Harry has a bad nightmare; Karrin is there to cheer him up.

Few facts to know:

- SPOILER until after Skin Game.
- Set in an unlikely future, several months later, in which Harry and Karrin are together and kickin' it. Expect fluff and smut. This is my first attempt at writing it, and I kinda liked the result, and I hope someone else kinda likes it too.
- This is my first fic in English, which is not my first language, and as much as I'm probably ok with it, I'm sure as hell not perfect. If you find a word/phrase that doesn't seem to make sense, feel free (and more than welcome!) to point it out. Thanks!

Disclaimer: The Dresden Files and all its characters belong to Jim Butcher. I am but a humble (slightly fanatic) admirer of his.

Nightmare remedies

I woke with a snarl of fear, and found myself breathing hard, my muscles tensed from the nightmare. The details were already fading, but I could still feel the sense of helplessness, self-blaming and general hatred for life, the universe and everything that was often parts of my sweet, sweet dreams. Especially when they involved a certain woman dying on a certain stone table, by the hand of a certain wizard. Mine, in case you were wondering.

I forced myself to breathe through my nose as quietly as possible and, ignoring the lingering feeling of blood on my fingers, courtesy of my way too realistic dream, got out of the bed as quietly as possible.

I got to the kitchen, my steps still too tense for my taste, and got out one of Mac's beers from the fridge: regardless of what he thought, a cold drink and a cold bottle against my temple were simply heaven for me, at the moment. I waited until I could feel at least some of my tension leave my muscles, and silently thanked God that Karrin kept some of Mac's beer at her place - definitely one more reason to love her.

Heh. Now I'd finally reached the point in my life when I could almost easily admit that I loved someone. Apparently, it had taken Susan turning into a half-vampire to get me to say it out loud for the first time, and my killing her to make me able to move on and actually thinking of loving someone else - and not anyone, but Karrin, definitely among the closest people I had in my life, if not the closest. And yet, what good was moving on, if a dream was enough to leave me shaking and with wet eyes in a kitchen that wasn't even my own?

I heard silent footsteps behind me and, without looking back, I sat on the table and just drank more of my beer. The Winter in me seemed to take that as a clue to stir up and start screaming about not showing weakness, never showing weakness, And what is she gonna do, make me talk and share my feelings? How dare she, I'm gonna teach her better, and if it takes violence all the better, and hell, maybe I'm gonna take it out on her, she's come here looking for it…

I was almost too tired even to start doing math in my mind to beat it down, and hardly heard the movement behind me, until I felt Karrin's hands on my shoulders, calmly massaging my rapidly tensing muscles in slow and strong strokes. I exhaled a breath I hadn't thought I was holding, and the coolness of the bottle on my temple together with the warmth of Karrin's hands on my shoulders made the exhalation turn into some kind of groan of pleasure. She seemed to take it as a go-on sign, and began making her strokes firmer and broader, while she started leaving kisses on my neck, down my shoulder and then back up, to my ear, where she stopped for a second to bite my lobe gently.

Too gentle, snarled the Winter in my belly, but I ignored it and let my head go slightly back, while she kept on kissing my neck and her hands kept on going more down my back, slowly and strongly, up and down and down my sides, along the muscles of my spine and waist and abdomen, until I could feel every inch of my skin flare electricity right down to between my legs. Hell's bells, if this was the reward, I could start changing my mind on having nightmares more often than not.

Her hands got to my PJs' waistband, and kept their firm movements there, on my back and then on the front of my torso, along my lower stomach, fingers only lightly grazing beneath the band. My belly muscles seemed to take it as a clue to tense all at the same time, and I couldn't stop another groan from escaping my lips. She shuddered slightly, her naked breasts briefly grazing my back, and a hum of pleasure went from her lips straight through my ear, which she was nibbling right at that moment.

All in all, I consider it completely appropriate that I lost it.

The Winter wasn't the only part in me that roared its approval as I whirled around, slammed the beer on the table away from where she was and took her wrists, pinning them down to the table's surface and forcing her to lean back in a slight ark: she had been kneeling behind me, on the table, and now her body was slightly stretched, breasts moving rapidly in time with her breaths. A gleam in her eyes, together with the strong scent of her that reached my nose, told me that she was more than happy to see the hunger that must have been showing in my eyes.

Oh, and the fact that she was completely naked tipped me off as well.

I stared at her for a few entire seconds before I wolfed down on her, my mouth between her legs, and felt her shiver and try to move; I kept her wrists down, hard, and held her legs still with my shoulders, not allowing her to change position: she was quite too beautiful like that, almost all of her body in display, at my disposal. I kissed and licked and sucked and savoured, almost biting her out of sheer lust, while my PJs pants kept getting more and more annoying, and her body kept shivering beneath me. She started letting out little sounds of pleasure, and I started being even faster and harder in my motions, my whole body aching to touch her, to feel - but first, I wanted to feel her crush beneath me. And then, after an infinitely delightful amount of time, she did, her body arching even more against my mouth, while several shivers rocked her for one, two, almost three minutes, my mouth never stopping and her lips letting out soft, soft moans that left me actually hurting to take her.

While she was still moaning, I left her wrists and finally took her waist, touching her, feeling her soft, toned skin and muscles under my fingers - and I finally drew her hard against my body, her breasts soft against my chest, our different heights then separating our torsos when I started kissing her, with her mouth slow but frantic against mine in a sloppy kiss. One of her hands started trying to get my pants down while the other one let her get her weight off the table enough to get her legs from under her to around my waist: I almost came when she pushed my now naked waist against hers, I was so hard. I clutched at her hips even more strongly while I finally entered her, any thought of restraint simply thrown out the window by the sweet sounds of urgency she was making in my mouth. I started moving in and out of her in a fast rhythm, while still kissing her, trying my best not to finish it immediately, trying to draw the pleasure out as long as possible. My lips and tongue started going down to kiss her jaw, her ear, her neck, stopping in the corner it made with her shoulder; she threw her head back, her hands frantic on my back, her whole body writhing in rhythm with my own and her lips hardly stopping little mewling sounds of pleasure. I bit down hard on her neck then, fastening my hips' pace - and a few moments later I felt her go tense against me, her body arching again against mine, and a soft moan making her sound like a damn goddess to my ears. The sound made me all but lose any kind of rhythm, and I started thrashing wildly inside her, my movements jerky and rough, until I finally reached my climax, my head thrown back and my throat emitting a sound that may or may not have been similar to that of an animal, rather than a human being.

I know, I know. It hurts to be this suave. Sometimes more than most.

I found myself fallen down on the table along Karrin's body, half leaning down on my elbows, half on her chest - more precisely, with my head on her breasts. She was tracing light caresses on my scalp with her fingernails, through my short hair. I was briefly very glad I'd decided to cut it after all, and felt myself exhale a content sigh on her skin, which was still flushed a pretty shade of red right next to where my face was. I didn't care about the discomfort I had in my legs and back from being bent, to let my torso be completely on the table and my head where it was: I liked it there, on Karrin's breasts. All things considered, I could stay there some more.

"Well, big guy, if you're already tired, we can call it a night."

Her voice was low and husky, and it made me both chuckle and twitch, which she must have noticed, considering that I was still inside her.

"That was… not expected. And definitely appreciated," I murmured, my voice also quite lower than usual. She shivered slightly, but her hands didn't stop their gentle moving and her tone of voice stayed light.

"I'd thought that maybe you should tell me about the dream and let it out, but… well. Things kind of got somewhere else."

I moved my head to look up at her, but left my chin on her left breast.

"And you thought of coming here naked and starting to massage me - naked, to have a nice chat?"

She shrugged lightly, which was all kinds of interesting given my position, and gave me a look of perfect innocence with her bright blue eyes.

"It's quite hot around here tonight, don't you think?"

I chuckled again and lifted my weight off her, supporting it on my elbows to lean down on her face and kiss her. It was a calm, sweet kiss, tongues only lightly touching the other's lips, our mouths moving gently on each other, while her fingers remained light on my scalp and mine roamed gently on her shoulders and upper arms. A deep, strong sense of gratitude was filling me, my lungs taking a deep breath that got mingled with Karrin's on the exhale, and I hoped I could fill the kiss with that gratitude, and my care, and just the sheer strength of the love I felt for her, all things I'd never be able to express through words. From the smile she gave me when I withdrew slightly, my lips still almost grazing hers, I thought maybe I'd managed it.

"Thank you, Karrin."

"I love you," she said simply, as if it was enough of an explanation. And, of course, it was. I smiled at her with what was probably a completely ridiculous amount of sappiness - damn but this woman was capable of transforming me in a piece of Jell-O - and then realized that maybe I'd been a little too forceful on her. Her knee had recovered quite well from the injury that Nicodemus had dealt it several months before, but I probably shouldn't have forced her to be kneeling like that while, ah… being very much tensed up. I idly wondered if I could blame it on the Mantel or it was only my pigheadedness when it came to sex, and felt my cheeks almost redden a bit in a slight twinge of shame.

"I, uhm… did I hurt you?"

She just chuckled, and the shiver that went through her seemed to pass seamlessly into me, as if it had been my own in the first place.

"Only in the best ways, Harry. Don't worry, I'm a big girl, you know."

I scoffed at that, which earned me a blow to the side of my head, but I relaxed at her sincerity and we ended up kissing again, still gently but longer, and more intensely. I could feel myself harden again inside her, and I didn't know if it was me getting to have better stamina as I grew older, or it was just the Winter Mantel; it must be my masculinity getting stronger with age, definitely. I didn't care in that moment, of course, and I just moved my elbows down a bit, so that my hands could start caressing her breasts, her reaction a harder breath on my lips and a slight movement of her torso, that pushed her breasts a bit more into my hands.

"Mmmhh… shall we move this to the bedroom? Your house, your rules," I murmured, my hands getting a bit firmer and my hips starting to rotate, slowly and gently. As I'd come to know and appreciate, she didn't need any fae mantel to make her want sex as much as me: she started trying to rush me, arching her back more and more, but I held her down with my weight and kept my movements light, a sudden desire in me to make her beg making me immediately harder, which in turn made her move even more urgently against me. Delicious. The fact that she'd never shown to me much weakness in bed just made me want to push more for it - and as much as the Mantel helped in this, I knew myself well enough to know that it was just like I wanted it, regardless of that.

"Yes," she hissed against my lips, one of her hands sliding down to my shoulders in a strong caress.

"Yes, what?" I said, my voice getting huskier while my movements started getting a bit faster. "I didn't hear the magic word, and you know I'm a wizard, I simply need the magic word."

"Dresden, my house, my rules. Get your ass moving or I'll make you pay for it," she said through gritted teeth, her hands coming to take mine from her breasts to her hips, presumably so that I could lift her with me and go.

But I had to keep my point, hadn't I? A wizard has his pride.

I clutched on her hips and thrust into her, hard, and she gasped slightly. Her fingernails started raking at my back, both of her hands now there, and I stilled my movements, my body screaming at me to move and do it hard, and fast, but my mind kept wanting to make the damn point. I looked at her with a wicked grin, and oh-so-slowly started moving out of her, my firm grasp of her hips forcing her to be still. She bit her lip and said nothing, but her fingers dug into my back, sending sweet bolts of sensation right down to my buttocks, and her whole body started tensing up, trying to move us faster. I stopped her, of course: she wasn't at all weak, but I wasn't the freaking Winter Knight for nothing, either. I kept on slowly sliding out of her until I was almost completely out, and then slammed back in, my force getting helped by her own efforts. She gasped again, and then I started again my agonizingly slow exit.

"Yes, what?"

This time my voice was barely audible, it was so low, and I could see in the sudden blush of her cheeks how it affected her.

"Harry…" she said, almost warningly, but I ignored her and kept on going out of her maddeningly slowly.

Useless to say, it was short lived.

As soon as I slammed into her again, she tightened around me, while biting me on the neck. I went completely berserk with lust at that, lost all interest in making any kind of point, and started thrashing into her faster and faster, our mouths finding each other again in long kisses and short bites, on each other's lips and necks, while our breaths got more frantic, just as our hands on each other's bodies, touching, caressing, grasping, never stopping. I managed, by some miracle, to wait until I could feel her arch into me, a soft moan again escaping her lips, and then I let myself lose completely control, until after a last jerky thrust I came into her, the pleasure making me lose conscience again, this time with my head next to hers on the table.

Our breaths got slowly back to normal, and again I heaved a sigh of pure satisfaction, my hair slightly rumpled by hers.

"You're an asshole, Dresden," she said, but I could hear the smile in her voice.

I lifted my head and gave her a light kiss, both our mouths smiling contentedly.

"I love you too, Karrin."