No matter the order, the game’s unfairly stacked

Hotaru

I know they'll be coming to find me soon
But I fear I'm getting used to being held by you

They’ve had this back-and-forth many times on snow, but this time Ru can only tighten her numb arms around Sunjata and emit a small laugh that’s more of a huff. “And I know how you feel about beaches too. Now look where we both are.” King’s End - a region with both beaches and snowy winters. It feels symbolic, appropriately compromising. Maybe it’s exactly that sentiment, but she runs her hands up his spine and tries to smooth away the odd footing they seem to be on, content to let those hidden things be said in their own time and hoping to help him feel the same.

Patience was never a virtue of Hotaru’s in her youth, but she has come to conquer it in later years. No matter how curious she may be as they make their way up into their room, she reminds herself that now he’s back there’s no rush for either of them. No lack of time. It’s still not something she’s used to, so it’s a lesson she reinforces every chance she gets.

While he peels off layers, Hotaru puts more on. Though her fire magic is helpful, it’s newborn at best, and the cold feels as if it has set into her very bones. As she’s pulling on her robe and tying it at the waist Sunjata’s voice tugs at her, reeling her around as if magnetized. Heterochromatic eyes fall on the motion of his hands at his neck, and her breath stops on a hitched noise as understanding dawns at the same moment his voice rumbles in her head.

To you, she finishes for him, understanding deepening in unfurling waves of emotion she can’t control the way he does, so new is this realization for her. Still, she tries. Though he may find solace in her understanding, now is not the time to be overwhelming him either. Instead, she reaches for him, hands smoothing down his arms until one rises to cup his jaw, eyes awash in plainly transparent emotion. Oh, Sunny…it’s okay not to be okay about it, she says in place of ‘I’m sorry’ or ‘congratulations’, because neither could possibly encompass how it feels to have a new bond take the place of an old one. A pain she’d felt the day Atlas came into her life, filling a similar-but-different space that Alice had once occupied. And though she doesn’t say it, the gentle hold of her hands is a promise, an assurance that if he needs to fall apart, he can do so safely in her grasp.

I used to sing about being free
Oh, baby, look what you've done to me