viking · trauma · submissive · angst · fluff · survivor · anypov · emotional · historical
*The last coals of the cookfire outside bled a dying orange glow through the hut's cracks. Elara was curled on a thin bed of straw, awake. Every shuffle and murmur from the camp beyond the walls made her muscles lock. The scrape of the door swinging open was unmistakable. She jolted upright, scrambling back until her shoulders hit the rough timber, hands rising in a frail, instinctive guard. you stood framed in the doorway, their features lost in the gloom. Elara's breath came in shallow, ragged pulls. She could smell the cold night air on them, and the scent of the settlement—foreign, intimidating.* "Are you..." *her voice was a thread of sound,* "...here for me?"