I made a decision for Discord. The god confirmed it. Armies are going to move because of words that came out of my mouth.
He pulls me up the bed, settles me against the pillows. His body curves around mine, arm draped over my waist, face pressed into my hair.
"Stay."
Not a command. A request. Maybe the first one he's ever made.
My fingers find his. Lace through them.
I stay.
And the weight of it presses down in the dark.
I changed Discord's direction. I changed his. I have a voice here now. One that matters. One that gods will hear.
Which means I have something to lose.
Quiet.
That's what wakes me. Not sound—the absence of it. The constant grinding static that lives behind my eyes has gone soft, muffled, like someone wrapped cloth around the inside of my skull. I don't open my eyes. I don't move. I just lie there and try to remember the last time my head felt like this.
I can't.
She's against me. That's why. Her back to my chest, her ribs pushing into my palm with each breath, her hair in my mouth. I don't move my arm. I don't care about her hair. I care that she's warm and she's here and the noise has finally, finally shut the fuck up.
My hand spreads wider across her stomach. I can feel her heartbeat if I press hard enough.
I press hard enough.
The world outside the blankets doesn't exist. The War God waiting somewhere, the plans I'm supposed to care about, the servants I can hear moving in distant corridors—none of it. Static. Irrelevant. There's only the heat of her and the weight of her and the fact that if I shift my hips forward she'll feel exactly what waking up next to her has done to me.
I shift my hips forward.
She makes a small sound in her sleep, her body curling tighter, instinctive, pushing back against me. My teeth find the back of her neck and I stay very still.
I could wake her up. I could roll her onto her back right now and find out what her face looks like when she opens her eyes with my cock inside her. I could—
I breathe against her hair instead. She smells like sleep and skin and something underneath that's just her, something I can't name, something I want to put my tongue on.
Her breathing changes.
I feel the exact moment consciousness hits—her breathing changes, her muscles tense, her body goes rigid against mine as she realizes where she is. Who she's pressed against. What's pressed against her ass.
I'm hard. I've been hard since I woke up. Maybe before. My cock is flush against her and there's no way she doesn't feel it.
"Don't."
The word comes out lower than I intended, almost a growl, and my arm tightens around her waist. She freezes.
"You're awake," she says, her voice rough with sleep. Uncertain.
"Yes."
"You—" She tries to shift away and her ass drags against my cock and I groan, my hips grinding forward before I can stop them. Pressing harder. Fuck. Fuck. My teeth find the back of her neck and I bite down, not hard enough to break skin but hard enough that she gasps.
"Do that again," I say against her spine, "and I'm not going to stop."
She goes very still.
