Whumpcember (day 18)
Pairing: Prince!Bucky x Princess!Reader
Prompt: Poisoned
Word Count: 1.9k
Warnings: Vivid descriptions of illness; poisoning; worried!Bucky
Author’s note: Don’t ask me where this came from, I have no idea. But, thank you for reading! <3
Masterlist | Whumpcember Masterlist
You hear him pacing outside your chamber.
His boots strike the stone floor in sharp, angry bursts.
Occasionally, the sound halts, but his voice doesn’t. He’s fuming. It started with low, threatening murmurs that soon escalated into raised voices - or rather one raised voice. He didn’t really let anyone else come to word. You can only assume he’s talking to his guards.
He’s on edge. Has been ever since your first symptoms appeared.
It started this afternoon, as you and Bucky - or Prince James to everybody else - strolled through the palace gardens.
It had been a great day, a little cold, but not terribly so. You had been laughing with him, feeding the ducks by the pond and he had playfully threatened to throw you in there himself if you told Knight Samuel about the way he had picked up some flowers for you at the edge of the water. Your laughter after that wasn’t very lady like but it just got worse when he started chasing and tickling you.
But you started to feel it as the two of you settled under the big willow tree.
It was a discomfort in your stomach, an unease that settled and burrowed, deeper the longer you dismissed it.
Bucky, of course, had picked up on your shift immediately and rushed you back inside. By then you already were pale, clammy, and lightheaded.
Now, confined to your chambers by Bucky’s orders, you’re surrounded by an entourage of healers, endlessly fretting over your condition.
They hover at your bedside, fingers continuously brushing your forehead, checking your pulse, mixing tinctures, and murmuring theories to one another in hushed voices.
There are always at least two or three of them at any given time, a constant rotation that leaves you feeling scrutinized, yet strangely detached from their fussing.
You can’t even roll over without one of them pausing to announce it to your parents and Bucky
It feels as though every thirty seconds, someone is rushing out to deliver updates to him.
He demands to be told everything; the slightest change in your complexion; the smallest shift in your breathing. He refuses to let the healers leave anything unsaid. And he takes every single one of the smallest updates on your condition with a seriousness that could have made you laugh in any other circumstance.
His clipped and commanding tone drifts in from the hall and you feel a little bad for the people receiving it.
Normally, the prince is full of composure and control, but that only ever seems to shatter when it comes to you.
You picture him out there, bristling with anger, his jaw clenched, his hands curling into fists as he barks orders and questions on how this could have happened. How you could have ended up falling ill.
He barely lets anyone else talk and when someone does, it doesn’t seem to be a good enough answer, judging the unmistakable sound of something heavy - perhaps a boot or a fist - striking a wall.
You wince again at the sharp pain tormenting your stomach. Your skin feels too cold one moment and burning hot the next, as though your body can’t decide whether to shake or sweat.
The faint dizziness from earlier has grown into a persistent haze that seems to move to your vision slowly, making it a little harder to get a clear picture. You try to blink it away.
There is a bitter taste at the back of your throat that no amount of water or tea can wash away.
The healers whisper words like poison when they think you’re too weak to hear them, but you hear them all the same.
The door to your chambers creaks open. The sound is urgent, and before you know it, Bucky is at your side. His movements are stiff, almost forceful, and though he likely doesn’t mean to, he brushes a healer away in his haste to get to you.
The poor man stumbles back, his hand still clutching the damp towel he’d been using to cool your fever.
But Bucky pays him no mind. His focus is singular, and he takes the towel himself.
With a tenderness that almost undoes you, he presses the cloth to your forehead. His touch is infinitely soft. It’s the kind of touch that aches.
He looks at you, you notice.
You feel it rather than seeing it. His gaze burns hotter than your fever does. Slowly, weakly you tilt your head to face him better. It takes effort. The hotness raging beneath your skin deliberately melts away your vision, making Bucky swim before you.
But you see enough. Enough to say that he left his furiousness outside in the hall. Here, inside, with you, this is just Bucky. Bucky as worried and unfiltered as he can get when it comes to you.
Your thoughts come slow. Lazily dragging through your mind and switching directions too often for you to latch onto something specific.
The towel brushes against your temple again, and though the coolness should bring relief, his touch you notice more.
His lips are moving, you realize when your eyes start to roam his face. He’s talking to you, but his voice is not yet fully meeting your ears. His words swim just like his face, in and out of reach.
You blink sluggishly, barely able to focus, but sounds start to come in.
He, like the healers before says something about poison. And it’s not the word that leaves the pain in your chest, it’s the way he says it. With his voice so quivery and rough.
“-slow-acting poison-” you catch again, with the same tone. “-subtle enough no one noticed it until it was too late.”
He calls your name then, and you blink a few times. The heavy blue of his eyes builds its picture in your mind and you try so much to focus.
He is breathing heavily. His lips are parted. His brows are knit together and his face is morphed in a grimace of desperation and pain as he still lets his eyes sear a hole through you.
He drops his head for a moment, exhaling sharply. He releases an anguished sound with it and clears his throat. He seems to be trying to focus too, just for other reasons.
“The testers,” he continues, and the sharp pain punctures your stomach again. Because the thickness in his voice sounds too much like guilt to you. So much guilt. “They… they are in the same condition as you. Same symptoms, same timeline.”
A shaky breath rattles out of him again as he swipes the towel over your forehead once more, dabbing your skin.
His eyes flicker over your face. There is a wetness to them. His pupils can’t stay in place, moving swiftly between your own eyes as if he’s searching for signs in you. Shadows spill across his gaze, fear trembling in the sheen of his watery blues.
“I should have caught this.” His voice is a whisper but it sounds like gravel.
He can’t go down that road again right now. Not when you’re in no condition to protest and argue with him as you normally would.
You even have problems swallowing. You have to put effort into blinking.
There is no way you can tell him that this is in no way his fault.
His hand curls into a fist against your bed. “I should have known something wasn’t right,” he only continues.
He did know. He knew the second your eyebrows began to crease ever so slightly by the swift pain pouncing on your stomach.
There is no way he could have known earlier.
But you can’t tell him that.
Your voice is a fragile thing right now, not even able to build up deep inside.
Bucky shakes his head again, his eyes squeezing shut for a moment. All you can do is watch. Well, try to watch.
“I’ve got the guards tearing this place apart - every pantry, every kitchen, every bloody corner. Somebody did this. Somebody thought they could hurt you, and I am going to find them.” His voice hardens with each word, but his hand softens as he reaches for yours. He threads his fingers through yours so gently and carefully, it doesn’t help with trying to breathe evenly.
“I will make them pay.” It sounds so determined, so terrifying if you were any other person.
His thumb strokes over your knuckles, while the towel still pads your face. It’s slow, and steady, grounding himself as much as you.
“But right now… right now, all that matters is you. I need you to fight this, alright? Darling? I need you to stay with me.” His voice cracks. It buckles, just not with the grace he is known for, but unevenly and unceremoniously. His next breath stumbles over itself and his gaze drops to your hand in his as though he’s ashamed to let you see the whole of his fear.
Your chest rises and falls in a slow, shallow breath, and as you exhale with an unsteadiness, it feels like you’re letting go of something you can’t quite name. The faint sound catches his attention immediately and his head snaps back up to you, again searching your eyes, your face, your body.
They don’t stray from you for a few heartbeats, as though he’s afraid he’ll lose you if he looks away for even a second.
Bucky straightens up, his presence suddenly larger. He leans closer, so close that you can feel the warmth of him bushing over your fevered skin. His free hand uncurls from his fist, white knuckles, going up to your face.
Soft fingers sweep back the strands of hair that cling to your damp face. The motion is unhurried, almost delicate, and for a moment, the coolness of his touch - or rather, his touch alone - is the only thing keeping the fading light of your awareness on for some time longer.
His thumb lingers at your temple, tracing lightly, and it is astounding to you that he managed to make you forget about the poison cursing through your veins for a tiny second.
His heart seems to have spilled entirely into his gaze because the emotions drowning there overwhelm you. They’re so deep, so afraid, so concerned. All you want is to grant him a reassuring smile. But your lips fail you.
“You are going to be okay.” It’s a plea and a promise. He speaks as if saying it out loud will carve it into stone - will make it reality. “This will not take you away from me. I’ve got you. I am right here. Please. You are going to stay with me.”
He leans closer still, as if closing the distance makes his words sink deeper, might make them take root into your fading consciousness.
His hand stays on your face, his other hand still holding the towel, his thumb brushing over your cheek. His touch is steady, although his voice isn’t.
There is a fire in his eyes, an unyielding resolve burning beneath the fear like he’s daring the universe to take you from him.
And you won’t let it take you, you tell yourself.
You will stay with him.
But you just need some sleep at the moment. And when you wake up, you will fight this unwelcome substance in your system.
But first, you have to get some sleep.
Just a little sleep.
