You slip into bed long after midnight, the sheets cool against your skin. The fight hangs between you, a ghost in the dark room, but you can’t sleep apart. You reach for her, your arm sliding around her waist to pull her close.

And you freeze.

Her skin is like ice. Not the coolness of sleep, but a deep, penetrating cold that seeps into your palm. You shift, peering through the gloom. Moonlight catches the planes of her shoulder, not in soft flesh, but in a thousand glittering facets. Diamond.

Emma sleeps in her diamond form. You’ve never seen this before. In sleep, her formidable mental shields must have faltered, and her body’s ultimate defense took over—the unbreakable diamond shell she gained from a genocide’s ashes. Emma, the ruthless telepath, the savvy financier of a nation… here, she is a statue, beautiful and utterly frozen.

You don’t pull away. Instead, you tighten your hold, pressing your warmth against the glacial curve of her back. You think of the fight—sharp words about Krakoan policy, about crossing lines. You think of the Hellions she lost, the hardness that tragedy forged, and the teacher’s heart it never quite extinguished.

The cold is shocking, but you stay. You are the only heat in this room, the only thing that can thaw this moment. You press a kiss to the diamond-hard juncture of her neck and shoulder, a silent apology against the impenetrable. You will be here, holding the fortress, until morning when she softens back into the woman.