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[notablenotions]

Mask's of Noblity-Chapter 33

Hans’ POV

The hall stank of boiled meat, cheap wine, and desperation.

The Baron of Visteck had spared no expense for his week-long farce: banners hung limp from the rafters, musicians screeched away on poorly tuned lutes, and the nobles of the region sweated under layers of brocade and pride. It was everything Hans Capon despised about court life condensed into one suffocating hall.

He might have survived it better if Henry were at his side.

He should have been.

Henry was meant to ride with them, nominally as Hans' guard, but mostly so Hans wouldn’t have to endure the creeping hands of ambitious daughters and the endless snide whispers about his "odd" wife alone.

But at the last moment, Henry had excused himself.

Mutt is sick, he claimed.

Couldn’t possibly leave the poor dog, he said. Looked very solemn about it.

Hans didn’t believe a word.

Mutt had eaten half a rabbit the night before and had looked robust enough to drag a cart.

No, Hans suspected the real reason was simpler—and far more frustrating: Henry had known Jitka would be here. Henry had seen the slow, dangerous shift happening between them. He’d seen how Hans was looking at her now, with too much softness, too much hunger.

And Henry—kind, patient Henry—was giving them space.

It was generous. It was selfless.

It also made Hans want to punch a wall.

Because now, here he was, marooned in a sea of drunken minor lords and their scheming daughters, with no anchor except the woman sitting beside him—the woman who was driving him quietly insane.

Lady Jitka Capon.

Six months of marriage, and Hans had been in love with her for half of it.

Not that they'd spoken about it.

Not really.

There had been that night—the laughter, the wine, the closeness. The way her hand had found his, casual and clumsy and unbearably tender. And then the way she had run from it—hiding behind jokes, behind embroidery, behind Henry.

He had overheard their conversation, too. Not the whole of it, but enough—the thick, trembling fear in her voice when she spoke of breaking people, of love being a danger she dared not wield.

He hadn't confronted her. Hadn’t had the chance. They’d been packed off to this cursed feast before the wound could even scab over.

And now?

Now he didn’t bother hiding it.

Every time he looked at her—at the tumble of pale hair, the careless curve of her smile, the long lashes casting shadows on her porcelain skin—he let it show.

He loved her.

He wanted her.

And every time he tried to lean toward it—to speak to it—she changed the subject with ruthless precision.

Tonight was no different.

They were both drunk enough to find the world funny again. Drunk enough to sit too close, to share a bottle between them under the table, their legs brushing with every stifled laugh.

Jitka bit her lip—her tell—and leaned in.

"You're grumpy," she teased. "Shall we play a game?"

Hans grinned, feeling the tension bleed away under the familiar rhythm of her banter. "A game, wife? You do realize you’re proposing treason in front of half the duchy."

"A simple one," she promised, blue eyes wicked. "Guess which guest dies first. Then guess how."

Hans barked a laugh, startling a few nearby nobles who already looked down their noses at Jitka like she was some strange beast brought to court for amusement.

He leaned in, conspiratorial. "You first, you little demon."

She scanned the room, finger tapping thoughtfully against her lips. Hans tried very hard not to stare at her mouth.

"Baron Visteck," she whispered, breath hot against his ear. "Heart failure mid-rut with his stablehand."

Hans choked on his wine.

"You're wicked," he murmured, delighted.

"My turn," she said sweetly, eyes glittering. "Who next?"

Hans leaned close, letting his lips almost brush her skin. "Lady Ludmilla. Chokes on a chicken bone while trying to seduce the bishop."

Jitka collapsed against him, laughing soundlessly into his shoulder.

The evening dissolved into wine and whispered predictions, each more ridiculous than the last. They kept score with sly glances and nudges under the table, lost in a world that, for once, felt like it belonged to them and not the grim obligations written into their bloodlines.

And for a little while, Hans could pretend.

Pretend that she was his—really his—not just by law, not just by duty, but by choice. By heart.

He hadn't so much as looked at another woman tonight. Three offers—and he hadn't even considered them.

All he wanted was her.

Later, when the laughter faded into a lazy warmth and the hall emptied of the worst of the vultures, Hans let his hand drift across the back of her chair, fingers brushing the soft linen of her sleeve.

Jitka leaned her head against his shoulder with a theatrical sigh.

"Three women," she murmured. "All turned away. Poor Henry. Does my husband intend to return to Rattay with his virtue intact?"

Hans chuckled low. "Are you trying to get me laid, wife?"

"Just ensuring you're not bored."

He tilted his head, studying her, feeling the slow, smoldering thud of his pulse.

"Or," he said quietly, "perhaps you're running."

She stilled.

"Running from the fact you want me."

She pulled back slightly, color rising to her cheeks—but she laughed it off, brushing it away like a cobweb.

"I think the wine has gone to your head, husband."

Hans smiled, slow and lazy, not bothering to hide the hunger in his gaze.

"You can keep hiding, Jitka," he said, voice rough. "With wit. With facts. With games."

He brushed his knuckles lightly across the curve of her wrist.

"But you can't hide forever."

She looked at him then, for a heartbeat—really looked—something raw flickering in her summer-sky eyes.

And then she looked away.

Changed the subject.

As she always did.

Hans let her.

For tonight.

[notablenotions]

Masks of Noblity-Chapter 32

Hans’ POV

It had been three days since the embroidery ambush.

Three days since whatever had happened between Henry and Jitka in that little sitting room—whatever tight-lipped, heart-stripped, emotionally-bloody thing had gone down—had settled into the air like storm smoke. Thick. Hard to breathe.

Jitka was pivoting. Pivoting like a master swordsman avoiding a duel.

Every time Hans tried to bring up That Night—the night, where they’d laughed over bad poetry and wine and something between them had curled like smoke—she danced around it. Distracted him with biting commentary about his boots, or the state of Pebbles’ mane, or once, an absolutely unhinged tale about Radzig nearly falling into a fishpond while drunk on mead (which might have been true).

Whenever Hans tried to catch her eyes, she redirected. Clever. Sharp. Beautifully infuriating.

And she was avoiding Henry too.

Which, frankly, meant something was very wrong.

---

Hans found Henry by the stables, where he was showing Pebbles something he insisted was a “hoof salve” but looked suspiciously like jam.

“Can I ask you something?” Hans asked.

Henry glanced up. “About Jitka?”

Hans frowned. “How do you—?”

Henry sighed. “You’re both terrible at pretending. Worse than Bartosch trying to lie about taxes.”

Hans sat on a crate, rubbing the back of his neck. “She won’t talk to me. I try, and she just—deflects. It’s like trying to have a heartfelt conversation with a cat who’s also a diplomat.”

Henry gave a wry smile. “We had a conversation. It got… intense.”

“What happened?”

“She’s scared,” Henry said, simply. “She thinks she’ll break you. Or us. So she’s trying to keep you in this box labeled ‘survival partner’ instead of just admitting she might love you too.”

Hans blinked.

“Oh.”

Henry stepped closer, face open but unreadable. “She’s trying to protect us. The only way she knows how.”

Hans let that sit for a moment. Then nodded, slowly. “I… I have to go to this feast. One of my minor lords. You know the type. Aged venison, bad music, and someone’s daughter being ‘coincidentally’ seated beside me.”

Henry raised an eyebrow. “Romantic.”

“I was going to bring you both,” Hans said. “But now…”

“Don’t bring me,” Henry said.

Hans looked startled. “Really?”

Henry nodded. “You need space with her. To figure this out. She’s retreating. You have to catch her.”

There was a pause. A shift.

Hans cleared his throat. “Henry… are you really okay? With me and her? If I…”

Henry smiled. Soft. Steady. “I’ve always known I couldn’t be your only. You have to marry. You have to have heirs. I was never going to be your ending, Hans.”

“But you are,” Hans said, voice low. “You’re my anchor. My breath. I need her, yes, but… I need you. You’re my beginning. You’re the reason I’m brave enough to even want more.”

Henry stepped close, cupped his cheek. “Then go want more. Just make sure she knows she’s not a replacement.”

Hans leaned in and kissed him, deep and fierce and full of everything that couldn’t be said in courtrooms and corridors.

When they parted, Henry smirked. “As long as I can still wench.”

Hans choked. “You—!”

“I am versatile,” Henry said with mock pride. “And I still owe the bailiff’s niece a dance.”

---

Hans found Jitka in the gardens, perched beside Bartosch near the herb beds. She was talking fast, hands moving, eyes darting.

“…and I just don’t see how he thinks this is wise. I’m not someone people fall in love with. That’s absurd. I mean, really. I’m me.”

Hans lingered behind a tree, listening.

“I’m strange,” Jitka continued. “I panic. I lock up. I made a kitchen boy cry because I asked if carrots had regional dialects. I’m not—this—this romantic figure. Hans has Henry. He has Bohemia. He’s been with half the duchy and could probably seduce a painting. I don’t…”

Bartosch scratched his beard. “You’re a right fool sometimes.”

Jitka glared. “Excuse me?”

“You’ve got plenty of people who love you.”

“People who tolerate me.”

“I love you.”

She blinked.

“You’re insufferable. Arrogant. Cleverer than me—which is deeply annoying. But I love you. So do the staff. So does Mutt. Hell, even Pebbles tolerates you and she hates nobility.”

Jitka’s mouth twisted.

“It’s the romantic part,” she admitted. “It requires… touch. Intimacy. I… I don’t understand it. Hans is Hans. He’s got Henry. He’s had every woman from here to Kuttenberg warming his bed. I can’t compare.”

Bartosch stared at her. “He’s an idiot if he ever tries to compare you.”

She glanced away.

“You should’ve married John II of Lichtenstein when you had the chance,” Bart muttered. “You two would’ve been delightfully awkward together. Played chess in silence for twenty years. Produced terrifying children.”

Jitka laughed softly. “I liked John. He had good manners and a healthy respect for poison.”

Hans stepped forward.

She froze.

He gave her a look that was equal parts affection and exasperation. “And yet your Married to me"

[notablenotions]

Masks of noblity - Chapter 31

Embroidery club.

A quiet agreement between two people who carried too much in their bones. A place of thread and tea and silence. Where emotion could slip into silk and color instead of breaking them open.

But today?

Today Henry had hijacked it with all the subtlety of a siege tower on fire.

It began innocently enough. A clear of his throat. A casual inquiry:

“So… will Hans be joining you for dinner?”

Jitka didn’t look up from her hoop. “Depends if he stops thinking I’m terrifying long enough to chew.”

“Hm,” Henry said. “He mentioned joining embroidery sometime.”

“Excellent. He can practice stitching up the wound he’ll earn if he tries to correct my tension.”

Pivot. Deflect. Redirect.

But Henry didn’t take the bait.

Instead, he set down his hoop. Rose. And stood in front of her chair, hands on either side—not looming, never looming—but blocking. Gently. Strategically.

She looked up at him and scowled. “You’re pulling a Bartosch.”

“You’re confusing Hans,” Henry said simply.

“And you’re blocking the tea.” She pointed toward the table. “Is this your clever new interrogation tactic? Beverage denial?”

“Jitka.”

She sighed. “Fine. He’s confused. He’s often confused. I once found him trying to get a goose to court a decorative swan. I’m not surprised.”

“Don’t do that.”

���What?”

“Hide behind cleverness. You’re hurting him.”

She stiffened. “It’s not that simple.”

“No. It never is. But you led him there, Jitka. You knew what he felt wasn’t platonic, and you let him believe it was.”

She dropped her hoop.

The thread unraveled slightly.

“I was protecting him,” she said tightly. “From himself. From this… this illusion.”

Henry crossed his arms. “What illusion?”

“That I can love him the way he deserves.”

There it was.

The quiet. The honest.

She stood, slowly, brushing down her skirts like a soldier smoothing armor. “He’s my husband, Henry. We are permanently bound. By law. By contract. If he wants my body, he can have it. That’s what the papers say.”

Henry’s jaw flexed, but he stayed silent.

“What he’s asking for,” she continued, voice shaking now, “is more than obligation. He wants something intimate. Something close. And if I let myself—if I let this happen—I will mess it up. I will ruin it. And then we’ll still have to make an heir. While hating each other.”

She looked at Henry directly, eyes sharp, wet. “I don’t want that for him.”

Henry studied her.

“You think he’ll move on,” he said softly. “That you’re just another skirt.”

She barked a laugh. “I’m not even a skirt, Henry. I’m odd. I’m strange. I don’t fit. You know that. You’ve seen it. I make people nervous. I talk too fast. I freeze when I should speak. I panic over touching. If you haven’t noticed by now, I’m wrong.”

“You’re not wrong,” Henry said.

She turned her back.

Henry stepped closer. “He’s hurting. Because he thinks he’s betraying your agreement. Because he thinks he misunderstood—and that it’s his fault. But it’s not. It’s yours.”

She spun. “Oh, so now I’m the villain?”

“You’re the coward,” Henry said gently. “And you’re using your cleverness like a shield because you’re terrified.”

Her voice broke on the next words. “He doesn’t even know me.”

“Then let him.”

She took a shaky breath. “If he’s falling for me, then he’s falling for the idea. Not the reality. He loves some version of me that smiles and says clever things and looks composed in candlelight. That’s not real. That’s theatre.”

“You think you’re protecting him,” Henry said, quietly. “You’re not.”

Her lip quivered.

Then—soft. Barely above a whisper—“Yes, I am.”

Henry stilled.

She didn’t look at him. “You don’t understand. I’m protecting you, too.”

Silence.

Then—gently—“From what?”

She stepped back. “Sometimes, when things are… too much, I can’t speak. I just… lock. I once walked halfway across the battlements while thinking about seed variance in wild rye before I realised I was barefoot. I nearly fell. I didn’t even notice.”

Henry said nothing.

She kept going, voice trembling. “Once, Radzig found me scrawling equations across his office wall. Writing on the walls. With ink. Some of it… was blood. He spent days washing it off before a scholar from Prague realised I’d solved something they thought was impossible.”

Henry’s eyes widened slightly.

“I cared for my father,” she said, suddenly sharp. “When madness took him. When he stopped recognising me. When he’d talk to ghosts, and scream at the windows, and call me by my mother’s name. I cleaned him. Fed him. Hid his fits from our tenants. I did it alone. My Kunštát relatives took my brother and left me behind.”

She was shaking now.

“I threatened the king for my father’s pension when I was five. They sent Radzig to talk me down. My father asked Radzig to take me—because he knew. Knew what was coming.”

Henry whispered, “Jitka…”

“They put him in a monastery,” she said. “And then I had to stand there while every member of my family explained why they couldn’t take me. Why they wouldn’t. And Radzig stepped forward and told the king he would.”

Henry reached out, but she stepped away.

“So yes,” she said, voice hoarse, “I probably love Hans. But out of love, I’m protecting him. From me.”

A long silence.

Then Henry said, “I believe you.”

Jitka blinked.

“I believe you’re scared,” he continued. “And I don’t blame you. But you don’t get to keep running from this while Hans bleeds. You don’t get to hide behind duty when the truth is, you’re afraid of being loved for the first time in your life.”

She turned to leave.

“Tell him the truth,” Henry said softly. “Because he deserves to be hurt by your honesty more than comforted by your lies.”

Jitka didn’t reply.

She just walked out, fists clenched, breath tight, her whole body trembling.

[notablenotions]

Mask's of Noblity -Chapter 30

Henry’s POV

Henry was grooming Pebbles with the solemnity of a monk polishing holy relics.

She was very particular about her appearance. Sensitive, even. Henry suspected this stemmed from several years of people calling her “hideous,” “demonic,” and once, “a walking curse on hooves.” Personally, he didn’t see it. She had kind eyes. Strong ankles. A charming refusal to trot when asked.

Samuel had once commented that Meg—the washerwoman Henry was briefly bedding—looked rather like Pebbles.

He'd apologized to Pebbles directly afterward.

With a pear.

And a promise it would never happen again.

Before Henry could reflect further on the emotional complexity of his horse and his questionable taste in women, the stable doors flung open.

Hans Capon exploded into the space, looking like a man who had been chased across half the kingdom by sin itself. His hair was wild. His doublet was only half-laced, and his shoes were on the wrong feet. His eyes were wide with panic.

“Henry!” he gasped, skidding to a halt, “I—I’ve done something catastrophic.”

Henry didn’t stop brushing.

He raised an eyebrow. “Worse than the wine incident with the Talmberg envoy?”

Hans flailed. “This is emotional, you peasant!”

Henry finished the brushstroke, set it down, and turned with a sigh. “What now?

Hans ran a hand through his hair, which only made things worse. “I spoke with Jitka—about us—about the marriage, the future, heirs—Christ, Henry, it was serious. And we agreed—like rational, sensible people—that we were… partners. Platonic. Bound by duty. Not love. Survivors.”

Henry tilted his head. “Alright.”

“But then—” Hans’s voice cracked. “Then it curled. In my stomach. Like bad mead. And I realised it wasn’t just duty. Or survival. It was love. Love, Henry.”

Henry blinked.

Hans looked wrecked.

“I’m in love with her. Alongside you. At the same time. It’s not a crush. It’s not admiration. It’s... It’s different, but it’s there.”

Henry studied him in silence.

Hans rubbed his face, guilt bleeding through every motion. “I didn’t want it. I didn’t ask for it. It just happened. And I—I don’t know what that means for us.”

Henry exhaled, long and slow, and reached for Pebbles’ reins to steady himself.

“I’ve known,” he said calmly.

Hans looked up, shocked. “You’ve known?”

Henry nodded. “You haven’t flirted with anyone in two months. You haven’t even looked. You’ve only been with me. And I figured—if you were going to fall in love with someone else... I’m glad it’s her.”

Hans stared, open-mouthed.

Henry continued, voice even. “Because she sees you. Not the mask. Not the fool’s act you put on for wenches and nobles. She sees you. Like I do.”

He shifted, glanced down. “I’ve always known there would be parts of your life I couldn’t be in. Heirs. Marriage. Titles. I accepted that.”

There was no bitterness. Just quiet truth.

Hans whispered, “Henry, I—”

“I’m not threatened,” Henry said. “Not by her. She’s... a safe pair of hands, I think. For your heart. Even if she’s prickly. Even if she’s complicated as hell.”

He paused.

“And she is complicated.”

Hans gave a shaky laugh. “You don’t say.”

“But something doesn’t sit right,” Henry added, frowning now. “You said she was open with you? Raw? Vulnerable?”

Hans nodded slowly. “Yes. More than I’ve ever seen her. She held my face. Said we were kin. That she’d protect our bond—me and you. She promised… support.”

Henry’s brow furrowed. “That’s not like her.”

Hans blinked. “What do you mean?”

Henry crossed his arms. “Jitka uses closeness the way other people use weapons. She trades in intimacy like it’s gold. She’s not careless with it. If she was that open... she was either slipping, or she wanted you to hear something specific.”

Hans frowned.

“I think,” Henry said slowly, “she was trying to cut you off at the pass.”

“What?”

“She was guiding your feelings before you even knew what they were. Telling you what you were feeling. Naming it. Containing it.”

Hans looked confused. “Why would she—?”

“I don’t know,” Henry admitted. “But I intend to ask.”

Hans sat down heavily on a nearby bale of hay, still stunned. “What happens if I love you both?”

Henry smiled faintly. “Then we figure it out.”

And before Hans could say another word, Henry stepped forward and kissed him.

It wasn’t a dramatic kiss. Just soft. Grounding. Reassuring. Their lips met like old hands finding one another in the dark. Hans melted into it for a moment, eyes fluttering shut.

Henry pulled back quickly when he heard voices nearby. Footsteps. Someone laughing just outside.

He cleared his throat, brushing invisible straw from his tunic. “Whatever happens,” he said softly, “I’m not going anywhere.”

Hans looked at him like he might fall apart from sheer relief.

Henry nodded toward the barracks. “I’ve got embroidery with Jitka.”

Hans blinked. “You still do that?”

“I lead it,” Henry replied, deadpan. “We’re doing... pears today.”

Hans choked.

Henry smiled faintly. But inside, something gnawed.

Because the Jitka he knew—the one who wielded vulnerability like a scalpel, who kept her heart buried under wit and steel—didn’t open up like that. Not unless she had a reason.

And he intended to find out why.

[notablenotions]

💠His light (The music on the replay was Fireflies Spaceouters)

[notablenotions]

Masks of noblity-Chapter 29

She didn’t say anything when she reached for his hand.

She just removed her glove—slowly, fingers flexing—and placed her palm over his, eyes pointedly not looking at him as she did it. It was deliberate. Not romantic. Not hesitant. Just… honest. A physical punctuation mark to everything she’d said.

Hans looked at their hands.

Looked at her profile in the firelight.

And promptly turned a shade of pink that would have made a virgin blush.

“Christ, husband,” she murmured, finally glancing back. Her blue eyes gleamed with dry amusement. “I won’t hold your hand if you insist on blushing like a moon-eyed milkmaid.”

“I—I am not,” Hans sputtered, sitting bolt upright. “Wife. I’ll have you know I am anything but virginal.”

Jitka snorted, unimpressed. “Aye, I’ve heard enough of you and Henry to confirm that. And then some.”

She arched a brow, clearly enjoying herself. “When you two agreed you could still bed women, I don’t think poor Henry meant every woman in Bohemia.”

Hans choked on a laugh, the tension unspooling from his chest like a too-tight sash finally loosened. He leaned in, smirking, the firelight catching in the angles of her face, softening her.

“It’s not my fault, wife,” he said, “that Henry simply couldn’t keep up.”

Jitka gave him a long, slow look. “No, husband. It’s not about keeping up. It’s about the fact that you sabotage him. You jealous little thing.”

Hans gasped, theatrically wounded. “I am not—!”

She cut him off with a sharp smile. “Then where is your dear Henry, while you languish in the company of your ever-so-wicked wife?”

Hans sighed dramatically, and to his own quiet surprise, leaned his head against her shoulder. He wasn’t sure when he got this close. But their legs were touching now, and she hadn’t moved away. His cheek rested against the soft line of her collarbone, and he could smell her perfume—amber and spice, warmed resins and something honeyed, like incense clinging to silk. It made his head fog, just a little.

“You see, my dear wife,” he murmured, “I was in such dire need of your company, I left my dear Henry to the wolves—your wolves, I might add. He’s gone to the tavern with Bartosch. And I, being a good husband, have set aside my jealousy to prioritise you. And our holy bond.”

Jitka blinked at him.

Then, softly—sincerely—“Then I thank you.”

They looked at each other for a moment, and something passed between them. Not flirtation. Not tension. Just… mutual bewilderment. A shared recognition that neither of them knew what the hell this was anymore.

Jitka stood abruptly. “Well. If you’ve time to waste,” she said briskly, “we may as well enjoy some wine. I’ve found a delightful little book of poetry. From Skalitz, before it burned.”

Hans watched her cross the room.

Watched the soft sway of her hips, the curve of her waist, the elegant roll of her shoulders as she fetched the book from a side table. The firelight caught the sheen of her hair, made it glow like gold thread.

He hated how he noticed.

She returned, sat beside him with a rustle of fabric. “There’s a poem in here by a teenage Henry,” she said. “He compares a woman’s breasts to beets. And her thighs to turnips.”

Hans choked on the wine he’d just poured. “What?!”

“I know.” She looked delighted. “I read it and wondered what on earth he’s doing to his poor bedmates.”

Hans burst into laughter. “Wife,” he said, grinning, “you truly know how to please a man.”

She laughed with him, unguarded and light. The sound curled around him like warmth. He handed her a cup of wine, and they curled together on the couch, the book between them.

And something began to curl inside him, too.

Something dangerous.

Because as the minutes passed, and her head leaned slightly against his, and her laugh lit the space between them, Hans realised he didn’t want to leave.

Hans sat beside her as the hour grew dark, their legs touching, her shoulder warm against his. The fire cracked gently, the wine rich on his tongue. Jitka was thumbing through the book, mock-reading Henry’s beet-thigh poetry with that dry, lopsided smirk she wore when amused by the world’s absurdity.

They had just agreed—just now—to be partners. Kin. A team forged by circumstance and kept alive by mutual understanding. Not lovers. Not bound by passion. They were to be two figures standing side by side, weathering the noble storms together.

That was the plan.

That was the safe thing.

But then she laughed again—freely, deeply—and leaned her head lightly against his.

And something in Hans broke.

Not in a painful, splintering way.

In a way that felt terrifyingly whole.

She smelled like warmth and spice and something sweet caught in a winter cloak. Her body beside his felt effortless, the touch of her hand still in his, and God help him, it didn’t feel like obligation or performance. It felt like home, and heat, and the beginning of a battle he had no sword for.

Jitka Capon was a storm. Something dangerous. Something wild and untamable, crackling with dry wit and subtle strength, an avalanche that did not ask for permission before it buried you.

Henry was the slow creep. The steady flood. The stone that wouldn’t move, even under fire. He was unyielding. Endlessly known.

And Hans—Hans was sitting between both of them, holding hands with the storm, and thinking of the flood, and realising—

He loved them.

Both of them.

Equally.

Differently.

Utterly.

Jitka, in the way fire loves oxygen. Henry, in the way roots love soil. One was a spark, the other a hearth. And Hans was drawn to both, consumed by both, lost to both.

And that…

That was not in the plan.

Hans looked at their joined hands. At the curve of her cheek, at the quiet of her breath.

He had just—just—agreed to be her brother in duty.

And now his heart was trying to write poetry about the way her mouth curled when she mocked his pride.

His throat was tight.

His hands were sweating.

His soul was screaming.

“Fuck.”

[notablenotions]

This has become my mantra during my flairs of one of my autoimmunes...haha and sometimes I wake up to a siege to lol

"The sooner I lie down, the better chance there is of nothing else fucking up today, so I shall bid you goodnight, my friend."

[notablenotions]

Chapter 28: Mask's of noblity

Once again, Hans Capon stood before his wife’s door, heart caught somewhere between his throat and the pit of his stomach. Against all common sense, against the warnings of his own dignity, here he was again.

Praying—genuinely praying—that tonight wouldn’t end in another libido-crushing reenactment of military siege tactics as a metaphor for reproduction.

A sentence he never imagined would plant itself in his mind and grow roots.

He raised a fist to knock. Hesitated.

Then knocked.

Jitka answered almost immediately.

Her hair was loose, falling in soft pale waves over her shoulders. She wore no formal gown tonight—only a simple house dress the color of forget-me-nots, the shade tugging more blue from her eyes than seemed fair. She looked utterly unguarded, almost domestic, and for a heartbeat Hans forgot what he’d come to say.

“You were here yesterday,” she said flatly, arms crossed. “Why are you here again? We’ve maintained the illusion of being bedded.”

“I need to speak with you,” Hans said, voice soft.

Jitka narrowed her eyes. “Two minutes.”

The door shut in his face.

A cacophony of noise followed—furniture being shifted, something wooden dragged across stone, a loud thud that might have been a shield being tossed under the bed.

Then, the door opened again.

She stood there, composed, though slightly flushed—cheeks touched with color, like someone who’d just wrestled a bear and won but refused to speak of it.

“Come in,” she said, a little too casually.

Hans stepped inside, eyes darting around the room for siege equipment, exposed blades, or overly aggressive herb arrangements. Finding none, he settled on a chair across from her near the hearth.

She sat opposite, curling one leg beneath herself. She tilted her head, watching him, biting her lower lip in that way she didn’t seem to realize she did. And God help him, it made something stir in his chest—a slow thud, unwelcome and undeniable.

Hans cleared his throat. “This isn’t a conversation I particularly want to have,” he said, “but it’s one we… need.”

Jitka said nothing, but her face shifted, the line of her mouth tightening. She was bracing herself. She always did.

“You know that at some point,” he said, forcing the words out, “we’ll be expected to produce an heir.”

There it was. Heavy. Cruel. Real.

She stilled.

And guilt bloomed in his chest like a spreading bruise. Because he didn’t want this—not like this. If the world were just, he’d still be curled in the Devil’s Den inn, in that awful lumpy bed with Henry beside him, wrapped around him like armor. There, no one cared who touched whom, or how. There was no performance, only warmth. Only truth.

But they weren’t there. They were here. Wearing crowns of glass, draped in duty, expected to love and breed and smile for portraits.

They hadn’t chosen this life. But they bore it.

“I want you to know,” he said, his voice trembling despite himself, “that after the other night—when I saw you… scrubbing your hands, red, raw, bleeding—I realised how blind I’ve been. You’re not just a sharp tongue and a brilliant mind. You’re not this untouchable noblewoman I couldn’t begin to understand. You’re… human.”

She made a face, the beginning of a snark forming—but he lifted a hand, gently.

“Please. Let me finish. I’ll lose the nerve.”

She stopped.

“I realised, in that moment, that I’ve failed you. That I’ve been cruel—not out of intention, but ignorance. I let my grief, my pride, my fear blind me to the truth: that neither of us chose this. That we’ve both been trying to survive it. And when it comes to… making an heir, it would be unforgivably cruel to just do it out of duty. Like crossing something off a ledger. To you. And to me.”

He looked down at his hands. They trembled faintly in his lap.

“I’ll never love you like I love Henry. He’s my breath. My sanctuary. The reason I bother with any of this. But I want to try something, with you. Not love. Not desire. Just… care. Trust. So that when the time comes, we’re not strangers walking into something cold. I don’t want to hurt you.”

His voice broke. He dropped his head into his hands, the truth heavy and aching.

And then—

A hand. Small, bandaged, warm. She touched his cheek, coaxed him to look up.

Her eyes were luminous in the firelight. Blue like glass over water. She looked at him like something fragile and burning.

“I’m very grateful,” she said softly, “for the respect and kindness you show me. Most men would have taken what they felt they were owed. But you didn’t. You never have. You are kind in ways few understand.”

Her voice didn’t tremble. It was calm. Solid. True.

“You remember the names of every servant. You smile at stable boys like they’re dukes. You say you hate Mutt, but I’ve seen you slip him sausages and whisper goodnight. You shine like a fool when someone tells you you’ve done well. And I think that’s beautiful.”

Hans could barely breathe.

“This marriage,” she continued, “was never meant for people like us. But here we are. And yes—we will have to create an heir. And you’re right—we should build something first. Something gentle. So our child isn’t born into ice and silence.”

She looked into the fire.

“I cannot give you passion. Or lust. That’s… not how I’m built. But I can give you loyalty. Kinship. Respect. I can promise to love you as family, even if the world calls us more than that. And I can protect what you and Henry have—because it’s sacred. And because he is part of me too, in a strange way.”

Hans stared at her, something unfamiliar and aching blooming inside his chest.

“I see our marriage as… partnership,” she said at last. “Not in the way they want. But in the way we can survive. Two people, not made for this world, but trying—because we care. About him. About each other. About the people who follow us.”

She leaned forward, rested her forehead gently against his.

“When the time comes,” she whispered, “we’ll face it together. As partners. As kin. We will not break.”

Hans closed his eyes. A tear slipped down his cheek, warm and aching.

He didn’t wipe it away.

He let it fall.

And in that moment—in her warmth, her strange tenderness, her honesty that cut sharper than any blade—he realised something he hadn’t dared admit:

He was beginning to care for her.

Not as a lover.

But as something stranger.

A partner. A soulmate, not of passion, but of shared wounds and chosen survival.

And maybe, just maybe, that could be enough.

[notablenotions]

Mask's of Noblity-Chapter 27

Hans Capon burst into Henry’s office like a man chasing the last train to sanity—and promptly froze.

There were two desks now.

Henry was seated at one, calmly embroidering something that suspiciously resembled a weeping knight holding a cabbage. At the other, Bartosch lounged like a noble’s bastard son who’d claimed squatter’s rights, feet up, smug and terrible.

Hans narrowed his eyes. “Why are you in here? With a desk?”

Bartosch grinned. “I work here now.”

“You what?”

“Thanks to your wife,” he said, casually inspecting his nails. “Apparently Henry needed help managing the barracks and chasing livestock. I’m the help.”

Hans opened his mouth. Closed it. Flapped. “I—I came here for—wait—never mind!”

He held up the book in his hands like a sacred text of impending doom.

It was small. Leather-bound. Embossed with gold foil.

The Little Duckling Care Pack.

A crowned duck was emblazoned on the front.

Henry squinted. “Is that—”

“Jitka,” Hans said, breathless. “Jitka is the duck.”

He opened the book. Cleared his throat. Began to read:

> “Radzig’s Little Duckling—apparently his pet name for her—requires a diet of sweets, pastries, sugared fruits, lemon cakes, more lemon cakes, tea, wine, and occasionally cheese. Absolutely no meat, grains, or vegetables.”

He paused dramatically.

Henry blinked. “She’s got the diet of a drunk spoiled princess.”

Bartosch nodded solemnly. “She runs on sugar and spite. I didn’t think I’d see it again.”

Hans slowly turned. “What do you mean again?”

Bartosch sighed, haunted. “Radzig had to leave once. Asked me to keep an eye on her. Made me memorize the whole book. I’ve seen what happens when she misses her sugar ration. It’s biblical.”

Hans flipped the page.

> “Keep Duckling away from bones—human or animal—as she has a habit of building siege equipment in vengeance. Several tutors are missing.”

Henry froze. “Several?”

“She once launched a man into a pig pen using nothing but chicken bones and a dinner tray,” Bartosch muttered. “Then fell asleep in a bush.”

Hans kept reading, dread building in his chest:

> “Duckling struggles to sleep. She requires warm sweetened milk (recipe in appendix), head in lap, and to be read classified military missives aloud—with voice acting.”

> “Ensure Duckling has eaten breakfast before dismantling geopolitical governmental structures.”

> “Do not let Duckling have her own garden without supervision. On order of the Papal Legate.”

They all went still.

Hans whispered, “She gardens daily.”

“She has pruning shears,” Henry murmured. “And an herb spiral.”

Bartosch frowned. “I don’t remember what caused that one. Probably wasn’t good.”

Hans turned the page to the final note:

> “Side note: Some of her Dollies are real agents. Some are fake. Will investigate further.”

Silence fell.

Henry exhaled slowly. “Hans… what did Hanush marry you to?”

Hans flailed. “I don’t know! A duck-shaped diplomatic nuke! Hanush laughed when he gave me this book. I think he married me to her out of revenge.”

Henry snorted. “Have you tried flanking?”

Hans groaned, rubbing his face.

And then—

“I am not paying for your bath wenches!”

Jitka swept into the office like divine judgment, holding a stack of expense reports.

“Morale boosting?” she snapped. “Therapeutic scrub services? Really, Henry?”

Henry coughed. “You’d be amazed what it does for troop discipline.”

Bartosch raised his hand proudly. “That one was me.”

Jitka ignored them. Then she saw the book.

Her expression fell into flat annoyance. “Ziggy gave you that?”

Hans held it up wordlessly.

She marched over, snatched it from his hands. “He’s so dramatic. I don’t need a care guide. I function fine.”

Henry cleared his throat. “We were just… trying to understand your upbringing. There are gaps in your worldly knowledge.”

Jitka tilted her head. “What gaps?”

Henry gestured vaguely. “Romance. Dancing. Appropriate siege behavior.”

Jitka frowned thoughtfully. “Well, my dancing’s lacking. But that’s not my fault. It’s hard to learn the women’s steps when Hanush insists on demonstrating them. He’s very fond of the twirls.”

Hans stared into the middle distance.

Henry muttered, “Explains so much.”

Hans turned to Henry, ghost-pale. “You’re sure Radzig is your father?”

Henry blinked. “He says he is.”

Hans collapsed into a chair. “Well. I married a siege-engine-loving duckling princess raised by your father and my uncle, and I think she has a shadow intelligence network in a dollhouse.”

Henry patted his back. “You did.”

Hans sighed. “I’m going to need more balm.”

[notablenotions]

Mask's of Noblity -Chapter 26

Hans Capon had made a decision.

A noble, logical, slightly horny decision.

With the bemused approval of his beloved Henry—the bastard—he was going to seduce the living daylights out of his wife. Get it out of his system. Exorcise whatever wicked thoughts had burrowed into his noble brain. Ideally, produce an heir in the process, so he’d never have to touch her again. In that way. He’d nod across dining tables, smile for portraits, but otherwise keep his lascivious soul devoted to Henry and only Henry.

It was a flawless plan.

He stood outside Jitka’s chamber, lute in hand, heart pounding, his entire body humming with poetry and lavender-scented sin. He would read her verse. Gently caress her arm. Kiss her neck. Taste that impossible mouth of hers and—

He slapped his cheek lightly. Focus, Capon. Don’t get caught up in thoughts of her lips. Or her hair. Or that body that God Himself had designed as a challenge to men with good intentions.

Then the door opened.

“You were breathing too loudly,” Jitka said flatly.

Hans jumped.

She looked down at the lute in his hand, unimpressed. “You’re not bringing that in here.”

Hans spluttered. “It’s for ambience!”

“Save it for Henry,” she replied, stepping aside.

He had no retort.

She was in a shift—just a shift—and Hans’ noble intentions promptly tried to jump out the window. The fabric clung like sin itself, soft and sheer where it shouldn’t be. Her waist could be held in one hand. Her hips were perfect for grabbing. Her breasts—Christ. He was a man of poetry and class, and yet all he could think was, they’re the perfect size. Not too much. Just enough to bite.

She was gold and cream, all soft blonde hair and sea-bright blue eyes, and a body that moved like it knew exactly what it was doing to him.

Which was, of course, entirely unintentional. Because Jitka Capon, his beautiful terrifying wife, had the libido of a brick.

He stepped inside on trembling legs. The hearth was lit. Letters were arranged in a circle on the floor. Jitka sat cross-legged in the center, her shift pooling artfully around her.

“You smell like lavender,” she said casually. “Balms work okay?”

Hans choked. “You gave them to him?”

She nodded. “You were agitated. I figured Henry could calm you down.”

Hans sniffed his sleeve. Yes. The lavender balm lingered.

Clearing his throat awkwardly, he tried to collect what remained of his dignity. “You… gave it to Henry?”

“At book club,” she said, picking up a scroll. “I always bring supplies.”

Hans blinked. “Book club’s Wednesday.”

Jitka waved her hand. “No, Pebbles kicked you out three weeks ago for harassing Henry. Henry felt bad, so he’s been faking book club for you.”

Hans staggered. “He—what?”

“You didn’t notice no one else was there?”

“I—well I didn’t read the book!” he protested, flustered. “But I meant to!”

And then, remembering his purpose, he rallied: “Wait—wife. Did you just say you gave your husband’s lover sex balm?!”

Jitka looked up innocently. “Yes?”

She blinked. “I’m your wife. I have a duty of care. You were jumping out of windows. I figured you needed Henry love.”

Hans looked at the ceiling. “That’s not—that’s a lovely thought, and Christ almighty—”

She stared up at him, completely unaware of the sinful plague she’d wrought upon his soul.

“Jitka,” he said carefully, “you do know what’s required to create an heir?”

Jitka’s face lit up. “Yes! Henry asked this at book club!”

Oh no.

“Come with me,” she said brightly.

She led him to the war room.

It was covered in maps. Actual military maps. Small wooden figures had been arranged in horrifying little formations, and as Jitka gestured excitedly, Hans’ soul died a little more.

“So,” she said, sweeping a stick across the terrain, “you begin with a flanking maneuver. That’s you. Coming from the western passage. Then—if the fortifications remain stable—we deploy the siege engines.”

Hans blinked. “The… what?”

“These,” she said, pointing to two alarmingly shaped tokens. “Breastplate support units. Then comes the battering ram—”

“No.”

“—and then if all goes well, we breach the gate, deploy the infantry, and retreat. Unless reinforcements arrive, in which case—”

Hans sat down on a bench. Hard.

“Who,” he said slowly, “taught you this?”

Jitka smiled fondly. “My guardian.”

---

The Next Morning

Hans hadn’t seduced his wife.

He’d watched her reorganize his sex life like a campaign, describe her chest as a support unit, and proudly compare intercourse to storming a fortress. Then she kissed his cheek and sent him to bed with a cup of tea.

He found Henry, still brushing down Pebbles, and dragged him to the office.

“Good night?” Henry smirked.

Hans rubbed his face like it might change reality. “Flanking, Henry.”

They arrived at the barracks office—only to find Lord Hanush already inside, drinking before noon.

“Uncle,” Hans said weakly, “who was her fucking guardian?”

Hanush blinked at him. “Radzig. Thought you knew.”

Henry went very still. “You mean my father?!”

Hanush nodded. “Aye. Oh—and don’t let her near chicken bones. She built a trebuchet out of them once. Launched her tutor into a pig pen. Went back to napping.”

Hans sank into the nearest chair.

Henry blinked. “Wait. Trebuchet?”

Hanush poured more wine. “Perfect form. Five-year-old menace.”

Hans looked at Henry.

Henry looked at Hans.

And then, with full sincerity, Henry said, “So... lavender balm again tonight?”

Hans didn’t respond.

He just poured wine.

[notablenotions]

Masks of Noblity-Chapter 25

Henry had seen a great many romantic misadventures in his time as both servant to and sometime lover of Sir Hans Capon.

He had, in fact, lived some of them.

There was, for instance, the time Hans wooed a maiden deep into the forest to show her his “noble member,” only for Henry to have to rush in wielding a jar of balm because said noble member had been stung by a bee.

Then there was the unfortunate incident involving fire, two of the bailiff’s daughters, and a stolen tapestry used for modesty (but which caught a breeze and very nearly caused a diplomatic incident with Sasau).

Suffice it to say, Henry had thought he was unshockable.

Until today.

From the stables, where he was hosting the weekly Pebbles Book Club, currently reading A Maiden’s Reckoning: The Passion of the Tannery Widow, Henry glanced up just in time to watch Hans Capon himself drop out of a window, land in a hay bale with all the grace of a disgraced swan, and immediately spring up to bolt behind a stack of barrels like a guilty lover in a farce.

Henry blinked.

He turned to Pebbles. “That was new.”

Bartosch, seated nearby and in a losing argument with Pebbles about the emotional arc of the tannery widow, looked up and squinted toward the keep. “What the fuck was that about?”

Before Henry could reply, a voice behind him said, calm as a saint and twice as alarming, “The goose is agitated again.”

Henry jumped.

Jitka Capon stood behind them holding the book in one hand and a satchel in the other. She handed Henry the satchel like a midwife presenting a holy relic.

“I’ve prepared balms and oils,” she said. “For when you go calm him down.”

Henry opened the satchel.

He immediately closed it.

Bartosch snorted and covered his face with his hand. “Kitty, I know you’re trying to be helpful, but—”

Jitka sat down primly on the straw. “It’s book club, isn’t it? Pebbles invited me. I have notes.”

Henry eyed the satchel like it might explode.

“Jitka,” he said carefully. “Do you know what’s wrong with Hans?”

She tilted her head. “Well. I came outside just now holding the book, ready to join you, and Hans saw me, screamed ‘you don’t have feelings!’ and then jumped out the window.”

She said it with the deadpan weariness of a woman used to living in absurdity.

Henry couldn’t even argue. That was… yeah. That was Hans.

He sighed, closing the book to Pebbles’ visible disappointment. “Jitka… he’s avoiding you.”

She bristled slightly, curling her arms protectively over her bandaged hands. “Is it because of… this?” she asked, nodding to the excessive linen hives still engulfing her wrists. “Does it disgust him?”

Henry immediately shook his head. “No—no, not at all. Hans isn’t like that. If anything, it’s the opposite. It made him realize you’re a—”

“A human woman?” Jitka cut in, raising an eyebrow. “With breasts and a mouth and other goose-disturbing features?”

Henry coughed violently. “Basically… yes.”

She considered that for a moment, then sighed. “So he noticed I have tits and panicked. That explains the ‘sinner fleeing church’ energy.”

Henry rubbed a hand over his face. “Yes.”

Jitka tilted her head thoughtfully. “And the staring? At breakfast? I thought I had jam on my lip.”

“You didn’t,” Henry croaked.

“Ah,” Jitka said, nodding. “That’s unfortunate. I’d have preferred jam.”

There was a pause. Pebbles snorted.

Henry, feeling increasingly like a man being marched into battle without a helmet, said slowly, “Jitka… you have had the talk, haven’t you?”

She made a face. “Unfortunately, yes.”

Bartosch groaned in the background and muttered, “Not this again.”

Jitka straightened, tone perfectly neutral. “My guardian explained it using military maps. There were battalions involved. Siege formations. Something about flanking maneuvers.”

Henry stared.

“I believe the diagram had flags,” she added. “And a small illustration of a trebuchet.”

Bartosch groaned louder and got up. “Right. Wine. We need wine for this. I’m not surviving another battle plan sex talk.”

He wandered off toward the kitchens.

Jitka, entirely unbothered, picked up the book. “So. Do we think the widow’s decision to reject the tanner was truly about honor, or emotional repression brought on by patriarchal expectations?”

Henry gave her a look. “You just said ‘tits’ and handed me sex balm for Hans. You can’t pivot back to literary critique.”

Jitka blinked at him. “I can multitask.”

Henry sighed, rubbing his temples.

“Look, he’s not disgusted. He’s just… panicked. You were safe to him before. Now he’s noticed you’re—well, you. And his brain shorted out.”

“Should I be offended or flattered?” she asked dryly.

Henry shrugged. “Both.”

She eyed him. “And you’re not upset? About him… seeing me as a woman?”

Henry smiled. “I love Hans. Deeply. But I don’t own him. And loving me hasn’t made me stop being attracted to women either. It’s not a switch. It’s not mutual exclusivity. It’s... us. And frankly?”

He smirked.

“Your arse is a masterpiece sent to ruin good men.”

Jitka blinked. Then smirked back. “You should see it when I wear the red riding dress.”

“I have.”

They laughed. Pebbles snorted like he was judging them both.

Henry sat back, taking a long breath. “Truth is… I thought you’d come between us. That you’d ruin everything. But you haven’t. You’ve joined it. In your own terrifying way.”

Jitka looked at him, for once without a quip. Then she snorted lightly and rolled her eyes.

“Oh, please. He’s a silly goose with great boots and an overfondness for collars. I’m not interested in Hans. That part of things…” she waved a vague hand, “never really made much sense to me. You know that.”

Henry smiled. “I do.”

“So,” she said, pushing the satchel toward him like she was bestowing a sacred relic, “take the oils. Go… soothe your goose.”

Henry gave her a flat look. “You’re aware the balms are for—”

“Yes,” she interrupted. “He’s stressed. You’re in love. I’m very good with logistics.”

Henry coughed into his fist. “Right.”

Jitka dusted straw from her skirts. “I’ll prepare more balm.”

Henry, still blushing faintly, cleared his throat and muttered, “The lavender one, please.”

---

Saw some theories of KCD3 and fact historically Hans dies in the potential period which is sad so here's a funny chapter

[notablenotions]

Ma Chapter 4: Turnip Diplomacy

Negotiating with a warlord was easier than this.

Radzig stood outside the locked nursery door, arms crossed, voice tight with patience that was rapidly disintegrating.

“Lady Curdlefluff, we have discussed this,” he said.

Silence.

Then, from behind the door, a high-pitched, cracked voice that sounded suspiciously like Jitka holding her nose: “General Peaches cannot come to the door. You may speak with her representative: Lady Curdlefluff, Princess of Wrath and Whimsy.”

Radzig sighed and rubbed his temple. “Lady Curdlefluff, your general has not eaten anything except lemon cake in four days. This is not sustainable.”

“Your food is unworthy,” came the shrill reply. “Lemon cakes are sacred. Anything else smells of betrayal. You betrayed her, Ziggy.”

Radzig closed his eyes. Gods give me strength.

“She knows you went through her things. She knows you’re not trying to be kind. You just want to know where she got the scrolls.”

Radzig clenched his jaw. “That is not why I took her.”

“Liar,” came the voice. “You took her to find out about the king. And now you won’t even let her see her papa.”

“Her papa tried to drown her,” Radzig growled, more to himself than the doll.

“She wants to see him.”

“She can’t.”

“She wants to see him, Ziggy. Why are you so cruel? She didn’t ask to be taken. You took her like a princess in a sad story. And now you just slide cakes under the door like she’s a mouse.”

Radzig winced. That part, admittedly, was true. He had been sliding lemon cakes under the door, once an hour, for four days.

He had been searching through her things, yes. Looking for a diary, a letter, something to tell him what she liked to eat. How to talk to her. How to stop failing every time she narrowed her eyes and spoke in third person through a burn-faced doll.

“Lady Curdlefluff,” he tried again, “I am simply trying to understand what your general needs. I can’t raise a child on lemon cakes. Unless… unless that is actually an acceptable diet for children?”

He never got an answer.

Because at that moment, a turnip hurtled down the corridor and struck him clean in the ribs.

“GHF,” Radzig grunted, staggering sideways and landing hard on the floor.

From behind the door came a soft, impressed, “Good hit.”

He groaned.

And then came the sound of stomping. Righteous, thunderous stomping.

Anna.

Radzig looked up from the stone floor just in time to see her striding toward him, cheeks blazing, hair tied back like she meant to conquer the gods themselves.

She was holding another turnip.

“A child, Radzig?” she hissed.

Radzig opened his mouth. No words came.

“You didn’t think to tell me? I had to find out from Henry! Who said—and I quote—'Old Lord Radzig’s come home with a little girl who looks like a doll and talks like a lord!'”

Radzig winced.

“The town is talking about it! That you rode in with a little girl. Apparently she’s good enough to raise in silk! But my boy doesn’t even get to know you?”

She brandished the turnip like a cudgel.

Radzig instinctively covered his groin.

Gods, she was stunning when she was furious.

She raised the turnip high—and then stopped.

She’d noticed the doll.

Lady Curdlefluff sat at the base of the door, staring up at them with a glass eye and a face that looked like it had seen three wars and one tax audit.

Radzig, still flat on his back, muttered, “Anna, allow me to introduce you to Lady Curdlefluff. Chief Negotiator, Keeper of Secrets, and Guardian of the Lemon Cakes.”

Anna lowered the turnip. Looked at Radzig.

“Ziggy,” she said slowly. “What. The fuck. Is going on.”

Radzig sat up, groaning. “Her name is Jitka. She blackmailed the king. Outwitted me and Hanush. She’s... she’s brilliant. Too brilliant.”

He rubbed his face. “Her father gave her to me. He was lucid—for a moment. Found me in the chapel. Said he mistook her for a bandit, tried to drown her. The madness is deep, Anna. Worse than I’ve seen. He said she’d die by his hands or be sold off to the first man with coin. Or worse—they’d use her cleverness. He begged me. Said I could keep her safe.”

Anna just stared at him.

Then: “Who the fuck gives you a child? You’re emotionally constipated and allergic to feelings.”

Radzig opened his mouth to argue. Thought better of it. Nodded solemnly.

“I know.”

“You slide cakes under the door.”

“I didn’t know what else to do!”

There was a small, nasal voice behind the door.

“Lady Curdlefluff wishes to clarify that the cakes were appreciated. Also, Ziggy is very good at bedtime. He reads battle reports in a scary voice. It helps her sleep.”

Anna blinked.

Then she sat down beside the door, crossed her arms, and said, “This is madness.”

“I know,” Radzig whispered.

Anna knocked gently. “Jitka, sweetheart. Can I talk to you?”

There was a pause.

Then, slowly, the door cracked open.

A tiny face appeared.

Jitka's eyes were red from crying, her curls tangled, and her grip on Lady Curdlefluff was fierce. But her chin was held high. A commander peeking out from her bunker.

She looked at Anna carefully.

“You look kind. Are you the Ma of Ziggy’s boy?”

Anna blinked. “Henry?”

Jitka nodded. “The steward said so. He was very drunk. I bribed him. He said that’s why Ziggy cries into romance books at night. Said you broke his heart.”

Radzig made a strangled, horrified sound.

Anna turned very slowly toward him, eyebrow raised. “Romance books?”

“Battle memoirs,” he said quickly. “With... very detailed footnotes.”

Jitka piped up, “There was kissing. I saw.”

Anna bit her lip to keep from laughing. Then turned back to the little face.

“That’s a very long story, darling. And a very messy one. But yes. In a way, I suppose I am.”

Jitka looked at her with too-old eyes.

“Do you think Papa hated me?”

Anna crouched down, voice gentle and warm as summer dusk.

“No, sweet one. I think your papa loved you so much it hurt. And that kind of love, when it mixes with pain and madness, turns dangerous. He gave you away because it was the only way he could protect you.”

Jitka swallowed, voice wobbling. “I miss him.”

Anna reached out slowly. “Then you should miss him. But you don’t have to do it alone. You have Ziggy now—stubborn and awkward as he is—and me. And Henry too.”

“Is Henry kind?”

Anna smiled, a quiet proud kind of smile. “Henry is good. He’s gentle, and brave when it matters most. He listens. He knows what it means to be hurt, and to help someone anyway. I think... I think you and Henry could be good friends.”

Jitka blinked. Then sniffled.

“Okay. But I want soup. And milk. And lemon cake.”

“Of course,” Anna said.

Jitka opened the door wider.

And for the first time, stepped into her new life.

[notablenotions]

Mask's of Noblity-Chapter 24:

She was human.

Hans Capon had known this intellectually. Legally. On paper. It was, after all, a requirement for marriage.

But it had never felt real before. Not like last night. Not like this morning. Not with the blood and the shaking hands and the soft breath of her sleeping against him.

She was human. A female human. With... with a waist. And... breasts. And those lips. Those lips he’d looked at far too long for a man in a devoted love affair with another man.

“Fuck,” Hans muttered as he half-ran, half-stumbled through the keep, his thoughts a jumbled snarl of guilt, lust, confusion, and a haunting memory of Jitka sleepily wrapped like a very sarcastic sausage roll. “What even was that.”

There was only one person who could possibly fix this. Only one man who knew his soul, his sins, and once held his hair back while he threw up at a monastery.

He needed Henry.

He burst into the barracks and slammed open the door to Henry’s office.

It had changed.

There were now two desks. Two. The small room was crammed with parchment, embroidery hoops, weapons maintenance logs, and a deeply concerning pile of dried herbs that smelled vaguely like pine and guilt. Henry sat at his desk, calm as a monk, needle in hand, embroidering a man weeping into a turnip.

He looked up, blinked once, and said, “Are you alright?”

Like this was normal. Like Hans bursting in like a harlot on fire was part of the routine.

Hans paced. He paced like a man possessed. “No, I am not alright. I—she—last night she broke and I held her and then this morning I looked at her lips and she looked at me and there was drool and blankets and fuck, Henry, I think I almost kissed my wife!”

Henry set the embroidery aside slowly. Folded his hands. Watched Hans with a familiar look of long-suffering amusement.

Hans flailed.

“I’m committed to you! Entirely! Monogamously! I haven’t even noticed another man or woman since you walked into my life with your sodding jawline and your brooding! And now she’s got feelings and breasts and I’m concerned! Do you know how horrifying that is?”

Henry tilted his head. “You’re upset because you’re attracted to a woman. Who is also your wife.”

“Yes!” Hans flailed again. “And you’re not even—jealous!?”

Henry raised an eyebrow. “Hans. Our relationship was founded on drinking, hunting, war, and wenching. You remember wenching, don’t you?”

Hans opened his mouth. Closed it. Blinked.

Henry smirked. “You remember that tavern near Uzhitz. The one with the twins and the red wine and the hay loft.”

“That was an intense spiritual male friendship,” Hans muttered defensively.

“We wenched,” Henry said, grinning. “Together. Eye contact and all.”

Hans made a noise like a kicked lute. “That was different! That was—bonding!”

Henry shrugged. “We wenched. And we always knew you’d have to marry. Produce heirs. I didn’t expect monogamy. Frankly, I thought you’d have bedded her by now.”

Hans looked vaguely scandalized. “She terrifies me.”

“She recommends balms, Hans,” Henry deadpanned. “She tells me which oils won’t chafe. That’s not terrifying. That’s... supportive. Thoughtful. She even cancelled embroidery today because your wrapping job turned her hands into linen hives.”

Hans covered his face with both hands. “I should have left. I should have not held her. But she sobbed. And she looked so—small. And then she started crying about lemon cakes and being alone and—”

Henry stood, moved closer. His voice gentled.

“I know what she’s like. And I know how she breaks. She’s not easy, but she’s kind, in her way. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

Hans peeked through his fingers. “But I wanted to kiss her.”

Henry paused. Thought about that.

Then said, “You still want me, don’t you?”

“Desperately.”

“Then that part hasn’t changed.” He smiled, small and sure. “I’m still very attracted to women, Hans. It doesn’t shut off because of you. And I don’t deny that, because denying that would be denying me.”

He walked back to his desk, picked up the turnip man again.

“And let’s be honest,” Henry added, stabbing the needle through cloth, “Jitka’s arse is a masterpiece sent by God to ruin men.”

Hans choked.

“That’s my wife!”

Henry smirked. “And I say this as a man who respects you both: the way she walks? Scandalous. Should be outlawed.”

“You’re a monster.”

Henry grinned. “You’re the one who married her.”

Hans slumped dramatically into the chair across from him, covering his eyes again. “I don’t know what’s happening to me.”

“You’re evolving,” Henry said dryly. “Like a very dramatic beetle.”

They sat in silence for a moment, Henry stitching, Hans trying not to cry.

Then Hans murmured, “You really aren’t jealous?”

Henry looked at him, serious now. “What hurt, once, was the fear. That she’d take you away from me. That marriage would mean I lost you. But I haven’t. Not really. And honestly? I think I’ve found a friend in her.”

He paused. Then added with a smile, “Or a very annoyed younger sister.”

Hans snorted. “She’s feral. I once saw her blackmail a bishop into apologizing for using too much incense.”

Henry nodded solemnly. “That tracks.”

And like that, the storm passed.

Hans felt lighter. Not solved—but steadier. Seen.

He watched Henry stitch a weeping turnip with the focus of a scholar and thought, I love this man. And I’m possibly developing feelings for my terrifying embroidery tyrant wife. I’m doomed.

And somehow, he didn’t mind.

[notablenotions]

Ma-Chapter 3

Radzig watched from the high tower window, arms folded, jaw tight. Below, the forge’s smoke curled like ghost-breath into the grey Bohemian sky.

He had set that forge just outside the keep walls—not too near to draw questions, but close enough that he could, from this perch, watch Henry hammer away. His boy. Not that anyone could know it.

To the world, Henry was Martin the blacksmith’s son. And Anna—sweet, brave, sun-warm Anna—was Martin’s lawful wife. And Martin, gods bless the fool, played the role better than Radzig ever could.

It had been a choice: titles over truth. Power over parenthood. A decision to sheath fatherhood in silence so his boy would never starve or bleed as he once had. Let the boy live in the shadow of a lie if it meant he lived at all.

But now Henry was ten. And his shoulders were growing broad. And his laughter, when it echoed up to this tower, cut sharper than any sword.

Radzig pressed his knuckles to the cold stone sill. Had he done right?

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of boots—no, a frantic stomp—and the door slamming open.

“Ziggy!”

Sir Hanush of Leipa, Radzig’s old war comrade and long-suffering friend, strode in, alarmingly sober and breathless.

“Tell me you’re decent,” Hanush panted.

Radzig arched a brow. “Only in law and doctrine.”

Hanush slapped a wrinkled, sticky parchment onto the nearest table. It bore the king's seal. And a faint smell of plum jam.

“They broke into the king’s writing room,” Hanush said. “Used his own parchment. And his bloody ink.”

“Ballsy.”

“Deranged. Read it.”

Radzig did. His face twitched.

“This is a threat."

“A threat with pastry-based demands. Look at the signature.”

Radzig tilted the page. “'General Peaches.'” He exhaled. “With a drawing of... a peach in armor?”

“They want a negotiation. At Erhart of Kunstadt’s old estate. You remember Erhart.”

“Death on horseback,” Radzig muttered. “He vanished after his wife died. No one mentions him.”

“Which, as we both know, means it’s probably a cursed swamp now.”

Radzig sighed. “Fine. Saddle the horses. Bring something to bribe lunatics. Almonds, maybe.”

---

Erhart’s keep looked like a forgotten ruin. The battlements crumbled like old bread. No guards. No banners. Just moss, quiet, and bad omens.

“I’m getting buried-alive feelings,” Hanush muttered.

The doors opened with the soft scrape of wood and doom.

And then she appeared.

Small. Five, maybe six. Blonde curls stuck out in all directions, wrangled by a crude circlet made of wildflowers, chicken bones, and rusted coins. Her face was moon-pale, cheeks flushed from activity or outrage. She wore a noble girl’s dress dyed in such violently clashing colors it could have triggered seizures. A single ragged doll dangled from her hip like a squire’s sword.

Her hands were on her hips. She scowled.

“You the misters the king sent?”

Hanush coughed. “Er. Yes.”

“He must be desperate,” she said, unimpressed. “You look like boiled pigs in a bishop's wig.”

Radzig opened his mouth to object. She cut him off with a wave.

“Come on. Be quiet. Papa’s resting. Again.”

They followed her through cold halls where light dared not linger. Staff skirted them like they were ghosts. The nursery they entered was more command tent than playroom.

One small table. Three child-sized chairs. One doll.

Commander Buttons: A bear with its face half-burnt off, stitched with red thread, a shard of mirror in one paw. "He sees everything," Jitka said, tone low. "Even in dreams."

She gestured to the table. “Sit. Or he’ll be offended.”

Radzig stared at the doll.

Hanush, already pale, sat.

Radzig followed, muttering a prayer.

Jitka dropped two lopsided crowns made of wire and feathers onto their heads. “We follow protocol in this house. Even the mad do.”

Then, the demands:

1. Her father's full pension.

2. A public feast in his honor.

3. Ten lemon cakes.

4. Commander Buttons wants a new eye. Not a fake one. A real one. Human preferred.

Radzig blinked. “That’s not happening.”

Jitka tilted her head slowly, like a wolf cub gauging wind. “Oh. Then we’ll have to renegotiate... with the goat files.”

Hanush cleared his throat. “Perhaps we could lower the lemon cake count, Your Ladyship?”

She stared at him. “Perhaps you could stop sweating like a pig in church.”

He flushed.

“Do you always cry when a little girl insults you, or just when you feel your failure as a knight press in on your cabbage-smelling shoulders?”

Hanush made a high, wheezing noise and looked away.

Radzig stood. “Enough. This is absurd! You’re five. This doll is terrifying. We’re not signing anything until I know where you’re getting your information.”

Jitka smiled. “From my dollies.”

“That is not—”

“They listen. Especially Commander Buttons. He’s been under the tables.”

She slid a scroll across the table. Radzig unrolled it. His own signature. In a brothel ledger.

Then another. Hanush. And a bottle of ink.

Then a map. Annotated. Personal guard rotations. Hunting schedules. Who in court was secretly sleeping with whom.

Radzig sat back. “How...”

“My dolly told me.”

He signed. Hanush signed. They didn’t ask about Operation Gooseberry.

---

Radzig visited the keep once more, weeks later. It was dusk. The torches burned low. Erhart waited for him in the chapel, kneeling before a broken statue of Saint George.

His eyes were sharp for once. Lucid. Desperate.

“Ziggy,” he said, voice thick with age and madness. “You have to take her.”

Radzig shook his head. “Erhart, she’s your daughter—”

“I nearly drowned her,” Erhart said, staring at the altar. “Last week. Thought she was... something else. My mind is going, Radzig. The walls whisper. The past crawls. But she... she listens. Too much.”

He grasped Radzig’s arm with strength he shouldn’t have had. “They’ll use her. My kin. The nobles. She’s clever, too clever. They’ll feed her lies and cut her to fit a dress. You can protect her. She respects you. Somehow.”

Radzig swallowed hard.

He knew what it meant for a man to give a child away. Knew the cost.

He said nothing. Only nodded.

---

She didn’t cry when Radzig came for her.

She simply looked at her doll. Then at him.

“Commander Buttons says you’re decent.”

She climbed onto his horse without another word.

In the months that followed, she refused to sleep anywhere but his armchair. She followed him like a Duckling so he called her that. Asked questions he never expected. Learned faster than she should.

One night, half-asleep in the chair beside his desk, she mumbled,

“Goodnight, Ziggy.”

He grunted. But he didn’t correct her.

She called him that ever after.

She became his daughter. By fate. By fire. By some godsdamned divine joke.

---

Moving a bit away from history for writing purposes enjoy :)

[notablenotions]

Mask's of Noblity-Chapter 23

Jitka awoke slowly.

The fog of sleep still clung to her thoughts like mist on a riverbank, heavy and sluggish. Her hands ached—sharp and dull all at once, skin tight from bandages that smelled faintly of lavender and panic. She felt warmth, too—unexpected and alive beside her. And weight. A lazy, heavy arm draped across her midsection, pulling her close.

She blinked blearily.

Hans Capon, her husband in title if not in practice, was curled around her like a very expensive, perfumed cat. He was fast asleep. Mouth slightly open. One leg flung over hers with aristocratic entitlement. His breath tickled the side of her neck.

And a rivulet of drool was slowly, steadily making its descent from the corner of his lip toward her cheek.

That, apparently, was her line.

“Hans!” she hissed, hoarse from the tightness left in her throat from the night before. “What on earth are you doing?”

Hans stirred like he was being roused from a nap in the sun, stretching one arm high above his head and yawning without shame.

“Oh—morning,” he said sleepily. “Didn’t want to leave you. Frankly, after bandaging you up—you’re welcome, by the way—you slept better with someone next to you. So I swaddled you. Like a very anxious lamb.”

Jitka looked down at herself.

The blanket was wound around her with the overzealous fervor of a novice nun wrapping relics for transport. Her hands—more accurately, her linen-beehive monstrosities—stuck out from her sides like some form of aristocratic punishment.

She remembered the basin. The blood. The shame. Shit.

He’d seen her. Really seen her.

She didn’t know whether to thank him or bite him.

Hans followed her gaze and winced.

“Ah. Yes. Didn’t really get a good look at them last night. Was sort of—y’know—panic wrapping. Let me just...”

He sat up, dragging the blankets with him, and began redoing her bandages. Surprisingly deft fingers unwrapped the mess and began rewrapping it properly—tender, efficient, far more focused than she’d expected from a man who once tried to swordfight a weathervane for insulting his hat.

She didn’t flinch. She didn’t mind the touch.

Which was... concerning.

“You’re much nicer to share a bed with than Henry,” Hans said, utterly without shame. “You don’t steal the blankets. Or elbow me. Or snore like a dying monk. Also you smell better. Which helps.”

He glanced around the room with mild suspicion.

“And you don’t have a dog that sits at the foot of the bed judging me. Mutt looks at me like a disappointed mother-in-law who wishes her daughter married the nice butcher’s son.”

Jitka, despite herself, smirked. “I thought it was the miller’s niece.”

Hans grinned, utterly unguarded. “Please. She’s got nothing on me.”

And just like that, the tension broke. Their banter picked up as it always did—quick, dry, and laced with sarcasm. She didn’t think about what it meant, or why it made her feel something that was not entirely annoyance.

He lingered, though. His hands worked slower now, the rhythm gentler. His thumb brushed the ridge of her knuckle, stayed there just a beat too long.

She looked at him.

He was looking at her.

“Hans?” she said cautiously.

His eyes searched her face, trailing down to her mouth. His expression had shifted—something earnest and unfamiliar blooming behind those pretty lashes. For once, he wasn’t preening or joking.

“Jitka, I wanted to say—”

Whatever it was, it curled in the space between them like something important.

And then—

“Henry!” Hans bolted upright like he’d been struck by lightning. “I forgot—Henry! I was supposed to—! Shit—sorry—!”

He launched himself off the bed, tripping on the blanket he’d lovingly cocooned her in, scrambled for the door with the elegance of a drunk goose, and vanished down the corridor, shouting apologies and curses in equal measure.

The silence left behind was thick with confusion.

Jitka blinked.

She looked down at her hands, which were once again wrapped in slightly uneven but oddly loving bandages. They looked like swollen linen hives.

She sighed.

“Perhaps it’s a ploy,” she muttered to herself. “Sabotage the hands, cancel embroidery, destroy order from within.”

She reached for her ink and parchment to send a note to Henry.

Today’s embroidery lesson would be postponed. A shame. He’d been making such remarkable progress on his latest piece: St. George Beheading a Sausage Thief While Weeping into a Turnip.

She hoped he wouldn’t be too disappointed.

[notablenotions]

Stupid sexy Bartosch

9 hours later....

[notablenotions]

𝐋𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐨𝐟 𝐏𝐢𝐫𝐤𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐢𝐧 🕊