Awakenings

[This post is from Hecate’s point of view.]

He stiffened, blinking and trying to draw back enough to look her in the eye. Hecate just held him tighter, burying her face against his shoulder again. Matt exhaled a sigh and his arms settled around her, holding her close.

“Talk to me,” he whispered. “Grá mo chroí, just talk to me. What is it? Why him and why now?”

Her eyes stung and she swallowed hard, feeling the bile rising at the back of her throat again. “Do I have to?” she asked, the words coming as a rasp, raw and pained. “I don’t want to talk about it. I don’t want to talk about what I saw.”

“What you saw,” Matt echoed softly. His palm skated along her spine, his other arm around her waist. She rested her head against his chest again, listening to the steady beat of her heart. He was her rock, her anchor point, the port in the storm of her world. “You had a nightmare?”

“The worst kind,” she whispered, the words muffled by the soft cotton of his shirt. “The kind you want to forget as soon as you wake up but it won’t let go, like it’s burned into your memory. I keep seeing it over and over and I just want to forget, Matt. I just want to forget.”

He hushed her gently, leaning down to kiss away her tears. “It’s all right,” he whispered back. “I’m here and you’re safe and nothing’s going to hurt you as long as we’re together.”

“Or you,” she whispered. “I won’t let anything help you, either. I swear it.”

“That nightmare was something else, wasn’t it? Do you—should we–?”

She shook her head, drawing their blankets closer around them. “No. I want to stay here with you. I want to stay just like this.”

I want to stay just like this forever.

[This post is from Hecate’s point of view.]

Still, the nightmare haunted her, even as Matt held her tightly against his chest. Hecate listened to the thud of his heart, counting the beats in an effort to shake off the last vestiges of the horror she’d experienced. This—this was solid and real. That was nothing but an ephemeral thing, a spectre conjured by her darkest fears. It wasn’t anything to dwell on.

And yet…

It wouldn’t let go of her. She kept seeing the images from that nightmare over and over again, kept seeing Cíar taken from her—a punishment, Aietes roared at her, for her blatant disrespect and refusal to cooperate with him. She could hear the crack of the whip, taste the salt of her tears and the copper of blood from a bitten lip—a lip bitten to keep from screaming, because screaming at her former husband to stop had only made him angrier, made him attack Cíar all the more savagely.

It was as much dream as it was memory—there had been beatings, though most of those had been designed to keep Cíar in line, not her. He’d been willful, especially at the beginning. As they grew closer, threats against her had worked—it was something she’d tried hard to forget. Not everything had remained a secret. Aietes had railed against it when it had happened, but when Cíar had been given to her custody, things had been easier for Olympium, but not for her. Aietes hadn’t wanted to let her go and it had taken more pleading than she liked to remember to win free of that binding.

The dream had changed abruptly, and that was the part that terrified her more than any memory ever could have. Cíar had become Matt and the whip had grown barbs, flaying his back open until all she could see was red. She remember choking on bile, shaking all over, and screaming, unable to stop herself. It hadn’t made a difference. Aietes had turned to her and smiled that wicked, cruel smile of his, the hungry one that warned of more and worse to come.

Then he’d come to her, hands still drenched in the blood of both of her lovers.

Mercifully, she couldn’t remember anything else—didn’t want to, not now or ever.

“You’re crying,” Matt whispered. “’Peia, what is it?”

“I will never let him hurt you,” she whispered, blinking back the tears as she looked up at him. “Never.”

“Who?”

“Aietes,” she whispered. “I will never let him touch you. No matter what. I promise—I swear it.”

[This post is from Hecate’s point of view.]

Startling awake with a gasp, trying to shake free the last vestiges of her nightmare, Hecate pressed a little closer to Matt, burrowing deeper beneath their shared covers. The freshly healed scar in her side twinged and burned in turns, bile rising hot and sour in the back of her throat, leaving it aching and raw. She felt like she’d been screaming in her sleep but knew she couldn’t have been because Matt was still out like a light, his arms cocooning her in warmth, in safety.

And yet, the nightmares still came.

Hecate squeezed her eyes shut against tears that stung, exhaling in a shaky sigh. It’s all right. You’re safe. Nothing can hurt you. You’re safe. You’re home. You’re fine. Everything is okay.

Matt stirred slightly as she pressed closer, fingers tangling in the blankets and the fabric of his shirt. His hand drifted higher under their blankets, palm skating along her spine until his fingers were laced through her hair.

“Shhh,” he breathed without opening his eyes. “It’s all right.”

Her heart missed a beat and she swallowed hard, shivering slightly. “How—?”

“I think I know you by now,” he murmured, drawing her tighter even as she wrapped one of her legs around his, toes scraping against the back of his calf. “Felt you startle awake. What’s the matter?”

“Just nightmares,” she whispered. “That’s all.”

As terrifying as they’d been, that was all they were—nightmares born of the ghosts of memories long buried in her past. All of it was long ago and far away. Her world was different now. She had a family again, people who cared.

For all that had happened in the last year, for all that she had lost over all the centuries, she’d gained so, so much more.

“Nothing’s going to hurt you,” he murmured into her hair. “Not so long as I’m here.”

“I know,” she whispered back. “I know.”