Prompt: #3 Sanctuary

Summary: Such moments, however few, should be cherished enough to last a lifetime.

A/N: This expands the Eclipse Series.

Templum is Latin for "Sanctuary".

Templum

Sunlight glistens through as the leaves above them softly sway. Those beams of light that shine from above, warm their skin with a sun kissed tan. A gentle breeze creates a natural melody that can find no duplication. This combined with the shade offered from the towering trees, create a canopy of tranquility. It soothes a heat that would otherwise be oppressive. The foliage is vibrant. Blades of thick, luscious grass flow with the winds, creating endless waves of various shades of green. Birds sing as they dance through the air, while the occasional buzzing of a bee passes the ear. Within the distance are a scattering of many healthy puffs of white clouds and the sky has seldom been this blue. The only foreign disturbances were the occasional, far away sounds of a hovering airship passing quickly through the skies. Otherwise, it is only the sights and scents of a simple summer afternoon that surround them as they lay here. It was a beautiful day.

This is the one place they can find such a reprieve. The one place they can leave troubles and duty behind them. Here there is only them. They filled the existence together. This is where their children can be enjoy their youth to the full and play freely. There are no restrictions and codes to follow here. No decorum that must be met in front of the eyes of his many opposers. Their eyes cannot reach this place. They would never be able to appreciate this anyway. Laughter and joy so seldom heard before made them uneasy when they now filled the dark hallways of the castle back in Nihilsomno. They carry here in the richness of this field. Here, within the private sanctuary of the country, can the sounds of his children's laughter add to the soundtrack of the day without disapproval.

This is so very different from the days of his own childhood. He does not remember ever being so free. Always ever mindful was how his days had been. If he thinks back long enough and hard enough, he can vaguely remember moments of easy laughter with his parents. They had tried to make their brief time together happy. For they had always known their time together would be short and he cannot imagine how they must have felt knowing that. Now that he is a father he can understand and he is thankful. He feels no such limitations with his young ones. He does not worry about living too short a time with his wife. If they only had but two more days such as today, he would have considered them a lifetime's worth of delight. They would more than suffice, even if he should die too soon. He would not feel cheated. He would be well satisfied. Someone long denied such things learned how to cherish such joys...and what joys they were. What man could not find such happiness when he was here, within this moment as he was.

"What are you thinking about?" asks a sweet voice near his ear. The absent strokes of her tender hand causes him to sigh as they run through his hair. He feels the touch of her lips against his brow. There is a smile there that matches his own as they watch their children play together. He is laying his head against her soft bosom and she cradles him as they lounge wistfully on a picnic blanket. Both watch keenly as their children gather flowers.

"That I am here, pillowed upon my love's ripening breast. Wanting forever to feel its soft swell and fall beneath my cheek, remaining forever awake in this sweet unrest. Just so that I could hear her tender taken breath," he says in a sigh. He entwines their free hands and hold them close. "As I watch our joys as they play so merrily in the fields. Within this day, I could live eternally or til my death."

He feels her clutch his head closer to her breast and he knows that she feels the same.

"Shall we awake to find this was all a dream?"

"We have so many attachments to the world outside," he says almost regretfully. "But within this one, this is a world of our own invention. The world where only we live."

"The world where no outside forces can intrude," she agrees.

He brings her hand to his lips for a kiss, before clutching it to his heart once again.

"Do you mind it?"

"Mind what?" she asks.

"That you, Bright Star, are no longer alone in your splendor in my night sky?"

"Why should I mind?" she asks with a hint of a smile. "I share the glory with my own."

"You may not, but I do," he says reproachfully.

"You do?" she sounds surprised.

"Yes," he confirms. "Before you were all mine and there was no need to share. Now, I must share you in three parts."

She chuckles a quiet laugh into his hair and he feels her bestow another kiss on his head.

"Would you ease my mind?" he asks pensively.

"How shall I do that, my Lord?" she asks indulgently.

"Would you confess that they were not equal parts?" he asks, tilting his head up to look at her face.

It is an unfair question but he does not care about showing just how unwilling he was to share her. To pacify him, she seems to muse over it for a moment.

"There really is no divide," she says finally, twisting to look down at him. What she should tell him is to grow up and not be such a pouty child about this, but he knows that she did not have it in her to be so mean. "Loving them is loving a piece of you and you know I love you wholly."

Yes, she was right of course. Their children were products of their union. To love one without loving the other seemed unreasonable. Were it not for the two of them together, they could have not produced the two joys they were watching so adoringly before them now.

"Perhaps I should have just kept it simple," he says, settling himself against her breast again. He can feel her smile as she waits for him to continue. "I mind that I must share your attention in three parts."

She laughs out loud at that, causing the two little ones to stop in their play and look over at them.

Lumina's long blonde ringlets bounce around her small chubby cheeks as she looks up at her older brother. They both seem to come to a decision as they approach their parents together. Both of their clothes are slightly grass stained as they walk hand in hand to reach their parents. It is evidence of how long they have been allowed to run wild and it makes him smile. Lumina crawls onto the picnic blanket and moves directly to her father while Lunae walks to sit on the other side of his mother.

"Papa," she cries, propping herself onto his stomach and thrusts a tangle of lilies onto his chest. She mumbles in her charming baby speech, obviously trying to explain the situation.

"She does not know how to tie them," explains Lunae for her. At almost four years of age, he already spoke better than most adults did. He watches as his eldest gets his hair ruffled affectionately by his mother. His hair is just as unruly as his own.

"Are these for your mother, Sunshine?" he asks the one who he considers the jewel of his life.

There was not a day that went by where he did not look at her and marvel at the beauty that he had helped create. Her entrance into the world had probably taken years off his life, but in the end she had been worth it. Before, he thought he would never know the love of another. Now, he had not only the love of his wife, he had the love of his children. Theirs was such a blinding love and devotion that was so lost in their world that he grieved its extinction. Everyone should feel such love and receive it in return. He loved them both equally but there was a special affection for his little star. This sweet creature who had so much of her mother and little bit of him too. She brought about a perfect balance with beside her older brother.

"Yes," she answers, reaching over to grasp a small lily in her tiny hands.

His response is delayed when she begins to swipe at his face with the miniature blossom.

"Mina stop it," chides Lunae. "You do not do such things to, Father."

"Yes, it is rather hard to answer you when you are doing that," he adds, pushing her small hands away. "Well then, you came to the right person if you are interested in tying these blossoms, my Loves," he answers, sitting up with the small assortment in one hand while reaching over and lifting her with the other. When she clutches the lapel of his jacket so trustingly, he is humbled and thankful to have such blessings. "How about the two of you pick the prettiest ones and I will do the rest?"

Lumina waves her hands in excitement, accidentally slapping his chin lightly in the process, before pointing to the area of the field she wants him to take her.

"Come along, Lunae," he says, rising to stand on his feet. "Our princess has given us directions."

"Coming, Father," is the answer below him.

"It is a good thing I do not mind your attention being divided in three parts," teases his wife, who is now sitting by herself on the blanket.

"You do not have to, Bright Star," he says, glancing back at her. "Because all three of us will always be thinking of you."

It would be the perfect end to a perfect afternoon. He knew that these memories being made today would forever be engrained into his mind. These listless times of simple joys. Within this sanctuary was his reality, the rest, was the dream.