Underground, Part 2

Leo

The next day, in the breaks between his instruction of Katonah and meals, he made arrangements, careful arrangements: very necessary, seeing as Xander would probably not approve of his plans for the evening. He had Niles go about it for him: the man was as discreet as they came. Unfortunately, his reliability was undercut by his dirty mouth.

The one-eyed man met him at a juncture around sunset, assuring him that everything was ready for him as he'd ordered.

"My thanks," Leo told him. "And I'm sorry about this. I know this is an off-day for you, Niles, and how much you value your time. I'll make sure that you're compensated for it."

"You do that, milord. I've been kicking for a new eye-patch, but don't quite have the scratch for it yet." The man gave a quirky smile, tilting his head. "You know, I couldn't help but notice that the saddle seats two."

Leo bristled. "Did you? It wouldn't be the first time your patch buggered your sight."

"There's no need for high hackles, milord. You know my lips are sealed on your account. I'm just curious. Who's the lucky lady?"

"That's for me to know, and you to never find out. Are we done here?"

Niles raised a brow. "So it is a woman. Wow. I suppose you couldn't go about ignoring them forever."

Leo blushed furiously. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Just the fact that you're a painfully late bloomer, milord. Would you like any tips on properly handling women?" He put a conniving hand to his mouth. "If you're up for it, that is."

For the love of— "Gods, why do I put up with you and your bilge? No doubt there are sewer rats with better manners!"

"Ouch, Lord Leo." Niles pretended to wince. "That hurt. It was just an observation."

"I don't pay you to voice your observations, cretin! Now be gone, before I change my mind about that compensation!"

Niles was amused. "As you will it, milord." He winked. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do."

Gods, that man! Leo glared after him as the retainer swaggered down the hall. Not for the first time, he considered firing the lewd masochist and finding a closed-mouthed, better-mannered replacement.

Later that night, he found himself, once again, standing outside of Katonah's door. Light came from the space underneath, illuminating the tips of Leo's boots. He wondered at that. It was very close to midnight. Was she still awake? He remembered the shadows under her eyes. Awake...or afraid to sleep. Did she have nightmares too?

He lifted his hand, then paused, suddenly damnably unsure. He felt strange, like he was standing on the lip of a precipice, or at the edge of a shadow. Melodramatic as it may have seemed, some inborn intuition told him that he was at the point of no return. He'd stood at such a crossroads before — his Corrin memories told him so. Yet that was a particular moment he couldn't quite remember. And he wasn't sure he wanted to.

He set his jaw. Crossroads. Melodrama indeed! He knocked.

A surprised reply came from inside. She was fully awake. "Yes? Who is it?"

Leo cleared his throat. "It's me."

He waited. Sounds of scrambling came from within: covers being thrown off, then muted footsteps as bare feet crossed the bedroom floor. The door opened a crack, revealing a partial view of Katonah in a white nightdress.

"What are you doing awake at this time of night?" she asked, opening the door a little further.

"I could ask you the same." He glanced over her head, into the bedroom. The fireplace was still lit. The maids hadn't come to put it out? No...more likely, she'd asked them to keep it ablaze. "Not tired?" he asked her.

She hesitated, suddenly uncertain. "Well...no. I am. I just..." Her next words came out in a heavy rush. "I seem to be having trouble falling asleep. That's all."

"Nightmares?"

She blinked. "No. I haven't been sleeping enough for nightmares." She rubbed at her eyes. "It's silly, really. I'm fine."

She kept saying that. I'm fine. He wished she wouldn't. Put up a front, that was. It was as though she didn't trust him with her true misgivings. She'd said as much back at the highway incident and, despite his assurances, she was still doing it. Did she still think he didn't care? Or was she still unsure because he was Xander's brother?

"I finished editing your letter," he said abruptly. He lifted a small roll of parchment that he held in one hand.

She rubbed at her eyes. "The one to Iseabail? Thank you."

"I rewrote it for you, too."

"Really?" She frowned. "You didn't have to do that. I could have rewritten it."

"I know. But I wanted to spare the eyesight of the poor guard who is to read it to your mother. Your penmanship is still rather horrific."

That coaxed a tired smile out of her. "You're the one who taught me how to write, Lord Leo. What does my horrific penmanship say about you?"

"That I haven't been cracking the whip hard enough." He gestured. "Why don't you get dressed? Then we can go mail it."

Her eyes widened. "What...now?"

"Now. Unless you'd rather sleep." He tilted his head, indicating the bed.

She stared at him a moment, as though trying to figure out if he were serious. Slowly, she nodded, uncertain. "Well...all right. Give me a few moments."

He stepped outside, waiting for her. At length, she emerged, wearing a simple black dress, belted around the middle with a bolt of bright green cloth. Just as he'd been on the morning of the betrothal ceremony, Leo was surprised at how well the color did on her: it drew out the dark green of her hair, emphasized the paleness of her skin. She tugged her cloak around her shoulders as she pulled the door shut behind her.

"What next?" she asked.

He beckoned. "Follow me."

They headed down the dark halls, their footsteps echoing down each corridor they passed. The castle was downright eerie at this time of night: dark and bone-achingly cold, and the hallways felt lifeless and empty without soldiers and servants running around, blunting the silence. The Grand Hall was like a dragon's lair, the ring of torches hugging the wall making the shadows deeper and more substantial; it was enough that one might think that they just barely hid a dragon's maw out of sight. Leo had a lantern with him, but even so, crossing the wide floor was like fording a black sea.

They reached the hall on the other side, one that took them outside, though the only way they could tell was by the way the air grew heaver and the cold more intense. Other than that, it was as though they'd stepped out into a void of blackness — without the lantern, neither of them would have been able to see where they were going. Katonah kept close to Leo's side, grabbing his arm to keep her balance as they made their way up the steps and onto a lonely pathway that spanned out into the blackness.

They reached the outer walls, entering a portico supported by hundreds of stocky pillars. Leo led them to a stairwell tucked away in the blackness, one long and steep that facilitated them up to the top of the walls. Here, another narrow pathway well-lit by braziers took them towards a drum-shaped watchtower, and the landing platform flanking it. There was a light there, in the middle of the platform: a soldier, standing by a lantern post. In his stiff hands he held the reins of a wyvern. The beast was lying on its belly beside the man, tail sweeping against the stones.

"Milord." The man bowed. "Your wyvern, as requested."

"Thank you. Dismissed." Leo fisted the reins and swung atop the beast. He patted the saddle behind him and said, "General?"

She was studying the wyvern with a suspicious frown. "Where are we going?"

"Windmire, if you must know."

"Does...Xander know about this?" His name was scratchy on her tongue.

"Do you want him to know about it?"

She shook her head, then hastily climbed on after him, securing her arms around his waist. Leo pulled on the reins, and the beast took off, twisting across the stone pathway, snaking towards the edge. Just before it hit the lip, the wyvern propelled itself upward with one strong thrust of its meaty legs, vaulting them over the side and sending them plunging into the darkness below.

For a moment, they fell like stones, rushing down the outer walls, down through the fortress's stone supports, the expanse of stone flashing past until there was nothing below but blackness, the abyss.

Then, the wyvern opened its wings, the nets of cartilage catching the cold air like sails. They were jerked upward, as though a god had reached down and stopped their fall. The wyvern twisted, wings out wide, riding the cold current upward in slow, easy circles. The castle reappeared, and they spiraled slowly upward up between the bridges, around the stronghold's torso, then up by the roofs of the watchtowers. Slowly but surely, the fortress passed as they rose up through the chasm, swallowed by the darkness festering at the bottom. A tear appeared in the darkness above: sky, sprinkled with a smatter of stars. It grew wider and wider as they rose higher and higher, until they were up and through, coasting high over the edge of the chasm.

Leo took in a deep breath. The air tasted sweet, cold and fresh and smelling of freshly fallen rain — it always did, after a sabbatical in Castle Krakenburg. Perhaps the air quality down in the chasm was poorer than surface air, or perhaps the air in the castle was fouled by being inhaled and exhaled by the same group of people for years on end. Whatever the case, surface air always tasted so much purer in comparison, and it felt good to be out in it, however cold it was — having it comb through his hair and sting his cheeks. He'd forgotten, again, how isolated Castle Krakenburg was, how crowded and insulated in its safe little chasm — out here in the dark open, he felt he had room to think. To breathe.

Katonah seemed to agree: "That feels good."

"Doesn't it? We've been cooped up in that castle for far too long."

There was a smirk in her voice. "We only arrived days ago."

"My point." He sat back a little, readjusted his grip on the reins. "My great-grandfather obviously didn't consider how such perfect isolation could, in turn, become suffocating only days in."

"I'm sure his planning only considered the castle's merits from a political standpoint."

There was sarcasm in her voice — that pleased him. Sarcasm was close to enthusiasm. "Indeed," he agreed.

She shifted behind him. "Tell me more about where we're going?"

"You'll see. You'll like it."

That caught her off guard. "Like it? What do you mean? I thought we were going to send a letter to the Northern Fortress."

He cleared his throat. He'd gotten ahead of himself. "We are."

"Then what's this about me liking 'it'? What's 'it'?"

"If I told you," Leo said with some exasperation, "then what would be the point?"

"Of what?" She paused. "A surprise?"

Leo fell silent — he felt his cheeks coloring.

"A surprise?" she pressed. "For me?"

"Maybe," he grunted. "It depends."

"On what?"

"Whether or not you like it."

Katonah began laughing. It took Leo by surprise. He hadn't said anything funny. Had he?

"What is it?" he demanded glaring back at her. Her eyes were still sad, tired, but she was smiling, her face rosy in the starlight.

"I'm just shocked that I was right," she said.

"About?"

"You. Being likable."

He scowled. "How is that surprising? Are you saying that I'm not likeable?"

"Sometimes it feels like you want the world to think you aren't. Remember the way we met?"

He stiffened a little, the fingers of his free hand digging into the lip of the saddle. "Perhaps you're right," he said, words snatched away by the cold wind. What rattled him was how right she was, how uncomfortably close she'd hit to home. Corrin invaded his thoughts again, just for a hundredth of a second, but it was enough to steal away the rest of his ease.

"What did you say, Leo?" Katonah asked.

He took a breath, banishing Corrin to the shadows once again. "Nothing."

"What's the matter?" Katonah sounded uncertain — she must've felt him tense up.

"Nothing," he said. "We're almost there."

(/\)

Windmire, indeed, soon appeared beneath them. The city was well lit with braziers and torches, but the streets were mostly empty — shockingly so, even for this time of night. They had no trouble finding a suitable place to land: a giant, empty market square, a line of governmental buildings sitting on raised steppes on one side, the low edge of a dry canal on the other. It was towards this dry river bed that Leo led Katonah — he gripped the reins of the wyvern in the other, leaving the big lizard to trail behind them.

They eased down the slope and onto the canal bed, a strip of stained stone that spanned in either direction like a separate road. Leo clicked several times, coaxing the wyvern onward, and Katonah fell into step beside him, gazing around as they began to move north.

"Where are we going?" she asked again.

He rolled his eyes. "I told you, you'll see when we get there. Keep up."

She glanced downward. "Why is this river dry?"

"Believe it or not, this never actually was a river — though it was intended to be."

"What do you mean?"

"According to Nohrian histories, several centuries ago, when Windmire was built, this canal was constructed with the intent to receive water that was to be diverted from a river several miles from the city."

"Divert a river?" She was in awe.

"It means to change the river's course, and channel it. In this case, into Windmire."

"You can do that?"

"With effort."

She looked back to where the canal wound out of sight behind them. "What happened?"

"A horrible flood. During a spring storm, the river burst its banks. This entire half of Nohr was flooded. Historical accounts liken it to walls of water sweeping over everything in its path. Windmire was the only metropolis in a hundred miles not devastated by it."

"How?"

Leo gestured. "This canal. It took the excess water like a reservoir, absorbing the incoming waves of water. Without it, we might've been wiped off the map. Afterwards, the crown decided to halt construction on diverting the river. The canals would stand as a reservoir instead, a defense against any floods in the future."

"Have there been any?"

"Not to my knowledge."

"Oh." For some reason, she sounded disappointed.

"The canal serves another purpose, however." The time had come to reveal the surprise. "It's also a universal pathway to the Nohr Underground."

Katonah perked up. "Nohr Underground? What is that?"

"You'll see."

She frowned. "I'm getting tired of hearing you say that."

Banter. Good! "It'll be worth it. Trust me."

Ten long minutes passed as they continued to follow the canal. Soon, they reached a bridge, a stone arch curving overhead. They stepped into its shadow, momentarily swallowed by the darkness. Leo paused underneath, taking a moment to pull on the hood of his cloak. Then, he reached out, grasping a doorknob set into the eastern wall of stone. He pulled, and the door swung open, revealing a black hole in the stone. He turned to see Katonah's eyes glowing with curiosity.

"What is this?" she asked.

"An entrance to Nohr's sewage system," Leo explained.

"Sewage?" Her nose wrinkled, and she put a hand to her face to block the smell. Leo waited. After a moment, she dropped her hand, frowning. She said, "But...it doesn't smell bad."

"Exactly. This is the old system, installed before Castle Krakenburg was built. It's long been abandoned. Now it hosts Nohr Underground." He stepped aside, gesturing to the doorway. "After you."

Uncertainly, Katonah stepped forward, peeking uneasily into the darkness. While she did, Leo directed a series of sharp clicks to the wyvern, something he'd learned from Camilla. Obediently, the wyvern dropped to its belly, folding its wings in neatly and curling its tail around itself. Effectively, Leo had just told it to sit and wait.

Katonah stepped through the door, and Leo followed. There were a series of lanterns hanging on hooks on the walls of the hallway beyond, and Leo fished one from its perch before pulling the door closed behind him. But even with the light, the darkness was still deep. Leo held out his arm.

"General," he said.

She took it immediately, hugging close to his side. Her touch made a ripple of stinging gooseflesh run up his arm, and he worked to steady himself with a silent breath.

Then, they were off, stepping into the blackness that spanned out before them. Their echoing footfalls were, for a while, their only description as to their surroundings: the hallway continued for a while, but was then, very abruptly, replaced by a large, cluttered room. From prior experience, Leo knew that it was jammed with an assortment of nonsensical items, ranging from pottery wheels to anvils to the remains of half-finished chairs. There were even a few boats crammed about, two wedged in one corner and one placed in the very center of the room, buried beneath the carcass of a couple of broken carriages. The oars stacked up against a ladder propped against the wall.

The clutter was meant to act as a deterrent, turning away anyone who had no business being down here. These days, Leo suspected, Nohrian royalty was included in that bracket. A pity he already knew his way through: Elise had taken him down here several times in the past. Stepping forward towards the boat in the center of the room, he lifted the heap of stained Nohrian standards draped over the nose, revealing a small hole in the throat of the prow. A newcomer might assume that the boat was simply damaged, rendering the hole insignificant, but the edges of the opening were too neat to be authentic. The hole had been made deliberately.

Leo dropped into a crouch, gesturing to the hole. "After you, General," he said again.

She looked like she wanted to ask, but didn't — she was too curious. Easing to the floor, she slowly wiggled her way inside. He gave her a few seconds to disappear and then followed, wincing as his shoulders brushed the edges of the hole: his wingspan had gotten wider. He pulled himself forward slowly with one hand, the other dragging the lantern behind him. A tiny tunnel spanned in front of him, pressured on all sides by the junk that had been piled into the boat. He went slowly at first, but then quickened his pace when he heard scratching somewhere nearby — he was in no mood to get a rat bite.

Katonah was waiting for him on the other side. He crawled the rest of the way out of the tunnel and found himself on the other side of the junk pile, the haphazard pile rising in a wall behind him. He now stood in the belly of a wide corridor, as dark as the last. Katonah took his arm again, and they continued on.

At length, they arrived at a junction. Leo steered them to the left into another long hallway. Not long after, echoes began to reach them from far away. Katonah straightened when she heard them.

"Are those voices?" she asked.

"Indeed. We're almost there."

Another turn led them to a massive chamber, one that contained even more junk than the last. Navigating through it was like navigating a sea of uselessness. Another deterrent to keep away those that weren't welcome. But soon, light appeared around the stacks of rubbish. The voices grew louder. A corner appeared. Leo made sure that his hood was firmly atop his head before guiding her around the corner.

"Here we are," he said.

Another large chamber spanned before them, but it was so long that it could be better described as a tunnel. A long line of crackling braziers occupied the entire length of the tunnel, separating it into left and right aisles, and illuminating an orderly mass of tents occupying the chamber from one end to the other in a range of shapes and sizes. But tents they were not: they were shops, all of them, and hundreds of people milled in between them, filling the air with the easygoing yammer of shoppers.

Leo glanced down at Katonah. "What do you think?"

She was in awe — her eyes were moving so fast, trying to take in everything, that it made Leo's own eyes ache. "Nohr Underground?"

"Nohr Underground. During the war five years ago, the streets of Windmire became unfit to be on. Someone got the idea to move business down here, and it wasn't long before the entire commercial community followed suit, emptying their above-ground shops for business down here. They haven't left since."

Leo guided her forward, easing into the crowd. He automatically tensed as they became engulfed in walls of people. Luckily, no one was looking at him too closely. The hood and the shadows seemed to be doing well in shrouding his face. With the insurgents encouraging hatred of the crown, he didn't know how the throng would react if they discovered that the prince of Nohr was milling about around them, but it was better to be safe than sorry.

"There are so many people here," Katonah gasped, tightly hugging his side.

"Much of Underground's business comes at night," Leo said over the din of shoppers. "During the war, the shop owners used to maintain their above-ground businesses during the day and come down here at night. Even when they abandoned their original shops entirely, they kept the schedule."

"Can we browse?" Katonah asked eagerly.

"No — we're going to stand over in that corner and watch everyone else shop." Leo snorted. "Of course we can browse. As long as you like."

Looking excited, Katonah moved further into the crowd, and Leo followed close behind. Predictably, it took the woman a moment to decide where to start: there was an overwhelming number of shops, each one looking more appealing than the last, and it was nearly impossible to choose only one to devote even a single moment to when there were so many others to browse.

Katonah wound up choosing a simple jewelry shop to start, one selling an assortment of vibrantly colored bangles and necklaces all made from bean shells. At the owner's insistence, she tried on several, but wound up choosing none, even though one of the stunningly red chokers she'd tried on complimented her green hair beautifully, in Leo's opinion. They gravitated to the shop next door, another jewelry shop, except this one sold anklets made out of actual gem stones. One piece, a wreath of precious blue sapphires, Leo was quite sure would buy a poor family enough food to last for at least two years.

They slowly made their way down the aisle of shops, inching their way towards the end of the underground corridor, moving from shop to shop to shop to shop, looking but never buying. Seeing so many unfamiliar, intriguing things seemed to bring Katonah out of her shell. The gloom and misery finally disappeared from her face, her eyes, replaced by curiosity and genuine delight at every new thing they encountered. At a scarf shop, she asked Leo how they managed to dye the material so many fascinating colors. At a tiny armory selling small, concealable weapons, she inquired as to how and when he'd learned swordplay. And when they reached a tiny boutique selling musical instruments, she pointed to a violin and asked how you could possibly coax music out of such a complex device.

"You use a bow," he explained. "Not that kind," he said to her incredulous expression. "It's not a weapon, it's an accessory. You use it to— Gods, why don't I just demonstrate? Madam," he inquired the shop owner. "Will you allow me to play that violin in the front there?"

The woman, fat and short, twisted her lip but relinquished the bow. "You break it, you bought it, boy."

Leo tried not to feel annoyed — she didn't know he was royalty, after all. It couldn't be helped. "Watch," he said to Katonah, placing the instrument on his shoulder. He stroked out a few notes, testing the tuning, then teased a simple, sweet melody out of the strings. It was short and plain, yet it turned heads — when he finished, several passerby paused to clap. Katonah and the shop-owner both looked impressed.

"Leo, that was amazing," Katonah said.

"I'll say," the owner agreed. "Thinking about buying, boy? With steady hands like that, it'll be a worthwhile investment. Wouldn't be surprised if you went on to play in the Cyrkensia Orchestra one day."

Leo couldn't help but feel smug as he handed her back the instrument. "Nice try, but I already have one. One that's better tuned, to boot." He offered Katonah his arm again, and they left, leaving the shop owner in a huff.

"Where did you learn to play like that?" she asked.

"Where do you think? Like you, I had tutors. Though I play cello, not violin."

Kataonh looked thoughtful. "Is that that big version of the violin that you had in your room at the Northern Fortress?"

"That's it. But trust me, it sounds a lot different." He cleared his throat, rubbing at his jaw. "I can show you sometime, if you'd like."

"Yes please." She cocked her head. "Is it hard to learn?"

"How play cello? Why? Interested?"

She laughed. "Oh no. It's just that instruments on the moorland are so much simpler."

"You lot play music?"

"Of course! We aren't complete savages."

That coaxed a smile out of him. "That remains to be seen. What are your instruments like?"

"Pipes, mostly. Sometimes drums. And our music is very simple. Even simpler than that melody you just played."

"Trying to reflect the earth in your songs, I wager."

"Indeed. My father once told me that Earth Tribe music mimics natural sounds, like bird song." She paused suddenly, her face losing some of its cheer.

"What is it?" Leo asked.

She shook her head. "Nothing. I'm sorry."

He shrugged. "Do you play pipes? Or drums?"

She smiled. "I wish I'd had time to learn. Most of my childhood, I trained to become a wise woman. Iseabail did teach me to sing, though."

He raised both brows. "Really? Are you any good?"

She poked him. "Yes, I'm good, Lord Leo! At least, Iseabail tells me so."

"Mothers — even foster mothers — always say that. It's entirely possible that she's trying to spare your feelings on the matter."

She smiled at him. "What an awful thing to say."

"Just my two cents."

"Perhaps your family's disillusioned about your music too."

"I'll let you be the judge of that."

"And I'll let you confirm that my singing has some merit."

"It's a deal." Leo paused — he'd almost said date instead of deal. Even so, he found himself grinning stupidly — he was shocked at how giddy he felt.

They continued on, an hour of plodding later seeing them at the end of the long corridor of tent-shops. A tea shop stood here at the end of the Nohr Underground, a complex of tables surrounding a central platform where a string quartet was stroking out a ballad more befitting an opera than an underground shopping plaza. The two stopped here for a while — Katonah found a place for them to sit, and Leo brought them two cups of herbal roast from the counter.

They talked while they consumed their cups of bitter tea, not about anything important, but about everything unimportant. Katonah asked him more about how one played the violin or cello. Leo asked her about her training with Iseabail, the kinds of things she'd learned. A warm kind of easiness came over Leo as they conversed, a delightful kind of peace, the likes of which he'd only felt when he'd meditated with Katonah and found his Center. But even though he was not touching the earth, or letting his thoughts wander, he felt that he was there, the Center — all of his misgivings and troubles seemed to fall away as he sat in this underground café, talking with this pretty woman, and he forgot what he'd been worried about earlier that night, what had made him, just hours before, so uncertain and anxious.

Too soon, they finished their tea. Arm in arm, they reentered the corridor, this time moving up the opposite aisle. Leo didn't let Katonah browse too much this time, even though there was so much more to see — dawn was no doubt not far off, and they still had a couple of important shops to hit.

One was halfway back towards the entrance: the sign read Dod's Messenger Pigeon Service, and it was here that Leo pulled Katonah to a halt. The man behind the counter was tall, bearded, and amiable, and the inside of his tent held an assortment of, indeed, messenger pigeons, but falcons too, each of them pecking about in their cages and directing curious eyes at Leo and Katonah. Leo patiently explained how the service worked.

"For a small fee, he'll direct his bird to take your letter to the destination of your choice," Leo said. He nodded at the man. "Dod is quick and reliable. I've used his service many times before, before I got my own falcon."

Katonah looked down at her letter to her foster mother, which she'd folded until it was a quarter of its original size. "Do any of your birds know the way to the Northern Fortress?" she asked the man.

"Oh yes, ma'am. My birds have been all over. They're the best in the business." Dod winked at her. "And don't worry, I always have my recipients return something to serve as a receipt of sorts. So you leave your address, and I'll make sure that you know whether or not they got the package."

Katonah gave him the letter, and Leo paid the man a couple of shillings before leaving both the location of the Northern Fortress and then an address to which to direct the receipt. He didn't dare put Castle Krakenburg — the last thing he wanted was Xander to stumble upon a messenger pigeon pecking at one of the windows and find a questionable receipt coming from the Northern Fortress. Instead, he put the address of one of the armories in Windmire — the owner was a friend, who would no doubt put the receipt aside until Leo's next visit for a new doublet or a fresh set of armored boots.

Once the arrangements were complete, they continued on. Katonah was beginning to look tired — she yawned twice, and her eyes began to droop. Leo was beginning to feel the same, which was problematic, seeing as he was going to have to fly them home. Still, they had one last stop: Katonah's surprise.

"General." Leo nudged her. "Look. This one particular shop I think you'll like."

She rubbed at her eyes, sleepily following his gesture, then gasped. Now fully alert, she hurried forward, rushing probably without meaning to. Leo followed her, finally coming to stop by where she stood at the entrance to a big tent, one of the biggest ones in the underground corridor. The front was lined with a perimeter of massive flowerpots, each boasting a cluster of brightly colored tulips and carnations.

As if drawn by some kind of magnetism, Katonah stepped into the tent's darker interior. Following, Leo for a moment felt as though he'd stepped into a miniature forest: two aisles of potted trees rose at either flank, their green canopies weaving together like leafy stitches overhead. Bunches of herbaceous shrubs, flowers, vines, vegetables, and fruity plants crowded the spaces in between, hanging in buckets overhead, plots of earth in between the trees, or in a variety of pots of all shapes and sizes. The plant life filled the inside of the tent with the calming, easy scent of green. By the dilation of Katonah's eyes, Leo could tell the smell was intoxicating to her.

"What is this place?" she breathed.

"It's a garden shop," Leo explained. "Sometimes people want to plant trees or vegetables near their homes. They come here for the supplies."

Katonah gazed over at one of the small saplings. "Where do they get the trees from?"

"A forest, I'd wager." Leo cocked his head. "Sometimes, they uproot old trees and grow them in pots. Other times, they simply use the seeds to grow saplings."

Katonah nodded, but Leo suspected she wasn't really listening. She gravitated towards a particular sapling, stroking its smooth bark. He wondered if she was speaking to it. He let her, remaining silent and simply watching. A woman appeared, probably the shop owner, asking if she could help, but Leo waved her off. After a long moment, he cleared his throat.

"Katonah," he said.

She blinked and turned to him. "Yes?"

"Many people over the years have complained that Castle Krakenburg is a dark and dreary place," he said, folding his arms behind him. "Some find its isolation suffocating, and others find its inner décor unfriendly and uninviting. It's generally agreed that the place needs a splash of color, but none of us, Xander included, were quite sure on how to remedy such a situation...until now." He gestured. "Do you think the castle could do with some natural life?"

Katonah glanced over at the pots of flowers, all of them cheerfully colorful and in full bloom. He could practically see her imagining such vibrant color in the dreary halls of the castle.

"I don't know," she said. "Flowers might clash with the castle's...color scheme."

He smirked. "I'm sure you would figure out a way to incorporate it."

That threw her for a loop. "Me?"

"Yes. I'm sure that we could hire an interior decorator to renovate the insides of the castle, make them more people-friendly, but I believe that you're the woman best suited for the job."

Her cheeks turned rosy. "Why me?"

"You're from the moor. You know more about natural beauty than most people in Nohr probably do. The same goes with caring for plants."

She shifted. "I wouldn't say that—"

"You see them as people, don't you? You said as much when we talked about your tribe. We see plants as things. Can you see why I think that you're better equipped to handle them?"

She was still a little uncertain. "So...you're saying that you want me to...?"

"I want you to undertake a beautification project for Castle Krakenburg," Leo explained. "She's housed us for so long, and yet she only gets more unfriendly as the years wear on. I want you to take these plants, these trees, as many or as few as you like, and use them to make her more...livable. Make her less suffocating." He shrugged. "It's a lot to ask, I know, but I feel like you need it."

"Like I need it?"

Leo's mouth parted in dismay. He'd gotten ahead of himself again, and he felt his ears heating up. "You...and the castle," he said, his words uncharacteristically clumsy. He looked away. "So...will you do it?" he said in a rush.

There was a stretch of silence. He felt her watching him and, for some reason, could not muster the courage to look at her. The blush had spread across his cheeks now in a band of red heat, and he could not diffuse his embarrassment. The conversation with Xander after dinner a few days ago made him realize that even though Xander and Katonah were nothing alike, they both succeeded in drawing the truth out of him, making him reveal embarrassing emotions that he'd meant to keep hidden.

After a long moment, Katonah said, "Yes, I'll do it. I'd be happy to do it."

Really. Leo glanced up to find Katonah smiling amiably at him. Yet, something in her eyes made him distinctly uncomfortable — there was something different about the way she was looking at him now, something that made the blush in his cheeks intensify. He couldn't even begin to guess what it was, and wasn't sure he wanted to. He was too afraid of what it might be.

He cleared his throat, unsuccessfully hiding his embarrassment. "Good. I'm glad. Well...how many plants would you like?"

She tipped her head on one side. "How much can our wyvern carry?"

(/\)

Leo did some calculations and estimated that their wyvern could carry around thirty-pounds-worth of gardening supplies. Even so, they went ahead and bought two hundred pounds of plant life, including four young saplings and twelve plots of tulips. Leo made arrangements with the shop owner to have the one hundred and seventy pounds of surplus stored away until he could arrange for someone — probably Niles, the blackguard — to fly out and ferry the rest of it back to the castle.

In the meantime, Leo and Katonah made several trips back up to the surface, carrying armloads of flowerpots, sacks of mulch and tools, and bags of seeds up to the canal, where their wyvern was still waiting, its black scales glowing silver in the rapidly growing morning light.

It was quite a relief when the lizard was finally packed with all of their merchandise and they were finally ready to go back to the castle. By then, Leo was desperately tired and struggling to keep his eyes open, even as the sunlight peeking over the city skyline continued to strengthen. But a jolt of alertness raced up his arm when Katonah, uncertainly, placed her hand over his.

"Um, Lord Leo..." She looked and sounded embarrassed. "I'm sorry, I..." She laughed nervously. "Up until we'd reached the garden shop, I hadn't realized..." She cleared her throat. "I hadn't realized how worried you were about me. You mentioned a surprise, but I still didn't really understand that you may have brought me here for my sake, that you gave me this project for me, not for you or anyone else — I just assumed that you thought it was important that I know how to mail a letter or something and..." She looked away. "Gods, I'm so bad at this, I'm sorry. What I'm trying to say is that..."

She gazed up into his eyes finally, and he sucked in a breath. There it was again, whatever it was: that openness, that raw tenderness in her eyes that she showed him without chagrin, without shame. It made the air thicken around them, as if more oxygen was suddenly crammed into the space around them, increasing the temperature and making the hairs on his skin rise at the brush of invisible electricity.

"Thank you," she said. She seemed to feel the thundercloud too, because suddenly her words came out breathlessly. "Thank you for caring, Leo. This is more than anyone else has done for me since I left the moor. You didn't have to do it — as the prince of Nohr, you're obligated to be as derisive as Xander, but you aren't, and you did. You don't know how much that means to me."

Leo swallowed. He was stunned at how important that was to him: hearing those words, hearing her appreciation. He wanted to be important to her. No, he didn't want it, he realized — he craved it. A deep, nearly forgotten part of him craved it, and even as he questioned why, he saw why: in this lonely, cold world that he lived in, the same world he shared with Corrin, this woman, this Earth Tribe princess, made him feel human, for the first time in a long time. She made him feel strong. She made him feel important. She made him feel unique, singular. She reminded him that he was alive and that he was likeable enough, worthy enough, to warrant the tension that crackled in between them.

The tension that continued to grow with every passing second.

She was watching him, waiting for him to say something. Say something. The thick air demanded it of him, yet he was still having trouble swallowing. Her words had completely shaken him, and now he fought two opposing forces warring inside him: the impulse to tell her how he felt, and the impulse to stay safe, in lieu of saying something he'd later regret.

But he said neither. Staring down, he mumbled, "I don't know what to say."

And yet, in those words, in their thick grit, their wobble, he let her see just how much she'd unbalanced him, just how deep he was in her thrall. Until he'd spoken, he hadn't even known how deep he'd jumped. And that frightened him.

A moment of silence passed, two. By now, the air was so thick that it threatened to burst into lightning at any second. It became hard to breathe. Leo still couldn't look at Katonah. His face was reddening again.

Finally, Katonah moved. Stepping to his side, she rose on her toes and kissed his cheek.

(/\)

The ride back to the castle was cold and silent. Katonah sat behind him, her arms wound comfortably around his waist, dozing. The wyvern was doing most of the flying; Leo stared straight ahead, watching the stars but not really watching them. His hands were shaking.

He remembered standing at Katonah's door earlier that night, that premonition overcoming him, one telling him that he'd reached the point of no return. The edge of a shadow. The lip of a precipice.

Now, he'd stepped into the darkness, rendering himself blind. He'd jumped from the cliff, with no idea of how far down lay the canyon floor. Seeds of feelings for Katonah had planted themselves into his heart, and tonight the first leaves had burst through the soil, vulnerable and exposed. He'd taken the first step into the unknown, and it all felt so familiar, so painfully, terrifyingly familiar.

After all, wasn't this how he'd fallen in love with Corrin?

--

Yep, I did it. A couple of you already guessed last chapter. And since Corrin will be making an appearance later on, this Katonah x Leo x Corrin setup is certainly going to make the rest of the book interesting to write.

Oh, and uh... EARTH SONG IS NOW ON HIATUS. Sorry, but I'm still working on the next several chapters, as well as fixing any plot holes/stupidity I see in my planning (and there has been some stupid stuff. I look at it and I'm like, "I actually thought that was a good idea?").

More updates are possible in the next several weeks, but do not expect for them to be regular. Again, sorry!