Or Alternatively, In Which Sedgewick Freaks Out and Makes Questionable Choices

Why was it that whenever he fell in love, he always ended up doing ridiculous, unnatural things?

Sedgewick sighed and placed his head in his hands. Ink-stained, discarded sheets of paper sprawled out on his kitchen table. He'd never been fond of holidays but tomorrow's Breyguard's festival held a special distaste for him.

Inspired by one of their kinds oldest and most romantic myths, it was technically a day meant for honoring marital fidelity and commitment but had evolved into a celebration of romantic relationships in general.

He usually ignored it, preferring to spend his time stifling the uptick in sales of illegal "love" potions that always increased around this time. But this year...

A hazy smile spread across Sedgewick's face. He sighed as memories of dark teal eyes, soft curves, silky blonde hair, and kissable lips washed over him. Feyla. This year, he had someone to celebrate with.

He might have felt happy if he wasn't desperate to shine brighter than the glow of her former flame.

Sedgewick scowled at his latest attempt before crumpling it up and tossing it with all the others. He knew Feyla wasn't still pining after Lord Beryn. But that did nothing to stifle the growing jealousy and hint of panic that was twining its way through his stomach. He remembered that year vividly...

He had been looking for Eleyna, although Sedgewick didn't quite remember why. It was either for approval to raid a couple buildings for a witch hunt or to complain about her idiot of a husband. Maybe both. At any rate, he'd stumbled on her strolling down the hall with Feyla, their arms linked as the two friends caught up. Sedgewick had been about to announce his presence when something Feyla had said caught his ears.

"It's one of the sweetest things a man has ever done for me," she'd gushed. "He wrote a whole song and sang it for me while playing his lute." Feyla had sighed, a dreamy look in her eyes that had made Sedgewick's chest twist in uncomfortable knots. He'd told himself that it was because of how ridiculously infatuated his assistant was with a man who he knew had no intention of ever bonding with her, but now Sedgewick could admit it was actually because he was bitterly jealous.

Sedgewick shook his head and grabbed another piece of paper. Maybe the twentieth time would be the charm. He'd forgiven Beryn for briefly stealing the heart of the woman he loved. After all, it wasn't as if he'd been willing to do anything about his own feelings at the time. But the memories of Feyla's gushing adoration and her humming that wretched song for days on end still set him on edge. His musical skills made a song out of the question but Sedgewick was determined to give Feyla something every bit as swoon-worthy as the younger man's gift had been.

Unfortunately, writing romantic, sentimental gibberish—also known as poetry—had never been a strong suit of his.

Oh, he could write treatises on spells and magic with the best of them and had an acerbic wit that made even the drier bits of the subject enjoyable. But strictly emotion language was beyond him and his rhyming skills caused the poets of old to roll over in their graves.

Yet he trudged on. Another hour later, Sedgewick leaned back in his chair and rubbed his cramped wrist while examining his latest handiwork.

Flowers are pretty

You are pretty

Therefore, you are a flower.

Well, it had a bit about a flower in it. He wasn't quite sure why that seemed to be a requirement for this sort of thing, but best stick to the formula. Speaking of formula, weren't things of this sort obsessed with eyes? Better add that.

Your eyes are...blueish.

Sedgewick paused. What else was blueish?

Daemon's fire is blueish

Therefore, you are...

Sedgewick snatched the paper up and ripped it in half before crumpling both parts up with a vengeance. He tossed them onto the floor. Telemachus padded up to one of the offending papers and kicked it away with his paw, joining his master in his rejection.

"Stupid gates-blasted..." Sedgewick grumbled on, scraping his chair back and pacing the room.

Telemachus padded behind him and thwapped his paw against Sedgewick's slipper. Sedgewick scooped him up and scratched his pet between the ears. "Yes, I love you too. Unfortunately, I doubt scratching Feyla behind the ears is as grand a gesture of affection as you find it." Sedgewick sighed, feeling far more worn than a few hours' of writing should have left him. "I might need some advice. Pity."

"Don't feel bad, Alverdyne. We all have our gifts. Yours is blasting people with magic, and mine is being handsome, charming, charismatic, musically gifted—"

"Annoying," Sedgewick said, cutting off Beryn's ego stroking.

Beryn gave him a withering glare before leaning back in an expensive wooden chair, one of several in the room he always stayed in whenever he was in the capital. "I don't understand why you can't just make a spell or a potion for her. It'd spare you a lot of grief."

"I'm here for your help, not to have you question my gift-giving choices." Originally, Sedgewick had been preparing a magic-related gift, but rejected that option days ago. Potions and spells just felt too...practical. One never heard of a grand romantic hero bestowing his beloved with a potion to help preserve her books or a spell to help her find her missing slippers.

He wanted something sappy and impractical. That was the way to do this sort of thing.

"So what are you hoping I can do again?"

Sedgewick dragged himself back to the present. He reached into his coat and pulled out his latest attempt, minus the disastrous second verse. "I don't know what keeps going wrong."

Beryn skimmed the paper with the eye of a professional romantic. His brow creased, and not in the way that caused women to throw themselves at him.

"Well?"

"It... has a flower in it," he said, stretching his diplomatic skills to the edge. "And maybe your second attempt will be better."

Sedgewick sank into a nearby chair, sighing in defeat. "That is my twentieth attempt."

"Oh."

"Yes."

"I'm so sorry."

Sedgewick scowled, jabbing a finger at the younger man. "You're supposed to be gifted at this sort of thing."

"Gifted, not a miracle worker," Beryn said, handing back the paper. "If that's as far as you got after twenty tries, there's no hope for you."

Sedgewick snatched his paper back, folding it neatly as if to make up for past abuse.

"Maybe I could let you see some of mine," Beryn said out loud as if thinking to himself. "They would be pretty inspiring."

"Do you keep verses on hand or something?" Sedgewick sneered.

Beryn blinked. "Of course." He stood from his chair and strode over to a chest near the room's desk. Beryn tugged the lid open and pulled out two large stacks of papers. He turned back to Sedgewick and began rifling through them. "I'm a lord. I don't have time to write a whole new set every time I get a new girl. So do you want to see the ones where I praise her beauty, the ones where I imply I've never felt like this before, or the ones where I say that fate has conspired against us and we should part ways?"

Sedgewick stood from his own chair and moved next to Beryn. "Why the gates would I want the last one?"

Beryn shrugged and put that stack aside. "Some of us can actually do better."

Sedgewick gave him a glare, but nothing more. Convincing the younger man that Feyla was clearly superior to Beryn's plethora of options would hardly be to Sedgewick's advantage. He took the other stacks from Beryn and began rifling through them.

Beryn craned over Sedgewick's shoulder and jabbed his finger at certain pieces. "These were inspired by Second Age style couplets, and those are actually talking about the ocean but the language is vague enough to pass off. And that one I actually originally wrote for..."

Sedgewick tuned the man's ramblings out and focused on analyzing the lines of poetry as if they were the trickiest of spells. Sedgewick's brow furrowed. He was a poor writer of verses but even he could tell the Beryn had some degree of talent and an idea of what he was doing. There were pages and pages of—of feelings described in increasing complex variations and metaphors that made his head spin.

Sedgewick's stomach sank. He couldn't replicate this. Not even if he made twenty thousand attempts. An image of Feyla's disappointed face when she realized how horrid he was at wooing rose before him like a twisted illusion. Feyla was a romantic. Could she really stay with someone who failed miserably at giving her things like this?

Sedgewick made a decision. He snagged one of the poems Beryn had boasted of and quickly committed it to memory.

"I think I have some more in here if you want—"

"No, thank you. I think I've seen enough," he said, handing the stacks back to Beryn.

Beryn's ears drooped ever so slightly as if he was disappointed he couldn't show off more of his work. He carefully tucked the pages away and closed the lid. "Good luck with your twenty-first try," Beryn said as he led Sedgewick to the door.

"Mhm," Sedgewick muttered distractedly while walking out the door.

Beryn grabbed Sedgewick's shoulder and turn him back around. "Don't beat yourself up about this, all right? Feyla likes you. I don't understand why, but she does. The woman would love a stick nailed with a ribbon as long as it came from you."

Sedgewick nodded in agreement while inwardly repeating the poem he'd seen. Someone like Beryn wouldn't understand.

"This is so exciting!" said Feyla, squeezing Sedgewick's arm affectionately as they walked down the palace halls. "Our first Breyguard's festival together."

Sedgewick's chest did an odd stutter at the sight of her happy face. Feyla had settled into their courtship so naturally. Meanwhile, he still had to reassure himself after every date that he hadn't woken from a taunting dream.

"So, we could go dancing, or have dinner. Or...maybe do the city run?" Feyla said, her voice raising in timid hopefulness. "Just for fun! Not seriously or anything," she added quickly.

Sedgewick's throat contracted in mild panic. The "city run" was an old tradition inspired by the legend of Breyguard, a warlord from the First Age, and his lover, the Pure Magic touched Aarya. After bonding with the woman and journeying with her on many tale-worthy adventures, Aarya vanished. Rather than returning to his clan and taking a new wife, Breyguard traversed the known world for centuries in search of her. Whether or not he found her depended heavily on how optimistic the bard telling the story felt that night. Regardless of that, Breyguard's devotion to his mate was held up among their kind as the highest example of marital love and loyalty.

The city run was essentially a scaled-down reenactment of the story. Couples started out in different parts of the city and attempted to find each other before midnight. Bonded couples could sense the general direction of their mate, so finding each other was seen as a reminder of their special connection. For couples merely courting, like he and Feyla were, finding each other anyway was considered a sign of good fortune for the relationship.

While Sedgewick wouldn't consider himself particularly experienced in relationships, he'd seen a fair share of disappointment born of this particular tradition. And it didn't help that certain couples (such as that idiot and his little girl) had a reputation of always finding each other within an hour. Sedgewick had seen more than one scorned romantic take the whole mess far too seriously.

And Feyla was nothing if not a romantic.

Maybe he could still get out of this. There was a lecture on First Age magical defense techniques going on tonight. Perhaps they could go to that instead...

Feyla stared at him expectantly while holding his hands like they were treasures.

Sedgewick opened his mouth to suggest going to the lecture, only for the words to be drowned on by the utter faith in her ocean-colored eyes. "I suppose we could," he answered before realizing what he'd said.

Feyla let out a squee before clamping down on his arm and dragged him down the hall.

Gates, he was going to regret this.

"I don't want to spend the whole night apart," Feyla said, her ears drooping as if that would be a national tragedy. "So if we don't find each other in two hours, let's just meet back up here."

Sedgewick shifted his weight as they stood just outside the palace gates. He nodded his head in agreement, too busy coming up with a plan to give a better response.

"I'll start on the east side of this district and you can start on the west."

Sedgewick nodded absent-mindedly again. She'll need to circle back to around here eventually, so if I could just mentally map out the most likely route for her return...

His thoughts became fuzzy and unimportant as Feyla suddenly flung her arms around his neck, her drawstring purse hitting his back as she nuzzled one of his ears. "I don't want to add pressure, but just know that I have total faith in you." She pressed a quick, firm kiss against his lips, one that made his head spin like he'd drunk a whole bottle of strong wine in under an hour.

Sedgewick leaned in for a second sip, but Feyla skirted away, a teasing smile on her lips. "Come and find me and you can have another."

Panic hit Sedgewick for the second time that day. What if he couldn't find her? A disgusted, betrayed vision of Feyla taking her love and her kisses elsewhere stabbed past the haze her last one had created.

For the second time that day, Sedgewick made a decision.

"Wait!" he called out, grabbing the hand that held her purse.

Guilt pricked past his panic at the sight of Feyla's open face, but not enough to dissolve it. I'm not mussing this up, he vowed. Sedgewick quickly summoned his magic while she was distracted.

"Yes?" she asked.

"I...love you?" Sedgewick stuttered out as he slipped a temporary tracking spell on her bag.

"You're sweet." Feyla smiled, turning to go.

Guilt hit him like a magic blast, burning away his justifications. What the gates was he doing? Stealing poetry, misusing spells...

"Wait."

Feyla rolled her eyes as she turned back to him. "Yes, I love you too."

"No, not that," he brushed the words aside. "I can't do this anymore, Feyla." The weight on his chest felt unbearable.

Feyla's lips parted. Her chest heaved in worry. "Sedgewick, please don't."

"I can't handle the things!"

"What thing?!"

"The—the romance! With the feelings and the rhyming words and the tracking spells!" He gestured wildly as if the regretful actions were before him.

Feyla stared at him, bewildered. "Rhyming? Tracking spell? Sedgewick, you're not making any sense!"

"I'm not good at this!" he shouted. Sedgewick sank to the ground by the palace wall and clutched his hair in his hands. "I tried... I really tried but I can't give you what you want." He pulled out the poem he'd written down from memory. "I can't write verses without stealing them from Beryn." Sedgewick ripped the paper up. "And I can't track you across the city like Breyguard. Not without magic." Sedgewick reached out his hand and tugged his spell off Feyla's purse. It flew to his hand and he dismissed the magic.

Feyla sank down beside Sedgewick, her face falling with her. "You were going to give me one of Beryn's old poems?"

He nodded.

"And use a spell to find me in the city?"

He nodded again, more hesitantly this time.

"Why?"

Sedgewick avoided her gaze. "You like the verses and the traditions, Feyla. Don't try to deny it. I love you and I...I wanted to show you that just as well as every other man could. If not better."

"Sedgewick..." Feyla's voice cracked.

He felt a stinging in the back of his eyes, but bit it down. "I'll understand if you feel you can't be with someone who can't give you those things without copying or magic."

Feyla remained still for a long moment as if she was collecting herself. Finally, she rested her head against his shoulder and stared out at the city down the steps below. "What was the name of that mage who came to visit you before we were together? The woman from the far northlands."

"Iliana?" Sedgewick asked. She was a master mage on the magiatic council.

"That one. I remember her visit. She brought you that bottle of wine and the two of you sat around your office and talked about magic for hours."

Sedgewick wrinkled his brow. What was the woman getting at?

"She was successful and independent and passionate about magic. Like you." Feyla snuggled closer and wrapped her arm around his. "And then there was me. A washed-up healer who couldn't follow along no matter how hard I tried. And I thought, 'Why would he want me when someone like her exists?'"

Feyla sat up, finally looking him in the face, her eyes solemn. "So why do you?"

Sedgewick bristled protectively. "That is not even a fair comparison. You have qualities Iliana could only dream of possessing." He skimmed the back of his hand down her cheek. "And you're very smart, Dearest. It just shows through differently. I wouldn't be with someone if I thought she was an idiot."

Feyla smiled as if he'd fallen into a trap. "And you're very romantic, Sedgewick. It just shows through differently. I wouldn't be with someone if I thought he wasn't able to show he loved me." She clasped his hand and leaned into it. "If I wanted a man like Beryn or Breyguard, I'd go find someone else. I want you. Don't twist yourself in knots and change the man I love."

Feyla smacked his arm, finally releasing the anger her compassion had held back. "Especially if those changes mean stealing poetry and putting spells on my things."

Guilt and regret tugged at him again. What had he been thinking? "Dearest, I'm so sorry."

"Mhm."

"Intensely sorry."

"Uh huh."

"I'll never do it again."

"You shouldn't have done it in the first place," Feyla said, turning away.

An idea struck him. "Let me make it up to you."

Sedgewick rushed back into the palace and to his desk. He unlocked a desk drawer and pulled out the small pouch that held the present he'd originally been intending to give to Feyla. Running back outside, he sat back down beside her and held out the pouch. "It's not verses but..."

Feyla eyed him for a moment before plucking the pouch out of his hand. She tugged open the strings and two small orbs, their surfaces dark gray with a prismatic sheen, rolled into her hand.

"They're linked scrying orbs," Sedgewick said, his voice soft and uncertain. "So we can speak to each other even when we're apart." He swallowed, looking away. "I know I have trouble talking about my...feelings." Sedgewick paused at the word like a man struggling to swallow a tough bite of food. "But I do care for you, Dearest, and I...I want to try to do better. For you. Which is what these are for." He gestured at the gift, letting out a breath as if he'd just finished a two-hour-long speech.

Feyla pressed one of the orbs into his hand. Sedgewick met her gaze, his throat clenching at the sight of tears in hers. She wiped them away and smiled at him smugly. "See? I told you that you could be romantic." She hugged her own orb to her chest. The pink glow of her magic coated it as she whispered something into it.

Sedgewick's own lit up as a distorted version of Feyla's voice came out the other side. "And I'll forgive you. But you better not do this again."

Sedgewick stared at her, smiling in spite of her chastisement. Gates, he didn't deserve her. Or understand her, come to think of it. "No more of that, love. Promise."

"Good. Now let's get going." Feyla stood, tucking her present carefully in her purse.

Sedgewick frowned in confusion. "Where?"

"We're still doing the city run. And I'm going to find you without magic," Feyla said, a challenge in her voice.

Sedgewick grinned. "Not if I find you first."

And for the record, not that he put much trust in signs of that sort, he did.

Without magic.

**************************

Author's Note: Is this my longest piece yet? Why yes, yes it is. Let me know if y'all would prefer I split ones this long into two parts in the future. And if anyone was wondering why Sedgewick flipped out over tracking Feyla when he used a similar spell in MM, he basically sees tracking a potential trading deal breaker at the request of a lord as different than monitoring the woman he's courting, even if it was temporary.