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Hopefully Luna wouldn’t mind a wild animal spending the night in her home.

Shutting the door, Brand swiped up the scale shards Araxis left him and went to the recently unburied fireplace, tossing a few logs inside with the kindling. “How about I make us a proper supper, hmm? Then bed.”

He struck the obsidian scales together, their burgundy iridescence flashing as they sent sparks into the dry leaves and branches, and Brand blew on the embers until they finally caught.

“Araxis only brought red meat this time around, so your choices are limited,” he said, digging through the food basket. “Somehow, I don’t think you’ll mind.”

Stirling jumped down to inspect the bounty, sneezing when he found a sachet of tea leaves.

“Right, no cuppa for you.” He gently shooed Stirling away and took out what he needed. “Just give us moment and you’ll see.”

It was the first night Brand went to bed with a smile on his face.

And a fox tucked into the crook of his arm.

Brand awoke in his rage as usual, but he wasn’t as peeved by it anymore.

In fact, having Stirling there, tangled in a curl of his horns and entirely unperturbed by the change, soothed something in him. He didn’t even need more than a couple of deep breaths to find the Lesser.

After a jaunt to the lake—where the fox waited on shore and refused to go in the water—Brand found himself standing in Luna’s bedroom.

“It’s almost time, Stirling. Just this one last thing.”

It dawned on him while he washed. Despite all the progress he made, Brand still avoided cleaning that room. The reasons were many, not the least of which was the fact that he missed her so much he was sick about it. But he also had some of his lowest moments there. Actions he regretted because they weren’t a good representation of him or how he felt about her.

Aside from the insult he delivered by throwing Luna’s absent-minded habits in her face, he hadn’t yet managed to tell her he loved her. Not with those few words. Yes, he’d told her in other ways—some most would think were more romantic—but there was something about not hiding. About coming out and saying exactly what he bloody meant, as clearly and succinctly as possible.

Luna deserved that.

First, he needed to face himself. Then, he could face her.

With his buckets and cloths, and the saddest broom he’d ever seen, Brand tackled it. Stirling followed him everywhere as he washed and dried the rest of her clothes. He played on the bare mattress when Brand stripped it to do the sheets. He sniffed and sneezed at everything while Brand sorted the shelves and baskets and boxes.

And he was right there when Brand found Luna’s latest project at the end, folded neatly in the chair on her side of the bed. He sank his fingers into the cloud-like weaving on a sigh, lifting it up to have a⁠—

Sisters save him.

Brand nearly dropped it, but he held fast, counting through his breaths to stay calm.

It was his door. She wove his bloody workshop door, every detail exactly the same—right up to the wary fox in the lower corner, peeking from behind a tangle of intricate knot work. Almost like…like Brand had known all along where he was going and where he’d be when he carved it. What that funny little animal would mean.

Stirling skimmed around his ankles as if to punctuate the thought and Brand freed a laughing sob.

There it was. Staring right back at him. The moment he was waiting for, that final piece settling into its place like a contended sigh

Brand and Luna were so similar, and yet…so different. Opposites in all the ways that mattered. Where he was hard like the door panel he’d painstakingly carved over months, she was soft as the blanket she’d woven over days.

He worried once that they’d find themselves forever going ‘round and ‘round each other’s shortcomings. The night they mated and sealed their bond, in fact. More recently, he was willing to bet they’d end up unwillingly separated for the rest of forever, no matter what they did. That they were cursed.

Her letter and suggestion for him to live a simple life without her for a time made him feel smug at first. He knew such a thing was coming and was pessimistic as usual. Luna knew better, though. Knew exactly what she was doing. The gift she was giving.

Shite.

Why a simple blanket helped him realize that some of those alleged shortcomings were actually strengths, he didn’t know. Strengths that made all the difference when he bothered to look at it a different way.

Brand and Luna were perfectly complementary. Who gave a shite whether she organized her things when it was something he enjoyed and would gladly do for her? What did it matter if he had a tendency to overthink and perseverate, when she was there to jump in head first, uncaring about the why or how or when?

He’d chase her every time and end up all the better for it, even if it made him want to tear his hair out now and again.