Some fights are... less tidy than others. Despite having access to the king's incredible well of magic, Nyx sometimes finds himself falling back on older instincts, the ones written into his very blood, passed down by generations of hunters and warriors. The Galahdians are—were—a people long defined by their physical prowess and ability to live off the land, no warring empires or sovereigns needed. A people born of their own strength, where physical weakness has always been frowned upon as less worthy.
So when that coeurl attacked the band of refugees, Nyx reacted without thought. Instinct overruled sense, overruled the tidy precision of the king's magic, and he fought, beast pitted against beast, blood and teeth and claws and the primal roars of savage beings struggling for their very lives.
One walked away, head lifted high despite mangled, bloody braids and the hobbling pain of a sliced-open thigh. In his hand he clutched the speckled tail: a trophy that was his right to take.
Coeurls are solitary, aggressive creatures with far-reaching territories—he said as much to Lunafreya when she asked if they were in any further danger; then, answer given, he was pointed in the direction of the nearby river and told in no uncertain terms that he was to return to the slow-moving convoy only when he was presentable once more.
It doesn't occur to him until he's standing on the bank of the river, shaded by a thick grove of bushes, that his leg is on fire and Lunafreya made no attempt to heal him. And somehow that pain cuts even deeper than the coeurl's knifelike claws—it's all he can do to keep his feet under him as he struggles through a sudden rush of disorientation.
It's just the backwashing adrenaline (mostly). He's gone through this before, the way a fight will kick his awareness of the world out from beneath his feet, but that doesn't make it any easier, and he blinks back to the present to find himself on his knees, one hand wrapped around his bloody, throbbing thigh, the other clutching the long grass growing at the water's edge.
A soft touch to the back of his head makes him slump further; he would know Lunafreya's hands in any life, on any world. "Princess, I—you shouldn't—"
His tongue is heavy, a dead thing in his mouth. It certainly tastes dead, and he coughs, trying to clear the sharp metallic coating lining his throat as he ducks away from her hand, abruptly and horrifyingly aware of just how filthy he is: covered in blood and gore and viscera, clinging to his skin, his clothing, his hair. It's vile, no sight a princess should ever have to witness, and he tries to brush her away. "No, let me—you should go so I can—"
"Nyx."
The steel in her voice, the satin of her touch—something makes him pause, makes him blink through crusted eyelashes up at her, outline softened by the dappled light but with a spark in her eyes like flint, like sun pouring down from the heavens to scorch all below. He swallows, grimaces at the taste of flesh, longed for, loathed. "Princess?"
"Strip."
He gapes, thoughts tripping one after the other after the other over themselves, experienced less as coherent images and more as a series of gut-punch emotions that leave him reeling. He seems to reel a lot around her. "What?"
She sighs, a sharp little sound that means he's not keeping up with her, a sound he often hears when he's around her, but the way her thumb touches his cheek is nothing but gentle. "Clothes off. Wash. Let me heal you."
Oh. Right, of course. His leg. He'd almost—almost—forgotten.
HIs hands are shakier than he'd like when he pushes himself to his feet with a nod. "Are you...?"
"Don't think," she instructs as her slim fingers make quick work of his coat's buttons. "Just do as I say."
Not having to think is a relief—he doesn't want to think, doesn't want to have to process what he did, what she saw, what she now knows. So he lets her sully her fingers on him, doesn't protest as she takes his weapons and his clothes and sets them beneath a bush, goes when her hands guide him into the water.
It burns his leg like fire, searing his mind into a blank space before thoughts flicker back to life, bright bursts of color that pop inside his head, make him remember who and what and where and oh astrals the princess is going to hate me now—
He's under the water before he knows it, hiding his shame, his rage, his resurging adrenaline, fingers scouring his skin like he'll be able to wash away the remains of his inner beast come to life. But he has to breathe eventually, so he breaks surface, sucks in a ragged breath of sunshine and clean fir.
And almost throws himself across the river when her hand finds his hair once more, combing through the soggy remains of his braids. Only because it's her does he go still, stiff, trying to work out why exactly she's so close, how she's gotten here with him. "Princess, what—"
"Hush." A palmful of water gets tipped over his head, then another and another, and though they don't run into his eyes, he finds himself blinking anyway, shaken by the way he hasn't yet been left alone. He deserves to be alone, deserves to lick his wounds in peace, and yet... she's stayed. Maybe, just maybe...
Once his hair is deemed clean, his shoulder is nudged and he finds himself turning around to face the marvel that is Lunafreya, the water's reflections playing around the lines of her collarbones, the edges of her eyes as her fingers ghost over his thigh. He hisses, tries not to jerk back as the deep slice flames hot under her touch, the discomfort of forced, rapid healing.
When the incantation is finished, soft words spoken through softer-looking lips, she looks up at him again, eyes bright with a sheen of tears that haven't yet fallen. "I thought I was going to lose you."
His fingers find her cheek, and though he doesn't deserve it, she leans into his touch, her hands grasping at his hips. "I'm here, I promise, I'm not going anywhere."
She surges forward then, a rush of water preluding the heat of her lips against his, the scrape of teeth over teeth as he reacts without thinking, wet fingers tangling into dry hair as he presses closer, drawn to the soft heat of her body, the sweet taste of her mouth, the comfort and reassurance and desire given and taken until he loops an arm around her and kicks off the silty bottom of the river so he can guide them both to shore.
"Nyx? What are—"
"I want you," he growls, fingers sinking deep into her soft sides as he lifts her to set her on the bed of grass carpeting the bank.
She gasps, clutching at his shoulders, his arms, and it's all he can do to not kiss her again. "I—yes, Nyx, please."
He hauls himself out of the water after her and bites the top of her shoulder, which earns him a startled sound that pierces through his head like a blade through flesh, halts him in his tracks. "Princess... I..."
"Nyx." Her expression is shrewd somewhere beneath the flush that's risen up her throat and across her cheeks. Always, always she can see to the heart of him. "I want this. Want you. Don't doubt yourself. Just take what you want, what you need."
It's permission and an order bundled into one, and he, perhaps too easily, gives in, searing the pale expanse of her skin with kisses as he takes her on the bank of the river, laying his claim to her in every way he can.
After, nestled together in the soft grass with her fingers roaming through his hair and her soft, sleepy words murmured to the crown of his head—a satisfied litany of "My warrior, my protector, my brave, strong Nyx"—he finds himself utterly spent, drifting, thoughts slowed but not quite stilled, and he clutches both her softness and the understanding she brings by way of her acceptance and her love, and he knows peace.