the heart knows best

When Minoth arrived to (rather, as) the remainder of the Tornan travelers' group, he quite obviously stuck out. Not only was he not one of a pair, the way Lora's and Hugo's Blades were both with each other and with their respective Drivers (and Milton and Mikhail were too, to boot); not only was his own Driver, ostensibly, half a Titan away; not only was he a relatively rarer element than all those rest; not only did he have a scar and all the untidy portents that came with it...he didn't even sleep normally.

Where everyone else was, yes, normal, and sensible, and slept underneath the blanket if also over one, limbs arranged for maximum warmth or wariness, depending on if you were Jin or Aegaeon or not, Minoth lay back with his hands held behind his head and one leg propped on the other knee, face to the air and insulation nowhere to be found. It was definitely the posture of an itinerant who made no bones, ever, about lifelong yenning for a normal home.

On the outside, that is. On the inside, beneath the cover of the night, he had other ideas. Richer ideas. Sweeter ideas.

More unobtainable and unaspirational ideas, such as returning to Aletta Manor after a trip in to the city for a seminar or a debate or some other staging of...some something or other, finding Flora waiting expectantly in the doorway with free hands and winning smiles and Addam lumbering happily in from the fields with just the very same.

They'd laugh, and they'd talk, and they'd look fondly at each other, and they'd eat soup and stir fry, and tell jokes and sing songs, and Addam would say, "You know, Minoth, I'm so awfully glad to have you," and Minoth would reply, "Glad to hear it, Addam, because I wouldn't be had by anybody else," Driver or otherwise.

And then they would play cards, and Flora would win, and then Minoth would stop messing around and clean out all the chips from the manor's delegate suitcase, and she'd scowl good-naturedly at his silly roundabout way of doing things that ran so contrary to his usual forthrightness, and they'd kiss her silly cheeks anyway, and it would be like Amalthus had never existed.

(If they weren't careful, it would also be like Malos and Mythra both had never existed, but never you mind about it, because they would be careful, because they had each other, all three, to keep sane with and for and by.)

It was quite possible that in a slightly unhappier telling of the tale, Minoth wouldn't have any concrete bearing on the likelihood that any of these pipedreams would ever see themselves to fruition, and being the classic, even classical, pragmatic pessimist that he was, he would thus promptly buckle down and assume for the worst. Addam would ditch him, Flora would shun him, and he'd be on his own again.

But this was happy, wasn't it? Of course it was. Minoth knew, with his whole chest and Core did he know, that Addam had no greater plan in life than to settle down on his farm, devoid of staff and militia swarm, with his wife, his children, and whoever else happened to be resembling his family at the moment - first that had been just Milton, but then Mythra, debatably, had been tacked on, and Minoth?

Minoth had been there all the while, dreaming these dreams. Smiling contentedly up at a starry sky he didn't even see fit to see wasn't the most predictable action from him, but knowing what we know, it also wasn't the least.

Maybe he was thinking, they look so kissable. Maybe he was thinking, wait a minute, I look so kissable, and they're going to kiss me. Always the same: hugs and kisses. We'll never know. We can only imagine.

On his way to collect his own thoughts that night in the woods off to one side of the trail, Addam happened, of course, to trip on Minoth's so oddly arranged foot, and spared a curse before remembering that Minoth was the last person to get indiscreet about the whole affair. He'd probably just shrug, and roll his eyes, and say, forget about it, Prince, just try not to be such a clod next time.

Except, he looked to be in a much better mood than that. He looked like he didn't have such a common care in the world.

So Addam watched. So Addam gauged. So Addam considered, without actually considering, the answers he was in short order to give to Mythra.

And so Minoth awoke, and not wryly, or presentably, with one roguishly scarred eye popped open and one plainly yet debonairly slipped shut. No, he blinked both nigh-fully awake in an instant, looking entirely too innocent, and Addam remarked, "You look very happy, Minoth."

Ah. Right. That.

No big deal. Nothing out of the ordinary.

Just...

"'Course I am, my prince. I'm with you."

...just all of my dreams come true.