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He hear the door click shut behind him.
The first thing he noticed was that it didn't smell like her. Keyleth's room should smell like Keyleth, that was basic logic, but it didn't. He realised this was probably because this wasn't technically Keyleth's room. It was Scanlan's impression of Keyleth's room.
He kicked himself. If he hadn't been a coward so long, if he had muscled up the courage to do this before, long before, back in the castle... Well, then her room would smell like her.
But it didn't. And it was his own fault.
It almost looked like her room. There were still spots that had too much of Scanlan's livery and not enough of her quiet grace, but it was close. Close enough.
There was a spark of something shiny on the other side of the room, and in its reflection, he could see her quietly leaned against the door, one arm loosely wrapped around her. Her eyes were looking everywhere but at him. She bit her lip, nervous, and then looked up at him. He didn't look back.
Waiting.
He realised that his hands were on his daggers out of nervousness, and he removed them, silent. He told himself he was a fool, this was a stupid idea, and he should just go back now, but... she moved. And his eyes flicked up to catch the shift.
She slipped past him, the bottom of her robe brushing against the edge of his cloak. The closeness made him bristle. She stepped into view at the corner of his eye, and he watched her sit down at a small vanity.
The mirror was framed in twisting wood that looked like white washed driftwood, with little green vines and flowers weaved within. It fit the theme, even if it didn't seem quite... right.
She still didn't look at him. Instead, she looked down at her vanity, as if looking for a clue, an idea... And then she reached into her drawer, and pulled out a hair brush, and closed it. He watched as she began to run the brush through her hair... But not really brushing. Just... fiddling.
He took this cue. He lifted a hand to his cloak and with a little snap it came apart. He stood in the middle of the room, not sure what to do with it, until he spotted a coat hanger on the side. Already, her warm brown cloak was hanging there, topped with her crown, as absent-mindedly as a top hat.
It struck him as just the sort of strange, Keyleth thing to do, and put his cloak next to her. Then he took off Simon and his daggers and... Took a good minute fully disarming himself, and hung it on top of the cloak.
When he moved behind her, she looked up, as if surprised that he was still there. Meeting his eye for only a moment, she looked away again, hands still on her hair, jaw clenched. He stepped closer, where she couldn't escape his reflection, and he held out a hand, slow, so that she had plenty of opportunity to tell him to stop... but she didn't. And he took the brush from her hand, and began to brush her hair.
I've wanted to do this forever, he wanted to tell her. You don't know how many times I stare at you... How long I've looked at your beautiful hair, wanting to run my fingers through its silky strands... How many times we've come out of battle and I just want to take all of those loose ringlets and tuck them back in... When you do something wild and amazing and I just want to put my fingers in those little knots and comb them out...
But he didn't say any of that. Instead, he just brushed her hair.
It was a moment until she made a soft sound that caught him off guard -- a warm sound, a kind of Mmm sound, and when he looked up in the mirror he saw that she was smiling. A soft, quiet, private smile that made his heart race. Her eyes were closed. She was just... enjoying the sheer luxury of the moment.
He moved back to her hair before she spoke. "I always wondered what this would feel like," she said, an opening gambit of sorts.
So have I, he wanted to say.
"I've always watched you do your sister's hair," she continued. He looked to her face, her eyes open, half-lidded, and shy. Looking down. "Perhaps she..."
There was that shyness, that self-consciousness that he adores. The ridiculously powerful druid, a woman who could move mountains and sweep any fool off his feet, and she's shy. And to have that humility with all of that power just makes her all the more perfect and beautiful for it.
"I've... wanted to do this too," he finally admitted. "Your hair is so..." Wild. It's like fire. It burns me. "...Beautiful."
She gives a small laugh. "Thanks, Vax." She gives a small roll of her eyes and looks up at him in the reflection. His face is still, and her smile falters. "I don't mind, you know. It's fine." She gives a little shrug.
He gave a little eyebrow quirk, and returned to his work, making his way through her long, beautiful hair... Careful to keep her from pain, careful to get every inch. When he'd finally brushed out all of the tangles, he set the brush down. He looked up to catch a look of slight disappointment and sadness as she looked to the brush... until his fingers dipped into her hair again, parting.
She smiled again, this time a big, brilliant smile, and she closed her eyes, letting him work. He swallowed a lump in his throat, not really believing this was happening. Certain this was just a really sweet dream, and that at any moment he would rudely awakened by Scanlan or his sister or... Trinket farts. But even if it was a dream, he was going to make it last.
He parted a piece on one side, and braided up along one side, weaving a crown over her head. So that even without the top hat sitting on the coat rack... everyone could still see what a princess she was. He braided her hair, not for utility, but for beauty. Tight, strong braids. And once he'd gone down the lenght of it, he twisted it around and around and around in a grand and glorious knot. He took a pin from her dresser -- it almost looked like a cat tail, like from the swamps that they'd met at, and as he stuck it into her hair, holding it in place. He took a step back, like an artisan proud, except that... Well, he wasn't an artisan, and it probably wasn't all that beautiful, but it was the best that he could do.
"There you are, Princess," he said, bowing slightly.
She smiled at him again, opening her eyes to roll them. "I'm no princess, Vax."
"You are to me," he answered, quietly.
He reached forward then, finding a small compact mirror on the dresser, and held it up so that she could see. She turned her head this way, and then that way, and then down a little bit, her smile growing. "Vax, it's beautiful." She seemed genuinely surprised. "I didn't know you could do that."
"There's a great many things I can do that nobody knows about." A lot of which, I hope you never find out about.
She turned in her chair then, giving him that wicked grin that made his heart skip again, that made him ache... That fire in her eyes.
"You have such..." She paused a moment, trying to think of the best way to phrase it. "Caring hands."
"Thank you." Said hands making fists and releasing, nervous with nothing else to do. They were also cruel hands. Strong hands. Mean hands. A killer's hands. Every time he'd grasped a blade and thrust it into someone. The blood that stained them... But then, they could do nice things too, now and again.
The look on her face changed then, a kind of determination that made him awed. With that moment of self-assurance, she stood, taking a hand to the back of his neck, and pulling him closer for a kiss.
His breath caught, wanting it, always wanting it this way, and he returned it, his hands catching at her nightgown, pale white silk like diamonds on her ivory skin. His fingers moved, memorising the small of her back, the warmth of her skin under the thin layer of silk, and he sighed. And she kissed him again. He teased with a tongue, and she seemed to gasp a little in surprise, but parted and let him in. She danced with him for a moment, learning, following... and he wondered if this was a dream after all.
And then she let out a breathy moan that he'd never dared to dream about. He broke apart, terrified. Keyleth, too, backed away, surprised, wondering. But there was still that spark in her eyes that caught him, once again and always, off guard.
He growled softly under his breath, teeth clenched. "Gods, how you vex me, woman."
For a moment, her face twisted into confusion, and then a wry grin. "That's a... Strange choice of words, there."
"Oh, shut up," he muttered, taking her again for a kiss. There was a small sound of surprise, and then she followed once again.
It was in this way he nudged his way in, trying not to be too greedy, too grasping, too clawsome... But when he let a little out, he found that she answered in kind. That bold, animal fury inside reaching out and clawing back. Gasping for one another, they eventually disrobed, entangling in the bed.
He was sure to take his time, to be slow, to be gentle... But when she gave him a look, that... "Don't hold out on me, Vax" look that instantly became his most favorite thing in the whole gods damned world, he would push a little harder... and push a little harder. When she finally came for the first time, it was like... witnessing the birth of a phoenix, all flame and chaos and wild and... Breathtakingly beautiful. He brought her on more, showing her what to do, where to go... Silent commands that she answered eagerly, and a little surprise for him here and there that left him, yet again, wondering what a miracle this creature was, and that she had let him in, that she had followed, that she had... taken back everything he'd offered to her was...
He didn't have words.
He felt himself about to come inside her, and moved quickly to not spoil her any more than he already had. She seemed surprised, shocked, scared even by the sudden stop. He groaned as he spilled himself on the sheets beneath her. Weary, he pulled himself beside her, her brow still furrowed in a child's confusion. He placed a cheek upon her breast and she quipped a small smile, his arms wrapped around her, fingers touching her hair, the loose tendrils threatening to burst out of her crown. He reached for the cat tail, plucking it out of the now looser knot, and tossed it away, listening to it clatter against the stone. His fingers worked at the bottom of the long braid, long enough to drape over her thigh, and he raked the braid loose again over her skin. He worked his way up, over her back, her shoulders, her neck... The loveliness of her hiding a shy smile in the pillows as he teased his nails into her scalp, until it was all as loose and lovely as before, with only a few dents and soft curves to bely his earlier work. He draped her hair over her body, a curtain of modesty over her soft, warm skin...
She watched him with a dark satisfaction in her eyes that was going to keep him awake for nights hence. "You really like to play with my hair, don't you?" she said quietly.
He nodded, amusing himself as he twirled a tendril between her breasts, enjoying the curve of it on her supple breasts. "Yes... I do."
Her fingers teased over him as well, tracing the collarbone, and the curve of his shoulders, the dips and swells of his arm... "I appreciate it," he said. "It's very beautiful."
She gave another shy smile, a rouge to her cheeks that was entirely his doing that made his heart soar as he just stared at her, swallowing every inch, every freckle, every line, every curve...
...But she was doing the same, and her face turned to something else as she loitered over a nasty scar. He shifted, moving his face to the crook of his neck so he didn't have to see... Have to see those sad eyes. He sighed, loving the smell of her, inhaling her, breathing her in. Just being there and knowing her. She was the musk of man, the cloying flower, the game of a tiger, that sweet sweat that was his doing, and something... something else. Something that was all her. Only her.
"...How old are you, Vax?"
He paused a moment, caught off guard by the question, but answered. "Why?"
She shook her head slightly, her soft hair teasing at his fingertips. "Just... Just wondering."
He kissed her soft skin, and she shivered. He smiled, liking this game, and kissed again, a little higher. She gave a soft groan, and he kept going, moving to her ear, that long half-elven ear, so much like his own, and teased at it.
She shivered. "Vax, that tickles," she hissed
"I know," he growled, grinning, grabbing her hips and moving her on top of him.
She giggled, settling against him, arms crossed on his chest, chin on her fingers as she smiled at him. "...Thank you. For this."
He gave a crooked grin, and propped his head on his arm behind him. "Not at all, darling. The pleasure was all mine."
Mischeivous, she pinched at his rib.
"Ow!" Not expecting such violence, and being that he was well and truly grappled by the devastatingly gorgeous druid on top of him, he was quite at her mercy. He laughed. "You're a feisty one, aren't ya?"
Dark eyes beckoned at him, raised brow, a challenging smirk. "Well, you would know that better than anyone now, wouldn't you?"
Oh, to hear that bedroom voice... He leaned forward, grasping her by the jaw. "Oh, you wicked thing..." He sighed. "I could have you forever and never be satisfied." Another kiss, this one hungry, and yet lazy. She teased with the tongue and he answered in kind, tugging at it with his teeth. She let out a sound of appreciation, and returned the favour, earning a growl.
"...You watch that, loff," he said. "Yer gonna have me on you again."
"Is that a threat or a promise?" she whispered, her hips moving over him in a cruel tease...
He groaned... "Both, Keyleth, both."
He reached for a kiss again, and... this time she is the one that pulled back. For a moment, he was worried the spell was broken, that she'd come to her senses, but it wasn't fear or shame, but a question in her eyes, as she cocked her head to the side with a little 'huh'.
He growled, impatient, praying she hadn't seen. "What?"
"That's the first time I've heard you call me 'Keyleth' in a very, very long time. Usually it's..."
"...Kiki," he supplied. This time it was his turn to blush, embarassed she'd caught it. He licked his lips. "I... Aye. Usually it is."
But she gave him a different smile. A dark, predatory smile that made a shiver slip down his spine... And he reminded himself again that this rather dangerous, sexy, glorious, gorgeous creature had him pinned in her own bed... "Say it again for me?"
He swallowed hard, unable to hide his recovering arousal. "Keyleth."
She bit her own lips, eyes black as sin, moving above him, on her own arms, her hips meeting his, and he felt his eyes roll in the back of his head at the feel of it. "Again."
"Keyleth." He made it a growl, a curse, and as he reached up for another rough kiss, he wrapped his arms around her, earning a squeak of surprise, and turned them both, taking dominance again. "I warned you..." he teased, grinning devilishly, hands reaching for her legs. Her laugh was a low and throaty chuckle, as she held her arms above her, not bothering to stop him.
It took much longer to come the second time. But when he did, they were both very, very happy. And very tired. And very sweaty. And sticky. And smelling of... Wonderful things.
As he curled up beside her, melted into a batch of happy goo... He watched her turn on her side to smile at him. He sighed, looking at her out of the corner of his eye. "What is it now, devil woman?" The lazy curve to his lips belied his good nature.
She just grinned at him. "Nothing! Hmm. Just sitting here. Watching you." Her eyes went big after a moment, like an owl, staring in a mildly off-putting way.
He cocked a brow. "Are you mocking me?"
She looked up. "Uh...Maybe?"
He laughed. "You are terrible at talks," he said, knowing his own vocabulary was rather limited and not-working-so-well at the moment.
Keyleth watched him, her grin softening into something more like fondness, as she reached for a blanket, wrapping it around them both, tucking it under her arm. "Well. At least I know I'm good at one thing."
He moved his arm a moment to give her another look. She took the chance to squirrel in, and the arm wrapped around her.
That you are, he wanted to say, but he didn't. He had the feeling she heard it anyway, and they both drifted off to sleep.