Just a little piece about healing…

…

When the War is Over

…

Her fingers trace his jawline and she smiles softly at him as they lay in their bed together, a sleepy haze surrounding them. Their heartbeats are still settling, bodies still coming down from the sheer elation of being able to spend a night together without the prospect of a goodbye. Her legs are tangled up in his, her heel pressed into his calf, the hair of his thigh still tickling her just above the knee. She can feel her eyelids growing heavy, but is reluctant to let him out of her sight, fighting to stay awake just that moment longer, continuing to catalogue his every feature with her fingertips.

He seems to be doing the same, eyes roving across her face as his hand skims the skin of her hip, the swell of her breast, the curve of her spine. It's a sweet moment in the calm of whatever storm they don't know they're in the middle of and she doesn't know how long they'll get to truly be together, so they're cherishing it.

He presses forward over the sheets to lay a soft kiss against her slightly parted lips. It's chaste and unhurried, a lazy slide and pull of lips while their foreheads rest together. And then his hand makes its way down the back of her thigh, squeezing at the sensitive skin there and waking her up anew.

She gasps into his mouth, rolling her hips forward and feeling the naked hardness of him against her pelvic bone. "Again?" she asks, her thighs still sticky from their last round only minutes ago. God, it makes her feel so wanted that she can do this to him, for him, with him.

Instead of answering immediately, he rolls until he is hovering over her, his kisses turning desperate as he nods. "Please, darling."

And she knew it had been hard for herself, she knows exactly how much she had missed him, how much her life had changed without him in it, how her heart had ached for this beautiful human. And she knows he had missed her too, had wanted to be back with her as much as she had wanted it. But the look in his eyes right now tells her what she's wondered from the moment she saw him again in the Underworld. Had he felt the moment the magic around her heart had snapped? Had he felt the loss in the same way that she had? As though the air had been taken from her lungs, a hand fisted around her heart, the light within her soul extinguished in a shuddering breath and then silence. It's there, right in the corner of his eyes, the mourning his own heart did in those separated days.

And god, she loves him so much. She never wants that to be a doubt in his mind again. Lifting a hand to his face, she tenderly runs her fingers across his cheek, swiping a thumb under his eye to catch the lone tear that is threatening to fall, that little droplet containing all of the agony he had been in. He blinks, eyes clearing and she surges forward, lips fusing to his as she lets her soul vibrate with her magic, their magic. She can tell the moment he feels it too, his weight sinking down to rest on his elbows as his length slides into her and they are one again.

She desperately clings to him as he pants ragged breaths into her ear, warm and damp and so, so loving. Her fingers find his, buried in the sheets somewhere, tangling them together and clenching tight.

"I love you," she whispers again and again, each thrust of his hips shaking her body and her voice until her words meld together and all they can hear is, "Love, love, love," in the night around them.

They both fall softly, like a rolling wave crashing on the shore, its fine tendrils reaching to touch each grain of sand that it can before it sinks beneath the surface. She gasps for breath, feeling him stutter and still, once more, inside of her. He breathes heavily into her shoulder as they try to grasp onto any place or time in this reality, try to understand the magnitude of what they're feeling. It's only when she shifts a leg that he rolls off to one side, eyelids heavy again. She follows him into his pull of gravity, rolling as well and ignoring the mess she knows their bodies have just left on the sheets. That's a tomorrow problem, she decides.

She smiles at him, all sleepy gaze and wonder, his blue eyes shining up at her in that desire-filled way they often do. "I can't do another," she whispers.

He chuckles sleepily, "Aye, love. I might tear apart."

She nods because she knows what he means. It's like their very souls are trying to intertwine, trying to escape their bodies so they can be together without barriers, without borders. It's a beautifully exhausting notion, one that has left them pulling close together and allowing their breathing to finally even out. Still, though, she is reluctant to close her eyes, reluctant to let him fall from her sight.

Her fingers follow the path they were taking before, sweeping over his jaw and down his neck. They still just over his pulse point and she frowns at what she had missed all this time. There are four distinct bruises, purple and blue against his skin.

She doesn't even need to ask before he answers, "Mr Hyde."

And they're not exactly the most life threatening of things that he has faced, but the placement of these little bruises is too close to the place she has lost him twice already. Her mind fills with images of his lifeless body on the bank of the lake, the thin and fatal trail of blood running down his neck and over his chest. She can see it in the field of middlemist flowers, the sunlight beating down on his perfectly still body.

It's not fair that he continue to hurt like this; that people continue to hurt him.

She lets her hand hover over the bruises, shaky and nerve-ridden. She is so tired, but this she can do for him; this she can heal.

Except that his hand reaches up to cover hers almost instantly, linking their fingers and bringing her arm down between them. She looks at him questioningly and he shakes his head.

"Let them heal on their own."

"But I can…" she starts, trying to pull her hand from his, "It'll only take a second."

His grip tightens. Not enough that she couldn't pull free if she wanted to, but enough that she understands that he doesn't want her to.

"Why?" she asks, biting her lip to keep herself from telling him how desperate she is to make him better. It's not for her to decide these things for him; she has learnt that the hard way. But, still, she is curious.

He smiles softly, bringing her fingers to his lips to kiss lightly, "I want to heal with you."

She frowns, not understanding for a moment because she doesn't have anything to heal. But then it falls into place, the puzzle pieces sliding together. He's not talking about physical wounds that have befallen her. No, her battles have been the emotional kind. And maybe, if she can see his wounds are healing, she will let hers close over as well. Maybe if she can recognise that he is alive, she will live too.

It takes all of her strength to let her magic leak back into her system, refraining from using it to mend him. She nods though, acceptance and gratitude rolling through her. "Thank you," she whispers, hoping he knows how much it means that he is always looking out for her. She may be the saviour, but she will always call him her saviour.

He smiles sleepily, moving in closer to her to drop a light kiss on the tip of her nose, and, as she blinks to accept it, she finds herself hardly able to open her eyes again. It panics her for a moment, sets her on edge that he's not in her line of vision anymore, but she is so tired, so exhausted, and they don't have any monsters to chase, any villains to thwart; just for a second, they can sleep.

And maybe, just maybe, when she opens her eyes next, the bruises on his neck will have faded a little and so too might the scars on her heart.

…

Thoughts?