Deirdre found the palace hard to sleep in.
Moving into it was not strenuous — the servants (both of the palace and the man she was now wed to) were careful with all her things. She knew her quarters from a tour her grandfather gave her: not the ones she would have had as a child in Belhalla, but befitting a grown woman, away from her deceased father's innocent ears.
Goodness.
The rooms were comfortable. A room for sitting, one for tea, for dressing, and then for sleeping. Certainly larger than her room in Lord Arvis' home, watching the servants unpack her dresses, but the room was not...cold? The hearth kept the bedroom warm, her lilac quilt unfurled from her traveling chest. The servants asked where to put this or that, so she directed them. Grandfather did not intervene — she was the princess, and if not the princess, Lord Arvis' lady wife.
His wife.
Between the thrill of the wedding and the weeks leading up to it, they managed to sit and talk without any sort of foulness distracting them: yes, his home was nice, and he would continue to stay in it, but if during the odd hours her grandfather kept him he fell into bed with her, what could be done? They were wed. Husband and wife, along with a few other things King Azmur mentioned.
So at the end of the day, after a quiet meal with him, she did not leave the palace. She said goodnight as a footman escorted him out of the dining room. What was she to do? Grandfather took late meals, her husband was anywhere besides her side, and the rabble of the daytime palace filtered out. Lazy her day was, she was tired with a full stomach. No wonder Grandfather did his day like this.
Except she found she could not sleep. At first she blamed the earlier hour — used to waiting up for Lord Arvis at his home — then the new bed. She sat up for a while longer reading a novel. Perhaps the sheet was wrong? She moved and kicked the quilt, lit the hearth to the level she liked, forewent her topmost gown for the simple shift underneath, cracked the curtains open to her balcony, brushed her drying hair out, and wrapped herself around the spare pillow.
Her eyes were heavy, but sleep dodged her. The shuffle of guards outside, knowing servants tittered constantly throughout the palace, no matter how far away they were. How close the horses were (they weren't), the chirp of a cricket in the gardens below, the scrape of a chair in the kitchen, which could not have been further away.
Deirdre squished her cheek against the pillow. Why was it so difficult? What skipped her? Even the nights she did not wait up for her now-husband she slept soundly in his home. Some nights, nondescript nightmares found her — falling into the plummeting darkness, golden eyes looming over her.
Now she was awake for no good reason. The moon moved out just past the balcony, peeking over it, out of sight, then graced her eyes again. Tonight, it was whole.
Her ears perked up again. The guards shuffled more (who knew their boots on carpet were so loud?), and the frontmost door to her suite opened. Only one would enter at this hour. She just saw him in the firelight, the edge of his tunic and hair caught by the light, creeping into her room. He removed his boots. She watched, his fingers pulling at the snaps that held his cloak on. No specific spot to leave his clothes, he softly set his clothes on the seat of her vanity.
Lord Arvis came to bed. The bed dipped where he kneeled on it, kissing her cheek. "You are not subtle," he informed her, so she twisted her hand in his shirt, pulling him down. "Why are you up, dear wife?"
"I do not know," she answered truthfully. He pulled the blanket back, so she moved her pillow to make room for him. Her hair felt out of place, brushing it down with her hands; her circlet was cocked, pulling it off. She stared at it (what was it? where was she from, who was she to have something like this?) then sat it on the nightstand. "I know it is the first night, but the palace is much noisier than your home."
She opened her arms for him. Dark it was, she saw him sigh, yet he crawled in exactly where she wanted him. "Why do you say that?" He laid his head on her chest, wrapped up in her arms, his own arm slung across her body.
Deirdre shifted, adjusting for his weight. He wasn't heavy, but they normally slept in different positions. "Your household finishes up dinner and doesn't peep until breakfast."
She needed to know what he got up to during the day, she knew, besides the vague. Until your firstborn son comes of age. Who knew how far away that was? How close? Sharing him — with her grandfather, the country and household — was the reality for...however long it took to have a son. "I find the palace easy to sleep in." Whatever he did in the day, once he finally got in her arms, that was it. He'd sneak out early, as he always did, but until then he was hers and hers alone.
Deirdre ran her fingers through his hair. "Do you?" Sleeping in the palace? He called her bed home for a few months before their marriage proper; before they committed, waiting for him in the sitting room of his home, there wasn't a night he didn't arrive.
"I have stayed here," Lord Arvis said. She gave his shoulder a squeeze. "Before you came into my care I slept here some nights, and your father housed me on occasion."
Deirdre could not help but smile. Her father. "I thought you and my," prince, "father were not close?"
"We did not have to be close to put me in a cold guest room." Her chest filled with one breath; he twisted further into her. Bits and pieces of his boyhood. She did not need to know it all. "You do get used to it," he promised.
She kissed his crown. "I do have one thing you did not." It was dark, but she felt him looking at her. "My husband! I assume you did not have one. I do not know much about Grannvale's custom."
Tonight he thought her humorous, at least, laughing. "I...I did not have a husband, no." One of these days she needed to learn, living now in the palace as the princess of Grannvale, but not now. For now, she could be a wife telling horrible jokes. She kissed him again. "I am glad to bring you that comfort. Find some sleep, wife. I will be."