~#~ Chapter 2 ~#~

Kaveh was asleep within minutes of entering their hotel suite. Alhaitham had left him on one of the two couches in the first of their rooms while he went to use the bathroom and by the time he came out, Kaveh had kicked off his shoes and was curled in a ball, facing the back of the couch, fast asleep.

Alhaitham pulled a blanket off Kaveh's bed and tucked it around the sleeping man. He then pulled his book out of his belt pouch and sat on the other couch reading until his stomach told him it was time to eat.

Kaveh was still sleeping so Alhaitham let himself out of the room and went downstairs alone. He ordered a simple, cold meal for them both and carried them upstairs, on covered plates. He ate his meal in silence, read for a bit longer and then went and got ready for bed. He left Kaveh's plate on the table where he would be guaranteed to see it when he woke up and then retired to the bedroom, leaving the door between the two rooms ajar and, by the time he woke, the next morning, Kaveh had moved from the couch and was sprawled untidily on top of the remaining covers on the second bed, still fully clothed.

~#~

Kaveh awoke as soon as Alhaitham stood up. He looked blearily around for a moment and then grimaced when he remembered where they were and why. "I'm sorry," he mumbled. "I didn't mean to just…" He waved his hand vaguely in the direction of the door and shrugged. "I guess I was more tired than I thought."

"It's fine," Alhaitham replied as he looked down at him. "I hate to say it though, but today's not likely to be any easier than yesterday was. Did you eat?"

Kaveh nodded. "I did, and I…know. I…are we, I mean, can we…start…by checking…by checking on Karene?"

"We can." Alhaitham crouched down beside him. "We can head there first thing, if that's what you want. Breakfast first though and you may want to get changed at some point as well."

Kaveh frowned for a moment before he looked down and realised that he hadn't changed out of his clothes before collapsing onto the bed. "Oh, yeah. I do kind of need to do that."

~#~

The initial impression of the House of the Hearth was one of noisy, barely organised chaos. Children of varying ages were running from one room to another, some were wailing loudly, and others were sitting silently, pressed against the furniture as if trying to disappear. The more upset youngsters were being tended to by some of the older children and, as Kaveh and Alhaitham stood in the entranceway, waiting to be seen, they realised that several of the teenagers were also cuddling babies.

"There's…just so many." Kaveh breathed, barely loud enough for Alhaitham to hear, let alone anyone further away. "I don't like this."

Alhaitham's lips were pressed tightly closed to refrain from wincing at the volume in the room. "I…agree," he ground out. "But it's only temporary. Just…hold onto that. It's only until their parents are located. Not perm…Oh, here we go."

An imposing woman with black stripes in her long white hair, had just breezed into the room and was purposefully striding towards them. Wearing an impeccably tailored, grey suit jacket paired with black, flared trousers and a wicked pair of red, heeled shoes, this obviously wasn't someone to be underestimated. "Welcome," she said courteously. "…to the House of the Hearth. You may call me Arlecchino and are, I believe, here for the architect's daughter. I was informed that someone would be here for her at some point. I can only apologise for the…" she turned around and waved both hands in front of herself in frustration. "…commotion that we have in here today. We are usually far more civilised. Now, come."

Without waiting for them, the woman strode away. Alhaitham grabbed a handful of Kaveh's shirt sleeve and hurried after her.

~#~

She led them up two flights of stairs to where the volume level was, mercifully, much lower. While there had been a few babies downstairs, it soon became clear that there were several being cared for on this floor as well. "The current situation is…less than ideal. As well as our own children, we are housing a large number of residents of Poisson who are staying with us while the infrastructure there is rebuilt. In the past week we have gained many more, most with one or both misplaced parents, some whose housing is in need of repair and, unfortunately, several who have been verified as orphans." She stopped in front of a closed door and knocked gently on it. "We are here."

It took a couple of moments for the knock to be answered when a slightly harassed-looking blonde youth, wearing a peculiar combination of a ruffled shirt, corset and suspenders, pulled the door open. He glanced up at Arlecchino, over at Alhaitham and then gasped when his vivid, lilac-hued eyes finally caught sight of Kaveh. He held a finger up, pushed the door mostly closed again and disappeared from view.

He reappeared a moment later with an equally harassed-looking young woman who was so similar in features to him that they couldn't be anything other than twins. She had a chubby, blonde and visibly distressed baby clasped against her chest and, as her brother pointed towards Kaveh, she stepped forwards and dropped the baby into his arms and then stepped back to stand beside her twin. "She won't sleep," she announced shortly. "Even at night. Ten minutes, maybe fifteen, that's the longest she's slept in one go since she got here. She'll settle but then you put her down and she…Lyney? What?"

Her brother had poked her arm to stop the rant which he had guessed was imminent. "Look." He pointed towards Kaveh who had automatically wrapped his arms around the baby when she'd been thrust upon him and was standing, stock still with a look of sheer terror on his face. The baby had quietened the moment she was in his arms and was already well on her way to sleep. Both twins let out quiet sighs of relief and even Arlecchino's expression softened when the baby let out a quiet squeak and went completely slack in Kaveh's arms.

"Lyney, Lynette," Arlecchino addressed the twins. "Well done, both of you. Please, catch up some sleep and then see if you can do something about the chaos that is the ground floor. It cannot remain as it currently is. There is no structure, and any sort of organisation disappears once everyone is out of bed. Arrange it how you see fit, just, please, arrange it."

The twins nodded silently and, as one, took a step back inside their room and closed the door. "You…" Arlecchino turned back to address Kaveh but frowned when she realised that he was still frozen in place. "Are you quite well?" She looked at Alhaitham and raised a questioning eyebrow.

Alhaitham reached up and gripped Kaveh's shoulder. He could feel the architect quivering and knew he only had moments before Kaveh broke down completely. "We're going to need a quiet room. Quickly, please."

Arlecchino frowned slightly but a moment later became aware of the developing tremors running through Kaveh. "Next floor, third door on the left from the top of the stairs. The kitchen is at the far end of the ground floor for when you need a bottle. If you leave, speak to someone first, otherwise dinner is at 5.30 sharp. If you are still here by then, you will be called upon to help."

Alhaitham nodded briefly. "Understood. Now, you…" He clutched hold of a fistful of Kaveh's shirt behind his right shoulder and then grabbed his belt and gently coaxed him towards the staircase. Kaveh resisted for a moment, but Alhaitham simply increased the pressure on both hands and literally forced him up the stairs.

~#~

Alhaitham had barely pressed Kaveh into the armchair in the room that Arlecchino had leant them when the architect began to gasp. Without relinquishing his hold on the now-sleeping baby, his eyes opened in fear as he struggled to suck in the air his body was demanding. "Hai," he gasped. "Can…br…bre…he'p."

Kaveh's occasional panic attacks were awful things to watch and, if left unattended, would usually culminate in Kaveh losing consciousness, regardless of where he was at the time. This had never failed to strike fear into Alhaitham but over the years he had become expert at spotting the signs of an impending attack and had developed his own technique to either reduce their severity or to stave some of them off completely.

Without hesitation, and being mindful of the baby in Kaveh's arms, Alhaitham straddled the architect's lap. With a knee on either side of Kaveh's thighs, he sunk his hands into Kaveh's hair and pressed their foreheads together so that the only thing Kaveh could see when he opened his eyes, was Alhaitham. "Breathe with me," he said softly. "Kaveh, focus on me and breathe. In and out. Iiin and out. Breathe with me. Iiin and out." It took far longer than Alhaitham was happy with but eventually Kaveh's gasping breaths began to even out as the scribe's quiet words permeated into his mind and his panic began to ease. "That's it. Come back to me. That's it. Well done."

Kaveh had never once questioned coming around from one of his attacks to find Alhaitham equivalently sitting in his lap. It was an intimate position and, had it been anyone but Alhaitham, he would have been mortified but there was nothing sexual about it and each time he had found himself immediately pulled into a gentle hug. Alhaitham would spend as long as needed simply rubbing his back and talking softly to him until Kaveh motioned for him to let go. This time was only different in so far as the hug wasn't as tight as normal because Alhaitham had allowed space between them for Karene.

Buried against Alhaitham's shoulder, Kaveh let out a quiet cry. "She's dead, isn't she? My mother is dead."

Alhaitham pressed a soft kiss against his hair. "We don't know that. Not for certain, but…it doesn't look good. If she could have got back for this one…" Alhaitham pushed back slightly so he could rest his hand on Karene's back. "…then she would have done so."

Kaveh sniffed loudly as he nodded. "What are we going to do? She…"

"…can't stay here." Both men finished the sentence at the same time.

Kaveh cocked an eyebrow at Alhaitham who looked back at him in confusion. "She cannot stay here. It's loud and…chaotic. They couldn't even get her to sleep and yet, look." Alhaitham waved his hand to encompass the sleeping baby in Kaveh's arms. "She may not have met you, but she knows you. Everyone here knows who you are, the moment they see you. Haven't you noticed?"

"It's…weird," Kaveh shrugged and then waved his hand to ask Alhaitham to move. "They don't know me, they know my mother, but how does everyone know her? I mean, how much of a reputation has she got herself? Is it good? Bad? Presumably good, at least I'm assuming so by the way I seem to have been received. I…do I really look so much like her that no one has even questioned my identity?"

Alhaitham twisted himself and dropped off Kaveh's lap to land on the couch beside him. "There is absolutely no doubt that you're Faranak's son. You're literally a taller, male version of her, with the exception of your eyes which, judging by Siraj's comments, must have come from your father." He stopped and chuckled briefly. "I never questioned who she was, when she burst into my office that afternoon. There was no doubt in my mind that she was your mother, even before she'd said anything."

Kaveh shrugged again as he gently stroked his hand down Karene's soft, blonde hair. "So…what are we going to do? Would they even let us take her out of here? We don't have the slightest idea of what to do with a baby. And where would we go? There's nothing at the hotel and it's not like we're back at home where we could get…well, anything we'd need. It's chaos out there, even if the buildings are mostly untouched. We don't know where sells what, even if we had any clue what we needed. It's…Hai…what are we going to do?"

"The first thing we're going to do," Alhaitham replied quietly. "…is remain calm. Winding yourself back into a state won't do anyone any good. She needs to sleep, that much is obvious and at some point she will need changing and feeding and there are people here who can help with that. If you…we…want…" Alhaitham stopped and shook his head, knowing that he had to get his point across clearly while Kaveh was hanging on his every word. "If we agree, and I believe we do, that we're not leaving her in here, then yes, we would need things. We would not, however, need to go out and buy everything. There's a house out there…somewhere…with everything already in it. We'd have to seek permission to enter but, judging by how everyone is treating you, I don't see access being a problem and…" He held a finger up when Kaveh opened his mouth to comment. "Stop that thought before it forms. We would not need to stay there. We have the hotel for as long as we need it so we'd just need…things and if you don't feel up to it then I could go in alone. You could stay here, at the hotel or even just wait outside for me."

Kaveh shook his head vigorously. "You…No, I can't ask you to do that. If we go in, we go in together but they're not going to let us take her…we don't have the slightest idea of what to do with a baby."

"Stop saying that," Alhaitham shook his head. "While I'll admit that we don't know what we're doing at the moment, what we are both good at doing, is learning. People have been raising children for thousands of years, it really can't be that hard."

Kaveh snorted loudly. "May I quote you on that? Sometime soon, maybe?"

"No, you may not," Alhaitham replied with a chuckle. "So, are we in agreement? We're going to see if they'll let us take her out of here, preferably to the hotel, via your mother's house? Maybe sometime tomorrow because, with the best will in the world, we're not going to manage to get everything organised properly before the end of today and, truthfully, I don't think this is something we want to rush. We need to be ready at the hotel prior to springing her."