Every night, it is the same.
He feels her claw-like fingers stroking down the back of his neck, a feathery touch as gentle as a mother's yet with the harsher rasp of a cold snake's hide reminding him just what she is. Gently, so gently, she trails those darkly painted claws through his hair- a soft feathery mass, so long neglected, forgotten amongst more important things like going out on secret missions (how ironic- he always admired the spies in the novels Kairi read, and now that he's one of them he hates it), being tormented by memories of fragmented, warped relationships that mean so much you him (that might never be the same again after what he's done), and (of course) hours spent here, here in the writhing, twisting, smothering darkness of his one-time home. A home he abandoned and never wants to come back to.
"Poor misguided child," she purrs, words dripping sweetly with subtle mockery, her voice a cloying silken poison to his ears. A single sharp nail traces the line of his jaw, igniting a barely-suppressed chilling shudder that wracks his slender frame. Darkly gleaming wings flutter from their perch on her shoulders, wafting air heavy with the scents of decaying hopes and dying hearts around him. She laughs softly to herself, a sibilant cackle whispering of his broken (shattered) destiny.
"Go away," he mutters, a single tear slipping down his face. "Go away."
Every night, it is the same, when the memories come back to haunt him.
He wakes suddenly, finding himself crying, feeling a gentle hand brush away those tears.
"It's okay, Riku," Kairi says softly, "we don't blame you." She tugs him into her embrace, and he lets her, grateful that she's always there for him. That they're always there for him, after everything he did that hurt them.
"Yeah," Sora says sleepily from his other side, snuggling closer against him in search of warmth. "We love you. Besides, you came back, didn't you?" That he did…
"It's okay, Riku," Kairi repeats. "We're here for you now. Everything will be okay."
"So go back to sleep," Sora murmurs, already following his own advice. "'S pancakes inna mornin', Kairi promised…"
"I love you two too," Riku says, soaking up the love they both have for him. Really, he thinks it's that more than anything that brought him back. "Pancakes are worth going to sleep for." And as he says this, his eyes are slipping shut, the world of dreams just waiting to pull him back in. This time, he thinks they might just be happy dreams.
Until tomorrow night, that is, when the dragon-lady will return and take him back to her lair…