content tags: MDNI!!! fluff, angst, mentions of past sex, unspecified age gap, maekar is complicated and is bad at feelings (surprise), northerner!reader but house is not specified, poorly beta read (you fucking KNOW IT IS), following tags contain spoilers (i guess?): misunderstandings, pregnancy.
author's note: this was supposed to be a multi-character drabble post but I couldn't shut the fuck up and it turned into sorta a one shot, will be doing the others later. also (off topic) look at how hot maemae looks in the first pic oh my god just put the baby in me??
Maekar knew that when his needy wife stopped clinging around him, stopped rambling on and on about any and every nonsense that crossed her mind that he fucked up — he must have.
You have never given any of his biting words any mind, always laughed them off.
He would go as far as to say you were annoying him on purpose because it amused you, because you loved it when he had enough and shut you up, and it didn't matter how he did it, whether he stuffed your mouth full with his cock or had your face buried in the pillows as he fucked that cattiness out of you, both of them were wins in your eyes.
But you hardly linger around him now, you barely even speak or meet his eyes for longer than a second anymore, and whenever you shared a bed you’d sleep turned away from him, never clinging to his back like you often would, he used to complain about it but now he missed it, missed your warmth.
He let this go on for days, hoping that he was overreacting and your mood would pass on it's own.
But the final straw was when he came to your shared bedchambers at the late hours — and you were not there.
Without a second thought he stomped to your old bedchamber, the one you quickly abandoned for his own at the very start of your marriage with the cheeky excuse of 'In the north we don't have separate bedchambers and if you truly care for me as your wife you would never let me sleep cold and alone.'
And what of him?
You would let him sleep cold and alone?
He found you awake still, pacing around before the hearth and wringing your hands together with a frown, seeming stressed like you had the weight of the world on your shoulders.
And out of all the dresses and jewelry you had worn, there was nothing you wore better than your smile. To see it gone for so long is unsettling.
That frown didn't suit you at all. The panic-stricken expression you gave him before you turned away from him was even worse.
"Why are you here, Maekar?"
Maekar?
What happened to my love? my darling? my dragon? my flame?
Even dragonman or maemae were preferable, at least you would be smiling then.
"I was tired," he walked up to you, his body joining with the flames of the hearth in warming you, still you don't turn.
"I came to our chambers, and was met with an empty bed with my wife nowhere in sight, care to tell me why that was?"
Silence.
"Look me in the eyes when I speak to you." Maekar said, voice low, gentle, and lacking the commanding tone one would expect.
Slowly, you turn, when you finally face him you kept your eyes trained on the ground between you, what little space there was of it.
Maekar lays a hand to the small of your back, pressing you close, using the other one to raise your chin up gently between his two fingers.
Still, you struggle to hold his gaze.
"What's wrong?" Maekar asks. "You used to make this a game, remember?"
One of the ways you found entertainment (at his expense) was to seat yourself on his lap, hold his face in your hands and say 'whoever looks away first loses'.
What does the winner get? nothing.
He knows that because he won everytime, since you couldn't keep it together for five seconds before giggling at his squished face.
Finally, you break your silence.
"You will be upset with me."
Maekar is unsure what heinous thing you could have done to make you so worried — so worried that you would behave like this, that you would avoid him for so long when you used to act like being separated for longer than two hours was an unforgivable crime.
You were blowing things out of proportion, he can't imagine you doing anything that would truly upset him.
"I will not." Maekar promised. "Tell me."
You hesitate.
"Out with it." Maekar said, restless and eager to move on from whatever was keeping you from him.
"I'm with child." You confessed, hand bunching at the fabrics at your stomach.
The air leaves his lungs.
"What?"
You turn away from him again.
He's told you way back when you were only his betrothed that he does not plan for a seventh, and you, watching his children run him ragged understood why he wouldn't want for more.
You were content with it, you were content with being the stepmother, it came with all the benefits with none of the pain of childbirth, but what were you to do when you began dreaming, of having one of your own with your beloved's pretty amethyst eyes and molten silver hair?
Nothing is what you did, but here you were. Pregnant despite all you've done to prevent it from happening, you couldn't find it in yourself to be happy.
Wouldn't he hate you for it? For not having the nerve to drink moon tea? For hesitating to tell him? For wanting to keep it?
"I told you that you would be upset with me."
"You stupid girl." Maekar said angrily, making you flinch.
He grabs your wrist and pulls you back against him, holding you even closer and pressing his cheek atop your head.
"I am not upset, not in the slightest." He said. "I am however, offended, that you think I would ever be."
You pull away and look up at him in shock.
"You said that you didn't want another child." You said, confused.
"Yes," Maekar said. "but I only said that because I didn't want to scare you, to go from being childless into a mother of six with a seventh on the way in the span of a few months is not something any young maiden finds herself dreaming of."
"But are you sure you want this? We don't have to–" He shuts you up with a kiss, his beard that always had you in awe of it's strange softness felt rough against your skin from the way he pressed his lips to yours — you loved when he kissed you like that.
Unfortunately, you could only hold your breaths for so long, you pull away, breathing heavily.
"Never ever suggest anything like that," he breathes out. "of course I want it."
Maekar comes down for another kiss, his fingers pulling the hair at the nape of your neck, curling himself into you. Again, your lungs betray you both, and you pull away.
His breaths warms the side of your face as he nuzzles at your temple, the tip of his nose fluttering along softly against your skin.
"And don't you ever leave me like that again," he pants against your ear. "never, do you understand?"
You nod frantically, always helpless to him when he spoke to you like that.
"Good." Maekar says, sweeping you off your feet and cradling you in his arms, forcing a surprised laugh out of you. He carries you to the abandoned bed.
"Why don't we make use of this bed since we're here?"
