fairlaetitia:
“It ain’t foolish to want her to be proud of you,” Ephram said, drawing Freddie in tight. “It ain’t foolish at all. And I reckon that’s what’s made this thing double confusing, is you spent your whole life trying to convince yourself that you didn’t need your mum, that you didn’t care nothin’ bout her approval, or disapproval, or whether or not she was proud of you or wanted you or missed you. So that’s a whole heap of stuff that you suddenly gotta deal with, standing right in front of you telling you that she needs and loves you.”
Ephram kissed Freddie’s hair, still holding him there like he could keep Freddie faced away from this whole Charybdis of a mess his darling was having to confront. He couldn’t, obviously; Freddie was their prince, and Laetitia was his mother the Queen, and there were a million things that needed to be looked at. But just for the space of them on this bed together, Ephram was willing and ready to be his husband’s safe port to the exclusion of all else.
“I think,” he said slowly, highly aware of his own blind spots in the area, “your mum’s really trying. Maybe we don’t know her full reasoning yet, but she’s a fairy, and the Unseelie Queen fairy at that, so it’s safe to reckon that she’s got a more self-serving motive at hand, right?” Ephram caught Ollie’s dark, wise eyes, the little Chin giving a huff of agreement with this supposition. “But honey – since when have you and me needed somebody to be totally pure and good and self-sacrificing to be worth having a relationship with? We know folks are more complex than that. And even though she’s your mum, with all the ideas and dreams that go with that sort’ve figure in your life, she’s a flawed person.”
None of this would be new to Freddie; Ephram was certain his fairy had examined Laetitia’s motives and temperament and neglect from every available angle. But hearing it from somebody else was another thing altogether.
“It might be worth giving her a chance. We’re both grown men and there’s three of us together. Her subjects seem likely to think for themselves so I don’t see em as any possible source of danger. Between you, Ollie, and me, if things go south we can handle it.” Ephram rubbed Freddie’s broad back, in a swirling motion that he’d developed to navigate his darling’s wings, feeling the muscles tight against his palm. Those words were somewhat more confident than he actually felt. In normal circumstances, the three of them were more than enough to get out of any predicaments.
In the fairy realm, with Freddie confronting a Mummy who it turned out had left him for survival reasons, and who now swept back into his life with praise and kisses and a throne for him? Chances were high that they were more compromised.
Freddie stayed quiet as Ephram spoke, just taking in the wisdom of everything his husband had to say and glorying in the comfort of both his and Ollie’s presence - then nodded his head against Ephram’s chest, pulling back to look his darling in the eye. “You’re right,” he said, needing to say it out loud to believe it. “The three of us can handle anything that comes our way. I love you both, and I’m so glad you’re here with me now. I don’t know where I’d be without you. Thank-you.”
And then he settled back down to cuddle some more, unsure he was yet up to anything else, and waiting on tenterhooks for Laetitia to return in need of yet another favour.
