New Cottage

He rubbed his nose against hers and smiled softly, reaching his hand up to smooth her hair.

"You're beautiful, you know that?"

He said, silver eyes staring at her warmly.

Her smile brightened a little as she leaned into the hand smoothing her hair back, eyes sliding closed.

She made a non-committal sound in the back of her throat in answer. No, she didn't know that. She didn't think she was beautiful.

They had already had this conversation before.

But she didn't want to bright it up again and cause a fight or anything.

He sighed inwardly and nestled his head in against her neck, holding her close.

He could tell she didn't want him to press the matter, though it saddened him that he could not compliment her and have her believe him.

Her arms curled tighter around him and sighed inaudibly.

She upset him; she could tell. And that, in turn, upset her. she didn't like upsetting people she was close with on any level.

"I'm sorry," she murmured softly. She wasn't entirely sure she knew what she was apologising for. Her inability to see beauty in herself, perhaps?

Zeke shook his head and smiled at her slightly.

"You have nothing to apologize for sweetheart."

He replied softly, kissing her forehead, he didn't want to have this fight with her again. In time he hoped her self esteem would rise and she would be able to see what he saw in her.

She gave him a weak smile in return.

This was still so odd. It had been happening for six months, but she still couldn't get her head around not apologising for everything she did and not being verbally abused at every turn.

Sometimes the new feeling of freedom confused and scared her and she ended up not knowing what to do and slipping back into her old habits of complete submissiveness; silent and self-degrading.

At the moment she was stuck between believing what Zeke was telling her - believing the opposite of what she had been told over and over again - or curling back into her shell and carrying believing what her clan had been telling her for the last century.

Moe hugged the man closer, burying her face in his neck.

He brushed his nose against hers, running his finger against her half-hearted smile.

"You can do better than that."
He murmured, kissing her softly, he loved to see her smile, her real smile that made her eyes light up with joy.

He wrapped his arms around her, holding her tightly against his, one of his hands running up her back to stroke her hair gently.

Her lips twitched into another weak smile before her body shook.

She hated feeling like this. She felt broken, incapable of thinking anything nice about herself.

Her body shook with another sob as a tear rolled down her cheek.

Moe buried her face further into his neck, trying uselessly to hide her tears from him.

"Moe.."
He murmured, his face dropping into a soft frown as he cradled her hand in against his neck.

He hated to see her cry, it pulled at his heart strings. He could feel the tears falling onto his skin, warm and unwelcome.

He kissed the top of her head softly, holding her tight in against his chest, she wanted to hide so he was no going to force her to look at him, but he held her tight enough for her to know he was there.

"Don't cry."

She bit her lip, trying to stop her soft sobs before she fell into a full-blown crying jag.

The hybrid clung to Zeke.

He was here for her; she wasn't alone in this; he'd help her get through this; she only had to ask.

...Why couldn't she ask?

She hated asking anyone for anything. She didn't like to burden people with her problems. She'd much rather try getting through something alone before she was force to ask for help.

Her body shook with another violent sob.

"Moe, sweety calm down, it's all right."
He cooed to her as he stroked her hair gently.
His hands ran down her back, rubbing her shoulders softly as she sobbed.

He had no idea what to do when she got like this so he would just hold her until she got it all out.
He felt a pang of guilt, his words had set this off, even if they were meant as a compliment he knew that they had hurt her.

She hated that he had to comfort her like this.

But she was too selfish to leave until she was calm. She wanted someone with her. She wanted to feel someone. So she'd make him suffer through this. She'd feel guilty and apologise after she had calmed down, but for now she just needed to feel him close.

It took a good few minutes for her to calm down enough to stop shaking.

"You deserve someone less broken," she murmured softly into his neck.

He sighed and shook his head.

"You think that I am all in one piece?
Love I am a very broken and scarred man, more than I care to admit, I just choose not to show that side of myself, it's a dark place that I would rather not dwell."

She gave a watery giggle.

"We're just as messed up as each other, aren't we?" She pulled back and gave him another smile, brighter than before.

As strange as it sounded, she was glad that she wasn't the only broken one here. It made her feel better knowing that she wasn't the only one that would have sensitive subjects and rough patches.

"We are indeed."
He replied with a chuckle, wiping the tears from her face before kissing her cheeks.

This took him back to what Alek had told him, you can't live this long without going through somw hardships.
They all had their crosses to bare.

She nuzzled against him, sniffling softly.

Her green eyes glistened as she smiled up at him. She loved that, even when she was crying, he found a way to cheer her up somehow.

"Aishiteru wa, Zeke-kun," she murmured softly.

"Te iubesc."

He murmured with a smile as he looked down at her, hugging her tighter in against his chest.
Leaning down he kissed her forehead.

She nuzzled into his neck, smiling softly after giving the usual small shiver at the foreign words.

She had deduced the meaning, but the foreign words were still beautiful sounding.

"What language is that?" she asked in a soft whisper.

"Romanian."
He muttered softly, nestling his face into her hair.

He would of thought she could of guessed that but he never really spoke about his life before coming to the mansion so it was understandable that she not no most things about him, like the fact he could only speak two languages.

"It's pretty."

She kissed his neck softly.

She loved the language, it sounded odd compared to the languages she knew. She'd probably endeavour to learn it eventually. She'd ask Zeke if things got difficult.

"What languages do you know?"

"I can speak Romanian and English but I only know how to read and write in English."
He explain, after his escape he had not stayed in Romania long enough for reading and writing to be of use to him.
He just got out of the country then began to learn English as it became a dominant language.

He had gotten by doing manual work, it was a rarity that such work needed literacy so he got by just fine.

Bilingual. That was pretty cool.

"I can't read and write in English very well." It had been too long since Aodh had taught her and she hadn't had to use it while she was in Japan.

She'd have to reteach herself soon.

That'd be an interesting experience.

"I've only had to learn to read an write relatively recently, society seems to use reading and writing a lot more, seems nowadays even manual workers need to literate."

He explained.
"So what languages do you know, just English and Japanese?"

"At least Bounty Hunting doesn't need for you to be able to read." She could always pick up a few bounties if she really needed money.

She shook her head a little. "I can speak four language. But I can only read and write two."

Her nose wrinkled a little. "I'm not good with phonetic languages. I can't read English or Irish, but Japanese and Elven come really easily to me." She did better with symbols.

"That's fair enough, it seems the younger languages just get more and more difficult."

Ancient languages were easy, there were only so many words in their vocabulary, modern languages had a word for everything.