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It was the 30th of Nightal, and Gale Dekarios could not sleep.
It was his own fault, really. Over dinner he’d begun telling Alys about how Waterdhavians celebrated Wintershield, the first day of the new calendar. “It’s a lovely moment to reflect on the past year,” he’d explained. “A chance to think about all that’s happened, all that’s changed, all that might be to come.”
Alys had arched an eyebrow across the table at him. “Maybe next year,” she’d said wryly. “Personally I could do without much reflection on the day we all walked through a mindflayer colony’s corpse pit. I’d pay good money to forget that smell.”
And now, several hours later, Alys was sleeping soundly at Gale’s side while he stared up at the ceiling, trying to wrap his head around a truly astonishing twelvemonth.
This certainly wasn’t the first sleepless night he’d spent this year. Far from it. In the days after the disaster with Karsus’s orb, Gale had rarely slept more than an hour or two at a time, his mind too full of fear and uncertainty to allow rest. After the tadpole, he’d found himself lying awake in a bedroll on the cold ground, simultaneously terrified of what would happen if he underwent ceremorphosis and fascinated by his strange predicament. Then Mystra had given him her orders, and for a time sleep seemed impossible—worse than impossible, like a waste of the few moments left to him, a scattering of the last grains of sand in his life’s hourglass.
If anyone had told him he would await a new year back home in Waterdeep, safe and alive and in love, he would never have believed them. He was awake tonight because he could scarcely believe it himself.
After an hour or so of trying not to toss and turn, trying not to wake Alys, he gave up and slipped from their shared bed, wrapping himself in a robe and stepping out onto the balcony he’d used as the setting for one of their first kisses. It was brisk, of course, but he found that he liked the feeling of the cold against his skin, the way it made him shiver and wrap his robes closer. It helped to reassure him that this was no mere fantasy, that this night was not some comforting illusion conjured by his impending demise. No. He was alive, and home, and had every reason to look forward to the new year.
Behind him, the balcony door squeaked.
“Gale?” Alys murmured, stepping out onto the balcony as she tied the sash of her robe. “Is everything all right?”
She looked nothing like her usual polished self. Her long, thick hair was tousled from sleep, more tangles than curls, and one side of her face was lined with pillow marks. The sight made Gale’s heart speed. What a privilege to get to be the person who saw her like this, sleep-rumpled and barely awake and looking for him.
“Everything is splendid,” he assured her. “I’m just saying goodbye to a rather unusual year.”
“‘Unusual’ is certainly one way to put it,” Alys murmured wryly, rubbing her eyes and taking a place next to him on the balcony seat. She glanced down at the hollow of his throat, the spot where the lines of the Netherese orb had once been marked on his skin. “Any regrets?”
“Not a one.” He took her hand. “Any other choices might have led me somewhere else besides here. And I cannot imagine a finer fate than holding your hand on this balcony, waiting for the first dawn of a new year.”
Alys rested her head on his shoulder. “Gale Dekarios, it’s unfair of you to charm me with poetry when I can barely string a sentence together,” she murmured, stifling another yawn.
“You are poetry.” He put his arm around her. “Stay with me until midnight?”
“All right.” She nestled close. “I know it’s superstitious, but I can’t help thinking it will be a good year if I begin it with you.”
“That was exactly my thought as well. Great minds do think alike.” Gale kissed her temple. “Happy Wintershield, darling.”
Alys tilted her head up to press her mouth to his. “Happy Wintershield, my love.”