By the time the spring festival arrived, everyone was reluctant to leave, at least a little bit. Beata of course because it was her home, but Aleksandr made surprised noises at finding so many small things he would miss.

Andreas was less surprised. There was something to every place you were stationed for long enough, little things that you did or found that kept you sane and stable, kept you from letting your homesickness get the better of you. And when they were gone, you missed them, too. He was more surprised that Aleksandr hadn't learned this yet, although with the war perhaps it wasn't surprising that he had never been out of his own country before. And even as much traveling as he had done, possibly he had never been stationed in a foreign embassy before.

"Are these things always so..." Aleksandr's voice broke through his thoughts, coming through the doorway into the bedroom and fussing with his shirt-front clasps. Beata laughed, coming to assist him.

He had changed to more native dress styles, which seemed to please her. Andreas hadn't followed along, but when he announced the decision they both told him they preferred it that way. He seemed somehow diminished without his uniform, Aleksandr had said, with a cautious head-tilt and a sardonic smile that nonetheless seemed more relaxed than he had been.

"Complicated?" Beata offered, finishing his attire and smoothing his doublet down over his chest.

"Loud," was what he decided on after a moment, wrinkling his nose.

Andreas chuckled. They could hear the noise of the preparations for the parade all the way there in the guest house of the main palace, and that was a good several kilometers off. "Aren't your celebrations as loud?"

Aleksandr opened his mouth to refute that, then stopped and thought about it for a second. Andreas's smile broadened.

"Exactly."

Weeks ago, that might have caused sulking or at the very least stone-faced solemnity from Aleksandr. Now the younger man only shook his head and chuckled, admitting the point. They had come at least that far during their time on Beata's world.

"Are we ready?"

Ready or not, they were due out to the palace and from there to the parade start point. They were still chattering as they came out into the sunlight, blinking at the change and coming around with their staff and security force to their vehicles. Andreas wondered that he had even gotten used to having staff at all, although they were all probably used to being followed around by auxiliaries in some form or fashion. Aleksandr had his aides, interns, and occasionally security personnel, he had his assistants and subordinates, and Beata had grown up in this.

So she didn't find it at all unusual when her staff shifted their focus to one of Aleksandr's men. Andreas glanced at his security staff, at his valet Liev, who nodded slightly. Something was very wrong.

"Andreas, what..." she started to ask, when he didn't get into the vehicle immediately. Instead he moved around to Aleksandr's side, grabbed his arm before he could get in. "Is everything all right?"

No. Something was very much not all right.

One of the staff came roaring out of the vehicle, weapon in hand. Andreas moved to step in front of Aleksandr, but to everyone's surprise the younger man was quicker than that. He grabbed the outstretched wrist and yanked, tumbling his attacker further forward than he had anticipated and therefore off balance. The man stumbled, reared back up and around again only for Aleksandr to catch him in the throat with the outstretched fingers of his open hand. Another couple of blows and it was over, at least as far as the threat was concerned. Security swooped in, stopping the scene in its tracks.

Andreas and Beata both stared at their husband. "I didn't know you knew hand-to-hand combat techniques..." Andreas mused aloud.

Aleksandr's eyes were wide, almost frightened. Certainly startled. "I didn't know I'd remember that." Until it happened. Andreas nodded; training was all well and good, but until you were faced with a field combat situation there was no way of predicting how good or bad you might be at actual fighting. Aleksandr, it seemed, was one of the blessed few who could react using what he had given in a defensive, near-textbook manner.

Something Andreas would have to remember, for future public appearances. Something their security staff would have to remember, too.

The perimeter was being cleared. Andreas kept one hand on Aleksandr's shoulder, Beata coming up on his other side. "Are you sure you're all right?" she fussed. The noise level around them swelled to chaotic proportions, three or four staff members echoing that question while a medic came out to look at both Aleksandr and the attacker, and guards surrounded the man and tried to restrain him.

Movement from that corner drew Andreas's attention as the man's eyes rolled up in his head and he collapsed like a puppet with its strings cut. Which was exactly the metaphor to use, Andreas realized. He was dead.

"Damn," he said, his own voice sounding strange in his ears. "That'll make the investigation harder."

The chaos began to ebb. Medical personnel took the body of the attacker away, looked over Aleksandr and determined that apart from a very slight case of shock and the rush of adrenaline leaving his system, he was fine.

Beata had her own ideas. "Are you sure you want to go? We could plead off, certainly no one would object after this..."

"No, I'm all right." Aleksandr straightened, jerking down the front of his doublet and smoothing his hair back. Nervous gestures. Andreas watched him pull his professional face around him, bland and smooth, like a mask. "We should go. If someone is trying to scare us back into hiding, or out of ... we should make a show of capability and that we can remain cool under pressure."

"This isn't a contest, Aleksandr." Or a test at all, Andreas thought. But he didn't know for certain, so he didn't raise any stronger objection.

And he wanted to know what the motivations were behind this young man's attack, if he was acting on his own or furthering a grudge against Aleksandr's people, or if there was a deeper problem here. Putting them out in the public eye where someone could make contact or claim responsibility would be one way of doing that. He looked over at Liev. "Can we step up security for the parade without making it seem too ..."

"Aggressive." He nodded slightly. "I will see to it, sir."

There were some advantages to having a former military officer working in their staff, he decided. Their security forces were adequate, but when it came to arranging certain things, especially certain things involving threats that might be manifest, Andreas felt more comfortable with the sharpness of experience as well as training and study.

"Then we might as well get going." He turned; Beata and Aleksandr were waiting to get in to the next vehicle that had been brought for them. The first one was towed elsewhere for inspection and security sweep.

Andreas looked around. They were down to their security and a minimal staff this time, only those who had been vetted and trusted. He wondered how much of that vetting was as thorough as he would be comfortable with, and whether those who had done the testing and examinations could be trusted. It was an uncomfortable feeling, even though the assassination attempt hadn't been directed at him. He could only imagine what Aleksandr was feeling now.

And indeed, by the time they reached the main palace and were being escorted into the hall, Aleksandr kept square in between the both of them, back stiff and jaw clenched against whatever vestiges of emotion might show on his face. It didn't make for a very good parade expression. But neither of them could find it in their hearts to correct him just then.

Three days later they were on a ship heading towards Straczynski Station, the first outpost at the edge of Republic space.

None of them said much on during boarding, though Aleksandr did seem to be more energetic at the prospect of returning home. The assassination attempt, or whatever it had been, still loomed large in their thoughts. Andreas checked and double checked all the preparations and personnel on the ship, everything that he could think of that had to do with their voyage, but he didn't find anything that raised his suspicions, which did nothing for his mood and, in a way, raised his suspicions even more. Things rarely were that perfect or that smooth.

Though it could also be that he didn't know what to look for. He rubbed his temples, trying to banish the lingering unease that crawled just under his skin and made the back of his head ache. Assassination attempts were irritating and tricky at best, infuriating and nerve-wracking at worst.

And Aleksandr either didn't register how much danger he was potentially in or responded to it with the same stoic calm that he responded to everything else. Except when he was being sarcastic or cutting.

"You're thinking about it again."

Beata came up behind him, wrapping her arms around his waist and pressing her open palms to his chest. He'd heard someone come up behind him, thought he'd recognized her footsteps, but it wasn't until he heard her voice muffled in his shirt and felt the warmth of her breath on his back that he relaxed.

"Does it show that much?" he asked, one eyebrow raised and his head half turned over his shoulder, one hand coming up to cover her tiny hands. They didn't quite meet over his chest, she was so tiny and he was so broad. "I can't help but think about it. Our safety ..."

Their safety was important to him. It should go without saying, and perhaps it did. He wasn't sure.

"I know. But you've done all you can, and my people are trained in this sort of thing, you know." Not a rebuke so much as a gentle tease. "They can do their jobs just as well as you could if you were among them. Can't you let it go for a little while?"

He sighed, heavy and tired, and bit back the snappish words that came first to mind. Snapping at her helped no one.

"If nothing else, you relaxing might help her to relax, and then we all might get some sleep."

And that was Aleksandr; he could see the man's reflection in the window projection. The ship didn't have actual windows, of course, the hull integrity was too important for that, but tiny cameras projected the impression of windows along specially constructed surfaces inside the ship. Constructed with the same reflectivity as a window, which meant the same dark silhouette.

"Was I keeping you up?" Now he turned, frowning, looking first at her and then at him. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean..."

Beata rolled her eyes fondly at Aleksandr. "What he means is, then I won't keep him up at night fussing at him when you don't come to bed at your usual hour."

"You keep patrolling the ship as though something is going to change. If something's going to happen it's going to happen, and the conspirator's already aboard. It's a bit hard to sneak on board a space ship while it's in flight."

Aleksandr had fewer compunctions about cutting words, but he was coming to learn that the younger man's sarcasm masked uncertainty or fear. Sometimes anger, but not this time, not with this laconic posture and drawling tone. His hands were resting in his pockets, his shoulders slumped.

Andreas shook his head. "You're probably right. That..." No, he didn't need to perpetuate the argument. "That won't make me feel much better, but I will try."

"Thank you," Beata murmured, burrowing into his chest and tightening her grip around his waist. Aleksandr cocked an amused look at him and made a bow, mouthing the same.

And he had to laugh at that. Maybe he hadn't been keeping them up as much as they'd seemed to imply, but if Aleksandr was making a joke out of it to lighten the mood, at least someone had been worried more than they were saying. He wasn't sure which one and he was pretty sure it didn't matter.

"So." Change of subject, then. He combed through Beata's hair as he talked. "What kind of reception can we expect when we land?"

A little different from what they'd discussed already, but similar enough that it gave the younger man a place to start. Aleksandr came further into the room, frowning, pulling his hands out of his pockets to pick at his fingernails. "Chilly. Polite. They won't know what to do with us, and they'll be much more comfortable if we're keeping up this marriage as a fiction in order to maintain the peace. It goes against the grain in many ways."

Andreas had experienced a few of them for himself, in his husband. He nodded. "We can be decorous in public, at least at first. What else?"

"Hmm. There will be an honor guard." He looked skyward and to the left, estimating. "Maybe a hundred or so strong..."

Beata whistled, turning her head out again from Andreas's chest. "That's a ... a large honor guard."

"They want to be sure every district is represented, so it ends up being a sizable group. Most of it is for show, although they're all trained, of course. Military. The Prime Minister will be there, and probably two or three members of his cabinet, plus they'll have invited your representatives..." he added, with a more professionally bemused look.

"It's been a while since your world has allowed representatives," Andreas smiled a little, trying not to show too many teeth. "How long have they been there?"

"Since the wedding, I think. No word on how they're settling in." Aleksandr shrugged, looking much calmer and, if it was possible to convey it with a look, much more aware of the potential difficulties facing the ambassadors. "Better than we managed, and worse in some ways because they're under more pressure than we were in the beginning?"

Beata didn't smile with the other two. "We'll be under pressure now. We were given the winter to rest and draw closer, and now we'll be expected to function as a unit, possibly by everyone."

Andreas's breath hissed out between his teeth. He hadn't counted on that. Aleksandr, by his lack of surprise, had, but somehow Andreas had managed to convince himself that just because there was a longer than usual honeymoon period by special dispensation of Beata's people, that it would be the same for the rest of them as well. It felt like coming out of a fog of shore leave and returning to active duty again. Not so unpleasant as he'd expected, true. He did wonder what Aleksandr and Beata thought would happen now.

"We'll have the rest of the trip to figure out what that means, at least," he said, shaking his head and dragging his focus back to the present. Aleksandr came in against him, one arm wrapping around his back. It felt comfortable, steady. More reassuring than he had expected. "That's a little time to prepare. And the rest..."

"The rest, we'll just have to see."

Aleksandr's fatalism was somewhat less encouraging.

They landed to the fanfare Aleksandr had predicted, to skies that were brighter and sharper on the eyes than Beata was used to, whether because of a difference in atmosphere or because of a difference in construction materials, or simply because she hadn't slept well the night before, she didn't know. She resisted the urge to shade her eyes with her hand and instead begged a pair of sunglasses off one of the guards before they descended the ramp, her between and slightly in front of the two men. It was a strategic decision even if it wasn't the most secure one. Putting her in front gave the public of Aleksandr's world a figure it was permissible to adore, a Princess to take apart on a social but not political level, and gave them a softer figure to fix their focus on. She didn't challenge their notions of proper sexual conduct, she was tiny and curvaceous and beautiful, and she had no history of an aggressive career path.

Andreas couldn't be trained out of his military gait, not in so short a time, and she wasn't sure she would have even if they could have anyway. He walked beside Aleksandr, who didn't have to stretch his steps to keep up. They made a pretty set of book-ends for her. And she was used to walking with handsome book-ends with military bearings.

"Your Highness," the Prime Minister bowed over her hand; someone had briefed him on the proper protocol with which to greet her. "Your Highness." And the men. Interesting that Aleksandr was referred to by his married title and not his title from his own homeworld, but that from hers instead. And not from Andreas', though she wasn't sure he even had a title in that country. "If you would come this way, please?"

Come this way, on the other hand, meant come this way and stop and pose for pictures and come a little further and shake a few more hands and come a little further. It took three times as long to cross the spaceport area between the polite maneuverings and the hand-shakes. She saw, or maybe felt more than saw, Andreas and their security detail getting more and more nervous the longer they stood out on the tarmac.

"Sir," she smiled, stepping forward if Aleksandr wasn't going to, or maybe it was a breach of protocol she could excuse by being a foreigner. Whatever it took. "If you please... there was an attempt on Aleksandr's life very recently."

As low a murmur as that was, it raised hairs and pulses all around her. She saw the Prime Minister react, saw his security detail react and heard Aleksandr's hiss of indrawn breath behind her. Yes, it was a breach of protocol, maybe as simple a thing as speaking directly. No, she was not going to take it back or be sorry for it.

"Of course. I'm sorry, I had..." Forgotten. He was going to conclude that sentence with, forgotten, but he hadn't forgotten.

So what did he hope to achieve by keeping them out in the open like this?

Nevertheless, it got their speed increased a bit, and soon they were ensconced in the safety of the armored vehicle and heading towards their home for the next several days. Not, by the way Aleksandr looked out the window, his old home, or even close to it. His eyes grew shadowed and lost, fingertips resting against the armored glass of the window as he looked out at the familiar sights. Familiar and yet unfamiliar. He didn't know this route to their supposed "home."

She reached out and laid a hand on his knee, because she could, and it might be of some comfort. And because Andreas couldn't offer any comfort or steadiness even if Aleksandr would take it, right now. The Prime Minister was also in the vehicle.

"My apologies. I had hoped to make a show of..." Searching for a word, but Beata knew what he meant. "Courage, I suppose. Something to show the people that we are not afraid. That this treaty will stand against any and all threats, overt or otherwise."

"Respect, Prime Minister," that was Andreas rumbling by her ear, she realized. And he was angry. "But the first thing after a long voyage is not the best time to spring a show of force and courage on us and expect us to perform to cue."

"Of course," the Prime Minister bowed, taking no obvious offense. "Again, my apologies. You will have two days to rest before the first round of press conferences and embassy parties begins."

Two days was gracious, by the sound of it and the look of him. He still had his polite, professional mask on, which only reinforced how much Aleksandr had relaxed around them. Beata glanced at her younger husband, still looking out the window. He'd only glanced inward at the party during the brief conversation, looked out as soon as he could again.

"What's happening in the..." he pointed, suddenly, no tremble in his voice or expression to his face but Beata caught the tightness and the meaning behind how quiet his tone was. Andreas, too, as he rested his hand unobtrusively on her knee.

"... the park?" The Prime Minister leaned out the window. "Reconstruction, I think. There was a bad storm here a month or so ago, several trees were knocked over and several benches and sculptures damaged. They took the opportunity to renovate."

Aleksandr nodded his understanding, didn't look around. The Prime Minister glanced at them for an interpretation of his actions; both Beata and Andreas gave him their best expressionless and polite faces in return. He shrugged, returning to a small conversation about local matters, construction and re-construction, recent events and festivals Beata had heard Aleksandr speak of very occasionally but didn't know enough of to participate.

She wanted to lean into Andreas's arm. She wanted to do that and then pull Aleksandr against her and all three of them curl up on the seat and rest, but they couldn't. Not with the Prime Minister there.

Aleksandr's home had a gate guard and a security perimeter that rivaled some Beata had seen on private estates in her own capital city. She didn't know if he had expected it but he certainly wasn't used to it, not by the way his eyes darted this way and that even when they were on his supposed grounds. By the look of him, no one had briefed him on the details of his new home, not even pictures.

She wondered, and then she wondered why it took her until they were coming up the walk to his new house, why she hadn't thought to ask if his things had been moved as well. Maybe he had asked, but maybe he was too distracted by the new place to think of it.

"Excuse me," she turned to the Prime Minister. "Has everything been moved?" Still banking on her foreign-ness to get over any awkwardness about the question. She resolved not to do that tomorrow.

The Prime Minister blinked at her. "I beg your pardon?"

"Has everything from my husband's..." Just the slightest bit of emphasis on that phrase there, in case he wondered why she was wondering. Aleksandr's eyes fixed on her with laser-like intensity. "... previous home been moved to this one? I just want to know if we should be expecting a moving company of some kind or..."

"Oh. No, no, that's all been taken care of. It was taken care of while you were en route." The man smiled his diplomatic smile, empty inside but polite nonetheless, and not empty out of any reason other than he didn't know what to make of her, how to react. All right, then. She nodded, smiled sweetly at him the way she did at her father when he was trying to be paternal.

"Thank you," she said, and touched Aleksandr's arm lightly as she stepped forward. "Shall we?"

Andreas would have to follow. She didn't dare treat them as equals here, not when they were so obviously standing far apart from each other as decorum could allow. The older man's shoulders were squared, his weathered face set in an expression of rigid discipline and little emotion, and she wanted so badly to sooth the wrinkles away from his forehead. She wanted it like it was a stone in her heart, and to bring some life or warmth back to Aleksandr's eyes. Their time on her world seemed so far away now.

All the parts of her world seemed far away. It was noisier here than it had been on her estate, and there were more chemical smells, fewer smells of green. She stepped in the entryway with Aleksandr passing her to move further into the room and stopped, looking around, trying to find something familiar in all this strange new place. The walls were too close together, the ceiling too low. The entryway was filled with a coat closet and a table and a trunk and she couldn't breathe, it was all too narrow and closed in.

The large, thorny hand on her elbow made her squeak and turn, almost colliding with her face into Andreas's chest.

"Are you all right?"

Aleksandr looked back at them, then back to looking around. Beata pushed her hair out of her face where it had come undone in the wind, dark strands on paler than usual skin with the lack of sun on the ship. "I... yes. Yes, I'm..."

Ahead of them in the hall, Aleksandr gave a soft snort. The man had the sharpest perception of anyone she knew, whether hearing or sight or simply paying attention to things most other people didn't. And he knew she was lying. So, too, did Andreas, most likely. If for no other reason than because she looked down when she said it.

He pulled her into his arms and she knew he knew she was lying, by the comfort he offered. Comfort which she gratefully accepted. As long as they didn't make her say it she could pretend not to be homesick, pretend to be strong. Now she felt the full impact of never having been far from home before, while the two of them had had to contend with this for years.

"I don't even know how many bedrooms there are in this place..." Aleksandr mused. It seemed like a strange thing to think of at a time like this. "Come on, let's have a look at the kitchen."

Beata turned her face from their husband's chest, frowning at him. "The kitchen? What..."

"You were learning how to cook back at home, I thought you'd want to see..."

Something eased in her chest, the clench loosening a little. "Oh." Baking bread smelled the same everywhere, didn't it? She could make something from home. It wasn't all strange and different, or it didn't have to be. "Thank ... yes, I think I'd like that."

In the privacy of their home Aleksandr could put his arm around her shoulders and clasp the shoulder of his husband and there was no one to see or glare or scorn. Beata didn't see any security guards, though she supposed there were patrols outside, and Aleksandr didn't have servants. And evidently this new place he had been moved to didn't come with servants, either. She wondered if she should hire some or if they would be better off on their own. Something to ask the men, later. When she was feeling stronger.

"It's a big kitchen, at least," Andreas rumbled above her head and to her left. She smiled a little, leaning her head on his shoulder again.

Aleksandr chuckled, the first time she'd heard that sound all day. "They didn't skimp. Most of the time these things don't see use, not by the residents of the home, anyway." He looked down at Beata, who was up to practically beaming into his eyes. "I get the idea this one will."

"Of course," she poked him in the ribs. "Someone has to keep you two from starving yourselves on bad food and no food and forgetting to eat all the time."

His bed was considerably smaller than the bed at Beata's estate, or maybe it just felt like that. He could hear Andreas snoring over Beata's head, feel the man's warm hand on his hip. They were all cuddled up together for warmth or for the reassurance of something familiar, because this house wasn't familiar to any of them. It felt like a cheat, somehow. As though his own people were punishing him for wedding himself to a man.

At their behest, too. Because they wanted a sacrificial someone to toss to the treaty, and why couldn't it have been a woman, anyway? Or someone else. Anyone else.

The thought carried more weariness with it than real resentment by this point. Andreas had been more than patient with him, and what they shared was something real and special, something more than he had been led to expect from years of prejudice. They hadn't even gotten to the gross part yet. Which was still the disgusting part. He didn't know how to think of it any other way, but he was trying. And Andreas was helping. Aleksandr didn't even know if he'd date an older woman although that piece of shallow vanity was easier to admit to, he'd known he'd had that tendency for years. Beata was much more his type. But they came as a matched set.

And if Aleksandr had had to sleep a night in this strange bed, he'd rather do so with them around. With company and with people he could trust, further.

It was late. He should be asleep. But they didn't have to be anywhere tomorrow and so he felt more comfortable sighing, turning to kiss Beata's forehead and even daring a touch on Andreas's shoulder before he extricated himself from the other two and slipped out into the hall, down the stairs. Down to the kitchen for something to drink at the very least, his mouth felt parched and empty.

"What's wrong with me," he muttered, expecting no real answer. "What the hell is wrong with me?"

Too many things to list. Too complicated and nebulous to name, most of them. He was back home, but it wasn't home anymore.

No, that wasn't true either. It was good to be home again. It was good to be in a familiar city, to see the sights he'd gotten used to, smell the rain on the buildings and hear the familiar tones of vehicles, cross-walks, air patrol, sirens now and again and the click and hum of the climate controls as they came on in the middle of the night. In Beata's estate everything was too quiet, hidden to allow the natural aesthetic of the birds and the insects to come in through the windows. It was nice, but it wasn't as comforting as this.

Aleksandr poured himself a glass of water, drained it in three long gulps. They had two days to acclimatize and then it was off to the races again, wasn't it. He didn't even know if he'd be able to acclimatize so quickly, let alone the other two.

"This is the sort of thing..." he started, but his voice sounded too odd in the silence. It was the sort of thing he should talk over with them, only he was bad at starting the conversations. At finding the words to describe the problem, let alone the solution. In politics, he could manage, he could negotiate a settlement between rival companies or a planetary or regional government and a corporation, he could apparently even manage to be a figurehead in the public eye, but fixing a marriage?

This was why he was single for so long, he decided. He didn't do intimacy, not of the kind required to maintain a relationship. Aware of it, yes, but not so good at it.

He couldn't for the life of him remember why he thought that, though.

"What are you doing?" Beata stood on the stairs, blinking at him and attempting to push her mass of hair out of her face, and only succeeding in making it worse.

Aleksandr started to refill his water, put the glass in the sink instead. "Nothing. Just... a little restless tonight. Let's get back to bed, hmm?" One arm around her shoulders, steering her back up the stairs and making himself relax while he did. At least no one expected him to figure out the problems of the world while they were in varying phases of half asleep. Or even the problems of their relationship. The morning would come soon enough, and if he was very lucky, he'd be able to figure out what to do then.

Somehow, in the middle of the night, though, he didn't have much confidence of it.

Trial by fire. Their first foray into the public world was a charity dinner hosted and sponsored by another diplomat, one of Aleksandr's actual friends. Beata thought it might have been a private arrangement between them, something to both make him look good and give him a little time with some friends as well. It was a good thought. These public dinners and the political maneuvering that came with them could be brutal.

They wouldn't have been able to afford it on his pay, either. So she wondered just how well this friend knew him, or if he was counting on Aleksandr having access to a greater fortune than he previously had.

She made sure the boys, as she was starting to think of them, were well dressed. "I don't suppose I need to remind you on table manners..." she started, then stopped as her face fell and she remembered they weren't on her world. This wasn't quite the same thing, their table manners weren't hers, most likely, and if anyone was going to educate them on proper behavior it would be Aleksandr. Who was fidgeting nervously anyway.

"Hmm?" he looked up and over, then came over and stood behind her, hands rubbing her shoulders. "No, but the thought is appreciated. It's not that much different from your world anyway."

Beata closed her eyes, letting his soft voice with its underlying roughness and faintly crisper sounds wash over her. Long, slender fingers massaging her bare shoulders. Andreas stood just within her field of vision, smiling. "This is how you felt, isn't it. Everything different, not just openly but in the small ways, the little things that you don't realize are different until you run into them. Like table manners."

"Something like that. Your world is much... fancier than mine." Both her world as a princess and her world in terms of nations, she heard, which made it doubly hard on both of them. There were no court politics here on top of the national ones. It was all political in the single dimension. So to speak.

"Are we ready?" Andreas broke the silence after several minutes. Beata and Aleksandr both looked up, both nodded.

The trip there was uneventful, and yet when Beata came into the open garden patio where the dinner was being held the bright lights strung along the trees and the rush of babble in a different language hit her, and for a second she couldn't understand anything anyone was saying. She smiled and shook hands and murmured greetings that she hoped matched with the greetings offered, moving on autopilot and with reflexes brought up out of years of experience. Similar, but not the same.

Andreas was the lifesaver. Steering her from behind with a hand between her shoulders as Aleksandr took the lead, murmuring cues behind her ear. Maybe this was all a campaign to him, something to be prepared for. He sounded as though he'd been reviewing a mission briefing.

"Damiano, how are you?" Aleksandr found and greeted his friend, who clasped him by the arm and smiled and brought him into a hug. Beata smiled, blinked, thought that it might be the first time she'd seen him hug anyone in public.

There were many things, she thought then, that he was doing that he didn't often. Or hadn't often, when he'd been on her world. Smiling, for one, he smiled more often, although she couldn't be sure it wasn't a put-on to make himself feel more friendly. With his old companion, yes, it was real. And then he seemed surrounded by friends and she and Andreas were left on the outer circles for the moment, to watch and introduce themselves to others that came by, while he renewed old acquaintances.

"I'm well enough, what have you been doing with yourself? I see something on that planet agreed with you, anyway, you look... Well, you look..." It might have been Beata's imagination, but she thought his friend was looking for something in his face, something he didn't entirely want to find.

Another man, slightly taller, with fair curls framing a rather sweet face, broke in. "You look good." And Aleksandr had a smile for him, too, another real one. This must be another friend.

He was introduced as Lev. "My old assistant, and a damn good negotiator in his own right, as well," Aleksandr grinned. Beata did like Lev when she shook his hand, returning grin for grin.

"Everything I did right, I can owe to learning from your ... husband, here," Lev said, and to both of them, eyes flicking from Beata to Andreas and back to her again, since he'd shaken her hand. He was the first person who had done that, and it made Beata like him a little bit more.

"Lev here has been invaluable to us since you've been gone," Damiano added, taking over the floor with the skill and ease of someone used to the focus and the spotlight. "He's been handling your old cases with Tom and that old bastard, you remember Mikhail?"

Aleksandr blinked, eyes widening and rolling at the same time, and Beata ducked her head to soften the laugh. "I wish I didn't. What's he up to now?"

"Attempting to negotiate for the sale of our military surplus to people known to fund terrorist organizations, despite the fact that doing so would put us squarely in the supply chain of people undermining the peace." Damiano snorted. "But apparently that doesn't matter, because they pay better than anyone and they're well funded and respectable, a socially conscious and acceptable group of terrorists."

It took Aleksandr a second, one hand pushing through his hair, but then he frowned. "O-ho, I know the ones you're talking about. ... wait, when the hell did he become involved with them?"

"When he got even more hidebound and stubborn and ... never mind, that's a subject for another time." He interrupted himself as the bell rang for dinner. "In the meantime, you'll have to give me a chance to get to know your lovely wife."

Beata's eyes focused on his face, startled. As though Andreas didn't exist. It was unspeakably rude, or would have been in a gathering at her own home. Even Lev looked uncomfortable with the statement, shifting his stance and throwing all three of them an apologetic look. Damiano didn't seem to notice, escorting her at Aleksandr's side as though he expected Andreas to tag along behind them like a dog.

And the entire dinner was like that. A blur in her mind, between the focus required to carry on a conversation in this setting with all the ambient chatter and keeping an eye on her two men, it all slurred together until she had a pounding headache by the night's end. It kept going, and she didn't know if the steady ignoring was worse than the sidelong stares, or better. Lev, and maybe one or two others, were the only ones who engaged Andreas in conversation, speaking slower and more clearly so that he would understand. Everyone else treated him as if he didn't exist, or was a servant or, worse, as though he might leap across the table and attack someone sexually.

Aleksandr smiled, but his smiles grew more and more distant, more and more rote. Beata wondered as they drove home if she was the only one who saw that, curled up on the seat with her cheek pressed against the cool window. Eyes closed against the lights in the rain that fell just after they all finished dinner, good timing there. Bright lights blurring in front of her eyes.

She barely noticed when Andreas scooped her up, the creaking of doors and footfalls on the stairs as they carried her to bed. All she knew was that they both curled around her as she drifted off to sleep, warm and tender, and it seemed like everything in this bed at least was as it had been.

Voices downstairs woke her again. Soft voices, hushed and even tones, and recognized instantly. They were trying to keep from waking her up, but once the headache abated and her energy returned the evening's events made that close to impossible. She couldn't keep from turning everything over in her mind, wondering how they were doing, how they would go on like this.

The contrast between the color of the light visible under the door and the shadows in the room, pale dark on deep dark, was unnerving. She slid out of bed and pulled on a pair of slippers the staff must have left for her, or maybe they were a gift of some administrative functionary. It took her a second to get acclimatized to the light, blinking. Even if it was dim, she realized, after she had been out in the hall long enough for her eyes to adjust.

Right. They had dimmed the lights, and it was still bright. Maybe the migraine hadn't entirely gone away after all.

Beata padded downstairs, listening. Listening in shamelessly so she would know where to pick up the thread of conversation.

"... as long as I can think back, at least. I mean, I know there are stories, histories, I mean, of people writing letters in secret, people being rounded up and imprisoned on charges of ... um. Unnatural fornication." Aleksandr's voice carried the wince she couldn't see.

Andreas only snorted. "If you're worried about hurting my feelings, I would have t--" Then he stopped, amended what he was going to say. "I would have to have thicker skin than that to stay in the military as long as I have. Don't worry about my feelings where the history and prejudices of your people are concerned."

That was not the right tone to take with Aleksandr, Beata thought. Though it was a very Andreas thing to say.

She took the next few steps down to the main room at a normal pace and weight, leaning a bit on the railing, but it didn't creak. They were sitting in the main room, or the main personal room, living room? Whatever it was they called it here, one on each couch for ease of stretching their legs out and a glass of wine in hand. It looked like a good way to spend the evening.

And yes, as she'd thought, Aleksandr's face had clouded again. "I'd like to worry about them, if you don't mind. There's a lot of prejudice..." and then he looked up and saw her. "Beata. Shouldn't you be resting?"

"If I rest much more I'll be up at dawn. I think," she smiled at them both as Andreas turned, too, exaggerating the yawn that turned out not to be so fake halfway through, stretching her shoulders a bit and pushing her hair out of her eyes. "Besides, I figured we ought to talk about what happened."

We, meaning her, too. She came and settled by Aleksandr, though, because Andreas seemed right. He wasn't bothered by the words of a few politicians, not when he didn't know them as friends and when their opinion of him didn't matter for the sake of his or their reputation.

"What do you think about what happened?" Aleksandr asked, tugging her against him with an arm around her shoulders. Perhaps it soothed him to have her close by. She tucked her cheek to his chest and listened to his heart beat.

"I don't think it's occurred to your friend that he will have to deal with things that are foreign to him, on his own home ground." That was as diplomatic as she could think to put it. "I don't think it's occurred to him what some of those things might be. Different foods, different languages are acceptable changes from the norm, even if they make our minds work in strange ways and ... feel badly, sometimes." She struggled to find the right words in Aleksandr's language to say what she meant. They didn't have the same sort of terms for malaise as her language did.

"Wound of the spirit," Aleksandr murmured, and Andreas chuckled across from them. Her language, from his lips. That was a welcome sound. Then they switched again. "Something like that. It is good to be home."

His heart beat eased, slowed. She smiled. "But he seemed not to notice that customs were different, or beliefs or... things."

"Taboos," Andreas offered.

"Those, yes."

Aleksandr shook his head, his fingers curling almost into a fist before he relaxed his hand again and brushed a gentle touch over her hair. "He was taken off interplanetary assignment. Not interplanetary," he corrected himself. "International. I think I'd forgotten that when we accepted the invitation. Nothing noticeable or distinctive, but he didn't settle in as well as the department would have hoped. He was moved to more local matters."

"Rigid in his thinking," Andreas nodded. "I know the type. There's a cluster of them in the military; as you might imagine, we encourage that sort of thing."

"Only to an extent," Beata frowned, sitting up a little. "There must be flexibility in order to deal with changing circumstances."

And they were going a little far afield. Andreas sighed. "We are in the middle of changing circumstances, drastic ones. There will be a great deal of resistance. I'm surprised, actually, that we didn't encounter more of it..."

Both of them looked over at Beata. She shook her head, trying to think of why they had made that decision in the first place. "I think... we thought it was best if the three of us had some time together, first. Our court is complicated, our system of government. We didn't want to inflict it on everyone..." But that had been her mother's idea. To keep them in her estate in the valley, give them time. Now Beata wondered if it had been such a good idea at all.

Aleksandr, though, smiled. "We had the time to build ourselves up, to become... at ease with ourselves and each other." A significant look between him and Andreas, though Beata thought she knew what that meant. In the space of one night, many things had changed. She didn't know how much, but they had. Every touch, every kiss stood as proof of that. It gave her more faith that they would make this work, and their countries would make this work.

"And now we have our ease assaulted by the comfort and comprehension of others," Andreas commented, sourly but still not overly bothered.

Beata sat up a little as she realized. It was less about his irritation at the other man and more about his need to protect Aleksandr and herself from being thought of as abnormal, freakish. Which was hardly a problem for her, this was commonplace in her world and every part of what surrounded her now reminded her that this wasn't her world. But Aleksandr...

Seemed to be more at ease, it was true. Maybe being protected, taken care of, was what he needed. As much as he also needed to be the strong one.

Two days later they had a rest day.

Andreas woke up at his usual time. Beata and Aleksandr lay in bed and stared across the sheet at each other and grinned, holding hands and speculating whether or not he was physically capable of sleeping in. Both of them agreed that they were, and stayed in bed until nearly lunchtime when the new and savory smells of whatever Andreas was cooking came wafting up to lure them out from beneath the covers.

As it turned out, kitchen technology did not vary much from one nation to the next. Which seemed reasonable; even when their nations were at war, the corporations sold to whoever had the money to buy their product, despite copious attempts at propaganda campaigns.

"I didn't know you knew how to cook," Beata smiled, digging in with an appetite that surprised even her.

Andreas chuckled. "It was either that or live off of base rations, and you can imagine which one I preferred." All three of them made a face at that. Base rations on any base were notoriously grim. "Besides, there's a certain kind of simple joy in it. Ingredients go in one side, food comes out the other."

"All my attempts at food usually wind up looking like nothing of the sort," Aleksandr pointed out, with equal parts self-deprecation and affection. He was taking his time about eating, poking everything into its place on the plate and sampling all the flavors while Beata wolfed down the food. She hadn't realized how hungry she was, or could be at least. This wasn't like her. Stress, maybe.

Andreas refilled her plate when it was empty, while she hopped down from the chair and went to get some more water from the filter. "I don't think I've ever tried to cook a meal. A small meal," she clarified, since she'd often been in the kitchens on her estate. "For one or two... or three people. I like helping out in the kitchens, though."

"We noticed," they chorused, grinning. Warmth and love, and Beata glowed under it all.

After lunch she settled in on the couch with her tablet and a book loaded, something that seemed to be all the fashion these days with Aleksandr's people. She didn't see him again for another half hour, until he came down the stairs again, dressed somewhat fancy for running an errand or spending a day around the house.

"Where are you going?" Andreas beat her to the question.

Aleksandr shrugged. "To temple. It's been a while, I thought I would catch the early evening service."

The older man nodded his understanding, but Beata sat up, fascinated. "Do you still go to Temple here? I mean, do you still have all the... the rituals?" one hand spiraled through the air, trailing off her question as Aleksandr stared at her the way she had been staring at his colleague the other night. Then, without a word, he turned and left the house.

Beata frowned, the tablet heavy in her fingers.

Andreas looked after him with a near unreadable expression, then looked over at her. Beata didn't know what to say. Obviously she'd said something wrong, but what and why she couldn't fathom. No, it was the why more than the what. But Andreas wasn't going to explain it to her. Not until she made overtures for herself, if the way he went back into the kitchen and started loading the dish washer was any indication.

She tucked her feet under her and leaned her side against the couch cushions and tried not to cry. Everything had been going so well there, for just a little while, and now everything was terrible again. And this time it wasn't some outside prejudice or the grim situation around them, it was her fault. She'd gone and put her foot in her mouth when she'd asked Aleksandr if he still went to Temple. Which he'd said he was going to. Why?

"Because they still go to Temple here," she mumbled into the cushion. Well, and that was the obvious answer, wasn't it. She'd asked something so basic and so ordinary that it didn't even merit comment. No, that didn't line up with the way things felt in the house now, hurt and upset. She had asked something obvious, she had asked it in the way she was used to asking things, if it was a local custom.

Was there something wrong in asking after local customs?

"I would have thought..." Andreas said from the doorway, shoulder against the frame and standing half-slouched for the first time that she could remember. "That someone so used to court and politics would know how to be more... diplomatic."

"I didn't..." she started, then stopped. She hadn't been diplomatic in some way, obviously, she'd really put her foot in her mouth, and she was still trying to untangle why. Beata rewound the last few minutes in her head. "I only wanted to know if he still went to Temple."

Andreas shook his head. "Apart from showing your ignorance, which you wouldn't have done if you'd read a little about his people and knew that they were deeply religious, it was your tone of voice that gave you away. Did you ever stop to wonder if maybe he didn't miss those rituals, as you called them, of his people while he was on your world?"

Beata opened her mouth to say that of course she had and then shut it again when she realized, no. That wasn't true at all. In fact, she hadn't given any thought to the little things Aleksandr might do, the daily rituals, saying a blessing over a meal or going to his favorite restaurant on a bad day to get a hot meal that reminded him of home. She knew he had asked for certain foods, sometimes, for dinner, when he knew they had them. She hadn't given any further thought to things he might miss.

"Why don't your people celebrate a faith?" Andreas asked, when she didn't say anything.

She didn't know how to answer that question. "We don't. We don't believe in a higher power. There are phenomena we can't explain, the human mind isn't capable of containing all knowledge, but we can ... That's not what you're asking, is it."

"You value science over faith. Reason over intuition, emotion. We... he, when he was on your world, I doubt he thought of it that way, but it didn't fulfill all his needs. And you just dismissed that with a few casual words, as though it was a curiosity."

Beata flinched. "I didn't mean to..."

"I know you didn't. But you did anyway. We might as well have said, you don't have any kind of faith? What's wrong with you?"

Her mouth twisted; she felt hot tears springing up behind her eyes and turned her face into the back of the couch so he wouldn't see. Part of her wanted to brush it off, to pretend it hadn't happened, scrape sand over it and ignore it and hope it went away. The rest of her knew it wasn't that easy or that simple.

Andreas, mercifully or maybe just fed up with her, left her alone to come up with some solution and apology on her own. She couldn't think of anything at the moment. Her mind went around in circles, and all she could come up with was how much she didn't know.

Which made correcting that the first place to start.

Beata gave him space for the rest of the day, which was just as well. Aleksandr didn't know if he could control his temper with her over what she had said, going to Temple aside. He didn't know how to pick out any one thing about her words that had upset him, just that all of it together had raked him up one side and down the other. Made it seem small, foolish, and provincial, despite the fact that his faith was that of billions of people. Made him seem backwards in some way.

He had gone to Temple, and that helped, some. The familiar songs and call-response chants soothing him, making him feel more as though he was at home and less as though he was an interloper in his own city. No one had recognized him, either. Or if they did, they kept it to themselves.

Aleksandr came back home, had a late lunch or early dinner, whichever it was. Apart from the other two. Andreas came in while he was finishing up and starting to clean up and gave him an inquiring look, to which he could only shake his head. No, he didn't want to talk about it right now. Maybe at some point later, but not right now.

Andreas nodded, one hand rubbing between his shoulders, and left him to it.

Beata appeared later as the evening wore down, with a glass of milk and a tray of biscuits that she must have heated up. Surely she couldn't know how to bake them.

He turned them over in his fingers and then laughed, which surprised them both.. "You bought these at the store earlier didn't you."

"Well, I didn't, um... There wasn't a recipe." She shrugged. It seemed to bother her a little that she hadn't known how to make them, or maybe the original act bothered her. He couldn't tell. It bothered him that he couldn't tell. "I'm sorry, Alek... I didn't mean to..."

Any other time he would have offered a sarcastic comment, but he was distracted by the fact that she'd named him so. No one ever gave him a nickname or a pet name, he just gave off the sort of air of someone who didn't have his name shortened, who wouldn't tolerate being diminished that way. But with her, in this conversation, it didn't seem to be a diminishment. Begging for forgiveness, maybe. A gesture, he realized, as the words fell into place, of peace. A sign that she, too, wanted this to be over and wanted them to be like they had been again.

He didn't know if he could manage that, but he could at least give her a sign in return. Something other than laughing at her efforts.

Actually...

"You didn't mean to, but you did. Just as I didn't mean to laugh at you just now..." She frowned at that, and started to protest that he hadn't. "Beata... Does it really seem strange or provincial to you?" he asked. That hadn't been what he'd meant to ask.

"I... what? No..." Beata frowned. "You thought..."

He waited for her to realize how she had sounded, if it hadn't been explained to her before. He wondered, while he waited, if Andreas expected to have this same problem. If Andreas had a faith of his own. They'd never discussed this kind of thing when they were at her home; it hadn't come up because they hadn't worshipped. Were there other things that hadn't come up, that should have?

She took a breath, took a couple of false starts before she started. "I was startled. I was surprised, I haven't... it's new to me. I haven't grown up in a place where people had that kind of..." Her hand gestured as though it could make up for what she wasn't able to say.

"Faith? In the unknowable, the untouchable, unmeasurable?" It was as good a definition as any. "You have faith that ... that the sun will rise tomorrow, even if you don't know it will, yes? That the results that you produce in your research facilities will always produce the same results." And that was not a good example; he grimaced even as he said it and saw her small frown cross her mouth.

"Yes, but you do, too. You follow the same scientific principles that we do..." He started to explain, or to try for another explanation, but she shook her head and waved it off. "No, you don't need to... to compare. We don't have anything similar, it's just something I'll have to get used to, I suppose. The same way you got used to the idea that in my country..."

The curve of her smile told him what she meant to say. "... all forms of love are equal. I think you'll have it easier, honestly." That still bothered him. More so now that he was home and things were back to what he thought of as normal, and he didn't have the excuse of being in a strange place.

"We none of us have it easy. But we're trying."

Beata came forward, slid her arms around his waist. It took him a moment or two to realize that she meant herself as well, that she and Andreas were trying, and she believed that he was trying. "See, you have faith in me." Not the perfectest example.

She poked her nose against his chest. "Yes, but I can measure you and know you," she told him, eyes peeking up at him in what must have been a sultry look at one point, before he started thinking too much.

He bent his head to kiss her instead of talking. Kissing was easier and something he was more familiar with, as opposed to talking in depth about himself and his beliefs and feelings and other complicated things.

Yes, she could measure him and know him, and would she understand him when she did? He still felt strange both on the inside and the out, after what she had said, a few casual sentences. Uncomfortable in his own skin and his own home.

"Aleksandr?" She tilted her head slightly, abandoning seduction.

"I'm here. No, I was just thinking." He sighed, hugging her a little closer. "Do you think you can sound a little less surprised when I do something you don't expect, at least? I ... it was the surprise more than anything. It sounded as though I was... I don't know. Doing something that human beings weren't supposed to do."

There was a plaintive note to his voice that he didn't like. He didn't like being open and vulnerable, and being hurt made him remember why. She didn't move from his arms, and in a little while the warmth put the memory a little further away.

"Is this where we go to bed and hope it's better in the morning?"

He dropped his chin to the top of her head. "I think so."

"I really am sorry, Alek."

"I know."