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War is, for better or worse (always worse), exhausting. When your enemy is a demon hell-bent on taking over the world... maybe it’s necessary. But that doesn’t change the fact that it is tiring.
Of course, the fact that Michalis works harder than anyone Camus knew, knows, and ever will know contributes, but Camus has decided that because Michalis works so hard to take care of others, however bashful he may be about it, Camus must work hard to take care of him. It’s his job, as a knight, to look after his allies.
It’s his job, as a lover, to look after the man he loves.
Camus has told Michalis that once, after seeing him drink his 13th cup of ambiguous medieval caffeinated beverage. Michalis had rolled his eyes, but that was his last cup. To Camus’s great relief, he didn’t drink another 7. Small victories. That stuff is probably bad for you anyway.
So when Camus, taking a walk and not so subtly looking for his lover, came across Michalis, sleeping with his knees pulled up to his chest, back against the training ground wall, spear discarded and Alexandros curled up not far away, puffing large breaths of steam in the chill night air... Camus wasn’t surprised. Exasperated, sure, laced with the fondness you have for someone you love too dearly for you to express.
He wasn’t shivering, because Michalis never shivered. He rode dozens of ambiguous medieval unit of measurements a day, atop a wyvern high enough in the sky for the air to be frigid, especially in the chill of late autumn, when the leaves have fallen off the forest trees but the first snow hasn’t quite come. But that didn’t stop Camus from draping his own coat over Michalis’s shoulders, wrapping it around him.
Camus sort of... sat there, for a moment, taking in Michalis’s face. He could be unbelievably cute sometimes, so cute that Camus wanted to spend his whole life in a warm embrace with Michalis. But that was impractical, however desirable.
So instead, he gently lifted Michalis into his arms and carried him to their room, softly putting him on the bed, so not to wake him, and curling up next to him to bask in his love for the man next to him... to drift off to sleep taking in his gentle breathing... letting the warmth that comes from domestic affection carry him to sleep.
He dreamed of the warm embrace he so desired, knowing, subconsciously, that even if he could not hold him forever, he could hold him as long as he could when they woke up.