Shattered Windows, Broken Locks

Her chest was starting to hurt with the way the muscles clenched, but she barely registered it, barely noticed her nails digging into her head. She was right there in the other room. She heard the door click shut, and her eyes squeezed shut with it. How often had Ashe refused to even hold a child because of how she had failed? How many times had she woken up with sound of a baby crying and cutting off sharply? She refused to have children, had worn a charm against it for a year and a half, because she had gotten Theea -    She knew he would come, but she still flinched sharply at the touch to her shoulders. Her skin felt too sensitive, and everything was too dark, too loud, too much, and she couldn’t breathe... but she let him turn her, draw her into him. Her whole body shook, and it took her a moment to understand that Kalt was holding her. Still she couldn’t inhale, but she folded against him and pressed her head against his chest as she shuddered. She finally opened her eyes when he moved her hands, moved her hair, and she turned her face into his chest with her lips parted. Still struggling for breath until.. she felt his deep inhale, heard his instruction.    Ashe felt some barrier crack, and she gasped with a sharp and heavy gulp of air. The moment her lungs filled, she she held it nearly on instinct. Theea is alive. She listened to Kalt's apology, and she had to focus on her lungs again. Her breath halted and skipped and stuttered as she tried to breathe around this twisting thing in her chest. She understood why he didn't tell her, gods, of course she did. She had nearly gotten Theea.. she had.. gods, if Kalt had told her, how long would it have taken Master to find out again? Ashe couldn't be trusted. To this day, she still didn't know how Master had caught her, and would likely never know. She had turned over everything in her head an infinite amount of times and ways - she still didn't know where it was she fucked up.    She felt his heart race, and she finally made herself look up at him with wide eyes. ’Are you okay?’ Her brows pulled together as she pressed her trembling lips together, and with glistening eyes she shook her head. Fuck, she couldn't even pretend, couldn’t find the will to lie. Not with Theea right in the other room. Not when near every night terror she had included that pit, that whip, the weeks after, and the silence following a baby's screams. She turned her eyes to the shut door, and it took everything in her not to rush back into that room, to hold her, smell her, look at her and hear her speak and watch her think and act and smile and live. She barely swallowed back the sob, thinking of how small she had been, how she fit in just one of Ashe's arms.    Ashe turned to look up at Kalt then with her racing heart and tear-filled eyes. ”She's okay,” she choked out, and her voice cracked. She looked down and squeezed her eyes shut, tried to hold her breath and shove it down, but Theea was okay. Better than okay.    The sob burst from her chest, and then her shoulders were shaking with the force of tears that refused to be held back. Ashe caved in on herself, leaning into Kalt without thought, a single hand rising over her lips as she fell apart entirely. Ashetta