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Johan looked back to him at the snort and replied with a sneer. He raised his head again, and sat up only enough to prop himself up by his elbow. “What exactly do you mean by that? ‘Sure?’ I wasn’t even talking to you anyway.” Just maybe if he grated on Fiori’s nerves enough he would leave the room completely, letting Johan alone to his rooms.
Fi glanced over at him and then sighed, setting his hand lightly on Johan's chest to push him down. He was still careful with Johan, even with his current apathy. "What I mean is that I doubt you have ever cared for a person who was not you and I doubt you ever will. You have all the compassion of a sea sponge, prince." For the first time, the title was sharp and hard, mocking instead of earnest.
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Johan didn’t fight this time when he was pushed down, and he stayed down. He winced at the word prince. It hadn’t bothered him until now, now that it was said with sharp mockery. Officially, technically he was no prince in the eyes of Nord Widona. His breath hitched when he tried to speak again, despite trying to stifle it. “You don’t know me, not at all, so don’t say that.” After a moment he added, “Prince.”
Fi winced when he heard that tiny little hitch, a tiny flash of guilt spiking through him before being overwhelmed by the numbness. Johan wore his arrogance like a coat of armor, it was hard to remember that he was mourning too. He'd lost everything last night. Even if he was a horrible person that still had to hurt, it wasn't right to punch down at him with something so petty. "I know you well enough, but… I am sorry. You do not deserve my annoyance, even if you are a pain." There was something almost playful in his voice, almost teasing. Making the effort was hard, but it was worth it.
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Johan brought his hands together at his stomach, where he felt a continuous pit since the guards surrounded him in the baths. He rubbed the prince ring indentation on his finger. It was very faded, but still there. Johan offered a small yet genuine smile up to the ceiling. He didn’t need the apology from Fiori, but it felt good to have it. “My brother used to call me that,” he admitted dryly. “Leviticus.”
Fi let out another snort and this one was softer, less derogatory. A laugh that had lost half its willpower somewhere. He still wasn't looking over at Johan, but if he had seen that smile on a better day he would've been absolutely delighted. "What? A pain?" He could see the image clearly in his mind's eye. "You are. Nice sometimes, but difficult always. And somehow it is still so easy to be around you."
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“I’m surprised you feel that way. I sold my brother into slavery and yet I’m still ‘nice sometimes’ and ‘easy to be around with.’” He shook his head side to side, focused on the simple motion as if it could help him wrap his mind around the concept. Maybe Fiori wasn’t so unbearable to be around either. He still wasn’t completely convinced. “But if it’s between being forgotten and being remembered for that, I guess I’ll take it.”
"I never said you were not a conniving bastard, it is just… easier to be around you than I had originally anticipated." His hand was still resting on Johan's chest ad he realized, dully, that he could feel the prince's heart beating beneath his fingertips. It was a soothing feeling, steady and sure. "You are very similar to me, but you are also very different. It is… hard to explain in your language. I do not have the words."
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“Rovnosiya.” Johan finished for him. “It’s a double meaning word, borrowed from another language I don’t care to remember the name of at the moment. It means both equinox and different yet the same. Two lines meeting at the same point and then continuing on their way in different directions.” He was very aware of Fiori’s hand on his chest. He didn’t particularly like it, but he also didn’t find it irritating enough yet to push him away.
"Rovnosiya," Fi echoed softly, feeling the word on his tongue. His pronunciation was too sharp. He'd never had the tongue for this lighter language, and his accent came out more now when he couldn't be bothered to polish it away., twisting words that should be feather-light into things as heavy as granite. "A good word, but… not entirely correct. Our lines have met already, and yet they meet again here. Do you have a word for the people whose paths you can't stop crossing?"
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“Damn, you caught that,” Johan sighed. He wished their paths had only crossed once and never met again. He preferred his memory of Fiori on the battlefield when nothing but a single goal was involved. Things were simpler then. “Perhaps the closest word you are looking for is vpánye. Not as flowery as the other one. It’s a common design that resembles a braid. Two, sometimes three wavy lines that intersect each other at the same points.”
Fiori laughed and let himself peer over at Johan. He always looked so troubled. He’d been different on the battlefield, still fiery but less weighed down, like an eagle diving in for the kill. Here he was a kept thing, a hooded falcon with nowhere to fly. “They all seem very flowery to me, Johannan. Vpánye or Rovnosiya, each one could fit us. What do I care if one is plain? All the words I know in your language are plain. You have too many words.”
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“Well then how do you explain anything in your language?” Johan peered over his nose back to Fiori. “If anything you have too little words.” He wasn’t as fluent in Usigen as Leviticus was. He’d always struggled with the language when he was younger and never saw much of a point to continue his studies when he was older. To him it was a barbaric language anyway, and he had no use for it other than basic sentences, just enough to talk to the slavers who took away Leviticus.
Fiori managed another laugh and shrugged. "We just… explain it. We do not have words that mean things like 'two lines that meet and go separate ways', we simply say 'two lines that meet and go separate ways'. It is easier that way, and it makes explaining to someone who does not know the language well easier because they can pick out all the separate words." He'd always enjoyed Widonian, even if he did speak it like a peasant instead of a noble.
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“It isn’t like we use those formal flowery words on a daily basis in casual conversation,” Johan countered, with a defensive lilt to his tone once again. It seemed to return every time he got too comfortable talking with Fiori. He drummed his fingers against the back of his other hand. “Why are you here anyway, especially if you prefer your own language to ours?” It was incredibly suspicious that Fiori was even here in the first place. Didn’t the prince of Usige have anything better to do?
"Then why have them at all?" Fi sounded genuinely curious. He didn't edge his words the way Johan always seemed to. "If you do not use them then what is the point of having them?" He watched Johan tap away while he thought, and then laughed again when he got the gist of what Johan was thinking about. It felt wrong a little, to let Johan make him so happy, but he could let that go because the little pinch of conscience was better than the all-consuming apathy of before. "I am here because I have a duty to fulfil, Johannan. And I never said I preferred Usigen."
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“I don’t know, I didn’t invent the language.” Johan stilled his hands and placed them at his sides. He was silent for a moment and the raised an eyebrow at Fiori’s laugh. He hadn’t meant his comment to be humorous. “To be my master?” He assumed, “In that case I release you if you’re duty, you’re free to leave. And obviously you would prefer Usigen, it suits you.”
Fi shook his head. "No. Not to be your master. It is not a duty you can release me from, Johannan. It is not a duty anyone can release me from." He needed to free his country, to throw out his uncle and clean up the mess he would inevitably make in Fiori's absence and get things running smoothly again. "Why should I prefer something just because it suits me? You prefer Widonian when Usigen would suit you just fine."
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Johan glanced down at Fiori with an almost offended expression, disbelieving that he would say such a thing. “Usigen does not suit me,” he spat. “What have I ever said that would make you think I even resemble the Usigen language in the slightest?” Johan scoffed, and reached his hands up to his heart. Heart sinking, he thought maybe his hair might resemble Usigen style. It did look somewhat like Fiori’s now. “I am, and will forever be Widonian royalty. By blood.”
"Widonians are… softer people, you do not prepare for war the same way Usigens do and yet… you lead like any one of my generals would." He looked over at Johan. Even with his hair cut short, he was Widonian through and through, pale and slim beneath his muscles with the prettiest blue eyes Fi had ever seen. "You do not talk, you fight. You push. You move. You wish to conquer instead of scheme. It is a very Usigen attitude, despite your blood."
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Johan slid his hand down his forehead, eventually covering his eyes with that hand. With some thought, and somewhere deep inside of himself he had to agree with Fiori. He did admire the Usigen’s way of fighting, and always had since he was old enough to start training. It felt more efficient, powerful, and more than that invigorating. “No, I can’t accept that. Usige is my enemy, Widona suits me just fine.”
Fi sighed and finally managed to slide his hand off of Johan's chest. He missed the heartbeat. He missed Cadmus, and wasn't that funny? He could go on for hours and hours being fine and then the memory punched its way into his thoughts and all he wanted to do was cry or run. Both were impossible. "If you cannot accept the truth then you cannot accept the truth. That doesn't make it any less true than it was before you decided to ignore it."
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Johan grimaced, but less out of pain and more from Fiori’s words. “That doesn’t—I don’t mean-“ he stammered, struggling for the right words. Eventually he gave up, took a breath, and decided to change the subject. “Have I been resting enough to your liking? Am I free to eat breakfast?”
Fi smiled up at the ceiling when he won their little argument, turning to Johan for a second before he pushed himself up into a sitting position. "If I could I would have you rest all day," he answered as he slid out of bed. He'd need to ask Levi about getting some new clothes. "But you would fight me over that and I do not wish to keep you caged for so long. Cora wants to see you today." He stripped off his shirt, shuffling through his saddle bag for a new one. "Will you be nice if we visit her?"
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“Cora wants to see me?” Johan echoed with a fair amount of surprise in his tone. He lifted his head up from the pillow. “Obviously I’ll be nice to her,” he promised, but didn’t make any promises about anyone else. He’d gotten so caught up in everything else in his life he’d stopped visiting her. That didn’t diminish the fact still he missed her terribly.
He only had one pair of clean pants. It was clear a visit to the tailors was imperative, especially when he had no idea where the washroom was. Another bullet point on the ever-growing list of things he needed to ask about. "She asked for you when I went down to make you dinner." He smoothed down his shirt, peering up at Johan with a surprised little frown. "You did not know she was missing you?"
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Johan inched his legs off the side of the bed. “I assumed she didn’t want to see me,” he admitted quietly, propping himself up to sit. Even if Cora told Fiori she wanted to see him last night, that was before the ceremony. Surely the news had gone around the castle like wildfire, and surely she didn’t want to see him now.
"She loves you, why in the world would she not want to see you?" Fi shot him a curious look, sliding his feet into riding boots. You weren't supposed to walk around barefoot in Widonian palaces, it seemed. Strange, but if it was polite who was Fiori to argue? "She said you were like her son, you know. She said she wished you would visit like you used to, that she missed having you around the kitchen."
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“I got busy,” Johan replied through a labored sigh. He glanced around the edge of the bed for his house shoes. They were less formal than ones he would wear outside, and much cleaner too. Unfortunately he had but no choice to walk barefoot last evening when he was caught in the bath. He stood up with help from the bed frame, sliding his feet into the fur-laced shoes. “And after last night, I’m not so sure she’ll think so highly of me.”
Fi nudged the shoes closer to Johan absently, scanning around for the hairbrush. Once his bedhead was dealt with he wandered over to the bed frame. "Not so busy now. Even knowing what you have done she wants to see you, I know it. Family does not let go of you so easily." He was hoovering, waiting until Johan seemed ready to go. "Am I allowed to pick you up today, or are you proud again?"
