Eliose:
I woke up before him, and though I should have been used to it by now… it still felt strange.
Not the waking, but the peace that came with it.
For a few seconds, I didn’t move. My eyes stayed half-closed, my body still, my senses quietly stretching out the way they always did when I surfaced from sleep, there were no footsteps outside the door, no tension in the air, no instinct screaming at me to get up and prepare to fight. Just… warmth.
I exhaled slowly, allowing my body to give in to the quiet that I don’t think I felt since I was a child.
Marcel’s arm was draped over me again, heavier this time, more certain, like sometime during the night he had stopped holding back that careful distance he always gave me.
His chest was pressed lightly to my back, his breath slow and ev
