Chapter Twenty-One
I n the middle of the night, I stumbled down to the kitchen for a snack, only for movement outside the window to catch my attention. Was that…?
Of course it was! That night owl.
I opened the window and called out.
“Rowan! Fancy some hot chocolate?”
The black cat jumped on the windowsill and rubbed himself all over me, marking his territory with his scent before I suddenly found myself crowded against the wall by a tall man.
“It’s freaky how you can shapeshift with your clothes,” I noted. “How does it even work?”
Rowan wriggled his fingers.
“Magic.”
“Right. That’s the answer to everything. Did you have fun stalking the perimeter around the house?”
He gave me a sheepish smile. Ah, so I guessed correctly. This sweet paranoid bastard.
“Have you been to the roof already?” He shook his head and I gasped. “That’s the best part! How about I make that promised hot chocolate, we grab a blanket or two, and I can show you how to get up there even as a human?”
Armed with the mugs full of delicious choco, a bag of marshmallows, and two fluffy blankets stolen from the couch we made our way around the house to where you could get up onto the shed and find a set of metal bars set into the side of the building. Climbing up with all of our stuff would prove troublesome if Rowan didn’t have amazing agility. I didn’t know if it was him being a cat or thanks to whatever assassin school had trained him, and, at this point, I was too afraid to ask.
I put one of the blankets on the slanted roof and wrapped the other one around the both of us until we were snuggled together in our little cocoon. The first sip of the hot choc spread through my body in a pleasurable wave of heat.
“Sometimes I don’t want to just be warm, you know?” I said. “I want to be cold and then made warm. With fluffy socks, warm blankets, fragrant hot tea…”
Rowan nodded but, due to how close we were sitting, it turned into him nuzzling against my cheek.
We sat, entwined in each other, and observed the stars in the clear night sky.
“When I traveled… the stars weren’t the same everywhere,” Rowan said quietly into the darkness of the night and I knew it was my time to keep silent and just listen. The words came a bit haltingly, but I could wait for them to come. There was no rush in our small corner of the world. “Sometimes I could barely believe it was the same sky I knew when each country had different names for the stars, different constellations, different gods trapped in the firmament. I don’t put much faith in astrology, but I believe growing up under a completely different view of stars has an impact on you.” Rowan reached a hand out as if he wanted to trap one of the stars between his fingers. “And now when I see the familiar sky I think: this is home.”
I took a sharp breath in when he turned to look at me and his eyes held the same appreciation in their depths as they held for the stars. Two cold hands cradled my face.
“But I’m starting to think I could deal with never seeing the stars again if only it meant you would stay by my side.”
“You can have both!” I insisted, touched by his confession. “If you can’t see the stars, I will… I will… I will bring the stars to you! Or bring you to them! Or describe them so thoroughly you will feel like you can see them in your mind! I will…”
Rowan shut me up with a kiss.
Which was not fair because I had more ridiculous promises to make! I didn’t even get to tell him that if the stars on the firmament were gods, then we could ascend together to be among them!
I found the silence fit us both better when our lips parted. It said as much as the words could. We were content just existing next to each other and finding the beauty of creation in each other’s eyes.