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Delicate fingers trailed through his hair, a soothing motion that dulled the pounding of his head.
It was hard to believe they were the same fingers that held a weapon with such confidence, the same fingers that could curl into a fist and best any brawl. Fingers that he’d seen drenched in blood, but would still give anything to hold intertwined with his own.
It was hard to believe that he was in this situation at all.
An ambush had been waiting for him outside the training grounds that night.
“So it’s true, you haven’t been sleeping.” Byleth was leaning against the wall next to the door. Her arms were folded across her chest, a deep frown across her lips as she watched him with those emerald eyes that seemed to almost glitter in the dark--a hue that still caught him off guard at times from its novelty.
It was almost enough to distract him from the assessment in her gaze. Almost.
Because he no doubt owed this particular visit to Dedue’s earlier insistence that their professor tell Dimitri to rest.
But how could he when the choir of corpses was so loud? How could he sleep peacefully when they still needed deliverance from their pain?
“I already told you. I won’t be able to even if I try; it’s nothing but a waste of time.”
Even now, it was nearly deafening. A cacophony that had him closing his eyes and rubbing his aching temples as he spoke.
He was met with silence. No doubt she was preparing to lecture him on the importance of proper rest, perhaps even attempt to drag him to the infirmary.
“In that case, shall I tell you a bedtime story?”
Dimitri’s eyes snapped open as he stared at his professor in shock.
It was not at all what he had been expecting. No, instead of lecturing, she was offering him something so gentle as a bedtime story. He couldn’t remember the last time--or truly any time--that he had been told a bedtime story.
His birth mother had died long before he could truly have any memory of her, and no one had stepped in to fill that specific void, not even his stepmother. The truth was that his heart ached for such a thing, but he would never admit that outloud.
Byleth cocked her head, not unlike a cat, and pressed the tip of a finger to the edge of her chin. “Is it no good?”
You do not need this distrac--
Dimitri cut his own father off, shaking his head vigorously, as if it could shake the voices from his ears. “No, no. It’s--I just--”
His professor was most merciful indeed. “Shall we go to your room, then?”
He nodded emphatically, not wanting his lack of energy to be seen as a lack of enthusiasm.
A benevolent smile graced her lips. “Lead the way.”
Dimitri did as she bid, leading the way to the second floor of the dormitories. By the time they reached his door, the reality of the situation was finally settling into his tired mind.
He was taking his professor to his bedroom at her own insistence. To fulfill an extremely innocent and pure offer, he reminded himself. There was no possibility that she was entertaining any of the thoughts that he was now trying to force from his mind.
Thoughts that led him to pause awkwardly in front of his door.
His professor clearly had no such salacious thoughts as she directed, “Go ahead and change into your sleepclothes. I will wait out here until you are ready.”
He hesitated in front of the door.
“The whole point of a bedtime story is for you to fall asleep by the end,” she encouraged, reminding him painfully that the lust was one-sided.
But he nodded mutely before closing himself in his room.
How pathetic, Glenn mused. She’s treating you as a child. She views you as a puppy and you still can’t stop following her around like a mangy mutt.
The warning growl rumbled from his chest before he could catch it. Of course he craved her. What man--mere mortals with mortal urges--wouldn’t crave her, a goddess in disguise.
Ooh, look out, the puppy bites. Glenn laughed, a cruel note to it, each peal sending a jolt of pain ricocheting around Dimitri’s skull.
Dimitri was too tired to fight with Glenn. And ultimately, he knew that Glenn was right.
He was a filthy, near feral beast. A rabid creature that was far better off being put down. A starving mutt that would eat up every scrap of affection the object of his obsession offered him.
And she was waiting.
He dressed--or rather, undressed--quickly, but left his attire more modest than his typical sleepwear. The more moderate climate of Garreg Mach had him sleeping in nothing but his undergarments, chasing some semblance of the cold of Faerghus.
Tonight he kept his undershirt on and changed into a flexible pair of pants--the kind that could easily be worn beneath armor.
His professor raised an eyebrow at him when he finally opened the door to greet her once more.
“Is this what you usually sleep in?” She shook her head before he could answer. “I’m sorry, pretend I didn’t ask that. It just doesn’t look that comfortable.”
It wasn’t comfortable compared to what he tended to wear, but the idea of revealing more of himself to her in this situation was far more uncomfortable. An idea that had his thoughts racing as he stepped aside to allow her into his room, an idea that had him hoping she couldn’t somehow sense the impure thoughts and acts he had committed in this room to her name.
Byleth stepped lightly into the room, casting a curious glance around at the barren quarters. But there was so little to see that it was not long before her gaze fell back on him as she hovered next to the bed.
The sight of her there, illuminated by the light of the candle on the bedside table, was so unfamiliar that it took Dimitri a moment to remember himself. “Ah.” He cleared his throat. “Please make yourself at home.”
What an absurd platitude given the circumstances.
But his professor merely smiled once more, still as captivating as the first time he had seen it, and gently patted the side of his bed. “I think a bedtime story requires you being in bed?”
What a ruthless and tantalizing question. But whether it was the forbidden comfort of her body, her presence, or her words, he was ravenous for it all.
He was still only mortal, after all, and he dared not refuse his goddess’ command.
So he complied, awkwardly clambering into his bed at her behest, feeling oddly like he was the visitor in the room.
Byleth slid lithely into place, seating herself next to his pillow. Her knees were tucked under her legs at an angle, leaving her feet hanging off the edge of the mattress. She then fixed that viridescent gaze on him once more, looking at him expectantly.
Dimitri stared back at her uncomprehendingly. She couldn’t possibly mean...
His professor patiently gestured at her lap.
She did mean.
If only she knew the sinful sentiments he held as he lifted his head from the pillow and shifted to rest it on her instead--the supple thighs wrapped in lace, the apex where fantasies dwelled.
He willed his cheeks not to burn, willed the rest of his body not to respond, a shameful surge of desire shooting through him as he laid his head down in her lap. But it was all too quickly snuffed out by his exhaustion.
A heavy, suffocating thing that smothered everything in its path, so all-consuming that it even cannibalized the jealousy that threatened to close its jaws around him when he wondered for a moment if she had made this offer to anyone else.
But the moment she started to run her fingers through his hair, it didn’t feel quite so stifling. For a moment, it felt like he could breathe again, slow, deep breaths, taking in the sweet petrichor.
“My father used to brush my hair and tell me this story on nights I couldn’t sleep,” she murmured.
Dimitri couldn’t see her face, but he thought he may have heard the faintest quiver in her voice. The loss of Jeralt was still fresh.
He dared not indulge in the idea that she had sought him out as much to seek comfort as to offer it. But he could not stop himself from reaching out to grasp her free hand.
She did something cruel--she squeezed his hand in response, as if she was grateful for the gesture.
Before he could torment himself dissecting the meaning of it, she began, all the while her fingers keeping a steady rhythm sweeping through his mane.
“In the great merc barracks
There was a weapons rack
And a sharpening stone
And a painting of–”
As much as he wanted to stay in this moment, watching the flicker of candlelight dance across the lace, his eyelids grew heavy.
“A horse jumping over the azure moon
And there were three tired men resting on a bench”
With each stroke of her fingers, the piercing in his head eased, no longer a dagger driving through his brain.
“And a pair of gauntlets
And a bunch of corselets
And a set of lances
And a place to run through stances”
The chorus that dogged his every moment with voices berating and blaming, voices demanding and decrying; those voices softened to murmurings.
“And a handful of swords and a bundle of practice boards
And a grizzled old captain breathing in snores”
That night, instead of the phantasm of flames, what awaited him was a terribly sweet dream. He dreamed of viridian tresses brushing across his cheek, a feather-light caress. He dreamed of soft lips pressing to his forehead. He dreamed of a quiet voice, whispering a wish for him, “Sleep well.”
And for once, he actually did.
“Papa?”
A tug on the leg of his pants had Dimitri cracking open his eye. His evenings were often spent this way--whittling down the final remnants of paperwork in between resting his remaining eye from the strain of focusing all day. And tonight was no exception, this particular stack having kept him later than usual.
He looked down to see a small boy with chubby cheeks and an unkempt mess of blonde hair. One hand was clinging to the fabric of his pant leg while the other was clutching the arm of a well-loved knitted and stuffed lion--the needlework a mastery delivered by Mercedes. The child’s youth was obvious in the dimples still present on the knuckles and elbows, the baby-like features that he hadn’t yet outgrown.
“What is it, my little cub?” Dimitri asked as he scooped his son up and placed him on his lap.
Deep blue eyes from a lifetime ago stared back at him. “Story?”
“Well, of course, I don’t mind. But where is your mother?” Byleth was the one who usually told the stories. Not simply because she insisted that Dimitri rest after a day of hard work, but because they were ultimately her stories to tell.
“Mama sleep.”
“What a sweet boy you are, letting her get some rest.”
A wide smile split the boy’s mouth as he nodded adamantly, clearly proud of himself.
Dimitri leaned back in the chair, moving to support the child as he settled into the crook of his arm.
He took a deep breath and then began, telling the same story that he had once been told by the boy’s mother.
“Goodnight barracks”
By this point, the boy’s eyelids had drifted shut.
“Goodnight azure moon
Goodnight horse jumping over the azure moon”
The words flowed easily, carved deeply into his memory. How many nights had he spent reciting these verses to that same moon as he laid upon the frigid ground, drowning in blood, as if they were the stanzas to a spell that could somehow preserve his sanity?
“Goodnight light
And the sharpening stone
Goodnight men
Goodnight bench”
But words alone had not been enough, not without Byleth there to tell them.
“Goodnight gauntlets
Goodnight corselets”
Yet she had come back, defying death to offer her hand and save him herself.
“Goodnight blades
Goodnight braids”
The boy’s breathing had slowed to the deep and steady rhythm of sleep.
“Goodnight lances
Goodnight stances”
He hoped to provide a future where he had no more need of Areadbhar.
“Goodnight daggers
Goodnight swords”
And he knew that Byleth was also working to provide a future where she no longer needed to wield the Sword of the Creator.
“Goodnight nobody
Goodnight practice boards”
Both parents were working hard to build a future where their son had no need for true weapons, only the fun of practice and sparring. A world where their son could sleep peacefully.
“And goodnight to the grizzled old captain breathing in snores”
The idea of Jeralt inserting himself into the rhymes that he told to his daughter to lull her to sleep had struck Dimitri as rather touching from the moment he’d first heard it. There were no such sweet caricatures that could be made of the monster he had been.
“Goodnight blue sea star
Goodnight air”
But the past no longer held him captive. Dimitri was living not for death--be it the wish for his own or those haunting him--but for the future. For the light by his side.
And while it could not erase what he had done or who he had been, he could endeavor to be a good man. He could endeavor to be a good king. And most importantly, he could endeavor to be a good husband and a good father.
“Goodnight noises everywhere”
It was a bittersweet finishing line for Dimitri. He did not know silence, not with the voices that followed him, even now, as he carried his son to his room. But they could not hurt him any longer.
Not as he laid down his son down to rest in his crib, laying a blanket over the child and the stuffed lion still held tightly in his arms.
“Goodnight, my little cub.”
No, the dead could not hurt him any longer, even as their cries rang in his ears. Not as he returned to his own room to find his wife curled up in front of the fire, tangled up in the cloak that she had refused to let him throw away.
“...mitri…” A sleepy hum left her lips as he lifted her in his arms, too tired to even catch all the syllables of his name.
He gently extracted her from the cape and laid her down in their bed, pulling the covers up so she wouldn’t need to be without the warmth of the fire for long.
“Goodnight, my beloved,” he murmured against her bangs as he pressed his lips to her forehead. “Sleep well.”
And he would do the same.