Breakfast had gone quite well after that last pat on Lucien's head from Leo. Though Leo's competitve streak that he had fighting for Sera's affection was still present, it was softer, more relaxed. Leo would still use his adorable looks to attract his Mama's attention, having her feed him by messily smearing tomato sauce over his face, ignoring the disapproving look blaring behind Sera. Bea was upset, for sure. She'd taught him to eat with good manners, using his smaller sized cutlery when Mama came back from fairyland.

When he first began learning to eat on his own, he'd made a huge mess of the floor and table, smeared pie all over his clothes. Bea had excused herself after multiple tries, disappearing as Leo sat happily enjoying the feel of warm pie smushing against his face.

When he'd grown tired of waiting for Bea, Leo had scooched himself off the chair and slid down the leg, to find Bea:

"There is no possibility that I would let my Queen down and let her come back to find the prince with manners no better than an animal!!!"

Brrr. Small shoulders shivered at the sight. Her intensity was too scary.

She'd been giving herself a pep talk in the bathroom mirror, wagging her finger at herself with eyes ablaze. Gulp. And she was looking at Leo with that same look now. 'Wait till I get my hands on you later' Leo knew she was thinking. Another impossibly long lecture was coming sometime today. Even so, he continues to et sloppily, beaming when his Mama wipes off the tomato sauce and gives him a kiss on the cheek. She even leans over to teach him how to hold a spoon, while his father looked on with a blank expression. Leo didn't care. He'd risk a scolding from Bea if it meant he could keep just a little bit of his Mama's attention focused on him and not his father.

--------

The breakfast was finished, and it was time for Lucien to go back to the castle and carry out his judgement, though that was glossed over as his 'duty' when Leo asked about it.

Sera follows Lucien to the door when he gets up to leave. Before he'd left, Lucien had brought out the long wooden box and laid it on the carpet before Leo.

"Fwather?" Leo cocks his head in confusion.

"Here."

"This is for you.....my son."

Leo's face lights up, his eyes crinkling at the corners in the exact same way Sera's did when she was happy. Lucien could feel the muscles of his face relaxing at the sight. "Thank you!"

Lucien carefully sets a heavy hand atop his small son's head. "You are most welcome"

"Ooooooh!!" Even the box itself looked so cool! Leo's fingers scratch against the sides of the lid, trying to figure out how to open it. But it was too unwieldy for small hands like his to open.

Lucien crouches down and asks his son, whose eyes never leave the box in front of him.
"May I come here to have dinner with you and your mother today?" That makes Leo pause, puffing out his soft round cheeks as he thinks.

A pause.

Leo shifts from one foot to another and begrudgingly replies. "Yes..."

Another soft pat on the head.

"Then I shall see you tonight."

"Mhmmm" Leo doesn't look up, too busy trying to shake the box and guess what was inside.

Lucien knew the small boy didn't want to welcome him whole-heartedly with open arms just yet. But having the young Leo call him Father was a good start.

While Leo excitedly hops about, begging Bea to open the wood box carved with hawks, Sera rests her head against Lucien's shoulder as they walk together to the door, Lucien's arm around her waist.

Sera stumbles on the rock path when Lucien pauses after exiting to the outside of the cottage. With Lucien standing before her, the bright blue sunlit sky behind him, she could only see his silhouette that draws closer to her as his feather-light touch brushes the hair off her cheek.

"Lucien?"

Her cheek should be a little sticky from the ointment Bea had already rubbed on for her.

"Did Bea do this?"

"Yes, first thing this morning she put it on my cheek." Putting a hand over her eyes, Sera smiles up at Lucien.

"Good." But why did he sound slightly unhappy? Was Sera mishearing the tone of his voice?

From his shirt pocket, Lucien hands her the small jar of ointment she'd forgotten in his room last night.

"It's coming off a bit."

His fingers gently feather over her cheek, over the tight blue shock on her cheekbone.

"I'll reapply it for you." Kissing the line of her jaw, he scrapes out a large dollop of the shiny cream on his finger, but Sera stops him.

Laughing, "Lucien, that's too much!" she tells him.

"No, it's the perfect amount. It's better to have more so that your cheek heals quickly" Another kiss, the slightest of whispers over the injured area, and then Lucien uses thick fingers to dab it in. He doesn't seem to mind the harsh medicinal smell of the ointment, making sure every inch of that bruise was covered.

His gaze was earnest, focused on applying the cream as lightly as possible and taking his sweet time to do it, his other thumb that tilted her chin up unconsciously rubbing over her lips.

Sera changes the subject from the itchiness her heart felt when Lucien kept rubbing the pad of his thumb over her parted lips. "Lucien, that lesson with the egg tart. That was wonderful."

"I'm glad you liked it."

"...But your father never taught you that did he?"

Looking up from her blue-black bruise, Lucien's eyes meet hers.

"How did you know?"

"He didn't seem like the type to go out of his way and teach you lessons like that."

A soft, cynical smirk. "No, he isn't"

Lucien goes back to smoothing the ointment in, taking his sweet time about it.

"He did teach me, in a sort of round-about manner. Watching him indulge in the sweet words of the Heads made me sick to my stomach."

"And what about the vegetable part?"

Soft swirling motions as he furrows his eyebrows, rubbing the ointment in.

"The Great War. It was a bitter experience, but because of the war, I learned from the General, my men,"

"and I got to meet you."

That smile again. The beautiful smile, with the dimple that greeted her on his scarred cheeks, make Sera feel a rush of warm, golden, fragrant happiness in her chest.

Slowly, his fingers lift off her cheek, the stickiness of the ointment making her skin stick to his glistening fingers like they didn't want him to leave. "Are we finished?" Blinking, Sera returns that smile with her own.

And then Lucien's gaze lowers to her smiling mouth.

"Yes..." But Lucien doesn't stop rubbing his thumb over the sensitive skin of her lips, dipping in between them and stroking her tongue with his clean hand.

At loss for what to do, Sera pushes her soft pink tongue against his thumb, blushing at the wet sounds coming out of her lips.

"Uhm, Lucien.." Lucien's eyes fall to half-mast as that look, the one that made Sera shiver to her toes, shines through his eyes. Slowly withdrawing his thumb from her lips, drawing out her saliva and making her lips shiny and juicy, Lucien's throat bobs as he swallows down the urge to want to devour her whole.

She was too adorable!!

"One last kiss before I go.." Sera doesn't deny him his request. She slides her hands up the smooth linen of his shirt, up his chest, and hooks her arms around his thick neck as he dives in for a kiss.

Mhmmmmm.

And as their lips touched, Sera blossomed like the sprays of vibrant flowers that surrounded them. She felt again the rush of heady desire that never failed to make heat pool in her veins, the overwhelming sensations of his taste on her lips. And it was right. This was right. Sera smiles against his lips, Lucien settling his arms tightly at the small of her back and pressing her closer to him as she kissed him back. No one could ever kiss her like he did. No one could ever hold her so tightly, so carefully like he did.

To know that this man, a wild man that had never been tamed, truly loved her was beauty itself.

And Lucien could feel his heart racing, faster than that time before his first battle as a young, untried youth. The sweet wetness of her lips, the trembling fire of her trust in him, everything about her made him mad with desire for her. Repeatedly they kissed, until both their lips grew swollen, their tastes mingled with each others till they no longer knew which part of them ended and the other began.

Lucien groans as Sera nibbles at his lip. This woman was fire itself, stroking him into an uncontainable wildfire. And she answered his groan with one of her own, a smaller moan in the back of her throat as she was lost in the lips clashing together, their heads angling to get deeper.

Her fingers massaged the back of his neck and then stroke through the freshly-cropped red locks as his tongue continued to tangle with hers.

Both of them startled when the young child's voice disturbs their moment, the high-pitched innocent tone sounding muffled behind the cottage door.

"Mamaaa~!! Leo can't opwen thea box!"

And so they slowly separate, Lucien helping Sera stand upright as she'd melted into his embrace.

"Um, I guess I should go now." Sera murmurs.

Lucien licks her lips like a pup, tucking Sera's loose hair behind her ear and stroking down the hair that he'd mussed up at the back of her head.

"See you at dinner?"

"Yes, I'll see you then." His low voice responds, the amorous glow in his eyes slowly fading as he blinks. The expression on his face settled into the usual look. Cold, proud, and with the heavy presence of a King. But only Sera knew the fire that crackled under his demeanor.

She smiles, stepping up on her tip toes and beckoning him to lean down so she could kiss his cheek one last time.

Smooch!

Blinking in surprise, she freezes as the kiss she'd meant for his cheek lands on his lips when he turned his head quickly to her.

Winking, Lucien turns to go, but then, as if remembering something, looks back at Sera.

"You may have some guests requesting your presence. I want you to know that you're my Queen, and you have the full authority to do what you think is right."

What did Lucien mean?

Before Sera could ask, Lucien gently knocks his forehead against hers. Another kiss, a soft, chaste one, and then he leaves, his long strides eating up the distance and taking him further away from Sera.

--------

There was a small notch carved into the bottom corner of the wood. "For Leo." it simply said.

It took Sera and Bea a while to figure out how to open the box. It was one of those puzzle boxes, where the pattern of hawks had to be slid just the right to open the lid.

With a soft click, it opens.

Revealing a finely-made, child-sized sword.

"A sword!!!!" Leo jumps about excitedly behind Sera, while she busily rubbed between her eyebrows.

Even Sera, with her shallow experience with children, knew that a sword was exactly what you WOULDN'T gift to a 5-year old child.

Lucien what was this!