#poly!phan

Fifth of January

Opal Palace, Opal City

Prince Daniel Howell of Etithoia stands at the gates of the Opal Palace, his hand on his sword, and an angry look in his eyes.

“Your Highness, Lord Philip is only seeing urgent visitors.” The guard states and the Prince shivers in the winter cold of Intora’s January. “And unfortunately, the Lord has not indicated that any urgent business with Etithoia would occur today.”

“Go in and tell your Lord that the Prince is here to speak to him.” He supplies, which he knows is unhelpful but it’s cold and he has a long ride back to Steeple Palace and he really, really doesn’t have the time for any sort of hold back to see Phil.

“Your Highness, the Lord has made it very clear that—”

“I believe what you meant to say was, ‘Prince Daniel, my pleasure. The Lord is always eager to meet you.’” He grunts, shivering. When the guard attempts to correct the Prince, Daniel cuts him off again. “Unless missing limbs is an idea the intrigues you, I do recommend that you fulfill the commands of your prince.” He’s bullshitting, of course, but the people of Intora don’t know that he’s never kept a threat through in his entire time ruling.

“Of course, Sire. However, the Lord has made it quite clear that—”

“Jefferson. Step down.” Lord Philip calls, and Dan doesn’t miss the fact that Phil has snow on his thick-framed glasses and that his black coat is blowing in the wind. He was walking in the gardens again—he does that a lot, no matter how many times Dan tells him that he’ll catch a cold.

“Phil,” Dan sighs happily, running to him and enveloping him in a hug, not caring that the guard was probably screaming about inappropriate behavior in his head.

Phil automatically hugged him back and placed a kiss on his hair, his hand coming up to grip his head as if to keep him from leaving. “Thought I heard your voice,” He whispered softly, before waving his hand towards Jefferson, “Jefferson, raise the gates. Prince Daniel and I have ordeals to discuss.”

Dan hears Jefferson mumble something that insinuates them fucking—and he notes how Phil barely even stiffens under the comment whereas Dan would have angrily demanded the guard repeat his words to the Prince’s face.

Phil seems to read his mind. “Why don’t you let the people see your soft side?” He says playfully, bumping his pelvis against Dan’s jokingly (and while Dan hates to say it, at this point, any contact with Phil gets him riled up). He grumbles a response, but Phil ignores it. “C’mon, you big softie. You saved baby animals constantly, you love kids, you’re sappy over everything—” Phil gets cut off by Dan pressing a chaste closed-mouth kiss to his lips, and when he pulls back, he sees Dan’s stupid grin. “You’re an idiot. People are scared of you, but have you ever actually harmed a person in your kingdom?”

The answer is no, obviously. He’s ordered executions but never fulfilled them—he’s always been a dramatic ruler, and therefore, he simply finds a way to prevent the execution from ever happening. The people are usually so caught up in other business to even care: most of them hardly feel any emotions, anyway.

But, Dan didn’t come here to have some much-needed alone time with his partner. “Phil, we need somewhere private.” He says, his voice dropping an octave and accidentally sounding more panicked than he had intended for it to.

If Dan’s voice was any other tone, Phil would’ve made a comment about Dan’s love for exhibitionism, perhaps commented on how he thought Dan might’ve preferred a more riskier area of the palace, but Phil knew better. When he said ‘private’ he didn’t mean that he wanted to catch up on their month apart—something had happened, probably something bad. “My chambers,” Phil suggests to, more like tells, Dan. “No cameras, no maids or butlers, no guards. Nothing can be tracked there.”

“That’s a bit unsafe for the future ruler to have no protection in his sleeping chambers.” Dan comments.

“I had to prevent the possibility of certain rumors being confirmed.” Phil states simply, and Dan laughs. “Besides, there’s nothing in there that a spy would want—most people tend to just ignore my existence.”

“They don’t need to be confirmed, everyone knows that they’re true.” Dan’s tone becomes cold again. “We need to stop stalling, come on. It’s urgent.” Dan grips Phil’s wrist and pulls him through the halls and up a staircase until they’re sat on Phil’s bed in his chambers.

“What’s happening?” Phil asks as soon as the door is closed.

“Away from the door,” Dan says, “someone could be listening.” He motions Phil to step away from the door and towards his bed.

Phil doesn’t argue; he doesn’t remind Dan that his people live by a code of privacy and kindness, he simply moves away from the door and to Dan’s side. Finally, Dan takes a deep breath, “The Princess is pregnant.” He states, and Phil nearly chokes on his own spit. “She’s eight weeks along. We wanted to wait until we told you, we found out a bit ago, but we… I couldn’t bring myself to break the news to you, and I definitely wouldn’t simply tell you this over the phone. I would have brought her with me but it’s a two-hour drive and she’s having a hard time and I read somewhere that stressful situations can induce a miscarriage and I—.”

“I-is it yours?” Phil cuts him off, hating that he knows the answer already. Of course, it’s Dan’s baby, why the hell wouldn’t it be? Dan and Isabella have been betrothed since they were young, and when they finally got married everyone knew that they were simply met to be. They had been best friends since they were young—Dan’s mother had been attempting allyship with Menia, so they had seen each other fairly often while growing up. Of course, Dan loved Phil and Isabella knew this, but he also loved Isabella and Phil knew this. He had no issues with it—the jealousy didn’t exist.

Until now, of course.

He would probably not be a part of the baby’s life at all, they probably wouldn’t ever see him, simply know that their father left too much to visit him.

Or maybe, he would no longer visit him. Maybe a baby would be too much work to balance a treasonous relationship.

The baby wasn’t his, obviously. He shouldn’t even want to be a part of its life, but he still did. It felt wrong to know that Dan would be raising a child he would never get to see, save from parties and royal affairs. He felt a pang of hurt in his chest, a sting that came with the knowledge of never being able to see them.

“Yes.” He says, and he won’t meet Phil’s eyes. “Phil, I’m so so—”

“No,” he chokes out. “Don’t give me pity. I should’ve been prepared for this, Dan. We can’t be… we can’t be together. How are you going to balance this,” he gestures between the two of them, “and a baby?”

Dan doesn’t look up still, but Phil can see the tears starting to build up behind his lash line. “Izzy and I want you to be a part of the baby’s life,” He practically sobs out. “We don’t—we don’t want you to be gone.” He takes Phil’s hands in his own and finally allows their eyes to meet. “There are ways to get around this. I want all of us to be happy, she doesn’t want to raise this baby without you there, I don’t want to raise this baby without you there.”

Phil thinks it would be inappropriate for him to say “thank fuck” but he does it anyway because really, he couldn’t be more thankful for them wanting him. “I don’t want to leave you, or the baby, I—” Dan kisses him once before he continues again. “I want to be a father to the baby. I want to be there when they wake up at night, I want to hold them, I want to be a part of their lives. I want to raise the baby with you and Izzy.”

“Our baby,” Dan corrects him, sweetly. “We’ll be a family. All three of us. We’ll figure out if it’s a girl or a boy and we’ll be happy.” Phil wipes a tear that’s fallen down Dan’s cheek and squeezes his other hand a little tighter in what he hopes is a reassuring manner.

“We’ll have to figure out the political side of this,” Phil says softly, breaking the happy moment. “My country… we’ve never been as open about the things that your country has been. To have me marry you and Izzy would be seen as a political passage—a joining of our countries. How will the people of Intora react to our countries becoming allied forces?”

“We… we want to join our kingdoms. We don’t have to say anything about,” he does that stupid gesture that indicates the two of them, “but, we would be able to have you move to Steeple Palace or we could move here or…” He looks at Phil to gauge a reaction.  

“I’m only an heir right now Dan, I can’t make such rash choices without a total council and then it would need to pass by the advisors until the King can even hear about it.” Phil shakes his head.

“You could live with us,” Dan says. “All three of us can get married in Etithoia,” he suggests. “You’re, what, second in line? Let Martyn and your father do the work, you can become a ruler of Etithoia. Our countries would be in peace, you would still have the political power you have now—more, in fact—and we’d be happy.” A perfect plan, except that he now needs to get the approval of a royal wedding from councilors or be seen as a traitor and get eloped.

Phil pulls him into a long, open-mouthed kiss before pulling back from him. “Let’s figure out how the hell to do this.” He states and realizes with raw certainty that he will do anything to be with the people he loves.