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Rowan snaked her arm around her husband’s bare waist, pulling herself close enough to bury her face along the space between his shoulders. She kissed him there and felt him chuckle against her hold— Julian had clasper the hand along his waist with his, before bringing it up to brush his lips against her knuckles.
“Mmmm, finally decided to join me in bed darling?”
His question came with a big yawn, one that Rowan felt more than heard, as Julian then shifted to face her. His eyes were already laced with sleep, legs tangling with hers, as he pulled her close to press a kiss on top of her forehead.
“Sorry,” came the muffled reply, “Nadia needed my advice on something. And then I had to pass by the shop since Asra left a package for us before leaving again.”
Julian’s good eye peeked under his hooded gaze. “Asra left us a package?”
“Yeah. Mostly stuff as a thank you for watching Faust the last time he left.”
Rowan’s gaze then turned to face the far corner of the room where the snake had recently made herself home. She was curled up, her long body surrounding her eggs with surprising maternal instinct. Rowan had always thought snakes would be horrible mothers.
Faust was obviously not like other snakes.
“You know, since Asra’s traveling again, do you think he’d be back in time when the eggs hatch?”
Rowan’s eyes then flitted back to Julian — who was already struggling to stay awake — before running a hand through his auburn curls. He only grunted something noncommittal in reply, blearily blinking his eye open in attempt to ward off sleep.
“…Probably. Asra,” drawling out the magician’s name in a yawn, “wouldn’t miss this for the world.”
“Oh?”
Julian weakly nodded. “For all his traveling…he seems to have a sense of timing, no? I mean he did come in the nick of time the last time…”
Rowan half-snorted, half-chuckled. Nick of time indeed. Her mind then flashed to a year or two back when they were still busy solving the murder — or rather, the un-murder — of Count Lucio. Asra had travelled to “Somewhere,” staying in that oasis for heaven knows long, before returning at the very moment Rowan needed him the most.
She couldn’t fault Julian’s observation in that. He was right on the money for that one.
“Mmhmm. I suppose I can chalk his mysteriously appearing when the babies come out to his familial side. He always was on the dot that way.”
It was Julian’s turn to laugh. Not one of his full chuckles, or ones where he sounded like he was close to choking on his own saliva, but something lighter. Almost silvery. “Never doubt a father or soon to be father’s instinct.“
Rowan’s lip turned into a teasing smirk, "And have you thought about being a father?”
Despite his sleepiness, the good doctor still had it in him to blush. “I…well…erm, sometimes admittedly.”
Now it was Rowan’s turn to blush.
No one was sure who was more startled or embarrassed at the confession. Parenthood seemed like such a far away thought to Rowan that the possibility of it hadn’t even occurred to her. Even the thought of Julian wanting children was something she didn’t even realise was an option.
Her surprise though was quite apparent – eyes wide and brows raised – that Julian had to run his hand down the slope of arm as a sign of reassurance. “I mean, I, uh, if you would like them at all that is! No pressure or anything like that, um, I mean, we don’t have to—”
Rowan interrupted him with a boop to his nose — effectively stilling her husband. She bit her lip before a smile had begun to grace her features. “No. Tell me. What have you thought about?”
Julian coughed. The blush from his cheeks began to spread to his ears and all the way down to his neck, before any coherent statement left him. “I, uh, well for starters, she’d probably have your eyes.”
“She?”
“I always thought we’d have a daughter first,” Julian admitted in a whisper. “She’d have your eyes, and maybe my hair? Though she’d likely have your hair color than mine.”
As if to make his point, threading his long fingers through her dark strands, Rowan humming contentedly at his touch. Julian grinned. Whatever worries he had of Rowan’s reactions were disappearing by the minute.
“Maybe your nose too,” he mused, this time kissing the tip of hers. “I think her having mine might be a little cruel.”
“But I like yours,” Rowan replied. A lone finger began to trace the length and curve of it, stopping only at the tip to place another boop. “I think it adds character.”
“Ah, well, I suppose I might look dashing with it but I think our daughter would look better with yours!”
Rowan then rolled her eyes. A small chuckle left her lips, almost threatening to spill over into a full laugh. “And what would she inherit from you? It seems a little unfair that she resembles me in totality.”
“Why my height and sense of humor!”
This time, Rowan scowled – playfully swatting his arm at the remark. “Ah yes. The tiny one versus the giants.”
“Darling, you’ll get wrinkles that way,” came the reply as Julian flicked the space between her furrowed brows, his grin growing into an ear splitting one. “And you’re not tiny. Everyone else is simply…taller.”
“I just said the same thing!”
“No, you didn’t. You’re…average, maybe a on the shorter side of average but still average!”
“You’re not helping your case Dr. Devorak”
“Ah well, would this suffice as sufficient evidence?”
He gently cupped her face, drawing her into a kiss. As chaste as it was, there was something about it that left Rowan smiling and breathless. Her eyes had closed on instinct but this time she couldn’t help but peer out of her hooded lashes. Julian’s eye was open, not fully either, but enough to make out the glimmer in it. Mischief. Want.
“This is a distraction from the main issue,” Rowan murmured as she began to pull back from his lips, “and I’m upset that it’s working.”
“And just how cross are you Mrs. Devorak?”
Julian’s hand then dipped to fiddle at the hem of her nightshift — rather a shirt of his that had been repurposed as such — the implication quite clear to Rowan. A furtive smiled graced her lips as she lifted herself up to straddle Julian at his waist. She beckoned him to rise up, allowing their foreheads to touch as she ghosted his lips with hers — a suggestion of a kiss and nothing more.
“Enough to make sure that we might not have our daughter in another year or two.”
Julian groaned. Flopping back down to the bed — causing Rowan to fumble down with him too — he could only reply with a tight hug and an overtly dramatic sigh. “You will truly be the death of me, Rowan. Completely and utterly so.”
“Ironic, considering that I saved you from the gallows.”
The tilt in her voice was teasing as she settled against Julian’s chest, listening closely to his heart beat. Even with how lightly her voice carried those words, both of them knew the weight behind them. Fate had been kind to them for once. And the proof was right here. Julian was safe. She was safe. And they were irrevocably each others.
A comfortable silence settled between them — no words needed to show how much they both felt so lucky. Sleep began to weigh back on the two of them, adrenaline and excitement thinning out into the quiet.
“Ilya,” Rowan murmured against his skin, her eyes slowly becoming more and more heavy, “you still haven’t told me what our daughter’s name would be.”
“I….I’m not sure. Her name changes all the time. Like sometimes when the moon is full and you’re by the window, whether mapping out your stars or just comfortable with a book, I think she might’ve been Luna.”
“Luna, huh?”
“Mhmmm. Or when we go to the market together, with the bustle of people and just seeing how everyone is so alive and well after…well, everything, sometimes I catch the drift of someone singing “Rose’s Fair.”
“So Rose then?”
“Or Morrigan. I always liked that part of the song.”
Rowan smiled, a small laugh escaping her lips as she snuggled even closer to her husband — who was busy smoothening down her thick black hair. “Oh I’m very sure. Any other names?”
“In times like this,” Julian said, struggling to stay awake, “I think of the name Katya.”
“And why Katya?”
“Because…it reminds me of home.”