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Saint sidles through the room on silent feet, creeping with a care that might surprise even his closest, as accustomed to his loud presence and bulk as they are. He has plenty of practice in ambush situations, but it’s not something to be usually expected in his own home. Their own home. He pauses, smiling faintly to himself, and looks down at Osiris. He’s fast asleep in a battered old chair, draped across it as carelessly as the layered blankets he’s half curled into. Saint’s jawlights bathe him in soft purple in their dimly lit living space as he smiles, and the distant glow of the City proper casts diffuse shadows across the walls. Everything else can wait.
It takes a great deal of strength not to wake him when he catches him dozing off at odd moments. Saint’s spent far, far too long watching Osiris sleep himself away to nothing to be able to relax in his presence, but he needs it. Osiris doesn’t like being asleep either; he never has in the centuries they’ve known each other - too much to do, and never enough time to do it in - but it’s worse, now. He wonders if it’s the nightmares, or if it’s because he considers his time more… precious. If he’s afraid he won’t wake up again. Saint hasn’t asked. He doesn’t want to.
He crouches, slowly, cautiously, eyes fixed on Osiris for any sign of him rousing, and carefully lowers himself to the floor beside the chair. His vigil is too familiar, but there are the small differences if he pays attention - occasional hitches of his breath, gentle sighs, the twitch of his fingers. Saint wraps his arms around his knees to stop himself reaching out, and settles.
An hour drifts by, then a second, and a third. Saint is intimately aware of the passage of every minute, counting his partner’s breaths, in and out, in and out. Time he’d thought was gone forever. Osiris almost stirs a few times, fists clenching, breath uneven, but sleep drags him back down each time.
—
Osiris jerks awake, bleary; sleep-drunk and aching. The sounds of the City outside have dropped to a soft and distant babble, and for a moment he’s almost too disoriented to recognise where he is. He reaches out instinctively for-
Remembers.
Clenches his open hand into a tight fist and sighs, painfully. Will it ever be easier? Does he even want it to? Wishing for the memory of her to be less sharp feels wrong, somehow, almost as if he’s killing her again. He looks down at his hands, his still-shaky memory piecing together those final moments once more. The blinding flash of her Light against the darkness, against the sigil, against his rapidly weakening frame as his Light is ripped away. Her words hanging between them, a command as much as a comfort. For the sake of her memory, then, as much as anything else.
He relaxes his grip, and the blanket he’d dozed off with slips from his lap and onto… Saint? Even in the dim half-light of civil dawn, there’s no mistaking him, slouched against the chair with his head lolling beside Osiris’s knee.
The light flop of the blanket startles him into wakefulness, and Osiris mumbles half an apology. Saint frees himself from the tangled blanket and raises his head, resting against his knee instead, reassuringly solid and alive. Osiris traces the seamed lines of his skull with well-practiced familiarity, idle hands unable to keep still. Saint relaxes.
“We have a bed, you know.” Osiris manages, eventually. His tongue is still thick with long disuse, and words don’t flow as easily as they once might have.
“And I have spent too much time in it alone.”
Ah.
“Saint, I’m s-”
“Is not your fault. You fell asleep, so I… ”
Waited. Again.
Osiris lets him tail off before stretching, joints creaking in protest. He attempts to stand, trying not to step on Saint, but the lingering stiffness from his awkward nap betrays him and he stumbles. Saint catches him with ease, even still half-asleep, and pulls him into his lap.
"Steady."
"I should-"
"You should stay." It's a command, not a question. Osiris obeys without protest. He relaxes instead, leaning in to press a kiss against Saint's cheek.
Saint's hands are more questioning than protective, now, and Osiris smiles despite everything. It's enough. It's enough.