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Lup is content. She has every right to be. This one of the Raven Queen’s babiest Reapers (fine, she’d gotten to the point that repeating Taako’s joke had become unironic) is done with work for the day, having exchanged her feathery cloak and scythe for an impossibly soft oversized cream-colored sweater and thick woolen socks. And if that would seem out of place in the Astral Plane, well, it sure as fuck doesn’t at home, where Lup is comfortably curled up on the couch and under a blue and silver blanket from Istus. In her hands is an open book, its faintly musty scent twining with that of the cinnamon and ginger candle she’d lit earlier.
Outside, it’s a crisp autumn day in the Prime Material Plane. A lively breeze races through the rainbow of leaves still clinging to the trees, while far above a far stronger wind sends faint whisps of clouds sailing through a pale blue sky. The chill in the air heralding the season to come still yields to the warmth of the late afternoon sunlight. Only the last reaches Lup here inside though. Golden light pours into the room, setting golden curls and silver yarn shining as well as illuminating the magical symbols and necromantic diagrams painstakingly drawn in the old book.
Okay, so, look, Lup may have picked up the book from a raid on a necromantic cult last week. Maybe.
Lup turns the page and hums. Hm. That’d be an interesting idea for their next at least somewhat condoned if still illicit necromantic experiment.
Okay, she definitely got the book from the raid on the necromantic cult.
The quiet of the room, broken only by the sound of an occasional turn of the page or a gust of wind rattling its way over the windows, is broken by the familiar, delicate rrrrrrrrrrrip of the barrier between this plane and their place of work.
“Hey, babe,” Lup says, looking up from the book as Barry steps through the rift. Her husband’s scythe disappears into nothingness as the tear closes behind him, and he turns to her with a smile.
“Hey, Lup. How is the most beautiful person in any world doing?” Barry asks, taking off his own black-feathered cloak. As expected, beneath the cloak and the scythe and the whole lichy, spooky agent of the Raven Queen vibe, Lup’s husband is as he ever was, one of the plane’s biggest nerds with a denim-clad ass that just won’t quit.
“I don’t know, Barry, how are you doing?” Lup replies, a triumphant smirk on her lips. As expected, even after decades, Barry goes bright IPRE red at the remark.
Barry clears his throat, straightening his glasses, likely trying to will the blush away. Gods, Lup is so in love. “I-I’m great. You?”
“Enjoying my time off, natch.” Lup puts the book down on the coffee table and takes a moment to stretch, cat-like, ears flicking as she does.
“Uh-huh. And how did you manage that?” Barry asks, stepping away toward the line of hooks on the wall where Lup’s cloak already is already hung up.
“I finished my paperwork early,” Lup says, smug and entirely pleased with herself.
Barry pauses, looking back over his shoulder at her. Whatever he sees in her face makes him let out a soft, fond snort as he shakes his head. “What did you bribe Kravitz with?” He calls as he hangs the cloak, trading sensible work boots for slippers. Having fully entered nerd alert mode, Barry quickly returns to his beloved wife.
Lup stifles a snicker, drawing her legs back and patting the newly vacated couch cushion. “How’d you know?”
Barry sits before turning to her, face schooled into solemnity. Lup bites back another giggle. “Well, now, you see, Lup, darling, love of my lives and deaths… liches have True Sight.”
At that, Lup does laugh, and Barry’s face splits into an easy, affectionate smile, the kind Lup might have called sappy if that same smile didn’t turn her own insides to lovey-dovey mush at the sight. If seeing Barry smile like that, at her, because of her, for her, didn’t fill her heart with such love that could anchor her across time and space and still bring her home. But, uh, it kinda does. Like a lot. So she doesn’t say a word, and Lup breaks into her own fond, loving smile.
Slowly, deliberately, just as quietly deliberate as the love they had carefully cultivated for 47 years, Lup rolls forward onto her knees and places her hands on her husband’s warm, steady shoulders. Barry remains still as Lup leans in and kisses him, soft, feather light. Even that simple touch sends a spark through her as the echo of their melody plays in her mind. Lup pulls back and studies Barry for a moment. Half a heartbeat after she does, Barry’s eyes open, and Lup is, not for the first time, struck by the depths of the love in his eyes. Lup’s lips, still electric where they’d touched Barry’s, quirk into a small smile. She leans in again, planting kisses on his forehead, his cheeks, his nose, once, twice, three times. The last elicits a quiet laugh, and Lup grins wider as she feels the shaking of his shoulders beneath her hands.
In a flash her arms are wrapped around his neck, tugging him forward as she falls backward into the couch. Barry’s lips are back on hers at once, warm and soft and so familiar. Even in the quiet cycles, where the Light had been found and worlds had been peaceful, there’d always been a sense of urgency, a sense that each kiss could be the last before they lost each other, perhaps for the final time. Now, in the calm and quiet of their comfortable home, in a far happier and more hopeful world- well, they really did have time enough to love each other.
Hey, Lup had said she’d smooch Barry’s brains out when she’d gotten her body back. She most definitely had, but she rather likes continuing to make good on that particular promise.
If the sun is lower in the sky when they finally draw back, breathless, neither of them comments on it. They fidget, rolling onto their sides with Lup throwing the blanket over Barry as well, neither letting go. Comfortable once more, Lup tilts her head in, bringing her forehead to touch Barry’s, their quick breaths mingling.
“Wow,” Barry whispers, seemingly stunned.
Lup might laugh, but for the moment she feels just the same, just as in love and in awe that she is so loved in return. “Taught him how to make elvish bread.”
“Hm?”
“Kravitz. What I traded for paperwork. How to make it. And how to twist it into the right shape.”
That gets Barry’s attention. Gods know he’d spent enough hours having Taako help him practice before presenting anything to Lup. “Huh.”
“Yeah.”
“How about that?”
“I know, about time, huh?” Lup breathes out a soft, breathy laugh.
“Can we really judge? We took long enough.”
“We took exactly the right amount of time; I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Barry’s chuckle seems to reverberate through her, and Lup reaches up to cup his face, running a thumb over his cheek. “Hey, babe?”
“Mm?”
“I think I have a new favorite plane.”
“Mmhmm? Which one?”
Lup leans in to kiss Barry again, but, just before she does, she answers. “This one.”