He laughs it off...
     So cavalier...
     Like nothing troubles him in all the world. Like nothing ever did. He moves through life with that same cafe-ease that you had seen, and had loved, in him before. But this time, you knew it was a lie. You knew he had lain awake in bed yesternight. You saw it etched there on his blood, a story behind the story. It was the first time -- and there will be many such times -- when he felt his heart was out of his control. If something had happened to you in London...
     ...So his hands had turned over the pages of an old book, gently handling the old paper, his eyes, his mind absorbing every word of you written there...
     Until he felt he was with you again...
      As the story unraveled, so did the knot in his soul. There was no need to worry -- so said the epic in every metered step...
     The bed shifts, and you feel a hand skimming against your skin. Discovering something about itself even as it moves over you. Your stomach. Your thigh. And there it lingers... a favorite place. One of so many.
     His mouth. It trails at the crook of your neck and shoulder, as if he shall seek the purchase of supper. But Valan merely feels you there. Feels you here. Smells your skin and your hair.
     And he? The blush of Bordeaux has been taken. The complexion to the paler side of cream. And his body is lazy-languid heavy. "You... were saying..."
     About London. About your story, Edward. What is it about you... that when my hands are on you I can think of nothing...

     He was dreaming. Dozing. Fantasizing about a young man that made his heart race.
     How often is one woken by a dream?
     "Oh..." Edward grins, licking his bottom lip. All of you, so intoxicating. An exhale. "It was as it was," he murmurs, trying not to wake too much. His hand comes to rest at your back, and he strokes while you kiss. "I went to see Anglesey and Remick," Edward explains, "...found them after their usual ransacking of the Hornet's Nest...a fuckin' dive near Merringate." Free hand snakes beneath his head, expanding his chest and causing his bicep to swell against his forearm. "About five am. They were too shit-faced to know," Edward whispers. "They came around a corner, into the alley, and...we had a little discussion."
     "They're associates of Mortimer's, though, I don't think he sent them per se, ami," words almost breathless. "But when I confronted him the next night, he knew. Saw him after his fuckin' early call to Panatiou. He still smelled like her." Damned kindred sense of smell. "He didn't want any of me, so I didn't press it -- save to tell him that his associates were hurt. Next time, they'd be missing limbs...and I count heads as limbs."
     A slight shrug follows, causing the sheets to rustle, not unlike a bit earlier. Edward turns his head, better able to see you now. "I then went to deRancey and he went to Tattinger. If I see reprisals..." Edward's brow simply lifts. "They know what they did, and what I've done. That's enough."

     "You are so poetic, ami," the brush of his mouth against your ear, his voice is soft. Most mortals would miss it. And he is still, your Valan, his body heavy. Warm, not by means of his own -- that will take more time and greater magic -- but by you, by the many blankets and sheets, by the fire at its comfortable distance.
     His hands are warmed by their constant, if slow, motion...
     "Heads as limbs," he chuckles. So terrible you are. So terribly sexy, ami. And the book, this has only fueled such thoughts. Such knowledge. It has stoked the engines of his own fantasies. "Hmmm... but you will be alright, oui..." Valan murmurs, his eyes drawing to a close. "There will be no more of this... at least for a while, I hope." There is a pause. "I know you do not like this Mortimer and this Panatiou. But ... you have caught them, hmm? Beaten them at their own game. They will leave you be?" Questions that are not questions...
     Valan lifts his head, golden hair in disarray, and the smile is winding slow and warm. "We are still going to stay at the hotel, oui? I think... hmmm... room service," his hand is in motion from thigh upward, "... would be nice..."

     "We can," Edward grins, especially when the hand moves, "...as long as you like. How about Claridge's?" he wonders. "Chester already has a room," his head turns, a wink as he faces you.
     "We are spending too much time on them," Edward notes, hand coming from under the pillow to clasp your shoulder. Sable eyes stare at his fingers moving gently upon your skin. "I think we'll be fine. No one is interested in battles in City alleys, ami. But a week of pampering," here and at Claridge's, "...can never be a bad thing, oui?"
     A vacuum of air lifts when Edward brings his knee up, feet to the bed. "What else shall we talk about?" he wonders, grin spreading again, much like his wandering fingers that press your skin. Here. There. "I have a question," Edward smirks, his lips angling, "...tell me who...was the first you were ever with." In that way, left with a preposition at the end. Brown eyes look askance at you, as if issuing a challenge. He expects you will not answer, even when he chuckles and nips at your nose.

     "I will answer your question," comes the soft voice, the issue of summer upon his words, "...if you will answer mine." Tit for tat, as they say. More tats between us than tits, mais oui, ami. And in the vacuum of air your shifting has created, Valan resettles upon you. Head on your stomach, an arm thrown lazily alongside you. His other hand?
     Amazingly enough, it is where it started. Moving inward from your thigh, trailing a circle around your navel. Valan looks up to you from where he lays, nestled between your legs, stretched out upon the bed below. And his smile leaves a brushing stroke. "Better this, you have to answer, in kind, the questions you ask me. So... you ask, I answer, you confess," gold glimmers in the wink, "...mon chevalier..."
     A bend of his head, and gold scatters against your stomach, his mouth against your skin. "His name was Phillipe... I was sixteen and he was twenty-two..." Valan tilts his head, looking to you again. "I have a thing for older men, mais oui..."

     Ha!
     Edward damned near turns crimson at that, tightening his lips together to stifle a laugh. You win that one, ami. Older. Hmm. That's funny.
     A sigh comes and he lifts his hand to wave defeat. "Alright, oui, I shall confess, if I can remember. Am I being asked the same question?" he wonders, head lifting and bending to see you. "Or you are to ask another question?"

     "Oui... who was your first," Valan whispers. He smiles. No, he grins to think of this. Edward was once a virgin. Once, he was a young, young man. A gangly youth, perhaps even. Once, he crawled. It is strange to think it -- one who is so many centuries on this world -- and yet, he can see it in you. In your smile. In your blush.
     "Although, I may ask another question..." His mouth begins to stray. Against you, nuzzling in darkness, the juncture of thighs. "I am making up the rules, ami, as we go along..."
     And this is why you love him, do you not?
     Valan circles your waist with his arms, snaking, entwining. Anchoring. "You probably do not remember your third or fourth or five-hundredth... but everyone remembers their first..."

     "Five-hundredth!?" Edward blinks, definitely caught aghast. "Five-hundred? Bah! Ami, what do you think I am?" Edward flushes again, this time his expression showing something of faint insult. But he smirks soon enough, trying to dispel that.
     "First...there is no way I can recall, ami, truly. I know she was some girl, a servant in the house. Dark-haired. She started to flirt with me one Spring...I must have been...well...recently given my duties as Vicomte, though the title was mine at birth. Hmm. Maybe...I was...fifteen? Fourteen? I cannot say, actually." And now he drifts, the insult long gone, eyes at the ceiling. Hmm. When did that happen?
     "Ah well. I am certain it was not so spectacular, hmm? Me, all hands and..." Edward laughs, "...other parts." He shrugs against the rustlng linens. "And there you are, ami. Some random servant girl, who is now long-gone..." nothing terribly exciting about that.
     "But...I want to hear more of you and this Phillippe," he tickles. "You wanted to be with such a man? You knew...already?" That you preferred men.

     "Oh, come now, Eduard," there is the tsk at your stomach, and he looks to you. "You are over five hundred years old. You are telling me that you... you as beautiful as you are... and as spectacular as you are between the sheets have slept with fewer than one person per year? With a book such as the one I saw pass hands between you and Davydd," Dahveed, he says.
     No, he does not believe you...
     Nor that you should have been insulted by such a thought that you have slept with more than five hundred beings...
     In over six hundred years...
     His chuckle sounds against your stomach, your hips, your thighs. "Hmmm... what is there to tell... let me see... I was sneaking into discos... and he saw me dancing, and so it went. And... oui... I knew. I grew up on a winery, and knew I preferred looking at men to women. So, I started sneaking into clubs. Passing, you know, the fake IDs." Eyes glimmer when he lifts them.

     Discos. Well, of course. Modern things are so different. But back to what I was thinking. Five-hundred beings in that span of time. Edward ponders on it a moment, then adds, "Well, for two-hundred, I was...exclusive property." In Spain. "And so, my average per year," can I believe I'm saying this, "...was less than one. For a while." That brings a warm grin.
     "But..." Edward smirks, "...so, he too saw you among so many others?"

     A kiss against your stomach travels upward. The brush of a parting mouth. The warmth that ends against your own mouth, parting. Sweetly. "You know how it is in the clubs. It is all heat and sweat and music and drinking or 'X'. We just sort of met and exploded for three nights and then the next week, I was at fencing team practice and life went on. I did not see him again, but..." Valan lowers, mouth pulling at yours again, "I did suddenly take more notice of my older teammates."
     The grin slides against your mouth...
     And Valan settles in a straddle, a leg on either side of you. "I was... a wild boy," he whispers. "When I got to university, I was beyond playing the decadent aristocrat. And then I met you..."

     "That was fast," Edward grins for the double-entendre. Then, he quirks curiously, head titling upon his pillow. "You were not sixteen when we met. Nothing happened in the interim?"

     It begins at his throat. It dips downward past his chest, to his gut. You see it all. A river of redness. In his otherwise... light complexion, such flushing is all the more obvious. "Non... I was twenty-six," he murmurs. Do you need me to tell you how awful I was? Eyes are bright, so bright. A sparkle of gold in the green. And his mouth slides a slanting smile. "Hmmm... from sixteen to... twenty, I was a party boy. Always at the best parties. Golden sloth," he whispers. "Then I grew up... twenty-two I was the elusive, unattainable Montague. So the years went. I began with wine and ended with champagne."
     From decadent wannabe to refined sensualist...
     "Ask me another question..."

     "What did you think of me," Edward murmurs, watching his hands now at your thighs, "...when you first saw me? The one with his friends," he recalls, a bit of disdain in his voice for how he was. "Easy target, I must have been," he sighs, mustering a small smile when his eyes lift to you again. He knows, he was not the most aware then.
     "I wonder, would I have not seen you, if I knew then...what I know now?" Edward philosophizes. "I was not looking for anyone that night," he admits, honesty in his expression. Then a laugh. "But you must have known this," he grins, looking away. Who was that who entered L'Emperor that night? A different man.

     His weight settles comfortably around you. As he bends, a hover over you, his mouth brushing your forehead. "Ami," Valan breathes there, "... you were not like other men. I saw you come in, who could have denied seeing you? Seeing William? Seeing Davydd? L'Emperor had never seen such as you. And I had never seen such. I was drawn," his mouth brushes again, "as they say about moths, to flame. Hmm? But... what is it you know now that would have caused us to miss in passing?" I do not understand this question.
     Valan lifts, fencer's build on display. Such a display. "I did not know that you were not looking," he adds with a lifting smile, dispelling confusion. "You did look intense. Like you were in need of ... lightening, hmmm? I wanted to be the one who took the burden from your shoulders, whatever it was..."

     He pauses, looking away again towards the hearth. Thinking. "If I were...about men...as I had been about women," Edward brings his gaze to bear again, "...I would have misssed you, ami. Seen you as I had seen many. Maybe...in my...inexperience," another confession and a frown, "...oh, I do not know, really, ami. I just wonder would I have made a mistake, if I saw men as I had seen women then? I didn't. And I...fell...for you instantly." Eyes drop again, not sure where he is going.
     "William...was moving...and then I saw you as I watched him. I didn't know what to think, what to say. And when," he inhales, "...you came to the table." Edward just closes his eyes, recalling the moment, "I was not...as I am with women. I was...not sure what to do. I thought...just that..." and he opens his eyes, "...just that you were so beautiful, ami. That's...all I could think about."

     Ah, I see...
     I had not thought of it...
     Your transition from women to me...
     You came to me so naturally, with such comfort. With such strength and bearing. I could not have been your first. A hand moves to your face, fingers padding softly, and softly he turns you to him. I could not have been your first...
     Could I?
     "Was I..."
     That beautiful...
     Your first...
     There is a tender look. "I am glad I found you as you were, and you saw me there when William moved away and to that blonde that was not his mate." And, yes, he wonders about this, too. Bending, his mouth is at yours again. "I like the word serendipity. It has good sound to it," he continues in a whisper. "So, I am going to say it was serendipity. It happened as it was meant to, Eduard."

     He smiles, thinking of it all. "Serendipity," he whispers in kind, turning it into a sticky kiss. "But, before you go on...I will say that I was..." he frowns, not sure how to say this, "...well, there was one before you, ami. Only two weeks or so. A first...try?" Experiment. And he's mentioned the couple of times in Spain where he...stood and let others indulge a few fetishes. Such was Maria's debts.
     "But, it was a failure," Edward explains, shrugging a little. Habit that. "Glorious failure," he half-hearted chuckles, remembering how he felt. It was confusing, certainly, for he trails off in the remembrance, staring at some scene elseplace, elsetime.

     And he turns...
     You feel the bed shifting...
     And then Valan is in your arms, half on you, half on the bed, his back given to part of your chest. Eyes closing, he exhales, and turns his head to rest against your own. "I will tell you, ami, it was with us... is with us... amazing. Incroyable," he repeats.
     Eyes open to find yours. Hoping to find yours. "I had never thought... this is a man who does not know what it is to love men. With us it was... so natural, hmm? We ... fit... ami. There was not a thought in my mind that it would not be so. Or should not be so. I was not going to take no for an answer," he chuckles suddenly. "I do not know what I would have done," he whispers. "If you had not wanted to see me again. I think I should have become fat and sad..."
     His mouth brushes against your cheek, just beneath your eye. "And... you like it.. being with a man? I hope so, I am now immortal and even less likely to take no for an answer. M. Montague is quite stubborn," he lilts, his fingers seeking your sides. A tickle.
     Tell me you do not regret your choice, Eduard...

     Edward smiles at the distraction, the reverie from whence you pull him. "Permanence," he whispers, turning to cradle you now. "And should you have sent me away, I do not know if I would have recovered." Strong arms embrace you, his lips at your ear.
     "I love being with you, ami. Valan," he murmurs, saying the name. "I love it. Being with...a man." Dare I say it. "But not with any man, ami. With you." A kiss touches your ear again, seeming a singular thing. Yet it does not end. The afterthought invites another, and another. Edward's kisses move to the nape of your neck, his face half-hidden by sandy-gold hair. His eyes closed.
     "I meant it," he murmurs, one hand slipping to rest on the rise of your hip, "...when I asked you if you would stay with me. That I should promise to ask you a question, and for you not to fear it. I had no plans...to ever have to ask anyone else again..."

     And when I said I would say 'yes'... I meant this too...
     It has been almost a year, ami...
     The turning...
     Valan does not even feel it consciously. Moving against the bedding until he is beneath you. A natural coil, that began nearly a year ago and has only intensified. Deepened. Echoed in the coiling of his mouth against and within yours.
     He does not feel the wetness that leaves his eyes. He does not see it, to know that it is blood. He only smells it...
     And the kiss is fueled by it and the emotion that created it...
     "Ask me again," he whispers. "It is a question I will not get tired of answering..." His arms surround you. And he loses track of where you end and he begins, and what is you, him or the bed. It is all the same.

     The scent is familiar. Edward's arms instinctively close, he resting against you, at your ear.
     "Will you have me, Valan Montague? Will you find me as interesting as those others, and let me love you?" Edward pauses, inhaling, then adds in almost inaudible tones, "I have waited lifetimes, Valan, to love someone like you..." If you can understand. "Will you...let me?"

     You do not even know how far you outshine the others that have moved in and out of my short life. But that is the beauty of this time we have, ami. I can show you. You will understand. You will know. You will see. Hear. Taste. Smell. Truth, ami, will be known. You know it in the kiss that captures your mouth before I answer...
     "Yes," he says, in English tried for you again, the smile pulling broadly, even though blood stains his cheeks. "That is why I am here on this earth, Eduard." As if life should have a greater purpose than that. If it does, I do not know of it. Is it not why we are all here? Trying to find this?
     A hand reaches up, fingers padding softly against your cheek. "And now that you have asked and I have answered, you must answer the same question for me," and so we have come back to our confessional game you and I. But no game this. "Will you let Valan Montague of No Battles love you, Edward Meurelle, Vicomte du Blois..." Fingers disappear in the darkness of your hair. "Will you give him this great honor," comes his voice upon a breath of French, "Knight of France, Second Born of Spain, Saviour of Alhambra..."
     And the words are echoed in script upon a page...
     In Spanish poetry, with notes in the margin in French...
     ...which rests, cover closed, upon the nearest nightstand.

     His answer is easy, coming with a smile.
     "I have given you, ami, all I have left to give."
     You will see splendid nights with me.
     And your days are gone forever.

Posted by rowan at May 07, 2003 12:05 AM