Collar sat tapping his stylus on his desk and glancing at the clock sitting in the corner of his private office. Three hours.

It was three hours until he had to leave and meet Rosewater.

He jerked his attention away from the slow swing of the pendulum and tried to block out the steady tock-tock-tock it made as it counted down time. Slower than a second, faster than a minute, it was three seconds to a swing, twelve tocks to a minute.

How many had he counted since he’d started trying to write the orders he needed to for Stride?

Sixty tocks? Five minutes?

It felt like hours.

He slammed his chair back and stood, pacing in time with every third tock, trying to clear his mind of tonight.

On the third repetition, he shoved the chair into the corner and commandeered Cloudy’s usual observer’s pillow. He tried to sit still and stare at the paper, but the tock-tock-tock drove him backup and pacing again.

Tonight would come soon enough, tonight would come on its own time, but he needed to give Stride the orders for keeping him on an open-sky set regime. It’s what Rosemary recommended since neither he nor Lace could countenance scent magic in the palace itself.

What’s wrong with me?

He stared at the orders he was supposed to be crafting, that he’d actually half-written already. All he needed to do was finish the orders, set his schedule and his daily tasks. That was easy. He did it for half a dozen of the Dammeguard that were assigned to palace security. He could pass it off to Captain Pink, but… Stride was his responsibility, and he’d accepted the responsibility of handling the scheduling of palace security.

And for him personally, admit it. Stride was something of a side-project for Collar. Trying to wipe away the upbringing of Primfeather prejudice against Merriers, especially after the incident with him and his older brothers that had left a family, an innocent group of Merriers with their children, fleeing terrified back across the bridge.

A harmless prank, they’d said, setting off a thunderburst right over top of them.

Of the lot, only Stride had been stallion enough to stand and receive the dressing down Collar had tried to give the lot of them. That a younger Collar himself had been dressed down by Lord Primfeather for attempting to shout some morals into his son had been beside the point.

But he’d also dared the young colt to prove that he was better than that.

And stars if he hadn’t stepped up and met the dare headon.

He owed it to the young stallion to take care of his mental well-being after Roseate’s attack had left him flying and screaming for his life. That it had been a fringe of Rosewater’s fear fog that had touched him made no difference. It was Roseate who’d started the fight and Rosewater who’d ended it.

And you, though you don’t recall it.

He sighed and focused down on the document, detailing Stride’s work days in two hour blocks, having him outside flying from station to station and gathering reports from watchers, then inside where Rosemary could talk to him and pull him back and away from the dark place he seemed to be drifting towards. Or for himself to sit down and discuss things with him. Nothing secret or sensitive, but involving him in something other than flight and guard duty.

When that was done, he was dismayed to see that only twenty minutes had passed, and he still had the better part of the latter afternoon to wile away before he needed to slip away from the palace.

He needed to set up someplace where he could teleport away, as Rosewater seemed to have, but the only dead spots in the anti-teleportation wards in Prim Palace were barely the size of an arrow slit or a window, and not large enough for even a small pony to appear in.

No, he had to be sneaky to get out of the palace.

He hated being sneaky.

But if he wanted to see her tonight, and again the next time, he would need to be sneaky.

He stood up from the pillow and cracked his neck. It was hard getting used to the different angle, but the seat was so much more forgiving. Merriers might have a point about not using chairs.

His office was empty for the time being. Cloudy was taking her time with being a courier for Priceless, Coat was on patrol in the city with a small squad for civil patrol, Poppy was doing his stint in the palace infirmary treating some of the palace staff for a cold that was going around.

Platinum and Sunrise were on guard in the wing on Rosemary’s and Glory’s doors.

Leaving him with few he could trust to keep confidence when what he really wanted to do was decompress and ask if he was still doing the right thing. He was growing to want to be in Rosewater’s presence more and more, and yesterday’s talks, and the clandestine look at her being a mother had only intensified that desire.

There was more depth there than he could have imagined, that she still kept hidden.

He was half-certain she didn’t mean to hide it from him intentionally, but the chance to let parts of herself come out just didn’t exist. It was as she’d said on their first date. There were masks she put on, some more intentional than others, and they were all her. Chill, aloof Rosewater was just as valid and a part of her as the warm-hearted pony who curled up so protectively around her child.

He started pacing his office again, more slowly, more intentionally, and only stopped to glance at his desk and make sure all he needed to do that night was already done.

That was one of his masks. The official Collar.

Another was when he was alone with Cloudy. A lover. Another was when he was alone with Rosewater. A friend? More?

That they were growing closer was incontrovertible. He worried about her, cared for her, and wanted her to be happy.

He glanced at the clock again, disappointed to see only five minutes had passed.

“Rut it.” Collar grunted and doused the candles on his desk, pondered taking a scarf or a coat, and stopped. He wanted to sit close to her again and feel that warmth all along his side from his shoulder to his hip.

“Rut me.”

He left the office without taking either coat or scarf and told the guard at the gate he was going for a walk. Then vanished before any of them could say anything about sending guards with him.

Rosewater considered the location she’d picked for their third date, then glanced up at the overcast sky and the chill crowning the moon with a frost halo high up, and hoped it wouldn’t get colder. The snap had started just last night with the usual katabatic winds rolling off the Crystal Mountains to the north, funneled down the river valley and kicking up fog everywhere it touched.

She still had a couple of hours before Collar arrived to plan things, and this small clearing was perfectly shielded from the winds coming from the north. Soon, but hopefully not tonight, it would start to rain a cold, hard rain.

Even that, she’d prepared for, though it would take time to set up, and the all-weather camp tent had been harder to procure quietly than finding a way to get the cooking set out of the basement.

It had taken three teleportation runs to outside of town to get everything she needed out of the basement, but she’d managed it, and the trek, veiled, across the river had been even more harrowing. It was the light of day, and while her coat made daytime veiling easier, carrying an unwieldy bundle on her back was harder to hide.

Whether or not she’d completely escaped detection remained to be seen, but once she’d made it to the woods, it’d become so much easier to find her way up the hill and to this place.

The firewood she’d stashed before her date with Cloudy was there, damp from an early morning rain that had thankfully departed before she’d needed to make her way out here.

“Cheese wheel,” she murmured, then stopped and fanned the flames stoking underneath the cooking set and checked the clay pot on the stand next to the fire. The first chunks were already melting, albeit slowly. She would need to let that melt fully before she added more, and possibly move the pot closer.

“Bread,” she murmured, inspecting the covered, rougher clay pot full of cubes and strips of breads she’d either procured herself or had procured from Damme. The cheesecloth covering wouldn’t survive close to the fire, but she didn’t need it to be too warm, just enough so that the bread was pleasantly ‘fresh’ feeling.

“A date?” a voice at the edge of the clearing asked.

Rosewater startled, briefly activating the jewel at her breast before she let it go. “Stars above! Collar!”

He chuckled and slipped free of the invisibility. “So your nose can be fooled.”

“In my defense,” she said a touch testily, “this cheese is very fragrant, and the breads are, as well.”

To her surprise, he grinned and nuzzled her neck, then sat a little way away from her, giving her room to work. “It smells good, honestly. But it has a strong smell.”

“Hello to you, too,” she grumbled, sniffing gently at his shoulder. “You took a good bath, didn’t you?”

“Hours ago,” he said with a grin. “Cloudy insisted.”

“And no doubt she checked you herself for stray scents.” Rosewater relaxed minutely and grinned. “So she’s taken a hoof in preparing you to prank me. But you’re not supposed to be here for another few hours. I’ve barely started preparing our dinner tonight.”

“What is for dinner tonight?” Collar asked, leaning closer to the pot and sniffing. “Something cheese based?”

“The cheese is part of the appetizer.” Rosewater raised the pot of bread. “This is the rest. I have hearty fish cakes, too.” She fished around in her saddlebags and brought out the cloth-wrapped bottle of wine. “And wine that Petal promised me would go well with the dish.”

“Why is it wrapped?”

“She made me promise not to look,” Rosewater replied, chuckling. “I think she planned something to surprise me.”

“Very suspicious,” he said, his lips curving into a teasing smile.

“So why are you out here so early?” Rosewater asked, some of her nerves dying back down to a more normal nervous hum. “I wasn’t expecting you to pop out like that and scare me.”

He hesitated, his eyes darting from her to linger on the fire still dying down to a more peaceful, cheery crackle and pop. “I wanted to see you again.”

Rosewater nodded, hesitated herself, then pulled up the cheese wheel and dull cheese knife, and began cutting cubes out of the rind and adding them to the pot. She didn’t trust herself yet to say anything, to push him more towards the Principes and towards what he seemed to be suggesting.

“I saw you yesterday,” he began again, suddenly, and sidled closer to her until she could almost feel the heat of his body in the small gap between them. “When you were taking a nap with your… with Rosemary.” He cleared his throat. “I’ve been thinking about that more than I thought I would.”

“I see.” Rosewater cleared her throat, too. “I… I needed time with her, like I used to do when she was small. Protecting her was something I could do. I missed being there for her, and reading about how my father helped to protect me, how Carnation protected me before I even knew they were doing it…”

Collar nodded solemnly and gently took the wheel and knife from her magic. “Let me help.”

She let him, and turned to tending the fire, prodding at the wood so it would fall into a neat pile when it finally collapsed. For long moments, he carved chunks of cheese out and fed them into the pot slowly, bringing it up to examine it every other cube, and in silence, they together prepared their meal for the night.

After the eighth cube, he set the wheel aside. “Did you bring anything else?”

“Not much besides the fish cakes. Made with potato, celery, and cubed, diced fish. I brought a pan, too, to fry them up in. In case the fondue isn’t hearty enough.” Rosewater chuckled. “They’re my own recipe, and maybe I’ll tell you the story behind them someday.”

Collar grinned and sidled closer, until he was sitting hip-to-hip with her. “It sounds tasty, and I will hold you to telling me about them later.” He glanced to the sky as the wind shifted, bringing a chill down through the branches with the smell of rain, albeit distant. “Cloudy said it might rain tonight if the winds keep up like they are.”

“Bliss said the same thing, and I have a tent, albeit a small one, made with a smoke hole for the fire.” She shifted the thick bundle of poles and sail-quality canvas. “I had to borrow it from the Garden.”

“You did a lot of work for tonight,” he murmured, glancing back at the tent, then at her. Something undefinable in his eyes caught at Rosewater’s heart. “You’ve always put a lot of care into preparing for our dates.”

“As did you,” Rosewater murmured.

Tension crackled in the air, and she felt certain he was about to do something when the fire crackled, popped, and the thin sticks making up the kindling collapsed and sent up sparks as the split firewood folded into an unstable tripod, slid, and slumped slowly into the flat self-supporting triangle.

The tension faded.

Rosewater let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.

Collar felt the tension fading, felt the prickle of want fade from his coat as the fire settled down into a cheerier blaze. What were you about to do?

Rosewater’s cheeks were pink, and the warmth of her against him was more than it had been. She felt it, too. But she didn’t push it, didn’t try to bring it up. Instead, she shifted the logs about and added another crosswise across them as if she hadn’t felt it.

“So.” Collar cleared his throat. “Is this some kind of cheese soup?”

She relaxed visibly and he could feel the change in her as he dragged their mutual attention past the awkward moment.

“Mmm. Close. Cloudy and Rosemary recommended it.” Her cheeks pinked, more clearly in the firelight than they had by moonlight. “It’s fondue.” She held up two tiny, long-handled forks. “For dipping.”

It was a weird little fork, only two tines, but long, blunted and slightly serrated along the inner edges. “For dipping bread?” He tested it out on one of the cubes. The serration held the bread in place, no matter how he tapped the handle against the side of the pot. “Clever design.”

“Well… Rosemary said she usually likes to do vegetables like cooked bits of potato, some breads of different kinds, sometimes carrots and broccoli.” Rosewater flushed a little. “It can be a full meal. Even some use fish or fish cakes or something of the sort. The restaurateur said that he makes a brisk business on fondue alone.”

“Fascinating,” Collar murmured, using his speared piece of bread to shift around the bread in the pot, seeking out the aforementioned bits. “I’m not seeing any of that here.”

She nodded, her cheeks coloring more deeply. “I have yet to cook the fish cakes, and I suppose we can dip them, but…” She shuffled around in her saddlebags for a moment and brought out a plate covered with a serving dome, tied down by a bit of kerchief wrapped around both. “If we’re still hungry after finishing the bread.”

“I will be. I ducked out of the palace before early dinner service,” Collar said, grinning, tempted to open the plate and see what she’d brought, but left it closed and set it beside the pot of bread. “You brought a pan?”

“And frying oil, yes.” Rosewater chuckled. “I was planning on having them well cooked by the time you arrived, and taste-tested the fondue, too.”

“Ahh, well, sometimes life comes at you fast, and you need to adapt.”

She nipped his cheek suddenly, winked, and set about preparing the pan and the secondary piece of the cook set for frying, her tongue firmly between her teeth as her shoulders shook with silent laughter.

“What was that for?”

“Life comes at you fast, and—”

“If you finish that, I swear to the stars I will—” He stopped himself mid-tease, having no backup that wouldn’t sound like flirtation. “Um.”

She laughed more heartily, throwing her head back before descending into more fillyish giggles as he tweaked her ear with a spell. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry!”

“You’d better be,” he mock-growled before succumbing to a chuckle. “Stars, I do enjoy these nights with you, Rosewater. Even more when they stray outside your plans.”

Her laughter faded into the most beatific smile he’d ever seen grace her lips. “I do, too, Collar. Thank you for breaking me out of my shell.”

“I’m only helping, Rosewater, but it is refreshing to see you come out of it more and more easily.” He leaned against her briefly and turned to her saddlebags. “And I’d like to help you cook, too, if I can.”

She pulled a blanket over them before he could flip up the top. “There’s… a surprise in there. For dessert.” Her cheeks were flushed, and she wouldn’t look him directly in the eye as she quietly pulled out the bottle of oil and the pan from the other side of the bags, both of them heavy-duty panniers more suited to a long overland trip than a day trip. A spatula came next. “They’re easy to cook.”

“What’s the surprise?” he asked as he accepted the items, his eyebrows rising.

“Something that will surely be making Roseate pull her mane out as soon as gossip gets to her.” Her ears lay flat, and her eyes finally came up to meet his. “And your spymaster will hear about it possibly at the same time.”

Collar’s eyebrows rose, and felt the question burbling up in his mind, almost on his lips, and shook his head. “It’s a surprise, then. A big one.”

She nodded, not a little bit sheepishly. “Thank you for helping cook.”

“You made them, Rosewater, I’m just trying not to burn them.”

They settled into a slow, awkward routine around the campfire, with Rosewater wandering over to check the fish cakes occasionally, and moving the pot of cheese farther and farther away from the fire before finally setting a wooden lid on top and nodding to him briefly.

She didn’t set up the tent, but she did unroll it and start setting poles around at predetermined points around the clearing.

“I used to go camping with Carnation and Rosemary,” Rosewater said as she laid out one of the poles, rolling it back and forth with a hoof once it was down. “With a tent like this. Sometimes, Budding Rosethorn would come with us and bring Seed, and we would make it a learning adventure. Identifying plants and fungi, tubers and leaves. All the things that we could and couldn’t eat, all the things that were fragrant or used in fragrances.”

Collar nodded faintly, waiting for her to go on, and checking the patty with the spatula. Goldening up nicely.

“We’d be gone for three days at most, travelling almost to Merriehollow on a long and circuitous path through the woods and out into the fields. Hashed browns smothered with cheese and gravy, oatmeal with crusty bits from where it stuck to the pot. Oat and honey bars. This reminds me of those times.”

“I’m glad,” Collar said at last. “You need those memories.”

“And I want more memories like it, Collar. I don’t want this to be the only time we get out of the cities and… just be. Us. Whatever we decide to do.” Rosewater’s throat bobbed as she swallowed thickly. “Even if it’s not because we’re in love, or married, I don’t want to lose this friendship with you.”

“You won’t,” he assured her, reaching out with a spell to brush back her forelock and cup her cheek with a warming spell. “I’ve grown fond of these times away from prying eyes and ears with you.” He almost said it, the words that would move him down the path towards the Principes, but he stopped himself just shy of them.

He needed to be sure. He needed to know for certain that what he was feeling was real and not just because he was having fun being with her. Telling her and then rescinding them would hurt her worse than if he never said them.

So he kept silent as she continued about the campsite, slowly laying out what would become the tent and occasionally raising her nose to sniff at the wind that grew chillier and chillier as the sun crept below the short rise to the west.

“It’s going to rain soon,” Rosewater said softly as she finally unfolded the tent material. “We have maybe half an hour before it hits.”

“You can smell it?”

“I can. Help me get this up.”

They had the tent up in less than ten minutes, and when they were done and tested the tension of the ropes and stakes, Rosewater pulled everything under the roof of the tent, careful to set her saddlebags against one of the poles. Even if it got a little wet, that was better than its precious cargo melting in the heat of the fire.

“You planned well,” Collar said softly as he took a seat against her again. Unlike their last date, he pulled one of the blankets free of the bundle of them she’d brought and draped it over their backs. “If it’s going to rain, it’s going to get cold.”

“It is. We might just see our first snow soon.”

“Stars, I hope not. We still have a quarter of our crop to harvest. A freeze will make it that much harder to dry the grain.” He shook his head, sighed, and leaned against her, then glanced down at the blanket. “Does this have… grommets in the corners?”

“They’re a contingency. In case the wind gets bad enough to drive the rain into the tent.” Rosewater conjured a ball of light and sent it drifting up to loose rope ties hanging from each corner of the tent.

“Or…” Collar untied one of the stays on the leeward side of the tent and looped it through two of the grommets, tying it loosely about them. “A clasp for a cloak for two.”

“Clever.” Rosewater raised a hoof to brush the tie, lowered it, and leaned against him. “It’s very cozy.”

He coughed, nodded, and turned his attention back to the food that’d been set aside and covered while they’d worked on the tent. “So. Fish cakes first or fondue first?”

“Well…” Rosewater cursed herself for making the remark and straightened. “If we leave the fish cakes on the pan and stand next to the fire, that’ll keep them hot without burning them, I think.” The pot of cheese, she pulled closer and pulled off the wooden topper. “Now. We have a choice. We can go with the cheese by itself, or we can add some herbs to make it more fragrant and more flavorful.”

Collar glanced at her, brow raised. “More fragrant?”

“I misspoke. Differently fragrant.” She wagged the little box in front of him. “Sage, rosemary, and dill. Some of your favorites, if I recall.”

“Mmm. Dill, yes.” Collar chuckled and nipped at her cheek. “Alright, mix it in. I’ll trust your judgement on flavor and fragrance.”

Startled, Rosewater almost dropped the box of herbs and glanced at him sharply, only to find even in the firelight that his cheeks were coloring, visible as a darkening of his copper coat.

“Sorry.” Collar coughed and flattened his ears to his mane. “I didn’t…” He trailed off, looking to the side.

“You did mean to,” Rosewater said quietly, turning her attention back to the pot of cheese and finishing preparing it for their appetizer. “It is something friends do, even in Damme, Collar. Tease each other, I mean, and even nip and play bite.” She eyed him in her peripheral vision, waiting for him to move just an inch…

When he did, she struck, nipping his cheek and giggling when he yelped.

“You meant to do that!”

“I did! Seriously, it doesn’t have to mean anything, Collar.”

“Okay, okay. Point taken.” He chuckled, keeping an exaggerated watch over her, and bent to smell the pot. “It is better smelling. Less sharp, more… refined?”

“That is the point. Now.” She twirled a fork in the air and jabbed it blindly into the pot of bread. “Shall we play a game?”

“Game?” Collar leaned forward, and she pulled him back away from the bread pot.

“Ah-ah! A game like this has to be adhered to. It’s something the restaurateur said was popular. Guess the food.” Rosewater veiled the fork and dunked it into the cheese pot, then swirled it around twice before pulling it up and letting the excess cheese drip off. “You like bread, right?”

“Love it. But I wouldn’t say that I’m an expert.” Collar squinted at the cube, glanced aside at her. “And how do I know you won’t cheat and use your nose?”

“Collar, Collar.” Rosewater clucked her tongue. “I am not a seer. I can smell them all together, but they’ve been heating up in that pot so much that any one bit of bread smells like every other bit of bread.” She held up the current contestant. “Are you in?”

He rolled his eyes and leaned forward, blowing on it, then taking the bite. After a few slow chews, he made an appreciative noise and swallowed. “Okay, so how do I figure it out? I don’t exactly have a list of…” His voice trailed off as Rosewater unfolded a slip of paper.

“He said it was part of the game. So.” She glanced at the ten different breads listed and held it out to him. “What did you think?”

“Delicious, and…”

Rosewater waited and watched, her stomach turning over as he mused. It was working. He wasn’t morose anymore, he wasn’t worried that he was leading her on.

“Blue-cheese infused onion dill.”

“That’s…” Rosewater laughed and threw her head back, tossing her mane and stamping a hoof. “Stars above, I forgot to check what kind it was before I dunked!”

“Then I win this round.” He grinned cheekily at her and hesitated, then took her fork, leaving his resting on the plate. “Okay. To play this right, close your eyes and hold your breath.”

“Hold my—” Rosewater chuckled and nipped his shoulder. “Then you had better choose and dunk fast.”

Collar chuckled in return and nipped her neck. “I promise. No more than a minute to decide. Now, close your eyes.”

What are you doing, Collar? He asked himself as she closed her eyes and took an exaggeratedly deep breath. What are you playing at?

There was a game to play, however, and a game that he was sure wasn’t what it seemed to be.

The next piece of bread was a marbled crust with dark striations in it, and the meat of it was just as striped. The list suggested it was marbled rye and sourdough.

“Hurry,” Rosewater gasped breathlessly.

“Sorry.” He plunged the piece into the cheese. “You can open your eyes now.”

“Breathe?” she wheezed.

Collar laughed and nudged her with his shoulder. “And breathe.” He let the piece soak for a while, and asked, “So this is what Merriers do on romantic dates?”

“It can be,” she admitted, her cheeks heating. “Petal, Seed, and Rosemary suggested that I should try it. It’s… new to Merrie. I think it’s from the east and across the sea, maybe.”

He let out a low whistle. “That’s a long way for a custom to travel. It certainly is tasty, I will give it that.” Following her example, he took the morsel out of the cheese and twirled it once, then twice, and held it out. “Enjoy.”

She ate as he had, slowly, cocking her head side to side, but hummed softly as she thought before swallowing, and glanced at the sheet, lips pursed. “That was a tough one. Did you look first?”

“I did not. I only looked after I speared it. You saw me.” He stuck his tongue out. “Give up?”

“Not yet.” She smacked her lips, then looked up at the tent as a faint, distant rumble sounded. “Thunder.”

“Or wind,” he said. “We sometimes hear a thunderous roar in the palace when the wind first comes off the rise, but it fades fast as it spreads out.”

A few seconds later, a dim flash settled the matter, and a low rumble came again.

“At least there’s not going to be snow, I don’t think. Not if it’s this warm,” Collar grumbled, and looked around them. “I sure hope nothing hits any of the trees.”

“It’s unlikely,” Rosewater murmured softly, snuggling closer as a touch of cooler wind reached down from the trees and set the blanket and the flames to stirring. The ropes and wooden rods held, and the fabric of the roof barely rippled in the passing. “There are higher ridges all around us.”

The rain came on the heels of the wind, pattering at first in disparate drops, then a more steady deluge as the front swept over them, the temperature dropping precipitously.

More thunder rumbled, but distant, and Rosewater turned her head to the west, towards the sea. “I think it’s thundering mostly over the sea. I imagine there, it gets more chance to rush and tumble than it does over trees and hills.”

“I hope it stays, then,” Collar mumbed, and tried not to think about how good she felt against him, how right his mind said it, and how closely their heights fit. “You still haven’t picked an answer.”

“Darn!” She giggled. “I have no idea. I thought I tasted sourdough, but there are two sourdough types in the list. I’d have to guess Sourdough dill.”

“My lady,” he said solemnly. “I’m afraid that I must disappoint you, because that is incorrect. It was Marbled Sourdough Rye.” When she gave him a raspberry and a bright smile, he laughed and nudged her foreleg with a gentle hoof. “My lady! That is hardly, er, a ladylike way to admit defeat.”

“Well!” She huffed and prized the fork away from him and jabbed it into the pot. “Close your eyes and hold your breath!”

“But I don’t—”

“Ah-ah. I didn’t make the rule, my lord. You must at least follow your own rules, yes?” She waggled the handle back and forth as if fishing for another piece. “Go on.”

He rolled his eyes and did as he was asked, pretending to sulk as he did.

Ten minutes later, Collar sat with a solid lead of five over her four wins, but that didn’t seem to bother Rosewater at that moment as they sat, staring into the pot together, cheeks pressed so each could look at the same time.

“I think that one is a salted blue,” he said, tapping one of the pieces with the tines of the fork. “See, it has the blue crumblies all over it.”

“But it doesn’t have the salted crust. I think that’s a sour blue.”

“The salt could have been shaken off while you were stirring the pot,” Collar grumped, pressing her head away from the opening and fishing around some more.

“Says Mr. I’m stirring the pot right now.”

“That is not my name. It’s Mr. Pot Stirrer, madam fork wiggler.”

“So dignified.” Rosewater laughed and raised her head from trying to jockey back into position and checked the fish cakes, pulling the pan over to show him. One side nice and golden brown, the other getting there. “Another log? I think this rain is just going to stick around for a while.”

“I think so.” Collar picked up the improvised trenching tool—a particularly sharply cut piece of firewood and started digging the trench around their campsite a little deeper, and worked on extending the excess flow trough towards the little gully that was already streaming downhill. “Good idea on the moat, too, though it won’t keep out much more than an ant.”

“Using a moat to keep out the water in the moat. Simple.” She grinned at him and set the pan back in place, then pulled out one of the dry pieces of firewood and set it in place. “How long do you want to stay out here, waiting for the rain to stop?”

“Let’s give it until…” He trailed off, his mind whirling over the possibilities come morning, the crews that were still allowed to log for another month. The dozens of ponies that would be tramping up and down the trail not a hundred paces and a hill away. She’d be caught, and he’d be caught with her, and there would be no escaping the repercussions of their secret romance. “You can’t be around here in the morning. If a lumber crew comes by and smells the fire…”

“Then you’ll have been alone before they get within sight of us.” Rosewater leaned against him more. “But I doubt they will be. Rolling logs in mud is dangerous business, I hear. Slippery.”

He didn’t reply except to grunt and nod.

“There’s the mud, too, to consider,” she said softly. “Two sets of hoofprints drying, the same stride length, one feminine and the other masculine…” She set her hoof beside his, her more delicate and sharp hoof contrasting with his thicker and more rounded hoof.

“I’m not sure that’s feminine so much as it is mountain-stock unicorn,” Collar murmured, raising her hoof with the back of his ankle to study it.

“I meant the size,” Rosewater murmured, but didn’t pull away, leaning against him as he studied her hoof.

He’d never really paid attention to them before, but they were delicate, and more sharply angled than his own. There was a hint of cleave in the middle, just a dimple hinting at farther back pure mountain stock. Far more than Cloudy’s or Dapper’s or even Lace’s. And beautiful. And unique to her. “I think you have your father’s hooves, Rosewater.”

He would have to check, though. It wasn’t like he’d memorized his parents’ or his lover’s hoof shapes. It was barely something he paid attention to for himself.

She didn’t pull away, but he felt her grow more distant as soon as he mentioned him. He began cursing himself when she came back, smiling brightly, and nodded. “They are. I’m sure of it.”

His foreleg stayed steady under the weight and warmth of hers, the delicate, sturdy bones of her ankle flexing minutely as she shifted the hoof left and right before she glanced at him, then lowered it to the ground again.

An opportunity that he’d barely even grasped sprung up in his mind too late to take hold of and act on. He could have given her the barest bit of what he was half-certain was growing inside him and kissed her ankle.

But that would be an insult. That’s something distant courtesans do, not…

He gave himself a mental shake and leaned closer to the again brightening fire to sniff at the fish cakes. “There’s more than potatoes, celery, and fish in there, isn’t there?”

“He does have a nose after all! Yes. Onion, dried and ground into a powder, and the same of garlic. They bind well with the little bit of flour, water, and mashed potatoes used to make the cakes solid and not mushy lumps of ick.”

“That sounds like the voice of experience.”

She laughed, a bark of sharp, surprised humor. “You could say that. But that, I will save as a story for another day. Else you might not have the courage to try these.”

Collar chuckled and held out his plate. “Are they ready, oh worthy and experienced chef?”

“Mmm.” Rosewater leaned forward to inspect the cakes, giving him the opportunity to admire the curve of her neck and the fineness of her features from a new angle. “Almost. The bottoms aren’t the right shade yet.”

It was an effort not to lean too much into her as she sat back. “Are we done with fondue?”

“I think so,” Collar said even as he poked the fork back into the pot and dipped the piece of bread in cheese. “Just one more.”

Rosewater chuckled. “Sure. Just one more.” She glanced at him, smirked, and closed her eyes, mouth open.

Rolling his eyes, Collar fed her the piece.

“Salted blue,” she said after only a second then chewed and swallowed. “Very good.”

“And now we’re even.” Collar didn’t even bother checking the sheet as he fished around for one for himself.

Rosewater leaned against Collar as he finished the last of his fish cake. The last of hers sat on her plate by the fire, keeping warm until she wanted to finish it off. With a bit of wine. Maybe just before dessert.

Tonight had been… perfect. She’d not even thought about what she was doing half the time and let herself just be in the moment, having fun with Collar and playing games, engaging in little quips and counters. Even without a romantic element, it felt good. It felt like they fit together in ways that she hadn’t with others.

Even Dazzle, whom she was more intimate with, didn’t fit with her the same way.

It might have had something to do with the similar responsibility and tension she and Collar both faced in their everyday lives. She as a mother, the future heir of a city whose ruler was all but openly hostile to her. He was the heir of a city that faced infiltration and possibly even invasion daily.

Their lives, she had discovered, had followed parallels, each of them coming to realizations and following paths in mirror to each other.

That commonality… what might have been.

She sighed and took another small bite of her fish cake, savoring the crunch and salt flavor of it, the spices heightening the smaller flavors and accentuating the fish, a species of salmon with a particularly meaty flesh. Usually not her taste, as she preferred lighter varieties, but in the cake it was complemented by the softness of the potato and crunch of the celery.

“Very good,” Collar murmured around the last mouthful of his. “I think you said something about dessert?”

“I did.” Rosewater craned her neck to glance at her saddlebags, one side spattered with specks of mud and water, the other side clean and cool. “The wine should be first, I think. It will go well with the cheese and fish cakes.”

“Save that for a toast.” He nudged her ankle with a hoof. “An end to tonight.”

Rosewater hesitated, then nodded and brought out the bottle. “Okay, but I need to see what she sent. I don’t want any more surprises from her.” She opened the side facing the rain and pulled out the cloth-wrapped bottle, and two sturdy tumblers. Both were clean, thankfully, if chilled. “Let’s see what she decided would be best for us.”

As soon as the cloth fell away, the string hanging loose in the light breeze, Rosewater wanted to strangle her nephew and his wife.

On the bottle’s paper label, written with a careful hoof, was ‘Pomegranate Kiss. Kissed with love.’ It was right underneath the actual label, ‘Pomegranate Paradise’ that was crossed out.

“He is in so much trouble,” Rosewater growled. “And so is she, as soon as I get a spell on each of their ears, I’m going to make them wish…” She trailed off as Collar tugged the bottle away from her, studying both the label and the glass.

“They’re looking out for you,” Collar said in a quiet voice. “They don’t know it’s me, do they?”

“They suspect. Strongly. They know it’s not Cloudy.”

“And the only other pony it could be is… Dazzle?” A strange hitch in his voice drew her attention to his eyes immediately. “You’re his lover?”

“Once. Before you and I started dating,” Rosewater said just as quietly. “I haven’t seen another’s bed since I started seriously dating both you and Cloudy. Nor has another seen mine.”

He nodded slowly, settling the bottle at their hooves, and took a deep breath. “I don’t mind it when Cloudy has her nights with other mares. She, too, has been ‘settling down’ as she calls it. But I have never asked her to abandon her culture, to abandon the freedom of love that she grew up with.” He glanced at her, his eyes serious. “I accept that she is deeply and madly in love with Rosemary, and I can even understand why. Getting to know her, I can see why anypony would fall in love with her.”

“I—”

“You,” he said, stopping her with a light touch of his nose to her cheek. “You were born and raised in the same culture. I admit. When I heard you were seen often with him, I was… jealous. I can admit that now. I was jealous that he got to see you like I’ve seen you tonight. Free of worry, free of constraint. I believe, tonight, that you’ve shown me what your heart would be should it be free to love, free of the fear of Roseate’s wrath. I don’t want you to lose that, Rosewater. I want you to feel free, so I can share in your happiness when you are free.” He started to say more, she could tell, but his eyes fell to the bottle again, and she studied it with him.

“Collar…”

Something in his eyes told her not to say what was on the tip of her tongue.

“Rosewater,” he said gently. “Your relationship with Dazzle, with Bliss, is yours. Not mine. What you do with it, with them, is not my business, no more than Cloudy’s lovers are my business. It would be hypocritical of me if I tried to claim otherwise.”

While Rosewater was still processing that idea, that he knew, that he wanted her to be free as Cloudy was, he surprised her again. His lips on her cheek, warm and strong, briefly kissing her.

“For a pomegranate kiss,” he said, smiling lopsidedly. “Thank you for a wonderful date tonight, Rosewater.”

She wanted to return it, to kiss him on the lips. Except she couldn’t. Not until he asked her to or did it first. Instead, she nodded slowly. “It’s been more than I could have hoped for. More fun. More… relaxing. More…” She raised the impromptu cloak and let it settle around them again. “Close. Thank you, Collar.”

“Any other surprises for tonight?”

“Dessert.” She didn’t waste any time bringing out the flimsy wooden boxes that rattled as she set them down. One was smaller, with heart decorations all over the top and sides, clearly painted on with a stencil. “They’re filled chocolates, a variety in each. My idea, not Petal’s or Seed’s. The small box is for us, tonight. The other is for you and Cloudy to share. And to share with Rosemary if you wish.”

Collar’s brows raised, and he glanced at her again. “Very romantic. It’s not even close to Hearth’s Home day.”

“It is.” Rosewater felt her cheeks heating as she hurriedly opened the small box to reveal four small, oblong chocolates with a little pink frosting decorating the tops of each. A little mussed from their journey, but still recognizably a heart. “But they’re… um. They were an impulse buy. I saw them, and thought of you. And I thought of Cloudy. And Rosemary.”

Rather than answering with words, Collar bent to inspect the chocolates more closely. “What kind are they?”

Smiling, Rosewater bent down, cheek to cheek again, and said. “I think we need to find out.”

Collar swept a look all around the woods outside, at the rain still falling, albeit more of a desultory drizzle intermittently peppered by briefly more powerful downpours. It was cold beyond the reach of the fire, with another quarter log on top of it added just a few minutes ago. The edge of mud was creeping farther inwards as the simple act of soaking the ground threatened their cleanliness.

Rosewater was leaning against him, studying the gooey, dark red center of a chocolate she’d just bitten half of. “If I didn’t know better,” she murmured around the bite, “I’d think that Petal knew and she conspired with the chocolatier to only stock pomegranate filled ones.”

It was so very tempting to kiss her cheek again and feel the warm vitality spreading as her blush grew. But he couldn’t lead her on any further. Politics made sure that they couldn’t work together. Even Cloudy’s marriage to Rosemary, and by proxy to him, was on very shaky legal ground.

He wasn’t ready to tell them that. He needed to. His studies of Frosty’s law and its history over the last week had shown him that his conceptions about it, like it was for most Dammers, he was sure, were tied up in the story of its inception, not in the legal battles that came after.

Getting rid of it was also the only way the cities would ever truly unite. A settled peace would only leave them as two cities with separate rulership, inviting the turmoil to reawaken in a generation or more.

Action was needed.

Rosewater brought him back to the present by offering him the other half. “This one does have nuts in it. So that’s different. Pecans.”

He made himself take half of the rest, which any Damme-born pony would see as some sort of kiss, but any Merrier would just see as another thing friends did. “Mmm. Very good. Like the last pomegranate one.” He chewed slowly, and finally found a nut. Or part of one. It was small. “Are you sure the nut wasn’t there by accident?”

Rosewater laughed, and even that sound was beautiful to his ears. “You might be right.”

“What is it about pomegranates that are so romantic?” He asked after swallowing. “They’re kinda… they’ve got a bite to them.”

“A story I can tell you at a later time,” Rosewater replied, her cheeks coloring again as he glanced at her inquisitively. “It comes from before the Day of Two Nights, supposedly. It’s very…” She coughed delicately and tapped the side of the wine bottle with a hoof. “Shall we?”

“Changing the subject, are we?” Collar asked, grinning and resisting the urge to nip her cheek. “I will hold you to that. But yes, I think some wine to end the night would be lovely.” He took the bottle before she could. “Allow me, Rosewater. You’ve done so much already tonight, and been excellent company.”

She sat back and leaned against him, sending a thrill through his entire body as she laid her cheek, the cheek he’d kissed, against his neck. “As you wish, my lord,” she said in a low, teasing voice.

He wanted to kiss her again. He wanted to tell her the words she’d already told him.

Sometime in the night, he’d passed beyond friendship, even close friendship, and begun to see her as somepony he could love. How and when the transition in his feelings had happened, he had no idea. It was like the moment with Cloudy.

One moment, he’d been her friend, and in the next, without seeming to have transitioned from one state to another, his thoughts had clicked. Looking back, he could see the ramping up of his feelings for her, and if he spent the time, he could with Rosewater as well, he was sure of it.

But that moment, the instant of change…

Collar twisted the corkscrew tighter, ears flat as he forced himself to focus on the task.

“Rather tightly fit,” Rosewater observed quietly, her voice hesitant, as if she’d realized the reason for his sudden fumbling, and was waiting for him to tell her. Stars, he wanted to.

“It’s not,” he grunted, careful not to shatter the bottle in his spell’s grip. It was actually a perfectly fit cork. Most corks made with a cork-press were. It was his emotional state that was causing his focus to slip.

What’s wrong with you? He pulled the cork out with a twist, and a roiling fog of mist came with the pop, spilling over the rim and enchanting his nose with the smell of tart and sweet.

As much as he wanted to taste it, to drown himself in the bottle and blunt the raging worries, doubts and fears filling his mind as he contemplated a future with her in the spare moments between the cusp of a moment when he’d fallen off it and into her eyes, and filling her glass.

“Is everything okay, Collar?” Her voice was even gentler, and her lean against him set his heart to thudding so hard she must have felt it.

“It is,” he managed to say, then leaned against her. “A chill I think.” To get closer to her, for her to shift just that much closer to him so there was no space between them on the ground blanket.

A moment spent readjusting the draping blanket let him shiver for real as the cold air kissed his warm back before it resettled around them with not even a gap. He was as close to her as he could be in the moment.

“It smells wonderful,” Rosewater said after a moment, apparently buying his reason. “Trust Petal to find a vintage better than the one she had me taste.” Her smile warmed him more as she leaned against him, sliding a little to the side on the blanket so he took up more of her weight. It left more of his side uncovered, but her weight on his shoulder was… it was… remarkably soothing to have her there, a comforting presence.

When he finished pouring his own, he half-corked the bottle and raised his tumbler. “What do we toast to?”

Rosewater didn’t look at him as she raised her glass, but he could feel her cheek warming against his neck. “To…” She hesitated, lowering the glass. “I know what I want to hope for. I don’t want to toast it, though, if you don’t.”

He knew, and he hated that he couldn’t give her that hope. He wanted to give it to her, but he couldn’t. He needed time. To review the law. To see if there was an out for them besides running away.

What he could give her, though… an inkling of what he wanted to do. It was all he could give and live with his conscience if all of his efforts failed.

“To the Principes Van Vrije Liefde. May love be available to all.”

She startled upright, almost pulling apart the fastener on their shared ‘cloak,’ and stared at him, her mouth open and working to make sound.

“I mean it,” he said softly. “The Principes is a beautiful philosophy, Rosewater. But I can’t hold it for myself.” But not because of a lack of want. He wanted to tell her, to kiss her and tell her they would find a way. But that was the province of poets and novelists, not of politics.

As she gazed into his eyes, she calmed, and her mouth closed. Her eyes closed, and she nodded, as if she’d seen past his words to his reasoning. “I understand, Collar. May love be available to all.” After a moment, before she touched her glass to his, she added, “Even for you and I. If we wish it.”

He hesitated. That hadn’t been part of the plan. But his lips moved for him as his heart swelled. “Even for you and I.”

Collar didn’t add the last part as he clinked glasses with her and downed his Pomegranate kiss, and tried not to think about the fact that it might be the only kiss he could share with her.

He wished for it. He wished at that moment he could open himself up to her as she had over the past month and more.

He couldn’t break her heart if he failed to do what needed to be done.

Author's Note

This date went through four different revisions before I was happy with how it went. Including three whole rewrites as the story evolved. I'm much happier with it now. It fits more neatly into the progression of their romance.

Frosty's law was a hard thing to quantify, to imagine how it was conceived and how it would be changed over the years to be more restrictive against the encroachment of Merrie mores among the populace and nobility as the war settled into more of an enforced cold war.

More of that is coming next week, explaining how that works, and how it's been portrayed popularly in propaganda (even among the ones who wrote it) and how misunderstandings grew.

So... as per usual, I'm practically hopping up and down excited to get this one out. So here it is. Thursday night instead of Friday. Sadly, I won't have enough chapters to make a two chapter week next week. Recent events have drastically slowed my writing tempo and I need what I have left to catch up again.