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flipomatic · 6 years ago

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Reason to Stay: Chapter 30

First Chapter

Previous Chapter

After the incident, the next few days passed with thankfully little activity. Hina visited Aya in the prison block after a couple days and seemed happier after she did. At the very least she said things were boppin.

Sayo still worried about the envoy, about her friends. She hoped everything was going alright for them.

With Tsugumi, something had changed again. Sayo couldn’t put her finger on it, the tension she felt in the kitchen. It was getting harder to maintain eye contact, which had never been a problem for Sayo before. They still talked as normal, so she tried not to let it bother her or interfere with her work.

One afternoon, around eight days after the spy was captured, Sayo was fetching some water for the kitchen when she saw a group of familiar faces passing through the courtyard.

Yukina, Lisa, Rinko, and Ako were all walking by,, dressed in full armor. Sayo couldn’t help but smile when she saw them; they must’ve just returned from the envoy. Lisa noticed her as well and waved broadly in Sayo’s direction.

Though Sayo carried a full bucket of water, she still turned to meet them in the middle of the courtyard. The four stopped to wait for her.

“Welcome back.” Sayo said as she reached them and looked between them. They appeared to be unharmed, which was good news.

“Thank you.” Yukina was smiling slightly, which was about as pleased of an expression as she could make.

Sayo shifted the bucket in her hands. “How was your trip?” She asked, eyes still passing between them.

“It was good!” Lisa replied enthusiastically. Perhaps too much so, Sayo noticed. “We shouldn’t hold you up, so we’ll tell you about it later.” Something about her tone sounded strange.

Sayo blinked once, but decided not to question it. “Okay.” She would’ve shrugged if she hadn’t been carrying the water.

“You should stop by upstairs when you’ve finished running errands.” Lisa pointed up as she made the suggestion, really asking Sayo to meet her in her quarters. Ah, now it made sense. This was a public space, and though they found they spy sometimes the walls had ears.

“I will. Good to see all of you.” Sayo bid the group farewell with a nod, before crossing the courtyard back towards the kitchen. The water still had to get there after all.

Once inside the kitchen, Sayo reported that the envoy had returned. This earned her a pleased smile from Tsugumi, along with asking if she’d seen Himari and Tomoe.

Sayo had to answer no to that, but told Tsugumi that if they were injured, the knights would’ve told her about it. Since she was going to meet Lisa later in private to discuss something, this could’ve in fact been false, but until proven otherwise Sayo chose to believe it.

She retrieved a few more buckets of water before being dismissed for the day. After apologizing to Tsugumi for not being able to stay late today, Sayo headed towards the stairs leading to the knights’ quarters.

The knights’ quarters were next to the guards’ ones, so Sayo knew where to find them. She had been by Lisa and Yukina’s rooms at least once before and should be able to find Lisa’s.

As expected, she located Lisa’s room with ease. Sayo knocked briskly, with Lisa quickly opening the door and ushering her inside. Surprisingly, Yukina wasn’t present.

Once the door was shut, Lisa let out a boisterous laugh and engulfed Sayo in a hug.

“I’ve not sure what I’ve done to deserve this.” Sayo spoke dryly, but accepted the gesture.

“Sorry.” Lisa pulled back, still grinning. “I just couldn’t help myself. It’s thanks to you that we’re back today!”

“What do you mean?” That didn’t make much sense to Sayo, after all she hadn’t been on the envoy.

Lisa gestured to a couple chairs in the room. “Come, sit, and I’ll tell you.” Sayo followed her, taking a seat in one of the chairs. “I didn’t know this when we set out, but the purpose of the envoy was to re-write the peace treaty between Circle and Pastel. There was a some kind of problem between the rulers recently, I never did find out what.” Lisa told the story, gesturing with her hands as she went. Sayo had an inkling that the breakdown between rulers had something to do with failed marriage proposals, but didn’t know that for sure. “There was a problem. No matter what terms we put the queen wouldn’t budge. She rejected every proposal without even reading it.” Sayo tried to picture Pastel’s queen in her mind, a young woman with long blonde hair. “But then, word came that you arrested the spy, and suddenly we had a bargaining chip. When we added the return of both intruders to the bargain, she finally agreed to a new treaty!” Her voice rose in satisfaction at this.

Sayo hadn’t realized just how important catching that spy was. She wondered how Tsugumi would feel about the information, how she would feel about her contribution. “Wow.” She managed to say. “So they’re sending both of them back?”

Lisa nodded. “Yes. An escort is leaving tomorrow to return them.” Hina would be sad, Sayo thought. Even though Aya was a spy, it seemed Hina still considered her a friend.

“Good.” Sayo nodded, still thinking it would be good to have them out of the castle, despite Hina’s misgivings. “I’m glad to have been of assistance, even from here.”

“We couldn’t have done it without you.” Lisa shook her head.

“How were your travels?” Sayo changed the subject slightly, leaning back in her chair. “Run into any bandits?”

Lisa let out a single low chuckle. “No, they seem to have learned their lesson from last time.”

“Excellent.”

The pair continued conversing, choosing to stay and talk rather than practice swordsmanship for the day. After a long few weeks of travel Lisa needed to rest, and it was nice for Sayo to spend time with her once again.

Yukina soon joined them, bringing her own rendition of the tale.

Sayo caught them up on knife training with Tsugumi and with the tale of how she caught the spy, which Lisa oohed and aahed through.

Yukina told stories about all of the cats she met in Pastel on this visit and Lisa shared some of the crazier things Kaoru had said to her.

Having them back, talking to them and spending time together, brought warmth to Sayo’s chest. It felt like home.

Now that her friends were back in the castle and the threat of an attack was gone, things were finally completely back to normal.

As sad as Hina was to see them go, it was a great relief to Sayo when the two prisoners were escorted out of the castle. She was still vigilant on guard duty, but didn’t have to worry any longer about an attack.

A couple days later on one cold morning, Sayo was in the kitchen helping Tsugumi make some berry filled pastries. These were significantly more complicated than the other baked goods Sayo had helped with before, so she didn’t actually help with the pastry part. Instead, Sayo stirred the berry filling as it boiled.

When Tsugumi said it was done she took it off the heat, watching as Tsugumi rolled the pastries.

By the time it was cool enough to fill with, Tsugumi had finished rolling the shells. She put the filling in a funnel like tube, showing Sayo how to hold it and fill the center of the pastries.

After demonstrating the technique, Tsugumi turned towards Sayo and offered her the funnel. In that moment she looked radiant, glowing, gorgeous.

The familiar rapid beating of Sayo’s heart returned, the odd feeling of a flush coming to her cheeks joining it. Why was this happening? She asked herself as she accepted the bag. Why did looking at Tsugumi make her feel this way.

She felt like the answer was something close, something that should’ve been obvious.

Sayo started to fill the pastries, going slowly as not to mess it up. Next to her Tsugumi prepared another funnel to join her.

She glanced to her left, watching one more time as Tsugumi masterfully completed one of the pastries.

Her heart soared and, was this...

Sayo had never been in love, not really. She’d heard about love and seen love, but hadn’t felt it.

It would explain the rushing pulse and easy embarrassment, the logical side of her brain provided. The smaller emotional part added that Tsugumi was adorable and wondered what it might be like to hear her innermost thoughts, what it would be like to kiss her.

That thought paralyzed her, stopped Sayo dead in the middle of filling a pastry.

It only took a moment for Tsugumi to notice that she’d stopped. “What’s wrong?” She leaned over to inspect the pastries, coming dangerously into Sayo’s personal space. “It’s okay if they’re not perfect.”

“Everything’s fine.” Sayo managed to lie, hopefully convincingly, as she forced her arms to keep moving. No emotional realizations here, nope that wasn’t happening.

“Hmm.” Tsugumi didn’t seem to completely buy it, but she let it slide.

Sayo could feel a bead of sweat on her neck as she continued filling the pastries. She wanted to drop the funnel and run, escape to work through her thoughts without scrutiny, but that wasn’t going to happen. Instead she had to stay and stew on her thoughts while still filling pastries.

By the time they were done, Sayo was sure Tsugumi thought she was sick or something. She sent her off with a request to rest up, which Sayo thanked her for before leaving.

She stopped only a few steps away from the kitchen to try and gather her thoughts.

The way Tsugumi looked at her, with care in her eyes, only solidified the thoughts Sayo had before.

Somehow, she had fallen in love with Tsugumi.

Sayo took a deep breath, and then another. She had to go meet Lisa for archery practice, so she needed to at the very least calm herself.

She stood outside the kitchen for a few minutes, eventually reaching a point where she was as calm as she could get given the circumstances.

Sayo passed through the castle without stopping for conversation, exiting through the stable gate and soon reaching the archery range. She beat Lisa there that day, so she picked a stall and started shooting.

Having the few extra minutes helped clear her head, even as Tsugumi’s smiling face kept flashing by in her mind.

Even with that distraction, Sayo was able to shoot accurately at the target. A far cry from the last time she couldn’t focus, when she was in crisis over Hina.

Lisa soon arrived, taking up the stall to her right. She started shooting as well, hitting near the center of the target with most of her shots.

Sayo watched with pride as Lisa hit the bullseye. She then turned towards Sayo with a bright grin.

“You have the fundamentals down.” Sayo couldn’t help but smile back. “All you need to do now is keep practicing.”

“Thanks for all your help!” Lisa exclaimed, still smiling. “I’d still love to practice with you, if you’ll have me.”

“Of course.” Sayo nodded, not about to turn her friend away.

“We’ll keep working on your shield skills too.” Lisa slung her bow over her shoulder, likely getting ready to retrieve her arrows. “You still have a few more basics to master.”

Sayo chuckled. “Your archery started at a higher point and didn’t have as far to go.” She crossed her arms in fake annoyance.

“You’re right.” Lisa laughed. The conversation lulled for a moment, but Lisa was never one to let silence reign for long. “I heard something interesting the other day, but I wanted to ask you. Have you been spending more time with Tsugumi lately?”

Interesting that she would come up the same day Sayo was so conflicted about her feelings for her. “I suppose a little, we did have one knife training session together. I have been staying late in the kitchen too…” Sayo trailed off, not sure what else to add. Her feelings were a new development, but she wasn’t sure if she wanted to share them quite yet.

“Well, I wish you the best of luck!” Lisa flashed a thumbs up, not even needing to be told about Sayo’s feelings, and Sayo felt her flush return.

“It’s not like that.” She shook her head, raising both hands in a dismissive manner to deflect the topic.

Lisa tilted her head with one eyebrow raised. “Alright.” She said in a sing-song tone. “If you need help with anything, just let me know.” She offered with a grin.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, but thanks.” Sayo replied with a sigh.

Lisa only winked back, hopping over the stall to go fetch her arrows. Sayo followed suit, and the two soon resumed shooting.

Was Sayo really so obvious that Lisa could read her feelings only an hour after she realized them? Maybe Sayo was just reading too much into Lisa’s words and she wasn’t referring to Sayo’s complicated and disastrous newly labeled emotions.

However it was, Sayo knew she would need to make a decision about what to do soon. She knew that the next time she went back to the kitchen, she would only be struck again.

Next Chapter

#flip writes #fanfiction #bandori fanfiction #bang dream fanfic #there are only 4 chapters left in this #and one is an epilogue #so we are actually #finally #almost done #wow

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