The servants brought the supper and set it for him. It remains covered upon the sofa table and other small tables around him, untouched so far. Not even the smells have woken him. The aromas lifted from the covered trays and floated into his surface dreams.
     His form is too large to sleep comfortably on the sofa, but he manages. A leg drapes off, his heel resting on the floor. His other leg is bent, relaxing against the sofa's back cushions. One arm likewise drapes off the edge of the sofa, while the other lies across his eyes.
     Time has been kind to the king. Though Diplomacy has softened a form that was once cut by the sails and the seas, he has maintained a fitness through fencing exercises and dancing through political minefields.
     His body is marked with stars: over shoulders and arms, chest and torso. He wears yet the silken trousers, which in the low light of early evening take on a translucence. Thus, Iowerth Rhudd Draig naps.

     The door opens quietly; it closes just as quietly, and there is the sound of cloth being drawn open and off. Your lover has returned, wearied of forms and frustrated by facts and fictions alike, removing his shirt and vest and casting them off. Where you are marked with stars, he is forever marked with crescents; the markings of his foster mother's cruelty, of a childhood twisted from what most would know as a norm.
     It has been some time since he was that boy. Now he draws near to you, looking down at you with the frustration rising to the surface, now, while you are quieted by sleep and unaware of it. You, whom he has loved since first he met you; you, who captured his heart so effortlessly and made him wish nothing more than to be with you, always.
     Always... and forever...
     Tiernan lowers himself to his knees next to the couch with a silent sigh that barely stirs the air, a hand lifting to drag fingertips gently over your side. I know how Hamlet felt. Nymph, in thine orisons be all my sins remembered. You look and you see him, and immediately, you remember...
     He leans in, hands tucked to the edge of the sofa as if to pray, and he rests his face against your ribs, eyes closed. He whispers, "I love you," not sure if it will wake you; not sure if it will be heard. For the first time in years, he is uncertain of what he should do. And he doesn't like it.

     The sleep of a king -- a High King -- is as light as a soldier's. It is taken, found, in moments, had like cattle graze... a little bit at a time. There is a breath, the first sound of him stirring slightly. I love you, too, it would seem to say. Iowerth turns his head toward where he feels you, hears you, his dreams starting to recede. Or maybe you will simply become a part of them, as you so often do...
     "Forgive me?" The whisper is soft. Had your ear not been to his ribcage, you might not have heard it. But you as much felt it as heard it. Iowerth's eyes crack open and he stretches beneath you. His hand lifting from where it drapes to rest upon your head.
     His touch is light and, with waking, clumsy. He seems to drift in and out a moment more. "...I ... love you," the words lift and lower like his sleepy breaths. "And am ... glad you came back..."

     "I can never leave you long," Tiernan answers you quietly. His hands ball, then open again; from fist to palms, earnest in their supplication. One hand slides up to rest on your belly. "There is nothing to forgive. You are my heart, Io. You are my life."
     There is suddenly wetness, cool against your skin and sliding to follow the curve of your hip. His fingers follow it, wiping it away as if to render unto it discretion that undoes all tears. "There is nothing to forgive," he repeats. "I only wish that I were better..."

     He was not truly awake until he felt the wetness on his skin. The warmth of your tears become cool against his warmer skin, evaporating and then disappearing beneath your fingers. His body moves -- stiff from his odd position -- until he is on his side and facing you.
     The multi-colored tattoos, the fair complexion, the periwinkle eyes and bronze hair combine into a startling sight in the low light. "Then come here," he gently speaks even as his body makes room for you to join him, to crowd the sofa with him.
     There is no doubting you, not even himself. There is only his love and his arms there to accept you. "Better," he murmurs in echo. His eyebrows sweep upward and his dreamy smile spreads with the warmth of love and his deep affection. "How could you possibly be better? I don't think I could take it..."

     He pulls himself up slowly, almost clumsily, joining you; the sofa creaks and groans in mild protest. His hands find your skin, moving against it as if to find the heartbeat that moves the blood in your veins; slow, unsteady, but definite, a presence you cannot help being aware of. "I still give you doubt," Tiernan answers you quietly, with all the seriousness that was his even at sixteen. "If I cannot ease your doubts, then I am not much good to you, my king, my heart."
     It is what he earnestly believes, and it is in his own eyes, the Aegean depths of them reflecting it all the way down. He sprawls, a knee next to your hip, his thigh sliding against yours as he tries to arrange himself without all his weight being on you. "And so I wish that I knew what to do."

     "I do not doubt you, Tiernan." His hand brushes against your face as he leads you to a kiss. "I do not doubt what we are or how we have been or what we shall become. We are married, in all senses of that word. Our fortunes, our fate, our joys, our regrets -- they are all wed to one another."
     His body acquiesces, shifting even as yours do to give you more space here, to tangle with you there. His arms slide around you, his hands pressed to the small of your back. "We did say, for better or for worse. That is what that means: our hopes, our fortunes, our failures, our successes are all linked. And I would not wish it any other way, love."
     Closing his eyes, he kisses you again. It is a sweet and tugging thing. It has not the bubbles of champagne that a siren's kiss would have, but it has in it the light and the fire of stars. Parting the embrace, Iowerth tips his chin so he can look you eye-to-eye. He smiles a little. "Now... I will admit, when I saw him, I regretted my decision to age but... I do not regret us, or anything about us. I ... am not worried. And you have not failed me," he repeats more seriously. "I just want you to believe that."

     There is nothing he loves more than being tangled with you, finding himself held, clasped. His arms slide against you, a hand in your hair, an arm around your waist. "It is here that I am home." It is quietly said, but with feeling, his heart in his eyes, on his lips, his tongue. "Here is where I belong..."
     Tiernan sighs, leaning into the kiss; savouring it, reluctant when it parts. "It was your choice; where you lead, I will follow, Io. It has always been so," he murmurs, hand tangling in your hair with a gentle tug. "I will not leave off following you now. I just - I know that you were hurt. And I do not know how to address that."

     The tangle is subtle. A slide of an arm here; the slip of a leg there. Soon, there is no separation -- a perfect blend of perfectly fitted bodies. "There is nothing to address," Iowerth murmurs, eyes drifting shut as your fingers tug the strands of his hair. "It was long ago. And that is where it needs to stay."
     His arms tighten their hold around you, one sliding up your back until a hand is in your black and silver hair. "I just want your happiness," he breathes against your mouth, claiming it in the pause. "I am happy to know that your happiness is with me."
     Iowerth nips and nudges, his body now in slow but constant motion.. "It only hurt because you loved him. I hurt you too, as I recall," he notes in a whisper. "So ... let's not mark down our hurts, tit for tat. The solution is here already," his hands clasp you. "You are where you need to be. And where I want you."

     There is a heartfelt groan, and his eyes close, head tipping back a little. Yes, he murmurs, silently, unheard for all save where you can hear. This is what I wanted. What he wanted; what he hoped for. Had been dreaming of, this afternoon, before the past resurfaced before your very eyes and his. Tiernan sighs, shifting, and there is the definite notification made of his arousal, growing.
     "I love it when you tell me it," Tiernan confides, eyes opening with a furtive flutter of those long dark lashes. Those, at least, have not silvered; he shifts against you, the slight tug of hips against you. "My love. When you are here, I lose time's passage..."

     Hands slide and press against your skin, from back to sides, until they tangle in between you, in the dark and tightened spaces in between. Drawstrings are plucked -- yours, his -- and silk and cotton fall slack. His breaths quicken in the quiet that comes between you. "Remember... that time in London.... when I fed you Pashmina's curry? When we couldn't even eat without having to be inside one another?"
     If we are to talk of the past, why not discuss something heated? Something that is ours?
     "We did not pay attention to the passage of time then either," Iowerth grins. Though, as he remembers, his brother certainly did, caught beneath the bed as he was for those six hours."You say such sweet things," Iowerth continues, his mouth brushing yours, teasing out the occasional open-mouthed kiss. "I love to hear you whisper poetry when we are like this, fumbling teenagers on a sofa."
     But his hands 'fumble' with precision, with the well-practiced grasp of a man very familiar with your form and your likes. His hand tugs down the cloth that separates you, his warm hands finding you.
     "This is all I need," Iowerth hotly whispers. "I need no other assurances. No other comfort than this."

     It is only at times like these that he loses the ability to speak, to form courtly words with polished tongue; any other time, he is as others know him to be. Quiet. Competent. Present, and alert in his presence.
     But now he is squirming, pressing in against you, eagerly competing with you for the next kiss, the next touch, frustrated only when you are not on him. Two hours has been torment enough. You find him, and his hips jerk slightly, breath heated and unsteady in a way few would believe in.
     "Io," Tiernan mumbles, his hands scuffling along your spine, tugging at your own trousers, gripping and releasing. "Deus... if I needed you a little less... or a little more..."

Posted by rowan at January 14, 2009 01:15 PM