Sapphy’s toes skimmed the tops of Torram’s feet where he held her elevated, crushed against his body. Usually he was kinda annoying when he got all dopey and romantic, but this was… pretty hot. Her fingers dug into his shoulders, her breath short and shallow on his neck. Torram was such a nerd that Sapphy often forgot the power he wielded when he wanted to, the strength of his arms – arms which held her as easily as if she were a bag of sugar. It was good to be reminded.

Breath-taking, in fact.

“Yeah,” she exhaled, winding her fingers tightly into his curls. “Kay.”

She reached over with her free hand, tapping the screen of the unused hop loop. Torram seemed to transfer her weight primarily to one arm while he did the same, sucking the breath back out of her. They vanished within a split second of each other. Sapphy reappeared first on the lawn in front of the Dragon, dropping onto the heels of her feet sharply. The absence of Torram’s arms left her arms cold and her breaths plentiful, giving her the sense that she could drown in the cool autumn air. He wasn’t gone long, reappearing at her shoulder within a fraction of a second. Sapphy exhaled a breath she didn’t realise she’d been holding and stared up at the inn.

She’d half expected not to return.

She wrapped one arm around Torram’s waist and leant against his shoulder, which was about the highest that her curly head reached. Carla’s hair had been bleached blonde and viciously straightened, the same as Sapphy’s had once been, but Shaman didn’t have a wide range of hair care products – especially not for mixed race girls. Pregnancy had thickened her hair so that it refused to stay tucked behind her ears, and she was forced to brush it impatiently aside once they stepped over the threshold and the wind could no longer tug it around. Without a word needing to be said, they walked together up the stairs and along the corridor they both lived on. Sapphy imagined that Tor’s step faltered for a second outside her bedroom, but she carried on past it without looking back and stepped inside his room instead. It was bigger than hers, spacious. Plenty of room for the crib he was building in his workshop.

Sapphy folded briefly back into his arms, planting a little kiss on his chin, before pushing him gently down onto the bed with none of her usual force or impatience. When he was sitting on the edge of the bed, she placed her hands on his shoulders and sat in his lap, face forward, as close to him as her growing belly would allow.

“Listen to me, you dumb nerd.” She slid her hands down his back and kissed him on the collarbone. “I don’t need no knight and I ain’t got time for your pissing code of manners or whatever. Don’t be so nice.” She balled his shirt into fists and tugged it down towards her, meeting his grey eyes with her muddy green ones. “I’ll meet you in the middle. If you can be rougher with me, I’ll be gentler with you.”