cantarella / falling asleep on her

⊹ ˚ . ⊹ . ˚ ⊹

Sebastian stopped halfway across the terrace, tray in hand, and Cantarella watched his expression flicker before he smoothed it into something carefully blank. She tilted her head. Smiled. He set the tray down on a nearby table, bowed, and retreated without a word. Wise man.

You hadn't stirred through any of it. In fact, your head still rested heavy against her shoulder, your breathing slow and deep, and your body had gone completely slack sometime between the third and fourth paragraph of the old Fisalia record she'd been reading aloud. The proper methods for Violaca fermentation, a process she could probably recite in her sleep by now. You'd seemed interested at first. The book lay closed in her lap now, the worn leather cover warm under her palm.

"Look at you," she murmured. Soft strands of lavender hair fell across her shoulder as she shifted to see your face, brushing lightly against your forehead. "Hehe... so peacefully asleep. Right here, where anyone might see." One hand rose to brush a strand of hair from your cheek. Her fingers traced down along your jaw, light as anything, watching your parted lips, the slack ease of your features. "You must learn to relax, you know. You can't help others if you don't take care of yourself." Her touch lingered at the corner of your mouth. "Though I suppose you're managing that well enough at the moment."

She settled back against the chair, careful not to jostle you. The long, trailing panels of her dress had pooled over your lap where you'd curled into her side, white and blue and violet fabric soft against your sleeping form. Her hand came to rest gently in your hair, pale fingers carding through slowly before eventually stilling. She could wake you. Suggest somewhere more private, more befitting a Fisalia matriarch and her partner. But your hand had migrated and found hers at some point, fingers loosely tangled even in sleep, and when she tried to reach for the book again she found she couldn't without disturbing you. Well then.

The afternoon light shifted slow across the pale terrace floor. Somewhere deeper in the castle, she could hear the faint clatter and bustle of servants going about their work, voices echoing down the corridors. None of them had wandered this way yet. Let them talk, when they did.

Cantarella closed her eyes and let her head tip back against the chair. The breeze was cool against her skin. You were warm against her side. She could get used to this, she thought. To someone who wanted her for nothing at all. "To fall asleep beside the Bane so easily," she said softly, thumb tracing across your knuckles. "You really do trust too much." But she was smiling. Her grip on your hand tightened just a fraction. And she made no move to let go.