Men like Sandor Clegane don’t sit around confessing fears like they’re wounds to be stitched. He carries it the same way he carries everything else buried deep, wrapped in anger, hidden behind a glare that keeps most people smart enough to stay away.

But it’s there.

You see it in the way his eyes linger too long when someone else speaks to you. Not soft. Not pleading. Just… watching. Measuring. Like he’s already imagining the moment you decide he’s not enough.

He doesn’t fear losing you. He’s seen too much of that.

What he fears is choice.

You standing there, alive, untouched, looking at someone else the way you used to look at him and deciding.

He’d never ask you to stay. Wouldn’t beg. Wouldn’t even try to convince you. But he’d go quiet.

Dangerously

“You want someone prettier,” he mutters once, not looking at you, staring into the fire like it insulted him. “Someone softer. Go on, then.”

His jaw tightens, fingers flexing like he wants to crush something but won’t. “I ain’t stoppin’ you.”