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Caspar’s not scared. That’d be stupid—he’d faced tougher enemies than this a thousand times over and come out on top, so this should be a piece of cake.
“He’s not an enemy, though,” Ferdinand says, frowning. “He’s your partner. You’re going about this the wrong way.”
“Shut up, Ferdinand, I’m thinking.”
“I noticed. You’re also pacing. And talking. Loudly.”
Why is he even here? “Why are you even here?”
He throws his hands up. “You won’t let me leave!”
“Yeah! Because I’m waiting for you to give me some actual good advice!”
Ferdinand sighs heavily and begins massaging his temples. He’s seated at Caspar’s desk, watching him “stalk” around the room “like a madman”, or whatever, and being generally useless. He’d say that, but Ferdinand has some sort of thing about that and would probably cry.
“Caspar, please. Linhardt loves you, and–”
He makes a strangled noise in the back of his throat. “Not helping.”
“What’s not helping!” Ferdinand exclaims. “Stating the obvious is suddenly a crime?”
“Yes! Shut up!”
It’s stupid. It’s so, so stupid for him to be frozen like this, now, over the stupidest of things, but his stomach’s in knots at the thought of seeing Linhardt right now, at all, and that’s without even considering his plans to–
He buries his face in his hands and groans, increasing in volume until it’s basically a scream.
“Okay! Alright there, Caspar!” Ferdinand’s hands are on his shoulders, gently and awkwardly giving them what he probably thinks is a very reassuring rub. “What-um-what exactly about this situation is giving you so much trouble?”
Caspar peeks out at him from behind his fingers. Whatever his expression is, it makes Ferdinand flinch back a bit. “Oh, gee, Ferdinand, I don’t know. Maybe the part where I’m asking him to give up his noble title to travel the world with a nobody ?”
“Caspar,” Ferdinand says, clearly trying to figure out a response before he settles on, “you’re not a nobody.”
“Right!” he says, throwing his arms in the air (Ferdinand just barely manages to step back and avoid getting smacked) and resuming his pacing. “No, I’m just a second son who has nothing to lose! Unlike the guy who’s got a fancy title waiting for him!”
“Caspar, inside voices,” he tries weakly, and when Caspar spins to him with murderous intent, he just sighs again. “I’m not entirely sure what you’re so afraid of. A few months ago you seemed pretty certain that Linhardt would love nothing more than to travel the world with you.”
Yeah, he knows. That’s why he’s talking to useless Ferdinand, instead of Dorothea, who would have actual good advice but tease him ruthlessly. “I was. I am . I mean, come on. But…”
“But what? What’s the problem here? If you know that’s what he wants and you know that’s what you want–” He stops, abruptly. “Caspar. Is this what you want?”
“Yes! Of course! I’ve wanted this forever.” Not forever. Not even since he realized at the tender age of nine that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with Linhardt, back when he wasn’t entirely sure what that would mean. But he has known, for a very long time now, that he wants this. And he’s pretty sure Linhardt wants this, too. It’s just…
“I’m sorry,” Ferdinand says, “but it feels like you’re dragging your feet on this for no reason.”
“Oh, you’re one to talk,” he mutters, and Ferdinand lets out an offended gasp. “It took you how long to pick up on Hu–”
“We are not! Talking about that!” he interrupts loudly. Inside voices, Aegir . “Caspar, you’ve fought an ancient dragon surrounded by the burning remains of a foreign capital with your bare fists.” That’s true, and he’s pretty proud of it, even if Linhardt nearly killed him for it. “You can handle asking your best friend in the world if he wants to run away with you when you already know the answer is yes.”
“But I don’t know!” he cries, and Ferdinand stops and stares at him, eyebrows starting to furrow in confusion. “I mean, sure, this is something he’s expressed interest in, but only, like, once , and only sorta , and it’s not like we’ve talked about it, and–” He can feel panic rising in his chest, but he can’t stop. “And why would he want to? All he’s talked about since the war started was how excited he was for it to be over so he could go back to napping all the time, but it’s kinda hard to nap when you’re always going somewhere, not to mention I don’t know how he can continue his Crest research when we’re moving away from where all the people with Crests are, and–”
“But he said he wanted to.”
“Once! Just one time! And I’m worried that maybe I’m wrong and he’ll say no, and–”
“And? What will you do if he does?”
He hasn’t thought about it. He doesn’t need to think about it. “I’ll do whatever he wants. I don’t wanna go anywhere if he’s not there with me.”
Ferdinand is looking at him again, with a similar kind of confusion. “That was… oddly romantic for you.”
Caspar huffs. “I can be romantic! I’m basically the king of romance!”
“Ah. Of course.” He’s studying him now, and Caspar isn’t particularly comfortable with that at all. “Do you think it’s… possible… that Linhardt feels the same way? That he also wants to be with you, wherever that takes him?”
Caspar blinks. “Uh. I guess.”
“Think of it this way. If he stays in Enbarr, he can study Crests, but he also has to deal with his father, and he probably won’t have the sort of freedom he’s looking for. If he goes with you, he gets to do as he pleases and spend all his time with you, with the slight downside that it will be a bit more difficult to study Crests–”
“I feel like you’re downplaying this a bit.”
“ Caspar . Linhardt is the Crest-bearing eldest child of a noble who is very set in his ways.” Caspar blinks at him. “The only way for Linhardt to, say,” he sighs deeply, “ marry as he chooses, rather than being forced to settle down with a young lady of good standing with a sizeable dowry who can produce a veritable hoard of Crest-bearing children,” (Caspar tries desperately not to get lost in the mess of words Ferdinand is throwing at him, but also his mind’s kinda sticking on marriage ) “is if he abandons his noble duties and parental expectations, which will be nigh-impossible if he stays where his father can reach him. Do you understand?”
“Um. Yeah.” Mostly. “So you think I should ask him to… marry me?”
“Caspar!” Ferdinand gasp, scandalized. “Goddess, no. I mean-I suppose you could, but that wasn’t the point. The point is that Linhardt has surely done the math, and he already knows that he wants to travel with you, so if you ask him, I swear to you he will say yes. Are you really going to ask Linhardt to marry you?”
“Uh. Well. Eventually.”
Ferdinand pinches the bridge of his nose. “Oh, Cichol, give me strength. Do not ask Linhardt to marry you now. That’s too much.”
“O-kay? If you say so.” He’s actually glad Ferdinand said that–-the idea of asking Linhardt to marry him sets his stomach flipping again. “Wait, hang on. If Linhardt can’t stay because his dad will force him to marry someone else, why are you sticking around Enbarr?”
“Oh, Caspar,” Ferdinand laughs. His face goes terrifying in a split second, his grin sharp. Toothy . “My father wishes he had that kind of power over me.”
“Ok great thanks Ferdinand I gotta go talk to you later!” And without another world, Caspar’s off to find Linhardt.
He’s easy to find. Everyone else is working, packing up belongings from the monastery in preparation to move back to the capital for Edelgard’s celebration of peace and unity or whatever. If everyone else is working, Linhardt is napping, and he’ll be in the place least likely to get him noticed and roped into helping.
He’s sleeping among the plants in the greenhouse. Caspar kicks gently at his feet and repeats his name until he groans and says, “Caspar, if the professor sent you to recruit me, I’d appreciate it if just this once you’d leave me to my rest–”
“They didn’t.”
“Well, I’m not getting up.”
“I’m not here to make you work, either.”
Linhardt cracks open one eye to give him a once-over, make sure he’s not lying. He frowns at whatever he sees. “What’s wrong with you?”
“Wh-nothing! Nothing’s wrong. What, I can’t just come see you?”
“Not when you say it like that.” Linhardt sits up and squints at him, looking him over for some sort of physical problem. Apparently not finding anything, his gaze returns to his face. “You have to tell me something.”
Caspar gapes for half a second, then catches himself and snaps his mouth shut. “No! Not-exactly, uh–”
Linhardt closes his eyes. “I won’t like it.”
“You will! You might!”
“You’re acting very anxious considering you’re about to tell me something I want to hear.”
“Well! I am anxious. It’s important.” He shuffles his feet, not quite ready to launch into it yet. Something about the way Linhardt’s acting has him convinced this is a bad idea. “Um, it’s really important, so–”
“So?”
“So could you stand up, please, having this conversation with you on the ground is weird!”
Linhardt does not stand up. In fact, he flops back into the flowerbeds, covering his face with his hands. “Oh, I’m not going to like this,” he groans, sounding dejected .
“I need you! To stop saying that! Because this is nerve-wracking enough without the commentary!” This was a mistake. Why did he decide to take relationship advice from Ferdinand , of all people. “Linhardt, I’m trying to ask you something and it’s really important to me so could you please stand up or at least make eye contact or something?”
Linhardt peeks out from behind his hands and squints suspiciously up at him. “You have to ask me something?”
“Yes! So if you could please–”
Before he gets the chance to ask again, Linhardt is on his feet, brushing dirt off his clothes. So. That was easy. He stills looks… uncertain, about the whole thing, but he says, “Alright, ask me.”
Now that he actually can Caspar’s overwhelmed with nerves again. “Uh-yeah, one sec, I just gotta–” He clears his throat, then looks at Linhardt, whose hair is a mess and who’s frowning at him but who glows a bit in the filtered light of the greenhouse, and then he clears his throat again, more violently this time. “Linhardt.”
“Caspar,” he says warmly.
“The, um. Well the war’s over now, and.”
Linhardt’s face darkens. “It is.”
Caspar falters. “Right. So now that the war’s over, I was wondering. If maybe. You. If we. Should maybe.”
“Caspar. If you don’t get to the point, I will blast your ass with Excalibur so hard you can’t see straight.”
“Okay! Okay. Linhardt. The war’s over, and-and I was thinking, I’d leave. Uh, Fódlan. I want to travel, and see the rest of the world, and-are you alright.”
Linhardt doesn’t look alright. His face is screwed up, like Caspar’d just announced he thought it might be a good idea to go swimming in a pool of blood. What he says, though, is “Fine. Very good. Continue.”
“Uh, okay, if you’re sure. I’m leaving Fódlan, and I’d really like it–-I mean, I’d really, really like it, like I want it a lot, like I just think it’d be great, if-you would come with me.”
Linhardt freezes, and his jaw actually drops. “I-you-what?”
Oh, this could be going a lot better. Caspar’s gonna find Ferdinand and punch him. “You don’t have to! Obviously! I think you should do whatever you think is best, and–-I mean, honestly, I’m not that sold on the whole travelling-the-world thing! I could stay here too! Or-wherever! If you didn’t want to–”
“Caspar.” Linhardt’s voice is dreamy, and his eyes are staring at something Caspar can’t actually see; he takes a step closer, in case Linhardt faints, but all of a sudden he meets his gaze and smiles, breathtakingly. “Oh, Caspar, you beautiful idiot.”
“I, um. I don’t know if I like where this is going.”
“You do,” Linhardt says simply, and then he’s sweeping Caspar up into a kiss. Caspar’s just started to melt into it–-three years, and still he’s not used to the way his heart flips in his chest–-when he pulls back to press their foreheads together, looking at him with so much affection that Caspar thinks he dies a little.
“I. Um. I really don’t know what’s happening here.”
Linhardt closes his eyes and grimaces. “I thought maybe you were breaking up with me.”
Caspar takes a step back, shocked. “Linhardt! What? Linhardt !”
He shrinks in on himself. “The way you were talking, it almost sounded like–”
“You’re kidding, right? You have to be kidding.”
“-it’s one thing when there’s a war going on, and there’s really no one else, but now–”
“Linhardt.” Caspar takes his face in his hands. “Linhardt, there isn’t anyone else. There never has been, and there never will be.”
Linhardt sighs. “ How do you manage romantic shit like that.”
“C’mon, I’m being serious. Linhardt, I love you. You know I love you.”
“I know, I just-I know. I’m sorry, I just…” He sighs, heavily. “I think I need to lie down.”
“Absolutely not! We’re having a conversation, here!”
“Can it wait? I’m suddenly exhausted.”
“Oh, of course you are! But, uh,” he puffs his cheeks out. “The thing is, you kinda haven’t. Exactly. Said anything, about.”
“Oh- saints , Caspar. Yes, obviously.” He looks awake now, eyes gleaming, and he places a hand over the one Caspar’s left on his face. “Of course I want to travel with you. Seiros, I’ve only been waiting ages for you to ask.”
Yeah, sure. Why not. “Oh, fuck you, do you know how long I’ve been sweating over this? I went to Ferdinand for help.”
“ Shit , Caspar. Why would you ever think he’d be of any help? He and Hubert spent months dancing around each other, and that was after they started conspicuously flirting with each other.”
Caspar throws his hands up. “It was a low point for me, alright? Gimme a break!”
Linhardt shakes his head, smiling fondly. “You really were nervous about this. Caspar, please. I couldn’t be without you, I’d burst. I’ll go where you go, so long as you go slow enough for me to keep up.”
Caspar feels himself going red, but he doesn’t particularly care. He’s grinning, ear to ear. “Yeah. Yeah, that sounds good.” He takes Linhardt’s hand in his, pleased with the way his face lights up with a smile. “We’ll stick together, yeah?”
Linhardt laughs. “Like you even have to ask?” He shakes his head and gives Caspar’s hand a squeeze. “Always.”