In the end, Hava sleeps on the luscious, extravagant sofa in Bitterblue's sitting room. It takes her a while to gather the nerve. Often, in the beginning, Bitterblue wakes to find Hava's sofa empty, she having deserted to return to the sculpture room in the night.
But eventually, the balance of nights tip, and Bitterblue wakes to find Hava still there. Her clothes and trunks find places in Bitterblue's sleeping room. Her brightly patterned curtains end up tucked away, and she and Bitterblue move the little sculpture of Hava turning into a bird into a corner of the sitting room, beside Bitterblue's crown.
One early morning several months later, Bitterblue wakes in tears. She can't remember what her dream was about, other than bones and blood and her father's voice. She wishes fiercely that Saf weren't a mountain range away and that he could send her into a dream of fearlessness before she has to begin her day.
Hava is stroking her hair. She hadn't noticed her enter the room, but Hava's flighty, gentle touch was probably what was able to rouse her from her nightmare. Bitterblue can see through her open door that Hava's blankets on the couch are disturbed, that Helda's door is closed.
"It goes both ways, Bitterblue," Hava whispers to her. "Sometimes little sisters take care of the big ones."
Some residue of the nightmare, or perhaps just the stripping away of daytime bravado, makes Bitterblue terribly unwilling to be left alone again. She understands in a flash why Hava so desired the company of her mother's sculptures. If it had been Saf who woke her, or even Giddon or Po, she would have eked out a single word: stay.
But there is something that she and Hava have that she and others do not, and she does not have to ask.
Hava, clumsily and timidly, pushes back the covers on the untouched side of Bitterblue's humongous bed. She resumes her stroking of Bitterblue's hair as she settles awkwardly in, frightened still.
"I love you, Hava," Bitterblue says, very calmly, very quietly. She eases closer to her sister in the bed and allows her head to drop to Hava's shoulder. Hava's arm flutters anxiously for a moment, and she flickers into a pillow before she wraps that arm around Bitterblue and holds her tight.
Bitterblue's eyes are closed and her breathing is smoothening when Hava kisses her on the top of the head, the way Po or Katsa might. "I love you, Bitterblue," Hava finally whispers back.
The sun peeks through the beautiful mullioned windows of Bitterblue's sleeping room as Bitterblue finally is able to return to peaceful sleep.
Truer words than those of love, she reflects dreamily, have never ever been spoken.