fondofapples | Inbox -- Genessia

Regina Mills
~~Queen~~ ~~Mayor~~ Mother
Sorceress
Fond of Plants

"You've reached the inbox of Regina Mills. Leave a message. If it's urgent, it's probably too late."

(text, voice, video, action, ooc planning if necessary for Genessia only)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

fondofapples

Over the past few hours, the sweating had stopped, the moaning had quieted, and Regina had started to believe the worst was over. She'd switched from potions to broth, trying to get a bit of warmth and salt into him instead of the sugar she'd been giving the fire to burn before.

She'd let herself sit for ten whole minutes at one point, drink a whole cup of coffee, brush her hair and touch up her makeup because she didn't want to look a mess when he woke this time, text the children--no promises, but making a point to sound a little more upbeat.

And she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt, it was that cup of coffee, the five minutes looking in the mirror that made her miss it, miss the turning point from lowering temperature to cold.

He'd said to get the doctors then, but there was no time. The time it would take to explain, even if she teleported him in, he'd freeze to death.

"I'm sorry... I'm so sorry," she whispered to him as she cranked up the heat on the heating blanket and piled on a weighted blanket it would be hard from him to spill off if he shuddered too hard. She cursed herself while she waited for the water to boil to make tea.

It wouldn't be enough, and she couldn't trust him to stay conscious to deal with flame if she gave it to him. So when she put the tea in his hands, she did the only thing she knew that would be. She stepped into the living room, and without looking at herself in mirror, plucked her heart from her chest. Then she put it in a box beside his.

She returned less than a minute later with another blanket from the couch, showing nothing on her face, and then draped the blanket around his shoulders. And for as long as he stayed awake, she gave him tea, broth, offered him a hot bath, anything she could think of to warm him even a bit.

The second he dropped off to sleep, she traded her clothes for a thin silk shift and slid into bed beside him. Even though he was cold to the touch, she wrapped herself around him. Layer by layer, she constructed in her mind the feeling that she was fevered, dangerously hot, focused everything on needing to be cool.

And then, heartless, she told him a lie.

"Neil," she called softly, so softly, just loud enough to activate his summoning spell, and let him feel how much she needed to be cool. "Please. I'm so hot. Help me." And then she slumped against him as though she'd passed out.

From:

hellorhighwater

Neil...

Neil’s eyes snapped open, the summoning spell pouring visions of fire and heat into his head, burning skin and fever beyond his own. Turning his head, he saw her there, felt her body slack against his...

In his fever mad mind, she was glowing, a hearth for him—a promise of relief.

With the little strength he had, Neil rolled over on his side, arm draping across her waist. Bending his head, he pressed dry, fever chapped lips to hers with a shaky sigh. His skin was still cool to the touch, his breath chilled as it feathered against her face.

“Jon uraidh ahn.” I’ve got you.

Kissing her, Neil drew her body heat into himself, warming his own body from hers...and once he started, he couldn’t find the strength to stop.

From:

fondofapples

It took every ounce of her will not to pull away or shiver, and instead remain pliant in his arms as though she were unconscious and burning with fever--until it wasn't difficult at all, because she lost consciousness.

In the moments between feeling her life bleeding away with her heat and feeling nothing at all, Regina noticed Neil's body warming. She opened her eyes to see him and smiled. He'd be all right, now. And without her own heart, she faced the unknown of what would come in calm and relative peace.

I love you.

From:

hellorhighwater

The lips against his were turning cold, dangerously so--but Neil couldn't stop. He was warm again, and he couldn't think around it, or the exhaustion, or the comfort of Regina's body tucked safely against his, where it belonged...

Pain ripped through him--a snap of agony as something in him severed, then a chill that shook him with such force that he let her go, falling on his back as his body seized.

Then there was heat--heat like he'd never felt before, heat flooding skin and muscle and filling his blood as the fire released its grip on him and greedily set to devouring the meal he'd given it.

With a shudder, his eyes rolled back into his head and he lost consciousness--and for the first time in nearly four days, finally entered a deep, healing sleep.

* * * * *

Neil's fucking head was killing him.

Groaning, he covered his eyes, groggy and sore and still wrung out. Everything was a haze, but he could think straight, at least. Maybe the fever hadn't been as bad as he thought? He'd dealt with short ones before.

With a grunt, Neil rolled over to fling an arm around Regina's waist--and was dragged from the hazy, sickly fog of sleep by the chill of the body at his side.

Sitting bolt upright, his entire body protested with pain and the noisome lurch of his stomach--both of which he ignored as he looked down in horror at the limp, cold body in bed with him. There were hazy things floating around in the back of his head, but nothing he could piece together with any certainty...

"No...ohhh, no no no--Regina? Regina, wake up." The words were a moan a he cradled her cheek, patting it gently, thinking far too clearly for the fear he felt. It more resembled the place he killed in, the white noise where he comfortably took life and dipped his hands in blood for love of king and kingdom...and sometimes, merely for pleasure.

Slipping his hand under the strap of her shift, he laid his palm against her chest and reached for his fire, channeling heat directly into her body without care for how hard his own was working to accomplish it. Beneath his skin, the veins and capillaries in his hand and fingers glowed like magma beneath his skin, his heart racing with the effort it took to force heat into her body, not merely channeling but forcing it in as deep and as fast as he could.

"C'mon, Regina...c'mon, wake up...mighty Ember, hear me--exaudi me Sol Dea, mighty Sky Maker...I have given you my life, my blood, my salvation--don't ask me to give you this woman..."

Leaning in, he kissed her, quick and desperate, resting his forehead against hers. Her skin was warming...but it still felt too cool.

He kept pouring the heat of his dragon fire into her.

"Beloved...wake up, Beloved. Wake up...I can't be the one to kill you. Don't let me be the one that killed you..."

From:

fondofapples

Cast deep into the recesses of her own mind, Regina had no awareness of time passing. She floated through one nightmarescape after another, no meaning to the sequence, and only the most minimal awareness--

She'd lied to Neil to save him and he wouldn't forgive her.

She wandered a wasteland scorched by dragon fire and couldn't find him, or Maleficent, and the sun neither rose nor set.

Henry called to her across a wreath of flame and she couldn't reach him.

Evie cursed her at what must've been a funeral.

Alice and Arya slaved over shoe leather in a factory.

Emma married Neil and took him home to Storybrooke. Zelena killed her and took Neil for herself.

And those were only the coherent torments. There were nightmare shadows, cthonic deities, blazing goddesses, Fairy Godmother riding a flame lion in the shape of Robin's tattoo. The stench of burned herbs and flesh and coffee pots that never came clean. Sweat turning to ice and choking her to death.

At one point she heard Neil wailing, voice echoing in canyons of ice. She tried to go to him, but the passes were melting, leaving her trapped.

But outside her mind, she remained cold, stiff, and still.

From:

hellorhighwater

It wasn't working. The gods weren't listening...he'd killed her.

Screwing his eyes shut, tears fell hot against her skin as he buried his head against her chest, still pouring his heat into her. He couldn't stop, couldn't stop trying, fighting, hoping. She'd done that to him, taught him to hope and believe and expect better.

Neil wasn't allowed to keep the good things, and this time it was his fault.

He'd killed his own mate.

"Give her back." he begged, the low keening sound of an animal in pain. "Dahgo inguz, vir qui naz mori--give her back to me or I'll turn your sky red with blood, my Goddess. I will cut out the heart of your Sky Maker, and I will burn it in front of your beloved son. I will snuff out every light the Ember has ever ignited if you don't give her back to me."

Even as he said it, he knew he wouldn't. He couldn't--not even his king could command him anymore. Even in death, Regina held fast to his sword arm--as readily as if her fingers were wrapped around his wrist, binding him as powerfully as her word to be still, to be hers, to be better.

Lifting his head, Neil kissed her again, tears on his lips as his free hand cradled her cold cheek--then pressed his face against her neck and let out an anguished, animal howl of pain muffled by her skin.

From:

fondofapples

Everywhere around her ice was melting, making islands amidst a still-cold sea, and they floated apart, too fast. Too fast for her to jump from one to the next, when she didn't know where she was trying to go in the first place. She was too warm, too, far too warm even though she ran across the icy ground barefoot and in nothing but a shift.

The wind howled, and out on a tundra some creature howled with it. It swirled around like... like something she couldn't quite remember, except that the color was wrong.

She grew tired and found a chunk of ice on which to sit. It became a bench and then a glass coffin, and she lay down. In the hands upon her breast, there rested an apple with a single bite taken from it. A crown slipped off her sweat-damp hair and crashed through the wall of the crystal coffin, or the howl shattered it, or perhaps the sea was melting it, she tasted it on her lips.

The howl took on a familiar tenor, and it called to her. The creature making that sound needed her. She sat up in her coffin of melting glass-ice and tried to place the sound.

She remembered the children first. Henry. Evie. Arya. Alice. Charlie. They needed her, but it wasn't any of their anguish that weighed so heavy on her chest and her neck. It was...

Oh Neil.

The winds that swirled changed temperature, became a gentle slinky mist. They darkened, gained visibility and turned purple. She remembered then, she didn't need to run and jump. She could teleport right to him. The mists whisked her away--

And her eyes opened.

One still chilled hand lifted without conscious though to cradle the back of his head and hold him against her. With consciousness came memory and enough anger to get her blood moving.

"You put your name in the box. You asshole," she croaked, voice raw and cracked, but somehow still warm. And then she gentled, stroked his hair. "It's all right, my love. I'm all right."

From:

hellorhighwater

He felt her shift before he felt the hand against the back of his head--keenly aware of the stillness of the body in his arms, shattering when he felt life in it again.

He was relieved, joyous--but still, for some reason, as her hand ran over his hair, as her voice rang in his ears, he couldn't stop the tears. Everything was agony and horror for how close he'd come, everything was jubilation and raw, bleeding relief for having his prayers answered.

Then he remembered how she got here--remembered the fever, and his head shot up to look down at her.

The eyes blazing into hers were still openly brimming with that relief, that anguish--and with blind, screaming rage. It rendered them bright as they had been with fever all over again--but the face that had been either flush with fever, gleaming with sweat, or just plain ashen for days was merely pale, mostly from the shadows of poor sleep beneath his eyes and the remnants of illness borne fatigue still clinging to him.

His hand shook with rage as he cradled her cheek, but his touch was reverent and infinitely gentle.

"Look who's fucking talking, shithead." he snarled softly just before pressing a greedy, desperate kiss against her mouth. "You let me try to kill you--I almost did. Bitch. I fucking hate you."

He immediately kissed her again, covering her body with his, not to seduce but to keep her there, to force more warmth into her still chilled skin--to reassure himself that she was alive and breathing and wasn't going to fucking leave him like that again.

From:

fondofapples

If her heart had been where it belonged, she might have responded to him in tight, bitter fury for the language, the hurtful words, but its absence cut the pain and left her smiling against his mouth. If he could curse her, he would live.

And then she remembered...

Heart or no heart, there was no stopping the tears spilling hot and fast down her cheeks and her cold, stiff arms wrapped under his arms and hands hooked to his shoulders--and held fast. She opened her mouth under his kiss and kissed back, starving for the feel of him alive and conscious and aware again.

It would be worse, too, when she gave them both back their hearts, but she didn't want to miss a single ounce of the joy and relief, gratitude to his faith and his goddess and god for bringing him back to her when she was so sure she'd killed him with her vanity.

Through her tears, she whispered, "In the living room. Top drawer in the desk. Two boxes. Bring them to me?" Because she was far too cold still to get out of bed, and with hearts, she wouldn't risk magic to get them.

From:

hellorhighwater

Neil almost told her to go to hell--not to be a bastard, but because the idea of leaving her terrified him. Getting up meant not being near her, and he was irrationally afraid of her slipping away in his absence.

Deciding on a compromise, he kissed her one more time and slid to the edge of the mattress, getting to his feet--and nearly falling as his knees tried to give way. Catching himself on the mattress before he could go down, he waited and tested his legs until he was sure they would support him, then carefully stood upright. Calling up a small ball of dragon fire, he contracted his fingers around it and then flung it towards the bed. Rather than lobbing a fireball, the dragon fire erupted in a shower of sparks that dispersed over mattress and blankets before disappearing, leaving heat in their wake to keep her warm in his absence.

"If you die, I'm gonna stab myself in the face and come after you!" he growled in warning before exiting the room to do as she asked. Locating both boxes, he obeyed without thinking to stop and look at what was inside, carrying them back into the bedroom with cautious, shuffling steps and setting them on the bed as he sat down on the edge of the mattress.

"Okay. What'd I get these for?"

From:

fondofapples

"I'm not dying!" she called after him, then sank back into the luxurious heat of the bed. For all she'd been near death minutes ago, he'd put so much heat into her that she was just cold, hypothermic now.

If she looked in a mirror, which she wasn't going to do, she knew her lips would still be somewhat blue. The skin beneath her fingernails was and she couldn't quite feel her toes or her fingertips. But she was in no danger as long as her mate came back today.

She closed her eyes -- and almost immediately drifted off, so much so that she was startled a few moments later when he appeared again. Her eyes opened and she had to think about it again, chase down the reason she'd--oh yes.

She propped herself up summoned another pillow to put behind her. With a wiggle of her fingers, she drew the two boxes to her. Which was which? At first, she couldn't recall, but then she remembered and took her own.

After flipping the lid open, she showed it to him, took it again, and slammed it back into her chest. The emotions slammed back at her, but she persevered, took his heart and explained, "I took it when you were unconscious. I didn't want you to see it, and have it damage your faith, but I needed it to control you with if you got violent..."

She felt...so many things about having done it, but regret wasn't one of them. It had worked and they were both still here.

From:

hellorhighwater

The sight of her heart was both disturbing and a relief—he still remembered what she said about her mate’s wife, how removing her heart saved her life. It was smart...stupid, but smart.

The sight of his own heart, however, smoothed that stunned and worried look off his face in favor of a smile instead.

“Seeing my heart don’t break my faith, Beloved—I put my heart in your hands,
course you could pull it out.” He grinned, nodding towards it. “Looks real, don’t it? But you don’t gotta sweat it—it’s an illusion, no one else but you can touch it.”

From:

fondofapples

Exhausted and still chilled to the bone, Regina's brain was sluggish, far too sluggish to argue with him even if she'd really wanted to. What she did manage to say before being wracked with an impressive shiver and chattering teeth was, "More of a conjuration." But then she was shaking and reaching out to him, as much for his arms around her as to put his heart back where she'd found it. Because it didn't follow that she'd taken nothing from him, even if the shape she'd taken it in didn't (whether in his mind or in actuality) exist.

"Come back to bed, love," she half-moaned through chattering teeth. They need to let the kids know he was all right, but they could do it from bed with her tucked close and tangled with him.

From:

hellorhighwater

Neil didn't hesitate to make sure both boxes were out of the way and slide into bed beside Regina. His temperature was back to normal--uncomfortably warm, of course, to anyone not chilled as she was. Pulling her against his bare chest, Neil quickly summoned a small ball of fire, then rolled it onto the back of his hand to sink into his skin, turning his hand into living coals that he immediately curled against the back of her neck.

"So tell me how all this happened while I warm you the hell back up." he instructed softly, shutting his eyes and channeling heat into her body through the hand at her nape. As he'd done in treating her headache a few weeks before, he followed his magic through skin and into her body, projecting his consciousness into her so he could work to raise her body temperature to something more comfortable.

"How the fuck did I get close enough to put you down? I don't remember much, but I'm pretty fuckin' sure I told you how to read any cues that said I was comin' to fuckin' kill you, goddamnit."

From:

fondofapples

"You didn't," she murmured, tucking her nose into the crook of his neck, equally to warm it and to enjoy the safety of the closeness his fever had robbed from her for four days now and almost forever.

Even the awareness of it was enough to set the tears sliding down her cheeks again; she might have held them back easily enough if she weren't so very, very tired. But then again, why should she? Why should she not let her mate see how much this had taken from her, how much she had missed him, how scared she had been of losing him?

"You were better. I took ten minutes for a cup of coffee and to clean up. When I checked again, you were cold. Doctors wouldn't be fast enough. You weren't conscious to handle fire if I made it. The only safe heat I had for you, real heat, was mine."

Heating blankets weren't the same, for whatever reason. The warmth couldn't be drawn from them the same way. Or it wasn't equivalent. It was something she'd learned. Heating blankets could keep him from getting colder, but they did very little to raise his overall temperature.

"I had to. I promised Charlie and Alice." I'll do everything I can to bring him home. If not in so many words, it had been implicit. "Call or text them...they need to know..." Her eyes had closed but tears still leaked from the corners; she pried them open. "...and Arya and Evie and Emma..."

Her lashes dropped again. Her mind wandered. How long had it been? Seconds or minutes? She forced them open again barely. "I missed you... I'm so so tired, and I missed you so much."

From:

hellorhighwater

Her voice was distorted filtered not through sound waves, but the vibrations inside her own skull. It lent a strange intimacy to her admissions, and talking about the kids...

As he channeled heat directly into her bloodstream, he felt the moment she nodded off and held his tongue, focusing instead on warming her blood, making sure the heart that slowed in sleep continued its steady, unceasing beat.

When she woke, he felt it, the spike in her pulse, the contraction of her veins that threatened to chill her again. It took some effort, deep as his awareness was in trying to manipulate her temperature, but he pulled at his limited control of his own body to tighten his arms around her, to hold her a little tighter as he made a decision and sighed.

“Tell me about the kids—how they’re handling this and how they’ve been when you talked to ‘em.” He asked softly. “Don’t worry if I get quiet, just...tryin’ something complicated to warm you up.”

From:

fondofapples

It was hard, so hard to stay awake. So hard not to cry when she was, from the weakness, the exhaustion, the misery of four days of watching the dragon fire try to kill him and having only the most rudimentary medicine and magic to help him fight. But there was... at least some comfort in him being here with her now.

It hurt when he asked about the kids instead of reassuring her, but she knew it wouldn't if she weren't so unwell. And he was trying to heal her, so really he was taking care of her first. But she had to tell herself that, and it felt small and selfish and she didn't like it.

Instead of indulgence the weakness and resentment, she forced herself awake to tell him: "Charlie's a wreck. She trusted me, but she knew if I wasn't letting her see you, it was bad. She asked me to explain what was happening, and I know you didn't want her to know how bad it was, but I couldn't lie to her. I explained the situation, left out the consequences she could figure for herself, and I've texted her here and there since to reassure her you were still alive. It's been... gods, I don't know, maybe six hours since the last time?

It was getting easier to think, anyway, if not to stay awake with him so warm and so close, and everything pulling her down down down again. She fought it, pulled her eyes open again. "Arya didn't ask questions. She doesn't. I think she didn't expect you to come home. Because in her world and her life, you wouldn't have. She didn't fuss or try to see you, because she knows this was nothing she could fight, and the best she could do was let me.

"Evie... I think Evie was more worried for me than you," and of course she would be, because as much as she liked Neil, he wasn't her father yet. But also... "She knows about Robin and Marian, and about Daniel, so... But I think... I think it would matter to her to know if anything happened to me you would still think of her as family..."

She was rambling, four days without sleep did that to a person, she knew, but it was frustrating when she tried so hard to be precise in speech. Less chilled, at least, the arms she'd had crossed over her chest, keeping her breasts close together for warmth, now slackened and slipped free to wrap around him instead.

"Alice was very scared you wouldn't be coming home. She asked me if we were... I couldn't lie to her any more than Charlie, but I promised I'd do everything I could. I know she heard what I didn't say, and she's a good, smart, sweet child, so she didn't push... But she's going to need a lot of comfort, even if she doesn't know it."

What she didn't do complain or protest how hard it had been. That was her job as a mother, but she never wanted to handle their fears alone if she didn't have to. Because as their father, that was his job, too. Just then, she heard it in her thoughts, the change--mother and father, something had knit them all closer in fighting to keep him alive. And that? She relished.

"I really hope I did all right by Charlie. I promise I tried."

From:

hellorhighwater

Neil focused on her voice, anchoring himself to it as he pushed more heat into her body, more of his magic to follow into her veins, through her tissues...and deeper still...

He hated going this deep, hated drifting beyond the safety of blood and muscle and bone. Here, within the core of all of them, the cells of her body, he couldn't hear her words, nor feel them through the resonance of bone. Here, he could see them in the core of every single one, in that spark of energy that existed to tell them not merely to continue growing and multiplying, but told them why. It had a light he couldn't describe, a function he could barely comprehend well enough to define, but it was the spark that generated the essence of the heat he stole to feed his power.

That spark echoed, shimmered, danced with every word, with desperation and joy and love--and exhaustion. That spark still burned, but it was burning low, drained by what he'd done and what she'd been through, caring for him.

Even now, he had to fight the urge that made him hate this place--made it so he didn't venture down this deep unless he had absolutely no choice. That spark, that heat...some form of fire lived in this, because he could feel the metaphysical muscle he would need just to pluck it out, to hold it in his hand...

"I know." he whispered, the only words he could muster as he focused all his attention on resisting that urge--because some gut instinct told him if he ever took it from anyone, just one person, he'd never be able to stop.

Gathering a single spark of dragon fire, a fleck of the crimson shower his flames produced, he planted it into that shining core, then laid his thoughts against it with careful attention to what he wanted to happen, what Regina needed and how she had to heal.

The moment he was done, he ran.

The effort it took to pull out of her cells as fast as he could made his breath catch, his body tense as his mind raced back to the safety of her veins, her muscles, her bloodstream. Once he was there, safe where he couldn't hurt her, he made sure his magic took before he withdrew again, finally opening his eyes and pulling her closer, huddling around her and pressing his face against the top of her head.

"I'm sorry you had to do that--I'm sorry this happened." he murmured. "But you did good. You saved my damn life--even if I kinda wanna shake you for lettin' me hurt you. Made up for it, though: you'll warm up now. If you start to feel feverish, take a cool shower, it'll pass. For now? You're gonna fuckin' sleep, and I'm gonna call the kids and let 'em know we'll be home in the morning--and that tomorrow, you're spending the damn day in bed. Fight me, I dare ya. I'll win--it's my turn to take care of you."

From:

fondofapples

Regina fell asleep halfway through his 'fight me' declaration, too tired even to muster rudimentary sass in response. She woke again less than two minutes later, because this was what she'd been doing for the past four days: pulling herself awake every single time she started to fall asleep.

And it was obvious what she'd done, because as soon as she woke, her pulse spiked and she pushed herself upright--only to be stopped by the arms locked so tightly around her. Then she remembered where she was, that he'd pulled through it, that she didn't have to stay awake anymore--and all the crying she'd done up until now was just pre-gaming for the sobs that wracked her now.

If she'd been a hitter, she'd have been punching him for what he'd put her through, never mind that he hadn't done it on purpose and it wasn't his fault, or that he had more right, since she had done this on purpose and put him through nearly losing her. Since she wasn't a hitter, and did try not to be a hypocrite, she only curled into a ball against him, drawing her knees up to her chest to try to stop the ache and the tears.

It really didn't take more than a minute to realize that wouldn't work, not when what she wanted was him. If letting him in (such a strange thought when he'd been inside her cells only moments before and he was inside her body any number of different ways on a regular basis) meant opening up her small, self-protective ball, and if opening up that crystalline casing meant crying more and harder for longer, then so be it. She needed him more than she needed oxygen anyway.

Awake again now, at least until she cried herself to sleep, she told him through fits and starts of tears, "The worst part was that I missed you so much and you were right there. I don't think I realized how much we talk to each other every day until I could taste your magic and your skin, but most of what I said went unanswered."

From:

hellorhighwater

The way she huddled in on herself was one of the most painful things he'd ever endured--how she tried to retreat into herself to escape the pain, how she tried to cut herself off even within the circle of his arms just to protect herself. It hurt, and his weakness had done that. If he'd been more aware of the coming fever, if he'd been able to slip away and spare her all of this...

"For what it's worth...I don't remember much of it, but what I do remember? I heard you." he assured her, resting a hand on her hip to pull her closer, sliding down her thigh and kneading with firm, even pressure to try and urge her to relax into him--and because she was tense as fuck. For good measure, he added a little magic by channeling some heat into his touch for good measure.

"I remember asking for you and you being there. I remember...more than a couple terrifying fucking delusions and nightmares, and your voice, your touch--it banished them. I remember just...moments when I wasn't asleep or awake, just there and burning up, and you'd kiss me or talk to me and I couldn't crawl outta the fog fast enough to answer you. I heard, though, Regina. I think even when I was flat out unconscious, I heard every word you said."

From:

fondofapples

Her jaw ached from the strain of biting down on the tears, not so much trying to stop them as just slow them enough to keep from choking on the sobs and nauseating herself with it. Her face hurt from the pressure in her sinuses when she nodded, acknowledging him.

"It's all right, Neil," she managed to say and hugged him tighter in gratitude for him trying to comfort her now. "I'm okay. I needed to be with you, for both of us. I just..." She rubbed her face against his shoulder, scrubbing away tears without letting go of him. "Missed you. Needed you, because you're who I talk to when I'm scared. Don't feel guilty, please. I'm just...catching up with you." And processing her own feelings.

From:

hellorhighwater

"Too late for the guilty thing." he deadpanned, kissing the top of her head as she pressed her face into his shoulder to wipe away her tears. "And don't say I shouldn't feel that way: I fucked up. Got complacent and I missed all the signs. So I ended up springing this shit on you...I got sloppy."

He shook his head, holding her a little tighter and staring into nothing with his nose pressed against her hair with a sigh, still berating himself for the whole thing.

"I thought I was safe, and I lost a whole day I could've spent makin' this easier on you." The one thing he promised he'd never do, the one thing he swore he'd never do when the Night Dragon made him his personal guard: he'd assumed everything was going to be fine.

And every time in his life Neil thought he was safe, the world bit back to remind him otherwise. Maybe this really was punishment from the Sky Maker--a reminder that his life wasn't meant to last, that every second for a human wielding dragon fire was borrowed time.

From:

fondofapples

"Easier on me?" she demanded, anger flaring beneath the tears and she pulled one hand free to smack him. "Easier on me?" she repeated angrily. "I'm not the one who spent the last three days trying to die every ten minutes."

The tears started to wane and she scrubbed them away with the back of her hand she'd swatted him with. "How do you think you were going to make this easier on me? And if you're even thinking 'by not telling you,' you can sleep on the couch for a month."

More even than that, if he tried to do this without her ever, she would unleash the kind of hellish fury he only imagined she might be capable of.

From:

hellorhighwater

...which, of course, was exactly what he'd been thinking, but now wasn't the time to admit to a goddamn thing. Maybe not ever.

"By talkin' you through more of it." he replied instead, praying he could dodge that bullet--since he hadn't been able to dodge or block her blow in his present state. "Help you talk to the kids in advance, give you a better rundown of Rueni, shit like that."

Narrowing his eyes, he caught the hand she smacked him with and roughly meshed his fingers with hers.

"And don't fuckin' hit me, it ain't like I'm conspiring to die in the slowest, most pathetic way possible." he growled, bringing their joined hands to his lips so he could kiss her fingers before he pulled her closer, huffing testily as he pressed his face against the top of her head, an annoyed string of muttering in the dragon tongue half muffled by her hair.

From:

fondofapples

Too exhausted to listen for deception, too hurt to want to known if he truly thought it would've been easier, Regina accepted what he told her. Instead of arguing more, she collapsed again into him. "M'not hitting you. I'm trying to knock some sense into you," she muttered, voice still rough and achy from crying so hard.

She tucked her head again, put her nose and lips against his neck to feel his pulse while he warmed her. Time passed, she didn't know how much, since she drifted on the warmth and sense of safety that came with being in his arms, but at some point, a thought surfaced.

"Why did you give the Sky Maker your name?"