Alcuin had been uncertain at first how well he'd be capable of sleeping alongside the boy; he'd only just gotten used to the sound of his master roaming their apartment in the morning, after all. And even then he still found himself startling awake – drenched in sweat and very much awaiting assault – at the sound of their neighbors shuffling down the hall in the evening. It was nothing like his previous household, which creaked and groaned and rattled with age, but was otherwise silent as the grave. Here, there was a near constant rotation of strange people at all hours of the day and night, and he worried the inclusion of another unknown element might further set his subconscious against him. He had been wrong.
If anything, his companion was a suitable distraction for his paranoia. Soon, the frightening noises from beyond the brick and mortar became nothing more than white noise. Alcuin could no longer imagine sleeping all by his lonesome. “Of course,” he murmured, leaning down to gently scoop the boy up in his arms until they laid in a comfortable tangle of bare arms and legs and warm breath. A ray of sunlight could not have parted them then.