[ He makes a low, luxurious sound as his eyes slip closed and his head tilts back further toward her hands. She feels exquisite. Like one of those many-armed deities he sees in some of the icons around here. If they aren't careful, he might slip right into the water without even thinking.
Don't worry, though, he's listening. ]
But you stayed.
[ He tips his head back slowly, opening one eye at her with a playful little grin. ]
[She massages his hair, the two points at the base of his skull, her fingers pressing deep. She moves so she's looking over his face, at that terrible playful smile.]
Because I wanted you. I dreamed about you. But you were convinced.
[She admits it.]
That's why it was a secret, Charles.
[But he knows, how much he means to her now. How addicted she is to him.]
And because it was Eleanor who arranged for it. Who told me she would help me get off Nassau.
Edited (Me: not important enough MORE DRAMA) 2022-03-22 15:26 (UTC)
[ Charles lets out a low rumbling sound of pleasure as her fingers dig into the back of his neck, kneading out whatever's left of the tension that sex wasn't enough to dissolve. His eyes drift shut again, lulled by the sensation and by the memories, and the satisfaction of knowing that they're devoted to each other now.
But then he opens his eyes again, focusing on nothing in particular. ]
Did she.
[ It doesn't surprise him, but it does needle at something within him, even this long after the fact, knowing how deeply Eleanor would betray him and to what lengths. Of course she tried to smuggle Daphne off the island. ]
She knew you'd be trouble, tigress. [ Then he slowly smirks again, with another glance back toward her. ] Lucky for me that you're not so easy to discourage.
[She leans down, and presses a kiss to his mouth, kisses that smirk off him. Back then Eleanor didn’t know what she was capable of but she was already aware of how she looked at Charles. It served Eleanor’s best interest to keep him tethered to her, and she knew.
It would have been impossible to run Nassau without that level of skill.
Daphne nods.]
And that I was paranoid to imagine a rival queen might send me on a journey where the men would try to kill me.
[ He sighs heavily, both in relaxation and exasperation. ]
And even if you'd told me, I wouldn't have believed you.
[ Not for any sense of mistrust, but he'd been warned about Eleanor by people who knew her better than Daphne did, and ignored those. There was a time when he would never have believed Eleanor capable of sending a woman to her death. She was ruthless, and he loved that about her, but some lines you just don't cross. ]
[She keeps rocking her fingers through his hair, and then moves so she’s in front of him, and dips his head back to rinse everything off, then starts on his skin. He looks so peaceful, then, her hands on his skin.]
Tell me, then.
[She presses up against him.]
Tell me a secret of your own.
[She likes secrets; she likes his secrets. She loves him so completely, but she doesn’t kid herself. She doesn’t know all his secrets.]
[ God, he feels too good. Too good for that question, even though it's fair, and he hates not to indulge her. She's asking only in playful goodwill, wanting to have all of him. And he wants her to have all of him.
It's just such a nice moment. Warm bath. Beautiful woman. Why ruin it?
So he catches her hand in his own, threading their fingers, bringing it up to his mouth for a kiss. ]
The only secrets I've kept from you are the ones that aren't worth knowing.
[There is a tiny, fluttery moment, the patient patter of her heart just against her chest, like she’s a teenager again and this is the first time a man has looked at her. She laughs to cover it up, her face ducking so he can’t see her flush.]
All right, Charles.
[She doesn’t pull away.]
Keep your secrets.
[She’s teasing, but she does pull away then, to get out of the bath.]
[ It's sweet, the way she says it, and teasing, but it sends a pang through him nonetheless. At times like this he can't help but feel like he's not giving her what she's due from him, which should be everything.
It is everything.
He submerges one more time, and then resurfaces in time to catch her just before she climbs up the side. ]
Meet me in our bed, and I'll unburden myself to you.
[ It's her bed, but it's also their bed. It'll be their bed tonight. ]
[She doesn't tell him he doesn't have to. He knows that; he knows that she doesn't need him to break boundaries to be with her, and she respects that decision. So she nods, slipping on a robe once she's dry.
When he does find her, she's sitting on the bed, her robe open, her legs crossed and a plate of fruit in front of her. Someone smart brought them some food, which is good because she's starving, and she has a skinned mango in one hand that she's eating with absolutely no care for mess except a plate on her lap.
She looks up when he pads into the room, and nudges the plate his way to signal that he should eat something.]
[ Charles spends a little extra time wringing out his hair, just to avoid dripping too much water into their bed, but he doesn't bother to wrap a towel or a robe around himself when he leaves the bath.
He does pull on a loose pair of pants that he'd bought after coming here, to her village. So much about her has been assimilated into him, anchoring him to her home now instead of any other town. Normally it doesn't bother him to think that there are things he hasn't told her, deliberately, because they don't matter to what the two of them have.
But now it's on his mind, and coinciding with something she'd said before, it becomes a more pressing issue.
So he rolls onto the bed, and stretches out beside her, propping himself up on one elbow, taking a piece of pineapple for himself. ]
When I told you I'd do anything you told me to do, before, you told me to stop lying. [ He glances up at her, taking a slow bite. ] What did you mean by that?
[She watches him eat, taking another bite of dripping mango, and her eyes widen just a little. She nudges just a bit closer to him, and licks her fingers.]
Do you really think you would allow me any part of your body?
Think hard before you say yes.
[She knows that he's no stranger to the kinds of things men crave. Nassau was practically an open-air brothel sometimes, and the men there weren't afraid of their impulses or desires.
[He's not upset; she can tell. But she did challenge him, she thinks, and so she moves that plate over just a little, so it's not between them anymore, and sets the mango pit down. Her hand is sticky, and she presses one finger to his mouth, where he can taste the sweetness of the fruit.]
Would you let me fuck you like a man might?
[She's never done it to him. She's done it before; she's had other lovers who would have gone belly up for her no matter what she wanted out of them.]
[ He continues to hold her gaze, sharply steady, as he folds his hand over hers and holds it against his mouth.
One kiss at the tip of her finger, then he draws it into his mouth and sucks the mango juice from her skin, and then he presses a kiss to her palm, and to her wrist. ]
I would now.
[ Then he closes his eyes, to nuzzle the soft skin over her pulse. ]
It's true that I don't offer it lightly. When I was a boy, wearing this mark--
[ He draws her fingers down to the brand. ]
--I wasn't given that choice. So I protect it now.
[The words but would you enjoy it stop right at her teeth. She looks at him, and knows that if she has the wrong reaction, makes the wrong kind of noise, he won't hate her for it, but it'll be a thorn in his side. He loves her, and he loves completely, she knows that.
But he's a man. And he's one who is giving her something vulnerable.
She slides a little closer to him, and runs her fingers over that mark.
There is a ripple in her hair, though. Orange that shimmers, a flash of amber in her eyes. That's the rage, the fury that someone would touch him like that, without his consent. That he didn't have a choice.]
[ Charles releases her hand only so he can slide his own through her hair, chasing that color that passes over her like passing sunbeams. ]
I shared it once, with someone I trusted.
[ It wasn't Eleanor. He never wanted her to look at him with pity - or worse, disgust, over his apparent weakness, at a time when he feared that most and the idea itself was intolerable. Jack was the one he confided in the most. But Charles deliberately doesn't think much about Jack anymore. Some loss is easier when it's clean.
In any case, there's no tremor or uncertainty in his voice, no bravado to mask the difficulty of talking about such things with her. In fact, it's not so difficult at all. Now that he's said it, it's done. And it feels like he's dropped the last weight that he'd been carrying for too long to even recognize it anymore. ]
But you have all of me now, Daphne. [ He smirks a little, finally, running his fingertips over her shoulder, drawing back the edge of her robe just enough to press a kiss against skin. ] And I've known enough whores to have a sense for what I'm missing.
[She suspects it was Jack; she knows he doesn't like to think about him. Daphne tried, god, she did, to get him. But the days leading up to Vane's execution were a mess, and there was no time to do anything patiently, to look for him. To find him and convince him, and the rest of Vane's men. She had to take the crew she had, a small band that Billy Bones had helped string together and men Daphne paid, men who had no allegiances then.
He leans forward to kiss her, and she smiles, leaning down a little to press her nose against his cheek.]
Would you enjoy it?
[She asks, honestly. Just because he would, just because he would let her, doesn't mean that he would enjoy the act.]
[ He raises an eyebrow, but there's a grin spreading across his face, shameless and a little wicked; he doesn't carry his trauma like old wounds, but more like a manifesto against the world, informing his principles as much as his grievances. ]
I guess I don't know.
[ Only for that moment does he pretend to sound even playfully uncertain, because the next thing he does is pull her hand back to his mouth, brushing his lips across her fingers. ]
But I look forward to finding out with you, my tigress.
How do you make me feel like a green girl every time you touch me?
[She isn't. She hasn't been, since she decided at the tender age of seventeen that she wasn't going to be a good girl who waited for a husband and got married to whoever her family told her to. The rules for the Khan are different; she chose the path she did with wild fury, with reckless abandon.
[ That makes him laugh softly, and he tilts upward so he can catch her lips with his own for a slow kiss, long and lazy and luxurious. ]
I'm looking forward to that as well.
[ Another kiss, and then he leans closer, pressing his mouth to the middle of her chest, between her breasts. Her skin tastes like mango juice and he can't seem to suck all of it off. ]
[She moves her legs a little, and moves back just a bit, smirking.]
You carried me into that bath.
[That said, she leans in and licks his mouth open, and makes a tiny noise when he kisses between her breasts. She runs a hand through his hair.]
I'll admit intense boredom, stuck in this bed with two nursemaids playing guard at the door. So you'll have to excuse how novel it is to have you finally willing to play even a little rough with me.
[Her aunt and her aunt's lackey have been very clear: no sex, no fussing, no walking around, until she was more healed. So this is the first day she's been able to spend any time doing anything at all. Charles, of course, has spent time with her, but he's just as restless as she is, and he's been gentler than anyone might think possible while all her wounds healed.]
[ He chuckles again, the sound thrumming against her breast. ]
Maybe it's just the taste of mango juice on your skin that I want.
[ After doing his level best to suck any trace of the fruit off of her, running one hand up her side beneath the fabric of her robe, Charles draws back with a pleased sound, and rolls to the pillows, folding an arm beneath his head. ]
There's a point in the healing where you've got to move, if you ever want to move right again. [ A smirk. ] I gathered you'd reached that point already.
Are you accusing me of getting soft? Do you need me to pin you down and remind you?
[She's teasing, as she moves to lie on his chest, her chin on her hands as she looks up at him. She bites her lips a little, and watches him.]
Do you want to take me out to sea for a while? On a sloop? Make me work?
[Daphne commissioned a little one when they returned; Charles' ship is big, made for carrying treasure, made for war, made for a crew. Daphne's little sloop is small enough to be handled by just a pair of people, if they're both experienced, and she mostly uses it if she needs to get somewhere on the coast fast and Charles isn't there to take her.
And she uses it to make him take her to the small islands that dot the coast, occasionally, to get away. She's not nearly skilled enough at sea to captain, but she'll work if he tells her what to do.]
Yes. Remind me of the softness of your skin after a bath.
[ With a grin, he folds his free arm over her, drawing her closer; his fingers trail up and down her side, tracing her ribs.
The idea of going out to sea with her thrills him, stirring deeper than simply wanting to have her following his orders. Any place that is theirs alone speaks more to him than sea or land combined. ]
I wouldn't mind stealing you away someplace where we can really be alone... no nursemaids or anything.
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cribellate2022-02-27 11:31 am
no subject
Don't worry, though, he's listening. ]
But you stayed.
[ He tips his head back slowly, opening one eye at her with a playful little grin. ]
Because you wanted me?
no subject
Because I wanted you. I dreamed about you. But you were convinced.
[She admits it.]
That's why it was a secret, Charles.
[But he knows, how much he means to her now. How addicted she is to him.]
And because it was Eleanor who arranged for it. Who told me she would help me get off Nassau.
not me like OH BITCH???
But then he opens his eyes again, focusing on nothing in particular. ]
Did she.
[ It doesn't surprise him, but it does needle at something within him, even this long after the fact, knowing how deeply Eleanor would betray him and to what lengths. Of course she tried to smuggle Daphne off the island. ]
She knew you'd be trouble, tigress. [ Then he slowly smirks again, with another glance back toward her. ] Lucky for me that you're not so easy to discourage.
no subject
It would have been impossible to run Nassau without that level of skill.
Daphne nods.]
And that I was paranoid to imagine a rival queen might send me on a journey where the men would try to kill me.
no subject
And even if you'd told me, I wouldn't have believed you.
[ Not for any sense of mistrust, but he'd been warned about Eleanor by people who knew her better than Daphne did, and ignored those. There was a time when he would never have believed Eleanor capable of sending a woman to her death. She was ruthless, and he loved that about her, but some lines you just don't cross. ]
I know better now.
no subject
Tell me, then.
[She presses up against him.]
Tell me a secret of your own.
[She likes secrets; she likes his secrets. She loves him so completely, but she doesn’t kid herself. She doesn’t know all his secrets.]
no subject
It's just such a nice moment. Warm bath. Beautiful woman. Why ruin it?
So he catches her hand in his own, threading their fingers, bringing it up to his mouth for a kiss. ]
The only secrets I've kept from you are the ones that aren't worth knowing.
no subject
All right, Charles.
[She doesn’t pull away.]
Keep your secrets.
[She’s teasing, but she does pull away then, to get out of the bath.]
no subject
It is everything.
He submerges one more time, and then resurfaces in time to catch her just before she climbs up the side. ]
Meet me in our bed, and I'll unburden myself to you.
[ It's her bed, but it's also their bed. It'll be their bed tonight. ]
no subject
When he does find her, she's sitting on the bed, her robe open, her legs crossed and a plate of fruit in front of her. Someone smart brought them some food, which is good because she's starving, and she has a skinned mango in one hand that she's eating with absolutely no care for mess except a plate on her lap.
She looks up when he pads into the room, and nudges the plate his way to signal that he should eat something.]
no subject
He does pull on a loose pair of pants that he'd bought after coming here, to her village. So much about her has been assimilated into him, anchoring him to her home now instead of any other town. Normally it doesn't bother him to think that there are things he hasn't told her, deliberately, because they don't matter to what the two of them have.
But now it's on his mind, and coinciding with something she'd said before, it becomes a more pressing issue.
So he rolls onto the bed, and stretches out beside her, propping himself up on one elbow, taking a piece of pineapple for himself. ]
When I told you I'd do anything you told me to do, before, you told me to stop lying. [ He glances up at her, taking a slow bite. ] What did you mean by that?
no subject
Do you really think you would allow me any part of your body?
Think hard before you say yes.
[She knows that he's no stranger to the kinds of things men crave. Nassau was practically an open-air brothel sometimes, and the men there weren't afraid of their impulses or desires.
Mostly.]
no subject
[ He holds his gaze on hers steadily, just in case she's looking for any uncertainty in him. She won't find it. ]
But I want you to tell me what it is you think I'd deny you.
no subject
Would you let me fuck you like a man might?
[She's never done it to him. She's done it before; she's had other lovers who would have gone belly up for her no matter what she wanted out of them.]
no subject
One kiss at the tip of her finger, then he draws it into his mouth and sucks the mango juice from her skin, and then he presses a kiss to her palm, and to her wrist. ]
I would now.
[ Then he closes his eyes, to nuzzle the soft skin over her pulse. ]
It's true that I don't offer it lightly. When I was a boy, wearing this mark--
[ He draws her fingers down to the brand. ]
--I wasn't given that choice. So I protect it now.
no subject
But he's a man. And he's one who is giving her something vulnerable.
She slides a little closer to him, and runs her fingers over that mark.
There is a ripple in her hair, though. Orange that shimmers, a flash of amber in her eyes. That's the rage, the fury that someone would touch him like that, without his consent. That he didn't have a choice.]
How long have you held onto that, lion?
[Does anyone else know?]
no subject
I shared it once, with someone I trusted.
[ It wasn't Eleanor. He never wanted her to look at him with pity - or worse, disgust, over his apparent weakness, at a time when he feared that most and the idea itself was intolerable. Jack was the one he confided in the most. But Charles deliberately doesn't think much about Jack anymore. Some loss is easier when it's clean.
In any case, there's no tremor or uncertainty in his voice, no bravado to mask the difficulty of talking about such things with her. In fact, it's not so difficult at all. Now that he's said it, it's done. And it feels like he's dropped the last weight that he'd been carrying for too long to even recognize it anymore. ]
But you have all of me now, Daphne. [ He smirks a little, finally, running his fingertips over her shoulder, drawing back the edge of her robe just enough to press a kiss against skin. ] And I've known enough whores to have a sense for what I'm missing.
no subject
He leans forward to kiss her, and she smiles, leaning down a little to press her nose against his cheek.]
Would you enjoy it?
[She asks, honestly. Just because he would, just because he would let her, doesn't mean that he would enjoy the act.]
no subject
I guess I don't know.
[ Only for that moment does he pretend to sound even playfully uncertain, because the next thing he does is pull her hand back to his mouth, brushing his lips across her fingers. ]
But I look forward to finding out with you, my tigress.
no subject
How do you do that?
How do you make me feel like a green girl every time you touch me?
[She isn't. She hasn't been, since she decided at the tender age of seventeen that she wasn't going to be a good girl who waited for a husband and got married to whoever her family told her to. The rules for the Khan are different; she chose the path she did with wild fury, with reckless abandon.
She rolls her shoulder a little.]
When I'm completely healed, then.
[In case she needs to hold him down.]
no subject
I'm looking forward to that as well.
[ Another kiss, and then he leans closer, pressing his mouth to the middle of her chest, between her breasts. Her skin tastes like mango juice and he can't seem to suck all of it off. ]
Remind me why we bother to bath at all?
no subject
[She moves her legs a little, and moves back just a bit, smirking.]
You carried me into that bath.
[That said, she leans in and licks his mouth open, and makes a tiny noise when he kisses between her breasts. She runs a hand through his hair.]
I'll admit intense boredom, stuck in this bed with two nursemaids playing guard at the door. So you'll have to excuse how novel it is to have you finally willing to play even a little rough with me.
[Her aunt and her aunt's lackey have been very clear: no sex, no fussing, no walking around, until she was more healed. So this is the first day she's been able to spend any time doing anything at all. Charles, of course, has spent time with her, but he's just as restless as she is, and he's been gentler than anyone might think possible while all her wounds healed.]
no subject
Maybe it's just the taste of mango juice on your skin that I want.
[ After doing his level best to suck any trace of the fruit off of her, running one hand up her side beneath the fabric of her robe, Charles draws back with a pleased sound, and rolls to the pillows, folding an arm beneath his head. ]
There's a point in the healing where you've got to move, if you ever want to move right again. [ A smirk. ] I gathered you'd reached that point already.
no subject
[She's teasing, as she moves to lie on his chest, her chin on her hands as she looks up at him. She bites her lips a little, and watches him.]
Do you want to take me out to sea for a while? On a sloop? Make me work?
[Daphne commissioned a little one when they returned; Charles' ship is big, made for carrying treasure, made for war, made for a crew. Daphne's little sloop is small enough to be handled by just a pair of people, if they're both experienced, and she mostly uses it if she needs to get somewhere on the coast fast and Charles isn't there to take her.
And she uses it to make him take her to the small islands that dot the coast, occasionally, to get away. She's not nearly skilled enough at sea to captain, but she'll work if he tells her what to do.]
no subject
[ With a grin, he folds his free arm over her, drawing her closer; his fingers trail up and down her side, tracing her ribs.
The idea of going out to sea with her thrills him, stirring deeper than simply wanting to have her following his orders. Any place that is theirs alone speaks more to him than sea or land combined. ]
I wouldn't mind stealing you away someplace where we can really be alone... no nursemaids or anything.
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