Frej sat in front of the mirror and looked at himself. We were supposed to get ready for the day, but he was still only dressed in a robe, staring at his reflection.

"What are you doing?" I asked as I pulled on a pair of trousers and bound them closed.

"Am... Am I attractive to you?"

I snorted very loudly and smiled at him. My smile paled when I realised he was being serious.

"Why are you asking me that?"

"It's just... Your family. The other people and deities... They look at me like I'm a freak of nature." He looked down at his hands.

I came up behind him and kissed his cheek very softly. "Look at yourself," I murmured against his skin. He hesitantly lifted his head and looked at me in the mirror before meeting his own gaze.

"I love the arch of your brows," I said and slowly slid my finger over the tiny red hairs. My hand dropped to his jaw. "I love how sharp the corner of your jaw is."

He inhaled sharply, the small hairs on the back of his neck rising.

I gently grabbed the robe and opened it, pulling it down from his shoulders. "Your shoulders are pure art." I kissed the side of his neck and looked up at him in the mirror, my arms around him. "Your chest is perfectly sized, making your body extremely symmetrical."

As my hands slid over his chest, he quietly moaned, leaning back against me, but didn't take his eyes off his own reflection.

"Your skin has the colour of new fallen snow on the first winter day. Your tattoos are art and I love discovering them. I love discovering your body." My hands ran down his ribs, over his stomach and further down. Red colour rose in his cheeks and his breath grew shallow. "Your mouth is soft like silk."

He exhaled very loudly and met my gaze through the mirror.

"Don't look at me. Look at yourself. You're the wonder that needs to be looked at, not I," I said with a determined but soft voice. "Get up."

He rose slowly and I rose with him, pushing the little seat in front of the mirror away. I pulled the robe off him, so he was completely nude.

"Look," I said as he leaned against me, both of us framed in the bronze mirror. "I love this man. Every inch of that man right there. See yourself as I see you." My hand ran down again, taking him in my hand and a small whimper slid out between those full lips of his. With my free hand I opened my trousers and grabbed his hand, pressing it to me. "Just feel how attracted I am to you."

"Yes," he breathed, his fingers wrapping around me and my moving wrist.

"Do you see it? Feel it?"

"Yes," he whispered and tore his gaze off the mirror, looking back at me. "I love you." He turned around, taking my face in his hands so gently. "How could I not?"

"Lover, every day I ask myself why you do love me. But I have to remind myself, that you do not have to justify your love for me. I know you love me and that is enough. You're enough, Fakkel."

He bent down a little and kissed me, and I was about to drop to my knees from the intensity of it. He pushed me back towards the bed and I sat down on it. He sat down in my lap and brushed my hair away from my face, smiling ever so sweetly at me. 

"I lack the words to describe you," he whispered and softly kissed me again. "To describe how much I love you."

"Show me then," I murmured and smiled up at him. He smiled back and leaned in again.

"Master," Alf said with a low voice, probably trying to not disturb me as I was focusing hard on drawing Frej. My lover was sitting in a chair in the most peculiar way. His back was against one armrest while one leg slung over the other armrest. His other leg was tucked under him and he was frowning at his book as it had offended him. I was trying to teach him to read my language, but he was struggling a bit. It was understandable. The characters we used were quite different from his Nordic runes after all.

"What is it?" I asked without looking up from my sketch.

"Your uncle and cousin left as soon as the sun set this evening."

"I wasn't expecting them to stay," I muttered and finished off my lover's hair.

"They wanted to let you know they'll be reporting back to your makers about what happened."

I tore my eyes off the paper and looked up at Alf. "Well, I guess you couldn't just have killed them, huh?"

"Unfortunately I am bound to this family and all of its members, master." He smiled slightly at me.

"Well, that is unfortunate." I returned my attention to my sketch.

"He's peculiar," Alf commented. I glanced up at him and he nodded towards my sketch.

"He's amazing," I corrected and gave him a pointed look.

"I do not disagree. But I've never been asked to not call any of my masters 'master.'"

"Frej is too humble for his own good."

"He also has a pretty good hearing sometimes," Frej muttered from his chair and looked up from his book. "Alf, more should ask you to just call them by their names. You're not below anyone."

Alf clenched his jaw and gave my husband a slight bow. "If you say so, Frej."

"You know what, he's right. Alf, we've known each other for a very long time. In all of those years I've never once thought twice about you calling me 'master.' I don't like it and it makes my husband uncomfortable. Call me Tec."

Alf widened his milky eyes at me. "Master, I wouldn't-"

"No more of that. Please," I interrupted without looking up.

"Tec," Alf murmured. "Right. I shall try and remember."

"Fantastic." I looked up again and caught Frej's gaze. He smiled very widely at me. I knew this made him happy. That I was trying to be less of a snob.

But it wasn't just that. I liked Frej's humility. The last traces of his humanity that didn't seem to disappear no matter how much time passed. I loved that part of him. That small flicker of life that still lived in him. It was the light in the eternal night I lived in. My small sun.

I woke up to a quiet tapping sounds. I opened my eyes and found Frej sitting by a candle on the floor, tattooing himself.

"What are you doing?" I murmured, having a hard time shedding sleep's grip on me.

"I'm tattooing myself," he replied casually.

I rose from the bed, bringing the covers with me and dumped down next to him. He was just about to finish a blue ring around his finger.

"What's this?" I asked.

"Another wedding band," he said and looked up from his work.

"Oh?"

"It was meant to be a surprise. It's been ten winters. Ten winters of love. For you." He smiled at me and kissed me on the cheek.

"Make one on me too." I kissed him back and put my hand in his lap.

"Yes," he breathed.

He finished the band around his own finger and then started on mine. We'd have it on the same finger and it would be permanent. I loved it and I couldn't stop looking at it when he was done. For some reason this one didn't hurt nearly as much as the one on my arm.

"Ten winters," Frej murmured and leaned against me. "It feels like ten nights, doesn't it?"

"It does, Fakkel. But at the same time it feels like there has never been a time where we weren't together."

"Really? You feel that way?" He looked wide-eyed up at me. "You've lived for so long..."

"None of it mattered before you came into my life. I'm not joking when I say, my life was bleak and I felt lost before I found you. With you, I found purpose with my life, Frej." I leaned in and kissed him softly. He sighed against my lips, but didn't pull back.

"I love you," he whispered.

I picked him up into my arms and carried him back to bed, gently laying him down on it. I jumped over him and he laughed out loud, circling his arms around my neck and body, bringing me down to him so he could kiss me again.