He counts the days by the moments like this one; when it is just the two of them, and he does not have to endure the remarks of their companions, nor the exhaustion of battle; when they are wound tightly together, kissing and talking and making love and starting over again; when their walls come down and they can be the truest versions of themselves they know.

There is divinity to be found in nights like these. Alistair would trade every lost day of his misbegotten childhood for a thousand more moments just like this one.

He's lying on his back in his bedroll, his head propped up against his knapsack so that he can look down at where Liv is draped across him. Her arms are folded across his chest and her chin is pressed on top of them, and she is looking down at him with the same stupid expression he knows he's wearing. He lazily trails his fingers across the silken expanse of her back, and he thinks idly that if he does become king, he's going to make it against the law for her to ever wear clothing again.

When she bursts into musical laughter, he realizes he has said the thought out loud.

If laughter could be made physical, could be turned into something tangible like a thread, Alistair would weave hers into a blanket and wrap himself so tightly within it that he could never be unraveled. He would turn it into bricks and build himself a home within it, so that he will never feel displaced again. He will have to make do, instead, with devouring it, drinking in every lovely chuckle with lips that will never tire of tasting her.


NOTE: I know I haven't updated Spitfire in a long, LONG time, but I wanted to make sure I declared that it is NOT dead, I am still very much invested in this story and this character. I'm just having a bit of writer's block that I'm trying to work through with some drabbles, and I also have another project coming up for these two that has gotten me a little bit distracted, oops! So bear with me, I'm not dead I swear.