He is unchanged from earlier. A passing of servants. His hand sweeps out across the world, breaking the currents of air that swirl around him. Touching the shoulder of someone passing. Palm upwards to feel the coolness of air that breezes through the nooks and crannies of Chinon. It all speaks to him now, and he is unafraid to listen.
     His path is marked, the young man in brown and cashmere. Silver eyes shine like radiating circles of moonlight, happier than they have ever known. A smile rests upon his lips. So beautiful is the world. Such joy and peace. Love. Desire. Companionship. What else can there be? Contentment. He walks in his skin as if there is no other place to be. The only addition, would be in your arms.
     And so his wandering path, some time later, sends him to his destination. A grin grows from the smile as he peeps silver around the opening door. Anyone home? You here? Hmm.

     He woke at some ungodly hour of the day and peered past the covers and drapes of the bed fit for a king, to the clean-swept floor of stone turned golden with some amount of winter sunlight. Some dream that bid him Wake, but one that... now, upon reflection, he can't remember. It must not have been very important. Not very important at all.
     But you were still sleeping and so he returned to the bed, his hand moving from the drapes and casting darkness on the interior of the canopy's spacious sleeping den. He returned to the pillows and to you. And that is where you will still find him. Only in the warmth of all those blankets and furs, a foot is stuck out from the canopy. And an arm.
     He has moved...
     When you left him, do you recall how peacefully he seemed to sleep? But not the vampiric sleep of Death... but of living... breathing...dozing...
     And now you can see his fingers curl... where drapes are parted. You can see him shift upon the pillows, and you know that indigo eyes are opening.
     Love... you shine like the sun...
     And you live on his blood, exuberant. And now William cannot sleep longer. The bed squeaks with the first major motion of your knight's large form.

     "Mmm, you are alive," he purrs, already slipping from brown Italian loafers to land on stone with olive socks. The young man lets the door close behind himself, and tripples over towards you and the bed. "How is the morning, laird?" his provencal well-dusted off these days.
     He smells of cherry blossoms. But it is a little early. He has been among the trees though, in the orchard. The blonde bends, his cashmere brushing your nose, and a kiss is placed at your cheek. Yet he wants more.
     "Tired?" he wonders, sliding to sit beside you, well within your space. His space. Legs, arms, shoulders...all touching.

     "Comfortable..." comes his answer, languid. Provence caught half in dreams. And he turns just slightly, twisting. You are up early. You are resplendent. And you smell of the orchards. The old cherry trees flavor everything in Chinon. Its wine. Its lords...
     Slow is the smile that pulls upon the waking mouth. Languid as his voice. It is like a drag of silk against skin -- smooth. Sensuous in its curving. Such natural sensuality -- that which exists merely because he does. It is not practiced or learned. He... and it... merely Is. William clears his throat. "I will feel more alive after a hot shower. Hmmm... care to put the water on for me...? I will... try to get up..."
     His syllables transform to laughter, quiet. Soft. "Do we still have a full house...? Should I go be social, amours?"

     The bathroom chamber is off of the main bed chamber and drawing room here, and a labyrinth of hidden rooms. Private quarters indeed...
     The bath itself has both modern shower, like your Strathfayr, as well as a bath and other such modern conveniences it never had in its original plans. This, a product of 20th Century re-engineering, non? The bathroom is quite vast. Palacial in and of itself...

     "You have a full house, oui, laird," the gaelic word slippery in your dialect, "...but I think they are all occupied for now," he smiles. He lifts and the bed relaxes for it, his form so easy to watch. You know it best.
     "Your cos and his friend seem to make plans for a departure," he observes, voice lifting as he walks away from you and disappears into the bath. "I left Victoria in the courtyard with the Dignitary. I have not seen Lausanne...but that's not surprising," his voice carries, thinner due to the attributes of the bath. Acoustics.
     And soon, the water runs.
     "Who else? Nothing of Hastur...I believe he has gone home finally." Poor man. Sympathy crackles for a moment within the happy contentedness.
     When he sticks his head around the door, the cross at his chest has appeared from within the cashmere. "Anyone else, laird?" That I've forgotten?

     It is a whirl of names and stories, causes and locations. And dark eyes blink solidly at it all. The mind is not yet wakened enough to grasp all of that...
     What you missed, indeed throughout your entire litany of names and places and even through the crackle of sympathy for poor Hastur, William lay in lording over the whole bed. A stretch that brought with it the first true glimmer of Consciousness... and the day's first groan. Past the water of the bath, past even your voice... you could hear this...
     And the sigh...
     And the squeaking of the bed as he finally sat upward. And stood.
     He doesn't bother with a robe... does he even own one? And when you peer around the door, you receive an... eyeful of Norman. William shakes his head, the trace of the earlier grin yet remaining. And in the doorway, the beginning of another stretch.
     Another groan...
     Another sigh... as he pads very slowly toward the shower. "Hmm... non... sounds like you... have it all accounted for..."
      No... Il dignatario did not stick.
     William pauses, the smile growing, a large hand settling softly at your side. A bend, and a brush of his mouth. "Good morning," such lazy Provencal, hanging upon the half-slumbering tongue.

     A sound curls from him when your touch lands. "Good morning," he whispers, meeting the brush with lazy lips of his own. Silver eyes do glance downward, and his brows wiggle when he turns away with humor.
     "Are you always like this?" he chuckles, moving to see about the water again. Teasing on the reversal. "If so, I need to wake up earlier more often, laird." A tick of the door as it opens, and the blonde youth inserts a hand to test.

     He leans against one of the shower's supporting walls. Vertical, oui -- but not entirely of his own volition yet. Nor has the ritual been cast. You can see the difference. In the responses that, while seamless, are nevertheless put on. Not quite natural. But no less beautiful...
     He runs a hand through his hair and glances to you, indigo eyes full more of violet in this half-waking. "I am not usually this talkative... but I am always this naked... is it hot enough for steam? I like it very hot..." William murmurs, and upon the edges of his words, a smile to you. I like this reversal. "Hmm... you do not usually ... get to see me before I am all ... put together..." Eyes squint in the spreading of his grin, "...how do you like the diamond in the rough, amours?"
     Hands are then in motion, with a slight start. Remembering his father's cross. It is removed, and the gold chain drips off of his fingertips to a towel that rests nearby. Only you can hear the metallic chime...

     Hot? Oh. Ian peels eyes from you to twist to the water again. Perhaps not hot enough for you. Fingers turn the knob, causing a better rush of white billowing clouds.
     "That might be it," he motions, moving aside as he shakes his wet hand. "No," he murmurs, "I don't get to see you like this so often," he sighs, leaning against the wall perpendicular to the shower faucets. You must brush his shoulder to step inside. "I should rise earlier," he offers, looking down still, for some reason, "...I miss all the good things."
     Goddess, but you're huge.
     Brows arch and he sighs with the thought. "I shouldn't make you talk," he smirks, "I don't want to tax you so early in the evening."

     And then he laughs. The first true laughter of the day. Rich and fluent, and it lights him. Warms him. Makes him for that moment truly living, something beyond pantomime and magic. Real. Even with that unreal form and face. "Non, non... it is good for me... the mind," his hand gesticulates from his forehead, "... is waking. Just slow..." Indigo, sudden... even as he speaks of the wakening mind, his eyes begin to show it.
     And he not only brushes your shoulder, as he begins to move into the shower and the water, he pauses there. A hand to you. Another kiss. "Stay with me?" As I greet my day...
     And then his touch recedes and steam and water begin to enfold the form. Tall and broad. A mountain in his own time. Even so ... still... in this modern time. And William sighs, face, hair, chest and the front of him soon immersed. Such a view, and one rarely afforded you. Though you live with him, see him everyday... how often like this?
     A shoulder rolls, and he turns to look at you. "You said earlier... something about a dignitary?"

     The door remains cracked open. A beautiful face swathed in cashmere tips around the wall to stare openly. "Hmm? Oh... Girault. He's here..." Words fade as eyes begin at the top. Nothing interesting there. But somewhere at your lower chest, that's where his eyes descend.
     And further.
     Dear God...
     "Ah...and...he is consoling Victoria, I believe." Nice word consoling.
     Nice thoughts. They crackle between you even as the audience turns to look at something else for a moment.

     "Hmmm... why am I not surprised by this... everywhere I look lately, I see Il Gatto di Firenze's face... next thing you know, he will be coined as the new face of France..." A pause, and there is only the sound of water dancing and thudding across his skin and his vocal sigh. Mon Dieu, but I needed this. And now the skin is alive again. Warm again...
     Honey. A light fragrance held in the soap made by one of the servants here. Alys, who also makes shampoo and essential oils for the skin. It is an old tradition, passed down from mother to daughter and so on. Who knows but that her great-grandmother may have made such things for Chinon's lord before her. The scent of it will remain on his skin long after, beneath layers of cinnamon and leather.
     If you turn back now, you will see it foaming on his skin. There is a cloth fitted to the hand like a half-glove, and beneath it, the soap lathers easily. Runs and clings against him. "But I am glad one of her own is here to care for her..."

     "Yeah..." Ian lazily rumbles, turning around to indeed watch you. The smile returns instantly. "He might as well...she sounds as if she wants to stay, so...." she might as well get to know her own ilk.
     "Oh!" Ian suddenly exclaims, brightening like a bulb before slinking into smug darkness and amusement against the wall. Oh, yes. I know something. Pry it out of me. His tongue clucks against the cave of his open mouth and his brows waggle.
     "Get this, laird," eyes staring at your endowments, "...um..." eyes lift, "...guess who is also here as....a representative of the council." He says. Operative word: Council. Guess, guess. Go ahead, you know you want to...his body leaning half into the shower stall.

     Your Norman is quite fastidious. And now, in this modern world, it is all the more convenient, oui? Clean water comes from walls! I could stand here all day. There is no rush, and so his hands move slowly, soap held captured in one of his paws, lather seems to emerge from his fingertips, merely because he wishes it to be so. Over the hills and valleys of his flesh. The musculature carved and defined. The lather lingers. Spreads. Covers. Now over the waves of muscles at his stomach and the ... endowments, as you say...
     Both black brows lift upward in an arch as William turns his head to you, his hands working independently. And diligently. "I would imagine .... that would be Lausanne, oui? Has he actually shown himself today?" The smile pulls slanting, and then William bends. The same care is given to his legs....
     It does not destroy your view. Oh non. But a turn of your head and you would see it all again. Beautiful, and from the ministrations of his hands... flesh is waking.

     Who?
     Oh. No.
     "No, no..." Ian drawls out, head instinctively bending as you do. He comes upright, pushing off the wall where he rests, disappearing around a corner.
     "Girault-Antonio of Firenze."
     You know. That guy.

     For a moment, there is nothing. You miss it, the rising... the knitting together of raven brows. William turns toward the water, another sigh as the soap is scattered. The form beneath the lather visible once more. In all its... glory... unabashed... beautiful. Blatant virility. Closing his eyes, he tips his head back. For a minute there, I thought you said it was Girault-Antonio di Medici...
     Wait.
     You ... did say... Girault-Antonio di Firenze...
     "Qui?" is the voice that calls out after, picking up and carrying past the shower. "Que voulez-vous dire?" You must be teasing me. And so I laugh. A chuckle held deep in his chest resounds in the shower's enclosure. And shampoo of the same honey is taken upon his hands, lathered in his hair.
     And then long arms reach to scrub at his back, and the rounds of his hind end.

     No, he's not kidding.
     When Ian comes around the corner, visible again, he is in nothing but the cross you've given him.
     And he watches you laugh.
     Hands come to rest on his bare hips.
     Eyes blink.
     And on the connection you share? Amusement, seriousness, and desire, all tangled.

     No, you are not kidding...
     But who can think of Girault when there is so much before him demanding his attention. Capturing him. As his hair is rinsed. He turns, a broad shoulder given to the heated water. A slow turning that brings him to face you...
     His skin is heated, warmed and flushed. So alive, and yet not living. But the ritual has begun. You can see it move in him. If he could be more beautiful, it transforms him thus. And honeyed lather moves silken against his skin. And the contours of the large, knightly form.
     He takes as much time looking at you as you had him before. Eyes moving from yours of silver, past your lips, past chest and shoulders. To your stomach -- which he wishes to adorn with such...
     ... You catch the flicker of a mental image. A desire. A vision of the future that almost was, and is still held upon his blood in the Soon Shall Be. Morning glories painted upon your skin, your stomach. Indigo and ink made of coffee and cloves, like the tattooing of a Moroccan prince. And he, painting it, creating it, even along the length of you. He would taste cloves as his mouth surrounded you. And as he lowered himself upon you...
     This surges through him, and moving on his blood... how could he but be moved by the surge? Girault is forgotten for a moment.
     "Really..." William murmurs. But ... is this to the words of Girault? Or a confirmation...that this is a desire... truly felt...

     "Really," he states, moving from his statue position to something more dynamic and living.
     His feet sound sticky upon the floor. The cracked door widens, and he takes his time stepping within upon the water-filled stall floor.
     "Interesting, isn't it?"
     And Girault too. The porcelain cross will take little damage, he hopes, for he'd rather keep it on. It, the water, the steam, and you.
     "Maybe...he forgot to mention it..." Ian's lips burble, his eyes closing as he steps beneath the water ahead of you.

     Interesting is not the word I would use. Amazing. Amazing is closer to it...
     And his mouth parts, but no words follow. It is merely an... open-mouthed look. Stunned. Beautiful. And the indigo, dark and brilliant, flickers. Fastening upon you. Feasting upon you. And the look lifts and lowers. Dieu...
     "It must have slipped his mind..." His words end against your skin. And heat eminates from his fingertips as his arms surround you. His hands lightly land upon you.
     I will worry about Girault later...
     You feel the silken touch of honey soap. Where his hands brush and grasp, lather spreads.

     He nods, the water draping over him. It pours over his skin, even where soap starts to rise. Ian's face comes out the opposite side of the falling sheet, allowing him to talk.
     "Maybe he forgot," he puts more bluntly, smiling. "Sometimes, when you have so much information, a bit can slip away..."
     Silver eyes look down to the hands, and his own covers the pair upon him.

     "Girault? He is not usually so ... absent-minded," William murmurs. The honeyed stone reflects the sound of his voice. A languid echo. The water does nothing to diminish it. And distraction pulls at his voice, syllables elongating... the Provencal -- as slow as it is naturally -- is further affected.
     Water is disrupted as he enters your space. His chest and torso to your back, you can feel the length of him... heavy with blood behind you. And his hands move against your stomach, fingers curling and the cloth used upon himself... still upon his right hand. A slight, but soft friction follows it. And wherever it touches, the silken soap remains.
     Golden, it forms nine bubbles in his hands as they reach inward to cup you. Fingers curl and surround, massage and skim. Like the pulling of his mouth...
     And he sees the vision again. Him giving himself to you. And though he stands behind you, and you feel his body tighten, muscles turning to a kind of warm stone, you see the images against the Bond... of you doing the same to him.
     "But it is .... like Girault... to pull a surprise such as that. He... is quite the comedian..."

     Those hands have loved, killed, and held so many.
     Ian's eyes close as they wander him, no resistance offered. His head tilts within shower's stream, allowing the heat to press his head, shoulders, and occasionally you.
     "Have I ever been so absent-minded?" Ian wonders, a laugh upon his lips. "Anything like that...that I've strategically forgotten, laird?" Just checking. "I doubt it," he finally chuckles, tightening as his lover's fingers explore. His own hands wander the back of yours still, shadowing movement.

     A smile pulls at your skin, his mouth at your neck. "Non..." The idea of you forgetting such a thing... or anything... this is truly funny. You feel a spark of amusement against your blood, suddenly. And the large hands, large but fine, splay against you, leaving the juncture of your hips for your stomach, and then your hips.
     Black hair drapes forward, midway between damp and drenched, as William bends his head. His eyes... tracing the line of your spine. The curvature of muscles. The rounds of your rear. And his fingers cannot help but follow. Soap mostly rinsed from them, they slide against wet skin in slow exploration.
     Where his fingers lead the way, his mouth shall follow...
     "Amours..." and you feel him moving behind you. Soon he will be kneeling, knees in water and stone. "... perhaps we should invite the Dignitary to stay... for a few extra nights..." And get the whole story.
     Those hands. Large and fine. They have killed many. Loved many. Held many. But none such as you. Even before he was immortal, they were bloodied across France all the way to the borders of Gascony and Navarre. And they know the ways of flesh, having learned it from you -- even more so than the thousand women he knew before you. Or the several... however many... that followed you.
     The next word he speaks is Dieu as his mouth draws a heated line down your spine and to the small of your back.

     Invite the Dignitary to stay?
     Now that had not come to mind.
     Where Ian's hands had moved to the wall ahead of him, they now splay and elbows bend...letting him twist to look at you behind and below eye level. A striking pose...many young men can tell you.
     No, that was not what he expected to hear, and his expression is even.
     "I thought we wanted to get to see your present?" he asks softly, not wanting to change the rising tension in the bath, that he looks forward to completing, but indeed curious now. "You think it is an issue?" He has not thought about the meaning of the information, in truth. A surprise that. Normally, he is filled with calculations about such consequence. But these days? He cares not. Not one machination or presumption of another's machinations comes to mind.
     You've changed that.

     "Just for a few nights, amours..."
     The rest is lost against you, muffled at your skin. And then you feel his tongue delve, the spiral dragging downward, and then inward. The water falls out of rhythm. Heat that comes and goes. Lapping at your skin, infrequently against his own. And his hands, those hands, spread, reaching. Strength surrounding you, even as his tongue lilts against and within you. Ah, the gifts of Provencal...

     Such freedom the modern world has to offer. Nothing like the age when you first met. Would any man have touched another in this way? Certainly lovemaking was allowed. Well, tolerated in darkened rooms. But like this? As you mesmerize him now? This sort of intimacy was unknown.
     As with all things, he learned too. At some point, some time, he was educated. Who knows who learned first. You? Him? However it happened, the lesson was brought back for you both to share.
     But now, we live in the light, yes? Where there are no rules when we are together. Where our best teachers have become each other. Where our greatest pleasure and joy now only comes from ourselves, brilliant in the light of what we have shared.
     No longer is it baggage. At some point, it ceased being a mix of pain and delight, joy and regret.
     At some point, we forgot. We learned to live in the present, the first taste of the Future.
     And we learned to think of nothing more.
     Happy are we, that have learned to love and be loved, teach and be taught, to depend and be depended upon. Happy are we that have learned...that nothing else matters.
     A sight it is, the pair taking up most of the glass box, as if performing for a private audience.
     But how right that is. For at least two are quite aware of the powerful emotion that eminates from the Logis Royeaux. One is stirred to such fanciful flights, that in his silent walking, he stops and looks up that direction. Plantagenet. Dunross? Oh, well, that's interesting.
     And Christian takes a lie upon a bench in the orchard, hands beneath his head. He'll enjoy this vicariously. And why not?

Posted by rowan at February 10, 2001 11:34 AM