comfort, sleep
"Shhh. Go back to sleep. It's ok. You're not alone," Neville says quietly from the other side of the bed. Gently he wraps an arm around his lover's waist, careful to not pin his arms to his sides, even if it leaves him free to flail in whatever nightmare he sees.
"No," Severus moans, low and desperate. "No, please, don't, I can't -"
It sounds as if he is the one being tortured, but Neville knows - because Severus has told him, in the vulnerable moments when he wakes from a nightmare - that his dreams are about others being tortured. Tortured and killed, until there is no one left alive that Severus cares about, leaving him alone. That when his spying had been exposed, Voldemort had taunted him, told him he would die alone and unmourned, because no one would be left alive who cared.
"Shhhh," Neville says again, and he soothes and pets Severus, spoons up against him and - when that fails, ruts against him, pressing his insistent morning erection against his lover's bony arse. "Wake up, Sev, this would be more fun with us both participating, and I'm not sharing you with some damn nightmare of a dead madman -"
He knows when Severus wakes enough to realize he isn't alone, and when he begins to rock back against him, grinding against him, Neville knows he's back in the present.
They fuck often; hard, frantic sex meant to remind themselves that yes, they are alive. It is no less desperate and frantic after a nightmare, and Severus trembles impatiently while Neville summons the lube and prepares him hastily.
It is hard and frantic and desperate but no less real - the sound Severus makes low in his throat when Neville slides into him, the way Neville bites his shoulder, the way Severus claws at the bedsheets and shouts when Neville makes him see stars.
But when it's over, with their seed cooling on their skin between their bodies, when they hold each other and let their breath even out, they whisper things they say no other time.
You're not alone. I'm not leaving. I love you.