𝖠𝖱𝖱𝖠𝖭𝖦𝖤𝖣 | 𝖥𝖱𝖤𝖣 𝖶𝖤𝖠𝖲𝖫𝖤𝖸

𝐋𝐗

𝐂𝐈𝐑𝐂𝐄 𝐒𝐍𝐀𝐏𝐄

TW: Explicit violence

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check [tʃɛk] 
CHESS
A move by which a piece or pawn directly attacks the opponent's king and by which the king may be checkmated.

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Fred woke up that morning in between sweats. He had a very dark nightmare in which he dreamed he was trapped inside that bloody cell again. His scars burnt because of the memories and his lungs tried to catch as much air as possible, in fear of it being his last breath. 

"Lilith," was the first word to leave his mouth, trying to normalise his breathing and looking around to find her, quite desperate. 

Soon, her soft hands trapped his in between caresses and made him look into the green of her eyes. Fred felt immediate relief covering him but he would lie if he said the anxious feeling didn't remain in his chest as shrapnel trapped inside a battle wound. He closed his eyes for a moment, taking a deep breath and concentrating on the feeling of Lilith's touch.

"I'm here, Freddie. What happened?" she asked worriedly. 

She had come back upstairs immediately after announcing to Remus her decision because she wanted Fred to partake and voice his opinion on what she was about to do next. Not that it would change her mind, though, but she didn't want to know what would happen if Fred found out she had gone to Snape manor without telling him and without his protection.

However, she had not expected to find him in such a familiar situation for her. Lilith recognised nightmares as trauma responses better than anyone else she could think of and the moment she saw Fred sweating, mumbling in his dreams and breathing too fast for his good, she knew something was wrong.

Of course, Azkaban had left a mark on Fred. And it cut her deeply to know she could barely do anything to help him deal with such a thing because if she could, she would suffer all that pain for him without blinking an eye.

"Nothing," Fred immediately replied, swallowing hard. He didn't want to worry his wife even though both knew that nothing was absolute bullshit. 

"Freddie, if you want to talk about anything, you know you can talk to me, do you?" she murmured, still caressing his hand and watching his reaction carefully. She was not going to pressure him to talk until he was ready to do so, but she wanted to show him her support. Back when her trauma still haunted her in her dreams, she had had Liv as her rock and she wanted to show Fred the same love Olivia had shown her back then.

"I know, darling, don't worry about me, I'm fine," he quickly said, leaving a little peck on her lips. "Or so I'll be soon. Where were you? I thought you were sleeping next to me."

"I was, but I started chewing into something and I couldn't sleep anymore so I went downstairs and talked with Remus about it."

"Oh, and, what is it?"

Lilith arched her eyebrow.

"I'll tell you once we visit Madame Pomfrey. Don't you think I have forgotten about that just because yesterday you managed to get your way by distracting me."

Fred couldn't help but smirk. The urge he had yesterday was mostly because of how eager he was to be with Lilith again, but also because the last thing he wanted to do was visit the nursery and distracting Lilith was the only way to avoid that.

"And how did I exactly distract you, love?" he came closer towards her, forgetting about anything else that wasn't his personal guardian angel.

"You know how. Don't play dumb" she followed his game, barely grazing his lips with hers.