The moment Yuuri sat down at his desk, Murata picked up the entire stack of paperwork and began sorting it into two piles, one of which was much bigger than
the other.
What are you doing?" asked Yuuri.
"Helping you. I'll pull out anything you might actually want to read. Just sign the rest." He watched Yuuri scrawl his absurdly long signature to the bottom of the
first document and leaned against the desk as he quickly sorted through the rest. "So, are you going to break the engagement or marry him?"
"What?" Yuuri yelped.
"Don't stop signing. You don't need to think to do that. None of these are remotely interesting. Forcing you to read this is either a stall tactic or an exercise in
cruelty. Probably both."
Flushing, Yuuri focused more than he actually needed to on the documents he was signing. That was easier than finding out what sort of expression was on
Murata's face. "I know how it looked earlier, but..." He closed his mouth and signed his name again. It wasn't quite as bad as it had looked, but it was close
enough that he didn't want to lie about it.
"The only reason I ask," Murata informed him, as he slid the stack of trivial nonsense in front of Yuuri, "is because, as a rule, fiances don't have sex before
marriage here. Get caught flaunting that tradition and you really will find yourself in a shotgun wedding."
Yuuri's arm jerked, leaving a streak of ink across his desk. "We're not having sex! Not even close!"
Murata sighed and didn't complain about the fact that Yuuri was staring at him and no longer signing. "You looked close enough for his brothers to demand a
wedding. Take my word for that. If you thought an accidental engagement was awkward, a forced marriage would be pure hell. Not the least of which because,
as the Maou, you'd gain the reputation of being a wimp who was dragged to the alter by force." He gave Yuuri a wry smile. "You can give up on ever being
taken seriously as the king if that happens. Since you haven't asked me to help you escape back to Earth yet, I'm guessing you plan to continue on as the
Maou. I'm telling you, a shotgun wedding is the last thing you want. Don't forget, once married you would actually have to consummate the marriage."
Yuuri couldn't focus on the threat of a shotgun wedding and how badly that would undermine his reputation as the Maou because his mind, and hormones,
were consumed by the thought of a wedding night. Marriage meant a wedding night. Black sheets and Wolfram in white? It would be like last night except
Wolfram wouldn't walk away from him this time. Would he be forward and bold again, or would he hesitate? Would Wolfram expect him to know what to do?
Then it occured to him that on their wedding night everyone in the castle would know exactly what they were doing. The thought of that, everyone watching him
knowingly and him frozen like a deer in headlights, had him breaking into a cold sweat.
"That's what I was afraid of," Murata muttered. So much for Yuuri's impending birthday sending his hormones out of control. He looked both terrified and sick
to his stomach, as if he still couldn't accept that such things happened between two males. "You need to move back into your own room, Shibuya. Everyone in
the castle is worried about what's going on between you two." Yuuri snapped him a wide-eyed look, growing even paler. Maybe Conrad was right and Yuuri
really was as innocent as the pure driven snow. He had a strong urge to smack that out of him. "If you're that set against it, then leave Wolfram alone until you
can end the engagement. Then you can both marry someone else."
"He's not marrying anyone but me and I am not ending the engagement!"
Yuuri shot to his feet and the force of his maryoku nearly had Murata slipping from where he was half-sitting against the side of the desk. Well, then. The
corners of his mouth twitched for a moment before he could mask his surprise. "You're not?"
"No!"
"Why not?" Murata raised an eyebrow when Yuuri's mouth snapped shut. As he stared at him he saw a dark blush completely take over his face. This time
when his lips twitched he didn't stop the smirk from forming. "Oh. And here I thought I had misjudged you. Puberty finally hit, eh, Shibuya? He is very attractive.
Beautiful and passionate. You'd have to be dead not to notice."
"You keep noticing and you will be dead," Yuuri growled, though it was mostly bluster. He sat down hard in his chair and willed the embarrassed heat off out of
his face. "I saw the way you looked at him this morning."
"Yes," Murata admitted, "but I'm not engaged to him. I'm not even a noble. If he were interested, he could take me as a lover without bothering with an
engagement." He watched with satisfaction as Yuuri's face tightened and his maryoku flared. It was nice to have proof that he hadn't misread the situation
after all. "You, on the other hand, have to play by their rules. Messing around with him is one thing, but don't let him push you into sex unless you're absolutely
certain you want to be married to him. For good and for real. He's not going to let you sleep around once you tie the knot. He'd likely kill you first." He lowered
his voice and said gravely, "You could die of old age without ever having known a woman."
As if that were the most horrible thing imaginable. Yuuri snorted and smiled despite himself. "Are you really a skirt-chaser, or do you just wish you were?"
"I have lived a lot of lives. Although I don't like to boast of my conquests," he said in a boasting tone, "I rarely had to do the chasing. They came to me. Just
one of my many charms."
Up until this lifetime, where he was a geek who got bullied to the point where he needed someone like Yuuri to rescue him. It was very hard to look at Murata
and see a person with any experience, let alone tons of it. He must have had sex in at least some of his lives, though. Yuuri squirmed at the awkwardness of it
as he asked, "Have you ever...done anything? With another guy?" For a moment Murata's eyes gleamed with pure deviousness behind his glasses and Yuuri
nearly bolted. Then he blinked and he was just another guy eager for some locker room boasting of his exploits.
"I've been around that block a time or two. There was this one time with scarves," and he grinned at how Yuuri was leaning toward him with wide eyes, "but you
wouldn't be interested in that since you have access to Earth. Fur covered handcuffs would be much sturdier."
A little whine started in Yuuri's throat and he gulped it down furiously. Bondage. Murata was talking about bondage sex. His imagination was eager to try
placing him and Wolfram into such a scenario and they hadn't even made out. Not really. "Not..." He coughed when his voice broke embarrassingly. "That's
not..."
"Too advanced?" Murata ventured. "Sorry. Have the two of you even kissed?" A furious blush assured him that they had, but there was a hint of guilt and
uncertainty in Yuuri's eyes that made him wonder. "Did it go badly...?"
"I don't know," Yuuri admitted with a groan. "I thought it was...it seemed like...but then he...I just don't know. I don't know what to think. He's eighty years old!
But Conrad says that makes him about my age. And yet he didn't act like he even-" He grimaced miserably. "There I was and he wasn't even..."
"Oh," Murata sighed with relief. "That. Someone should have warned you about that." He was sure Conrad would have done so if Yuuri hadn't been engaged
to his virginal little brother. "They're hormone surges, Shibuya. All Mazoku go through that when they come of age. It's worse for you because as the Maou you
have a lot of maryoku tied up with your hormones and emotions. Just do your best not to let your Maou side take over and you should be fine."
Was it his 'Maou side' that he had been fighting last night? His violent response had seemed so much worse faced with Wolfram's complete lack of one. "Is it
like puberty, then? Do mazoku have a second one or is this the only one they go through?"
"We, not they," Murata corrected him with a smile. "And, yes, that's a fine comparison. It's merely a second milestone on the road to adulthood."
"Then Wolfram went through it, too." Did that mean Wolfram would understand and sympathize, or that he'd look down on him for losing control so easily? He
didn't want to be the only one reacting like that, and he definitely didn't want Wolfram looking down on him because of it. And what if he did lose control? "What
is my 'maou side'? Do you know if that was really part of me or something to do with Shinou?" The question was out before he remembered he probably
shouldn't bring Shinou up around Murata. But the boy didn't look bothered, didn't hesitate at all. He even offered him a smile.
"That's all you, Shibuya. I don't know why your imagination gave it a separate personality, but it's just an aspect of who you are. Maybe it was your mind's way
of letting your maryoku and instincts act when you weren't yet ready to take charge yourself. He's more like a uniform you put on than another person sharing
your body. With practice you should be able to don that uniform without pretending you're someone else."
"Practice," Yuuri huffed, with a little laugh. "It comes out when I'm angry. I'm not sure I can practice being angry."
"I suspect you'll get more practice than you actually need," Murata admitted. He directed Yuuri's attention back to the stack of busy-work before him. Although
Yuuri was the very powder-keg of hormones he had assumed he would be by now, things hadn't progressed far enough to risk an explosion just yet. If Yuuri
caught the brothers plotting to send Wolfram away he might banish the lot of them. The kingdom would sink without Gwendal at the helm. Murata was too fond
of Shin Makoku to let that happen.
.-.
Wolfram spent the morning consumed by desire and fear. He couldn't stop reliving the kiss and that horrible moment when he had pulled away. He had
imagined himself back in that cave, free from responsibility and inhibitions, just him and Yuuri away from the world and he wanted. He wanted that intimacy, the
merging, and he wanted Yuuri to want it, too. But they hadn't been in that cave. They'd been in his bedroom, in the castle, fiance and Maou, and he couldn't
bear to have Yuuri be the one who pulled away first. The rejection would have broken him. It still might. He should never have kissed him, not like that. The
desire should have been locked up tight, buried under a mountain of snow and ice so deeply no amount of fire could reach it. Now it had surfaced, was
burning in his chest, and he didn't know what to do about it. He had a desperate desire to talk to his mother. That terrified him more than anything.
He transferred that terror onto the servant who showed up to pass along an invitation to breakfast from Yuuri. She fled down the hall to see about returning his
room to some semblance of normalcy. He watched her disappear with a ghost of satisfaction before turning on his heel and heading in the other direction.
Using a servant's exit he made it all the way to the stables before his escape was blocked by an orange-haired man who was smiling in a way he didn't
appreciate at all. He never liked being laughed at. Now he couldn't bear it.
"Where are you running away to?" Yozak asked, casually filling the entrance to the stables.
Wolfram halted in his tracks. Was he really running away? From Yuuri? From his own feelings for Yuuri? So much for his pride. He looked past Yozak and
caught sight of his horse down the way. Cowardly or not, he needed this. He needed out, away, just for a while, just long enough to quiet the fear. "I'm going to
the temple," he decided. Now that Shinou was gone it would be a place of solitude, if nothing else.
Yozak took a slow step forward so that Wolfram grudgingly looked back at him. "The Great Sage is currently in the castle, if you were hoping to talk to him.
Besides that, I have it on good authority Von Voltaire wants to have a word with you." He jerked his chin up, directing Wolfram to look back over his shoulder to
where a green uniformed man was hurrying across the courtyard towards them. He caught a glimpse of Wolfram's clenched teeth before the boy snapped
around and marched over to meet the man halfway. Yozak couldn't help but sigh in sympathy for him. The poor kid looked fit to explode. He supposed he
could have let him escape for a little while, shadowing him at a distance to keep Conrad happy. But if Wolfram was that eager to get away from the castle he
might very well jump at whatever excuse the brothers had come up with.
Wolfram clenched his fists so tightly they trembled as he stalked through the halls, outpacing the soldier who continued to follow him as if he might refuse the
summons. If Gwendal wanted to speak to him during breakfast then it concerned Yuuri and his decision to move into his room. He didn't want to deal with this.
He couldn't deal with this right now. What did he care about propriety when he was drowning? But Yozak had been staking out the stables, which pointed to
Conrad's involvement as well. Better to face them now and be done with it. Maybe then they would direct their complaints to Yuuri for once. This couldn't
possibly be entirely his fault. Yuuri deserved some blame for this, surely. Even the kiss hadn't been entirely his fault. Yuuri had kissed him back, he really had,
and now he found himself wishing he hadn't. The unfairness of that was so painful he could barely breathe past it. He didn't want to do battle with his brothers.
He wanted to cry to his mother. Oh, how he hated himself for that.
Conrad and Gunter were waiting in Gwendal's office. Wolfram entered the room, taking what was fast becoming his usual spot before the desk, and looked
past them all to and through the window visible past Gwendal's head. He didn't have to engage them. All he had to do was listen dutifully, and then he'd be
free to go. He could do that. The lecture began predictably with the inappropriateness of the Maou sleeping in the soldiers' wing. As petty as taking a black
horse away from a little girl, Wolfram thought to himself. Except a black horse was a target as surely as a Maou surrounded by soldiers. He knew that,
accepted it, even. He wasn't to blame for this. Not that anyone cared. His eyes latched onto the tiny form of a winged skeleton in the sky and that brought to
mind Yuuri's helpless amusement at the fanciful notion of such things. He quickly directed his blank stare to the clouds instead.
"Are you listening?" Gwendal demanded.
"Yes," said Wolfram. His own voice sounded so calm and polite, even casual, that he marveled at himself. He let his eyes drop and focus on his oldest brother
and was surprised to find that it was easy. He simply didn't care. Compared to the turmoil eating him from the inside out his brother's frustration, criticism, and
disappointment, none of it seemed that important. He didn't care. "It's inappropriate and unacceptable. Would you like me to explain that to His Majesty on your
behalf?" He wondered if it were cruel to let them see how little he cared. He didn't care if it was. That should have been funny but wasn't.
"I would like for you to take this seriously," Gwendal bit out.
"Wolfram," Conrad started, taking a step toward him. "This situation is more concerning than you realize." Wolfram looked over at him and a cold chill clawed
its way down his spine. There was nothing in his eyes. The vivid green was flat, as blank as his expressionless face. As if he wasn't even in the room. Conrad
sent a shocked look at Gwendal, finally understanding why he had been so rigid since the moment Wolfram entered the room. Was this what he had meant?
How often had Gwendal seen him like this? "Wolfram," Conrad said again, more firmly this time.
A hand reached for Wolfram's shoulder and he took a sharp step back. If Conrad touched him he was fairly sure he would hurt him. What a nice mess that
would make. "Just say it. The situation is concerning. In what way? And what do you expect me to do about it?"
Conrad was silent for so long that Gunter jumped into the breach. "Someone may be attempting to harm His Majesty." He quickly explained about Morgif, the
map, and the attempt on his bedroom door. Taken as a whole, and with Wolfram's uninterested stare drilling through him, Gunter suffered a moment of doubt.
It actually didn't sound that threatening, did it? But this was Yuuri they were talking about. "His Majesty's very life may be in danger!"
"Would you like me to bar my door against him?" asked Wolfram. If Yuuri was a real Maou that wouldn't stop him, but since he was Yuuri it probably would.
There would be no more private talks, no more kissing, and without the temptation maybe the fear would go away, too. That would be nice. Wouldn't it? "Or I
could leave the castle for a while," he offered. His brothers stiffened as if he had struck them. As if his presence here was really necessary, anyway. "I would
be back in time for the ball."
Gwendal dropped his eyes so his glare burned into his desk. He hated this. "As a matter of fact, that-"
"No!" Conrad said sharply. "That's no longer-"
The door to the office was thrown open and Anissina swept in as if they were, or should have been, expecting her. She smiled at Wolfram, who blinked,
flinched, and then slowly started edging away from her. Then she directed the full force of her annoyance at Gwendal. "Since when am I left out of strategic
family meetings? I should have been invited."
Gwendal tensed, fighting not to fidget. "Can't this wait?" he asked through his teeth.
"Why?" she demanded. "So you can jump to even more ludicrous conclusions?" She turned back to Wolfram, who had edged closer to Conrad as if he could
actually hide behind him. "I delivered Morgif to your room. One of the maids mentioned having found Yuuri's clothes in the bath and since I doubted he had
been washed back to his world this soon I decided to save you both some embarrassment in the morning. You may thank me this afternoon. I have been
designing an experiment that has your name written all over it." She enjoyed the way Wolfram cringed. then she snapped an annoyed look back to Gwendal.
Really, the man was too old to be so foolish. "As for the map..." She stepped aside to reveal a little girl with hunched shoulders and a piece of folded paper
clutched in both hands.
"I'm sorry," Greta cried, her eyes pleading with Gwendal. "I was just letting Yuuri borrow it. I didn't mean to get anyone in trouble!"
"You?" Conrad demanded in disbelief. He flushed guiltily when Great flinched at his tone. "I'm sorry," he said quickly, lowering his voice. "I'm just...surprised.
How did you come by a map like that?" With someone's help, obviously. Which meant Yozak was right. How could Yozak have been right when he hadn't even
been in the castle for more than a day at a time in months?
Greta gave him a wary look and took the hand Anissina offered her. "It's my map. I wanted to see Wolfram. Then I dreamt about finding him and that's how I
got the map. He's almost always at the red x when he's in the castle. I only loaned it to Yuuri so he could visit him..."
"You saw it in a dream?" Gunter asked, his tone dripping with skepticism. He regretted that when both Gwendal and Anissina pinned him with black reproachful
stares. "Not that I doubt you in any way, of course!" He wouldn't dream of calling His Majesty's daughter a liar. "I'm just...surprised. Yes," he nodded to Conrad,
"it's quite a surprise."
"Indeed," Anissina said icily. Then she turned, reached around Conrad to catch Wolfram by the arm, and swept both him and Greta toward the door. "Next time
you decide to have a strategy meeting," she called over her shoulder, "do remember to invite the most intelligent person in this castle."
Silence reigned in the office as all three men dropped their eyes. Gwendal was relieved she had chosen Wolfram as her torture subject. He hadn't failed to
notice that her arrival had immediately brought life, and a natural fear, to his eyes. She did have that much going for her, at least. Gunter was torn between
loyalty to his king and the urge to point out to anyone who would listen that humans simply didn't have prophetic dreams without the use of houjutsu. Either
Greta had lied or there was something very strange going on with her. Yet how could he point that logical fact out when even Gwendal didn't want to hear it?
Conrad was feeling foolish and uncertain. Yozak was right? Meddling females afoot and they had all looked to Cecilie without even considering that Anissina
was still in residence. Wolfram had come back the moment she appeared. How wrong was it that he was so distant from his own brothers that it took someone
like her to bring him back? Had he drifted that far on his own or had they driven him to it? Or had Yuuri's departure done that? He had been so focused on
protecting Wolfram physically that he hadn't given a thought to his emotional state. He had no idea what was happening to him, let alone how to fix it.
The silence continued, growing heavier until it oozed out into the hall. Murata wrinkled his nose at it and then peeked his head into the room. "I take it this
means you won't be sending Wolfram away. Right?" The two brothers merely stiffened in surprise, but Gunter gave a startled jump and nearly tripped on his
own robes. Murata smiled at him for that lively response. "Isn't it amazing what you can learn when you simply ask people? And it's so much more efficient than
speculating and assuming the worst. All of you have missed breakfast, by the way. That's too bad. The cooks informed the rest of us that today's experiment is
going to keep them so busy they've decided to skip lunch and serve an extra large dinner instead. Just in case you start wondering why there's no lunch being
served and decide to assume it's an evil plot on the side of the kitchen workers or something." With a knowing smile he strolled on past the room, leaving them
to their syrupy silence. There was no harm in rubbing their faces in it a little. They were the ones who had requested his assistance, after all.
.-.
PART 10
.-.
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