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They wake late in the night, early in the morning, to a small knock on their door.
Chirrut stirs awake, uncertain for a moment what woke him, when the knock comes again, quiet, soft, hesitant. Beside him, Baze shifts, turning toward the sound then sitting up on his elbows, dislodging Chirrut from his shoulder. Grumbling, frowning, Chirrut tucks down deeper under the blanket, digging a hand over and around Baze’s waist in an attempt to keep him bed-bound.
“One of your suitors?” he asks, voice rough, trapping Baze’s thigh between two bony knees. “I thought I’d finally scared them all off.”
The knock comes again, quieter still, barely there but caught at the end on a small whimper, just enough to be heard. Baze is tossing back the blanket in a moment, untangling from Chirrut and climbing over him to cross the small space of their living quarters to the door. The rush of cold air slithers into the warmth of the bed as Chirrut sits up, pulling the blanket up with him. Jedha’s winter frost has settled deep into the bones of their moon, and the temple’s ageing heaters are never quite enough to keep the chill at bay.
There is hardly any light in the room, the shutters pulled tight against the biting winds, but the low lamps in the hallway light Baze’s face as he opens the door. He looks out into the gloomy dark, then down.
Ziranya, all of four years old, a temple foundling brought into the fold only a few months prior, stands before him. The door barely opens before she launches toward Baze, nearly tripping over the trailing edge of her oversized sleepshirt, wrapping too-thin arms around his knees. Baze catches her with a broad hand against her back, feeling the shiver running through her small frame. Crouching down, he gently pries her off his legs to rest his hands on her shoulders, looking her over and rubbing warmth into her arms.
“Zira, what’s wrong? What’s happened?”
His low tones are pitched soft as he looks her over, but she won’t meet his eyes, curling her shoulders to stare down at his feet. He rests a hand against the back of her head, nudging her to look up at him. Tear-filled eyes slowly raise to meet his, and Zira’s face crumples, her hands wringing in her night shirt.
Baze hums, then reaches out to wrap Zira up in his arms, lifting her against his hip and stepping back into their room, letting the door swish shut behind him. The light from the hallway vanishes, leaving the three of them in the dim illumination offered by the scattered crystals embedded in the walls. He rocks her for a moment, feeling her shivering against him, rubbing slow circles into her back. She settles slowly, and he leans back to look into her face where it’s pressed against his shoulder.
“You are safe here with us,” he says. “Can you tell me what’s wrong?”
Zira shudders again. “There’s ghosts,” she whimpers. “I heard them. Master Chirrut said. Said they get lonely, when it’s cold.”
Baze lets out a low sigh. “There are no ghosts in the temple,” he says firmly, turning to deliver a pointed look over his shoulder. Chirrut winces a smile back to him; his colorful storytelling with the foundlings that afternoon may have gotten away from him.
He makes room at the edge of the bed, and Baze carries her over to sit down next to him, the rickety bed frame squeaking in protest. Chirrut reaches out to cup Zira’s cheek in his hand. Her golden eyes flash in the low light, and she peers at him with a wary regard.
“I’m sorry Zira,” he says, brushing away a tear with his thumb. “It was only a story, I promise. I should not have tried to scare you like that.”
The shutters choose that moment to clatter as a sharp wind whips across the temple tower, moaning low as it winds its way through the echoing halls. Zira hides her face against Baze’s shoulder with a small cry, and Baze leans his cheek against the loose braids of her hair.
“Just the wind, child,” he murmurs, rocking in a slow, steady movement. “Just Jedha telling us to stay inside, where it is warm and safe.”
“Telling us to keep our socks on,” Chirrut adds, reaching out for a small bare foot jutting into Baze’s side, gentling tugging on her toes. Zira twitches her foot. Her eyes crinkle in a watery smile.
The bed creaks again as Baze rises. “Let’s see if we can’t get back to sleep, hm?” he says to Zira, settling her more comfortably against him as he starts a slow pacing. “You have much to learn and do tomorrow. You need your rest.”
Baze walks the room in a slow, meandering loop, stepping softly, swaying in a smooth and practiced rhythm. After a few moments, Zira lays her head down on his shoulder, her limbs already beginning to droop in his arms. Chirrut folds back down into the blankets and settles on his side to watch their slow, quiet dance, Baze’s socked feet whispering against their threadbare rug. He hums softly under his breath, nonsense melodies, and Chirrut smiles into the dark and closes his eyes. He knows that hum well. How it rumbles in Baze’s broad chest, how it sounds under his ear, how it feels against the palm of his hand.
Jedha’s winter winds call out their long and mournful song across the mesa, whipping through the city’s crooked streets and across the temple’s great spire. But the winds can’t reach them here. Underneath the howl, Chirrut can hear the temple sighing, wrapped up in the slumber of its keepers, restful, watchful. The whole galaxy seems to fall away, bit by bit, until nothing is left but this small room, one pinpoint in an endless expanse of night. Nothing but Baze, steady and strong and so gentle, and the child folded up in his arms.
His husband’s arms. Chirrut smiles to himself again. Still new, still strange in its own way, the small thrill that comes along with the thought, husband, husband. Maybe it will be unremarkable one day, as familiar and plain as the color of the sands. He hopes not.
He must begin to fall asleep again himself, because no time seems to pass between that warming thought and the light touch of lips against his cheek. He opens his eyes. Baze leans over him, Zira held secure against his chest.
“I’m going to put her back to bed,” he murmurs, and Chirrut nods, buried under the blankets and already halfway back to sleep once more. He hears the soft brush of Baze’s voice at a distance, then the quiet woosh of the door.
He drifts, counting Baze’s steps as he descends into the lower levels where the children sleep, kept safe in the heart of the temple, kept warm by the dark tunnels and caves and natural springs that twist beneath them. He follows the path in his mind: down the spiraling stairs, skirting the edges of the kitchens and their ancient, ever-warm ovens, down the long corridor that leads to the rooms where the children study and practice and play. Nudging the door to the nursery open and stepping carefully inside, tucking his charge back into her bed, counting the heads to reassure himself that no one else has gone astray.
He comes awake again as Baze levers himself over him, back into the too-small bed, in his place against the stone wall, tucking his cold hands underneath Chirrut’s sleepshirt. Chirrut sucks in a breath and lets it out on a curse, and Baze laughs at him, presses a warm, wet kiss to his neck.
“Serves you right,” he whispers, drawing Chirrut close.
Chirrut tugs his arm into place across his waist, wriggling back with a petulant jab to Baze’s shins. “Is she all right?”
“Yes. No harm done.”
“Hm.” Chirrut runs his palm down Baze’s chilled arm. Baze squeezes him and drops another kiss behind his ear.
“No harm done,” he says again, softer.
Chirrut cranes back to plant a kiss somewhere approaching Baze’s lips. Baze huffs a laugh, adjusts the angle, squeezes him again around the waist, then settles back into place. The bed is too small for two, cramped and too short, but they slot together just so, just as they always have. The cold point of Baze’s nose presses against the back of Chirrut’s neck. Baze whuffs out a long sigh and relaxes, his hold at Chirrut’s waist going loose, and Chirrut closes his eyes, warmth suffusing out from his chest, down to the ends of his toes and the tips of his fingers.
The winds cry. The children sleep, and so does Baze, and Chirrut, eventually. He lies awake for a time, breathing with the rhythm of Baze’s sleeping breaths, listening for ghosts.