So I decided to finally start an anthology of sorts to hold the shorter one-off fics that until now I've just been posting on my Tumblr. All will be about Emma and Killian in some form, canon-based, AUs, spec fics, and ratings will vary. Most will probably be unconnected. Outtakes and extra scenes from Beyond the Horizon will continue to be posted in the Interlude at Sea series - but other fics are fair game and may show up in here.

This first story is set immediately after the end of Season Five - a little bit of hurt and comfort.

gimme shelter

The first night they hadn't so much slept as collapsed, still half-clothed when they fall into the bed and too spent for anything but a chaste kiss before they both give into the fatigue that drags them into a slumber as deep as any sleeping curse and doesn't let go until long after the sun comes up the next morning.

The second night they had made love for hours, slowly, thoroughly, exploring each other from head to toe with hands and mouths until they came together at last in a hot slide of hard against soft. His fingers link with hers against the bedclothes and she peppers his whole face with kisses again, making him smile and laugh as he had done at their reunion. They both laugh this time, as giddy as drunkards with the love that blooms between them. True love, the words keep running through his mind over and over again, true love, true love, true love, the first thought when he wakes the next morning with Emma curled into his side, feet tangled with his and golden hair spread across his chest as the pale light filters in through the fluttering curtains and slants over her sleeping face. True love.

The third night was when the nightmares begin.

He is no stranger to bad dreams, the centuries have been long and unkind and there's plenty to pick and choose from when his head hits the pillow. Hades laughs, sending them on a fool's errand to find what he knows isn't there. Only this time there's no escape and Emma is trapped alongside him, the bright flower that will wither and fade without the sun and beating her hands raw and bloody against a locked door that refuses to yield. Pan smirks, forever two steps ahead of him on that cursed isle and dangling what he wants, needs, just beyond his reach. His limbs grow slack and heavy and his blood longs to join with Liam's, he falls to his knees and it spills wetly into the dirt beneath his feet until Neverland claims him at last. The Crocodile snaps his jaws around his hand and takes Milah's heart, sinking back into the oozing muck with it while he's helpless to stop the light in her eyes from fading away, fingers on his cheek growing cold and chest going still as her triumphant bastard of a husband drains her life away in punishment. The king mourns the loss of the Jewel but not his brother, Liam's name is blackened alongside his own for his mutinous crime and his soul condemned to the fiery depths. Liam falls and his grip fails, over and over again he watches him consigned to the flames as he was to the sea. Only there's no shroud covering his face this time, Liam's eyes are wide and terrified at the fate that beckons from the pit of torment and hellfire. Captain Silver flogs him for the first time, he's barely a man and he bites the inside of his cheek until he tastes blood as the lash bites into his tender flesh while the rest of the crew watches and jeers. In the dreams he doesn't stop, flaying the skin from his back right down to his bones as he sags against the mast and prays for someone, anyone, to deliver him from the mercy of uncaring men.

His father leaves, and he's a small boy forever waiting alone and afraid in the dark.

It's dark when he wakes, shaking and sweating with the sheets in a tangle around him like the slip of a noose on his neck. Only he's not alone anymore and his single hand gropes across the bed until he reaches her. He anchors himself against the curve of her hip, finds his port in the storm between her legs. It's rough, and raw, he wants to be gentle but he can't, he can't, and he sucks marks into her neck and across the tops of her breasts, livid brands of a dirty pirate who can only take and never give. The sweat rolls down his back as he braces himself against the headboard and thrusts madly, sheathing himself inside Emma over and over again until he can't tell where he ends and she begins and he wants this, wants only this, wants to lose himself in her and forget everything except this. She welcomes him every time, thighs opening at once when he rolls on top of her and hips tilting up to ease his passage. When he presses his mouth to hers and pleas for forgiveness against her lips she shushes him, when he buries his face in her neck and shudders out his release she cups the back of his head and holds him to her until he softens and slips from her at last.

"Emma, I-"

"I know."

I love you...I want you...I need you.

She knows.

She knows because he's not the only one, some nights it's her who wakes fleeing from the demons that haunt the princess who never was and she seeks him out, stroking him to life before he's fully awake with a grip that has him gasping and arching, eyes flying open and hand fisting in the linens when she climbs onto his lap and sinks down, down, down. Her nails rake across his chest and leave burning trails as she rides him at a near gallop but he doesn't protest, the pain is nothing compared to the pleasure and there's nothing else that matters but this, the way her quim fits around him like a velvet glove and the racing of his heart under her palms as she presses them flat to steady herself and her hips stutter and jerk against his.

"Killian, I-"

"I know."

He knows that the nightmares might never leave them fully, they've seen too much, done too much, lost too much to hope for that. The life that awaits them does not promise to be an easy one, not for the savior of the realm and a former pirate with only one hand. But they climb into bed together every night and she rests her head on his shoulder, his fingers playing with her hair and her feet tangling with his under the blanket. They hold their love between them and take shelter in each other until the storm breaks.

It always does, and the sun shines again in the morning.