Her eyes close slightly, leaning into the touch.
“Don’t look at me like that,” she murmurs, voice soft. “You’re wrecked.”
“We’re both wrecked,” I reply. My fingers press soft along her jawline, over the curve of her cheekbone, where a bruise isalready blossoming purple. I taste salt — sweat, ash, fear, and relief. I breathe it in.
“Tonight,” I whisper. “We lay down the war. We lay down the armor.”
She nods. Not with words. I can feel it in the way her shoulders slump. The way her breath shallows.
I slide the ragged cloak from my shoulders — the one with scorched edges, blood-slick seams, patches of old repair. I let it fall against broken steel. My chest is bare now — bone-spurs cracked, ribs carved by blade-shrapnel, flesh mottled with old scars and fresh burns. The air is cool against my skin — cold and sharp, alive.
Freya watches. Her eyes flick down, up, then meet mine again — steady. There’s no fear. No flinch.
She stands and slowly, carefully, begins to slide off her own torn armor. The cloth of her uniform rips in little threads, fabric dust puffing soft as ash. Her skin — human, warm, trembling under the pale light — shows scars I helped her ignore before: a faded line across her ribs, a shallow mark on her shoulder, a bruise still red on her thigh. I taste grief, yes — but also something stronger.
Trust.
When she stands before me, unclad of armor but still strong in muscle and will, I rise too. The gravity of scars, of survival, presses between us like promise.
I reach for the length of cloth draped over the bed — rough-woven, soot-marred — and fold it into a soft strap. I hold it out.
“May I?” I ask, voice low.
She watches me, then nods — slow. Acceptance, not command.
I move gently, kneeling behind her, sliding the cloth around her wrists — not tight, just snug. Light, careful. I tie a simpleknot. I slip a finger under the loop, testing the slack. There’s space for breath, for movement, for comfort.
She doesn’t resist. She stands still, shoulders square, chin tilted back. She tastes of sweat and ash and fire-light. She smells like survival.
“You good?” I murmur.
She turns her head slightly, lips quirking. “I don’t know yet,” she whispers. Then her eyes find mine. “But I’m not afraid.”
The motion sends a pulse through me — something ancient, raw, old as bone.
I brush the back of my hand across her cheek, soft as smoke. And then I kiss her — slow, reverent. No rush. No hunger. Not yet. Just breath, lips, skin pressed close, heat pooling between us.
She rests her forehead against mine. Quiet.
“Tell me what you feel,” I whisper.
Her breath comes fast — but steady. She closes her eyes. I can feel the flutter of her lashes as she smiles against me.
“Alive,” she breathes. “Broken. But alive. With you.”
That word — with you — moves through me like a drum-beat in bone.
I lift my hands to her waist, slide them down along ribs bruised but soft, along skin warm and scar-sweet. Each stroke is slow, sacred — as if I’m memorizing every scar, every curve, every breath she’s saved just for me.
She takes a step back, reaches for me. Claws against flesh, bone against bone. Her fingers dig into me — not bruising, but holding. Grip firm. Intent sure.
I close the distance. Bridge between ribs and shoulders, join skin against skin. The world outside — with its smoke and screams, betrayal and ash — fades. All I feel is her. All I hear is breath, ragged but alive; the soft thrum of armor shifting; thedistant groan of stone settling under wreckage, like the planet itself exhaling after war.
We don’t move fast. There’s no urgency in our trembling limbs. No hunger in our kiss. Just … presence. Mutual claiming. Fragile trust.
I taste sweat and salt. I taste ash and hope.
She trails her fingers down my spine — over scars, over healed slices, over old bone-breaks that left ridges under skin. I don’t flinch. I don’t pull away.
