Work Text:
One breath.
Two breaths.
“Are you feeling any better?”
The dragon is immediately shaken out of her daze and blinks up at the source of the voice. Soft, gentle eyes stare back into hers, and her heart does something that can only be described as skipping a beat.
She investigates the girl whose lap her head is currently resting on, though she is plenty familiar with every feature of the hermit already. Long, autumn brown locks of hair flow naturally into loose curls. Horns curve downwards, unlike the dragon's, imitating a goat’s. Pink lips part just slightly, and her cheeks dust a light rose.
“You’re staring,” the hermit mumbled, laying a hand on the other’s forehead.
The dragon leans into the cool touch, subconsciously allowing her eyes to shut close. She manages to mutter a small “sorry,” under her breath before taking a hold of the other girl’s hand and placing it on her cheek instead, nuzzling against it.
“It’s okay. I… uh, I don’t really mind,” she replies. “Would you like a glass of water? You looked terrible when you arrived home, and—”
The dragon snaps up into a sitting position and throws her arms around one of the hermit’s, burying her face in her shoulder.
“No,” She blurts grumpily, “Stay. Please. Stay with me.”
And what other choice did the woman have? She sighed, feigning irritation, but she couldn’t have been any fonder of the girl she’s grown accustomed to caring for. The hermit hides a tender smile behind a frown while she gently guides the dragon back onto the bed the both of them have been sitting on, gingerly placing the nearest pillow under her head. She studies her—just for a moment—before she is immediately pulled back into the other’s warmth. The dragon flips the both of them over, swapping their positions, and plants her face directly into her chest, earning a gasp.
The hermit can feel her entire face redden as arms wrap around her waist, blocking any escape from the cuddle she has been, oh, so rudely forced into, but she doesn’t complain. Her eyes flick to the scaled tail wagging from side to side, and her hand drifts back to the dragon’s head, though this time she finds herself combing through orange-tinted brunette hair.
She stays like that for a while before hearing quiet snores faintly escaping the dragon’s lips. Her fingers leave their place from her hair and trace along every other trait, starting from the tip of her horns. They wander down to her jaw, her chin, then back up to her forehead. Then, the hermit softly places her hand on it, just like before, lifting her bangs. She hesitates before kissing the girl’s temple and quickly pulling away, surely flushing a dark crimson by now.
However, she looks back at the sleeping face drooling on top of her torso, and lets herself finally crack a smile.
“Cute,” the hermit whispers to herself. She carefully wipes the line of saliva off with her thumb, holding her breath in while doing so. Now with her arms adjusting themselves to wrap around the dragon’s neck, her attention shifts to the ceiling, and she thinks.
Thinks about how long they can stay like this, clinging to each other like they're koalas.
Thinks about how strange this all is, taking in practically a doppelgänger, who she also found out bears the same as her, into her home one day years ago just to save her from armored men who were apparently out to capture the dragon.
Thinks about how in love with her own doppelgänger she oddly is, wishing every day that the small gestures of affection the dragon shows her resemble reciprocated feelings.
Thinks about how one day she’ll pass and leave the dragon looking after herself in solitude because, unlike the hermit, she was born immortal.
It’s best to bask in the present, she concludes. They have each other for now, and that’s all she could really care about.