The oil lamp burned low, wick sputtering in a shallow pool of gold. The tent sagged slightly at one end, pinned too close to a rock, but neither of you had bothered to fix it. Outside, the war moved like a beast in sleep—snorting, shifting, licking its wounds. Inside, the air smelled of ink and sweat and the lingering heat of the day.

You sat cross-legged on a folded pelt, stylus in hand, sketching the crooked bend of his elbow.

Diomedes was sprawled across the couch like some half-tamed thing, one leg hitched lazily over the armrest, shield propped against his hip like a lover he wasn’t ready to part with. His tunic clung damply to his chest in patches, the laces loose, and his mouth curved with the lazy cruelty of someone who knew they were being watched.

"Mind how your hand moves," he said, voice low, edged like a whetted blade. "You gaze as though carving a monument, not drawing a man."

He tipped his head slightly, just enough for the firelight to kiss the corner of his mouth, "Or is it a bier you sketch, and me already laid upon it?"

You didn’t dignify that with a reply. Instead, you dragged the stylus down the parchment, catching the hard angle of his jaw—too sharp, always too sharp, like he’d been carved with a chisel in a hurry. You didn’t say how familiar the lines were. How many nights like this you’d sat and tried to capture him, even during your Epigoni days. Not in bronze or epic, but in slanted strokes and soft smudges.

Diomedes snorted at the silence, but didn’t protest when you kept sketching. The fire cast long shadows, and somewhere beneath the snide remarks and thrown elbows, there was that familiar quiet. The kind that only came from knowing someone too long, too well.

Quiet settled, thick and companionable. His eyes drifted shut.

You didn’t stop drawing.