that’s much like an undressing after a long day. A time when they can shed down all the things weighing them down throughout the week, when they don’t have to be parents or killers. In those precious few hours, they’re just a man and a woman with names that might not be entirely theirs, but neither of them care. Not when he has his arm around her shoulders and she is pressed against his side and a movie plays in front of them, so bright and so loud it swallows everyone else in this whole wide world.
And then it is time to go home, so they go home. Their daughter, as always, would still be awake waiting for them. Her face would brighten as she took them in, and she would happily be herded into bed, and Loid would pull the blanket up her chin and Yor would drop a kiss on her forehead and they would both leave the door open by a little crack. And they would wish each other good night, and they would go to their separate rooms, and tomorrow the week begins anew.
Which is all to say, not much has changed since they found out about each other—just enough.
Yor’s just about to give up on Loid’s week-old bloodstained jacket when he pops his head into the bathroom doorway, asking, “Any luck?”
She sighs. “Some,” she says, which isn’t wrong, exactly. The splotches are now a much lighter shade of brown. “I’ll keep trying.”
“It’s alright,” he says evenly. “It might be time for me to order a new suit anyway.”
“But they cost so much, Loid.” Her hair’s sticking to her sweaty face; she tries futilely to push it away. She’s not sure why she’s all frazzled; she’s been trying to pinpoint the cause in the half hour she’s been scrubbing and scrubbing and scrubbing. Loid should’ve washed the jacket himself before the blood dried, she thought at first, but she couldn’t blame him for his long and dangerous business trip. Besides, she should be able to get the stain out anyway, and if not, he could just buy a new suit. They’re not poor. She’s not poor. She just can’t get these damn splotches off somehow and her hands are all wrinkled and soap-watered and she just knows she’ll have to use even more hand cream than usual after this.
It’s one of those days.
“Yor,” he says, and he’s smiling. No, not just smiling. He’s holding back a laugh.
“What is it?” she says, trying not to sound too short.
“You have foam on your face.”
“What?” she says, swiping at her cheek where Loid indicates it. “Did I get it?”
“No, just—” he steps in, kneeling in front of her. Reaches out. “Stay still.”
His hand, warm and dry, cups her chin lightly. His thumb slides along the edge of her lips and he is so very close, and she can feel herself leaning into his touch, feel the tension in her back and shoulders melt away, feel—
Here’s the problem: before she found out that Loid was a spy, she had already nurtured a sapling of a crush for him. It has always been easy to like him. He was kind. Thoughtful. Smart. And he looked at her like he knew her, the core of her, and liked what he saw.
So she had liked him more than a little bit. That’s not surprising, especially when he revealed that a good chunk of Loid Forger is meant to be likable.
What does surprise her is that she likes the spy just as much, if not more. She likes his sharp, focused eyes. She likes the seriousness in his voice. She likes that he does actually know her.
But now he’s here, his thumb resting on the corner of her lips, and she realizes—terribly, horrifyingly—that she doesn’t just like him.
She’s in love with him.
Yor scrambles back, scooting on the floor until she’s pressed against the bathtub, kicking the bucket of soap water as she does so. The jacket spills out, water sloshing and splashing onto Loid’s trousers.
Before either of them could say anything, the doorbell rings.
Loid looks at her, clearly disappointed—in her? Does he know? Please don’t let him know—and sighs, pushing his bangs back as he stands up. “I’ll get it. It’s probably Anya.”
He’s right; as soon as the door clicks open, Anya declares, “Papa’s pants are wet.”
“Welcome home,” Loid says.
Yor—having gathered enough wits to emerge from the bathroom—asks, “Did you have a good time with Becky?”
“Yeah.” Anya stares at her, long and hard, then at Loid. “Mama and Papa were flirting.”
“We were not!”
Yor tries ignoring it at first. Surely, if she tries hard enough, she can pretend she’s not twitterpated by every little normal thing Loid does, like taking off her coat for her when she comes home, or sliding her dinner plate before her with a soft “Here you go, Yor,” or telling her good night in that calm, hushed voice of his. These are, after all, completely mundane things that happen pretty much every day. Over time, she’ll get used to it.
And she does get used to those things, but it doesn’t make everything better. If anything, she’s getting worse—every day, she finds a new thing to appreciate about Loid: his hand as he holds a knife in the kitchen, the careful way he places his shoes at the doorway upon entering the house, his slow, patient tone as he explains a particularly complicated math problem to their daughter. Five days after her resolve, she finds herself admiring the way sunlight seems to light his eyelashes gold from the inside out.
It is then that she is forced to admit that trying to ignore her feelings is not at all working.
So, Yor makes a list. All the reasons she mustn’t be in love with Loid, no matter how lovely he is.
One: he’s technically her enemy. If Garden finds out about him, they’ll probably make her kill him. If the west finds out about her, they’ll probably make him kill her—or worse, spy on her. Actually, she can’t even say for sure that he isn’t already spying on her. She cannot, no matter how much she wants to, trust him. How is she supposed to love a man she cannot even trust?
Two: theirs is not that kind of relationship. They have agreed to help with each other’s situations, yes. He needs a mother for Anya, which she happily will be. She needs the respectability and cover of a marriage, which he gladly provides. They split their responsibilities and work well to maintain their lives. That is all. Love is nowhere written in their agreement. It might be a violation of their terms.
Three: Loid is kind. She can say that with absolute certainty, now. He is a spy and a killer and he has lied to her so many times and he is, even then, so very kind. And he respects her as a partner, cares for her as a member of his family, maybe even likes her enough to call her a friend—but to expect more from him would be unfair. Because that is what love is, ultimately: the ache of an expectation. The sting of a wish.
As long as she loves him, she will hurt. As long as she loves him, he will be burdened.
She recites the list in her mind, holds it like a talisman when he’s around.
It still doesn’t work.
And so Yor does the only thing left she can think of.
She runs.
She can’t really run. That would be very irresponsible of her. But she can request as many assignments as possible so she doesn’t have to spend more time than necessary with Loid, including date nights. She makes her excuses. He understands. He’s always so understanding, which really doesn’t help things. But it means she doesn’t have to argue with him, and it’s good enough.
And for a time, it does work. It’s easy to immerse herself in the sheer physicality of combat, the stretch of muscles and pumping of blood. It’s easy to claim that she’s exhausted, let’s talk another time, good night, Loid. It’s easy to fill the rest of the time she’s forced to spend with him with small talk, with catching up on Anya and her life at school, or with nothing at all. Just a silence that stretches and stretches and stretches until one of them caves and excuses themself.
Usually, it’s him who breaks first.
It’s not surprising, really. He must have noticed her feelings for him by now. She’s not exactly good at lying like he is; she’s never had the training. And the way he keeps exiting the room when she’s actually around, it’s evident that he wants nothing to do with those feelings.
“Mama,” Anya says solemnly, breaking Yor’s train of thought.
“Yes?”
Anya opens her mouth, then closes it. Shakes her little head. “Nothing. Can Anya have cocoa?”
Yor leans forward, peeking at Anya’s workbook. “When you finish your homework, sweetie.”
“Okay.” Anya looks down, scribbling something for a while, then looks up again. “Mama and Papa should get along better.”
“We always do,” Yor says. The lie sinks like a stone in her stomach.
“There are no customers left?”
“Yes, Mrs. Forger,” Director McMahon says evenly. “I’m afraid you’ve gotten them all in the past two weeks.”
“But—” Yor says, her voice cracking a little in her rising panic, “—there must be something I can do tonight?”
“You can go home,” the director says kindly. “You’ve worked hard enough.”
But it’s date night, she wants to say, except it would be impolite to argue further and she doesn’t want people to think that she’s having a fight with Loid. “Yes, Director.”
“Is there something wrong?” he asks, eyes keen behind his thick glasses. “An argument with your husband, maybe?”
“We didn’t argue.”
“But there is something wrong?”
Yor doesn’t immediately answer, hesitating. Garden has thus far stayed out of her marriage, but she’s not sure what they’ll do if she tells them about her Loid-shaped problem. But then, Garden already notices that something is off. If she gives them nothing, they’ll probably start digging, and who knows what they’ll find.
Yor grimaces. Alright. She can do this. She can tell them part of the truth, and hopefully that’s enough to keep them at bay.
“Well, um—Director, you know how the marriage is… an arrangement?”
McMahon nods. “I remember. He needed a mother for his daughter, and you wanted the security of a family.”
“Yes. It’s not romantic, isn’t it? I mean, it’s not supposed to be, it’s alright. We’re happy just as we are right now. He’s caring, and kind, and considerate. We’re good friends.”
McMahon waits silently.
Yor wrings her wrist, twists it until the skin grows red under her palm. “I think I might be ruining things,” she says quietly. Mortifyingly, pinpricks of tears grow hot beneath her eyelids. “My husband, he—I mean, I—”
“Yor!” Camilla calls out from the far end of the floor, phone receiver pressed to her ear.
“Yes?”
Camilla scrunches her nose. “Are you crying? No, don’t answer that, I don’t care. Your husband’s downstairs to get you. Huh?” She waits, listening to the other end. “Are you serious? He brought flowers? Hey, Yor—”
“Um, yes. Yes, okay,” Yor says, wiping her eyes. “Director—”
“Go,” he says. “Talk to him.”
“But—”
McMahon sighs, long and hard. “Mrs. Forger,” he says, just a tinge of impatience in his voice. “A wife loving her husband is nothing strange.”
She wants to say, not this time. Or, we’re not like that. Or, you don’t understand.
Except she’s beginning to think she doesn’t understand it, either. Loid never gets her flowers. He also never picks her up from work without telling her first. He shouldn’t even know that she’s free tonight, with how busy she’s been. This surprise—because what else would she call it, really—is too much like something a normal husband would do to reconcile with his wife after an argument. Too much like one of those movies they’d watched in those date nights long ago.
It makes no sense.
But it does make her wonder.
Loid's flowers come in an explosion of colors, all wrapped up in paper and ribbon. She recalls seeing some of them at Garden, but doesn’t quite remember the names, much less the corresponding meanings of each.
It makes her feel a little unqualified to receive it.
“I got this for you,” he says, offering the bouquet to Yor.
“Thank you,” she replies, because if nothing else, she remembers her manners.
His answering smile is bright and happy; a Loid Forger smile. He offers her his elbow. “Shall we?”
“Um.” Yor bites her lip, hesitating for a moment before resting her hand on the crook of his arm. As she does so, she notices that everyone—everyone—in the lobby is staring at them. She understands. Loid is very handsome, dressed sharply in one of his suits, and he has his charm on maximum volume. Her hand tightens on his arm, just a little. “Where are we going?”
“Well,” he says slowly. “I said before that I wanted to see you use your stilettos, so if you’re not too tired I thought we could do that. Unless you don’t want to, and we can just go and have dinner somewhere nice.”
Be stuck in a restaurant with Loid, or do something that she knows she’s good at doing? It’s hardly a choice—even if she is quite tired from all the overtime she’s been pulling. “We need to go somewhere no one can hear us,” she says, because that’s the only sticking point she can think of.
Loid pulls his arm—and by extension, her—closer to him. “I know just the place.”
Loid takes her to the same warehouse compound they’d run into each other at, the one they’d burned until it was nothing but soot and steel. There’s still police tape at the gate; they scale the fence and jump off to the other side instead.
“Why here?” Yor asks, looking around the complex. The police must’ve cleaned up the bodies, but they didn’t touch the debris. Here and there are overturned vans and smashed, burnt-up crates.
“It’s out of the way. The property’s been seized by the state, but they can’t do anything with it until they finish investigating the massacre. And there’s not really anything valuable left here, so the security is non-existent.” He rubs the back of his neck, angling his face slightly away from her. “Also, I’m feeling a little nostalgic.”
“I see,” she says, her face warming up as she remembers that night. It feels as if it happened so long ago, though barely three months have passed since.
“The moon is much more beautiful tonight, though.”
She looks up to the sky. The moon peeks out from beneath a blanket of cloud, and it is really quite beautiful—but she can’t say she remembers what it was like last time. “It was warmer, too.” That, she can say for sure. It’s already autumn now.
“It was. Ah, we should start getting our winter clothes ready. Especially Anya, she’s grown a lot since last year.”
“Has it been a year?” she asks, startled. It has felt like a few months, at best, but— “No, you’re right. It’s almost the start of the new school term again.”
Loid smiles that small, secret smile he wears only around her. “It was exactly one year ago that we made our vows to each other.”
Oh.
“Happy anniversary, Yor.”
Oh, no. “I—”
“What’s wrong?”
She takes one, two steps back. “I’m—I’m sorry, Loid. I completely forgot it was our anniversary!”
Loid raises both hands placatingly. “Yor, it’s okay.”
“No, no, no. I should’ve remembered. Why didn’t I remember?” She’s noted it down on her calendar, she knows she has. Except—oh, of course—she’s been too busy avoiding him to notice the red circle around the date. “Loid, I’m so sorry. I’ll make it up to you, I promise.”
He looks like he wants to say something, but then he sighs, shaking his head. “Alright. I’ll tell you how to make it up to me.”
“Okay,” she says, nodding firmly.
“Fight me.”
“What?”
He opens his arms wide, as if asking for a hug—which is at odds with the words coming out of his mouth. “I’ve wanted to spar with you even before I found out about you, Yor. Fight me. Do you have your weapons with you?”
“Yes.” She was hoping to be sent on another assignment, after all.
He nods. “Don’t go easy on me.”
“But I—” she starts, except Loid is running towards her, fist readied to punch, and she swallows her words as she steps aside to dodge him. “Loid!”
He crouches, low, leg sweeping around in a lovely arc. Yor leaps back and away easily. “Take out your weapons,” he says, his voice low and serious.
She does, sliding them out as she shucks her coat off.
He smiles. Takes his jacket off and rolls his sleeves up his elbows. “Good.”
The compliment sends a shiver down her spine—very unhelpful, these stupid feelings for him—but she stands still, waiting for him to come at her again.
She doesn’t have to wait for long.
This time, she doesn’t try to get out of his range. She dodges tightly, weaving a path around his strikes, blocking every so often with the length of her stilettos, but keeping herself close, matching him step by step. She realizes, absurdly, that this is the closest she’s gotten to dancing with him. She could almost hear the music.
“Are you going to start attacking me soon?” he asks, his voice oddly calm even though she’s just blocked his punch hard enough that his whole arm must be ringing with the impact.
“I don’t think—Loid, stop that—I don’t think that’s such a good idea.”
“But it’s our anniversary, darling.”
“Darling?” she squeaks, stumbling.
He grins. His fist approaches her middle, fast—she doesn’t have time to dodge—his palm opens—it lands on her stomach and tips her backward, backward—
She hits the floor, the impact driving the breath out of her. Something soft cushions her head from the fall. She blinks, refocusing her eyes, and realizes that it’s Loid’s hand.
“Oh, no,” she says, quickly rolling away from him and sitting up. She takes his hand. Turns it around. The knuckles are scuffed red. “Loid, you hurt your hand.”
Chuckling, he says, “I’ve been worse.”
“That doesn’t mean you’re not hurt now,” she replies, obstinate. “We should get this cleaned, come on.”
“Yor.” He slides his hand until it is wrapped around her wrist, loose enough for her to break easily but tight enough that she can feel the roughness of his palm against her skin. “I’m okay.”
In the moonlight, his eyes are as dark as the sea. She looks away before she drowns.
“I think that’s enough excitement for today.” She stands up, tugging her hand away, wondering if he noticed the leap of her pulse. “Let’s just go home.”
“I’m sorry.”
She stops walking. “What?”
“I know you’re angry at me, you’ve been avoiding me so much it’s impossible not to notice.”
“I’m not angry with you,” she says, because why would she be? “And… you’re the one who keeps backing away when we’re around each other lately.”
“Well—I thought I was making you uncomfortable.” He pauses, clearly expecting her to respond. When she doesn’t—because he’s not exactly wrong and love isn’t really all that comfortable—he continues, “Because I almost kissed you, that day you were doing the laundry.”
Of all the things Loid has said and done today that make no sense, this one is possibly the worst. “You—what?”
He’s properly kneeling, now, hands resting on his thighs, face upturned like a plant seeking for sunlight. “Yor, I’m sorry. You’ve made it clear to me before that you don’t have romantic feelings for me, and so I tried to stop myself, but—you’re so easy to love, darling.”
No, she takes it back. This is the worst one. She almost can’t hear her own voice as she asks, no, pleads, “You love me?”
“Yes,” he says. As if it’s the easiest thing to say, to admit. As if it’s obvious and she should’ve known all along.
Maybe she should’ve. Maybe if she told Camilla or Millie or Sharon they would tell her that she was being dense, that of course he loves her, that the signs have been there all along. But there’s no way for her to really know, is there? She has never been in love before. She has never been loved before—not like this.
Because now that he’s said it, she can see it plain as day.
Loid loves her.
He loves her back.
He continues, unaware of the rapid thoughts in her mind, “Please don’t feel like you have to reciprocate. I said a while ago that you could divorce me anytime, and I will uphold that promise, but please—”
“Loid.”
“Yes?” he asks, his voice carefully neutral.
“I’ve been avoiding you…” It’s hard to say, standing up over him like this, so she lowers herself to the ground, too. “I’ve been avoiding you because I realized that day that I was in love with you.”
He looks at her for a long, long while, slack-jawed and wide-eyed. She waits, allowing herself to be looked at, meeting his eyes even though her heart feels as if it could explode anytime now and her face feels campfire-hot.
“Oh,” he finally breathes out, reaching for her. “I’ve been stupid.”
His hand tangling in her hair, he pulls her toward him, closer and closer and closer still. She feels a sigh escaping her lips as she leans in. His eyes are still that same ocean-dark tint.
She lets the tide take her.
Lying side-by-side on the ground, they watch as the clouds shift to reveal the moon, bright and full. Their hands are intertwined, their breaths ragged. Yor can still taste the faint peppermint of Loid’s mouth.
“Marry me,” he says into the night air.
“But we’re already married?”
“For real, this time. With a wedding and a cake and real rings.”
It sounds lovely. It also sounds so very normal, which they aren’t. “Can we do that?”
A pause. “I don’t know.”
“I’m happy, Loid,” she says, lifting their joined hands, kissing the first phalanx of his ring finger. “I don’t need a wedding. Though, Anya would probably love to have a cake.”
“I’ll bake one for her. Three tiers and all,” he promises. “What about the rings?”
She pictures it: a gold band around the spot she’s just kissed. “I don’t need them, but I would like them anyway.”
“Then I’ll get them. My anniversary gift for you.”
Yor thinks this is terribly unfair of him. “And what can I get you, then?”
He turns his head towards her, grinning. “I told you, didn’t I? Show me how you use your weapons.”
“You’ll probably lose,” she protests.
“I know.” He rolls over toward her, planting a kiss on her lips. “Come on and fight me anyway, darling. I’ve been missing you.”
A breeze washes over them, a whistle-like music; they dance to it well into the night.