Archive of Our Own ^beta

THE ARRANGEMENT

The betrothal announcement comes on the first day of the harvest moon.

Zoro stands at his post by the door, where he always stands, where he has stood for three years now. Close enough to intervene and far enough to pretend he isn't watching. He listens to King Zeff read the terms aloud. An alliance between the Kingdom of Baratie and the Empire of Totto Land. A marriage between Prince Sanji, third son of the disgraced House Vinsmoke and adopted heir to the Baratie throne, and Princess Charlotte Pudding, thirty-fifth daughter of Empress Linlin.

The terms are favorable. The dowry is generous. The political implications are significant enough that even Zoro, who has never cared for the machinations of court, understands what this means.

Peace. Prosperity. Protection from the Vinsmoke threat that has loomed over Baratie since the day Zeff pulled a half-drowned boy from the sea and declared him son.

It is, by any reasonable measure, a good match.

Zoro's hand tightens on the hilt of Wado Ichimonji until the leather wrapping creaks.

Sanji accepts the betrothal with the grace expected of a prince.

He bows to his father. Thanks the Totto Land ambassador, a tall thin man with a perpetual smile that doesn't reach his eyes, for the honor of the offer. Promises to be a worthy husband to the princess.

His voice doesn't waver. His hands don't shake. He is the picture of composure, of diplomatic poise, of everything a prince should be.

But Zoro has spent three years learning to read the language of Sanji's body. The tension in his shoulders, the angle of his jaw, the almost imperceptible tightness around his eyes. He knows.

Sanji is afraid.

Not of the marriage itself, perhaps. But of what it represents. Of the family he escaped being dragged back into relevance, of the politics that will now surround him like a cage, of the future being decided for him by men in rooms he will never enter.

Zoro knows this because he has stood outside those rooms. Has listened through doors he was meant to guard, not eavesdrop through. Has watched Sanji pace his chambers at night, too restless to sleep, too proud to admit his fears to anyone.

He knows Sanji in ways a knight should not know his prince.

And he says nothing, because saying something would mean acknowledging truths that neither of them can afford.

The portrait arrives a week later.

Princess Charlotte Pudding is beautiful. Even Zoro, who has never had much use for beauty, can acknowledge that. Dark hair that falls in waves past her shoulders. A sweet, heart-shaped face. Eyes that seem to hold some gentle secret.

Sanji stares at the portrait for a long time.

"She looks kind," he says finally. "Don't you think?"

It's not really a question. Or rather, it's a question that expects only one answer, and Zoro has learned by now that princes don't actually want honesty from their knights. They want reassurance. They want someone to tell them that the choices being made for them are the right ones.

"She looks like a painting," Zoro says instead. "I'll reserve judgment for the real thing."

Sanji makes a sound that might be a laugh. "Ever the romantic."

"I'm your sworn sword, not your poet. Romance isn't in my duties."

"No," Sanji agrees, still looking at the portrait. "I suppose it isn't."

There's something in his voice that Zoro can't quite parse. Something almost wistful. But before he can examine it further, Sanji straightens, schools his expression back into pleasant neutrality, and says: "I'd like to write to her. Before she arrives. It seems proper."

"As you wish, Your Highness."

The title feels wrong in Zoro's mouth, the way it always does when they're alone. Too formal. Too distant. A reminder of the gap between them that Zoro has spent three years pretending doesn't matter.

Sanji's eyes flick to him, something sharp in them. "Zoro."

"What?"

"Don't call me that when it's just us. You know I hate it."

I know, Zoro thinks. I know everything about you, and that's exactly the problem.

"Fine," he says. "Cook."

The nickname earns him a scowl, which is better than the strange, soft look Sanji had been wearing a moment ago. Easier to handle. Safer.

"I should have requested a different knight," Sanji mutters, but there's no heat in it. "One with actual manners."

"You tried. Three times. Your father kept sending me back."

"Because you're the best swordsman in the kingdom and he's paranoid."

"Because I'm the only one who can stand you for more than an hour."

Sanji's lips twitch. Almost a smile. "That too."

They stand there for a moment, in the comfortable silence that has become familiar over years of proximity. Zoro watches Sanji watch the portrait, and tries not to think about the tightness in his own chest.

She looks kind, Sanji had said.

Zoro hopes, for both their sakes, that he's right.

THE LETTERS

The correspondence begins.

Sanji writes with the careful penmanship of someone who was beaten for imperfection as a child. Letters precise, spacing exact, every flourish intentional. Zoro knows this because he has seen the scars on Sanji's hands, faded now but still visible if you know where to look. Has heard the stories, told in fragments during late nights when sleep won't come and the darkness makes confession easier.

The Vinsmokes did not believe in imperfection. They believed in engineering. In crafting children like weapons, honing them until anything soft or human had been carved away.

Sanji was the failure. The one who cried. The one who fed rats and wrote poetry and refused to stop feeling, no matter how many times they tried to beat it out of him.

Zoro has never hated anyone the way he hates the Vinsmoke family. Has never wanted to kill anyone as badly as he wants to kill the brothers who tormented a boy for the crime of being gentle.

But those are thoughts he keeps locked away, in the same place he keeps everything else he cannot afford to feel.

Princess Pudding's responses arrive like clockwork.

Her handwriting is elegant, looping. Her words are warm, curious, full of questions about Baratie and its customs, about Sanji's interests and hobbies, about the food he loves to cook. She tells him about her life in Totto Land: the festivals, the sweets, the elaborate parties her mother throws. She tells him she's nervous about the marriage too, but hopeful. She tells him she thinks they could be happy together.

Sanji reads each letter multiple times.

Zoro knows this because he stands guard while Sanji reads, and has learned to count the number of times those blue eyes track back to the beginning of a page. Three times, usually. Sometimes four. As if Sanji is memorizing the words, or searching for hidden meanings, or simply savoring the attention of someone who seems to want to know him.

It's the wanting that gets him, Zoro thinks. The novelty of being wanted.

Sanji has been unwanted for so long. By his birth family, by the nobility who whisper about his common mother and his tainted blood, by everyone except Zeff and the small circle of people who have seen past the prince to the person beneath.

And now here is this beautiful princess, writing letters full of warmth and interest, asking about his favorite dishes and his childhood memories and the books he likes to read. Treating him like someone worth knowing.

Of course Sanji is falling for it.

Of course he's letting himself hope.

Zoro watches it happen, letter by letter, week by week, and feels something in his chest that he refuses to name.

"She asked about my cooking," Sanji says one evening, apropos of nothing.

They're in his chambers. Sanji is at his desk, drafting yet another response; Zoro is by the window, pretending to watch the courtyard below when really he's watching the reflection of candlelight on Sanji's hair.

"Most people ask about my swordsmanship, or my riding, or my knowledge of politics," Sanji continues. "The things a prince should excel at. But Pudding asked about my cooking. About the dishes I learned from Father, and the recipes I've invented, and whether I'd cook for her after we're married."

"And?"

"And I said yes. Obviously." Sanji sets down his quill, turning in his chair to face Zoro properly. "She seems genuinely interested. In the real me, not just the title."

I'm interested in the real you, Zoro doesn't say. I've been interested for three years. I've watched you cook at midnight when you can't sleep, watched you sneak into the kitchens to feed the scullery children, watched you smile at stable hands and servants the same way you smile at nobles because you've never learned to see the difference.

I know you. All of you. The parts you show and the parts you hide.

What he says instead is: "That's good. For the alliance."

Something flickers in Sanji's expression. Disappointment, maybe. Or something else.

"Yes," he says, turning back to his letter. "For the alliance."

The other Straw Hats have opinions.

This is what they've taken to calling themselves: the loose collection of misfits that has gathered around Prince Sanji over the years, bound not by rank or duty but by something harder to define. Loyalty, maybe. Or friendship. Or simply the recognition that they are all, in their own ways, outsiders.

Luffy is the youngest prince of the Eastern Kingdom, sent to foster at Baratie as part of an old treaty. He's supposed to be learning diplomacy and statecraft; instead, he spends most of his time causing chaos, eating everything in sight, and declaring that Sanji is his cook and anyone who tries to take him will have to fight him first.

Nami is Sanji's spymaster, though officially she holds the title of Royal Treasurer. She has a network of informants that spans three kingdoms and a talent for extracting information that would make professional torturers weep with envy.

Robin is the court historian, keeper of the royal library, and probably the most dangerous person in the castle. She knows things. Secrets that could topple kingdoms, histories that powerful people would prefer to stay buried. She smiles like she's constantly amused by something only she can see.

Usopp is the court herald and inventor, responsible for announcements, entertainment, and an ever-growing collection of mechanical devices that occasionally explode. He's also Sanji's oldest friend, having arrived at Baratie as a refugee child the same year Sanji did.

Chopper is the royal physician, despite being barely old enough to qualify. He's a prodigy, though, trained by the legendary Doctor Kureha, and Sanji trusts him with his life.

Franky is the master builder, responsible for the castle's defenses and the fleet's construction. He's loud, emotional, and has a tendency to cry at weddings.

Brook is the court musician. He's been at Baratie longer than anyone can remember, old enough that rumors have started circulating about deals with dark powers. He plays the violin like it's a living thing, and tells jokes so terrible they circle back around to funny.

And Zoro.

Zoro is the sworn sword. The bodyguard. The shadow that follows Sanji everywhere, close enough to die for him and far enough to pretend he wouldn't.

"I don't like it," Nami says flatly.

They're gathered in Sanji's private solar, which has become their unofficial meeting place. Sanji is showing off his latest letter from Pudding; Nami is frowning at it like it's personally offended her.

"You don't like anything that threatens your monopoly on Sanji's attention," Usopp points out.

"I don't like things that smell like traps." Nami sets the letter down. "And this smells like a trap."

"She seems nice," Chopper offers hesitantly.

"She seems nice. That's the problem. Nobody is this nice without a reason."

"Some people are just kind," Sanji says, and there's an edge to his voice that warns against pushing further. "Not everyone has ulterior motives."

"In politics? Everyone has ulterior motives."

"Nami—"

"I'm just saying. Totto Land isn't known for its altruism. Big Mom doesn't make alliances out of the goodness of her heart. There's something else going on here, and we should find out what it is before you marry into it."

The silence that follows is heavy.

Sanji's jaw tightens. "She's not her mother."

"No. But she's her daughter. And in that family, that means something."

Zoro watches the exchange without speaking. He agrees with Nami, has agreed since the first letter arrived, since he saw the way the words were crafted just a little too perfectly, designed to appeal to exactly the things Sanji craves.

But saying so would mean explaining how he knows what Sanji craves. Would mean admitting how closely he's been paying attention. Would mean opening a door he's spent three years keeping firmly shut.

"I'll look into it," Nami says finally. "Discreetly. If there's nothing to find, no harm done. If there is..."

"There won't be."

"If there is," Nami repeats, "then we deal with it. Together. That's what we do."

Sanji's expression softens, just slightly. "Fine. But be careful. I don't want to insult her before she even arrives."

"Have I ever been anything but careful?"

"Do you want the list chronologically or alphabetically?"

The tension breaks into laughter, and Zoro lets himself breathe.

But he catches Nami's eye across the room, and she gives him a small nod.

I know, that nod says. I see what you see.

We'll figure this out.

THE ARRIVAL

Princess Charlotte Pudding arrives on the first day of autumn.

The entire court turns out to greet her. Banners fly from every tower, the path from the gates to the great hall is lined with flower petals, and the air smells of the feast that's been preparing for days. Sanji has been awake since before dawn, overseeing every detail, determined that everything be perfect.

Zoro has been awake since before dawn too, but only because Sanji was.

The carriage is elaborate. Totto Land colors, pink and white and gold, with the Charlotte family crest emblazoned on the door. The horses are perfectly matched, their manes braided with ribbons. The whole procession gleams like something out of a fairy tale.

The princess herself is even more beautiful than her portrait.

She emerges from the carriage like a vision. Pink gown, dark hair, that sweet face that seems to glow in the autumn light. She smiles at the crowd, waves with practiced grace, embodies everything a princess should be.

And when her eyes find Sanji, waiting at the bottom of the steps, something in her expression shifts. A warmth that seems genuine. A spark of recognition, as if she's been waiting for this moment just as much as he has.

"Prince Sanji," she says, and her voice is exactly as lovely as her letters suggested. "I've dreamed of meeting you."

Sanji takes her hand. Bows over it. When he straightens, he's smiling. Really smiling, the kind of smile Zoro has only seen a handful of times in three years.

"Princess Pudding. The dream was mine as well."

It's a courtly response. Expected. Proper.

But the look in Sanji's eyes is anything but proper.

Zoro watches from his position three steps behind and slightly to the left, the perfect distance for a sworn sword, and feels something cold settle in his chest.

He's seen Sanji flustered by beautiful women before. Has watched him swan and flirt and make a fool of himself over every lady who crosses his path. It's always been performative, though. A game. A mask to wear in court, as much a part of his armor as his fine clothes and diplomatic smile.

This is different.

This is Sanji looking at someone like she might be the answer to a question he's been asking his whole life.

She's not, Zoro wants to say. She's a political alliance dressed in silk. Whatever warmth you think you're seeing is calculated. Practiced. Designed.

But that's not his place. His place is three steps behind and slightly to the left. His place is silent vigilance and professional distance.

His place is watching the person he loves fall in love with someone else.

The feast is extravagant.

Seven courses, each more elaborate than the last. Wine from six different kingdoms. Entertainment between courses: jugglers, acrobats, Brook's haunting violin. The great hall is filled with laughter and conversation, the kind of celebration that comes when two kingdoms decide to stop circling each other like wary dogs.

Sanji and Pudding sit at the high table, heads bent together, talking in low voices that don't carry.

She laughs at something he says. Touches his arm. Looks at him through lowered lashes.

He leans closer. Refills her wine glass. Tells another story that makes her smile.

From his position by the wall, Zoro watches.

He's not supposed to be watching them specifically. He's supposed to be scanning the crowd for threats, tracking the movements of the Totto Land guards, maintaining situational awareness.

But his eyes keep drifting back.

"You're going to burn a hole through the princess if you keep glaring like that."

Robin's voice is soft, almost amused. She's appeared beside him without warning, which is her particular talent.

"I'm not glaring."

"Of course not. You're just... observing intensely."

Zoro doesn't dignify that with a response.

Robin follows his gaze to the high table, where Sanji is now presenting Pudding with some kind of dessert he made specially for her. The princess's delight seems genuine: clapping her hands, exclaiming over the artistry, insisting that Sanji try the first bite himself.

"He seems happy," Robin observes.

"Good for him."

"Is it?"

Zoro turns to look at her. Robin's expression is carefully neutral, which means she's thinking something dangerous.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing at all. Just an observation." She pauses. "Nami's reports came back. About the princess."

Something cold coils in Zoro's gut. "And?"

"Nothing concrete. Rumors, mostly. Whispers about the Charlottes that don't quite add up. But no proof of anything."

"Whispers about what?"

Robin is quiet for a moment. Then: "Have you heard of the Charlotte family's third eye?"

"No."

"It's said that certain members of the family, those with a particular bloodline, are born with an extra eye. Hidden beneath their hair. A mark of their heritage." She pauses again. "It's also said that these family members are not treated kindly. By the empress or by each other."

"What does that have to do with Pudding?"

"Perhaps nothing. Perhaps everything." Robin's gaze drifts back to the high table. "I only mention it because the princess never removes the hair that covers her forehead. Not even when sleeping, according to her handmaidens."

Zoro processes this. "You think she's hiding something."

"I think everyone is hiding something. The question is whether what she's hiding is relevant." Robin smiles, that enigmatic expression that could mean anything. "But that's a conversation for another time. For now, I simply wanted to remind you: not everything that glitters is gold."

She drifts away before Zoro can respond, disappearing into the crowd as smoothly as she appeared.

Zoro looks back at the high table.

Sanji is feeding Pudding a strawberry now, some kind of romantic gesture that makes the surrounding nobles titter with approval. The princess's cheeks are flushed. Sanji's eyes are soft.

Not everything that glitters is gold.

Zoro's hand tightens on his sword.

THE COURTSHIP

The weeks that follow are a study in torment.

Sanji courts Princess Pudding with the same intensity he brings to everything: wholly, passionately, without reservation. He arranges private dinners where he cooks her favorite dishes. Takes her riding through the autumn forests. Shows her the hidden corners of the castle, the places that are meaningful to him.

He gives her pieces of himself that Zoro has never seen him give anyone.

And Zoro stands guard through all of it.

He stands outside the door while they dine alone. Waits with the horses while they walk through the gardens. Maintains his position three steps behind and slightly to the left as Sanji leads Pudding through corridors that Zoro knows by heart, explaining histories he's heard a hundred times before.

It shouldn't hurt. These are just places. Just stories. Just moments in time that don't belong to Zoro, have never belonged to Zoro, were never his to claim.

But he's spent three years in these halls. Three years learning every shadow, every secret passage, every spot where the afternoon light falls just right. Three years being the one who stands beside Sanji in the spaces between official functions, when the masks come off and the real person emerges.

Watching Sanji share those spaces with someone else feels like watching him give away pieces of a home Zoro didn't realize he'd been building.

"You cooked for her again," Zoro says one night.

They're in Sanji's chambers. The prince is at his vanity, removing the elaborate pins that held his hair in place for the evening's formal dinner. Zoro is by the door, where he always is.

"I cook for everyone."

"You cooked specially for her. That pastry thing. The one you've been working on for months."

Sanji's hands still on his hair. "You noticed that?"

"I notice everything. It's my job."

Through the mirror, Sanji's eyes meet his. There's something in them that Zoro can't read. Surprise, maybe. Or something else.

"You pay attention to what I cook?"

I pay attention to everything about you, Zoro doesn't say. I know you stress-bake at midnight. I know you hum when you're working on a new recipe. I know that your cooking changes with your mood: sharper flavors when you're angry, sweeter ones when you're sad.

I know the pastry you gave her tonight was the first thing you ever made that your father called perfect.

"You gave her something that matters to you," Zoro says instead. "I'm just wondering why."

Sanji turns away from the mirror. His expression is complicated, part defensive, part something softer.

"Because she matters to me. Because I want her to know me, really know me, not just the version of me that shows up at state functions." He pauses. "Is that so strange?"

"No."

"Then why do you sound like it is?"

Because I've been standing three steps behind you for three years and you've never once offered to cook for me. Because I've watched you give pieces of yourself away and I've never asked for any of them, never thought I could, never imagined—

"I don't," Zoro says. "I'm just your knight. What you do with your fiancée isn't my concern."

Something flickers across Sanji's face. Hurt, maybe. Or disappointment.

"Right," he says quietly. "Of course."

The silence that follows is heavy with things unsaid.

Zoro should leave. Should return to his quarters, get what rest he can, prepare for tomorrow's endless cycle of standing guard while Sanji falls deeper and deeper into whatever this is.

"Do you ever think," Sanji says suddenly, "about what you want?"

The question catches Zoro off guard. "What?"

"What you want. For yourself. Not duty or obligation or whatever code you've built your life around. Just what would make you happy."

You, Zoro thinks, and the word rises so fast he has to clench his jaw to keep it from escaping.

"I'm a knight," he says instead. "What I want doesn't factor into it."

"That's not an answer."

"It's the only one I have."

Sanji studies him for a long moment. In the candlelight, his eyes look almost gold.

"Sometimes," he says softly, "I think you're the loneliest person I've ever met."

The words land like a blow.

Zoro doesn't know how to respond to that. Doesn't know what his face is doing, what his body language is revealing. For three years he's been so careful, so controlled, keeping everything locked away—

"I should go," he says. "Early morning tomorrow."

He reaches the door before Sanji can say anything else. Closes it behind him with more care than necessary, as if the wood itself might shatter under rough treatment.

The corridor is empty. Silent. His footsteps echo against the stone as he walks away from the light spilling under Sanji's door.

The loneliest person I've ever met.

Zoro's hand finds the hilt of his sword. Grips it until his knuckles ache.

He's been called many things in his life. Dangerous. Talented. Reckless. Devoted.

But never lonely.

Never seen.

The walk to his quarters has never felt longer.

The problem with running is that you can't run from things that follow you.

Zoro lies awake that night, staring at the ceiling of his quarters, and thinks about wanting.

He wasn't supposed to want anything. That was the point of the oath he swore, the life he chose. A knight serves. A knight protects. A knight puts the needs of his charge above everything else, including himself.

Wanting complicates things. Wanting makes you weak. Wanting gives you something to lose, and Zoro learned a long time ago, watching Kuina fall, watching his dreams shatter on the stone steps of their dojo, that loss is not something he can afford.

So he locked it away. The wanting. The needing. The part of himself that reached for things he couldn't have.

And then Sanji.

Sanji, who burns so bright it hurts to look at him. Sanji, who feels everything so deeply it's a miracle he's survived this long. Sanji, who looked at Zoro three years ago and said I don't need a babysitter and if you're going to follow me around, at least try to be interesting and somehow, impossibly, became the most important person in Zoro's world.

Zoro didn't mean to fall in love.

He's not sure he believes in love, really. It seems like something poets invented to justify poor decisions. But whatever this is, this constant awareness, this gravitational pull, this feeling like the world tilts toward Sanji no matter which way Zoro is facing—

If it's not love, it's close enough.

And it doesn't matter.

Because Sanji is a prince, and Zoro is a sword, and swords don't get to want the people they protect.

THE CRACKS

The first crack appears three weeks into the courtship.

Zoro is escorting Sanji to his morning meeting with the council when they pass a cluster of Totto Land servants in the corridor. The servants fall silent as they approach, which isn't unusual. Servants often go quiet around nobility.

But one of them, a young woman with anxious eyes, meets Zoro's gaze for just a moment.

There's fear in that look. Not the general wariness of a servant facing someone armed. Something specific. Something like warning.

Then she looks away, and the moment passes.

Zoro files it away. Adds it to the growing collection of small wrongnesses he's been accumulating since Pudding arrived.

The second crack comes a week later.

Sanji has arranged a private dinner in the tower room, his favorite space, with its view of the stars and its distance from the noise of the court. He's been cooking all day, more elaborate than usual, more focused.

Zoro takes his position outside the door.

Through the wood, he can hear fragments of conversation. Pudding's musical laugh. Sanji's voice, softer than it usually is, the tone he reserves for people he's trying to impress.

Then:

"It's so hard to be good, you know? When you're raised the way we were."

Pudding's voice. Earnest, confiding.

"I do know." Sanji's response, equally soft. "The expectations. The performances. Never being allowed to just... be."

"Exactly. My mother has thirty-nine children, and every single one of us is expected to be perfect. To serve her vision. To never question, never deviate, never—" A pause that sounds like tears being swallowed. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't burden you with this."

"You're not burdening me. I want to know you. The real you."

"The real me..." Another pause. Longer. "The real me is scared, Sanji. Scared that you'll see what I really am and hate me for it."

"That won't happen."

"How can you be sure?"

"Because I know what it's like to be judged for things you can't control. To be told you're broken, defective, wrong. And I know that none of that defines who you actually are." Sanji's voice is fierce now, passionate. "Whatever you're hiding, whatever you think is so terrible, it doesn't matter. I see you. And I—"

Zoro stops listening.

He steps away from the door, moves to the end of the corridor, puts enough distance between himself and that conversation that he can't make out words anymore.

His hands are shaking.

I see you.

Sanji doesn't see anything. He sees what she's showing him: a carefully constructed mirror of his own pain, designed to make him feel understood. Every confession, every vulnerability, every tearful admission, it's all calculated. Zoro's certain of it now, even if he can't prove it.

She's playing him.

And Sanji, desperate to be seen, desperate to be wanted, is falling for it.

"Tell him."

Nami's voice cuts through Zoro's thoughts. They're in the armory, where Zoro goes to maintain his swords when he needs to think. Nami has tracked him down, which means this isn't a casual visit.

"Tell him what?"

"What you've noticed. The servant who looked scared. The way Pudding's stories never quite match up. The fact that every single thing she says is designed to appeal to exactly what Sanji needs to hear." Nami crosses her arms. "Don't pretend you haven't been keeping track."

"Even if I have, there's no proof."

"Since when do you need proof? You have instincts. They've kept both of you alive."

"My instincts aren't admissible evidence in matters of the heart."

Nami's eyes narrow. "Matters of the heart? That's an interesting way to phrase it."

Zoro realizes his mistake. "I meant—"

"I know what you meant." Nami's expression softens, just slightly. "I also know why you haven't said anything. But Zoro, he's going to get hurt. Whether you tell him or not, whether there's proof or not, she's going to hurt him. The question is whether he finds out before the wedding or after."

"He won't believe me."

"Maybe not. But at least he'll have been warned."

Zoro is silent for a long moment.

"He's happy," he says finally. "For the first time since I've known him, he's actually happy. He thinks someone wants him for who he is, not what he can do or what title he holds. And you want me to take that away?"

"I want you to tell him the truth."

"The truth will destroy him."

"Better destroyed by truth than by lies."

She's right. Zoro knows she's right. But—

"I can't," he says. "Not yet. Not without something concrete."

Nami studies him for a long moment. Whatever she sees in his face makes her sigh.

"Fine. But if you won't tell him, at least watch her more closely. Whatever she's planning, it'll reveal itself eventually. And when it does—"

"When it does, I'll be ready."

THE REVELATION

The truth, when it comes, arrives like most truths do: accidentally, in fragments, at the worst possible moment.

It's been six weeks since Pudding's arrival. The wedding is scheduled for spring, four months away, and preparations have begun in earnest. Sanji spends most of his time in meetings about guest lists and seating arrangements and the thousand small details that apparently accompany a royal marriage.

He still cooks for Pudding every evening. Still walks with her in the gardens. Still looks at her like she's the sun and he's been living in darkness.

Zoro still stands guard.

He's gotten good at not listening. At not watching. At keeping his eyes forward and his expression neutral and his heart locked away where it can't cause trouble.

But tonight, something is different.

Pudding had asked for a meeting with the Totto Land ambassador, her cousin, apparently, a man named Mont-d'Or. Sanji had agreed readily, pleased that she was beginning to engage with the political aspects of their arrangement.

Zoro had been dismissed. Told the meeting was private, family only, nothing that required a guard.

He should have accepted it. Should have returned to his quarters, gotten some rest, taken the rare night off.

Instead, he's in the corridor outside the meeting room, in the shadow of a pillar, not close enough to be seen but close enough to hear.

It's not eavesdropping, he tells himself. It's reconnaissance.

For the first hour, the conversation is mundane. Trade agreements. Border disputes. The political situation in kingdoms Zoro has barely heard of.

Then:

"And the prince? He suspects nothing?"

Mont-d'Or's voice, sharp with something that sounds like amusement.

"Nothing." Pudding's voice, but different now. Harder. Colder. Nothing like the sweet tone she uses with Sanji. "He's pathetically eager. Shows me everything, tells me everything, hands over his weaknesses like presents. It's almost too easy."

"Mother will be pleased."

"Mother is always pleased when her plans work. The question is whether this one will work well enough to satisfy her."

A pause. The sound of wine being poured.

"The assassination is scheduled for the wedding night," Mont-d'Or continues. "You'll need to be convincing until then. Can you manage?"

"I've been managing for six weeks. A few more months won't be a challenge."

"And afterward?"

"Afterward, we have grounds for war. Baratie assassinates their own prince on his wedding night, tragic, really. Totto Land has no choice but to respond. Within a year, this entire kingdom will be ours."

Zoro's blood runs cold.

"You're sure you can do it? When the moment comes?"

Pudding laughs. It's nothing like the warm, gentle sound Sanji has come to cherish. It's cruel. Mocking.

"Please. I've spent six weeks listening to his pathetic attempts at romance, pretending to care about his cooking and his tragic childhood and his desperate need to be loved. Killing him will be a relief." Another laugh, sharper. "Do you know what the funniest part is? He actually thinks I like him. He told me last night that I'm the first person who's ever really seen him."

Mont-d'Or's matching laughter. "How touching."

"It's pathetic. He's pathetic. A broken prince playing at being whole, and he actually believed—" She cuts herself off. "It doesn't matter. In four months, he'll be dead, and I'll never have to pretend again."

"Mother will reward you handsomely."

"Mother will make me governor of the conquered territory. That's the deal."

"Of course. Of course..."

The conversation shifts back to logistics. Timing. The disposition of forces.

Zoro doesn't hear any of it.

He's already moving.

THE TELLING

He finds Sanji in the kitchen.

Of course he's in the kitchen. When Sanji is stressed or anxious or can't sleep, he cooks. It's the only coping mechanism he's ever developed that doesn't hurt him.

Tonight, he's making something elaborate. Multiple pots on the stove, something in the oven, his hands moving with the precise grace that makes Zoro's chest ache.

He looks up when Zoro enters. Smiles.

"You're supposed to be off duty."

"I know."

Something in Zoro's voice must register, because Sanji's smile fades. He sets down the knife he's holding, wipes his hands on his apron.

"What happened?"

Zoro opens his mouth to respond.

She's going to kill you.

Everything she's told you is a lie.

The woman you love is an assassin, and every moment of tenderness was just part of the performance.

The words won't come.

Because Zoro knows what this will do to Sanji. Has been watching him open up, let down his walls, allow himself to want for the first time in years. Has seen the hope in his eyes, the way he's started to believe that maybe, finally, someone could love him the way he's always longed to be loved.

Telling him the truth will break that.

Will prove every fear he's ever had about being unwantable, unlovable, fundamentally defective in some way that makes people not want to keep him.

The Vinsmokes told him he was broken. The nobles whisper that he's tainted. And now the woman who was supposed to prove them all wrong—

"Zoro?" Sanji's voice, worried now. "You're scaring me."

"I heard something," Zoro says. The words come out rough, scraped raw from his throat. "About Pudding."

Sanji goes still.

"What about her?"

"She's—" Zoro stops. Tries again. "The meeting with Mont-d'Or. I listened."

"You listened to a private meeting?"

"I had a feeling something was wrong. I was right."

"A feeling." Sanji's voice has gone flat. Defensive. "You've had 'feelings' about Pudding since she arrived. Forgive me if I don't take your instincts as gospel."

"This isn't instinct. This is fact. I heard them planning—"

"Planning what?"

Zoro meets Sanji's eyes. Holds them.

"Your assassination. On the wedding night. Followed by a war to conquer Baratie."

Silence.

Sanji's face doesn't change. Doesn't show shock or denial or any of the things Zoro expected.

"No."

"Sanji—"

"No." Harder now. "You're wrong. You misheard, or you misunderstood, or you—" He stops. Takes a breath. "You don't like her. You've never liked her. And now you're inventing reasons to—"

"I'm not inventing anything. I heard her laugh about how pathetic you are. About how killing you will be a relief."

Sanji flinches like Zoro hit him.

"I'm sorry," Zoro says. "I'm sorry, I wish I was wrong, I wish—"

"Get out."

"What?"

"I said get out." Sanji's voice is shaking now. His hands too. "I don't know why you're doing this. Jealousy, or paranoia, or some twisted sense of duty. But I won't stand here and let you destroy the first good thing that's happened to me in years."

"Sanji, I'm not—"

"Get out."

Zoro goes.

He doesn't go far.

He posts himself outside the kitchen door, back against the wall, and waits.

Through the wood, he can hear Sanji moving. Pots being slammed down. Chopping that's more violent than necessary. The sounds of someone trying to work through emotions they can't process.

Then, eventually, quiet.

Then, even more quietly, the sound of crying.

Zoro closes his eyes.

He did this. Whether he's right or wrong, and he knows he's right, knows it with the certainty of someone who has spent three years learning to read threats, he did this. Took the fragile thing Sanji was building and shattered it with a few words.

It was necessary. It might save Sanji's life.

That doesn't make it feel any less like betrayal.

THE PROOF

Sanji avoids him for three days.

This has never happened before. Zoro is his sworn sword, his constant shadow, the one person who is always supposed to be there. But now Sanji requests different guards. Takes different routes. Refuses to be in any room where Zoro might be.

The other Straw Hats notice.

"What did you do?" Nami demands, cornering him in the armory again.

"Told him the truth."

"And?"

"And he didn't believe me."

Nami's expression shifts. Understanding, and something that might be sympathy.

"We need proof," she says. "Something concrete. Something he can't explain away."

"I know."

"Robin's been digging. She might have found something."

"What?"

"I don't know yet. She wants us all to meet tonight. Sanji included, if you can convince him to come."

Zoro laughs, and it sounds hollow even to his own ears. "He won't come if I'm there."

"Then figure out a way to make him." Nami's voice is fierce. "Because if what you heard is true, we have four months to stop an assassination and a war. And we can't do that if the person being targeted won't even listen."

Convincing Sanji takes intervention from Luffy.

The young prince has a particular talent for ignoring social conventions and emotional complications in favor of what he considers obvious solutions. In this case, the obvious solution is: walk into Sanji's chambers, declare that there's a meeting and he has to come, and physically drag him if he refuses.

Sanji comes.

But he won't look at Zoro, and he sits as far from him as the solar allows, and when their eyes accidentally meet, Sanji's expression is so full of hurt that Zoro has to look away.

Robin spreads the documents across the table.

"The Charlotte family," she begins, "has thirty-nine children, all from different fathers. Each child is expected to serve the empire in whatever capacity their mother decrees. Many are married off strategically, forging alliances that benefit Totto Land."

"We know this," Sanji says. His voice is flat. "Pudding told me."

"I'm sure she did. What she may not have told you is that six of those strategic marriages have ended with the death of the spouse within a year. In each case, the death was blamed on the host kingdom, and in each case, it provided grounds for Totto Land to expand their territory."

Silence.

"That's—" Sanji starts.

"Coincidence? Perhaps. But I've also found records of a particular unit within the Charlotte forces. An assassination squad, trained from childhood. The records refer to them by code names, but the descriptions match several of the Charlotte children who have been married out." Robin pauses. "Including Princess Pudding."

"That doesn't prove—"

"There's more." Robin produces another document. "A letter, intercepted by Nami's network. It appears to be instructions from Empress Linlin to Mont-d'Or, detailing the timeline for what's referred to as 'the Baratie operation.' The wedding. The assassination. The subsequent invasion."

Sanji takes the letter with hands that aren't quite steady.

He reads it once. Twice.

His face doesn't change, but something in his eyes does.

"This could be forged," he says, but his voice has lost its conviction.

"It could be," Robin agrees. "But consider: why would any of us forge such a thing? What would we gain from destroying your happiness?"

"I don't—" Sanji stops. Swallows. "Maybe you're wrong about what it means. Maybe there's another explanation."

"Sanji," Nami says gently. "We're not your enemies. We're trying to protect you."

"From what? From being loved? From finally having something good?" His voice cracks on the last word. "You don't understand what it's like. Being told your whole life that you're broken, that no one will ever want you, and then finally, finally someone seems to—"

He can't finish.

The room is quiet.

Zoro wants to go to him. Wants to put a hand on his shoulder, offer some kind of comfort. But he knows his presence would only make things worse right now.

"We understand more than you think," Usopp says quietly. He's been silent until now, watching his oldest friend with worried eyes. "We've all been the person no one wanted, Sanji. That's why we ended up here. But that doesn't mean every person who claims to want us is telling the truth."

Sanji doesn't respond.

But he doesn't argue either.

THE CONFRONTATION

They set the trap together.

It's Nami's plan, mostly. Create a situation where Pudding thinks she's speaking privately to Mont-d'Or, but arrange for Sanji to hear. Let him judge for himself whether the woman he loves is who she claims to be.

"If we're wrong," Nami says, "then all he hears is a normal conversation. We owe him an apology, and we move on."

"And if we're right?" Chopper asks, his small voice worried.

No one has an answer for that.

The trap is set for the following evening.

Sanji claims illness, begging off from the scheduled dinner with Pudding. She expresses concern, sends flowers and well-wishes, promises to check on him later.

Instead, Mont-d'Or arrives for an "emergency meeting" with information from Totto Land.

Sanji watches from behind a hidden panel, one of the castle's many secret passages, installed by some paranoid ancestor centuries ago.

Zoro is with him.

They haven't spoken directly since that night in the kitchen, but when Sanji said he wanted someone with him for this, Zoro was the only one he asked.

"If you're wrong," Sanji whispers, "I will never forgive you for making me doubt her."

"I know."

"And if you're right—" His voice breaks. "If you're right, I don't know what I'll do."

"You'll survive," Zoro says. "You've survived everything else."

Through the panel, they watch Mont-d'Or enter the meeting room.

And then Pudding arrives.

"He's suspicious," Mont-d'Or says without preamble. "My sources say his friends have been investigating."

"Let them investigate." Pudding's voice is calm. Cold. Nothing like the warmth Sanji has come to expect. "They won't find anything they can prove."

"The wedding is still months away. If he starts to doubt—"

"He won't." A cruel smile crosses her face. "I've been very careful with him. Showing him exactly what he needs to see, telling him exactly what he needs to hear. The broken little prince so desperate for love that he'll believe anything."

Behind the panel, Sanji makes a sound. Small. Wounded.

Zoro's hand finds his in the darkness. Squeezes.

"Still," Mont-d'Or says, "perhaps we should accelerate the timeline. The sooner he's dead, the sooner we can proceed with the invasion."

"No. Mother's plan is specific. The wedding creates legitimacy. If he dies before, we're just murderers. If he dies after, we're grieving allies, forced to act by tragedy." Pudding laughs. "Besides, I'm enjoying myself. It's been years since I've had a target this pathetic."

"Pathetic?"

"You haven't heard him. 'You're the first person who's ever really understood me.' 'I never thought I could be happy until I met you.' 'When I'm with you, I finally feel like I'm enough.'" Her voice drips with mockery. "He actually believes I care about his cooking. His precious recipes that he guards like treasure. He made me his grandmother's pastry last week and cried when I said it was delicious."

"That is... very pathetic."

"The most pathetic part is that he thinks he's found love. Real love. The kind that will last forever." She shakes her head. "As if anyone could actually love something that broken."

Behind the panel, Sanji has stopped breathing.

Zoro's grip on his hand tightens.

"Well," Mont-d'Or says, "I suppose we should discuss the specifics. The poison, the timing—"

"Wait." Pudding holds up a hand. Her expression has shifted. Suspicious. "Do you hear something?"

Silence.

Then:

"There's someone behind that panel."

THE AFTERMATH

The next few minutes are chaos.

Zoro kicks open the panel, putting himself between Sanji and the threat. Mont-d'Or draws a blade. Pudding produces a pistol from somewhere.

"You," she says, staring at Sanji. Her mask is gone now, no sweetness, no warmth, just cold calculation. "You heard all of that, didn't you?"

Sanji doesn't respond.

He's staring at her like he's never seen her before. Like she's a stranger wearing the face of someone he loved.

"Sanji," Zoro says quietly. "We need to move."

"How long?" Sanji's voice is barely a whisper. "How long have you been lying?"

Pudding laughs. "From the very first letter, darling. Every word, every smile, every moment of pretended vulnerability. All of it designed to make you trust me. And you did. So easily. Like a lamb walking into the slaughter."

"I thought—" Sanji's voice cracks. "I thought you—"

"Loved you? Oh, Sanji." Her smile is razor-sharp. "Nobody could love you. You're a failure from a family of monsters and a kingdom of peasants. You were useful, nothing more."

Something shifts in Sanji's expression.

The hurt is still there, raw and devastating, but underneath it, something else is rising.

"Zoro," he says, his voice suddenly calm. "Arrest them."

"With pleasure."

The arrests are swift.

Mont-d'Or tries to fight; Zoro disarms him in three moves. Pudding attempts to flee; she's stopped by Robin's hands emerging from the walls, a talent no one outside the Straw Hats knows she possesses.

Within an hour, both Charlotte agents are in the dungeon, and word is being sent to Totto Land that the alliance is dissolved.

There will be consequences. War, possibly. Certainly diplomatic chaos.

But that's a problem for tomorrow.

Tonight, the only thing that matters is Sanji.

Zoro finds him on the battlements.

The prince is standing at the edge, looking out over the kingdom he almost died to protect. His posture is rigid, controlled, but when Zoro approaches, he can see the tear tracks on Sanji's cheeks.

He doesn't say anything. Just moves to stand beside him, close enough that their shoulders almost touch.

"You were right," Sanji says finally. "Everything you said. You were right."

"I wish I wasn't."

"I know." A pause. "I said terrible things to you. After you told me."

"You were protecting yourself. I understood."

"That doesn't make it okay."

Zoro doesn't respond.

They stand in silence for a long moment. The wind is cold, carrying the first hints of winter. Below them, the castle is quiet, the chaos of the arrests contained, the questions and recriminations postponed until morning.

"She was right, you know." Sanji's voice is barely audible. "About me being broken."

"No." The word comes out hard, absolute. Zoro turns to face him fully. "She wasn't."

"I believed every word. Every lie. I wanted so badly for it to be real that I ignored every warning sign." He laughs, and it sounds like shattered glass. "What kind of person does that?"

"A person who deserves to be loved." Zoro's voice is fierce. "A person who's been told his whole life that he's not enough, and still has enough hope left to believe that maybe, somewhere, someone—"

He stops himself.

Too close. Too revealing.

But Sanji is looking at him now, really looking, and something in his expression has shifted.

"You knew," Sanji says. "The whole time. You saw what she was doing."

"I suspected."

"But you knew. Because you—" He stops. "Because you were paying attention. To me. To what I needed, what I wanted, what made me vulnerable."

Zoro doesn't deny it.

"How long?"

"How long what?"

"How long have you been paying that much attention?"

The question hangs between them.

Zoro could deflect. Could fall back on duty, on the requirements of his position, on the excuse of professional vigilance. It's what he's been doing for three years.

But Sanji has just had his heart broken. Has just learned that everything he believed was a lie. Has just stood in a hidden passage and heard the woman he loved mock him for the crime of wanting to be loved.

He deserves honesty.

"Since the beginning," Zoro says. "Since the first day I was assigned to you."

Sanji's breath catches.

"Why didn't you—"

"Because you're a prince. And I'm a sword." Zoro's voice is steady, even though his heart is racing. "Because what I feel doesn't matter. Because my job is to protect you, not to want you, and I've spent three years trying to keep those things separate."

"And have you? Kept them separate?"

Zoro meets his eyes.

"No."

The word falls between them like a stone.

Sanji doesn't respond. Just stares at Zoro with an expression that's impossible to read. Shock, maybe, or confusion, or something else entirely.

"I'm not telling you this because I expect anything," Zoro says. "I'm telling you because you just found out that someone who claimed to love you was lying. And I don't want you to spend another second thinking that no one sees you. That no one wants you for who you are." He pauses. "I see you. I've always seen you. And whatever happens from here, whether you want me to stay or go, whether this changes things or doesn't, that won't change."

Silence.

Then, slowly, Sanji reaches out.

His hand finds Zoro's.

Holds.

"I don't know what I feel right now," Sanji says quietly. "Everything is... I can't—"

"You don't have to know. You don't have to feel anything."

"But I want to." His voice cracks on the words. "I want to feel something that isn't this. Isn't betrayal and humiliation and the certainty that I'm exactly as broken as everyone always said."

"You're not broken."

"Everyone keeps saying that."

"Because it's true." Zoro turns to face him properly, keeping hold of his hand. "You're not broken, Sanji. You're not unlovable. You're not pathetic or worthless or any of the things she said or your family said or the voices in your head keep repeating."

"How do you know?"

The question is barely a whisper.

Zoro raises his free hand. Hesitates. Then, carefully, gently, cups Sanji's face.

"Because I've spent three years watching you. Not because it's my job, but because I couldn't look away. Because everything you do, the way you cook, the way you fight, the way you care for everyone around you without ever asking for anything in return, makes me want to be better. Be more. Be worthy of standing beside you."

Sanji's eyes are bright with tears.

"Zoro—"

"You don't have to say anything. You don't have to feel anything. Just know that what she said was wrong. All of it. And if you never want to think about love again, I understand. But if someday you do, if someday you're ready to try again—"

He doesn't finish the sentence.

He doesn't have to.

Sanji leans forward, just slightly, until his forehead rests against Zoro's.

"Stay," he whispers.

"What?"

"Stay. Here. With me. Tonight."

"Sanji—"

"Not for... I just—" He takes a shaky breath. "I don't want to be alone. And you're the only person I want to not be alone with."

It's not a confession. It's not a promise. It's just a request, raw and vulnerable and painfully honest.

Zoro answers the only way he can.

"Okay," he says. "I'll stay."

They spend the night on the battlements.

Not talking, mostly. Just sitting side by side, watching the stars wheel overhead, sharing warmth in the cold winter air. At some point, Sanji falls asleep against Zoro's shoulder, exhausted finally by the weight of everything.

Zoro stays awake.

He watches the horizon. Thinks about tomorrow, and all the tomorrows after that. The political chaos that's coming. The possible war. The long, difficult process of helping Sanji heal from this latest wound.

But underneath all of that, something else.

Sanji asked him to stay.

Not as a knight. Not as a duty. Just as Zoro.

The weight against his shoulder shifts slightly. Sanji murmurs something in his sleep, too quiet to hear, and his hand finds Zoro's collar. Grips it. Holds on like he's afraid of falling, even now, even unconscious.

Zoro doesn't move.

He sits there, watching the stars turn overhead, and lets himself be held onto. Lets himself be the thing that keeps someone from falling.

It's not love. Not yet. Maybe not for a long time. Sanji needs to heal first, needs to rebuild whatever part of himself this betrayal shattered. And Zoro has spent too many years keeping his distance to close it all at once.

But the stars are bright, and the night is quiet, and somewhere in the space between them, something has shifted.

That will have to be enough.

For now.

"A knight's oath is a chain worn willingly, but some chains become the things that hold us together."

THE MORNING AFTER

The sun rises on a kingdom in chaos.

Zoro watches it from the battlements, Sanji still asleep against his shoulder, and catalogs the damage below. Servants rushing between buildings with the particular urgency of people who don't know what's happening but know it's bad. Guards in Baratie colors taking up positions at every entrance. The Totto Land delegation's quarters surrounded, sealed, awaiting a decision that hasn't been made yet.

In a few hours, King Zeff will convene the council. There will be questions. Accusations. Demands to know how an assassination plot flourished under their noses for six weeks. Someone will have to answer for that.

Several someones, probably.

Zoro doesn't care about any of it. Not the politics, not the war that's almost certainly coming, not the diplomatic nightmare that will consume the next several months. He cares about the weight against his shoulder. The slow, steady breathing of someone who cried himself to exhaustion and finally found rest.

Sanji stirs.

"Zoro?"

"Still here."

A pause. Sanji doesn't move away, but something in his body tenses. The particular stillness of someone remembering, all at once, why they fell asleep crying.

"The council meets in three hours," Zoro says. "You should eat something first."

"I'm not hungry."

"I know. Eat anyway."

Sanji makes a sound that might be a laugh, if laughs could be that hollow. "Is that an order?"

"It's a request. From someone who's watched you barely touch food for days and doesn't want to watch you collapse in front of the entire court."

Silence. Then Sanji straightens, pulling away from Zoro's shoulder with a reluctance that might be exhaustion or might be something else.

"Fine," he says. "But you're eating too. You think I haven't noticed you living on hardtack and spite?"

It's not banter. Not quite. But it's something. A step toward the rhythm they used to have, before everything shattered.

Zoro will take it.

The council meeting is brutal.

Zoro stands at his usual position by the door, watching Sanji field questions from men twice his age who seem more interested in assigning blame than solving problems. The Totto Land ambassador knew. The handmaidens knew. The entire delegation was complicit. How did no one in Baratie notice? How did the prince's own sworn sword miss an assassination plot unfolding under his nose?

That last question comes from Lord Absalom, a minor noble with major ambitions who has never liked Sanji and doesn't bother hiding it. He directs the question at Zoro, but his eyes are on the prince.

"Roronoa noticed," King Zeff says, his voice cutting through the murmur of agreement. "He's the one who uncovered the plot. If you'd read the report instead of just the summary, you'd know that."

"After six weeks," Absalom presses. "Six weeks of courtship, of private dinners, of the prince making a fool of himself over a woman who was planning to murder him."

"Careful." Zeff's voice has gone dangerously quiet. "That's my son you're speaking of."

"With respect, Your Majesty, that's precisely the problem. Your son's judgment—"

"My judgment was compromised." Sanji's voice cuts through the argument. He's been silent until now, letting the accusations wash over him, but something has shifted. He stands, and the room goes quiet. "I wanted to believe she was genuine. I ignored warnings from people I trust because I wanted something to be true more than I wanted to see clearly."

The silence that follows is absolute.

"That's on me," Sanji continues. "Not on Zoro, not on my father, not on anyone else in this room. I was targeted because I was vulnerable, and I was vulnerable because I wanted to be loved." He pauses. "If that makes me a fool, then I'm a fool. But I'm a fool who's still alive, because the people around me didn't give up on me even when I gave them every reason to."

Lord Absalom opens his mouth to respond.

"This discussion is over." Zeff rises from his throne. "We have more pressing matters than relitigating my son's romantic failures. Totto Land will demand answers. We need to decide what those answers will be."

The council shifts, grudgingly, to the business at hand. But Zoro catches Sanji's eye across the room, and something passes between them. Not the fragile intimacy of the battlements. Something harder. The acknowledgment of two people who have seen each other at their worst and haven't looked away.

THE PRISONER

Pudding is being held in the east tower.

Zoro knows this because he's been tracking the guard rotations, noting which corridors lead where, mapping escape routes and vulnerabilities out of habit. He also knows it because Sanji asked, casually, over breakfast, as if it didn't matter.

It matters.

"You're not seriously thinking of going to see her," Nami says. They're in the solar, the Straw Hats gathered for their own private council, separate from the official one that ended hours ago.

"I need to understand." Sanji is by the window, looking out at nothing. "Why me. Why any of it."

"Because you were convenient," Nami says flatly. "Because you were the heir to a kingdom her mother wanted to absorb. Because—"

"Because I was easy." Sanji's voice is quiet. "I know. But there were moments. Things she said that didn't fit the script." He turns to face them. "I'm not saying she wasn't lying. I'm saying I don't think she was lying about everything."

"Does it matter?" Usopp asks. "She was going to kill you."

"It matters to me."

The room is quiet.

"I'll go with you," Zoro says.

Sanji looks at him. "You don't have to."

"I know."

Something passes between them. The same thing that's been passing between them since the battlements, unspoken and unexamined. Sanji nods, just once.

"Tonight, then. After the guard change."

The east tower is cold.

Stone walls, narrow windows, the kind of accommodations reserved for prisoners too valuable to kill and too dangerous to trust. Pudding's cell is at the top, accessible only by a winding staircase that leaves visitors winded and vulnerable. Good for security. Bad for comfort.

The guards let them pass without question. Prince's orders. The prince's sworn sword. Whatever happens in that cell, it's not their concern.

Pudding is sitting by the window when they enter.

She looks different without the performance. Smaller, somehow. The elaborate gowns have been replaced with simple prison garb. The artful curls have been pulled back, revealing what she's spent her whole life hiding.

The third eye.

It sits in the center of her forehead, lidded now but unmistakable. Zoro had heard Robin's theory, but seeing it is different. Understanding why she kept it hidden, why she constructed such elaborate walls around it.

"So," Pudding says without turning around. "You came."

"I have questions." Sanji's voice is steady. Whatever he's feeling, he's not letting it show.

"I'm sure you do." Now she turns. Her expression is strange. Not the cold calculation from the meeting room, not the false warmth from the courtship. Something rawer. "Ask them, then. I have nothing left to lose."

Sanji moves further into the cell. Zoro stays by the door, watching. Ready.

"Was any of it real?"

The question hangs in the air.

Pudding laughs. It's a hollow sound. "Does it matter? You know what I was planning. You know what I am."

"I'm asking anyway."

For a long moment, she doesn't respond. Then, slowly, something in her expression shifts.

"The letters," she says quietly. "Those were strategy. Every word calculated, every question designed to make you trust me. Mother trained me well." She pauses. "But the conversations. The ones where you talked about your family, about what it was like to grow up knowing you were the failure. To be told you were broken, defective, wrong."

Her hand moves, unconsciously, to her forehead. To the eye.

"I wasn't acting during those," she says. "I couldn't have been. I didn't know what my real feelings looked like anymore."

Sanji is silent.

"My mother has thirty-nine children," Pudding continues. "Do you know how many of us she actually loves? None. We're tools. Weapons. Pieces on a board she's been arranging since before we were born." Her voice cracks. "I've been called a monster since I could understand words. This eye, this mark, it makes me useful for assassination but worthless for everything else. Mother likes to remind me of that. My siblings like to remind me of that. Everyone likes to remind me of that."

"So when you told me you understood what it was like to be judged—"

"I wasn't lying." Her eyes meet his. "I was manipulating you, yes. Using your pain to make you trust me. But the pain I was using was real. It's always been real."

The silence that follows is heavy.

"That doesn't excuse what you were going to do," Sanji says finally.

"No. It doesn't." Pudding's voice is steady now. Resigned. "I was going to kill you. I was going to let my mother's army burn your kingdom to the ground. I was going to stand on the ashes and feel nothing, because feeling things is dangerous and I learned a long time ago to stop."

"Then why are you telling me this?"

"Because you asked." A pause. "And because I'm tired. Tired of performing, tired of calculating, tired of being the weapon everyone expects me to be." She laughs again, that hollow sound. "You're the first person who's ever looked at me and seen something other than a tool. Even if it was only because I made you see it."

Sanji is quiet for a long moment.

Then he does something that surprises even Zoro.

He sits down.

Not close to her. Not within reach. But in the cell, on the floor, like they're equals instead of prisoner and prince.

"When I was seven," Sanji says, "my brothers locked me in a cell. For months. They told me I was defective, that I would never be good enough, that I should just die and make everyone's lives easier."

Pudding doesn't respond.

"I used to pray that someone would come and save me. Anyone. I would have done anything, trusted anyone, believed anything they told me if it meant getting out of that darkness." He pauses. "When I finally escaped, I swore I would never be that desperate again. Never let myself need someone so badly that I couldn't see them clearly."

"And then I came along."

"And then you came along." Sanji's voice is quiet. "You showed me exactly what I wanted to see. A kindred spirit. Someone who understood. Someone who wanted me for who I was, not what I could do."

"I'm sorry."

The words hang in the air. They seem too small for what they're meant to carry.

"I know you are." Sanji stands. "I believe you. I even understand why you did it, in a way. Survival looks different when you're fighting just to exist."

"But?"

"But I can't trust you. Not now. Maybe not ever." He moves toward the door, then stops. "I forgive you, Pudding. For whatever that's worth. Not because you deserve it, but because carrying hatred is heavier than carrying grief, and I'm tired too."

He's at the door now, beside Zoro. But he turns back one last time.

"For what it's worth," he says, "your eye isn't monstrous. It's just an eye. The people who told you otherwise were the monsters."

Then he's gone, and Zoro follows, and they leave Pudding alone in her tower with nothing but the sound of her own breathing.

THE HEALING

The days blur together.

War preparations consume the kingdom. Messengers fly between Baratie and its allies, carrying warnings, requests for aid, assurances of loyalty. The Totto Land delegation is expelled, escorted to the border under heavy guard. Pudding remains in the tower, awaiting a trial that keeps getting postponed because no one can agree on what charges to bring.

Through all of it, Sanji performs his duties. Attends council meetings. Reviews troop movements. Plays the role of prince with the same meticulous precision he brings to everything.

But Zoro sees what's underneath.

The way Sanji's hands shake when he thinks no one is watching. The dark circles under his eyes that speak of sleepless nights. The careful distance he maintains from everyone, including the crew, including Zoro. As if letting anyone too close might shatter whatever fragile shell he's constructed around himself.

This is what Zoro learns about grief in the weeks that follow: it doesn't move in straight lines. It spirals. Doubles back on itself. Lets you think you've reached solid ground only to pull the floor out from under you when you least expect it.

Sanji has good days. Days when he almost seems like himself, when he laughs at Luffy's antics or argues with Nami about the treasury or cooks elaborate meals and insists everyone eat together. Days when Zoro can almost believe they're moving forward.

And then there are the other days.

It happens two weeks after the arrest.

Zoro is on his way to his quarters after the midnight guard rotation when he hears it. The sound of breaking glass, coming from the kitchens. He changes direction without thinking, hand on his sword, moving through shadows until he reaches the door.

Sanji is alone.

He's surrounded by the remnants of what looks like an elaborate dessert. Cream and fruit and shattered porcelain, scattered across the floor like the aftermath of an explosion. He's on his knees in the middle of it, hands bleeding from where he must have grabbed the broken pieces, staring at nothing.

"Sanji."

The prince doesn't respond.

Zoro crosses the kitchen, careful to avoid the worst of the debris. Crouches down until they're at eye level.

"Hey. Look at me."

Slowly, Sanji's eyes focus. There's something wild in them. Desperate.

"It was her recipe," he says. His voice is hoarse. "The one she said she loved. I thought if I could make it without thinking of her, it would mean something. That I could take it back somehow. Prove she didn't ruin everything she touched."

"And?"

"And I got halfway through and realized I was still making it for her. Even now. Even after everything." He laughs, and it sounds like something breaking. "How pathetic is that? She was going to kill me, and I'm still trying to impress her."

Zoro doesn't offer platitudes. Doesn't tell him it's okay, or that time heals all wounds, or any of the comfortable lies people tell each other in moments like this.

Instead, he reaches out and takes Sanji's bleeding hands in his own.

"Come on," he says. "Let's clean these up."

"It doesn't matter."

"Maybe not to you. Matters to me."

Sanji looks at him then. Really looks, in a way he's been avoiding for weeks. Whatever he sees makes his expression crumble, the careful walls collapsing all at once.

"Why are you still here?"

The question isn't rhetorical. It's raw, almost accusatory. As if Zoro's continued presence is an accusation in itself.

"Where else would I be?"

"Anywhere. Somewhere with a prince who isn't falling apart in a kitchen at midnight." Sanji's voice cracks. "I keep waiting for you to realize I'm not worth it. That whatever you thought you saw in me was just another performance, and underneath there's nothing but—"

"Stop."

The word comes out sharper than Zoro intended. Sanji flinches.

Zoro takes a breath. Softens his voice.

"You keep saying that word. Broken. Like it's a verdict. Like once something's broken, it stays broken forever." He pauses, choosing his next words carefully. "You know what I do when a sword gets damaged?"

Sanji doesn't respond.

"I don't throw it away. I take it to a smith. They heat it up, hammer it out, fold it back together. The sword that comes out isn't the same as the one that went in. But it's still a sword. Sometimes it's even stronger."

"I'm not a sword."

"No. You're not." Zoro's grip on his hands tightens, just slightly. "You're harder to fix than a sword. More complicated. But that doesn't mean it can't be done."

Silence stretches between them.

"I don't know how to let you help me," Sanji admits. His voice is barely above a whisper. "I've never known how to let anyone help me. It always felt like weakness. Like admitting I couldn't handle things on my own."

"Can you? Handle things on your own?"

"No." The word comes out like a confession. "No, I don't think I can. Not anymore."

Zoro doesn't offer reassurance. Doesn't make promises. He just shifts his grip on Sanji's hands, holds them steady the way you'd hold something precious that might shatter.

"Good," he says. "Because I'm not going anywhere."

Sanji's eyes are wet. He blinks rapidly, as if he can will the tears away through sheer force of stubbornness.

"You'll get tired of it eventually. Of me."

"Probably," Zoro agrees. "And you'll get tired of my snoring and my drinking and the way I pick fights with anyone who looks at me sideways. That's how it works. You get tired of each other, and you stay anyway."

A sound escapes Sanji. Half sob, half laugh.

"That's the worst romantic speech I've ever heard."

"Good thing I'm not a poet."

They stay like that for a long moment, kneeling in the wreckage of a dessert that was never going to fix anything. Then Sanji leans forward, not to kiss, not to embrace, but simply to rest his head against Zoro's shoulder. The way a drowning man might rest against a piece of driftwood. Not salvation, but survival.

Zoro lets him stay there.

And when Sanji's breathing finally evens out, when the tension drains from his body and exhaustion takes over, Zoro carries him to his chambers. Settles him on the bed. Pulls a blanket over shoulders that are too thin, have been too thin for weeks.

He doesn't leave.

He takes the chair by the window, sword across his knees, and watches the shadows move across the floor as the night deepens. Somewhere in the castle, servants are cleaning up the chaos Sanji left behind. Broken porcelain, ruined cream, the scattered remnants of a recipe that was never really about food at all.

In the morning, there will be questions. Concerns. The careful looks that people give when they're trying to decide if someone is falling apart.

But that's tomorrow.

Tonight, there's only this, the sound of breathing, slow and even. The weight of a sword in his hands. The knowledge that whatever comes next, Sanji won't face it alone.

THE WAITING

"You're being very patient with him."

Robin's voice catches Zoro off guard. He's in the library, pretending to read a book on military tactics while actually watching Sanji through the window, where he's walking through the gardens with Chopper.

"He needs time."

"He does." Robin sets down her own book. "But what about what you need?"

Zoro doesn't look at her. "What I need doesn't matter."

"Doesn't it?" There's something knowing in her tone. "You told him how you felt. You laid yourself bare on those battlements, offered him everything. And now you're waiting, indefinitely, for him to be ready to accept it."

"That's the job."

"Is it?" Robin tilts her head. "You're his sworn sword, Zoro. Not his nursemaid. Not his therapist. Not his... whatever this is becoming." She pauses. "I'm not saying you should stop. I'm saying you should be honest with yourself about why you're doing it."

"I know why I'm doing it."

"Then say it."

Zoro is silent for a long moment.

"Because I love him," he says finally. The words feel strange in his mouth. He's thought them a thousand times, but speaking them aloud is different. Makes them real in a way they weren't before. "Because I've loved him for three years, and I'll probably love him for the rest of my life, and the only thing worse than loving someone who can't love you back is walking away before you know for sure."

Robin's expression softens.

"And if he can't? Love you back?"

"Then I'll figure that out when it happens." Zoro's voice is steady. "But I'm not leaving. Not because I'm waiting for him to change his mind. Because this is where I choose to be."

"That's very selfless of you."

"It's not selfless at all." He finally turns to look at her. "It's the most selfish thing I've ever done. I'm staying because leaving would hurt more than staying. I'm staying because a world where I walk away from him isn't a world I want to live in." He pauses. "If that makes me a fool, then I'm a fool. I've been called worse."

Robin studies him for a long moment. Whatever she sees seems to satisfy her, because she picks up her book again.

"He's lucky to have you," she says. "I hope he realizes that before too long."

"He doesn't have to realize anything. He just has to be okay."

"And if he's never okay?"

Zoro looks back out the window. Sanji is laughing at something Chopper said, a real laugh, the kind that crinkles the corners of his eyes. It's the first genuine laugh Zoro has seen from him in weeks.

"He will be," he says. "Eventually. He's too stubborn not to be."

The first sign of change comes on a Tuesday.

Zoro is in the armory, running through his kata, when Sanji appears in the doorway. This isn't unusual. Sanji often seeks him out during the day, sometimes to talk, sometimes just to exist in the same space. What's unusual is what he's carrying.

A plate. With food on it.

"You missed lunch," Sanji says. "Again."

"Wasn't hungry."

"Liar." Sanji crosses the room, sets the plate on a bench. "You're always hungry after training. You just forget to eat because you're too busy brooding, and then you get irritable, and then you pick fights with the guards for entertainment."

"They deserve it."

"They're doing their jobs." But there's no real heat in Sanji's voice. He's almost smiling. "Eat."

Zoro looks at the plate. It's simple fare. Bread, cheese, some kind of preserved meat. But there's also a small pastry, golden and flaky, tucked into the corner.

He recognizes it.

"Is that—"

"I made it this morning." Sanji's voice is careful. Controlled, but not cold. "First time since everything happened. I wasn't sure I could do it without—" He stops. Starts again. "I wanted to see if I could make it mine again. Instead of hers."

"And?"

"And it's still her recipe. Probably always will be." A pause. "But I didn't make it for her. I made it for you. So maybe that changes something."

Zoro picks up the pastry. Takes a bite.

It's good. Buttery and light, with a hint of something sweet underneath. The same recipe Pudding claimed to love, but different somehow. Less elaborate. More honest.

"Well?" Sanji is watching him with an intensity that seems out of proportion to a pastry.

"It's good."

"Just good?"

"What do you want me to say? It's a pastry. It tastes like pastry."

Sanji laughs. It's small and surprised, like he didn't know he was going to make the sound until it happened.

"You're impossible."

"So I've been told."

They stand there for a moment, something shifting in the air between them. Lighter than it's been in weeks. Sanji doesn't leave immediately. Lingers in the doorway, watching Zoro eat.

"Thank you," he says eventually. "For being patient with me."

"Haven't done anything worth thanking."

"You stayed. When anyone else would have walked away, you stayed." Sanji's voice is quiet. "That's not nothing, Zoro. That's everything."

He's gone before Zoro can respond.

The armory feels different after he leaves. Warmer, somehow, despite the stone walls and the autumn chill creeping through the windows. Zoro looks down at the plate Sanji brought him. The bread, the cheese, the meat.

The pastry, half-eaten now, flaky crumbs scattered across his training clothes.

He picks up the rest of it. Takes another bite. Lets the taste sit on his tongue: butter and sweetness and something else, something that tastes like a choice being made.

Outside, the leaves are starting to turn. Soon it will be winter, and then spring, and then whatever comes after. Wars to fight, wounds to heal, a kingdom to rebuild.

But right now, in this moment, there's just this: the taste of something Sanji made for him. Not for duty. Not for performance.

For him.

Zoro finishes the pastry, licks the crumbs from his fingers, and gets back to his training.

THE CONFESSION

It happens a month after the arrest.

Spring has come to Baratie, tentative but unmistakable. The snow is melting, the gardens are starting to bloom, and the threat of war has receded into a tense diplomatic standoff that may or may not erupt when summer arrives. The kingdom holds its breath, waiting.

Zoro finds Sanji on the battlements.

This has become their place, somehow. The spot where everything changed. Sanji comes here when he can't sleep, and Zoro has learned to find him there, to sit beside him in silence until the sun comes up.

Tonight is different.

Tonight, Sanji speaks.

"Do you remember what you said to me? That first night?"

Zoro doesn't need to ask which night. "I remember."

"You said you saw me. The real me. Not the performance." Sanji's voice is quiet, contemplative. "I didn't believe you. I thought it was just... something people say. Words that sound nice but don't mean anything."

"And now?"

"Now I've had a month to watch you prove it." Sanji turns to look at him. In the moonlight, his eyes look almost silver. "You've seen me at my worst, Zoro. Kneeling in broken porcelain with blood on my hands. Crying over a woman who wanted to kill me. Falling apart in ways I didn't know I could fall apart. And you didn't leave."

"I told you I wouldn't."

"You did. But saying and doing are different things." A pause. "You did. That matters."

Zoro's heart is pounding, but he keeps his voice steady. "What are you trying to say?"

"I'm trying to say—" Sanji takes a breath. "I've been thinking. About what you offered, that first night. About what it would mean to accept it."

"You don't have to—"

"Let me finish." Sanji's voice is firm. "I need to say this, and if I stop now, I might not be able to start again."

Zoro falls silent.

"I've spent my whole life believing I was unlovable," Sanji says. "Not because anyone told me, but because of what they didn't say. What they didn't do. My father never held me. My brothers only touched me to hurt me. Every relationship I've ever had has been transactional."

He pauses.

"When Pudding came along, she told me exactly what I wanted to hear. That I was special. That I was wanted. That someone could see me and choose me anyway. And I believed her, because I needed to believe her. Because the alternative was accepting that maybe I really was as unlovable as I always feared."

"Sanji—"

"I'm not done." Sanji reaches out. Takes Zoro's hand. The gesture is tentative, almost shy, so different from the confident prince who used to flirt with every woman in sight.

"The thing is, everything she pretended to offer, you've actually given me. Not with words. With actions. You've seen me at my worst and stayed. You've been patient when I couldn't be patient with myself. You've never once made me feel like I owed you something for your kindness."

"You don't owe me anything."

"I know." Sanji's grip tightens. "That's what I'm trying to tell you. I know. And that knowing has changed something in me."

Zoro's breath catches.

"I'm not promising I'll be good at this," Sanji continues. "I'll probably panic. Push you away. Say things I don't mean because I'm scared of things I do mean. It's going to be messy and complicated and probably exhausting."

"I can handle messy."

"I'm counting on it." Sanji's mouth curves, just slightly. Not quite a smile, but the ghost of one. "Is this the part where you kiss me, or do I have to do everything myself?"

Zoro answers by closing the distance between them.

The kiss is different from what he imagined. Softer. More uncertain. Two people learning the shape of each other for the first time, finding the places where they fit together. Sanji's hand comes up to grip his collar, pulling him closer, and Zoro lets himself be pulled.

When they break apart, they're both breathing hard.

"That was—" Sanji starts.

"Yeah."

"We should probably—"

"Yeah."

Neither of them moves.

"I'm still scared," Sanji admits. "This doesn't fix anything. I'm still all the things I was before."

"I know."

"You're not supposed to agree with me."

"You want me to lie?"

Sanji laughs. It's wet and shaky, but real. The realest thing Zoro has heard from him in days.

"No," he says. "No, I don't want you to lie. I've had enough lies to last a lifetime."

"Then here's the truth." Zoro cups Sanji's face in his hands. "You're a disaster. Dramatic, stubborn, infuriating. You pick fights you don't need to pick and you care too much about things that don't matter and you make the worst decisions when you're emotional."

"This is a terrible confession."

"I'm not done." Zoro's voice softens. "You're also the bravest person I've ever met. The kindest. The most loyal. You'd give your life for the people you love without hesitation, and you'd give your heart to anyone who asked for it, even when you knew they'd break it."

"And you? Are you going to break it?"

"I can't promise I won't. I'm not perfect either." He pauses. "But I can promise I'll try not to. Every day. For as long as you'll let me."

Sanji's eyes are bright.

"That's still a terrible confession," he says. "You're supposed to say I'm beautiful and perfect and you can't live without me."

"You have a mirror. You know you're beautiful. And perfect is boring."

"And the can't live without me part?"

Zoro considers this.

"I could live without you," he says finally. "I'd survive. I'd keep breathing, keep fighting, keep doing what I do. But it would be a smaller life. Dimmer." He pauses. "I don't want to live like that. Not when the alternative is standing here with you."

Sanji kisses him again. Harder this time. More certain.

"That," he says against Zoro's lips, "was better."

"I'm learning."

"You'd better be. I have standards."

They stay on the battlements until dawn, learning the shape of this new thing between them. It's not a happy ending. There's still a war coming, still a kingdom to protect, still wounds that will take years to fully heal. Pudding is still in her tower. The Vinsmokes are still out there.

But here, now, in this moment, none of that matters.

What matters is this: two people who found each other in the wreckage. Who chose to stay. Who are learning, slowly and imperfectly, to build something new.

The future is uncertain. The past is full of wounds that haven't finished healing.

But Sanji's hand is warm in his, and the stars are bright overhead, and somewhere below them a kingdom is holding its breath, waiting to see what comes next.

Let it wait.

They have time.

"Forgiveness is not a door you open once. It is a choice you make every morning upon waking."

THE BEFORE

Later, Zoro will try to pinpoint the exact moment everything changed.

Not the kiss on the battlements. That was an ending, not a beginning, the culmination of years of wanting finally permitted to breathe. Not the first night Sanji fell asleep in his arms, trusting enough to let down his guard, vulnerable in ways that made Zoro's chest ache with something too large to name.

No. The moment that changed everything came three weeks later, on an unremarkable Tuesday afternoon, when a messenger arrived with news from the border.

But that comes later.

First, there is this: a month of learning what it means to want something and have it. A month of navigating the strange territory between knight and lover, between duty and desire. A month that Zoro will replay in his mind during the dark nights to come, searching for signs he should have seen, warnings he should have heeded.

He finds none. That's the cruelest part. The happiness was real, untainted by foreshadowing. They were simply two people discovering each other, and then they weren't.

The thing about loving someone, Zoro discovers, is that it doesn't actually change very much.

He still stands guard. Still follows Sanji through the endless parade of council meetings and diplomatic functions and all the tedious machinery of running a kingdom. Still watches, still waits, still maintains the professional distance expected of a sworn sword.

The difference is in the small things.

The way Sanji's hand brushes his when they pass in corridors. The private smile, quick and conspiratorial, that flickers across his face when their eyes meet across a crowded room. The nights when duty ends and something else begins, when the door closes and they're just two people instead of prince and knight.

"You're holding back," Sanji says one morning. They're in the training yard, wooden practice swords crossed between them. Dawn is just breaking, the sky streaked with pink and gold, and they have perhaps an hour before the rest of the castle wakes.

"I'm always holding back. You'd be dead otherwise."

"Liar." Sanji disengages, circles. His footwork has improved since they started these sessions—less formal, more instinctive. "You're distracted. Thinking about something else."

You, Zoro doesn't say. I'm thinking about the way you looked last night, half-asleep and trusting. About the sound you make when I kiss your neck. About how terrifying it is to have something I actually want to keep.

"Maybe I'm just tired."

"You're never tired." Sanji lunges; Zoro parries. "You're the most annoyingly alert person I've ever met. You once woke up because a mouse sneezed three rooms away."

"That mouse was suspicious."

Sanji laughs. It's still a sound that catches Zoro off guard, even now, even after weeks of hearing it more freely than he ever has before. There's a lightness to Sanji lately that Zoro doesn't quite trust. Not because it's false, but because he knows how fragile it is. How easily it could shatter.

They trade blows in comfortable silence for a while. The rhythm of it is familiar now—attack, defend, retreat, advance. A conversation without words.

"I keep waiting," Sanji says eventually, "for you to change your mind."

Zoro's sword stills. "About what?"

"This. Us." Sanji lowers his own blade, meets Zoro's eyes. In the early light, he looks younger somehow. More vulnerable. "I keep thinking you'll realize I'm not worth the trouble. That you'll wake up one morning and wonder what you were thinking."

"I've had three years to figure out what I was thinking."

"That's not—"

"And every morning I wake up thinking the same thing." Zoro closes the distance between them. Reaches out, tilts Sanji's chin up with one calloused finger. "You're an idiot. Dramatic, stubborn, impossible. And I'm exactly where I want to be."

Sanji's breath catches. For a moment, he looks like he might argue. Might deflect, the way he always does when someone says something too honest.

Instead, he leans forward. Presses his forehead to Zoro's.

"You're the idiot," he says quietly. "But I'm glad you're my idiot."

The training yard is empty. The castle is quiet. And for a few stolen minutes, they're just two people standing in the dawn light, learning what it means to belong to someone.

It won't last. Nothing this good ever does.

But for now, it's enough.

THE MESSENGER

The messenger arrives on a Tuesday.

Zoro remembers this because Tuesdays are sparring days, the one morning each week when Sanji joins him in the training yard instead of drowning in paperwork. It's become a ritual of sorts. A way for them to exist together outside the constraints of their roles, to communicate in the language of movement and combat that comes more naturally to both of them than words.

They're mid-bout when the horn sounds.

Three short blasts, then one long. The signal for urgent news from the border. Sanji's sword falters, his attention snapping toward the castle gates, and Zoro takes advantage of the opening to disarm him with a move that would be embarrassing if either of them were paying attention.

"Sorry," Sanji says automatically, reaching for the blade Zoro holds out to him.

"Don't apologize. Go."

They move together toward the great hall, the easy rhythm of the training yard giving way to something more formal. By the time they arrive, King Zeff is already on the throne, his expression carved from stone.

The messenger kneels at the foot of the dais. He's young, barely more than a boy, and there's something in his eyes that makes Zoro's hand drift toward his sword.

"Report," Zeff commands.

"Your Majesty." The boy's voice shakes. "Totto Land has crossed the border. Three legions, moving fast. They'll reach the outer villages by nightfall."

The silence that follows is absolute.

Zoro watches Sanji's face. Watches the color drain from it, watches the careful composure crack and reform into something harder. The prince who emerged from Pudding's betrayal, the one who learned to smile again, retreats behind walls that took weeks to lower.

"How many casualties?" Zeff's voice betrays nothing.

"Unknown, Majesty. But the villages in their path..." The messenger swallows. "They're not taking prisoners."

The war council convenes within the hour.

Zoro stands at his post by the door, listening to generals argue about troop movements and supply lines and all the logistics of violence. Sanji sits at his father's right hand, silent, his face a mask that Zoro has learned to read.

He's thinking about the villages. About the people who will die because his almost-wife decided to murder him and failed. About the weight of responsibility that settles on the shoulders of princes, whether they want it or not.

"We need intelligence," Nami says. She's at the far end of the table, maps spread before her, her network of informants already mobilizing. "Big Mom doesn't move this fast without a reason. Something's changed."

"What could have changed?" Lord Absalom demands. "We exposed their plot. They're retaliating."

"Three legions is more than retaliation. That's a full invasion force." Robin's voice is calm, measured. "This was already in motion before the arrest. We simply accelerated their timeline."

"Then we need to know what their original plan was." Nami taps the map. "And there's only one person who might be able to tell us."

The room goes quiet.

Everyone knows who she means.

"No."

Sanji's voice is flat. Final. They're in his chambers, the war council adjourned, and Zoro can see the tension radiating off him in waves.

"She knows things," Nami presses. "Things that could save lives."

"She was going to kill me. She was going to help her mother burn this kingdom to the ground. And now you want me to what? Ask her nicely for help?"

"I want you to use every resource available. Including the one locked in our east tower." Nami's expression is hard. "I know it's not fair. I know it's asking too much. But people are dying, Sanji. Right now, as we speak, people are dying because we didn't see this coming. She might be the only one who can help us see what's coming next."

Sanji is silent for a long moment.

Zoro watches him struggle. Watches the war play out across his features: pride against pragmatism, hurt against necessity, the desire to protect his wounded heart against the duty to protect his people.

"I'll go," Zoro says.

Both of them turn to look at him.

"I'll talk to her. You don't have to see her. You don't have to be anywhere near her." He holds Sanji's gaze. "Let me do this."

"You can't—" Sanji stops. Starts again. "She won't talk to you. She has no reason to help us."

"Then I'll find a reason." Zoro's voice is steady. "But you're not going back to that tower. Not unless you want to."

Something shifts in Sanji's expression. The hard edges soften, just slightly.

"You can't protect me from everything."

"No. But I can protect you from this."

The silence stretches between them. Nami, wisely, says nothing.

Finally, Sanji nods.

"Fine," he says. "Talk to her. But Zoro—" He hesitates. "Be careful. She's more dangerous than she looks."

"I know." Zoro moves toward the door, then pauses. Looks back. "And for the record? I'm not protecting you because I think you're weak. I'm protecting you because you've already survived her once. You shouldn't have to do it again."

Sanji's expression shifts. Something complicated moving behind his eyes, too quick to read.

Zoro doesn't wait for a response. Some things don't need words.

The corridor is cold as he makes his way toward the east tower, but he barely notices. His mind is already turning over strategies, approaches, the particular kind of leverage you need when dealing with someone who has nothing left to lose.

Pudding tried to kill the man Zoro loves.

Now she's going to help save him.

Whether she wants to or not.

THE PRISONER AGAIN

The east tower hasn't changed.

Same cold stone, same narrow windows, same winding staircase that seems designed to exhaust visitors before they reach the top. Zoro climbs without hurrying, giving himself time to think about what he's going to say.

He doesn't have a plan. Plans aren't really his strength. But he knows people, knows how to read them, knows that Pudding's cruelty toward Sanji was at least partially performance. There was something underneath it, something that cracked when Sanji told her that her eye wasn't monstrous.

That's what he's counting on.

The guards let him pass without question. Prince's sworn sword, here on prince's business. They don't need to know that the prince himself is miles away from this tower, that Zoro is operating on instinct and desperation and the faint hope that something in Pudding's broken heart is still capable of choice.

She's by the window when he enters. Same position as before, same prison garb, same defeated slump to her shoulders. But when she turns to face him, there's something different in her expression.

Surprise. And beneath it, something that looks almost like curiosity.

"The knight," she says. "Not the prince."

"The prince has a kingdom to defend. He sent me instead."

"Did he?" Her laugh is bitter. "Or did you volunteer, to spare him the indignity of asking his would-be murderer for help?"

Zoro doesn't deny it. There's no point.

"We need information," he says. "About your mother's plans. About the invasion."

"And you think I'll just give it to you? Out of the goodness of my heart?"

"No. I think you'll give it to us because you're tired of being a weapon."

Pudding goes still.

"He told you," she says. "What I said. About being tired."

"He tells me everything." It's not quite true, but it's close enough. "And I've been watching you, these past weeks. The guards report that you barely eat, barely sleep. You spend hours staring out that window, not at the road, but at the sky. Like you're looking for something you've lost."

"How poetic. Did you rehearse that?"

"I don't rehearse." Zoro moves further into the cell, not crowding her, but not maintaining distance either. "Here's what I think. I think you've spent your whole life being what other people needed you to be. Weapon. Tool. Assassin. I think you've never once been allowed to choose for yourself, and I think that's eating you alive."

Pudding's expression flickers. Just for a moment, the mask slips.

"What would you know about it?"

"Nothing. But Sanji does." Zoro's voice softens, just slightly. "He was raised the same way. Made into something he never wanted to be. The difference is, he found people who let him be something else. People who saw the person underneath the weapon and chose to love him anyway."

Silence.

"You're offering me that? Love and acceptance and a chance to be something different?" Pudding's laugh is sharp, but there's something desperate underneath it. "I tried to kill him. I mocked him, humiliated him, used every vulnerability he ever showed me as ammunition for my cruelty. You think that's forgivable?"

"He already forgave you."

The words land like a blow. Pudding's face crumbles, just for a second, before she rebuilds her walls.

"Then he's a fool."

"Maybe. But he's alive. And right now, thousands of people in this kingdom might not be, unless you help us." Zoro holds her gaze. "I'm not offering you absolution. I'm offering you a choice. For once in your life, you get to decide what you want to be. Weapon, or something else."

The silence stretches between them.

Finally, Pudding turns back to the window.

"My mother has a weakness," she says quietly. "Her rage. When things don't go according to plan, she loses control. Becomes reckless. That's why she's moving so fast now. She's furious that the plot failed, and she's not thinking clearly."

"How does that help us?"

"Because reckless means mistakes. And my mother doesn't make mistakes when she's calm." Pudding pauses. "There's a supply depot, three days' march from here. If you can cut her supply lines, force her to overextend, she'll make a mistake. A big one. The kind you can exploit."

Zoro files this away. "What kind of mistake?"

"She'll split her forces. Send her best commanders on a flanking maneuver while the main army pushes forward. It's her favorite strategy when she's angry. She thinks it makes her look unpredictable." Pudding's voice turns bitter. "It makes her look like a mother who never learned that her children aren't pawns."

"Which commanders? Where will they go?"

Pudding tells him. Names, routes, timing. Information that could turn the tide of a war, offered without negotiation or demand.

When she's done, Zoro nods.

"Thank you."

"Don't thank me." She still won't look at him. "I'm not doing this for you. Or for him. Or for any noble reason you'd like to imagine."

"Then why?"

A long pause. When she finally speaks, her voice is fractured, each word dragged out reluctantly.

"Because I'm tired. Because my mother will burn this kingdom and a dozen others and never once wonder if it was worth the cost. Because—" She stops. Her hand moves to her forehead, touches the place where her third eye hides beneath her hair. "Because when I was mocking him, calling him pathetic, telling him no one could ever love something that broken, I was talking about myself. Every word. And he looked at me afterward, in that cell, and he knew. He knew, and he still said my eye wasn't monstrous."

She turns, finally, and Zoro sees that her eyes are wet.

"I wanted to hate him for that. It would be easier if I could hate him. If I could tell myself he was just another mark, another fool who fell for the performance." Her laugh is ragged. "But he saw me. The real me. The ugly, broken thing underneath all the lies. And he didn't flinch."

"So you're helping us because—"

"Because I don't know what I am anymore." The words come out fierce, almost angry. "I spent my whole life being exactly what my mother made me. And then one stupid, kind, impossibly naive prince looked at me like I was a person instead of a weapon, and now I can't—" She breaks off. Takes a breath. "I can't go back to not knowing what that feels like. Even if I never feel it again."

Zoro is quiet for a moment.

"That's not nothing," he says finally.

"It's not redemption either."

"No. But it's a choice. Your choice." He moves toward the door, then pauses. "For what it's worth, I don't think you're a monster. I think you're someone who was never given the chance to be anything else. That's not the same thing."

Pudding doesn't respond.

But as Zoro descends the tower stairs, he thinks he hears something that sounds almost like crying.

THE BATTLE

The next weeks blur together.

Zoro experiences them in fragments: the chaos of mobilization, the endless strategy sessions, the long marches through terrain that's becoming increasingly familiar as the war pushes deeper into Baratie territory.

The Straw Hats scatter to their roles. Nami coordinates intelligence from a makeshift command post, her maps covered in pins and string, tracking enemy movements with the precision of someone who learned long ago that information is the sharpest weapon. Usopp works around the clock with Franky, building siege equipment and fortifications, his hands steady even when his voice shakes. Robin moves like a ghost through the chaos, gathering secrets, whispering warnings, appearing wherever she's needed most.

Chopper sets up field hospitals behind the lines. Zoro sees him once, briefly, between skirmishes—the young physician covered in blood that isn't his, face pale but hands steady as he works to save a soldier who probably won't survive the night. He's aged ten years in ten days.

Brook plays for the troops in the evenings. Songs that shouldn't be comforting but somehow are, melodies that remind exhausted soldiers of home and hearth and all the things worth fighting for. He plays until his fingers bleed, and then he plays some more.

And Luffy—

Luffy wants to fight. Of course he does. He's been pacing the war council like a caged animal, demanding to know why he can't just punch Big Mom in the face and end this whole thing. It takes Sanji, Nami, and two royal guards to keep him from charging the enemy lines single-handed.

"Sanji's my cook," he says, as if this explains everything. "Nobody threatens my cook."

"This isn't about me," Sanji tries to tell him. "It's about the kingdom. About all the people who'll die if we don't do this right."

Luffy frowns. "But you're part of the kingdom. So it's about you too."

There's no arguing with Luffy's logic. There never has been.

Pudding's intelligence proves accurate. The supply depot falls in a single night, a surgical strike that Zoro leads personally. Big Mom's forces falter, overextend, and then, just as predicted, split.

The flanking force is commanded by Charlotte Katakuri, Big Mom's most dangerous child. A thousand soldiers at his back, moving through the mountain passes toward Baratie's undefended eastern border.

Zoro intercepts them with three hundred.

Luffy tries to come with him. Actually has to be physically restrained by Franky, who's the only one strong enough to hold him.

"Let me go!" Luffy shouts. "Zoro's my friend! I should be there!"

"You're a prince of the Eastern Kingdom," Nami snaps. "If you die on a Baratie battlefield, it'll start another war. Stay. Here."

Zoro meets Luffy's eyes across the chaos of the camp.

"I'll come back," he says. It's not quite a promise. Promises are dangerous things.

"You better," Luffy says. His voice is fierce, but his eyes are scared. "I'm not done fighting with you yet."

Later, he won't remember much of the battle itself.

Violence has a way of collapsing time, of reducing hours to moments and moments to instinct. He remembers the weight of his swords in his hands. The sound of steel on steel. The particular resistance of flesh giving way to blade.

He remembers Katakuri's eyes, cold and calculating, as they faced each other across the churned earth of the battlefield. The Charlotte commander moved like nothing Zoro had ever seen, all fluid grace and devastating precision. A warrior who had never known defeat.

Zoro gave him his first.

It cost him. Three ribs cracked, maybe broken. A gash across his chest that will leave a scar to match all the others. Blood loss significant enough that his vision started to tunnel as Katakuri finally fell.

But he stayed standing.

That's what matters.

When he wakes, Sanji is there.

Not pacing, not fretting, just sitting in a chair beside the bed, watching Zoro with an expression that's impossible to read. The room is dim, lit only by a single candle, and Zoro has no idea what time it is or how long he's been unconscious.

"Hey," he manages. His voice comes out rough, scraped raw.

"Hey yourself." Sanji's tone is carefully neutral. "The healers say you'll live. Though they also say you're an idiot who should have died three times over on that battlefield."

"Only three? I'm losing my touch."

Sanji doesn't laugh.

"You could have been killed." His voice is quiet now. Too quiet. "When they brought you back, I thought—" He stops. Takes a breath. "I thought I was going to have to learn what it feels like to lose you."

"You didn't."

"This time. What about next time? Or the time after that?" Sanji leans forward, and Zoro can see now what he couldn't see before: the red-rimmed eyes, the tension in his jaw, the particular pallor of someone who has spent days preparing for the worst. "You took three hundred soldiers against a thousand. You faced Katakuri alone. What were you thinking?"

"I was thinking that someone had to do it."

"Someone. Not you specifically. We could have found another way."

"There wasn't time."

"There's never time. There's always a reason to throw yourself into danger, always a cause worth dying for." Sanji's voice cracks. "But you promised. You promised you'd stay."

Zoro reaches for him. The movement pulls at his wounds, sends pain lancing through his chest, but he doesn't care. He finds Sanji's hand, grips it tight.

"I'm still here."

"You're here now. But what about next time there's a battle? Next time you decide the only way to protect me is to nearly get yourself killed?"

"That's not—"

"It is." Sanji's eyes are bright. "You think I don't know what you were doing? You weren't just defending the border. You were trying to end this war before it could reach me. Before I could be threatened. Before any of it could touch me."

Zoro doesn't deny it. He can't. Sanji knows him too well now, reads him too clearly.

"I won't apologize for wanting to protect you."

"I'm not asking you to apologize. I'm asking you to stop treating your life like it's worth less than mine." Sanji's grip on his hand tightens almost painfully. "I can't do this if you're going to throw yourself away every time I'm in danger. I can't love someone who doesn't believe they deserve to survive."

The words hit Zoro like a second sword wound.

Because Sanji's right. That's the thing he's been avoiding, the truth he's been hiding even from himself. Three years of wanting from a distance taught him that his own needs didn't matter. That his job was to serve, to protect, to sacrifice. That love meant putting Sanji first, always, even when first meant dying.

He never learned how to be loved back.

"I don't know how to do this differently," he admits. The words come slowly, dragged out of somewhere deep. "I've spent so long being your sword. Your shield. The thing that stands between you and everything that wants to hurt you. I don't know how to be something else."

"Then learn." Sanji's voice softens. "Learn with me. Because I need you alive, Zoro. Not as a bodyguard, not as a protector. As the person who makes me believe I'm worth staying for."

"You are worth staying for."

"Then stay." Sanji brings their joined hands to his lips, presses a kiss to Zoro's bruised knuckles. "Stay alive. That's all I'm asking. Just... stay alive."

Zoro closes his eyes.

This is the thing no one tells you about loving someone. It's not about the grand gestures, the dramatic confessions, the willing-to-die-for-you declarations that poets build entire careers around. It's about the willingness to live. To keep living, even when it's harder than dying. To choose, every day, to stay.

"Okay," he says finally. "I'll try."

"That's all I'm asking."

They stay like that, hands intertwined, as the candle burns low and the night stretches on. Outside, the war continues. Soldiers fight and die. The fate of kingdoms hangs in the balance.

But here, in this room, there's only this: two people learning that love isn't about sacrifice. It's about survival.

Together.

THE TURNING

The war turns in their favor two weeks later.

Big Mom, enraged by Katakuri's defeat, makes exactly the mistake Pudding predicted. She splits her forces again, sends her remaining commanders on increasingly desperate flanking maneuvers, and leaves her main army exposed.

Baratie's forces, bolstered by allies from the Eastern Kingdom, strike at the heart of the Totto Land advance. The battle is brutal, bloody, the kind of decisive conflict that ends wars one way or another.

It ends in Baratie's favor.

Zoro isn't there for it. His wounds, though healing, have kept him off the front lines despite his protests. He watches the messengers arrive instead, each one bringing news of another victory, another retreat, another step toward the end.

When it's over, when the last Totto Land soldier has withdrawn beyond the border and the terms of surrender have been negotiated, he finds Sanji on the battlements.

Their place. Where everything began.

Sanji is watching the horizon, the same way he watched it that first night after the betrayal. But his posture is different now. Less defeated. More... tired. The exhaustion of someone who has carried too much for too long and is finally allowed to set it down.

"It's over," Zoro says, coming to stand beside him.

"For now." Sanji doesn't look away from the horizon. "Big Mom is still out there. The Vinsmokes are still out there. There will be other wars, other threats."

"Probably. But not today."

"No. Not today."

They stand in silence for a long moment. The wind is warm now, carrying the scent of summer. Below them, the castle is celebrating, voices and laughter drifting up from the courtyard. Life, continuing despite everything.

"What happens to Pudding?" Zoro asks.

"Father wants to execute her. The council is divided." Sanji pauses. "I asked them to spare her."

"Why?"

"Because she helped us. Because her intelligence saved thousands of lives." Another pause, longer this time. "Because I know what it's like to be used as a weapon, and I know what it costs to choose differently."

Zoro thinks about the girl in the tower, staring at the sky. About the way her voice broke when she said no one had ever told her she wasn't monstrous.

"What will they do?"

"Exile, probably. Send her somewhere far away, where she can't hurt anyone and no one can hurt her." Sanji finally turns to look at him. "It's not justice. Not really. But I'm not sure justice is possible for people like us. People who were made into weapons before we knew how to be anything else."

"You're not a weapon."

"No. Not anymore." Sanji's expression softens. "Because someone taught me I could be something else."

Zoro doesn't know what to say to that. So he just reaches out, pulls Sanji close, holds him against the wind and the fading light.

"What now?" he asks.

"Now we rebuild. Heal. Try to figure out how to be a kingdom that's not constantly under threat." Sanji's voice is muffled against Zoro's shoulder. "Try to figure out how to be together when the world isn't ending."

"That might be harder than the war."

"Probably." Sanji pulls back just enough to meet his eyes. "But I'd rather figure it out with you than without you."

"Even if I'm stubborn and reckless and apparently have a death wish?"

"Especially then." Sanji's mouth curves. "Someone has to keep you alive. Might as well be me."

Zoro kisses him.

It's not like the first kiss, desperate and uncertain. It's not like the kisses during the war, stolen moments between crises. It's something new. Something that tastes like possibility.

When they break apart, the sun is setting over Baratie, painting the sky in shades of gold and crimson.

"I love you," Zoro says.

He's never said it before. Not in those words. The confession on the battlements was about seeing, about wanting, about being willing to stay. This is different. Simpler. More terrifying.

Sanji's breath catches.

"I know," he says. And then, softer: "I love you too. I think I have for a while. I just didn't know what it was called."

They stay on the battlements until the stars come out, learning this new language between them. The war is over. The future is uncertain. There will be other battles, other scars, other moments when one of them stands too close to the edge and the other has to pull them back.

But for now, there is this, two people who found each other in the wreckage and chose to stay. Two people learning that love isn't about dying for someone.

It's about living with them.

"The problem with happiness is that it makes cowards of us all. But sometimes, cowardice is just another word for having something worth protecting. And sometimes, protecting it means staying alive long enough to enjoy it."