Daine awoke with a start, sitting up in her bedroll, and glancing around. She tried to figure out what had awoken her. It didn't feel wrong, not the way an immortal attack did. Rather, it just felt like a magical disturbance. She glanced around the clearing they were camped in, and sighed when she saw what had roused her.

Numair lay not a meter from her, his entire body radiating with black fire, and sparks of light cracking off of his twisting form. He hadn't been sleeping well for weeks now. His nightmares, if that's what was causing this, had become an almost nightly occurrence. She desperately wanted to comfort him, but he had been rather displeased the last time she had attempted that...


"I could have hurt you magelet!" Numair looked horrified, and drew away from the hand she had placed on his chest. "If...if you can see my aura while I'm sleeping it means I..." he trailed off, looking away ashamed. "It means I don't have control of my magic" he whispered. "Please sweet" he begged. "Please promise me you won't try to wake me when that's happening. If something happened... I could never forgive myself." He reached his hand out, as if to brush her hair back, but then let it drop without making contact. "Promise me Daine." His voice was stern, but he didn't wait for her to answer before turning his back to her, and curling back into his bedroll.


So here they were, black fire radiating off the obviously distraught mage, and she wasn't supposed to do a thing about it.

She wished she could ignore him and fall back into Gainel's realm. She felt as if she had been wrenched away from something pleasant. She knew she had dreamed about it again...the same dream that she had been having for weeks.

Numair was holding her hand, brushing her hair back, and whispering to her. She thought she heard him tell her something fair important. It felt so real. He was telling her he loved her...that he would love her always. Even in the dream world where things felt real, she could tell it was an illusion. She felt feverish, and the edges of her vision were fuzzy...and Numair's hair was blue.

It was just a dream, an apparition of her desperate longing. Daine knew it was only a figment of her own subconsciousness, brought on by her hopeless unrequited feelings...but she couldn't help wishing it was real.

She was afraid that Numair had begun to recognize her infatuation, and that he was trying to discourage it. He had barely touched her in weeks, and then only the briefest of contacts. She tried to tell herself that it was just stress, but it was difficult to accept that when her own stress only caused her to ache to be close to the man.

She had taken to volunteering to set up their camp, just so she could set up their bedrolls close together. In his sleep he would sometimes reach out to her, and she was content just to listen to him breathe.

The air cracked again. Numair's sharp intake of breath drew her out of her reverie, and back to the dilemma at hand. She ached to simply go to the mage, and wake him from whatever misery haunted his sleep. He whimpered. The air splintered around him.

"Daine..." Her name came out harsh and pleading, and she watched as the still unconscious mage grasped at his wrist, as if making sure it was still attached to his body. The oxygen seemed to leach out of the air around them, and she felt like she was trying to breath under water.

"Odds bobs" she muttered. "This is fair ridiculous." If he was having a nightmare involving her, then she wasn't going to sit here and ignore it. She stood, dragging her bedding toward Numair's restless form. He quieted when she reached him, but it wasn't until she ran her fingers gently through his hair, that the blackness of his magic retreated into him. The oxygen slowly flowed back into the clearing's air, and his eyes flickered open as he took a deep breath.

He didn't say anything. He simply reached out and pulled her down to him, turning her into the curve of his body, and draping his arm across her hips. She shifted to reach for her bedding, but his arm tightened possessively. She stilled, sinking back into his warmth, and shivering at the feeling of his breath on the nape of her neck. His lips caressed the curls just behind her left ear, and then she felt him tuck his face into the curve of her neck.

Daine knew it wouldn't last. Like her dream, she would be wrenched out of this bliss the minute Numair regained his awareness. He would inevitably resume his recent stance of vigilantly avoiding any physical contact. For now, she allowed herself to enjoy the way his thumb methodically stroked her hip bone...the way his forearm tensed when she shifted, pulling her closer, and brushing the sliver of exposed skin on her abdomen...the way he sleepily nuzzled her neck.

His breathing deepened, evening out. She knew he had fallen back asleep, no longer plagued by nightmares. She enjoyed the sensation of being curled in his arms for as long as possible, before she too gave way to a dreamless sleep.