And another fic, because I'm on an uploading spree. I may continue this, either in a second chapter, or add it on the end of this one, but don't hold your breath.
"Dante.."
He doesn't bother asking what it is, that would bring her to his doorway in the early hours of the morning, when most sane people are resting, and even they should have long abandoned the odd work hours they keep and sought out their beds. He can hear the rain, feel it tug on old wounds the same way he knows she does. He wonders if her leg aches, the way he aches sometimes, when it rains and the memories are fresh. He rolls over to face her, lifts the corner of the covers, and she crawls into bed with him, winding herself around him as best she can. She's still so small, and he's not the lanky teenager he was, his frame broadening as the muscles develop across his shoulders and chest. He folds his arms around her and she feels fragile in his embrace, like a doll, although she'd never forgive him if he said as much.
Burrowing into his chest, fingers digging points of pressure into his shoulders as she hides her face, he feels the subtle tremor running through her. If she were any other woman, she would cry. But she is Lady, and so she clings to him in silence, letting him comfort her without words, just with the slightly clumsy touch of calloused fingers through her hair, over her jaw, following that shudder down her spine. There's nothing sexual in it, he respects her too much to take advantage of her in this state, even if she is the most beautiful woman he's ever seen. Her strength, her boldness, they set him alight, but when she's like this, small and lost and needing something to cling to, he aches for her, and all he can do is hold her.
"How many years has it been?" Her voice, soft and steady, breaks the silence.
"Six," he replies with a tired little sigh. Six years... Six years today, if memory serves. Which, of course, it does.
She pushes her face further against his chest, as though she wants to nuzzle against his beating heart. "Why... Is it supposed to still hurt?"
That simple sentence all but robs him of breath. They never speak of it, of how it affected them, both of them too respectful of each other's boundaries to broach the subject.
"I don't know," he answers at length, words pressed against the top of her head, raven hair like silk against his mouth. "But.. It does."
She nods, and her tremors ease, though she holds him even tighter. "..You too, huh?"
"Yeah.." Whatever bad choices he made in his life, Vergil was his twin, and being without him still hurts. There are times when he'll catch his reflection in a mirror, or a window, and he'll be pulling the same sombre expression that his brother used to wear, and he'll feel the bottom drop out of his stomach.
Lady distracts him, then, leaning up to brush her lips over the corner of his mouth, delicate and almost shy. "Thank you," she whispers, so faintly that he can barely hear it over the sound of the rain. "For understanding... and for proving me wrong."
He looks at her askance, blue eyes asking for an explanation of that, but she shakes her head and gives him a faint, sad little smile. "Never mind, Dante," she reassures, lips moving to press against the rise of his cheekbone. "Just... thank you." She sinks back, then, relaxing into the safety of his arms, and her smile is now more stable, her mismatched eyes warm and filled with something he daren't try to put a name to. Delicate fingers reach up, tracing the shape of his jaw, the curve of his lower lip, and it's all he can do not to capture those fingers and nibble on them, but then her eyelids flutter closed and the shape of her mouth is so trusting, and so he settles for a kiss on her forehead, hand wrapping around hers, all but dwarfing those slim, elegant fingers as they twist in his hold, folding over his and squeezing.
Just like that, completely at ease in the arms of a half-demon she once believed was as evil as the rest, her breathing evens out, the tension leaves her small frame and she slips into a deep sleep. He's left staring at her, taking in all of her gentle beauty; her heart-shaped face, unmarred by her usual harsh scowls, skin taking on a faint tan that would never fully mature, with the twilight hours they live in, lashes long and dark against her cheeks, eyelids flickering as she dreams, the curve of her mouth, the generous pout of her lower lip, the dark line of the scar over her nose that will never fully fade. He watches her until the sound of the rain stops and the sun rises, turning pale skin golden and all but robbing him of breath all over again. Then he finally lets himself sleep, knowing that she will be gone by the time he awakens, but her warmth will still linger, the scent of her skin will still invade his senses when he presses his face into the pillow where her head had lain only moments before. And it will be enough.