310 Years Ago - Capital, Ensolian Imperium, Ensolia

  It was cold in the palace.

  A soft snow was falling from the sky this night, tiny flakes of ice gently dotting the far window of this small kitchen. A figure stands highlighted by the firelight, hurriedly mixing, heating, throwing, kneading dough. A taste of honey, cinnamon in the air; the oven alight with charcoal and love and desire and worry and panic.

  The next batch comes out, nestled within the copper sheet the white, uncooked edges of a pastry terribly made. Small circlets of dough cut open with a carving blade, stuffed with the steaming flesh of freshly picked figs from a conquered land and baked within the earthen oven of brick.

  They looked horrible, but were still a much better result compared to her earlier inedible lumps of charcoal or exploded bits of fruit matter that were tossed back into the oven for a crude, criminal disposal.

  I’ll need to taste it first. The young woman informs herself with confidence. Before I bring it to him I’ll need to make sure it…

  A pot is knocked over behind her, clattering onto the stone ground with explosive force. Reaction, like a released bow she moves with intense precision and speed. The small carving knife ripped from its place on the cutting board, and with a deft hand and continuous motion she sent the lethal edge to the shadowed figure standing at the doorway.

  And with an equal speed, the unknown body moved too. A masterful dodge to the sheen of incoming steel.

  “WOAH!” The voice, familiarly masculine and in that soft Reichland accent, shouted out as the thrown knife sinks itself into the wooden doorframe. “SOPHIA ITS ME!”

  The silvered haired Second Princess of the Imperium stopped just as she’s about to reach for the ceramic shortblade at her hip, watching carefully as the man stepped into the light of the burning oven.

  Chiseled jawed, blonde hair long and braided, and standing at her height. He wore his nightclothes, the young man’s simple pajamas betraying his unarmored, unarmed form. The weapons available to him now were found in simple muscularity, no blade or bludgeoning armament upon him.

  He comes down from the adrenaline rush, taking a deep breath as he holds up both his hands. “Goddess Sophia, you could’ve killed me.”

  “Do not scare me as such.” The Princess growled back, adjusting her body in an attempt at hiding the pastries behind her. “You are far too silent for your own benefit.”

  “Maybe I am.” He laughed at her ‘joke’, changing the topic quickly. “I was wondering where you went, I guess I found you.”

  “Why were you looking for me?”

  He smiled. “I wanted to talk with you.”

  “What is there to discuss?” She coldly continued.

  “Is it not natural for a husband to want to talk to his wife?”

  He had her there, Sophia Elise the First begrudgingly returning to her project. “There is nothing to discuss. I believe we have settled the court matters of today.”

  He lowered his voice, bringing that deep Reichland base tone down to her. “I didn’t want to talk to you about court matters. Not tonight.”

  Sophia gave him a cold shoulder shrug, wishing him to continue as she bit her tongue at her own distantness. CAN YOU NOT EVEN FACE YOUR OWN HUSBAND?!

  “Sophia, it’s been one year since I’ve met you.” He began to say.

  Ridiculous, they’ve only been married for four months.

  Six months ago the Reichlands’ last hold out, the “Goldmedaille Concord,” had as part of their unconditional surrender, brought before the Princess Sophia Elise the First nine princes and princesses of their united, defeated kingdoms for her selection.

  This Princess, the White Wolf, spoke with each one, and at the end of a week-long trial had chosen him for this marriage of diplomacy.

  You were attracted to his tactical mind, his handsome face, and his lean body. The Second Princess’ thought process reminded her. But also his… temperament.

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  How out of the nine kingdoms’ envoys, only his words didn’t seem desperate, overly flirtatious, or even arrogant. How even his stance seemed the most comfortable in that chair in that sunroom, and when he drank the served chamomile tea he simply joked that he much preferred something more caffeinated to keep his alertness, since he was facing an armed enemy general who could easily kill him (the Second Princess didn’t laugh, despite every fiber of her being screaming at her to).

  He continued stepping closer, the Second Princess adjusting her stance to block his view of the items behind her. His words are tragic, reminiscent in those blue eyes of his. “You were there in Goldmedaille, when they were transferring the soldiers out and bringing the Council in to sign the surrender.”

  The Second Princess failed to read him, her own disposition much better suited to driving ceramic blades through plate armor rather than playing this most intimate game of personal deception. He continued. “You were riding that Seastrider Horse of yours, and you were wearing that white cloak undirtied; with the imperial cross in silver.”

  He could have overhead that, a witness must’ve…

  “And you whispered to one of your ceramic demons before leaving it to escort us, ‘make sure they all make it home, safe and unharmed.’”

  Sophia freezed as she stares at her husband, at one of the dirty-faced officers that they had captured in the midst of the Concord’s final rout. In the warm mud and rain of that summer day, through the howls of trebuchets and catapults, hidden amongst them was the sole heir to a defeated power, a prince of…

  Goddess above, he was there.

  “Sophia.” He continued drawing closer. “When I heard you were to be married to one of the Nine’s heirs I fought for a place amongst them. They may have said that I gave myself up, sacrificed myself to bring peace to my homeland… but I did it for me.”

  And he doesn’t leave the last part to her interpretation. “I did it for us. When you gave that order to protect us, I finally realized that you weren’t the Scourge of the Divide, or the White Wolf, that you weren’t a destroyer or some monster as I was told before…”

  He’s so close now, she’s pushed against the table as her breath tightens.

  “Sophia, I fell in love with you on that day. And I still love you, and I always will love you.”

  For you, I would march ten thousand miles to fight a thousand wars. I would sail a hundred oceans, if it meant coming home to you.

  This confession broke her, those eyes of hers completely locked onto his as she tried to find a response.

  You love him. Her own mind told her. In four months you have witnessed his kindness towards your servants, his humor as he played this foreign court so far away from home, his power as he so easily cut down a Baron of Montglace in a duel of blades; in four months your heart has ached for him. Do not hide it any longer, let it loose and let it live.

  Her cheeks were redder than overripe cherries now, and she instinctively put her hands over her face to hide this expression from him.

  Sophia can’t say it, so instead her husband finds that secret hidden behind her.

  “What is…?”

  “NO DON’T!” She screamed out loud. “PLEASE DON’T…”

  He takes his realization of the pastry on the plate, the filling and the recipe -- the implication of the food. He has to ask. “Were you making fig fritters…?”

  “I was!” She admits it right there, spitting out the words.

  “Who were you making them…”

  “I WAS MAKING THEM FOR YOU!” She howls at him.

  Oh.

  “And you know…” Her Husband began, trying not to make eye contact with his scowling wife.

  “I know what they mean. I know exactly what they mean.” She took a step closer to him, grabbing two of the things and stuffing one into his hands. “Eat. Now!”

  They were so undercooked, raw dough disgustingly elastic mixing with the sharp crisp of ripe fig seeds, crowned by the overwhelming taste of too much cinnamon. An awful flavor mixing in their mouths, how they laughed, smiled; how she put her hand onto his chest and his onto her waist. How as they carefully, gently touched their lips together they felt that fire growing within their chests against the chill of the snow outside.

  She moved her hand towards his waist, a sudden hesitation to his breath as she broke a small smile. My love, she pulled away, whispering to him as she ran a finger alongside his thigh. “Let us retire for the night.”

  How as she began to strip from him his sleepwear in their shared bed he had barely the time to whisper. “W-wait Sophia…”

  “You belong to me, husband.” She growled at him like a tundra wolf, straddling him as she tossed the blade she kept on her at all times carelessly onto the ground beside the bed. “You’re mine.”

  And in their nakedness and sleeplessness, as the snow continued to fall outside into drifts and as their bodies were filled with the rush of lovemaking, they spoke.

  “Sophia.” He whispered to her as they caught their breaths, the soft light of Unudo illuminating their bodies and his next confession. “Those fig fritters were awful.”

  She pressed into him, their flesh becoming a union of one as she laughed wildly at his joke, at the truth of that statement. “If all our heirs can have a love as wonderful as ours, then I can forever curse them to never create an edible dish again.”

  The 4th Princess Just Wants to Rot! is the canonical sequel to Sophia the First's story: .