The campsite was bathed in the silver light of the moon, and somewhere in the distance a chocobo called out. Noctis smiled. If Prompto was awake, he would be trying to run off and take a picture of it. He raised his hands to the fire but it did little to warm him. The dead of winter wasn't kind when you were this far from the nearest city. He stared into the flames, listening to Gladio snore from the tent, comforted by the sound that usually irritated him. It made for an odd melody with the calls of the beasts that inhabited the woods.
"You should rest, Highness."
He raised his blank stare from the fire and let his gaze refocus on the man next to him. "What are you still doing up?"
"I am always the last to bed and the first to rise, you're just too sound of a sleeper to ever notice."
"Bed is a strong word," Noctis huffed, glancing at the tent.
Ignis stoked the campfire. "Are you alright?"
"Don't worry about me so much."
Noctis drew his knees to his chest and hugged them for warmth. He looked at Ignis sideways through his fringe of hair, watching the orange glow of the flames dance across his advisor's face. He was no more than a foot from Ignis and noticed, not for the first time, the way he seemed to radiate heat. Maybe it was because he spent so much time cooking that he had just absorbed some over the years. Noctis chuckled at his own absurd logic, eyes once again slipping out of focus and turning Ignis into a blurry figure of dark clothes and fair skin.
He didn't pay any mind to the form moving until something heavy came to rest on his shoulders. He pulled it around himself instinctively, before he recognized the scent of cinnamon and leather. "Take your jacket back, Specs."
"I won't have the prince getting sick," Ignis said, his arms now also basked in the firelight where they were exposed by his rolled up, leopard printed sleeves.
"That doesn't mean I want you getting sick, either," he mumbled as he turned his face into the leather lapel of the jacket.
Ignis leaned back on his hands and stretched his legs out so his shoes stopped just before the base of the fire. "You've never questioned me putting your well being before my own before." His words were not pointed but Noctis still stiffened.
"I'm sorry. I treated you like crap for the longest time, and look at you, still here tending to my every need."
Ignis furrowed his brow and reached over to put a hand on Noctis' shoulder. "You're behaving oddly, Noct. Of course I'm here. Where else would I be?"
Not in danger, Noctis thought, but he held his tongue and dropped his head onto Ignis' hand. "I guess I'm just tired."
"Go to the tent and rest, then. We have a long walk ahead of us tomorrow."
"It's too cold to sleep."
Ignis sighed. His glove was rough against Noct's face, but his fingers were toasty from being over the fire as he kept it burning. Noctis started to drift off but he jolted awake every time he began tipping sideways toward the ground. He knew they should have stayed in Hammerhead while there was still daylight. For some reason he thought back to before they begun their journey, to his days of living alone. He tried to fit the Ignis of those days into the man sitting next to him. Some things were the same. Ignis was still his rock, a steadfast and unwavering presence. And Noctis would still never say that out loud. He had resented Ignis for pushing him the way he did at first but he had long since accepted that he wouldn't be the man he was without his advisor.
The ground moved again but Noctis was wide awake, too invested in his train of thought to doze again. He started as he was engulfed by warmth. The hand on his shoulder had moved down to pull him sideways, and he found he was unsure what to do with himself as he was pulled against Ignis. His desire to stop shivering won out and he let himself lean on the other man. His weight did not affect Ignis in the least, reminding Noct that his advisor was as much a literal rock as a figurative one. It was easy to forget what was hidden under those clothes. There likely wasn't an ounce more of fat on Ignis than there was Gladio.
"Better?" Ignis asked.
Noctis nodded, absently drawing shapes through the animal print with his fingers. "Yeah. Thanks, Iggy."
He couldn't have said when he fell asleep, only that some time later, he awoke to strong arms lifting him like he was no more than a child. He tried to ask if it was time to get up already but the words were lost in the broad expanse of Ignis' chest. A moment later there was the hiss of a zipper and he was cocooned in his sleeping back. The warmth surrounding him vanished, and he stretched his hand out with a low whine. His fingers closed around something he couldn't make out in the darkness.
The figure next to him turned so much as he was able in the confined space of the tent and Noctis found that he was holding Ignis' belt loop. He gave it a persistent tug. "Now I'm cold again."
"I fear you may have poor circulation, Highness," Ignis remarked softly, careful not to wake the other two.
"Or maybe I'm cold because it's like two degrees outside." He felt Ignis' eyes on him and looked in the general direction he thought his advisor's face would be. "Stay?"
There was a hesitation in which Noctis feared he had made Ignis uncomfortable, but the silence ended with a subdued, "As you wish."
The sleeping bags were rearranged and Noct's human space heater returned to his side. He wasn't sure he had entirely woken up since he was carried into the tent, but in some half conscious state he wrapped himself around the taller man's warm body.
He could tell from Ignis' breathing that he remained awake long after him. Noctis smiled, drifting off again. Of course Ignis would still be awake. He wouldn't dare let himself fall asleep before his charge because that's the kind of duty bound idiot he was. With that thought on his mind and a stupid grin on his face, Noctis quit shivering and finally, he slept.