He woke up to the sounds of sobbing. His lover had somehow moved over to the other side of the bed, and was trembling and crying, his back to him, no longer in his arms. The low, terrified moans coming from the prone figure were a chilling contrast to the soft cries of pleasure he could usually elicit from him at night. Staring through askew blonde locks, he pulled himself over to the boy, and listened to the soft, broken pleas he was whimpering over and over, like some twisted mantra. He could barely make out words, and repeated, whimpered phrases, what sounded like pleas for help...
"..stop...please, stop..."
"..it hurts..."
"..I'm...sorry...I won't...disobey you..."
"...Russia-san..."
Feliks' heart went cold.
Reaching out with a single, feminine hand, he lightly stroked Toris' soft brown hair, willing him to wake soon - he'd learnt from experience that trying to force him to wake would only make the nightmare worse. Slipping his arms around his shivering lover, he murmured soft, comforting words to him, words he liked to pretend might just penetrate through the nightmare, and give him some source of comfort.
It seemed like an eternity until the brunette woke. But finally, his eyes shot open as he jerked painfully into awareness, choking on a breathless gasp and freezing up as his mind struggled to comprehend the reality that, no, he wasn't dying, he wasn't being beaten, he wasn't chained and bleeding in the cold and the snow at the mercy of that man...
Feliks snuggled close to him, murmuring his name, hushing him. Slender hands wrapped around him, a velvety Polish voice whispering sweet-nothings in his ear. Little i-love-yous and the wonderful, calming words only his Feliks knew how to whisper so tenderly.
Eventually, the shaking ceased, the suppressed sobbing came to a halt; the brunette was quiet again, so quiet, almost as if he'd fallen back asleep. But Feliks knew he was still awake. He would be lucky to get back to sleep at all tonight. He never did, not when this happened...
"...Liet..?"
"...hm?"
The brunette wouldn't look at him; he kept his face averted. Of course. He would insist on being reserved at a moment like this. With a small pout, Feliks reached and clasped his shoulder, tugging on it; after a moment, he succeeded in getting Toris to roll over to face him, staring at him questioningly. For a moment, all the shorter man could do was stare into his lover's eyes. At an unguarded time like this...they were full of such pain. Loneliness, confusion, fear, and overshadowing all, a weary, sad agony...
He hated it. He just wanted to kiss away the pain, he wanted it gone, the pain and the sadness and those memories, he hated waking up to his Liet shaking and sobbing in the night, he wanted it gone, all gone. But what could he do? Toris told him not to worry, that he was helping a lot more than he realised, but...if that were true, Toris would be happy, and not...like this.
How he hated seeing his Liet suffer.
It must have showed in his eyes...because suddenly, the brunette had him in his arms, and was whispering apologies to him. Soft little i'm-sorrys in that sweet, lilting low voice, yes, that's what he wanted to hear, the love in Liet's voice, the hidden warmth that wrapped him up and enveloped him, that was everything he needed, right there. But he didn't want him apologising, no, those weren't the right words. Feliks wanted to say he was sorry, because dammit, he was, he was sorry for being so useless, so unable to stop the nightmares, the memories, the pain that never healed...
He sought out Toris' lips and met them with his own, stemming the whispered flood of apologies, shutting him up in the nicest way he could. Toris melted into the kiss, gently submitting...his tears were bitter, but he still tasted so sweet. So like him, so beautiful and simple. Everything about his Baltic lover was beautiful. Even...
Feliks' arms wrapped around Toris, hands against his naked back. He could feel the broken, scarred skin under his palms. With an index finger, gently, he began to trace the network of scars and lashes which marked his lover's skin. Toris shivered; the scars didn't hurt, but at the same time, they did, they hurt like hell, in his mind, locked away with the memories of the time they were fresh...the pain was still there, it always would be. But... he held in his arms the cure to the pain, the one thing in his life that could take away the darkness, the cold, the suffering, the torture locked away in his mind which emerged to terrorise him at night.
His light; his sunshine; his Poland.
He clung to him, submitting to the gentle hands tracing patterns on his back, patterns made long ago by a whip and a cruel Russian hand. The hands that held him now would never do such a thing; he knew that, and the fact soothed him, calmed him from the cold terror of what once was - what would never be again.
"... Liet..."
That uncertain voice, again. He looked into those pale green eyes, and saw Feliks unguarded; shy, uncertain, worried, but full of love, and light, and everything he loved about him, everything that made him so wonderful.
Deep green eyes looked into his, and Feliks felt like he was drowning in them. The raw emotion, not fierce, but deep and sincere, it was so beautifully and uniquely Liet. Even when he suffered, those eyes still glowed with the gentle passion that made Feliks' heart flutter. Gazing into those emerald orbs, he spoke in a murmur, hesitating a little, but never looking away.
"..I'm, like, here for you, okay? So, um... don't be, like, scared, or anything. Nothing's gonna hurt you when I'm here."
And just like that, his Polish knight chased the nightmares away.
Toris smiled. Oh, he loved him so much.
"Thankyou..."
He really, really did.
And, moments of kissing and cuddling later, as he fell asleep in Feliks' arms, he didn't care if the nightmares came back. He could endure it all, as long as he woke up in the same precious arms he fell asleep being held by.