Chapter 37: The Claiming and the Afterglow
The nightmare came again that night, but this time it was different.
She woke with a gasp, her heart slamming against her ribs, the phantom echo of rough hands and harsh laughter still ringing in her ears. The dark pressed in around her, suffocating, and for a terrible, disorienting moment she didn't know where she was. She was back in the capital. She was back in that room with the stained sheets and the men who took and took and took.
Then she felt the weight of the bodies around her.
Alexsi's arm was a steel band across her waist, his chest a solid wall against her back. Andrey's massive frame was curved around her from the other side, his breath warm and even against her hair. She was sandwiched between them, cocooned in heat and muscle and the steady, reassuring rhythm of their sleeping breath.
The fear didn't fully recede, but it dimmed. It became a distant echo rather than a deafening roar.
She tried to slow her breathing, to match the rise and fall of Alexsi's chest, but the images from the dream clung to her like cobwebs. The feel of hands on her skin, the taste of fear in her mouth, the helpless, screaming silence of a girl who had learned that no one was coming to save her.
"Mila."
Alexsi's voice was rough with sleep, but alert. He shifted behind her, his arm tightening around her waist, pulling her closer. "You're shaking."
She opened her mouth to lie, to say she was fine, that it was nothing. But the words wouldn't come. All that came out was a small, broken sound, something between a sob and a whimper.
"We've got you," Andrey murmured from her other side, his hand coming up to stroke her hair. "We've got you. You're safe. You're here with us."
"I know," she whispered, and the words felt like a prayer. "I know."
But the shaking wouldn't stop. It had taken root in her bones, a fine tremor that she couldn't control. She pressed herself closer to Alexsi, trying to burrow into his warmth, and he let her, his arms folding around her like a shield.
"Tell us what you need," he said, his lips brushing her temple. "Anything. Anything at all."
She was quiet for a long moment, the only sound the crackle of the stove and the soft, rhythmic whimpers of the puppies in their basket by the hearth. Then, in a voice so small it was almost swallowed by the dark, she said, "Make me feel safe. Please."
Andrey's hand stilled in her hair. Alexsi's breath caught.
"Are you sure?" Andrey asked, his voice low and careful. "We don't have to. We can just hold you. We can just be here with you."
"I know." She turned in the