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Robin is not the easiest to share a bed with.
It gets to the point where Lucina knows what Robin dreamt about the previous night better than Robin does. Sudden outbursts about not to touch her tactics books, reaching for an imaginary sword to slash at an equally imaginary enemy – if Robin kept tomes by her bedside, Lucina is sure she would have to worry about Robin casting spells in her sleep as well.
Many of the dreams are ridiculous. Lissa's continual references to a particular dream about “Risen riding wolves” prepared Lucina for that, and Robin certainly does not disappoint in that regard. Among other things, Robin dreams of having to polish wyvern scales with nothing more than a dishrag, hunting bears with Panne to cure Frederick's inexplicable bear-related illness, and a particular Valmese general's mustache rising from the dead for long-belated revenge.
In the morning, Robin has forgotten her dreams, though if she notices a slight smile on Lucina's face, she may ask, exasperatedly, what she said the previous night that was so funny.
Some mornings, though, Robin doesn't look for a telltale smile – she doesn't even look at Lucina at first. Her gaze is more haunted as she lays there, staring straight ahead and at something Lucina cannot see. Those are the dawns after the nightmares.
Lucina hears Robin mumble about them in her sleep. Pleading for Phila to stay back as she clutches at nothing. Reaching out to catch a falling Emmeryn that cannot be saved. Sometimes, the roles change – someone else is ambushed by the Mad King, or Robin is rushing to save another person from falling off a certain precipice. But it is always a reenactment of the Ylissean-Plegian War's last days.
And Grima. The nightmares of Grima are always the worst.
All too many cries for help, for something to change, for anything to be different, as her nightmares show Robin what is only history to Lucina. When Robin has a nightmare, especially one about the fell dragon, she doesn't flail or lash out. She merely trembles, her gestures much more subdued if they happen at all, and she whispers into the night, as if not wanting to wake Lucina.
Lucina wakes every time, anyway – one doesn't survive apocalyptic futures by being a heavy sleeper.
Responding to the nightmares is an uncomfortable prospect, because she might only make it worse. Of course she is hardly a stranger to such night terrors, but Robin's evasive behavior after such a nightmare grows more worrisome every time they happen.
One night, Lucina hears Robin whispering – it sounds like a plea for death, to be killed before she harms anyone else, to die before she repeats Lucina's past. At this, Lucina tenses, visions of what might have been also flashing through her mind's eye.
But this time, she rolls over and holds Robin close, resting her face near Robin's head. Robin's arm shifts to rest on top of Lucina's, and she leans into the embrace. The trembling subsides, and the rasped mumbles fall away to steady breathing to match Lucina's own. Neither of them move for the rest of the night.
The nightmares will always come back, but at least now Robin has a smile on her face when she wakes in the morning.
