Comms and Other Long FE Oneshots

Cranes and Dragons

*Part of something I call the Takumi Timeline. Conquest up until Izumo, and then stuff happens. All royal siblings survive.*

Leo stared up at the dark ceiling, then gave a slow, quiet exhale of frustration. How could the Hoshidans call these futons beds? There was nearly nothing between his back and the hard wooden floor. A soft shift, and then some footsteps caught his attention, and he turned his head. "I'm sorry you're awake, Father," Forrest told him solemnly, falling to his knees next to the futon with a thump. He gazed at Leo with sleepy dark brown eyes. "I'm awake too."

"A little bit, at least," Leo murmured wryly, lifting up the blanket in invitation. "Let's fix that, alright?"

Forrest beamed, crawling into the open space on the futon and keeping a slight distance from Leo. As he preferred it. He was lucky to have two such thoughtful boys for his sons. He let the blanket fall over the child, gently placing a hand on his pale blue hair that was still silky and soft even though it was tousled from being slept on. "This has been a very odd visit to Hoshido," Forrest remarked, closing his eyes. "Do you think that Uncle Takumi's alright?"

"People do fall ill, son, it's part of life," Leo replied, taking his hand away. "I'm sure he'll be fine."

Seemingly reassured, Forrest's breathing soon evened out and he fell asleep curled up on the futon. Leo kept an eye on him for a moment, and then sat up. Perhaps it was just his insomnia that was keeping him awake, though it kept hitting him whenever he was in Hoshido. He wasn't doing himself any good by just lying here. He carefully slid off of the futon, standing and walking over to the desk to light the lantern on it.

The glow of the fire inside the lantern illuminated most of the room, but Shigure and Forrest didn't even stir. Leo gave a slight smile, and then walked across the room and quietly left. There were no guards in these dark halls now, thank the gods. Their impassive faces and stiff manner always made Leo uncomfortable when he'd come across them. He eyed the door that all of the women of both royal families were behind as he passed it, but didn't pause. He knew that Azura would be asleep in there with all of their sisters, or if she wasn't, out by the lake. They didn't talk much at night here unless they accidentally ran into each other when they both had insomnia.

He carefully opened the door to the library, slipping inside, then paused when he saw another light glowing from behind one of the bookshelves. There was a continuous rustle of paper coming from that direction, too much for whoever it was to be reading. Leo frowned, then walked across the room to the other side of the shelf.

Prince Takumi didn't look up from the paper he was folding. The light from the lantern by his side was obviously meant for illuminating the paper and not him, but Leo could see the gray-brown color of that long, disheveled hair that he had never seen so loose or unkempt. "Evening."

The Hoshidan's voice was so soft that Leo almost didn't catch the greeting. "Too late to be called that, Takumi," he told him, coming over and eyeing the tatami mat that was directly across from where the other prince was focused on his paper folding. He could see other papers already folded in the shape of what looked like birds. This was called origami, wasn't it? "Your siblings said that you were feeling poorly."

"I'm always feeling poorly," Takumi replied, something wry in his voice. "It's just worse than usual this week. You can sit."

Leo refrained from asking why there was another mat, instead just sitting on it and crossing his legs and setting his lantern down in a way that cast Takumi into the light.

Gods. He had never seen the other prince so... unpolished. He'd never thought of the Hoshidans as polished, not on the Nohrian level, but they definitely maintained appearances. Judging by how pale Takumi was, though, and by the darker-than-usual circles under his eyes, he was too tired to care about keeping an image. His eyes, though... there had always been a fire in them, even when they got that strange, empty look that immediately had one of his sisters fussing over him when they saw it. That was absent, and Leo did not like the resulting dark and hollow look to the brown irises. "Are those birds?" he asked instead of one of the thousands of concerned questions that were swirling around in his head. Takumi had never reacted well to his sisters' or retainers' fussing, he was fairly certain that his reaction to a foreign prince's would be worse, even if they were on friendly terms now.