He doesn't remember drinking much: why do I feel drunk? With heart and soul squeezed out like a rag, he didn't stand a chance against the fizziness of a wedding. His hair is still out of sorts from the static. His heart is out of sorts from the romantic ambush.
     And all he can think of is how easy it would be to joke about it...
     In a reflex, Iowerth turns to his soul's mate as he has always done, wearing the memory of that old, droll smile. Its spirit hovers in his eyes. (Next week, something will occur to him, and he'll turn. And you won't be there. But his body will still move, naturally, reflexively, turning to you like breathing.)
     One of his hands is locked to yours; locked, but with a casual grip. His other lifts to try to settle his bronze hair. He realizes he can't keep up; for this moment, he doesn't bother trying. Wordlessly, Iowerth leans in, a kiss placed to your temple as he slowly walks the hall from the formal dining room (ballroom, really) to the chambers you've been sharing.
     Clasping, his fingers moor in your grasp, and he walks against you as much as with you, sighing in your dark hair. I don't remember having that much champagne. The thought is an idle one; not slurred, not surprised, not even teasing. Merely... observant.

     He holds your hand, he stays with you, patiently and as constantly as he always has, all through your married life. He smiles at you, bringing your hand for a moment to his lips; he closes his eyes. His feeling is not so different from yours...
     "It isn't the champagne, my heart," Tiernan answers with a small, quick smile as he looks over at you. The band around your heart is around his own; as how could it be otherwise? He looks to the ceiling. If there were any way he could ask for more time, he would. But a week is all that's left. "It's a wedding. Our son's wedding. We've one son and one daughter left, Io." Bahara, after all, is promised to Heaven. Someone had to be.
     He leans forward to get the door for you, opening the way with his usual quiet gallantry. "Want anything? I can arrange it, I'm sure."

     Sabira and Anierin. In the headiness of the ceremony shared, such typically anchoring thoughts do not sink him in overwhelmed responsibility. Iowerth looks ahead, some few feet past his steps, and the smile lingers. Although not some wide grin, it's the most he's smiled at a single sitting in days, and for that all the more remarkable. "Three, really. Tanira's only engaged. We'll see if Duma survives. I hope Sabira and Anierin take their time." Periwinkle eyes are bright as Iowerth turns to you. "At least until after the whiplash passes. But," there's a small laugh, "I know it is of little use to pray for that. It will ...always be sooner than I want."
     It is spoken without bitterness, without anger. It is a factual acknowledgement of truth. Simple. Shaking his head, Iowerth frees your hand as you open the door. He walks ahead. "No," he says quietly, pausing to remove his suit jacket as he reaches the sofa. Pivoting, he looks to you. "What about you?"
     Iowerth looks away as he sets the jacket aside. "It was a nice surprise. A nice tribute. You've a good son, with a good head on his shoulders, and a smart woman to go with." A final rake of his hand stills the static lingering in his hair, his thick, red waves settling at last.

     He smiles, but there is sadness in it. Too soon. Yes. It is always too soon; he agrees, silently, and he only lets go of your hand when he must, so that you can remove your jacket. "The only thing I want or need is you," Tiernan answer quietly. The same as always. Why should everything be assumed to change?
     He removes his jacket, turning away so that he doesn't need to see your face if you reject his words, exhaling quietly. "I'm glad for them. I hope they'll be happy. That's all I really want for our children, you know."

     "They will do their best, as they always have. Really, that's all anyone can ask or hope for," Iowerth mentions quietly. Jacket deposited, Iowerth closes the distance between you.
     "Don't worry," he whispers, his hand resting on your side. "They will do their best. It's who they are." Iowerth places another kiss at your temple, exhaling in your dark hair once again. He closes his eyes as his arms circle around you. He doesn't ask you want you are thinking, what you want other than what you have already mentioned. In truth, he doesn't want to acknowledge the significance of it, only to be reminded of your departure. Iowerth just holds you, as if there were nothing more extraordinary about this day than a surprise wedding affecting two parents.
     "We could ... take a nap. Take a bath," he offers quietly, his words slightly muffled in your curls. "We may as well drink. I already feel tipsy."

     He is not worried about them nearly so much as he is worried about you; but he can't say that, much as he'd like to. It is you he's worried about; but he can't say anything. You've sealed his lips as effectively as with a gag. "If you like."
     Tiernan's eyes lower as he pulls away at your final suggestion, to go to get the glasses, setting them up. It's torture, being this close to you and yet not being able to indulge in you. "Brandy? We always liked brandy, of course. Or do you want something different for a change?"

     I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to remember. And I don't know how to talk to you right now, without talking about it. What else is there, but what's happening?
     "Brandy's fine." The words are quiet. They come out easily enough. "It's ...our drink. And it's good for winter." Your hands take the glasses, take the bottle, with Toymaker precision, like you're moving on gears. That's how it seems. Iowerth takes a seat on the sofa, sitting back in that old, familiar slump of his -- one that his children never learned to master, but one which Gwilym can copy on cue. Silently, he watches you.
     I don't want to talk about it, but what else is there?
     "That was ... a very noble thing for Balthazar to do. I'm glad he thought of it. It was the best Yule present that I think we could have." Even saying Yule conjures up thoughts he's trying hard to deny. "It reminded me of our own, really. How simple it was. How improbable." Periwinkle eyes lift from his thoughts to find you, to watch you.

     The brandy tumbles in a red-gold flow of liqueur into first one glass, then the other. "I didn't expect it, but it was kind of them both," Tiernan answers quietly. He carries the glasses over, silently offering you your choice of them, then draws back again to tidy away the bottles. "Of course, it benefits him. I am sure that he was finding the waiting a burden, even if a burden he would joyfully carry."
     He sits with his drink, and he watches you. There is compassion in his gaze; he knows this is hard for you. He wants to stay... but he can't. "I hope they don't rush into children, but his bride seems a capable of sort in any case. Do you want anything to eat?"

     I try to close the distance, and it is still there. No matter how hard or how long I swim, I am always far from the shore. I am slogging through water, up to my waist. You are the light at the edge of horizon. The point longed for, but never reached.
     "Diolch," Iowerth murmurs, accepting the glass from you with warmth in his face and eyes. As you draw back again (tide and ebb, again), he tilts his glass and stares into the red-gold liquid. "I don't think he's thought of that. I don't think that even occurred to him until they were leaving. I'm sure it did, then." He closes his eyes for the first swallow.
     Resting his head against one hand, his body relaxed against the sofa, Iowerth lowers his glass. He looks at the liquid again, as if his eyes could scry something there, divine some way to speak with you as if none of this were happening. "No, I'm not hungry," he glances up to you. "She's not the sort to rush. He is," Iowerth tacks on, the glass resting on a thigh. He swishes the liquid slowly. It's a good distraction. "She's a good balance for him, as he is for her. Or seems to be. As long as they're happy, nothing else really matters."
     Periwinkle eyes lift with too much knowledge, denial fraying at the edges like a weather-beaten flag. "How are you feeling? Is there anything you want or... would like. I suppose there's no point in dancing around it," his voice is barely audible. He doesn't have to say what the it is.
     Just because he knows he cannot dance around it, cannot help but bow to it, doesn't mean he wants to hear the orchestra. Closing his eyes, Iowerth takes another drink.

     "The only thing I want is what I've always wanted, Io." He looks up from his brandy and smiles at you. It is the same gentle smile you've seen, but there is a wistful note to it, somehow. "I want your love. I want your happiness. I want you to be certain, sure, in all that you feel and do."
     I want this cup to be lifted away...
     "I want your heart," Tiernan tells you in a hush. He swallows some brandy, roughly for him, lets it slosh in his mouth, feeling the sting and burn of it. "I ... want to know what you want. I don't want there to be any questions unanswered... any needs unfulfilled. What else could there be?"

     "You have my love, you have my heart," he answers you. "You have since we met in the library that day." He keeps his eyes on you. The rest of your words dissemble at his ears. There are no answers for those other things.
     Iowerth finishes his brandy with a swallow, not a sip. His eyes tend now to the swell of air in the empty vessel. With a lean, he sets the glass aside. "I don't want to talk about it," his voice is raspy with his own emotion and he looks back to you. "And you are sitting too far away."
     He knows the water is breaching his hull. He knows he's sinking. And he can hear the thunder in the distance. The time is coming. But he'd rather hear the band on deck. He'd rather have a cup of tea. The Captain looks to his First Mate, his eyes begging, silently: Lie to me.

     "There has been no one else in my heart since we met. No one could hope to compete. No one ever shall." He smiles at you, but his words have the ring of a vow; of a truth, stated simply, perhaps, but with meaning. Tiernan rises and crosses the room to settle next to you; against you, his arms surrounding you. He leaves his brandy behind.
     He needs no intoxicants; knows of no finer intoxicants than you give him with your presence, your kiss. He touches your hair, brushes his lips against the line of your jaw. "I love you," he whispers, "more than you can ever know, Io. I love you..."

     Just as he cannot promise you he will be happy, he cannot scold you, he realizes, for making your own vows. It's not something he can ask you not to do, just as no one can really ask him to move on after you.
     Everyone has their own way of doing things. Their own way of living. Their own way of saying goodbye.
     His arms slide around you as yours slide around him. He is solid, however ephemeral his emotions may have made him seem. Iowerth dips his chin to the slide of your mouth at his jaw, and in the turning of his head he kisses you, just a brush of his mouth, a light touch. And he tastes and he smells of the sea.
     Can we forget? Can we just listen to the violins and sink and not think about the drowning?
     Iowerth closes his eyes, and he doesn't hear your promises. Those are yours to make, to yourself and not to him. He has none of his own. He blanks his mind and lets his mouth blindly, dumbly find the way against your own.

     You kiss him, and he kisses you, hands sliding against your clothing as he finds his way beneath your shirt. His eyes are closed now. I love you so...
     Tiernan is refusing to say goodbye. No matter how you take it, it is not what he will do; not who he will be. He is stubborn unto death, as you well know. He hides it behind that air of gentleness, of gentility, but there is a reason why he has been so successful in business. Even as he ceded to you the forum of majesty, he took up his own sword, his own crown and scepter. It has gotten him attention before.
     But there have been no secretaries or interns tiptoeing from his office. From the time you and he were wed, there has been no one else. And he parts his lips against yours, seeks the taste of your mouth with eyes closed. Tiernan pulls you to him, pulls himself to you. I love you...

     I want to remember. I want to forget...
     Both sentiments exist simultaneously, are felt simultaneously in the kiss. It is everything he could ever want. It is everything he will miss and long for and never have again. It is his lifeline, the board and ropes of the sea-wreck. It is the cannon that started it all.
     I love you and I will miss you...
     I need you and I will never have you...
     Pleasure and panic flood to the surface of his skin. And into the kiss, he sighs and he weeps. It is what he wants, what he needs, and its rightness is unbearable. Iowerth leans against you, the muscles of his back tightening beneath the palm of your hand.
     "We should ... go in the other room," he murmurs, his mouth moving against your mouth. That is the voice of a father, speaking. Out here in the living room of his chamber, anyone could enter at any time. Iowerth looks to you, periwinkle eyes a glimmer between bronze lashes.

     You are giving him what he wants and needs, as much as you are receiving it. He closes his eyes as if never to open them again, holding onto you, teeth grazing your earlobe. "The other room," Tiernan agrees absently, then blinks. The other room. The other - oh!
     He rises, reddening until he is quite ruddy with it, his hands held out to you. "Come with me," Tiernan whispers. He strokes your cheek. He does not cling, but he reaches for you, as greedily as he has ever shown you his need. I love you...
     I need you...

     With Gruffydd and Balthazar around, it is easy to forget how tall Iowerth actually is. He rises after you, the surface-stalwart captain. His face is damp, splotchy pink -- a flush map of his emotions. He takes your hand and walks with you to the bedroom.
     There is a prickly feeling on the air between you, a rise of humidity. Fingers slide together as the door is reached. He doesn't apologize for his nervousness, his vulnerability. That's given to you, too. This is for you. This will be for you. The only thing he can give you.
     The bedroom door is quietly closed and just as quietly locked. I'm not myself, he wants to say -- but he doesn't. Iowerth looks to you. He gives you the good and the bad, the desirous and the fearful. At the bedside, he lifts his free hand to touch your face and brush back your dark hair.
     This is not about me. This is for you. This will be for you. It's the only thing I have to offer. Iowerth stares at you a moment before kissing you gently once more. And then his hands let go of yours, to begin to unbutton his shirt.
     No, he cannot conjure the fire of his apparent youth. He simply does not have it. What he does have is love and bravery. As the fabric begins to loosen, then fall away, the dragons and milky way whirlpools are revealed upon his skin. "I love you, too, Tiernan." Iowerth lifts his eyes from the buttons to your face.

Posted by rowan at September 22, 2010 03:23 PM