He asked her to stay—and she had, for the most part.
They had found a home in the Cove and, most nights, when they fell asleep, it was her twilight body curled against his own. It was with the heat of his breath against the back of his neck, the sound of his heart pounding against her. She found comfort in the routine of him, even though she knew that there was nothing routine about it. She found comfort in the roiling violence underneath the surface that always threatened to snap at any moment, the restraint that was just barely there, as though it may escape.
It was the kind of comfort that she knew best.
But even the weightiness of that was not enough to hold her close. It was not enough to keep her entirely rooted—and so she still wandered. She left their roost and moved beyond to find other souls that would captivate her for the night, although none made her want to stay in one spot so much as he did.
So she always returned.
And, tonight, she returns because of something else.
The curve of her belly had grown and the gravity is unlike anything that she’s ever known. She feels it in the labored breath and the sweat that makes her neck go slick. She feels it in the way her muscles seize together and then her knees go weak—the way she finally makes her way to the ground, legs folding underneath her as she groans, leaning into the pain that rises up and over her like a monsoon.
The hours pass in a blur.
When all is said and done, the night sky is at its darkest peak, save for the spattering of stars over them, and her child curls against her side. She curls her neck and stares in wonder at the aurora that covers her child too, Without thinking, she calls on the starlight above them and it dances in a silver ribbon, almost like an aurora of their own, beckoning to Dacian should he see it, celebrating her child even if he did not.
I said I never knew the moral but I guess that's how the story goes
my lovers never been a mirror in the hour that I needed it most