They weren't in the habit of grand gestures or elaborate gifts. It was enough to simply be together, to know that they didn't need fancy things or story book moments to validate their love. It was a quiet sort of affection, a pulse beating in time with the breath of the world; constant and slow, keeping them both steady.
Their most treasured moments were private, jealously guarded so no one else could take away the memories with their outside knowledge. They were a world unto themselves – Sorrow and Nora, Nora and Sorrow. Both had found perfection within the other.
But Nora knew that would have to change. It was a sad thought, the shattering of the glass they had built around themselves. It could no longer be the two of them. There was a third on the way.
She had yet to tell Sorrow she was pregnant. It had been weeks since she found out but still she waited; for the right moment, for the right words. There was no reason to be nervous, no fear to be had over Sorrow's reaction. Yet she was nervous and she did fear.
She wouldn't be able to hide it much longer and truly she didn't want to. All the feelings she had she wished to share with Sorrow. So tonight, with the last warm breeze of summer playing through the air, she vowed to tell him.
She was quiet as they walked the grounds hand in hand, past the mirror of the lake where they had shared their first kiss, and beyond the reach of the castle lights that were starting to flicker on one by one. Her silence was hardly unusual. They often spent their strolls in comfortable stillness. Sorrow, however, knew her better than anyone.
He did not press her to speak, but only slipped his arm around her and pressed his lips to the flames of her hair. They continued on until the dark of the forest welcomed them and the faint light from the stars filtered down to guide their feet. After a while Nora slowed her pace and eventually stopped. Sorrow paused with her and looked down with a concerned frown.
“There's something on your mind?” He phrased it as a question but Nora knew he had not doubts of what he said. How she had been able to keep anything from him this long was a mystery.
She took a deep breath, opened her mouth and shut it again. The words were too difficult to push out. “Yes,” she said simply, and looked away.
The way he looked at her, the way he stood so close, and the way she could not find her voice was familiar. They echoed the night, now years ago, that their feelings were laid bare. It was a winter wind that ruffled her hair then, not the late summer breeze that warmed them now, but much was still the same. She recalled how Sorrow had been caught in his own troubles, and how his carefully constructed words came out in rushes and pauses. She remembered when she kissed him and everything fell into place.
It was that memory that gave her courage. Her confession now would be received just as well as the one years ago. With one more calming breath, which did little to ease her nerves, Nora looked back to Sorrow and said it as simply as she could.
“I'm pregnant.”
Nora wasn't sure what to expect from Sorrow when he heard the news. They had spoken only hesitantly of starting a family before. It was rare, Sorrow had told her, for a human and a vampire to conceive. Not unheard of, but extremely rare. While the news had left them both somewhat disheartened, it was something they could live with. So they had proceeded with the thought that they would never have children. It was a concrete fact to them. But now...
She waited for Sorrow to speak, to say something, anything. He only looked at her, her words likely taking a moment to process. She focused on his eyes, tried to ground herself in them. They widened, became the open sky. There was shock in them, but behind that something greater, something deeper. It was the look of someone's heart, open and exposed. It was everything he couldn't say but felt like fire.
Slowly, deliberately, he closed the distance between them and pressed his lips to hers. He was shaking; she could feel the tremor in his touch. Before she could move to kiss him back he fell to his knees, the soft earth below him welcoming. His arms reached around her waist, drawing her close and for once she didn't feel the chill of his touch.
Nora didn't dare break the silence that had fallen since her words. There was nothing to say. Not yet. Everything was clear; for a few golden minutes everything was clear. The look on Sorrow's face and the way he rested his head on her stomach said it all. Hope and fear waged a war that was won in the end by love. Love for her, and love for the new life within her.
Surely he could not hear the still forming heartbeat with his ear pressed to her, but perhaps he could sense it. Whatever kept Sorrow there, his eyes lightly shut and the corner of his mouth turning to a peaceful smile, Nora was glad for it.
When he finally rose what felt like a warm eternity later she had tears streaming down her face. They were not for the loss of her and Sorrow's little secluded world, but for the future ahead of them.
Calendar