Hope Falls

"And Karina would be a human shield to protect her son," Magnus swallowed, shoulders tensing. "All of it would be like a game of dominoes, one after another."

---

"What is to come? The worst has - has already passed, hasn't it?" Conan frowned, squeezing his hands. "What are you expecting?"

“You will spiral if we have this conversation Conan. It is not a criticism but… your day has been bad enough and the sun has only just begun to shine, I am not ruining it further for you.” Lucian shook his head. “I can deal with things. And we can deal with what comes.”

---

“We are helpless. This is a mess they have all created and only they can get themselves out of. We just have to sit at the top of the hole and hope they can climb their way to the top.”

"I would rather transparency, Lucian." Conan frowned, moving his hands back to rest them on his lap instead. "Tell me, please..."

---

"If his death would have been... expected then I would have assured him I would keep his children safe as I have done for Dagmar. The promise was never made but it still doesn't sit right i can't keep it."

“Emmett?” Thea glanced to him, gently moving her hand to brush across his face. “Ira is a man now… and able to make his own choices. Short of kidnapping him we can’t do anything if he refuses. And I suppose it is the same with Aesira and Cassius. If they - if they turn down our help then are you willing to kidnap the children of a King to keep your promise - in fact no, do not answer that.” She snorted, shaking her head. “Of course you are.”

---

“I may have come to that meeting late but I watched Liara leave the room in tears. What happens when Alistair Zhao turns up here demanding answers? You need time to grieve losing Dagmar even if it is just for a short while. I love you Conan but we both know you will not be able to keep your composure if he turns up with his chest puffed out and you still feel angry towards his sister. What happens when Magnus and Thea leave and I am the only one Karina can lean on because Dagmar is not here and I am not enough and she decides to fling herself off a building again to see the man who was enough? What if this turns into something much bigger and it all falls apart and I am stuck in another siege and - “ Lucian shook his head, swallowing thickly.

Conan moved from his seat to the other side of the desk, perching on the edge of the seat beside Lucians chair and leaning in to hug him. "You have been through.... absolute hell the past few years, everything has been taken from you that makes you feel like you. You have still stayed though, still fought, still smiled when you could. You have been my rock, and they would be so so proud of the man you have become. Give me today, give me the next few hours to be sad with my children and then allow me to be your rock, Luca. It's my turn now."

---

"Both General Aster and the Valkyrie will understand the need to knock their children out to transport them if it was to save their life." He snorted his amusment.

“Do you know how bad it will look internationally if we kidnap another Kings heirs?” Thea properly laughed then, shaking her head. “Oh it is never a dull day being married to you…”

---

“You have just lost the woman you love it - this should be the other way around. I abandoned both you and Karina this last week when you needed me I - I should be comforting you.” Lucian let out a weak laugh, closing his eyes at the hug.

"You have spent the past week saving them, helping us by finding a way to save them. You have done more than enough." Conan rested his cheek on top of Lucian's head, closing his own eyes. "I am so grateful, for everything you do. There has not been a day when I haven't felt blessed you walked back in here, with your infuriating grin and the notion that you know better." He took in a trembling breath, "You believe Karina is your soul mate, I believe Dagmar is mine, but in the end you will always have me and I will have you. You are enough, enough for me, and that is the most important thing, really."

---

"We throw a party and it will look like a big game, no one will know any different." Magnus chuckled

“I don’t regret staying for you. I can’t say I don’t miss my other family… but I have never regretted staying. I hope you know that.”

---

“And I would go along with the madness because somehow you’d find a way to get us out of it. You always do. You have never let me down.”

"I do. I hope you know that I will not behave like a petulant child if you need to express how much you miss them. We can talk to one another, it works both ways, it always has."

---

"You give me far too much credit, you are just as mad. It wouldn't work any other way."

“Five years goes by quickly… It isn’t what you want to hear I know but… I have experience in missing people I thought I’d spend every day of the rest of my life with… You will get through this… I will get you through this.”

---

“I am perfectly sane I will have you know.”

"In that case you are not the woman I married." Magnus brushed his nose against the hair on the top of her head.

---

Conan finally leant back from the hug, encouraging gently, "Go to Karina, whatever anxieties you are feeling are ones to be laid to rest with her. I am fine, Luca. I promise."

“There is still an entirely other situation to contend with Conan. You may be fine for now. But can you maintain that if Lord Zhao turns up on our doorstep? Can we deal with dissent and upset so soon after what happened this morning? I cannot go to Kari and promise her everything will be okay if our lives are due to explode again.”

---

“I’m a little bit different than her, mm… a lot has happened since. But I still love you all the same… If not more than I ever did.”

"Please have faith in me, if you don't then I really have fallen too far." Conan turned his gaze away, "I know I can do this."

---

"You are feeling sentimental."

(( Night night )(

“I look at the position Karina has been in the last week… I look at where Dagmar is now. I am lucky to have you. You would never leave me the way Lucian left Karina to just hang and deal with everything alone with not knowing why. I just… I feel incredibly lucky to have you.”

---

Lucian was quiet as he studied his cousin before nodding. “I believe in you.” He nodded. “If you say you can keep it together… I believe you.”

"Go to your wife, bring your family back together as much as you can."  Conan encouraged quietly, squeezing his shoulder. "I don't need babysitting, not as fragile as I appear."

---

Magnus leant forward to brush his lips delicately against hers, whispering, "We make a good team. I couldn't imagine anyone else being my Queen, or my closest friend."

“Going to bathe first, find a change of clothes. Ira will need time to get whatever it is out of his system, and Karina will need some quiet too. I have a feeling she’s already going to be going through her daughters things and trying to trigger visions to rest her mind…”

---

“We are lucky we got away with it… incredibly so. For all they say it is not allowed we could only have ended up like this because fate dictated it.”

"You are avoiding her." He surmised.

---

"Lets not talk about it too much, or too loudly. Let's not risk reminding them."

“No. I’m not smothering her.”

---

“You think they could undo what they have done? I wouldn’t allow it.” Thea assured with a grin, kissing him gently. “This will never be us.” She gestured to the castle around them. “We are careful. We are calculated. And we do not give up so easily.”

"You haven't seen her for several days, going to her now is not smothering.' Conan chuckled beneath his breath. "You have to face her eventually."

“You giving yourself some time before you see the kids isn’t avoiding them… it’s composing yourself and making sure you don’t fuck up their day further… That is all I am doing. A bath, some clothes, composing myself.”

"Making sure you don't smell of dust and rotting paper is probably an important thing to do before getting too close to anyone, I see your point."

---

"We should go inside, make sure we are on alert for Aesira and Cassius tonight." Magnus whispered.

“I imagine our own children have many stories from their sleepovers they wish to share too. Zaria has become quite enamoured with my sisters here, far more than the ones at home for some reason.”

---

“When things are less… as they are, we should have someone go down there and archive things. There’s fucking all sorts down there. Not just books… looks like in the days after the takeover whoever remained in the castle loyal to your father stored a lot of stuff down there to prevent it being destroyed. Portraits, trinkets, diaries…”

"They are faces she doesn't see every day, with no stories and other ways to gossip." Magnus chuckled. "Zaria's charm wouldn't have stopped working on them yet, they'll be wrapped around her little finger."

---

"That was quite an undertaking for just one person, dangerous too. Tomorrow I will task it to someone, by the time we are all feeling able to deal with it then they may have be finished."

“Who knows what else is down there mm? Our parents had secrets… Hopefully nothing earth shattering.”

---

Thea got up, reaching her hand over to help him to his feet. “She could talk her way into and out of anything that girl.”

"She is like you," His arm found it's way around her waist when he was stood, heading back into the building.

---

"I'd like to think it is something mundane, like the apples they insisted were grown in our orchards were actually shipped over from an Eastern Kingdom."