Change of Heart - A Cahir X Reader story

Chapter 16 - A horrible memory

Cahir's armor was way too dirty. If he had to use it, he couldn't because it was covered in dry, dark red blood. He was still asleep, our actions must have been even more exhausting for him than they were for me, so I decided to do him a favor and clean all his pieces of metal. I carried piece by piece to the bathroom, it was just way too heavy to carry it all at once. Then, I tried getting away all the blood stains and polished it, so that it looked almost like it was brand new.

Then I remembered about his undergarment having blood stains as well, so I tried washing them off too. It was way harder than cleaning the armor since blood was just so hard to get out of fabric. But I knew a trick that my mother once taught me, when I was a child and got hurt once while running and tripping over a stone. With that trick, it actually worked and when all the blood stains were gone, I put his tunic and pants next to the fireplace to let them dry. Then it was time for me to go to Cecilia and take Alice back. She came out of her bedroom with Alice on her arm, telling me that her husband has just fallen asleep. "That battle changed him in some way. I don't know why, but he was actually being nice yesterday." Cecilia told me. "What did he tell you about it?" "He told me that it was hard, but now everything is fine and the soldiers are about to win this in some days. He still seems to be shocked though." I thanked her for telling me that, took Alice and went back to our bedroom.

I opened the door and stepped inside, not noticing Cahir who was standing behind the door at first, so when he suddenly appeared behind me, saying "Good morning, you two most beautiful girls in the world" I was more than startled. "Oh god, please never do that again." I said, my heart still racing in shock. "I'm sorry, my love." Cahir answered and kissed me on the cheek. He was wearing one of these robes that just looked so stunning on him. "So I've noticed that you took care of my armor. Thank you so much darling but you know that you don't have to do that, right? It's the duty of the knight himself to keep it clean."

It was cute that Cahir said that, but at the same time I knew that actually keeping the armor clean wasn't the duty of the knight himself, but of his squire or his wife. "You were still asleep.", I told him. "So what else should I have done?" Cahir smiled and hugged Alice and me. "Did you eat something yet?" I asked him then and he shook his head, so then he started eating while I fed Alice. That was when I decided to ask Cahir about the battle.

"So, I talked to Cecilia and she told me that her husband was still shocked somehow. You know, by everything that happened when you two were gone. Was it really that hard?" "No." He answered. "It was normal." I immediately knew that he wasn't telling the truth so I told him that he could tell me everything that was on his mind. He sighed but then agreed to tell me what it really was like.

"I don't know what it was, really, but it was more horrible than ever before. Just seeing all those wounded people, people with missing parts of their body, screaming in pain. And all the dead bodies everywhere. I knew some of them. They were my recruits and now..." He stopped. I walked over to where he was sitting after putting Alice on the floor and carefully stroked his arm, signalizing that it was okay if he got emotional now, which he did. "Now I think... what if I failed in training them? What if they lost their lifes because I was bad at showing them how to fight properly?"

I noticed tears forming in his eyes. I took a step closer and he quickly laid his arms around my waist, putting his forehead against my stomach, trying to hide his tears. I ran my hands through his hair, trying to calm him down in any way possible. It just broke my heart to see him like that and we stayed in this position for a long time. I tried to carefully take a step back but he wouldn't let me. His grip on me was so tight that I wasn't able to go anywhere.

"Darling, please listen to me now." I whispered, making Cahir look up at me with his eyes, red from crying and with tear stains on his cheeks. "It's fine if you feel that, that shows what a good person you are, but you need to realize that this wasn't your fault and that you're not guilty of anything." He sniffled and shut his eyes for a moment. "You're so patient with me. I bet you think that I'm wimp now, don't you?" This kind of shocked me, to be honest. "Of course not. It's a normal reaction after having seen all this shit. Your body needs to relax now, you need to recover from everything. And I'm here to help you with that." That made him almost smile as he looked deep into my eyes. "I honestly don't know how I deserve you." He whispered. I just pulled him closer and kissed the top of his head. "I love you so so much, Cahir."

We basically didn't do anything that day, Cahir was just feeling way too down. I actually spent the day reading to him because he had requested it, saying he "could never get enough of my voice". So we were just laying in bed, me holding him in my arms and him trying to press his body impossibly close to mine. He just needed this closeness and I was so glad when he was finally drifting off to sleep.

It was in the middle of the night when I got woken up and saw Cahir sitting on the edge of the bed, not moving at all. I shuffled towards him and gently stroke his back as I sat up. "What's the matter, love?" I whispered. With Alice sleeping in the same room I didn't want to talk too loud. Cahir didn't say anything in response, he probably needed to process everything. "I had a nightmare and now I can't get it out of my head." I felt really sorry. Now he didn't even get some peace in his own dreams. I knew that he didn't want me to ask him about his nightmare, so I didn't. Instead I waited for him to tell me if he wanted. "These horrible scenes keep playing in my head. Over and over again and I can't stand it anymore. I'm honestly afraid to fall asleep again." When he said that, I immediately got an idea how I could probably comfort him, so I gently pulled him down again and held him tight to myself, showing him that he was safe in my arms.

Then I told him to look out of the window, to see all the stars in this clear night and showed him some of the many constallations I knew. "Why do you know all this?" He asked quietly. "My sister often used to be scared at night. So I showed her the stars as well, they always managed to calm her down and let her sleep peacefully." I explained. "You're truly stunning." Cahir said and asked me to show him even more, which I did until he finally fell asleep again.