"Vampires are reportedly quite prone to not knowing their own strength when handling humans even after being accustomed to it. Lazarus, does your defensive magic handle that, or is it like mine and Alice's and won't block ordinary physical damage?"
"Well then. I produce no further objections to any consensual hugging that may or may not occur once Alice is capable of standing up," Bella says.
Bella conjures up a few glass bottles of the bubbly golden stuff that Elspeth likes so much. Ah, magic. So useful.
Star, star, star, star star star starstarstar—
Bella throws a questioning glance at Lazarus while she wraps her arms around her boyfriend.
"That wasn't a star," he says, staring at Alice's coin necklace, forgetting to blush in his fascination.
Everything is so much more. Brighter, sharper, louder, with a depth and clarity that human senses could never achieve.
And out of all of them, the thing that's most is how much he loves Bella. It's the same as it was, but different. Bigger. Clearer. Deeper. Louder. Sharper. Brighter.
Grinning, he kisses her forehead. He's still hugging her, and the pressure of his arms is as delicate as you could want, but the kiss hits hard enough to bruise.
Then: "Not a star?" She peers at Alice's chain of coins.
"Not a star," Lazarus repeats. "Bigger than a star. I didn't know they came bigger than stars."
"Whoa," says Alice.
Alice can't see magic, or her coins; she spends the hex and the star to declaw the evil-looking thing right then without changing her expression at all. Used undeclawed, it would probably incinerate an entire planet, maybe send the Sun supernova. "I should probably hold onto this," she says anyway.
"Take it," he says, kissing her forehead again. This time he gets it right. "Love you."
She takes it, and most of the stars and hexes he's carrying too, and kisses his forehead too. "Love you."
"Speaking of which," says Lazarus, "I think I would describe Alice's power and his vampire mate bond as... snuggling. Do they usually do that?"
"Do mate bonds and powers usually snuggle?" Bella asks. "How would I know?"
"I have no idea. But it's very cute," he says. "It looked, right when you opened your eyes," he says to Alice, "like your power was suspicious, and the mate bond just... was itself at it, and then your power decided it was okay and snuggled up."