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Thaisha walked another circuit through the house, unable to entirely settle.
She stopped first at the place she'd started, where Hal was still asleep in the bed, his expression softened in sleep. She'd stayed with him for the first few hours, reassured by the sound of his breath and the gentle weight of his arm across her stomach, but for as soothing as she found sleeping beside him, she'd only managed to catch a few hours before she woke with the need to slip out of his embrace and go check on the other residents of the house.
Azune was no longer pacing the halls on guard, although he had been for longer than he probably should have. She'd convinced him to go home only with the reminder that this was her ancestral home, and the lands themselves would alert her to any dangers, even if she was asleep. He'd left about an hour after Murray and Bolaire had, slipping back to their various haunts to find out whatever information they could, none of them left in quite so precarious a position as those who had been at the Palazzo Davinos.
Vaelus, looking strangely approachable in her tiredness but still as poised and regal as she'd been since the moment she walked up the street towards Hal's home, looked up when she appeared in the doorway. She was sitting straight-backed in a chair by the bed, her attention on the boy lying under the covers, only a puff of dark hair visible on the pillow.
Occtis looked almost the same as he had asleep in Thaisha's bed only that morning, barely past his teenage years and still inclined to sleep as long as he possibly could, except this was, she knew, the kind of true bone-deep exhaustion that had knocked him flat even as he'd continued answering Aranessa's questions, and Thaisha had held him like a much younger child, his head lolling back against her shoulder, until his words slurred too badly to be coherent any longer. She hadn't been able to bring herself to let anyone else sponge the blood and grime from his face and hair, but when he was clean and safe and tucked into a guest bedroom that she'd chosen for him long before he ever arrived, Vaelus had gently but firmly sent her to find her own bed, and she'd gone only with the promise that Vaelus would watch over him.
Even now, as he slept entirely motionless, only distinguishable from the body she had carried so far earlier by the way Pin was curled up at the back of his neck with his chin draped over him to press the line of their jaws together, Vaelus kept her sky-pale gaze fixed on him. She looked up only to meet Thaisha's gaze and nod once, just like she'd done the last three times Thaisha had come in.
Still fine, then. No change.
That left only two to find.
Last she'd seen Julien, he'd been standing guard outside, unable to be persuaded that it wasn't necessary. Thaisha wasn't sure if it was because she was the one asking or if he just couldn't stand the idea of doing nothing.
Now, though, he was nowhere to be found. Thaisha frowned and did a quick loop before she went to the next most likely place for him to be.
The door to Aranessa's borrowed room was still half-open, and Thaisha peeked inside to find her not in bed, but sitting on the small couch on the other side of the room, eyes fixed on nothing in particular. Thaisha could see her only in profile, but she could tell that she hadn't slept, and had barely bothered to clean up; her pinned-up hair had finally slid almost all of the way out of its elaborate braids and was stiff with sweat, and her ornate gown was unlaced but that was as far as she'd dressed down. She was making some kind of repetitive motion in her lap with one hand, unfocused but not stopping, but when Thaisha appeared in the doorway, she looked up with a tired, sad smile.
Thaisha took that as an invitation and padded inside. She opened her mouth to speak, but Aranessa's free hand came up to shush her before she could. She quieted obediently, confused, and followed Aranessa's gaze down to the shadowed mass by her feet.
Thaisha had assumed it was a pile of pillows or blankets or something, maybe just a dense bit of her petticoats, indistinct in the dim lighting, but as she stepped closer, she realized with a start that it was something else entirely.
Julien was asleep at her feet, his head in Aranessa's lap, looking much smaller in sleep than he did when he was awake and talking. Only the bulkiest pieces of armor had been removed, and he hadn't cleaned up, either—there were bandages over what Thaisha remembered as being his worse injuries, but he was still dressed in his bloody clothes, and the only thing that seemed to have been cared for at all was his hair, probably because Aranessa was running her hand over it, again and again, gentle and quiet and tender. His dark curls slid through her fingers like water, and Thaisha suspected she was casting Prestidigitation periodically, because his hair wasn't nearly as bloody as it had been the last time she'd seen him.
That answered her original question, at least. She had no idea how Aranessa had gotten him to sit still, but at least he wasn't wandering the grounds.
Something uncomfortable twisted in Thaisha's stomach as she watched him, cheek pressed against Aranessa's thigh, one hand lying on her lap where she had put it down to gesture to Thaisha and now took hold of it again, his other hand curled into her skirts like a shy child.
She didn't want to feel bad for him, but she couldn't help but stare at his expression. It was still tense, even asleep, tear tracks dried into the grime on his face, and he looked… hollow, somehow. All of the rage that had carried him through the battle, and the obsessive focus on Aranessa that had gotten him through the aftermath, was gone, and all it left behind was a terrible grief and exhaustion that marked his face even as he slept quietly, curled up on the floor guarded by Aranessa.
Thaisha's shoulder ached where she had walked into his blade.
Instead of any of the dozens of other things she could have said, she whispered, "How long ago did he get to sleep?"
"About an hour," Aranessa answered, just as quietly. "I'd prefer to keep him that way, if we can."
Thaisha nodded, and drifted over to sit on the bed across from them, still unable to look away from Julien's face. Without the cocky assholery and flippant irreverence that never failed to irritate Thaisha in thirty seconds or less, he looked… much, much younger.
She didn't mean to do the math—she didn't particularly want to know, because she already had too many people to worry about and she had no intention of adding Julien fucking Davinos to that list, but… he wasn't actually all that much older than Shadia. A handful of years, maybe.
She didn't want to know that.
Aranessa watched her watch him, quiet and unreadable. Thaisha realized belatedly that she'd zoned out, her own lingering exhaustion starting to get the better of her again as she sat on the bed. She stood quickly, before she could actually fall asleep there, and bumped against the wooden bed frame as she did. The clunk was louder than she'd anticipated, and she froze.
Julien shifted at the noise, his forehead creasing unhappily as he buried himself a little deeper in Aranessa's hold. She cupped his cheek with the hand that had been stroking his hair, her thumb tracing soothing circles on his cheekbone, and whispered something quiet and gentle in a language Thaisha didn't know. He settled again without waking, calm and trusting under her hands.
Thaisha realized abruptly that it was long past time for her to leave.
She'd done her part by confirming that he hadn't run off to confront Primus or gone to kill Occtis in his sleep or something. She was sorry he'd lost his father so gruesomely, sure, but it wasn't her job to watch over him in the aftermath, particularly when Aranessa clearly had it under control. His youth, his grief, his exhaustion—none of that was her problem.
She went to leave. As she reached the door, though, Aranessa said, "Thaisha."
She turned. Aranessa had gone back to petting Julien's hair, slow and steady, and the protective curl of her hand around his shoulder was gentle but unyielding.
"I know that you don't like him," Aranessa said quietly, gently twisting a coal-dark lock of hair around her finger briefly before she let it drop. "I don't blame you. He's a hard man to get along with, sometimes. And I don't fault you for protecting your child, if and when you must."
Thaisha thought about reminding her that Occtis wasn't her son, but it seemed pointless now. Instead she just ventured, "…But?"
"But Julien is very dear to me," Aranessa said, meeting her gaze steadily. "And now, he is perhaps the only thing I have left in this world. Our Houses may be gone, but he is mine."
Her hand stilled, resting on the back of Julien's neck, holding him to her. Thaisha realized, maybe a little late, that the contact was probably just as much for her sake as his.
"So, as your friend," Aranessa continued, her voice quiet enough not to wake him but without an ounce of hesitation or doubt. "I am telling you that if I ever find that you are threatening him, or attempting to take him from me…"
She didn't bother to finish the thought, but after everything they'd done tonight, she didn't need to. Her dark eyes bored into Thaisha's.
Not for the first time, Thaisha wondered how anyone could possibly forget that this woman was the head of a house with one foot in Faerie.
"As your friend," Thaisha said quietly, "you know I wouldn't."
"I know," Aranessa said, and offered just the hint of a smile, softening the sharp edges of her not-quite-threat. "But I must be sure, because I will not lose more than I already have. He's mine, and I'm keeping him."
Thaisha looked back at them, Julien lax and tearstained and entirely docile under her hands, Aranessa's grip on him somewhere between protective and possessive. For all his vitriol and bite and the way he'd torn through the ghouls with violent efficiency just hours ago, Aranessa seemed far more dangerous just then, holding him in the palm of her hand.
"I understand," Thaisha said.
She didn't, really, but she could see the shape of it now, Aranessa with Julien at her feet like a woman with a panther calm in her lap, his uncompromising devotion returned just as deeply, even if she was quieter about it.
Thaisha had absolutely no intention of trying to pull them apart. If she did, she suspected, Julien's fury would not be what she'd have to worry about.
"Goodnight, Thaisha," Aranessa said.
"Goodnight, Lady Aranessa," Thaisha replied, and left them alone, retreating to her own rest and the comfort of Hal's embrace.