Claudeleth week, day 4: reunion/pining
[Pairing: Claude von Riegan x Byleth*]
Claude just got out another reunion of the round table and run out the castle, searching for a place where he could see the entrance of it, waiting for signs of life, in vain.
He decided to go around all the castle to calm himself, ignoring everyone who wanted to talk with him, touching his hair at every step, and watching out of the windows at the slightest noise.
Even with all this attention, concern and anxiety distracted him when the army returned inside the walls. He rushed out, searching for that green head he hadn’t seen in months, found some of his former classmates instead
“Ignatz! Hilda!” He rushed towards them, noticing as soon as he hugged them a lot of injuries and bandages on their body “Care to explain what happened? Where’s the professor?” he was still searching for that unique hair color
“We were suddenly attacked by the forces of Almyra in the last battle and we were reduced to what you see now”
“The professor, well… I think you should check the infirmary” The girl couldn’t look at the greenish eyes of the male in front of her, but as she found the courage to look up, he already left running like crazy with the infirmary as his goal.
The doctors and priests made him wait outside to complete the care of the wounded calmly.
As soon as they left the room and moved away enough, Claude rushed in trying to be as quiet as possible, searching for his beloved one and finally finding that figure lying in the last bed of the infirmary, under the window.
“Teach? Professor?” He tried with every name he used to try to arise a reaction in that apparently dead body, slowly cuddling that bright hair spread all over the pillow.
He remained beside that bed for all day, passing his fingers on the bandages that covered the face he loved to stare as first thing in the morning, that neck that was strangely clean from all the usual bites and hickeys -a thing that made the dark-skinned man laugh quietly- and the only hand free from the heavy blankets, searching with his eyes the other hand, apparently still covered.
Only in the middle of the night that exhausted body started to move again; the only eye free from the bandages allowed Byleth to see those unique colors on Claude’s sash and, looking a bit up from there, the face that was first directed towards the body on the bed was now bent, closed eyes due to his need of sleeping, arms resting on his tights and that tiny streak of hair covered his left eye.
Byleth sat down slowly, still feeling his body aching and reached for Claude’s hand; as soon as their hands touched, Claude straightened his back and opened his eyes suddenly, feeling something stinging in them before two tears, one from each eye
“Come here” Byleth coughed, waiting not more than a second before Claude wrapped that fragile body in his arms, feeling just a hand on his back as a response
“I’m sorry I left you alone on the battlefield. Next time I’ll leave those incompetents of the round table”
“No, you must help them and the county, you made the right choice”.
Claude tried to look up to be able to see those eyes that for all these months did nothing but dream yet, on the way to the latter, Claude’s eyes stopped at the height of Byleth’s left arm, or at least, at the height of where the arm should have been, but there wasn’t anything anymore.
“Oh yeah, I lost something on the way back here but it’s not important” Byleth smiled trying to calm down Claude, already in tears
“T-This isn’t important? You’re kidding right?” Even if he wanted to scream, he couldn’t, so he was there, powerless in front of what happened to the only one he loved, with tears as his only way to vent.
“I failed so this is what I deserve; they had to amputate half of Lorenz’s leg, Hilda lost her left eye and the right one is injured and I don’t know how many other people lost something and… Leonie and Raphael and many others that fought in the frontlines…. I tried to think about a successful strategy to protect everyone but I failed. I failed everything this time so this is nothing compared to what I deserve.” Byleth squeezed Claude with the remaining arm, trying to hold the tears in every way known.
“You said you tried right? That’s enough. I know you tried everything and I know that also the others understand this. You did your best but we’re still in war, if it’s not Almyra it’s the Empire and each time we lose our people, This time they caught you off guard and couldn’t think about a better strategy but you tried and that’s what matters. We all fail sometimes and we have to embrace the consequences and go on with our lives” He kept his beloved in his arms, cuddling every corner of that injured body, wiping off the tears from those red cheeks and leaving his lips in contact with the bandaged forehead “The important is that you’re here with me again, alive, maybe with fewer pieces than before but still beautiful and smart as always” He joked on this cruel reunion, trying to lighten the whole situation like he always did.
“I missed you…”
“You don’t know how much I missed you”
*I tried to write Byleth as neutral as possible and it’s really hell in earth-
I don’t even know if most of what I wrote makes sense, I’m sorry ;-;