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She sighed as the door to her room in the Mansion clicked shut behind her. Her fingers moved slowly and methodically as she unbuckled her armour, as she slipped her antlered headdress from her brow. She set them aside along with her staff, her boots quickly following.
She continued through the motions of her nightly routine, her movements slow and heavy as her own tiredness caught up to her. She spared a thought to bemoan the fact that her room in the Mansion lacked a window; it may have been a pocket dimension, and any windows would not accurately reflect the world outside of the Mansion, but it was still a comfort to be able to look out and see the stars. Without them, the night and day blurred together to make time feel never-ending.
She was pulled from her thoughts by a gentle knock at her door. Her feet carried her across the room to it before she even had the chance to consider who it might be.
But of course, she knew who it was. There was no doubt in her mind, no thought that it could be anybody else. Not when she had swallowed down her fears and anxieties like a bitter medicine just the previous night and knocked on his door.
Her fears and anxieties, mercy of mercies, decided to stay swallowed in this gentle moment. It was ease itself to open up her door and find him standing there. It was ease itself to smile softly at him, and for her heart to flutter as he smiled softly in response. It was ease itself to step aside and let him in her door.
In a quiet mirror to the previous night, they sat side-by-side on the bed – hers this time, instead of his – she towards the head, and he towards the foot. They sat in silence for a short while, though for once the silence was blessedly calm and comfortable. Their hands rested clasped between them, and while their legs faced forwards, their bodies were half-turned towards one another, like flowers reaching towards the sunlight.
They turned and caught each other’s eye, and both started to speak in the same instant. A pair of self-conscious giggles bubbled up between them. He looked at her with eyes open in more ways than one, and just as quickly as it had come, ease abandoned her. Her tongue felt thick and dumb in her mouth as the words caught in her throat.
Somehow, she managed to blurt out “Can I kiss you?” As the question left her, she could feel her face blaze, and that familiar choking anxiety threatened to bubble up in her chest. But she saw his face; he smiled at her like the first flowers of spring pushing up from beneath the last of winter’s snow, or the first rays of sunlight that pierced through the clouds after a storm. That sunlight, those flowers, dissolved her nerves until she was able to smile back at him.
In a joyous mirror to their conversation the previous night, he laughed again and wrapped his arms around her and she tumbled backwards against the mattress, clinging to him as they fell. His laughter was infectious. His eyes were squeezed shut, crow’s feet pinching at the corners of his eyes. Her eyes were still wide open, drinking in the sight of him.
And then, ease returned to her. It was ease itself to slide her hands down from his back to his shoulders, to cup his face between them. It was ease itself to gently tug him towards her, especially when he easily followed her pull like the tide pulled by Catha’s light. It was ease itself to push herself up and press her lips to his.
They had kissed before; their first kiss, sudden and filled with the desperate belief that there would not be a second, had been smeared with blood and abrupt and confusing. Thankfully, this one was nothing like that. Their second kiss, that had happened just the previous night, was much like this one, soft and gentle and slow.
This kiss was just closed lips against closed lips, only a scant few seconds long. They parted after a moment, but did not immediately fall into one another again for a dozen more. It was nothing like the wild and passionate things that she had read about in novels.
When he pulled back from her, she saw the questions in his eyes. Was that okay, and are you alright, and do we need to take this slower. She saw another question, one that she didn’t think he had intended for her to see: have you changed your mind?
It was ease itself to grab his face and pull him in once more, not a question, but an answer.
And oh, it was the answer that she’d been so scared of for so long. He wasn’t particularly strong or heavy, but his lean body still pressed against hers, the pressure keeping her grounded. His hands, his clever fingers, tangled in her hair like they belonged there. His breath caught and he softly moaned into her mouth as she pried both of their lips open.
And oh, that sound ignited something in her. Her nerves crackled with lightning, her veins flooded with burning lava. Her breath came out hot and wet and violent like the heart of a hurricane, and her heart pounded in her breast like the rumbling of an earthquake.
This was a whole new kind of fear, of anxiousness. She had come to terms with loving someone, with allowing her heart to be soft and vulnerable, to know that it would ache and bruise and break, and that it would also heal in time. She had grown comfortable with the thought of kisses, and loving embraces, and sharing the moments right before succumbing to slumber and just after returning to consciousness in the dawn.
But to want like this, to feel heat and electric need course through her in a way that she never had before, was something that she hadn’t even thought to consider. Of course she knew about sex, but she had honestly never considered that she would ever be a participant.
Once again, that familiar anxiety bubbled up, but she fiercely forced it down. It did not matter if she had never experienced this before. It did not matter if she didn’t know what she was doing, or if she made herself look like a fool. She had the most beautiful and gentle man in her bed, looking at her with the reverence that clerics held when they spoke of their gods. He would not laugh or judge or grow impatient with her. She was safe with him.
Eventually, they pulled apart to breathe. Their breaths came in heavy and ragged, and they stared into one another’s eyes. She saw nothing but truth within his eyes; she could only assume that the same was reflected in hers.
Her armour had already been discarded, but he had left his on. A little sparkling thrill ran through her when she realized that meant that he had come right to her, instead of stopping in his room first. She reached out to one of the buckles at his shoulder. His lips started to form a reassurance, maybe are you sure or we don’t have to if you don’t want, but she breezed right past it as her fingers slipped the closure apart.
She had never been more sure of anything in her life.
Their fingers tripped over each other’s as they pulled his armour off, piece by piece. It fell in a pile beside her bed, not too far from her own. For every piece that came off, she ran her palms over the place where it had sat. Each time, she felt the tight ropes of his muscles unravel, and with something akin to wonder, she realized that she wasn’t the only one of them that was nervous. She remembered what he had told her last night, about his deal and his sister and the fear of the unknown that had been hanging over him for so long.
You’re safe with me, she said in every press of her palms.
She honestly could not say if it was her or him that reached down to the bottom hem of his undershirt. She could not say who decided to be that brave in that moment. She did know that both of them pulled the fabric off of him together, and that they both laughed softly as it got tangled in his hair.
And then their laughter died away once more, his shirt falling utterly forgotten to the floor. He sat above her, his legs bracketing her hips and his hair tumbling down his shoulders and his eyes full of such naked adoration that she felt like she was the one who had disrobed. Once more, she wished desperately for a window in her room; he would have been achingly beautiful with his skin painted in moonlight.
It was a dizzying thing, somewhere between the heady intoxication of alcohol and the abrupt, consuming surge of a riptide. That she could reach out a trembling hand and just touch. That her lips could seek out his neck, his cheek, his lips, and just taste. That she could let her eyes fall upon the dip of his collarbone, or the flex of his shoulder blades, or where the V of his hips disappeared beneath his trousers, and let her sight linger there.
That such bold and brazen desire was not only allowed, but wanted.
He caught her hand where it had strayed to his cheek, her thumb resting on the dip of his lower lip. He turned his head and pressed a lingering kiss to her palm, his eyes never leaving hers. The heat within her surged, and her strangled gasp was matched with her hips arching up without her permission. He echoed with a strangled gasp of his own, and she could feel his hardness against her.
Another electric spark raced through her; she did that to him, she made his breath catch and she made him blush, dappled rose petals on his high cheekbones. She caused this aching arousal in him. She had wielded lighting and flame and animal ferocity before, but she could honestly say that she had never felt more powerful than she did in this moment.
Even as she marvelled, she could see him pull back slightly. She saw his expression change minutely, the arousal and devotion cracking as concern pushed through from behind them. He was about to ask her is this too fast or we don’t have to do this right now if you don’t want to, or some other infuriatingly considerate thing. He was always so kind with her, so patient, so gentle.
But she was so tired of feeling fragile.
He tried to lift his hips away from hers, even just a little bit, but she wrapped her arms around his slim waist and rocked up against him like the tide. This time, he fully groaned, a deep and throaty sound like ancient branches moving deep in the forest that pooled deep within her. He fell forwards, one arm braced beside her, the other dangling off the side of the bed like he wasn’t quite sure what to do with it. He rolled his hips down into her, dragging his still-clothed cock along her, and she was sure that even through the layers of fabric he could feel how wet she was.
They moved together so beautifully, rolling against one another in a never-ending loop. There was a part of her that wanted to continue like this until the end, waves breaking against rocks and rocks crashing into the waves, tectonic plates grinding against each other as mountains and valleys formed. She would have no complaints if the night kept on in this fashion, but there was a part of her – a not insubstantial part of her – that hungered.
She wanted to feel the weight of him in her hand, and wanted to know if that weight was any different when it was on her tongue. She wanted his clever fingers and even cleverer mouth to learn her so well that he could draw out a map of her skin, blindfolded. She wanted to take him deep inside of her and join with him into one being. She wanted to lose control of herself until her fingers shifted into claws and her teeth became fangs and she tasted the blood of him, just enough to keep that part of him with her.
But words were never easy for her, and those thoughts frightened her as much as they thrilled, so all she could say was “Hang on a second”. He stopped his rocking so abruptly that she wanted to cry out from the loss, but she knew his gentle soul and his overflowing heart would think that she wanted to stop completely, so she had to move quickly.
Thankfully, her dress had simple closures, but she needed to sit up to get to them. She muttered under her breath as she undid the clasps, her hair covering her face. She couldn’t see his expression, and she was so caught up in trying to get that one last stupid clasp undone that had decided to betray her in this most important moment-
And then another set of fingers joined hers. Fingers that were so good at getting into trouble, at opening whatever had been kept closed, at plucking away valuable trinkets and beautiful things.
He held out a hand to steady her, and she took it gratefully as she rose from the bed. She let her dress fall to her feet in a downpour, and slipped her smallclothes off a moment later, fighting down the counter-intuitive urge to hide herself as his eyes roamed across her skin. After a moment, she gave him a little nod, of confirmation, yes, but mostly an impatient reminder to him. She watched him start, just a little, just enough to know that he truly had gotten lost in her, and she giggled.
He blushed again, so beautifully, but chuckled as he unlaced his breeches and pulled them and his smallclothes off in one movement. She once again fought her immediate response to look away, to give him privacy; instead, she let her sight trail down his chest, his stomach, along the V of his hips and through the course, dark hair below. His cock was as beautiful as the rest of him, flushed ruddy and standing proud; some instinct in her made her run her tongue across her lips, which she only realized she did when she saw him throb.
She reached out and grasped his hand with her own. She backed up, leading them both back towards her bed, and while her tumble backwards onto the mattress was planned, it was perhaps not planned for that specific moment, nor to be that ungraceful. Her face burned again, but he grinned in a way that could only come from the Fey ancestry that their kind shared, so it was a burn that she could endure.
She gently pulled him down atop her, but he didn’t stay where she led him – though, truth be told, he rarely ever did. She bent one leg and braced her foot against the bed as he slid down the length of her body, his mouth languidly leaving a searing trail of kisses until he reached the core of her. He pressed one last tiny kiss to her clit, and then two fingers slid into her as if they were made to fit there.
She groaned, unbeautiful and wild and something akin to an injured animal, as he worked his magic. His lips found her quickly, and his tongue lathed lines along her cunt that had her shivering with fever while his fingers stroked within her until she could scarcely breathe. Her body was a lock, and the crook and thrust of his fingers were his picks and wrenches, working her from within until the tension broke and she fell open in his hands.
She startled when his unoccupied fingers found hers. He delicately pried away where she had dug her fingers like claws into the sheets, and smoothed out her knuckles before guiding her hand to the top of his head. She felt his hair, soft and dark like raven’s down, under her fingertips, and was struck by the urge, the need, to see him. She propped herself up on her elbow.
He was already looking up at her by the time her eyes reached him. He was buried in her ginger curls, his tongue tracing letters of some alphabet that was unknown to the world into her clit, and his fingers pulled at that fire deep within her. His eyes, already dark but now darker still with his pupils blown wide, held hers. That stare, those eyes that saw every inch of her skin and her soul and hopelessly loved it all, broke her.
She wrapped her hand in his silken hair, the other quickly and instinctively followed suit, and she pulled at him as she clenched around his fingers. He moaned against her, and his eyes fluttered shut, and he sucked hard at her clit like a man in a desert with the first drops of water that he had seen in an age. She rocked against his face, moaning loudly enough to shatter the veil of night, her eyes squeezed shut. She wrapped her legs around him, drawing him even closer to her, trying to make him an inextricable part of her. The molten heat within her ramped higher, and higher, and higher still, the precipice of a volcanic eruption.
He slowed but did not stop as she shuddered through her orgasm, sparkling electric. It was the oppressive humidity of summer, finally culminating in a roiling storm, until the rain broke free and the heat dropped down once more. She panted for breath and fell boneless against the mattress. It dipped beneath her, and then he was atop her once more, his body pressed against her sweat-slick skin.
He kissed her like a wild thing, some feral animal ravenous with hunger. She could taste herself on his tongue, salty and bitter. She knew he was the sort to place others before himself – in battle, in station, in matters of the heart. She knew he would not chase his own pleasure, and perhaps he might even take greater joy in bringing her ecstasy than experiencing it himself. She could understand the feeling well, considering she had never before thought that she was a creature capable of such desire. But now she had tasted it, and she wanted to sunder him with her own clumsy touch.
Her hand stole down his arm, then his side, then rested for a moment in the valley of his hip. It was ease itself to wrap her fingers around his cock, velvet soft and hot as flame in her hand. His voice came out a strangled, piteous curse as she slipped her thumb through the pearly fluid at his tip. She wasn’t sure of her movements, if her strokes were the right speed or if her grip was too loose, but the way his breath punched out of him into her own mouth suggested that she had the right idea.
His forest-deep groans grew steadily higher and shorter and faster and higher, sounding more like birdsong in the early mornings by the moment. She caught his chin with her free hand, her thumb resting in the hollow beneath his lip like it had been carved into the marble of his face just for her. He forced his eyes open, the naked arousal and affection sending a diluted aftershock of desire through her.
He pushed himself into the ring of her hand, finally chasing his own release. His forehead pushed into hers, and she felt the vine-like cords of his body tense and quiver in the frozen instant before he spilled hot and wet over her hand. He shook almost as much as she had as he came down from that height, rolling his hips in a few smaller thrusts as his muscles slowly softened.
She drew her hand away and wiped it off on the sheets beside her somewhere; it felt like such an inconsequential thing in that moment. Did the cerulean ocean care about the boats atop it when the silver gleam of Catha was there to push and pull its tides? Did the sunset care about searing the eyes of anyone who looked upon it when there were titanic mountains, earthen monuments of time, to tuck itself between? Should she care about perfunctory cleanliness when her most beautiful man had just fallen apart in her hands, and who now draped himself across her, one leg and one arm tethering her to the earth?
He nuzzled his nose into the crook of her neck, almost kittenish. His rose petal lips brushed half-formed kisses against her skin as her fingers carded through his hair. She played with those raven’s down locks, twirling the strands around her fingers like creeping ivy.
She folded him into her arms, and her eyes grew heavy with the irrefutable gravity of sleep. She knew that they would need to speak about this metamorphosis that their relationship had gone through. She knew that their earlier conversation surrounding life and death and fate was not finished, though she did not expect that it would ever really end. She knew that the moment that they left the ephemeral oasis of her bedroom in the morning, the rest of their family would be aware of what had transpired – and they would be lovingly insufferable about it, as well.
But all of that could wait until the dawn’s light. In this crystalline moment, it was ease itself to slip into slumber with her beloved.