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Benedick rolls over, expecting to throw an arm over his wife, and discovers the bedsheets cold and empty. He sits up with a frown, casting about - where could she have gone?
There are no candles lit, but the moon is nearly full; he can just make out the dark shape of a person sitting on the window-sill. He gets up, tucking his feet into his slippers, and shuffles over.
“My dear lady disdains our bed?” he murmurs, wrapping an arm around her waist and resting his chin on her head. She doesn’t elbow him in the ribs, which means she’s feeling relatively mellow at the moment.
“Look at the stars,” she says quietly. “They are so bright tonight.”
Benedick hums acknowledgement. The stars are bright; he can name some of the constellations, though not all of them. “Which one was yours?” he asks after a moment. “The one which danced when you were born?”
Beatrice laughs softly. “Which one do you think?”
Benedick considers, rubbing his cheek against her hair fondly and grinning when she sighs at his beard catching against it and messing up her tidy sleeping braid. Finally he points. “That one.”
Beatrice makes a startled little sound. “Why that one?”
“Because you are my true north,” Benedick replies, a truth he thinks he only could speak here in this odd midnight moment, when the sheltering darkness lets them both be gentle.
“Since when are you allowed to be sweet?” Beatrice whispers, and leans back against him, resting her hand over his on her waist.
“I’ll cross wits with you in the morning,” Benedick promises. Beatrice chuckles softly and tilts her head back until he can lean down and kiss her.
“I shall hold you to that,” she promises, and turns back to the diamond-spattered velvet of the night sky, sighing in contentment.
Benedick holds his wife close and watches the north star, gleaming high above, as brilliant as the woman in his arms.