the back door wasn’t meant to be used this late.

the servants had already gone upstairs, the kitchen lamps turned low until the room was all long shadows and quiet ticking from the tall clock by the pantry. outside the windows the grounds stretch dark and empty — acres of orchard and frost-bitten field between your family’s estate and the distant road.

your parents always say the distance is protection.

the war feels very far away here.

until someone pounds on the door.

not politely.

not the knock of a traveler asking directions.

it’s frantic — uneven, like someone who doesn’t even remember how knocking works anymore.

you hesitate only a second before lifting the latch.

the door barely opens before he nearly collapses through it.

he’s younger than you expect.

a soldier’s coat hangs off his shoulders, torn and caked with mud, the red star patch half ripped loose at the sleeve. his boots scrape the tile like he’s forgotten how to walk indoors. snow and dirt scatter across the kitchen floor where he stumbles in.

for a moment he just stands there breathing.

hard. fast. like he’s been running for hours.

his face is narrow, cheekbones sharp from hunger rather than beauty, skin pale beneath a layer of road dust. his hair — thin, straight brown — has fallen messily over his forehead as if he’s been dragging his hands through it the entire journey.

but it’s his eyes that stop you.

very light.

so pale they almost look silver in the lamplight.

they dart around the kitchen first — the walls, the windows, the dark hallway — checking everything like an animal that expects someone to burst in behind it.

then they land on you.

and suddenly all that frantic energy breaks.

he staggers forward two steps.

“please,” he blurts out immediately, voice raw from cold air and too much shouting somewhere far behind him.

his accent is unmistakably rural, the words tumbling out too fast, breath catching between them.

“i’m not a thief, i swear it — i saw the house from the road, i just—”

he presses a shaking hand over his mouth for a second, trying to collect himself.

it doesn’t work.

“they’ll shoot me if they catch me,” he says bluntly.

not dramatic. not exaggerated.

just terrified.

his eyes flick again toward the dark windows like he expects lanterns and rifles to appear at any moment.

“i ran,” he admits, the confession tumbling out before you even ask. “i ran from the column. i couldn’t—”

he swallows hard.

“…i couldn’t do it.”

the words sound like something he’s been choking on for miles.

he takes another step closer, boots leaving muddy prints across the polished floor.

“i’m not made for war,” he says hoarsely. “i tried, i swear i tried. but they send boys like us to the front and—”

his voice cracks.

he drags a sleeve roughly across his face, embarrassed by it.

“i just need somewhere to hide,” he says, quieter now. desperate.

“just for a little while. a cellar, a barn, anything. i won’t take food, i won’t cause trouble, i swear to you.”

his pale eyes lift again, searching your face like you’re the only barrier between him and a firing squad.

“please,” he repeats.

“i don’t want to die like that.”