"If I needed someone to love You're the one that I'd be thinking of If I needed someone..."      It's not unusual to hear music coming from Black Jack Davy's, no matter the night. What is unusual is that it'd shut down on a Wednesday night. Not Open To Pub Tonight, the sign says, See You Tomorrow. Right underneath that is another note: Fiona's Welcomed      But there are clearly people inside. There's clearly a live band playing -- that's no piped in tune. It's Davydd's voice on a Beatles song with a tight, electric sound...      When the door's opened for you by a waiting and attendant hand (one of the Davy's Girls on duty. In fact, the only one), you are greeted by the sight of men who have been talking through music for much of the early evening. It's warm in the pub and there's the sign of perspiration. Davydd is dressed in jeans and a simple navy blue t-shirt, probably worn under a sweater when he arrived, the sweater discarded a good half hour ago, his tattoos slithering up and down his left arm (his move, too, under the right circumstances), dragons and holly leaves and berries. On the other hand and arm, other dragons twisting slowly, powerfully as his fingers work the blue-bodied Les Paul Special he's playing. "If I had some more time to spend Then I guess I'd be with you my friend If I needed someone..."      Such an earthy voice, but in that roughness is a warmth and a sweetness. And it pushes against the air where it thuds like a heartbeat against the pub's glass windows, filling evening with the kinetic need to sing and move. "Had you come some other day Then it might not have been like this But you see now I'm too much in love..."      And your Other Husband is with him, his voice sweeter and purer, not as earthy as it works an upper line of harmony with him. They look not so much at one another, but either at their hands, at the air ahead of them, and as you step through the door... at you. The crowd is minimal: one waitress, a woman with a baby, another young girl dressed in tweed and wool. The women of the men playing. Bonnie Charlie Parker, Stuart on bass. And one thing you might not have noticed before ... each one glows with sparkle, a twinkle of magic. Could it just be the charged music? "Carve your number on my wall And maybe you will get a call from me If I needed someone If I had some more time to spend Then I guess I'd be with you my friend If I needed someone Had you come some other day Then it might not have been like this But you see now I'm too much in love..."

     She's taken a little time out of her life to tend to her life, to herself. Friday, Saturday - those days and nights were gone in a haze of sighs and moans and spread thighs and bending limbs. But after that, she's taken time for herself; hairdresser, salon, shopping. Girly things that she's hoped might help her connect with herself and grant her time to think but instead drive her further from herself to her near-infinite frustration.
     She just isn't girly in that way...
     But she's received the message (twice over, in fact), and torn herself away from her day planner and her financial rearrangements and discussions of personal secretaries and accountants to manage things during her impending absence and any other absences to come - and she's dressed herself and she's headed down to Davy's. What else could she do?
     Staying away would be showing fear or shame and she wouldn't admit to the first without a fight and she hasn't felt the second. Fiona does smile a little at the sign, tapping a fingertip against her name as she goes for the door, offering the smile instead to the Girl that's at the handle. And she's dressed for the occasion in her own unique, inimitable style. Something to suggest she's got a little bit of an attitude left, after all, at that.
     The hair's simple - braided in a single thick coil that it'd take a Black Jack to get a hand closed around, the tufted end brushing the backs of her knees with any long-legged step. Uncoloured, it stands at its natural oakheart shade, skin that cream colour with rosepetals mixed in that suggests she's definitely spent at least a day being pummeled and massaged and steamed and frozen and toweled and exfoliated. She stands on display in a pair of snug, faded jeans that tuck into black tanker boots that ordinarily would buckle tightly over the calves but have been left partially unbuckled - the easier to get in and out of them if and when she wants to. For her top, she's chosen something a little different. It's silk - unmistakable in any light. And it's gold and silver and blue and cream, swirled together like someone mixing paint and stopping a quarter of the way through, a draping button-up shirt that is just loose enough to show how snug it could fit if only it were a size smaller, the collar flopping half up and half down, fragile hands seeming the more delicate for where they poke out of the cuffs. It's the sort of shirt made to make men wonder what's underneath once they can stop looking...
     The Davy's Girl gets a murmur of welcome, and Fiona moves on in the rest of the way - trying not to look as aware of the attention she gets from Certain Quarters as she in fact is. The other women get a smile as well, and a slight lift of a hand, and she lifts that hand further, to tap the sunglasses she's wearing. There's her real 'attitude' showing. Heart-shaped and ocean blue, casting their flickering heart-shadows against her blue eyes...
     Well. What is she in age compared to two Black Jacks but a Lolita?

     All that's missing is the popping gum and the bobbysocks, bonita Lolita...
     The song doesn't end in a nice fade out but in the abruptness of a simple ending, with Charlie Parker breaking into a skiffing drum solo with a lopsided grin as Davydd drops back to tune, to look at a piece of paper on the floor (a playlist, perhaps?). Rhodri, himself dressed in a lighter, faded (very worn) pair of jeans and a black t-shirt, red tattoos running up and down the length of his own arms, comes forward. Mouth at the mic, Fiona, he grins at you, "Hey, darlin," and the issuing warmth of his fills the empty pub. Some of the women are smiling at you, they're smiling at you for you're the woman of You Know Who.
     But he's not the only one. Darker green eyes flicker up at you. Your Other Husband smiles. That's when Rhodri's voice sounds sweetly in the mic, a song renewed, something sweeter, something rougher too. Stuart and Charlie start in with him, as if they all knew in a single instant what song to play.

"Silent woman in the night you came
Took my seed from my shakin' frame
Same old fire another flame
and the wheel rolls on
Silent woman through the flames you come
From the deep behind the sun
Kissed my nightmares my lovin' gun
Left me barely holdin' on hold hold..."
     Davydd joins in, but he's smirking, his lips curling around the body of his cigarette. A roll of his eyes, and he gravels out: "Hell of a way to serenade a woman. Jesus... " The other women laugh a little, but they're not laughing at you.
     "Hi," the woman with the baby at a breast leans forward, "I'm Bianca," she's also French or something, "... Charlie's woman. This is Beatrix, Stuart's girlfriend. I think you know Molly," the waitress. She locks the door and is then at your elbow.
     "Something to drink, Fiona." You lucky thing, you.

     There's a reddening of cheeks for the song and the words of the song, never mind the smile - the hell with the smile and the greeting, with a song like that! Fiona mutters something indistinct under her breath, rolling her eyes as she turns away from the stage. "Bastards," she says softly, though there's a certain affection there - for both of the men, not just the one. She moves to the other women as if intending to find solidarity...
     "Hi, Bianca," Fiona offers, leaning in a bit. "Beatrix - Molly and I've met, yes. Good to meet you two, though." The smile is genuine, meant, and she slides the sunglasses off, then props them atop her head. "Got dragged along for the ride? Who's the wee one?" Now they've got her doing it - wee. Next she'll be saying more than oes...
     She turns to Molly with a slant of a grin. "Pear cider if it's any good tonight, otherwise I'll let you pick. Not feeling it all that much yet. But thanks."
     Maybe, if she keeps her back to the stage, she can pretend very hard that Husband and Other Husband aren't there. Ha. As if.

     There's a subtext to this all...
     There are universes between each verse he sings, each note and each measure. The pub is the pub but you knew it could never be that simple. The wood floor becomes the earth when they play. The air is tangible magic, taste it, breathe it, it's everywhere.
     Molly returns with a large pint of pear cider, an apple blossom flowering stuck in as a garnish. Apple blossoms -- both of your husbands have it etched upon their skin, within their souls.
     Bianca smiles, tipping her head down. Flower petals fall from her hair, a crown of flowers worn that appear in moments between music, between the threads of the combined voices of the king and his heir. "His name is Romy," she lifts her face to smile at you, dark-haired, red-lipped Bianca. "Charlie's new son." She murmurs pardon in an old French as she shifts her son to her other breast, not caring that both are given to the room. It is nature, is it not...

"Blazin' eyes see the tremblin' hand
when we know the time has come
Ooh blinded senses lose command
Feel your healin' rivers run..."
     The song quickens, the Les Paul Special taking command, Davydd looks at you, cigarette still in his mouth. It's a cover, played faster, louder than the original:
"Well if I had to do it all over again
Babe I'd do it all over you
And if I had to wait for ten thousand years
Babe I'd even do that too
Well a dog's got his bone in the alley
A cat she's got nine lives
A millionaire's got a million dollars
King Saud's got four hundred wives
Well ev'rybody's got somethin'
That they're lookin' forward to
I'm lookin' forward to when I can do it all again
And babe I'll do it all over you..."

     There's a deep breath taken, and Fiona turns to take the pint from Molly with a smiling thanks. She's a bit wary, a bit on edge - not knowing what to expect, not knowing what's transpired. The apple blossom's taken from the glass and slid to rest in her hair, dangling from above an ear as the world blinks between beats. Blue eyes flash, turning quickly towards Bianca and then away again. "He's quite adorable."
     This is no time to lose one's aplomb...
     One hand goes back to a table's surface and she pushes up, hopping up to sit on it and drink, watching the stage with cheeks that stay a bit warmer in colour than she'd intended. No artifice needed in this - the music is enough, and she takes a long pull at her cider to cover for it. "Pull the other one," she murmurs, with a faint hint of grin. "It's got bells on, hasn't it...?"
     She dumps her back next to her, pulling her legs up so that she's crosslegged on the table, watching first one man, then the other. But no matter her intentions in this - her attention's been grabbed, and it's only a matter of which one to watch at any given time. No point doing more than waving to Charlie or Stuart - distracting them'd be a sin, wouldn't it?

     Thick. Thick as thieves. It flashes on the currents of music, it throbs on the waves of sound. Stronger intoxicant, this music, than a thousand barrels of the cider you drink. And they are not immune. You can see they feel it, too, when all of the sudden your look is met by two pairs of green eyes, one sparkling light, the other dark and deep.
     I love you, comes the voice of One
     I love you, comes the voice of The Other
     There is silence for a moment, the guitars fade out with a lingering hum, electric quivering sound trailing out in an ever-softening buzz. Over this, the sound of two male voices, a cappella. Welsh. One lower, one slightly higher. Shifting harmonies as they both look to you, knowing that the other is looking too, they sing an ancient song of love and longing. The song is called The White Dove...
     Bianca leans over to you, smiling. "This night is for you. The Holly King has named his heir. He's crowning his prince tonight..."
     The White Dove, Y Glomen Gwyn...
     The white dove sang on the branch of the tree, oh...

     The smile that tugs up at the corners of her mouth isn't shy, though she glances down at her lap and at the pint glass she holds. It isn't meek - god forbid! But it is warm, and it is reminiscent.
     I love you, too.
     It's sent back to both, heart open behind it, worn on her sleeve and held in loosely clasped hands, on display where anyone can see. Why pretend? Why start now? She isn't ashamed of it, and she isn't even afraid of it. Whatever her fears are, it is not of her love.
     Fiona glances over to Bianca, lifting two fingers and a thumb to pull the heart-shaped glasses away with a toss to the table behind her. "I'm glad they've gotten that much cleared up," she murmurs, "though it looks as if I've missed any of the shouting. Just as well, I'd end up telling them where to stuff it at this point." The smile she turns to the stage nonetheless has a note of pure adoration in it, shining up through her eyes unsubdued. Might as well try to lock down the moon...
     "Nice of them," Fiona murmurs, "to turn it over to me, though really, shouldn't it be about them? I'm not the one being crowned." One hand furls and is under her chin, colour racing back into her cheeks as her gaze dips down and then back up, from one to the other and back and forth.

     "When men are in love, they make no sense," Bianca smiles to her son, taking him off her breast and lifting the dark-haired wonder to her shoulder, her hand circling and patting on her infant's back. "There wasn't any shouting. Rhodri passed His Majesty a beer. They looked at one another, they sighed, they shook hands. Then, they embraced."
     She shakes her head, laughing lightly, so quietly. She does not want to disrupt such beautiful music. Leaning in to you again, she lowers her voice. "I think this is the fighting," she coos. "A battle of the bands, I think they call it?" Her lips pucker with a wife's knowledge, though she never said she and Charlie were married officially. "You know men... you know how they are..."
     Davydd backs away from the mic and stamps out the cigarette. "Molly," he calls out, "...a snakebite, will y'..." He glances to Rhodri, then looks at you, dead-on. "Queen Fiona..." he waves you over and Charlie gives a drumroll. Stuart tunes, as does Davydd as he waits for you. Yes, he beckoned. He expects you to come over.
     Rhodri grins, mouth at the mic: "Fiona," he says in a honeyed roll, "... I want a little summerwine...bring your glass to me..." He smiles and the room wavers. Pub. Meadow. Flowers. Trees. Barstools.     The beginning strains of Summerwine is plucked by Davydd's fingers as Molly brings him his drink, setting it on the stool near his side. Beautiful, throaty sound. Eyes on Rhodri, he lifts an eyebrow as if to ask 'Is this it?' why he knows damn well, and you and Rhodri too, that he knows the song like his own hand. He smiles suddenly, the great shite. "We'll make it a trio," Davydd announces. "Get up here, queenie. We can't do it without the siren of the song..."
     Bianca settles back and smiles, chuckling a little as her babe belches. "I think that's your cue, my lady..."

     "Only recently," Fiona murmurs to Bianca. Only recently has she known men. Let alone these men in particular. Only these men in particular, but who's counting? Aside from the three of them... "Though I'm beginning to think I should just knock their heads together and run - that'd get them to work together, do you think?"
     There's a slant of that grin again, and a little relief to know about the sigh, the handshake, the embrace. As long as they're not giving up and they're not at each other's throats - it's good to know, isn't it? Even if it doesn't mean everything's settled.
     Male glances fall onto her, and she hears her name with a title; she groans, more to herself than to them. "They're going to make me work for my drink," Fiona complains to Bianca. "But I suppose I'd better not make them come hunting. I like this place, be a shame if anything happened to it." Perish the thought. She slides off the table, leaving her bag and her sunglasses behind but not her drink, and she saunters towards the stage with a rolling of hips as she moves.
     Call her a siren and she'll play the part, it seems. There's a low, intense stare given to each in his turn, then a perfectly amiable grin given to Stuart and to Charlie. Let's ... not complicate things by giving the two kings any reason to think the queen's looking for a third. Not like she is...
     "Hello, fellows," Fiona offers casually as she climbs up onto the stage, arms folding over her chest, under her breasts. "Someone called me, told me to be here, can't imagine why. So what's all the noise about? Looking for a bit of ... backup vocals?"
     She'll play it cool ... while she can ...

     "Oh god," Davydd croons with a roll of his eyes and a laugh. "Listen to that cool tone. Back up vocals, sure. She's been hanging out with you too much," he cracks to Rhodri. "That's your bad influence, that..."
     "I can't take credit for it," Rhodri notes with a casual air. "Right here in the center, darlin'," he says to you, head turned from the mic but the mic picks it up anyway. Yes, right in between them, a husband on either end.
     And no... that's not coincidental...
     We've decided to celebrate it. That's Rhodri's voice slipping within you. You between us. We have a choice. Fight one another and be miserable and make you miserable or accept it, conquer it, weave it into our world and be done with it.
     You want it. We want you. Davydd's voice. It's more simple than it sounds, I guess. So... I've made him crown prince... your children will be the heirs of Avalon. Our children will be... heirs to something else. Of what, he does not specify.
     "So," Davydd exhales, glancing around to his fellows, "...shall we sing or what?" He moves the mic closer, as does Rhodri. So she has two to sing into. No, that isn't coincidental either. He turns and takes a long swallow of his snakebite while the other two get settled.

     Fiona moves a bit warily from the edge of the stage, looking from one to the other - her men, her husbands, her lovers. Both have seen her at her best and at her worst, both have heard her cry, moan, scream, for a variety of reasons. And right now, she isn't at all sure what they're up to, what's going to happen next.
     But - when does she ever, really?
     "Alright, you two, am I going to be trying to reach for the back rows with my voice or do you have a mic for me as well?" Start simple, try not to react to the closeness and the presence, the warmth that started moving up inside of her before there'd been more than glances and a voice here or there. "And a stool. I'd like to sit down for this."
     Considering the words that come next, unheard except by her, she might need to...
     Colour is rising into her face even as the mics are rearranged, even before she really gets the words out. She'll try to ignore the twisting in her stomach, settling instead for leaning forward to look at the mics, sniffing at them suspiciously. "Someone had onions for dinner," Fiona remarks - she gets that wise-ass streak from her lovers. And it keeps it light, at least on the surface, while she absorbs what else has been Declared into herself.
     So ... does this mean I get to walk on my own power once in a while? And that I don't have to hit you over the head, with music or my fists? I'd hate to break my hands on your heads, but I was prepared to keep smacking you both if I had to. If only willpower could settle her stomach! Why is it that in front of an audience of three and a half, she's got more butterflies than in front of all Davy's regulars? Well, Fiona knows why...
     I love you both. Now either start the music or I'm getting off the stage.

     A stool is provided, courtesy of Stuart as Davydd half-pivots toward you. There you are, two mics for your one mouth. A bit of overkill, but you're used to that. Getting more than you bargained for...
     The intro is from Davydd's fingers, the plucked melody that will soon be mimicked by her voice. Sweet and dropping like apple blossoms drizzling from a tree...blossoms that now fall upon the floor-earth...
     A second guitar comes in, strumming the rhythm -- and Rhodri is a good one to set the rhythm, is he not? Davydd, the virtuoso, Rhodri the ...rhythm section...
     For now the drums and bass are silent...
     Davydd leans in to share a mic, his voice issuing in smoky tones. "I walked in town on silver spurs that jingled to a song that I had only sing to just a few. She saw my silver spurs and said let's pass some time, and I will give to you...summer wine..."

     Fiona eases onto the stool, shoulders and head swaying to the familiar melody - the familiar, but no less heady earthen-rich voice. "Ohhh... summer wine..."
     Impossible for her not to begin to feel it - as if she weren't already. Just being there in proximity to the two of you makes her feel as if there were something ripening upon the air. She draws breath, eyes closing halfway as her lips curve into a smile redolent with promise - and mischief.
     "Strawberries, cherries and an angel's kiss in spring, my summer wine is really made from all these things. Take off your silver spurs and help me pass the time, and I will give to you...summer wine..."
     She leans in as she sings, a little down-dip of her shoulders on the breathy half-moan in places, chin lifting as if she's about to laugh. No real glance is given around; the song deserves better than that. It's felt, instead, where it counts, held and drawn out, allowed to linger.
     "Ohhhh... summer wine..."

     On your right hand, Rhodri leans in, his voice near your hear. Summer is suddenly everywhere. Warmth and a breeze, the smell of apples and honey. Is that the effect of the pear cider?
     "My eyes grew heavy and my lips they could not speak. I tried to get up but I couldn't find my feet. She reassured me with the unfamiliar line and then she gave to me...more summer wine..."
     And then both of them.... at the same time... harmony in unison...
     "Oh..oh..oh...summer wine..."
     Was that a touch upon your hair?
     A brush of a hand, or was it a mouth to your cheek?
     Or the air compressing between two halves of the year, two kings, two husbands, two bards...
     The bars of an interlude sound, the subsequent solo, first from One Husband, then The Other. It is neither hand nor mouth that presses against you. It is not a straying touch, or a finger's stroke. It's the magic that issues from each of them, making a circuit with your own, each molecule of power binding and serving as a catalyst for the other. The music is like the wire that runs conductive. Is there any wonder there's a spark?

     It's almost a pressure against her chest, against the soft skin over her lower belly, moving through each breast and down with a sharp yet liquid warmth to between her hips. It's bad when she can feel the heat move in her face, but she doesn't dare let it interrupt the song...
     "Strawberries, cherries and an angel's kiss in spring, my summer wine is really made from all these things. Take off your silver spurs and help me pass the time, and I will give to you...summer wine..."
     There's a certain warmth that carries through in her voice, even as she sits up a little straighter on the stool. One leg crosses over the opposite thigh, shoulders back as she tilts towards the microphone with burnished cheeks. Just the reflection off of all this red hair, really. No, really.
     Magic answers to magic, as it always has, as it always will. Fiona may do her best to keep the heat reflecting back off her expression, but it emanates from her, in the languid, suddenly torrid glance she gives, in the faint pout and shift of lips and voice, and particularly in the moan of the bridge from one chorus to the next verse.
     "Oh,ohhhh... summer wine..."

     At your left, the coolness a balm for your burning cheeks, the darkness a shelter for you to slip into. His power, his grasp, his bed. It is not merely autumn, autumn is only a part. Winter, only a fraction. There is harvest, everything your heart desired in summer is realized in him. What one wishes in summer, the harvest provides.
     Davydd leans in, his mouth close to the mic as the earthy, smoky tone of his voice pours thickly over the next verse:
     "When I woke up, the sun was shining in my eyes, my silver spurs were gone, my head felt twice its size. She took my silver spurs, a dollar and a dime, and left me craving for...more summer wine..."
     Both of them lean in again, space between the three immortally joined only insofar as instruments must still be played. But they don't sing in the mic, though the mic is clever -- it picks up the sound -- but at your ear, their voices on either side of you, you pinned between:
     "Oh..oh..summer wine..."

     It really isn't fair...
     Her eyes are as admixed as ever, the green and grey and blue of them as tumultuous as if churned that way by a storm at sea, ocean waves that roll in to meet the land not gently but with the crash and roar of enthusiasm and violence. That's about what her insides feel like, all crashed in upon. Thick, pale eyelashes sweep down to her cheeks, one hand touching the edge of the mic stand and the other curving fingers around the edge of the stool in a surprisingly tight grip.
     "Oh, ohhh... summer wine..."
     "oh, ohhh, oh..."
     "Ohh, ohhh, oohhhhh..."
     "Ohh, ohhh, ohhh, oh..."
     She draws it out, letting it fade with a faint smile as he eyes slant open just a crack. It's hard to play the part of the thieving tart when she's just been very palpably reminded what those last onomatopoeic syllables most resemble. As the last notes die away, Fiona sits back up again, squaring her shoulders as if to regain some breathing room.
     As she's so fond of saying, as if...

     The music ended somewhere, sometime before your voice halted, the pub quiet and absorbing the sound of it. That ends it, no other sound should but the sound of your voice. There's quiet and then there's applause from the girls, a whistle from the erstwhile quiet Beatrix.
     "I think that'll call it, Davy-bach," Charlie's voice is a musical lilt. Christ, the man sings when he speaks. "Bianca's giving me the hook with her eye," he chuckles. From where she sits, rocking her son in her arms, Bianca smiles. "I am such a spoil sport," she says, standing. Regal, this lady. A gypsy queen she would seem to be; earthy but with a grace that could only come from some innate nobility.
     "We'll put away the kit tomorrow, leave it," Davydd says, his voice quiet, out of body. He removes his guitar where he stands, staring at his queen. "We will meet in Avalon the next full moon."
     Avalon... they all know?
     Bianca smiles, her clothing altering as she rises, a long trailing gown of flowers, real flowers, imaginary flowers, the flowers that only blossom and bloom in dreams. "I will ready the court for your arrival, your majesty." She bows her head to him, and then, Fiona, to you. "My lady." And then to Rhodri. Bonnie Charlie Parker appears, but he doesn't look like the Rolling Stones reject he normally looks like. He's dressed in green, a cloak of green leaves, dark hair -- the same as his newborn son. A hand to his wife's slender back, he turns to look at the trio. "Fiona," he winks. He says no more but follows his mistress to the rear of the pub and to another world.
     Beatrix and Stuart seem as mundane as anyone. But as she nods to you, there's a flicker of orange like flame, the brief flash of an image, a berry-crowned maiden with flaming red hair, a holly fairy perhaps. She takes Stuart's hand and follows the trail of the other couple.
     And Molly?
     Molly was bending, stowing away glasses: "Night everyone!" she says. As if nothing remarkable had happened at all. "I'll lock up Davy... Rhodri... nevermind it. G'on..." She smiles as she begins to move away from the bar and to the front door.
     And then there were three...
     A large hand covers your right, your left... a different hand. Each hand is lifted to a different pair of male lips and kissed. "Thank you for singing," Davydd murmurs there.
     Rhodri lifts his head, a teasing smile tracing across his expression. "I wasn't sure you would. I'm glad you did." A look is shared between your men. "Shall we...?"
     Davydd looks from his son to you, Fiona, and clasping your hand with both of his, he lifts your fingers to his mouth again. "Yes. We should share your news. Our news." He pauses, his gaze only on Fiona. "With our wife."

     She isn't so out of it as to fail to notice the applause, though she's damned close. She stays seated, braid shivering as she gives her head a little roll and toss, as if the energy flowing around her and through her could be so easily shaken off. As if - as if, indeed. Fiona offers a slightly abashed smile over to Charlie, then to Bianca; eyes blued again, they snap wide as one man speaks.
     Avalon? Now, hang on a minute, they haven't been and not telling me everything, have they...?
     Oh, those bloody bastards, they are so going to get it...
     Eyes narrow for a moment, then relax, and she offers Bianca and Charlie both the same slant of smile, as if she'd known all along, really she had. "A pleasure to meet you," she murmurs to Bianca as she turns. "And to see you again, Charlie."
     Mischief. Mischief and mayhem, redoubled. Oh, you are all so going to get it. I am SO not telling you where it is that I'm going next.
     Beatrix and Stuart get that same smile and faint nod, the murmured pleasure of acquaintance, Molly gets a glance - how much is she in on the joke? Narrowed eyes which then relax again. And then tension takes back over...
     "You didn't think I'd sing for you? When have I ever turned either of you down?" For anything? But she can't get that much out. She can't tease, right now. Breathing's just become optional as it is, by way of difficulty. Her hands are suddenly not her own, anyway, and there's that liquid warmth tracing up through both arms.
     "I think," Fiona says carefully, "that whatever news you two have for me, I'm going to need a drink for. Or maybe I just need a drink." Something to settle the sudden flight of butterflies in her stomach, and goodness, but these butterflies seem to be condor-sized...
     "Not," Fiona adds with far too much politeness, "that I object to hearing your news. May I have my hands back now?" Her gaze shifts with sudden restlessness from one pair of green eyes to the other. So this must be what it feels like to be a plump, juicy mouse caught away from its hole with a couple of green-eyed orange tomcats to either side.

     "Fancy that, you want a drink and we happen to have a bartender in our presence," Davydd lilts out, a wink given to both of you in turn. He's loathe to give up the hand he holds, but he does. A squeeze of his fingers, but your hand is returned to you after a moment.
     And your other as Rhodri backs away from the triad of power at the mic. Not that he needs a drink. The power alone is intoxicating. "Aye," he grins, "...best drinks in the house." And that's no lie. He removes his keys from his jeans and nods the two of you to follow him.
     Rhodri... then you... Davydd bringing up the rear...
     Coincidence?
     Molly gives a final wave as you all head out. The bar's truly closed for the night now. As you depart the tavern chamber, you are serenaded with the sound of a cash register being cashed out and lights switching off.
     Rhodri opens the door to his apartment, holding it open as you and then Davydd pass. "Any special requests?" he asks. "Or shall it be bartender's choice tonight?"
     Davydd continues to the sofa, cigarettes and lighter going to the coffee table to rest there until needed. No doubt they'll be needed eventually. Davydd without a cigarette is like London without fog. Doesn't necessarily happen every night but, by god, there'll be smoke sometime. "Lady's choice, I think," he offers grandly, taking a seat on the sofa, giving his legs a stretch. He smiles to the Lady in question. I'm sure you know exactly what you want. "Stoli vanil?" Davydd wonders with an upraised brow, his head turning toward you, voice lowering as if what was uttered were to be private.
     Rhodri heads into the kitchen, opening cabinets, removing three glasses, taking down four or five bottles. There's stoli, rum, whiskey, irish creme, brandy. Ah, and wine. He looks over to the two of you. Requests?

     It's hard enough to think at all, let alone thoughts of what she wants. Oh, she knows what she wants - knows it too well and not by just half but a whole. Wants, and wants a lot more...
     Fiona leaves her bag of tricks downstairs - it'd look too contrived, too coy, to go fetch it, and besides, who's going to steal it? Not Molly, and noone else is getting in tonight - that much, she's sure of. That much is obvious. She allows herself to be bracketed, escorted, trying not to breathe in too deeply as if the act would send her so high she'd have to tumble to the floor; not breathe in too deeply, for skin might come into contact with skin, and right now even cloth in touch with cloth might send her over some cataclysmic edge. The energy's that strong, she doesn't need to touch to feel it.
     "No vodka tonight, thanks," Fiona murmurs. "Seems a bit inappropriate. Irish creme sounds good to me, what do you think? Or I'll let you pick for me if you think something else will go better." She drops over the arm of a chair, flumphing into the cushion and then struggling up again to unbuckle her boots the rest of the way before she collapses back down for a minute.
     Let me just lie here and feel it ... I don't need to face it right away, whatever it is, do I?
     "So ..." Fiona's voice comes up from the invisible portion of her, one foot waving to nudge off the other boot, "Cute note on the door. You do realize you two bastards had me scared, don't you? I should be right pissed, you know..."
     Ah, it must be uncertain ground. Here's Drancy.

     Davydd flashes a grin, trademark that, a comet streak of a smile trailing warmth and laughter behind it. "Oh yeah? I still have it then, do I? I was beginning to wonder. You were seeming awfully comfortable. Well," he rolls on, "... I thought ...what the fuck am I doing... hanging back isn't my way, so we talked..."
     "Mmhmm," Rhodri seconds, pouring three healthy glasses full of the irish creme liqueur, over ice. Naturally. "So... I said, we should play, jam a bit, get it out in the open..."
     "Which is what we did," Davydd picks up the thread where Rhodri leaves off, rolling his head against a broad shoulder to look at you. "No one's miffed, no one's being jilted. And..." an exhale, "... I thought it would be ...helpful to the situation if I crowned Rhodri as King in Waiting for Avalon, Crown Prince. Though he always knew he was my heir. But it cleared the air, with the certainty of ...other children to come. I wanted him to know where his place with me was, which is... the highest. His children with you will be heirs to Avalon and your kingdom if you wish. The children we have together... " Davydd smiles a little. "When what shall happen has taken place, it will be more clear. In a century's time. But I think we are well on our way to a successful reign in this world and that."
     "And when it came right down to it," Rhodri says, three drinks balanced easily. He joins you on the arm of the chair, handing you your drink, bending for a brief kiss. "...we both love you. And what we want most of all is your joy, your happiness and your success. The rest can be...sorted. We've agreed to be men about it..."
     Davydd reaches in, he sits close by, and takes his own irish creme from Rhodri's reach. "And not to compare notes, as it were. And, yes," he smirks, "...I'll dance at your wedding. But all the same to both of you, I just want to be a spectator. I think that'll be plenty for me."
     "So," Rhodri brushes a hand against your oak-blonde hair. "...now you know the whole of it. In a month's time, on the next full moon, we will have a coronation ceremony in Avalon..."
     "And I... we," Davydd corrects, with a glance to Rhodri, "... would really like you to be there. You should be there with your... kings." Davydd takes a sip of the creme and then another. His other hand reaches for your hand again.
     Wherever you are touched, wherever you are not touched, there is a hum, a vibration. Like a plucked string, still singing after the moment of music is gone. The room vibrates with it. The alcohol is superfluous, really.

     The other boot is shoved and grated off to fall to the floor after the first, and then she's shifting upwards to regard each of you with a certain suspicion lingering. It can't be as easy as this, can it? "I've never wanted you two to be jealous of each other, or ... wondering who comes first. I don't compare you, you know. You shouldn't compare yourselves. So ... I'm glad you've gotten that cleared up."
     Her legs still dangle, but she's closer to sitting properly now, bringing her braid forward over her shoulder, unknotting the strings that hold the heavy hair bound. She isn't undoing the braid, just untying the knot - one problem down, one knot untied...
     Blue eyes glance up almost questioningly, a small hand taking a glass and chin lifting to accept the kiss that seems to go with it. Lips remain just slightly parted for a moment, and then Fiona turns quickly, looking back at the Other as more words come. "Some sports should be spectator sports. I'll at least try to have pretty bridesmaids so you don't have to dance just with me."
     There's a faint shiver for the touch to her hair, for the claiming of her hand, and her other hand remains holding her glass, bringing it to her lips almost too hastily. The rim bumps against her lips and she has to reacquaint herself with its proportions, licking the splash of creme from her lips and just above them. "I'd like to be there," Fiona says simply, once she's swallowed a bit of liqueur. "I'll do my best to look ... queenly."
     Now her lips twitch a little. She can do that. Oh, yes, she can...
     Quickly, though, she interjects, looking from one set of green eyes to another. "You both - got over things awfully fast," Fiona remarks, again a little warily. "Was it really that easy? I'm glad, either way, you know I don't want to lose either of you. But the way you both told me to come and be at the pub, I didn't know if I was going to arrive to pools of blood..."
     Keep talking, when in doubt, keep talking, keep talking until things make sense...

     "I love you both. If I wished your unhappiness," Davydd rises as he speaks. He comes to get his own kiss. "What sort of man would I be? Moreover," his lips brush your own, "...what sort of king? What sort of father?" The large, regal hand untwines the braid partially, lifting it and brushing the blonde ends against your nose. "As I said," he murmurs, "...if I have to have a rival, I'd rather had no other man but this one."
     There's a look that passes between Old Friends, Father and Son, King to King. Davydd perches upon the arm of the adjacent sofa. "I'd sooner hurt myself than either of you, that's the way of it. For me... family is all. Sure, I may smart a bit when the first child is born," Rhodri's hand takes the braid now as Davydd speaks, untwining it a bit more, "... and at the wedding. It'd be a natural reaction, but... my love is stronger. I've come to realize just how strong of late." The tone is teasing, but the dark green gaze is keen.
     From hand to hand, your braid is passed until it is no braid at all but tresses freed and flowing. You feel each thought, each man's presence within you, a presence you know so well, have become acquainted with so intimately with such monotonous regularity. Free... like that... I love it like that. Each of them reacts to the untwining as surely as if it were an undressing.
     Irish creme is swallowed. Ice is rattled in the glass. Rhodri tilts his head, looking from Davydd to you. "The rest is negotiation. We'll have to continue to negotiate. I think... switching off the paternity was a stroke of genius. It keeps the footing equal. And we don't want to put you in a position of having to keep the peace. Our love of you should keep it, if we're wise."
     "You are our queen," Davydd murmurs. "And we love you more than our pride, Fiona. You will make a fine Queen of Avalon." And perhaps even High Queen, if things go as I think they might... you are beautiful, beaming. God I love you...
     Davydd tilts up his drink and finishes it, setting it upon the side table. He stands again, his shadow cast upon you both. "My son becomes king soon," he murmurs. "Soon, he shall become your husband by mortal and immortal law. But it is the three of us who are joined. One, inseparable from the others..." His hand brushes against your cheek. "To be frank, it is a marriage in triad. We are a chord, the three of us. As one, we are far greater than we would ever be individually."
     Hand on your face, Davydd bends, bends as he tilts your face upward to him for a kiss. Pulling, suckling, his mouth parting your own.
     It parts, but is followed by another touch, another bend, another tilt, another set of lips. "We want to marry you tonight," Rhodri whispers there.
     "A marriage, a vow we make between the three of us alone," Davydd speaks after. "A pledge to one another, and to the unit we now make."

     There are tremors moving through her, visible and invisible alike, keeping the colour in her cheeks. Words that are more than words, touches which signify world-spanning changes. The loosening of her hair is only the most visible and perhaps the least of these...
     "You know that the last thing I want is for either of you to hurt." Fiona's voice has softened, now, audible but only just, a little husky with emotion and tingling with the energy she can't contain nor control. "I might snap and bite, but you know how I mean that. I've not wanted for either of you to feel ... like you had to lose your dignity because of me. After all, if anyone's the clown and the newcomer here, it's me..."
     She's feeling her youth very sharply right about now. Twenty-three years old, in the company of two ancient kings. Two - handsome, virile, very experienced kings...
     Her head tips back to allow the unweaving to continue, eyes closing as the taut pressure is released bit by bit, and she sighs for it. A hand to her cheek causes her eyes to open again, blinking up to the giver of the touch. "I love you," Fiona whispers, the words giving up to the air with a tremble and then the hint of unsteady laugh. "Funny... I thought it was braiding the hair that's supposed to mean marriage..."
     Kiss is followed by kiss, and blue eyes close again with a soft, incoherent sound for the woman on the receiving end of those kisses. "I - you know that's what I want. Both of you. There isn't anything in any world that I want more, except for the two of you to be happy, and to be - proud of me." The glass in her hand has been all but forgotten, most precariously. It gets shoved down into the sofa cushions, held in place for the moment so that she can focus on what's being said, try to focus on those wonderful, frightening, incomprehensible, absurd, meaningful words. "But how? What? I... you know what I mean." Fiona presses back against the back of the seat. She blinks at one and then the other, and mutters, "I feel like I'm sitting with the Mad Hatter and the March Hare, suddenly. But - tell me. I want to. ...Help?"
     It occurs to her a moment later, perhaps she should be saying that for rather different reasons...

     A look passes from king to king, from Dark Half to Light Half, the White Queen in between. Rhodri stands and you have two hands held out in offer to you. Should you not take them for balance reasons, let alone the double, even triple meaning of such an offer of hands.
     Davydd smiles gently to you. The expression does not mean to be patronizing. "We want you to marry us tonight, in a private... intimate ceremony. Only the three of us will know," he murmurs, standing, helping you to rise. "In a year or two, whenever you and Rhodri are ready, you will marry in the mortal and immortal realm before your family, peers and courts. And I will attend, with a secret smile upon my face. For I shall know that we three are already wed."
     "Something solemn," Rhodri says softly. "... something simply and just for us, my love. Our love," he smiles that out. "Help? My dear, it is not something you can help with. It is something for which you are a necessary part, not simply a ...help."
     Two hands join at your back, each in your hair, resettling it in loosened tresses, brushing through it. "What we enter into, no man may put asunder," Davydd whispers. His mouth finds yours again. Another mouth brushes against the side of your neck. "You will have us both," he speaks in a hush. "Tonight, and to the end of Time."
     "You will have us both," Rhodri echoes just as softly at your ear. "Tonight and to the end of time."

     Both...
     The blood in her body doesn't know whether to rise or fall, and for a moment she looks as if she might faint. But if she didn't faint when she got bitten by a tree or when tattoos appeared from nowhere or when an actual honest-to-God (no kidding) angel appeared in her living room, she isn't going to faint now. Slowly, more carefully than perhaps either of you have ever seen her move before, her hands come up to take the two hands held out in offering. She accepts the help in rising to her feet; right now, maybe she needs it more than usual.
     "You know I wouldn't say no," Fiona murmurs. You're suddenly both too close, too close for things to be comfortable, but the electric pulse on the air hasn't been comfortable since she arrived. That's hardly going to change. Lips touch hers, touch her skin, met with a quiet little whimper that escapes her. "You know I want you both."
     Lips remain parted, she takes a shallow gulp of air; more needs to be said, she can feel it. Her hands come up, tugging up the gold chain that she's got under her shirt, pulling it out to rest on the outside where the two rings - one ruby, one emerald - can be seen by the both of you. "I need you both. Without you - one or both - I'm incomplete," Fiona whispers, liquid collecting at the corners of her eyes to trickle down her cheeks. "I'm broken without you. You have me... I'm yours. I always have been, just waiting for you to recognise me..."

     "Hasn't anyone warned you that Welsh men can be dense," Davydd's voice insinuates with humor and lust inseparably intertwined. "What you have always wanted, we now recognize." His large arm winds around your own far more slender, to bear you up should your legs give away.
     "And we both need you," Rhodri replies, his own arm winding around hers. "We should have known the universe would have us move in three's..."
     Each of your husbands turns toward the hall that leads to the master bedroom and its two companion guest rooms. But you know where you shall be taken. Taken perhaps being the operable word here. The pace is slow. As you are led, two pair of green eyes look to you, each with intense love, intense desire. The air becomes constrictive, alive, writhing. And the tattoos echo this. Davydd's dragons slither and coil, the leaves of the companion trees lifting and falling, suggestive clusters of nuts shifting, blossoms and berries all. On Rhodri's arms, hounds frolic after the desired prey. The unicorn lingers, wanting to be caught.
     When you are led into the hallway, the male arms shift. Hands hold your hands, arms wind around you. A set of fingers circles on your back, along your spine and to the nape of your neck. Another set of fingers, Davydd's, travels downward, over the small of your back and dipping slightly to tease at the waistband of your clothing.
     There is a pause at the threshold, a moment taken for the monumentality of what is about to occur. Solemn they are. There is no wisecracking. Davydd takes you in his arms, a gentle, loving embrace. A long and full kiss, the drinking of your tears.
     Then you are passed from one to the other. Rhodri takes you in his arms, into his own gentle hug. Both hands frame your face and he kisses you sweetly, lingering in it. There is no competition suddenly -- no wondering whose mouth was sweeter, whose kiss was longer. All of that, with this, shall be dispelled.
     Hands take your hands again and lead you inward to the bed.

     Being led like this - it is More than right. There is something ceremonial to it. This is not a game, and she does not treat it as such, even if the tears from her eyes are not as they have been at times, tears of frustration and futility and impatience. The assistance in being led is accepted gratefully, without words to clutter up the already busied air.
     While she knows what is happening in some ways, it is an intuitive understanding, something of spirit more even than flesh. There is desire there; it makes her shudder, keeps her from walking on her own or with accustomed grace. And perhaps that's for the best; would it really be fitting for a queen to go to her wedding without trembling a little with the enormity of it all?
     Those changing sky and ocean eyes meet one pair of green, then the other, then drop again, watching the shifting of magic and the Art that moves, is moved by the magic. There's a brief smile for the unicorn - she knows how that feels. Doesn't she just...
     The change that occurs in the hallway makes her startle slightly, then sigh, small hands lifting to a broad Welsh chest even as she leans back against another, letting her hands be captured, letting herself be touched and petted. It's hard to hold still; it takes every bit, every ounce of willpower she's got. Fiona squirms, a momentary mutinous look on her face. Why do you torture her so? As if she didn't know...
     The threshold makes even mutiny grow quiet and leap over the side of the Bounty to swim for foreign shores, there to join other fugitives on Pitcairn Island. Fiona has no thought for it now, no thought but for the embrace, eyes closed as she's kissed. Davydd... my Davy. And then she's passed, and the kiss is accepted just as wholly, eyes just as closed. She doesn't need to see to recognise the flavour of each kiss. They may run one into another, but she knows her husbands to be two separate people. Rhodri ... my thief ...
     Blue eyes blink open again as her hands are taken, and though she sways, she allows herself to be led in, not quite daring to speak - as if to speak would be to disturb the sanctity of the Moment...

     They are distinct. There is no confusing them now...
     With Davydd, there is immeasurable bounty, generosity, fertility, sensuality -- the decadence of dizzying harvest. His kiss is a bacchanal. It comes with the flavor of clove, of cinnamon, of gushing, intoxicating wine and mead. The sweet bite of quince. The smoky quality of nutmeg.
     With Rhodri, there is warmth, crisp apple sweetness, the flavor and texture of honey. Tactile, tangible, heady. His is dizzying. Consuming. The burning bel-fire, energetic and intense. His kiss is the squirming orgy of summer.
     My Queen...
     My love...
     My girl...
     My darling...
     Their voices press in and out with invisible fingers along the inside of your skin as they lead you within, and lead you to the bed. There are no light-hearted comments, no quips, no distractions. You are assisted to sit upon the bed, their hands sliding through your hair, brushing it back.
     Piece by piece. Moment by moment. Layer by layer. Your clothes are removed like the holy disrobing of a goddess by her consort lovers. Your skin brushed slightly in the process, but you are not fondled, man-handled. This night you are a Queen. Tonight, Fiona, you are a Queen.

     She is dazed, she is drugged, intoxicated beyond intoxicants' grasp. She is led to the bed and she sits there, passive, pliant, the flush to her cheeks betraying her desire; she'd pass a breathalyzer but one look at her pupils would have any beat cop nodding knowingly and then reaching for the radio. Her lips remain parted as if about to speak, but only just - the moment between the thought and the word, held hovering like a hummingbird, the droning of its wings adding to the thickness and richness of the world.
     Farewell, denim, goodbye, knit socks; sayonara, silk shirt, arrivederci, antique blue and cream lace lingerie. Little touches can only add to the state she's in; quivering but sitting up as straight as she can, fingers spread against the blankets with her hands at her sides. Her chin lifts slightly, and she resists the urge to grow shy and fold her arms over her breasts...
     This really is as close to religion as Fiona has ever gotten, brushes with angels not counting in the slightest. How well could she fit, in a pew, listening to the words of a Judeo-Christian preacher? Where would her world fit, in the lock of Adam and Eve, one woman to a man and definitely one man to a woman? Her world is unevenly divided into threes, and it is the most even division she's found.
     But she waits, watching the two of you, watching her clothing taken from her, aware of her response and its strength. Everything is metaphor, but everything is more Real than perhaps it ever has been...

     Again the clove and cinnamon, the decadent roll of one husband's tongue against your own. Again, the taste of wine in the suckling of his mouth. The kiss is widened beneath the press of Davydd's expert mouth. That mouth that is his greatest asset even as it is often his worst enemy. His hand in your hair, he tilts back your head to receive him...
     And in the arching, another pair of fingers easily find you breasts, fingers brushing against upraised nipples, squeezing only lightly before four hands guide you to recline. The bed becomes insubstantial, floating, unreal even as this is unbelievable. Everything moves in slow motion as they join you. What could have just as easily been an orgiastic, writhing pile becomes something degrees more meaningful.
     You are surrounded by them, your husband two. Fine hands of a thief direct your face to him, tease your lips with a kiss suddenly full, suddenly wild with summer's intensity, as slower autumn, more decadent autumn crests over the rise of your left breast. Tongues swirl and mouths suckle and pull, interchanging like the changing of the seasons from your mouth to your breasts.
     Two hands slip between your thighs, a slow tangle of fingers rolls you against two different palms as your mouth is freed by them both, your breasts suckled -- fire and honey around one, decadent motion, the swirl of a talented tongue around the other.
     You are Ours. comes their voices within you in unison. My wife, my queen, I pledge my life to you, your happiness my happiness, your life my treasure to protect. comes Rhodri's inner voice, flicking against you, as if pressing from the inside out to meet the swirling of his fingers.
     My wife, my queen, my life, my joy. I pledge my life to you, my partner, queen of queens, my only companion. Davydd's voice curls through you, coiling as his tongue does around your left nipple.
     Their mouths lift. One by one they seal their vow to you with a kiss. One by one, their fingers halt their sliding between your thighs, splaying against your torso until they lift from you altogether. Are they so cruel? To touch so and then to halt so suddenly?
     Two shirts, one navy and one black, float to the floor as they are discarded. Vivid blue tattoos, coiling, writhing dragons move against Davydd's chest, torso, shoulders, arms. A sound like the chiming of a bell sounds. A bell? The belt is undone and denim unfastened...
     Crimson hounds hunt across his skin, the mountains and valleys of Rhodri's musculature upon shoulders, arms, chest and torso. Another bell chimes as another belt is loosened, as a second pair of trousers is unfastened. Smiling, they stand, clothing pooling at their ankles, lengths hardened and perpendicular to their bodies, rigidly parallel to the floor. Dragons and mistletoe, hounds and mistletoe -- it is a blatant display of virility and desire.

     It's funny how once she wouldn't know where to look, but now she doesn't know how to look away. It has never been 'just sex' for her, with either of you; the idea of anything ever being 'just sex' is an alien concept, more than to most women. Everything holds Meaning, everything holds emotion, her heart on display, fighting and resisting only so that she can give you what she knows you want, what she knows you know she wants.
     This, though...
     This is so far removed from 'just sex' for it to be laughable. Not that Fiona is laughing now...
     Her head tilts back, eyes drifting half-closed as fingers find their way into her hair, allowing her lips to be parted by the pressure of lips with a little surrendering sigh. How often were kisses desired before it was she knew it was that she wanted you to kiss her? And now she has kisses for the asking.
     The kiss turns into a soft moan as her breasts are touched, nipples teased. She lies back as she's guided, swallowing past a sudden lump in her throat as she's joined, then turned; the unpredictability of that wild summer-heated kiss holds the same effect on her as when she was first stolen, first fulfilled. Her lips darken under the exchange of kisses, lips growing tender, eyes darkening as well with the effects of passion, magic and emotion all.
     Thighs slide apart and there is no containing the moan that escapes her, no controlling her reaction at the twining of fingers and palms moving against her, the dual mouths against her breasts. There is a buzz of white noise in Fiona's brain, briefly deafening her to all but that magical intimate speech that moves not against her ears but her Self.
     The words move her, more than even the very talented motions of adept fingers and tongues could; tears trickle down her cheeks silently, and kisses keep her silent rather than her own will. Though it is not an inconsiderable Will to have brought her thus far, time has shown that where you two are concerned, she only has will to be with you, not to resist you...
     She is abandoned, and tears are blinked away in sudden surprise and nameless alarm. She lifts her head, pulling herself slowly upright, nude and flushed and more than nude, naked as she looks upon you - her two husbands, her two kings. The reaction is visible in her expression, eyes as wide as for first times, lips not quite able to part after so many kisses.
     Admiration, awe, desire, lust, love - all are written in her face. And here, after all, is where she must give answer, isn't it? You know, and she knows that you know, but that is not enough; that would be the act of a child, and while there is that part of her that is and ever will be the Child, the Maiden, that is not the act of the Queen that she intends to be.
     I am Yours. To you I give my Self, for that is all that I have. I give my body, the flesh that I wish for you to desire and to take until your own, and more, I give my fertility. No children but yours will come of my body. No men but you will I have to hold, to take into myself.
     Her voice is soft, even on that plane, flavoured with soft things, orange blossom nectar and sweet strands of cinnamon, peppered not with pepper but with fig seed and truffle. It is nonetheless Fiona, no matter how soft, how gentle, how slow her answer comes. I give you my Spirit, which you have had, to tease and to hold, to protect and to test and to test against. All that I have, all that I am is yours. All my efforts will turn towards my dowry, towards You, my Kings. I want you. I love you. I need you. Without you, I would surely die...
     Fiona moves to the edge of the bed, sitting there, and now she holds her hands out, looking up with almost a child's solemnity. What she says, she feels, she is, she Means...

     Each king meets your offered hand, not with their hands but with the universal symbol of kingship. Each different, as individual as the kiss. From the tattoos that mark the rigid lengths to the width and length of the members themselves. Blooded, heavy, they rest in your hands and from above there comes a coupled grin.
     The grin was inherited. You can clearly see this now...
     No one shall come between us. None but ourselves. A sudden teasing tone, two voices intertwining within you. You... will always be between us, darling...sweet, beautiful Queen...
     Thickness slides against your palms, then draw away, lifting heavily in powerful, lustful spasms and twitches. The bed sounds, shifting as they join you on the bed, your body drawn back to the surface of the bed with them. Now, it becomes a tangle, as tangled as the tattoos that cover their bodies from shoulders to groins.
     Muscular forms, such strength, press you between them, embraces, trading kisses again, and then Davydd turns, his mouth finding the juncture of your thighs as the thickness -- and it is heft indeed -- presses against your mouth. His thighs, your sky, and the painted blue balls you once constantly threatened with castration.
     Another pair of hands spread your thighs beneath Davydd's mouth, and as Davydd's tongue spirals and curls, his lips and mouth tugging and suckling, another slips inside you, twisting. Like links of a chain clicking into place, their tongues along you, within you, create a circuit of energy, of humming magic, prickles and tingles, heat and agility. It sweeps over you in a wave, within you as a song, bringing with it extemporaneous music, lyrical words that pass you by in a tempest of inspiration and enlightenment. And visions, prophetic visions, of a High King's court. Of you. Of Davydd. Of a Kingdom of Three, even as this bed... this bed is the beginning of that kingdom...

     As small as her hands are in comparison with yours, she has had some experience with wrapping them around those kingly rods by now. Those grins are met with a brief, joyous smile and laugh which is only interrupted because she has to pause to draw breath as your voices sound within her. The bed shifts and she's drawn up along you. Her eyelids close as her eyes roll back for a moment in her head. Opium is for the poor people...
     Lips part obediently, willingly as a certain thickness is presented to her mouth; it isn't the first time her mouth has been acquainted with that thickness, even if it requires a certain effort. It is the first time, though, that there has been this level of assault upon her senses, her sensitivities. Fiona brings her hands up, as if to balance herself against that blue sky. Castration is certainly not on her mind now. Of course, right now it's almost inconceivable that she has any mind left.
     Two mouths, then, tilting her to more than distraction; it's as well her thighs are spread for her, because muscles twitch and squirm most involuntarily even if pleasurably under this assault. Masculinity in her hands, magic within her and all around her, visions, the beginnings of yet something More which is New - this is religion. This is all the Truth Fiona has room for.

     Syllables of Welsh move against you, lilting upon the edge of the tongue that circles over you as its partner thrusts inside. Davydd murmurs incomprehensible poetry against silken flesh, his face burying itself between your thighs in time with the thrusting of himself within the close-quarter confines of your mouth. So thick, he presses your mouth to open widely, until the upper corners of your jaw ache.
     A pair of hands land upon the bed's surface over Davydd's back and at either side of you as hips curl forward with spasmodic intensity. Rhodri sits up on his knees as he sinks deeply, suddenly inside you. Hands on your hips, he pulls you onto him, impaling with sudden strokes. The percussion of his skin meeting your skin sounds loudly in the otherwise quiet chamber. Oes... Fiona... my Queen...
     The bed tosses, forcing Davydd's mouth upon your mons. Suckling strongly upon soft and sweet lips there below, he plunges in and out of your mouth, his hips recoiling to pull him completely from your mouth's tight grasp, to tease against your lips, before sinking within you again. My apple tree, my brightness...

     Blue eyes are closed tightly, now. There is no room on her brain for images; all available space is being taken up by the intricate ballet being performed around her, on her, in her. Mouth opened as wide as she can, Fiona still has to concentrate, the urge to protect from any scrape of teeth there. Oh, but it's hard to concentrate, with mouths and hands playing. Soft sounds are muffled, at least, as they have not been in the past...
     Fiona's eyes go wide and huge in sudden surprise as she's entered, the flush that plays over her cheeks vivid. It's only her mouth being full that prevents an answering cry, and there is nonetheless an emphatic sound deep in her throat. One hand curls against the bedding, elbow sliding and bringing rounded breasts into close contact as her other hand tightens even involuntarily.
     Intense blue...
     That colour which they say if stared at, the afterimage is a burnished blood red tainted by a hint of orange...
     That is the colour of her eyes right now, the before-image of Welsh hair, blue dragons to red hounds. She gasps for breath as her mouth is suddenly free, a moan drawn in and let out as a cry, lips nuzzling and then accepting. Yours ... I am yours, this is where I am, where I belong...

     Your mouth is freed, your cries are wanted. Swinging upward, your legs are dangled over mountainous shoulders, lying white against a scarlet-painted canvas. Another pair of hands reaches for your legs, guiding them gently back, opening you to the consumption of Summer.
     Understand the fire, such motion would seem to say. Desire untamed, need and hope. Prosperity in Harvest must come from...somewhere, right? It comes from this. Fire of fertility. Bee buzz and honey dripping, quaking and quivering thighs, flowers spilled on the ground from the shaking of the trees by the wind.
     Thighs splayed wide in masculine display, your Summer husband slows his pace, letting you see the thrust from its beginning -- the drawing back of his hips (like the drawing of a bow), the tightening of his muscles (like the tightening of the string, feel the tautness, see the tension), the powerful release (the arrow is set free), and you feel it end at your cervix. The male groan, the sound of the arrow's strike.
     Against your mouth, another moves, the slow, heavy stroke of the draconic length (like a spear moving a curtain of leaves to the side). There is no sound now, it is as if you were in his dark wood. The only sound is that of your own fast heartbeat, and his much slower, much deeper beat beneath it. You have never been more precious to me. the Holly King's voice issues through you, lingering and swirling wherever his mouth had previously toyed. You are my lover, my spouse, future mother of my children, and my daughter too. In you... my sweet... is every woman. Desirous. Maternal. Ever Youthful.
     You are swallowed in the warm, strong hold of two men. Two pair of hands run along your body, embracing, touching, exploring. You are rolled in Rhodri's arms until both of you are lying on your sides, he still deeply ensconced within you. Rhodri's kiss is sweet, honeyed, slow and savoring, his tongue rolling against your own as one hand rests and massages against your waist, his other beneath you.
     Another mouth parts at your shoulder, not as warm as the one at your mouth. But it brings with it the pinpricks of holly leaves, two canines that scratch and mark you as his, drawing your blood to the surface of your skin, that he might feel it flush beneath him even though it is not yet spilled. Davydd's hand grasps your hip, slides along your thigh, joined by the hand of your other husband.
     Two hands gently lift your top leg, holding it high and aloft, spreading you to them. Rhodri opens his eyes, glittering emerald looking at your face as he thrusts in and withdraws completely, only to be replaced by Davydd who, from behind you, fills the void his son has left behind. He, too, withdraws completely after a single stroke, to be replaced by his son.
     They trade off strokes with gut-borne groans of your name. Can you tell the difference? Rhodri, the longer of the two, crushing against where your body prevents him from going further. Davydd, far thicker, who overwhelms the nervendings by sheer sliding girth. One after the other, rolling, bucking, quick strokes, strokes long and slow...

     Everything real has been undone until the only reality is what is Now, the life measured in the moments of such closeness and truth. Fiona cannot move save but for involuntary little gestures, reaction rather than action, affected rather than effecting. And the Cause may be laid at the doorstep of the seasons...
     Everything which she sees makes the breath tremble in and out of her body, everything she feels, she feels so intensely - and isn't that the crux of her identity? What she feels, she Feels. The arrow does not strike without drawing a gasping little cry, female counterpart to male groan, a slight jump and twitch of hips providing the shudder of the target being struck.
     As fast as her heart is beating, there is no terror for the Event, for woods or hills alike. There is fear, the same excited thread of fear that is the Unknown, that trust and love bind about in the woman's caduceus of sacrifice. Darkness or light, it makes no difference; her heart still leaps in her breast, she leans in with yearning, echoing in wordless thoughts and cries.
     There is something to be said for being so ensconced Between. The hands that move over her leave their mark; she is flush with desire, gloriously disheveled and passion-stained. Every kiss gets a sigh, a moan, every bite, every tug, every thrust a soft little cry, a sound that begins with 'oh' but is drawn up from her pelvic muscles. It is entirely without intent; any good intentions were left with the bad ones, with the cellphone that was turned off before she ever entered the pub, huddling together for electronic warmth in a handbag on a table somewhere down below. Forgotten. Ignored. Unneeded.
     The feel of hands moving along her thigh makes her whimper, looking up through dimmed eyes that are hard-pressed to focus. She sees you both not with her eyes but with her heart, right now.... Any question is gone before it got life from her, turned into a sharper cry as she's thrust into, cry turning into a whimper as she's emptied and then into a new cry as she's filled again. Fiona's power of speech has been stripped away; even names are impossible right now. If she could speak, it might be to beg...
     It might be to pray...
     Right now, there isn't much difference...
     But the prayers would all be to You, and they are there, within her, expressed in surges of reaction and of emotion, warmth that emanates from and through her, taking what you give and returning it with all of herself, all of her Self. Hands open and close, move to clutch and to wander, aimless, as incoherent and random as her cries. But not without Meaning. Never without Meaning...

     You will have one... then you will have the other. From vows of marriage to the changing of the seasons. The moment is as crammed with Meaning as you are with men. The world speeds up -- as do they -- Time slows -- as do they -- there is the circling of repeating patterns in the grinding of hips. Worlds are born, children are born, realities are born and blossom with each voiced breath, each breathy cry.
     It is Rhodri you feel again, your current husband, your mortal and immortal husband, the first father of your first child (though not to be conceived tonight!), who crushes to you again, whose mouth assails your mouth, with biting, wild summer kisses claiming it. The bed tosses in another cresting, crescendo-moment, his hands clasping you, pulling you into him...
     Your slender leg is lowered, allowed to hook over a large thigh -- whose? -- and both men swim in your magic. Physically, covered in it and you. Emotionally, lusting and loving you, snippets of emotion flashing within you like the birth and death of stars. Spiritually, this connection the three of you now make. Individual ownership begins to dissolve. His hand? Whose hand? Our hand. Her leg? Whose leg? Our leg. The skin provides for physical separation, but now there is no spiritual separation.
     When a hand smoothes over the rounds of your rear, even as another pair grasp just above to create the thrusting fulcrum, is it felt at all? When mouth suckles at the nape of your neck, your hair tossed in a golden tempest out of his way, does your hair even land or does it magically float, even as the three of you do in this bodiless blending? When strong fingers slip between your legs, gathering moisture even as the sky does from the sea, and landing it like rain in a circle around your other budding opening, what of this?
     The curved thorns of the Holly King scratch at the tender skin at the nape of your neck, the scratch drawing the faintest drop of blood, as Davydd's finger slips within you, testing, teasing, preparing. Timed with your other husbands thrusts, upbeat...downbeat, you become the composition, the song they play, verses measured out by your breaths now faster than 4/4 time.
     One of Rhodri's hands captures a breast, finger and thumb squeezing at an upraised nipple, upbeat...downbeat, in time to Davydd's own motion. One finger... two fingers...one finger...none...
     A greater pressure replaces the feeling at your rear, the fingers retreating, drizzling back to your hips, holding you still even as Rhodri moves against you. The air tightens, Davydd's flesh tightens. At your rear, there is sudden hardness, silken with thicker liquid, thick like honey, and the crown of his length pushes slowly inside you, as your other husband rolls against you in a slowing undulation.
     Now, not one or the other. No, a picture of the afterlife, the life in a century. When you have them both at once.

     She has never been unable to tell you apart, until there was no 'apart'. The change is noted, in some dim and murky backwater of her mind where the lonely stenographer must forever take notes to perhaps and someday be reviewed in some later meeting. Fiona isn't accepting calls right now, though...
     What reality is this? One doesn't spend life forever in bed, no matter how tempting it sometimes is, to make forts of blankets and pillows and huddle there with love in tow. But it is the only reality that matters, in its ripeness; the possibility, the ripeness of fruition that allows all other possibility to breathe and have life. Fingernails scrape and hands tug, but it isn't in command - do this, not that, the other, yes, that. No, it's acknowledgment...
     All that she can do is hold onto you both, eyes wide and unseeing as she is spread, opened, heart beating against the inside of her body as if trying to escape. Breath comes in efforts she isn't aware of making, body reacts without her awareness. She gave it permission when she gave you consent; when she gave more than consent. But that is why she is here, isn't it? Because of that give and that take, that neither of you have come to wish to live without. Her thigh drapes over yours, she leans forward tremblingly, slender, graceful arms clutching around your neck as you hold her, as you slide into her not in one place but in two. That single drop of blood that is shed is only fitting; what's a sacrifice without a little blood?
     There's a soft cry from between soft lips, the sound of a lone raven far-off, of a dove closer by. In this moment, Fiona is the conquered rather than conqueror, the willing sacrifice, accepting what happens because she desires it - not just for the now, but for the What Will Be...
     It becomes rather harder to breathe, now; her breasts still lift, but her breaths are shallow, sips of air as from a cup she isn't willing to empty but with a thirst that makes the sips rapid, one after another after another. Hands clutch and then release to fall back, one to a shoulder here, one to a hip there, eyes shut tightly. She doesn't need to see.
     She knows who you are...

     Greeks, Romans, Etruscans, Celts. Each have the myths, some even the history, of the ravished woman, a stolen bride, a woman torn between two kings. But seldom, if ever, is she so adored by them. You are loved. You do not know this because they fill you, in alternating strokes have you, though it is certainly one expression of it, but for the act itself, the tenderness and adoration that may be found with in it...
     Gentle pressing fingers...padding pressure... symbols of possession...moments of caring...
     One voice at your mouth, another at your ear, speaking such poetry, singing in fact such words to you. Of the worthiness they will bestow upon you. On the kingdoms you inspire. Your thighs, your breasts as two male hands cup them and one another, your mouth, and now the rounds of your rear. Odes and epigraphs, testaments...
     ...These turn to rough shouts, padding fingers of one husband's hands upon your breasts, then your face, pulling your mouth to his as he releases himself within you in spasmodic motion, strong convulsions and with each one a sea-surge of magic. Creative. Song. Enlightenment. Wisdom. Poetry. Inspiration...symbolized by the white stag and by man's forever hunting after it. It runs through you, known by you, married to you...
     Large hands clasp you tightly, Davydd quickening through Rhodri's orgasm, driving you between them strongly. Where one is Inspiration Itself, vital liquid of creativity, the other is Life and Death, the Cycle Complete and the immortality that exists of all matter. When the great mountain behind you quickens, his hands covering your hips and pulling you into him, onto him, it is birth, it is death, it is everlasting life. Darkness bursting with sudden Illumination -- which is more than simple light but a light from within, from the Source. Light softening, dulling into Darkness, as all suns must set. He is this, too. And he is the frenzy of Life, the struggle of Life, against Death. The frenzy of celebration, and this is what is visited upon you, against you, within you. Overflowing magic, a strong tidal wave of even greater power, which courses through you from where he spills within you, from toe to top, in tangles like vines, wrapping around your heart.
     Shout subside into groaning. Thrusting subsides into grinding (but motion does not end, still they move inside you), and hands that clasped in anchoring and ownership slide against your skin as two sets of powerful, warrior arms surround you. Mouths part at your skin, warmly sliding over you from ear to neck, to shoulder, to breast, tongues tasting the sugar and the salt on your skin.
     My Queen...
     My Queen...
     Both Voices slide against you from within, first one, then the other...
     We are the kingdom of kingdoms...

     It is hard to understand, sometimes; as certain as she has been that she is loved, that both of you do truly love her (and that certainty is a fairly recent innovation on her part - accepting that truth as real and not a wish), as certain as she has been, the why of it has been forever lost to her. It is something that Is, something she hopes will not change, something that she has feared losing but accepting reluctantly her powerlessness over.
     Sometimes, she still turns it over in her hands, puzzling over it, wondering at the Why...
     There is no time given to that pondering now, though perhaps later she will. Much later. Her appetite is quiescent right now, not sated but without the hungry, driving greed that sometimes tears at her to your amusement and enjoyment. How could she feel greedy when she has you both?
     The poetry of the moment is not lost on her, though it serves to fuel her bewilderment, perhaps. It is one thing to accept and to bestow love with all of herself, but it is another to understand how other eyes see her. Though she's vanquished her mother, being a queen, your queen or any other, is still new to her, and in some ways ever will be.
     Poetry gives way to more driving masculinity, answered with the clasp of her body, the parted lips echoing shout with a high-pitched, keening note, broken down the middle. First one, then the other... Magic had already had a hold of her, but now...

I would not have believed you, had I never seen
Now you and I are intimately pictured in my dreams
I could not forsake you for tumbling away
And If I live in wonderland I'm better off this way...
     Magic runs through her like a river, seeking and binding, tugging and pulling, answered by her Self in turn. How could she not? And there is she where you have found her, as you have found her -
     She is the child with the too-wise and knowing eyes in the solemn face, seeing that which the adults have forgotten. Her children will always have that look in half-dreaming moments...
     She is the girl with heart held in the cup between her hands, hoping for those strains of love. Juliet had that look behind the mask when Romeo was drawn there. But so had Hermia for Lysander...
     She is the new bride, oh, now most especially of all! - the new bride, waiting for the veil to be lifted, for kiss and cradle and carry, thighs waiting to be parted, womb waiting to be opened, at the threshold of all things. World may be born from her, more than just children...
     She is the new mother, patiently prying open fists that clutch and counting the pebbles upon the palm, showing new things to eyes ready to see. Her gentleness is tempered by the lioness within, as those who seek to upturn her peace will find. And as in any well-organized home, no lack of improvisation may be called to hand...
     She is the crafter, the wisdom that she does not know she has maturing as she brings her children to adulthood, as she remains as she is and was and will be. In a handful of sand there is a universe, and from those granules she will give diamonds and dreams...
     What I do, I do for You. What I am, is Yours. You are my Kings and my husbands. There has and shall never be any but You...
     Fiona's echo is soft, wistful, lips parted in soft little whimpering moans that she can't seem to stop. All she can do is accept. And all she can do is give...

Posted by rowan at December 22, 2004 09:02 PM