here’s my first entry (day 1!) for @unappreciatedotomelove ‘s 30 day challenge! My personal challenge - take at least 10 minutes a day to write something for Yukimura, my best boy, and create an influx of love for him aww. Dunno if I’ll manage to write every day (probably not :c) but every 1 fic is 1 fic more than before!
Prompt: Day 1 - first of any kind AND saying goodbye
Characters: Ikemen Sengoku: Yukimura Sanada x MC
Genre: Fluff & Angst (?). No content warnings.
Summary: “I’ll never love another woman again. I don’t want anyone if I can’t have her.” A “train of thought” retelling of the events occurring over the course of Chapter 6/7 of Yukimura’s route. Might need to have played his route to really know what’s going on, idk.
The first time Yukimura held her hand was outside of the shrine at the festival. They’d gotten separated, even though he told her to stay close, but the flow of the crowd pried them apart, and he panicked, for the split moment she’d disappeared entirely from his sight. Her hand was soft - completely unlike his own, rough from years and years of fighting and training. And as he clasped her hand, he felt her own fingers curl against his and it sent a rush of heat to his cheeks - the fact that she was holding him just as much as he her. In this evening, dimly illuminated by moonlight and the glowing red of the lanterns adorning the festival stalls, she was beautiful, and Yukimura could pretend that the hue on his face came from the light of the lanterns instead of from how he looked at her.
The first time he saw her cry, his heart contorted in a way more painful than any wound he’d ever sustained. It was dangerous, after all, to be frozen with fear on the battlefield. And though he didn’t know what to do, he knew he had to do something - anything, except freeze up like he was about to, and he led her away from the crowds at the shrine and into the tree grove nearby, still holding her hand. Lord Shingen would have surely offered her a hand towel and sweet-talked the tears away, but Yukimura never knew how to deal with tears - not women’s, not children’s, and perhaps most of all - not his own. And he told her he didn’t want anyone else to see that vulnerable expression on her, but the words had tumbled out too easily, as if to cover up his true feelings - to let her cry in peace, away from strangers’ curious gazes. It was a strange, insatiable urge, to be the one she could feel at ease with, and allow her vulnerability to show.
The first time he kissed her, she was a rainbow of tastes. Salty - from her tears, running down her face and to her lips. Sweet - from the snacks he’d bought and that they shared, laughing as they did so. Sesame tofu, candied apple, sweet red bean paste bun… He tasted their entire evening on her lips and it was as if he relived it, and he knew these flavors would taste even sweeter when he again tried them. And she’d stopped crying by the time they pulled away, and the heat in her gaze was enough to make his heart pound - not that it hadn’t been doing so already.
The first time she made his blood run cold was when he saw her on the battlefield, arms wrapped tightly around Nobunaga’s waist. Their eyes met and hers widened, just as his had, and he forced himself to tear his gaze away before this terrible image burned into his soul. Even now, with her hair haphazardly tied back and strewn across her face by the wind, she was beautiful. Even now, with her face illuminated red by the dancing flames of the fires burning up around them, she was beautiful. War was far too devastating for as gentle a soul as her. But even caught in the heat of it, she was ethereal. Less like an angel, and more like a god - wild and fickle and dangerous. And as the flames danced around them, her expression broke and she begged them not to fight, and it took everything Yukimura had to push all thoughts of her away. It was dangerous, after all, to be frozen in fear on the battlefield, and he had a responsibility to keep his vassals safe - no matter what it took.
The first time she said his name, it felt like a stab to the heart. He wanted to pull her close and kiss her and plead against her ear, that Yuki had not been a lie, not entirely. That it wasn’t his name - but Lord Shingen called him that anyway, so it wasn’t not his name, either. That he wasn’t really a merchant, but - he’d come to love Azuchi and its tea houses and busy streets in his own way. That even though he’d kept the truth from her, he’d never lied. And most of all - that his feelings for her were real. That his heart had raced when she took his hand back at the festival. That he wanted to pull her close against him and protect her from the world when she, vulnerable, showed him her tearful face. That even now, so many days later, he still tasted her lips on his tongue, sweet and salty, like a ghost of a touch, a whisper of a memory.
It was the first time he’d fallen in love, and the first time his heart had shattered. And though she begged him not to go, though she said his name - Yukimura - with the same love she’d said Yuki, they could not be together. And though his heart raced madly and his chest and throat constricted with what felt like tears (he wouldn’t know - Yukimura couldn’t remember the last time he cried), they could not be together. And though she fit perfectly in his arms, and though they sank down onto the forest floor together and though his hands undid her obi sash and though their legs tangled with one another - they could not be together.
The first time they made love, he left her before sun-up. Making sure not to wake her, he wrapped her in her kimono as carefully as he could. He’d pressed one last lingering kiss to her cheek as he looked upon her resting figure, etching the sight that he would never see again into his mind.
It was the first time he’d fallen in love, and - Yukimura promised himself - the last.