#'why does aymeric know what it tastes like to lick a sock'

[blackestnight]

either 💛 reunion kiss / relief or 💜 surprise kiss / impulsive kiss (which ever strikes your fancy)

reunion kiss / relief set prior to the ultima thule portion of endwalker msq

Aymeric did not consider himself particularly prone to aethersickness, but longer journeys had a tendency to leave him out of sorts, mostly due to a lack of opportunity to build up a tolerance. Not that practice would have prepared him for the experimental aetheryte—a daunting name, but Estinien had mentioned one in his own reports, and the researchers in Idyllshire assured him it was safe. They had also, with strained smiles, warned him of some mild discomfort, which was perhaps an understatement, as upon re-manifesting in the Sharlayan teleportation laboratory Aymeric was forced to sit on the cold tile before he blacked out. The scientist was sympathetic, at least, and ready with a revitalizing tonic, which smelled strongly of mint and left a gentle aftertaste similar to licking a well-worn sock.

Not the finest travel experience he’d ever had.

The researcher at Confluence was also kind enough to point him in the direction of the Baldesion Annex, once Aymeric had recovered enough to walk, where he was greeted by a cheerful Lalafellin receptionist who informed him that Hanami was out and about on errands (of course). Further instruction led him down toward the harbor, to a seaside eatery named—perhaps in a fit of morbid humor—the Last Stand, where Aymeric did not find Hanami, but did find a tipsy Y’shtola and Thancred wrangling an astoundingly drunken Urianger out of his seat; Y’shtola directed him towards the residential area, and Leveilleur Manor, which Aymeric managed to locate mostly by dint of following the hulking silhouette of the roofline. (He thought, with bittersweet nostalgia, of the popular adage among Ishgardian natives, that one could always locate a road that led to the Vault so long as one could find a road that went up.) Hanami wasn’t at the manor either, but he did find Estinien glowering at young Alphinaud as they both ambled down the road leading toward a fountain plaza, and after exhausting a range of pleasantries with Alphinaud (and receiving a welcoming grunt from Estinien) Aymeric managed to ferret out that Hanami had passed by before making her way toward the library called Noumenon. And so back across the city he went, past the grand statehouse of the Rostra and across rolling lawns dotted with gazebos, one of which was occupied by Alisaie and a bleary-eyed G’raha Tia, both of whom gave him perfunctory greetings before confessing that Hanami had already finished her business and made her way back to the Annex.

By the time Aymeric made his way back, past the apologetic receptionist to the room where Hanami was scrawled in chalk on the wooden door, he was cold and still vaguely nauseous, and yet the discomfort melted away like hoarfrost under sunlight when his own sunrise opened the door.

She was only partway undressed, sock-footed and her nose still pink from the cold, and as radiant as Aymeric had ever seen her when she said, “When did you get here?”

“You,” he said, stepping forward past the threshold, “can be remarkably difficult to find.”

“Blame my mother for teaching me to sneak,” Hanami fired back, a slow smile breaking across her face as she sidestepped to shut the door behind him. She was already raising her free hand to brace against his shoulder, and when the door latched shut he was already stooping to meet her: her wedding band was on her hand for once, cold against the skin of his neck when he pressed his own relieved smile against her mouth. Despite the chill her skin was comfortingly warm against his palms when he spread them over the small of her back. Hanami flinched when his nose brushed against her own, and immediately her hands moved to wind through his hair, guiding his face down into the dip of her shoulder. “You are freezing,” she grumbled, while he huffed a laugh and stumbled slightly as she threatened to unbalance him.

“I was sent on a bit of a hunt to find you,” he admitted, and pressed another kiss to the scales at her neck as punctuation.

She murmured a noise against the tip of his ear—not an apology, not really, but the closest he thought she would come—and released her grip so he could stand properly, long enough to take him by the elbow and draw him toward the table. He followed, unbuttoning his jacket, and allowed himself a sigh of relief: worthy as his quest had been, he was all the more comforted by the reward of her presence.

#ask #ask meme #writing - mine #oc: hanami hagane #s: a minor justice #aymeric de borel #THANKEE JAYNE #'why does aymeric know what it tastes like to lick a sock' #listen at some point in his life he was an impulsive teenager who would do a lot of weird things on a dare