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Sleep—sleeping lightly—was one of the first lessons stitched into Damian’s bones. Before his mother pressed a dagger into his palm and wrapped his fingers around the hilt, he knew sleeping to be something that could be poorly done. A demand of the body that left it vulnerable; a frustrating fact of nature that had to be adapted to as opposed to circumvented.
Yet, every lesson seemed rather moot when Damian curled up next to Jon.
Jon, who would stretch out on the floor and nap in sunbeams, who kept the internal temperature of a furnace, whose breathing never faltered from sleep-slow- safe when Titus or Ace joined him at odd hours.
Jon, who never flinched when Damian pressed his forehead against his shoulder. Jon, who pulled him close with slow, sleepy blinks and the softest curve of a smile.
“S’all good?” Jon murmured.
Damian hummed in answer. “Good,” he agreed, letting his eyes fall closed.
And when he succumbed to the embrace of slumber, Jon’s heartbeat under his ear, he meant it.