Series Title: How to Tame Your Volga
Disclaimer: I don't own HW.
Author's Notes: This is a direct continuation from the previous entry. If you haven't read it, you might want to do that first for full context. I think it works as a stand-alone in a general sense, but it works better with the previous entry.
And now the balm for those wounds. As always, thanks for reading.
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Story Title: All Is Right and Good Once More
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Link woke up with a jolt. He panicked and swiped at the shadows, not knowing where he was going and where Volga had been taken. The dragon's head had just been in his arms. He didn't remember much from what had happened after he had swung his sword. A strained cry creaked out from Link's tight throat. His hands reached out and fumbled in the dark for a dragon knight that was not there. Not any longer. ...Or not yet. It took a moment for the last of the fog of sleep to let him go and for the real world to come into truth once more.
It had only been a nightmare. A lie. A fear he held in his heart and hoped never came to pass.
Link wiped away the hot tear tracks streaking down his face. He breathed in slowly, taking his time to fill his lungs to capacity before slowly exhaling. Over and over. He needed to calm the storm in his shaken heart. He was surprised that no one had heard him crying out and checked in on him after...what he had done to Volga. Link shook his head. That wasn't real, he reminded himself. That had only been in a dream.
His room at the inn was dark and unfamiliar. Link longed for his own bed back home and the familiar shapes and shadows surrounding him at night. Above all else, he longed for Volga. This room was cold and empty without the dragon knight's presence occupying Link's attention. Nothing would have burned away the nightmare quicker than the dragon knight holding him in the dark, and his thick arms tightening around him until the pressure on his bones was just that right balance between comfort and pain. Link wished he was here. His mind and soul needed him, and the dragon knight was nowhere close.
Link climbed out of bed and headed straight out the door. He didn't change his clothes or slip on his boots. He had to find Volga and see with his own eyes that the nightmare was over. The crisp night air slapped his face with a burning sting. His tunic clung to his back from his cold sweat. Speeding up to a run did nothing to fight off the chill. He was shivering by the time he found the dragon knight sitting on the ridge overlooking the village. Volga had his reasons to be here, though what reason exactly Link was unsure. A need to survey his territory, temporary as it was, perhaps. It was possibly something as simple and silly as the dragon knight did not wish to stay among the Hyrulean forces while they occupied this village.
Volga heard Link's bare footsteps on the rock's flat surface as he approached him. "Why do you concern yourself with my whereabouts when you should be in bed?" he grumbled, without bothering to peer away from his self-imposed lookout. Not that he really needed to. Only Link would have went looking for him in the first place.
Link didn't answer his question. He threw his arms around Volga's neck and draped himself over his shoulders and back. Volga growled low, but having grown more used to Link's sudden hugs, he did not immediately twist his shoulders and order him to get off. Still the dragon knight was only going to tolerate his position for a minute at most, so Link had to relish the time given to him. He was just so relieved to confirm that Volga was okay. It had all been a bad dream. Just a stupid, terrible dream.
It was all just so overwhelming his myriad of emotions were. Link scrunched up his face to keep his tears from falling, but fat tears escaped and dripped down onto Volga's long-sleeved shirt. And the dragon knight took notice. There wasn't much Volga could see, but he could feel the tension in Link's shaking body and heard his sniffling and the short, hitching breaths he tried to muffle.
Volga's harsh exterior immediately fell apart. "Again?" he asked softly.
Link shook his head yes. Several more tears flung onto the dark fabric.
Volga leaned in and nudged his nose against Link's cheek. He tried to get him to lift his head with another nudge, but Link wasn't being very cooperative. Still Volga was trying. His way of comforting him, he supposed. Really, it was nice. The little forehead bumps. His deep, reassuring rumble. The scratchiness of Volga's rough stubble on his clean face. The dragon knight's lips gliding across his cheekbones. Light touches. Warm breath. Little reminders that he was here and all was well. Volga planted a small kiss on the corner of his mouth. Volga was many things, and occasionally he was sweet.
"Come," Volga said, reaching back and tugging Link forward by his nightshirt.
Link accepted the invitation and sat in his lap, facing toward the dragon knight. He wrapped his arms and legs around his barrel chest and clung to him tightly. No blade wedged between them was going to pry him from his dragon. Link buried his face in his pecs, giving himself just enough breathing room in the pit of his chest. Volga laid a hand on the back of Link's head and pressed his face a little closer in. Volga's chest fluttered as he chuckled in amusement.
Squeezed snugly in the dragon knight's arms, his bones on the verge of aching, nothing felt more safe and right to Link. It was everything he had wanted from him. Volga kissed the top of his head, and then did not pull away. Link grinned to himself. He always did like proving him wrong.
While it had been horrific in the moment, his nightmare was merely a lie, not a portent of the future. And that was all it was ever going to be. Volga had been touched by darkness, led astray by its powerful sway, but there was no more room in Volga's heart for Cia's dark magic to worm itself into. Certain of this truth, and surrounded by a most familiar presence, one he knew better than home, Link was slowly lulled back to sleep.