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Crimson Days, she'd called it.
Acrius isn't sure what, exactly, that entails. He'd asked in passing as they walked through the Tower; banners and all sorts of odd decorations had been strewn around the Courtyard - all of it seeming to stem from a secluded corner with a massive Titan.
But the Young Wolf had offered nothing more on the matter.
The Valus couldn't even decipher her voice this time - it's ordinarily so easy for him to read her on matters like this. After the Festival of the Lost incident, he'd opted to try and partake in more human customs as she has for him aboard the flagship.
But this particular instance? The Young Wolf is a mystery.
Acrius waits patiently as his partner speaks with the Gunsmith, discussing modifications to a pulse rifle or something or other. He's far too enthralled in tracing the swirling ribbons with his eyes - they seem to form an oddly geometric shape Acrius is unfamiliar with.
"Are you ready?"
Her voice beside him jars the Valus from his idle thoughts and his gaze falls to the Gunslinger beside him.
"What are those shapes meant to represent?" He points to the overhanging banister.
The Guardian looks up, angling her head. "That's a heart," she supplies nonchalantly, "We associate them with love and affection."
"...that doesn't look like your organ?"
The Young Wolf snorts a laugh, "It's not meant to, love. It's…I don't know the origins of it exactly but we believe that's where we feel love, in our hearts." She reaches up, patting over top where his heart is, "The shape is more or less just a representation and if you angle two organs," she gives him a teasing look, "together, they form that shape. Two hearts becoming one."
"...seems," he pauses, noting her expectant head tilt. "Sentimental?"
She snorts, "Smooth save, lover boy." She gives him a light push before she starts past him.
Acrius sighs and falls into step beside the Guardian, "Humans have so many…events to celebrate weird things. The Dawning. Guardian Games?" He shakes his head. "There aren't even battles commemorating these things. They're just–"
"Fun," she interjects as they make their way back to the hangar. "The word you're looking for, my Valus, is fun."
"I was going to see needlessly leisurely but sure." Acrius grumbles, maneuvering to fit through the doorway with some trouble.
The Guardian shakes her head, stepping through the threshold without any issue.
"I think you're just…uptight."
Uptight?
There's nothing upright about wanting a reason for celebration. This event is also based on sentimental nonsense. No wonder the Vanguard–
His gaze falls to his partner, her gaze fixed on the stairs ahead of them as they walk.
She doesn't complain of his events, does she?
The Valus heaves a sigh, pausing long enough to gaze back at the Courtyard. A moment of reflection is all he needs to realize she's tried to keep a passive air about the whole thing. She held no…enthusiasm as she has when she explained the other 'holidays'.
So why is she dispassionate about this one?
He'd think she'd be more invested in this one. She has him, after all. And while he's fairly new to calling this love? His feelings for her have grown in the months since their binding.
He doesn't know that he could imagine his life without her now.
Returning to a silent bedroom now is torture enough when she's on assignment. Spending time at his station when she is aboard the flagship is even worse. He can't simply request a leave every time his partner returns so he can sleep beside her.
How very irritatingly sentimental of him.
But then again, the Guardian has never been shy about her feelings. Her affection for him, when it came about, suddenly became glaringly obvious. He can recall the first time she told him she loved him like it was just this morning. A tender moment between them in the aftermath of her first death in front of him…at his hand.
She's said it so many times since and he has grown to ache in its absence. To hear her utter it? It stirs a flutter in his chest, a warmth and tenderness foreign to his person until he met her.
But now? Now she utters it and yet, her talk about its significance - of love's significance - is bland and muted.
Acrius has to know why.
"Do you not enjoy this holiday, Little One?"
Her head lifts and angles toward him though her focus remains forward.
"I wouldn't say that–"
"Then why do you sounds so…forlorn when you speak of its role in this event." He finishes as his hand grasps her shoulder and pulls her to a halt in front of him.
The Guardian doesn't look up at him and that is his next clue something is amiss. He kneels, his hand shifting to cradle the side of her head but she pulls it away.
"What is it?" He coaxes softly, his hand falling away from her form.
"It's nothing–"
"I'd like to think I know you a bit better than that by now, Guardian." He returns stubbornly and he notes the way her shoulders sag.
"Talk to me, Little One. Let me help."
"It's not something you can help with, Acrius." She steps into him, pressing her form to his chest and his worry only grows. A large hand settles along her back, his brow furrowing as he holds her close.
"Let me try."
Silence hangs over them for a long while - the bustling of the Tower forgotten beyond this quiet passage. Between the hangar and the courtyard, they're afforded a small reprieve from the noise and the prying eyes of civilians and Vanguard alike.
"...we had a Cabal binding." She begins softly, uncertainly, "When it was decided, Zavala asked me if I'd ever want to do one on Earth. At the time, you and I didn't get along, I told him not to…because marriage meant something different to me."
Acrius's brow furrows, "What does it mean to you, Guardian?"
She hesitates, a degree of guilt in her voice when she finally speaks, "That I chose you. That this was more than a formality and there was somehow affection involved."
"But…there is affection now?" He draws back a fraction to see her, "Isn't there?"
Isn't that what she meant when she told him she loved him? Isn't that what it means in the first place? Affection? Tenderness? An unwavering bond between partners?
"Of course…we didn't get to choose each other but we did find," she searches for the right wording, “A certain amount of choice with each other.” She looks up at him, lifting a hand to smooth along the edge of his mask.
“We made the choice to love one another.”
Acrius’s eyes soften as he inclines his head into her touch, “Is it a choice you regret, Guardian?” He doesn’t recognize the uncertainty in his voice and…the fear? Is that what it is?
The idea that she could regret what they’ve become? That she may yet resent him for not only his behavior when they first met but his nature since? That stirs something deep in him - something pained and, no, agonized. Something like despair if this has all been for naught.
But when his partner presses a kiss to the bridge between his eyes, some of that panic ebbs. Yet, he finds himself drawing her closer, unconsciously curling fingers around her cloak in a silent plea.
Could you regret me, my love?
Another kiss and his head angles weakly.
Please, tell me.
The Young Wolf meets his gaze then, stroking a thumb over a patch of skin just above his mask. “I could never regret that choice, Acrius.” She assures him with a tender smile. “You make all of this madness a little more tolerable. I don’t return and feel as though I’m still drowning when I’m in your arms. I know nowhere safer than right here.”
She presses another kiss to her face before she speaks again.
“Loving you…is the best decision I ever made, Acrius.”
The Valus has an impulse to crush her against his chest in a loving embrace, but that would surely shatter most of her bones. He aches to kiss her but he cannot stand the idea of removing his mask in public. There is relief and desperation at war in his chest and all he can do is lower his head against hers and pray it is enough to sate the whirlwind of emotion.
Irritatingly sentimental…but he doesn’t care.
The Guardian nuzzles his face for a long moment before she wraps her arms around his neck as much as she can and hugs him impossibly tight for a creature so small.
“I love you, Acrius.”
“I love you, too, Guardian.” He murmurs, pressing his face against her shoulder.
It’s only after a weighted minute or two that he realizes she never truly explained why she felt this way about Crimson Days. He could ignore it, leave things as they were but he needed to know.
“If you don’t dislike this holiday, what has you so dispassionate about it, Little One?” He asks softly though he doesn’t pull back.
Her arms tighten around his neck and she presses closer.
“Because I’ve been wanting to ask you something…something important but menial at the same time. It’s stupid really.”
“Out with it, Hunter,” he chides with a soft chuckle. “It can’t be all that bad.”
She pulls back, her hands framing his face in a comically too small contrast. He can see a smile in her eyes despite the determination in her features.
“Acrius…will you marry me?” She asks softly, though there’s an assuredness to her tone. No fear just unequivocally awkward about the entire question.
Acrius stares at her for a lengthy instant before a laugh rumbles through him. “Yes, my love, I will marry you.”
She surges forward to hug him, but the force by which she does it is enough to force the Valus back and he ends up on his ass with his partner sprawled over him. They share a laugh, she mutters an apology but he’s impressed by her strength and dismisses it almost as quickly as it leaves her lips.
She relaxes atop him, curling around him as much as she can and Acrius holds her.
“That was all that kept you…contained?”
She huffs a sound of annoyance but they both know it’s not genuine.
“Well, Crimson Days is about love and…all that goes with it.” Her head lifts and she smiles at him tenderly, her feigned irritation long forgotten. “I didn’t get to choose you myself, but I got to choose to love you. And now I get to marry you in our customs,” she settles back down with a sigh of relief.
“Which means, in the end, I chose you, Acrius, to be my partner.”
That certainly is a roundabout way of thinking about why the holiday bothered her but Acrius isn’t about to question it. He has his answer and he has his Guardian.
He can’t ask for anymore.
But perhaps this one time…
“Hunter?”
She makes a sound of acknowledgement but her head does not lift from his chest. He starts to sit up, she looks up at him with something like protest in her eyes that he quiets almost immediately with a brush of his thumb over her cheek and jaw.
“...why don’t you show me more of these,” he angles his head with a tender smile, “Crimson Day festivities?”
Her eyes brighten, her spine straightening as she stares up at him before her eyes narrow and her head tilts.
“I thought they were nonsense.”
“You say they’re fun, I’ll indulge you, Little One. So long as I don’t have to dance.”
She laughs, “You weren’t that bad.”
“Clumsy is an apt descriptor for that atrocity.”
“But I enjoyed it,” she grins, climbing out of his lap and stepping back to give him space to get on his feet.
She’s happy again, that’s a relief. He doesn’t often get her in this sort of mood - carefree and substantially more energetic. He’ll take it. All of it. Her. The silly holidays - all of it if it means she keeps smiling at him this way.
In the end, this is all he wants.
As he straightens to his full height, the Young Wolf slips her hand in his - substantially smaller yet somehow, a perfect fit for them.
“Lead on, Little One. Show me the wonders of your Crimson Days.”
And she does.
—