Getting Stronger By Marrying And Investing In Abandoned Villainesses

Theo laid it all out across the living room table like a man setting up for inspection, bags first, then the contents of the bags, until there was barely any table left to see.

”Alright.”

He rubbed his hands together.

”Presents.”

Estea, sitting in her chair at the end of the table, did not look impressed.

”You said that like it’s an event.”

”It is an event.”

He started with her, because if he started with Sesan first, she’d spend the whole unveiling glaring a hole through the back of his head, and he’d learned that lesson already.

He lifted the first gown free of its wrapping and held it up by the shoulders, crimson silk catching the lamplight, the fabric heavier and finer than anything currently hanging in her closet.

Estea’s eyes went to it before she could stop them. Then, a beat too late, they went to him instead, unimpressed on purpose.

”What is that for?”

”You. Obviously.”

”I have clothes.”

”You have three shirts and a robe with a hole in it.”

”The hole is character.”

He held the gown out anyway, and after a long moment of pretending that accepting it was beneath her, Estea took it from him and laid it flat across her lap. She ran two fingers down the seam, checking the stitching for flaws.

She didn’t find any.

She didn’t say so.

”It’s passable.”

There was a cardigan next, thick and soft, the kind of thing meant for cold mornings and worse days. Then came the blanket, folded so the embroidery showed on top, flames stitched in thread that shifted from deep orange to a hot, pale gold whenever the lamplight caught it.

Estea went still when he unfolded it all the way.

”It reminded me of you,” Theo said.

”The fire, I mean. Not the...”

”I know what you meant.”

She didn’t thank him. But before he’d even finished unpacking the rest of the bags, Estea had already wheeled herself halfway across the room, hauled the old grey blanket off her lap with more force than the task required, and dropped the new one into its place. She tucked it in at the corners as neatly as she could.

Then she caught him watching.

”It was cold in here,” she said. ”That’s all.”

”Sure.”

”Don’t look at me like that.”

”I’m not looking at you like anything.”

”You are. Stop it.”

He let it go. Pushing past ”It’s passable” and a grey blanket on the floor in under a minute was more than he usually got out of her in a week, and he knew better than to spend all his luck in one conversation.

Sesan had been vibrating in place through the entire exchange, both hands pressed flat against her knees like she was physically holding herself down. The second Theo turned to her, she was already leaning forward off the couch.

”Alright, alright.” He laughed and pulled out her bag. ”Your turn.”

The coat came first, deep blue and lined thick enough to sleep in. She took it from him with both hands like it might break, holding it up in front of her face to inspect it before she’d even tried it on.

Then came the hat, soft wool and a little too big. She pulled it down over her ears immediately and left it there, frost-pale hair sticking out from beneath the brim in every direction.

Then the candies.

There were a lot of candies.

He’d meant to buy one bag and had somehow walked out with four. The moment Sesan saw the colors through the wrapping, her whole face changed, her cheeks rounding with a smile she didn’t bother to hide behind anything this time.

She hugged the bag to her chest the way she hugged everything that mattered, tight enough to crumple it. She rocked once on her heels, making a small sound in her throat that wasn’t a word and never would be, and Theo had long since learned to hear it as one anyway.

She didn’t say thank you either.

Instead, she reached out, grabbed a fistful of his sleeve, and held on to it while she tore into the candy bag with her other hand.

”There’s more,” Theo said, lifting out the small jar and the flower last. ”This one’s an ointment. It’s supposed to help strengthen bone over time. I don’t know how much it’ll do against the Frozen Sea, but it can’t hurt to try it on your legs. I got one for you too, Estea!”

Estea grunted from across the room while Sesan paused around a mouthful of candy long enough to look at the jar. She nodded once, then went straight back to the candy.

The flower he carried through to her room himself, a pale, closed bloom that hadn’t opened yet, and set it on the table beside her bed.

The shopkeeper had sworn up and down that the scent, once it bloomed, eased the kind of static buildup that came before a seizure. Theo had bought it on faith, along with Captain Dunn’s grudging confirmation that it wasn’t a scam.

He didn’t know if it would work.

He was going to find out either way.

Uthed’s gift was smaller and plain, wrapped in cloth rather than paper. A whetstone and a small bottle of blade oil, the good kind, the kind that actually did something instead of just smelling nice.

Uthed turned the gifts over once in his hands on the porch, staring down at them.

”You did not need to.”

”I wanted to.”

”Then I accept it.” He raised his sword. ”She greets you too.”

”Does she talk now?”

”No.”

Uthed set the stone down beside him, very precisely.

”But I imagine she would, if she could, and she would be more gracious about it than I am.”

Odette’s gifts were practical too, a set of good needles and three skeins of wool in colors she’d never buy for herself, plus a tin of proper tea to replace whatever she’d been rationing out of a jar that had clearly been refilled too many times.

She looked at the gifts for a long moment.

”You didn’t have to spend on me.”

”I can buy you tea.”

She said nothing.

Then she folded the wool into her bag without comment and went back to the stove.

Theo was still standing in the middle of the wreckage of wrapping paper, watching Sesan work her way through her second candy already, when the panel opened in front of him, quiet and gold at the edges.

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