[SE] There's something warm about the winter when you come around

Kaisel

Heaven help me, the devil wears lace and she can't be tamed

"What aboooooooout, Suriel?" he wonders, bent over the fire he's assembling. The sticks are pulled out of his backpack, methodically arranged like a tent, and circled by stones to keep the soot contained within the makeshift pit. He shakes his head with disagreement, the name landing wrong as he says it. "Maybe we keep it simple," he reasons. "Just make our last name...Spice!" An homage to the best girl seems fitting too.

Striking a match to glow against the backdrop of settling twilight, he leans down to set it against the smaller, drier kindling tucked beneath the sticks. He lets it catch on a few sections all around, the red crackle of fire inhaling the dry coming quick and racing up the center. He blows against it, breath encouraging the flame to reach up and grab hold of more substantial food as the heat swarms in, barely felt with the backdrop of the Climb in Longheat. "There!" he asserts with a nod, and a grin that's far too wide and proud for the feat he just accomplished, a rather basic survival skill. Still, he's never had to make one on him own before. "Isn't it GLORIOUS!?" Not nearly as nice as the Tanau bonfire they'd just been visiting, but that's fine by him, there's enough heat to go around.

---

Quest req: complete a thread spending a night in The Climb (in a board of his choice), bathing his weapon in the light of an open fire.

Let me see the good girl you wanted to be. All of my praise, only from me.

flora

Flora is already unrolling the travel cushions she'd packed by the time Kai's voice stretches the name into the air, the sound of it winding through the heat and the low, restless hiss of lava like something half-summoned, half-mispronounced, and she pauses only long enough to shoot him a look that is pure theatre, brows lifted, mouth pulled into a line that says she is unimpressed but indulging him anyway because that is the shape of so many of her smiles these days where last names are concerned. "Suriel?" she repeats, letting it sit there between them as she wrinkles her nose and shakes her head, curls bouncing against her shoulders, gold rings glinting as her hands smooth fabric against stone. "I'm pretty sure that's the name of one of the characters in those books my brother always reads."

The cushions settle under her palms in an effort to bring some comfort into roughing it, even as the world around them feels like it might crack open at any moment, heat breathing up from the Climb’s skin, the land alive and watchful beneath their feet. His suggestion of Spice has her snickering despite herself, the sound slipping out before she can stop it, lips quirking as she glances back at him and rolls her shoulders in a half-shrug. "I mean, Flora Spice doesn't sound terrible," she admits, smirk deepening, eyes bright with mischief, "but Kaisel Spice actually sounds like it could be some sort of spice. Like something expensive and rare that people argue about how to pronounce." Maybe something that looked vaguely like sprinkles.

She watches him with open amusement as the fire takes, the glow painting warmth streaks across her face and her grin widens. "Not bad for a city boy," she says, voice smooth, affectionate, before turning her attention back to the small comforts she has decided they need anyway, because comfort has always been her quiet rebellion against hostile places. She grabs the blanket—entirely unnecessary in the LongHeat, ridiculous even—and spreads it out with deliberate care, arranging the cushions atop it as though they are not sitting on volcanic land but somewhere far softer, far safer, a pocket of normal she is stubborn enough to insist into being. When she straightens, she gives him a slow, exaggerated round of applause, hands clapping together with theatrical enthusiasm. "Ashborn?" she says, head tilting, eyes dancing. "More like Fireborn." Cue laugh track. The words are barely out before she lifts a finger, already shaking her head, curls swaying as she cuts him off with a laugh that carries warmth and warning in equal measure. "Don't even think about it. Fireborn is absolutely not happening."

i scream for whatever it's worth
"i love you" ain't that the worst thing you've ever heard?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Kaisel

Heaven help me, the devil wears lace and she can't be tamed

How anyone reads for fun is beyond him, but he’s not about to let his genius last name idea be mixed up with some book. So he snorts that away immediately. The Spice consideration however, earns a brief glance her way. A smile flashes over on the heels of the look, and a long, drawn out ”awww, babe,” melts over the heat of the area with something far warmer and heartfelt. ”You’re calling me expensive and rare? That’s so sweet!” Not the usual bargain bin of ketchup and sprinkles. ”It would probably be confusing for Spice though,” he laments with a hefty sigh.

The warm glow of the fire throws new shadows into the dusk, each of them dancing with the writhing flames as they crawl and burrow around the wood. ”I know, right!?” he approves of himself and his city boy nature, all too aware of it, at her praise. He’s pulling his chakram out of his backpack now, laying it beside the flame with a pat, as if he’s just tucked the weapon in for the night.

Rising from his crouch to spin and give her applause a grand bow, he waves away the remainder of the pretend crowd with an overabundance of gratitude. ”Thank you, thank you. No really, you’re too kind. It’s just some fire, not like harnessing the elements of the world of anything, haha!” Carting his backpack with him as he strides through the crowd to her oasis of plush pillows among the hard ground, he lights up considerably as she tosses out fireborn. The quick way she backpeddles over it though has the smile daring to deepen, and he pounces into her space, sweeping a hand around her waist and drawing her in for a delighted smooch. ”No, definitely not,” he scoffs around the side of her cheek. ”It doesn’t sound expensive or rare, so clearly it doesn’t suit,” he laughs.

Peeling away a bit to watch the firelight paint her face. She’s always stunning, but there’s something about the high contrast of dark and light playing over her that always makes her shine, like losing some of her edges is an invitation to find them again. ”Maaaaybe,” he offers, a tease weaving back into his expression after he glances around at her comfort fortress. ”Pillowdown?”

Let me see the good girl you wanted to be. All of my praise, only from me.

flora

Flora bears the full weight of Kaisel's enthusiasm with a long-suffering sigh that is so exaggerated it borders on parody, lashes lowering as if she is counting to ten for patience she absolutely does not need, because the truth of it hums too brightly under her skin to hide for long, a spark of mischief already breaking through the cracks as she watches him soak up her praise like sunlight. Gods, she adores how he meets her where she is, how every playful offering she makes is caught and flung back twice as bold, twice as warm, the kind of energy that never asks her to dim herself, only to keep going, keep spiralling.

When she makes a show of trying to dash away, it is half a joke and half instinct, laughter already curling in her chest before she is pulled back into heat and presence and that undeniable gravity he has over her, and she is acutely, traitorously aware of how hot he is, not just with the fire nearby but with the way he exists in her space, solid and real and impossible to ignore. The kiss pressed noisily to her cheek is more ridiculous than it is sultry, all sound and affection, but it still sends warmth flooding through her, settling somewhere deep and satisfied, her smile breaking free before she can stop it.

When he steps back, she turns slowly to face him, letting the firelight catch her just so, eyes sharpening into something vixen-bright, all intrigue and coy invitation threaded with the kind of confidence that comes from knowing exactly how she is being seen and by who. She resists the urge to roll her eyes at the suggestion offered, though, choosing instead to lean fully into the moment, planting one hand on her hip while the other rises to tap thoughtfully at her chin, head tilting as if she is genuinely considering it, lips pursed in mock seriousness. "Noooo," she says at last, voice smooth and playful, "no, that is absolutely not the password to the pillow fort." Her smile curves, wicked and delighted, gaze never leaving his. "But you can try again," she adds, lifting her fingers to count it out in the air. "Three guesses. After that, you are locked out."

i scream for whatever it's worth
"i love you" ain't that the worst thing you've ever heard?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Kaisel

Heaven help me, the devil wears lace and she can't be tamed

The pose she strikes is clearly a dramatic show of thought, but he thinks it's a consideration of the name, a back and forth between them that's gone on for days now. It's picked up and set back down as easily as pushing pause on a show for frequent snack breaks and silly dashes through the house. So when password finishes up her disapproving sound, surprise instantly steals his expression, one brow reaching for his hairline to steady its understanding. The full strike of her mischief lands then, pulling sharp the corners of her features in just the right way, akin to a flashlight throwing spooky shadows from below for a ghost telling session. She comes alive in a very different way when she's plotting, and damn if it doesn't threaten to arrest his breath every time.

"Oh!" he says with a swift palm slapping his forehead as he retreats off whatever edge of her comfort he's trespassed on. "I should have expected the very respectable Pillow Fort to require more than showing up," he admits with an exaggerated ruffle of his hand through his hair, purposefully letting the slope of his bicep catch the backlight of fire. Treating it like an exclusive club, which by all rights it is when the other options here are fire and brimstone, he respects its borders completely.

Three, he mouths back to her with the faintest tilt of his head, gaze skipping away as if too nonchalant and cool to be overly worried about this barred entry. The hand on his head slips to his hip in near perfect mirroring of her as he audibly thinks. The hmms seem to guide the movement of his hand, each one sending it off his hip and reaching lazily beneath the hem of his shirt, pulling it up higher and higher over his abdomen as fingers splay idly against his skin in thought. "It couldn't be, Spice the best girl, could it?" he wonders casually, a look sliding her way slowly. There's more than one way to get around a password and sneak in somewhere, after all, and flirting with the bouncer is certainly one.

Let me see the good girl you wanted to be. All of my praise, only from me.

flora

Flora lifts her brows in slow, deliberate approval, chin tipping just enough to make the gesture unmistakably condescending, because yes, obviously Château Pillow Fort is not some roadside inn where anyone with a match and a mediocre last-name idea can wander in unannounced. Her lips purse as though she is assessing his understanding of the matter, then she gives a prim little nod that says he has, at the very least, grasped the gravity of the establishment. "I'm pleased you recognize its standards," she says smoothly, one shoulder angling back as though she might actually sweep invisible skirts aside to re-enter her fortress of cushions.

When his hand ruffles through his hair and the firelight catches along the line of his arm, her throat clears—just once, subtle, almost polite—as if she has merely inhaled a bit too much volcanic air and not noticed at all the way his muscles flex beneath the thin fabric of his tank. They have grown, she realizes with a quiet flicker of awareness, fuller and more defined than even a few seasons before, and there is something unfair about the way the fire gilds every contour, as though the Climb itself has conspired to stage-light her husband for dramatic effect. She keeps her expression cool, aqua gaze steady, but heat begins to thread through it all the same, warming the edges of her composure as he mouths three and mirrors her stance, that insufferably confident tilt of his head doing very little to steady the rhythm beginning to pulse beneath her ribs.

She watches—pretending not to watch—as his hand drifts from his hip and beneath the hem of his shirt, the motion lazy, thoughtful, entirely too casual for the effect it has, and she feels herself shift, just slightly, the movement small and almost girlish despite the haughty air she is trying so valiantly to maintain. Newly married or not, she is not immune to the spectacle of him, and she most certainly does want him inside the pillow fort, wants him stretched across those cushions she so carefully arranged, wants the world narrowed down to firelight and breath and the quiet rebellion of softness against stone. But she will not make it easy, not when he is preening like that.

So, she folds her arms across her chest, the gesture calculated and artful, drawing her shoulders back in a way that maximizes her cleavage, and makes a sharp, cheerful sound like an incorrect buzzer. "Ehhh," she sings out, shaking her head with mock severity. "Wrong." The word lands with theatrical disappointment, though the corners of her mouth are already threatening to betray her. "Only two left," she warns, voice smooth but carrying a tremor of anticipation she hopes the crackle of the fire disguises. "Before you're spending the night out here with your ass on the ground."

Her heart is beating just a touch faster now, pulse tapping lightly at her throat, and she can feel a faint warmth blooming across her cheeks that has nothing to do with the Climb’s relentless heat, her gaze flicking once—just once—to the sliver of skin he has revealed before snapping back up to his face, daring him to try again.

i scream for whatever it's worth
"i love you" ain't that the worst thing you've ever heard?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Kaisel

Heaven help me, the devil wears lace and she can't be tamed

One brow rises, slow and curious, as her arms cross and she pulls herself taller, as if requiring every part of her for the denial. Or perhaps, just leveling her own defensive counter measures against him, if the newfound swell of her breasts over the fire line is any indication. It's certainly an indication of his attention, as helpless as the sea responding to the pull of the moon, so his gaze is inevitably controlled by the sway of his wife's cleavage.

The emphasized buzzer sound helps break the spell, the appeal of her chest less than conquering her, at least in this moment. A flicker of a frown mars his otherwise neutral expression as his failure becomes clear. "Not Spice?" he scoffs out, disbelief causing a small shake of his head. "You're mad." Clearly, it's easy to break into any of his password protected things. Not letting the dejection that Spice hadn't been the answer and that he hadn't gotten it on the first try settle, his eyes shift to the side, contemplative.

"Hmmm," he muses aloud, slipping back into the game of feigned indifference. His hand keeps his shirt riding high over his stomach, fingers still splayed just beneath his pecs as if there's comfort in holding himself through these trials and nothing more meant to it. It's also so hot, though the slow return of his eyes back to her dusk-dusted silhouette suggests there's more than the Climb's surrounding air to blame, and certainly more than decoding on his mind. Whenever he catches himself back on her though, he turns it away, schooling the inevitable tilt of his lips back into something puckered with disinterest.

His other hand hooks hard into the waistband of his pants, a casual prop for the weight of his arm. Except, the pressure of the perch there causes his loose pants to ride down beneath the curve of his thumb, his adonis belt rising above the sinking fabric. Sighing as if amused at how obvious the answer could be, he tosses out simple, "It's gummyworms, isn't it?"

Let me see the good girl you wanted to be. All of my praise, only from me.

flora

Flora does not miss the way his gaze sinks, helpless and tidal, to the curve she has so deliberately arranged for him, and if she happens to inhale a little deeper when she catches him looking—shoulders drawing back, breath expanding her chest in a slow, unhurried swell that makes the firelight play even more generously across her skin—well, so what? Her grin sharpens when he calls her mad, as though he has just handed her a medal instead of an accusation. "I've been called worse," she replies lightly, eyes gleaming, entirely pleased that he thinks her unreasonable. It means she's winning.

But then the tables tilt. Her gaze drifts, betraying her despite the hauteur she is trying to maintain, as Kaisel continues to trace the defined lines of his stomach where the shirt remains caught beneath his hand. Firelight gilds every ridge and hollow, and she knows that terrain intimately—knows the give of it beneath her palms, the way muscle tightens and shifts under her touch—and her fingers twitch where they are tucked against her arms, a phantom memory stirring through them like static. When his thumb hooks into his waistband and drags it lower, revealing that sharp V of muscle that disappears beneath fabric, her breath stumbles for half a second before she can smooth it out. The thought of what lies just beyond sends a flicker of heat straight through her, and she shifts her weight, subtle but restless, as though her body is trying to decide something without consulting her pride.

He says gummyworms, and she almost laughs, the absurdity of it colliding violently with the way her pulse has begun to quicken. "Gummyworms?" she echoes, voice pitched somewhere between disbelief and intrigue, letting the word linger as if she is tasting it, as if maybe it's right. Then, with a composure so deliberate it borders on theatrical, she begins to move, but oh so slowly.

She sinks down onto her knees in front of him, the blanket soft beneath her but the air electric between them, eyes never leaving his face as she descends. The fire throws shadows along her cheekbones, catches in her aqua gaze, and she lets her smile soften into something unreadable. Her hands lift, gathering her loose curls back from her shoulders, fingers combing through blonde strands as she pulls them into a makeshift ponytail at the nape of her neck. The gesture is unhurried, purposeful, chin tilting upward as she looks at him through her lashes, lips parting just enough to suggest breath, to suggest intention, to suggest possibly not just entry into the fort, but maybe a reward for being correct as well.

Her mouth hovers dangerously close to his waistline, posture poised with exquisite deliberation, she holds the moment there, stretching it thin as spun sugar. Then, softly, wickedly, she purrs, "wrong again."

i scream for whatever it's worth
"i love you" ain't that the worst thing you've ever heard?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Kaisel

Heaven help me, the devil wears lace and she can't be tamed

The skin he's exposed barely feels like it. The air here hangs with a heavy heat that wraps around him like its own layer of cloth. If not for the tension of his waistband tugging back on his thumb, or the accordion fold of his shirt across half his hand, he might have forgotten he's tried to remove any clothing at all. That, and the tells from his wife that she is watching, and dare he say, it is working.

She doesn't return his answer in a way that sounds like victory, coming in a bit too high, too sharp, but he can't mistake it for anything else when she begins to descend. It's not with reluctance, like he imagines the crumbling of her security would mean, but with performance. She drops with all the stage presence of a main character's demise, every motion drawn out to pull the audience in, and consider him perched on the edge of his seat now.

His breath breaks from behind his teeth, rough and needy, held without realizing it. His chin tips down with her, the steady eye contact bordering that unknown smile something which snares his full attention. Shadows extend her lashes, while firelight glints off the corner of her perfectly pursed and plump lips, the promise of them accentuated with the glinting upturn. Now his breath seizes back in his chest, stuttering to move around the swell of arousal that grabs hold of every process and plummets south. It's clear then, this is not a show of her demise, but his.

A wide, toothy smile of success pleats his cheeks as he leans towards her, body breaking over the thin barrier of hard rock and plush landscape. He transfers the hold of his shirt to his mouth, a bit of fabric steering him to her to free up both hands for sliding his pants further down, happy to take the offered prize of her tongue. It's then that her wickedness turns itself upon him, as masterful as a cat setting a trap with its belly, only to later reveal its claws. Wrong[ lands like a stone in a glass house, and Kaisel sputters as he shatters.

His mouth slackens, shirt tumbling free, and he pulls both thumbs away with an elastic snap. "W H A T!" he demands, that rush still rolling through him needing some direction now. He stares down at her for a moment, nostrils flaring with the huff of breath he takes before he turns away to march down the entrance of the club in a repeating course of grumbling thought. Flirting with the bouncer is much easier when she doesn't flirt back.

"I've given you TWO great passwords already," he accuses, holding up two fingers. "Starting to think you picked something absolutely terrible, or just no password at all!" He'd not put it past her to have devised some insane mixture of letters and numbers and symbols, or a trick baked into this that he's failed to see.

All pretense of nonchalance has been lost, and he's half a mind to just storm her pillow castle now and take it by force. He even throws a calculating stare over his shoulder, gauging offensive possibilities for the siege. A true tactician wouldn't waste effort unnecessarily though, and he's got one chance left to do this without violence.

Pacing back and forth, bowed in very serious decision making, sweat begins to mark its own trail down his shoulders. He rolls them, the back of his hand swiping away the glimmer starting down his temples. Shortly thereafter he just pulls his shirt entirely off, using it like mop for this heat and something to work his ideas into as he moves, hands wadding it up like a stress ball. He thumbs over new possibilities. Rupert, Doubletake, Assborn, Sugar Tide, shooting stars, hot ketchup. Memories reduced into phrases and moments to words. He pauses suddenly then, turning towards her with a soldierly aboutface. "It's not... runningiscool1!, is it?" he asks, his tone unimpressed as he offers it up.

Let me see the good girl you wanted to be. All of my praise, only from me.

flora

The elastic snap of his waistband and the outrage in his voice land at exactly the same time, and Flora cannot help it, she laughs, low and wicked and delighted, shoulders shaking as she remains kneeling there like some smug little villain who has just sprung the perfect trap. The way he had leaned in, shirt caught between his teeth, fully prepared to claim his oral validation, sends another ripple of amusement through her. "Oh no," she purrs under her breath, watching him sputter, watching the heat that had gathered so triumphantly now forced to reroute itself somewhere less satisfying. 

When he prowls away, grumbling, hands cutting through the air as though arguing with the Climb's invisible board of directors about access protocols, she watches him with open adoration threaded through her smuggery. He is so dramatic. So earnest. So entirely himself in the way he paces and recalculates like a general planning siege warfare against a fortress made of throw pillows and pride. She can see the tension in him, the restless energy pulling at his hands and shoulders, the way his pants sit just a little tighter than before, and gods if it does not thrill her to know she has done that. That she is the architect of this delicious unraveling. She folds one leg slightly beneath her, settling more comfortably on her calves, chin lifted, eyes bright with victory as she lets him stew in it.

When he finally rips the shirt off entirely, using it to mop at sweat and frustration alike, she inhales slowly—not dramatically, not enough to give herself away—but enough that the air feels charged in her lungs. Two can play that game. Without breaking eye contact, she reaches back and peels her own top away, the movement smooth and unhurried, leaving her in nothing but her black bra against golden skin, the contrast stark in the firelight. She does not pose or preen, but simply remains there, perched and smug, as though this is the most natural state in the world and not a calculated escalation.

Flora raises one brow, doubt carving slowly across her expression as she tilts her head. "Is that your final guess?" she asks sweetly, tone lilting with the promise of consequences. Behind her, Spice shifts and little dragon gives her head an exaggerated shake, no, before lifting into the air with a decisive flutter of wings, white scales catching the firelight as she makes a beeline for Kaisel. In fact there are multiple passwords that would give Kaisel access and while chirades are not the dragon's forte, she thinks there are a few that she could act out. In fact, one of them isn't even a password at all.

Spice reaches him in a blink, small claws delicately grasping the sparkly blue hair tie around his wrist, tugging it just enough to stretch before letting it snap back with a playful flick. Then she hovers there, nodding over her shoulder in Flora’s direction, where, unable to see the manoeuvre unfolding behind her, Flora folds her arms across her chest once more—strategic, proud, accusatory—and fixes the pair with a look that says she is already preparing to deny him again. "HEY!" she calls out, indignant and suspicious all at once, arms tightening across her chest as she twists slightly, trying to sense what betrayal is taking place in front of her. "No outside assistance!"

i scream for whatever it's worth
"i love you" ain't that the worst thing you've ever heard?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Kaisel

Heaven help me, the devil wears lace and she can't be tamed

With it being prime bikini season, and Flora a strong supporter of Torchline culture (read, clothing is always optional), the display of her chest in a bra seems like it should not hold the power over him it once used to. In truth, the source of her power has nothing to do with thread count. She could wear a hazmat suit and he'd still be drawn to the flash of her smile behind the visor, and surely find some manner of curve to delightfully assess. It's not her body, or however much of it he can see, it's her. From pinky toe to hair follicles on her scalp, he loves every inch of her so completely, he's very much at her mercy if she ever chooses to wield her abilities on him. Which she does, often, and now.

He inhales sharply when he turns to face her, brandishing his last guess like a hail mary right before tilting into all out war. Not the flag of surrender, to be sure, but the shot he shoots just because he has the ball still. Gods, he nearly does lift up his shirt and wave it though when he finds her equally as stripped, and his lip twitches with the effort of a swallow. Her voice is a quick reminder that she is still the enemy. "No!" he laughs, loud and high and clearly put on as he tries to pass off the attempt as nothing more than an obvious joke. "Pfffft, who would guess that." He raspberries the air, grip tightening around his shirt.

Spice rises then, enough casual drift in her flight that he doesn't give in to the immediate suspicion that she is a missile being sent his way to not only bar his entry, but escort him away from the premises entirely. His gaze tracks her, brows rising curiously as she comes in close, grabbing at his most important possession. He's inclined to draw it back to his chest, to curl it in and protect it, especially when the cord snaps against his skin like a personally delivered flick. He's spent enough time with the dragon now though to know her intents, and this is not her in mischief mode, at least not against him.

His expression tightens on the blue band, thoughts rolling over it in quick succession. Hairtie, wedding band, married, wife, happy ever after. He blinks up with the faintest startle when Flora's sharp reprimand cuts across them. He can't contain the grin that sinks his concentration, and softly he whispers out to Spice, "you're the best girl." Leaning around her, he shouts back at Flora a petulant, "I'm not!" Technically, one could argue Spice came from inside the club, hence she was not outside assistance.

Proudly, he fists his hands on both hips and plants his feet. "The password is, I love you."

Let me see the good girl you wanted to be. All of my praise, only from me.

flora

Spice, preening under the praise, exhales a brisk, cooling puff straight into Kaisel’s face, a deliberate little blast that pushes his hair back from his forehead and ruffles it into greater disarray before she drifts aside with satisfied dignity, as though she has completed her civic duty. Flora, still with her arms crossed and chin tipped upward in judgment, watches the exchange with narrowed eyes, trying to piece together what conspiracy has just unfolded without her consent. She looks unimpressed—thoroughly, regally unimpressed—even as mischief flickers bright behind her aqua gaze when he strides back toward her with the solemnity of a knight about to offer his final oath.

She braces herself for another ridiculous guess, already preparing the buzzer sound in the back of her throat. As he guesses, the teasing line of her mouth falters. Not dramatically, not theatrically, but enough. The wicked curve softens, the sharpened glint in her eyes dissolving into something warmer, richer, molten in its own right. For a breath she simply looks at him, the firelight catching in her lashes, the weight of those words settling somewhere deep and steady inside her chest. And then, with a slow, grand flourish befitting the exclusive and illustrious Château Pillow Fort, she extends both arms wide in invitation.

"Correct," she says, voice softer now, edged in gold instead of mischief, and the moment he steps close enough, she hooks her fingers into the waistband of his pants—his pocket, fabric, whatever purchase she can claim—and tugs him down with decisive glee onto the nest of blankets and cushions she has so carefully arranged. The fire crackles merrily beside them as he tumbles into her territory, and she hovers over him for half a second, victorious.

"I would have also accepted hot ketchup," she purrs, settling back on her calves beside him, "or sprinkles. Or secret wedding." Her smile curves knowingly. They are things no one else would think to guess, fragments of shared moments and ridiculous private language that belong only to them. The pillow fort is exclusive because she is exclusive; she would never hand out entry to anyone who did not know the map of her heart the way he does.

Her gaze drops to the sparkly blue hairtie at his wrist, and she chuckles, reaching out to brush her fingers over it. "What Spice was trying to tell you," she says lightly, "is that the hairtie could have counted as a VIP wristband." She shrugs one shoulder, casual, but her fingers linger where they rest against him. "Anywhere I go, means you already have access." The fire pops softly, lava hissing somewhere distant beyond the blankets, and she leans in just enough that her breath brushes warm against his skin. [say}"It means," she adds, smile slow and certain, "that anywhere I go, you go."

i scream for whatever it's worth
"i love you" ain't that the worst thing you've ever heard?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

Kaisel

Heaven help me, the devil wears lace and she can't be tamed

He waits, poised on the threshold of change—he'll either be cheering or charging in the next breath. The slow drop of her defenses gives him hope, but he's been tricked by the show of her before, so he does not yield to the temptation of early celebration. It tightens him though, muscles cording at the ready for a burst of something one way or another.

When correct at last lands, so pure and sweet to his ears, his grin overwhelms every other feature. Much like the Princess Bride, love is the answer. ”YES!” he crows, leaping into the air with one hand fisting up above him in a victory punch. The win is a relief that sinks in deeper than just competition would, because this had never been about besting her, but being with her. It’s why he’d have broken in—not for comfort, but for closeness. It’d been about knowing her too, even if he’d needed assistance to puzzle out the wide array of possibilities, the result of two professional yappers turning everything into an inside joke.

Without further hesitation, he proudly marches back to the entryway of Château Pillow Fort, and before he can tackle her down into it as she well and truly deserves for this trial, she beats him to it and snatches him immediately. Some strangled sound of surprise and knee-jerk protest cuts out before he smothers it with a laugh, surrending to the yank with a willing flop into the plush domain.”Ah,” he sighs with contentement, wriggling in deeper with a shoulder shimmy as he settles on his side, gaze cast up and rolling over her like a summer storm born of amber haze.

Despite him being the winner, which by all accounts he is every day he wakes up with her, she stands over him as if she’s the one that’s conquered something. The pose is absurd and absolutely delightful when worn by her, and he has no qualms with yielding her the gold, it looks far better on her anyway. ”I thought of that one!” he gasps, half rising from his sideways lounge with the force of the truth. He sinks back down though, laughter rich and endless now as she continues to list off other key words from moments they’ve had together. ”Maybe we turn one of those into a name,” he hums. ”Not sprinkles outright, but some, rendition. A code, maybe we’d only know baked into the name.” A secret shared just between them, which seems to be more of their foundation than he’s ever realized. Not due to stealth, necessarily, but because it all does became their own language.

As she reaches for his ring wristband, the humor settles, like honey finding its shape after spilling. His attention slowly drifts from the seaglass shine fighting against the orange glow and violet dark, slipping down to where her fingers trace. What she says lands with a weight that draws his breath shorter, smile softening from ridiculous to moved. Flicking his gaze back to hers, he reaches to tug her closer yet, dragging her to way he leans in for a kiss.

”So,” he breathes out slow after a moment. ”Is that why you kicked me out?” There might be war yet.

Let me see the good girl you wanted to be. All of my praise, only from me.

flora

Flora is laughing before she even means to be, the sound spilling out of her as Kaisel celebrates like he has just conquered kingdoms instead of correctly guessing a very obvious password. There is something so unguarded about his joy that it lights her from the inside, and when she drags him down into the pillows it is not just triumph but relief, because finally—finally—she can put her hands on him without pretending like he isn't temptation incarnate.

Her palms slide immediately over the ridged plane of his stomach, fingers splaying wide as though reacquainting themselves with territory they had only been permitted to admire moments ago. The firelight dances along his skin beneath her touch, and she hums in quiet approval before rolling her eyes at him with theatrical exasperation. "Well, why didn't you say it then?" she demands, widening her eyes as though he is the most oblivious man alive.  She shakes her head in mock disappointment, though her hands remain very much occupied, thumbs grazing over the muscle he had so shamelessly displayed.

At his suggestion of coded last names, she pauses just long enough to tilt her head thoughtfully, fingertips now tracing lazy, absent-minded circles along his side. "Mmm," she says, brows lifting as she considers it with exaggerated seriousness. "So instead of Sprinkles it'd be...like, Sprink-elz?" The absurdity of it cracks her composure instantly, a giggle escaping her before she can stop it. "Okay but..I kinda love that idea," she declares, delighted, despite how utterly stupid it was.

When he tugs her down into a kiss she lets herself be drawn, though she plants one hand against his shoulder so she does not collapse fully atop him. The kiss is playful but charged, her mouth warm and certain against his, a hint of the earlier teasing still lingering there in the way she presses closer before pulling back just enough to brush her nose against his. "I did not kick you out," she murmurs, tone carrying a feigned bite that cannot fully disguise the smile threatening at its edges. "You were just far too busy boyscouting about the fire to come in while construction was still underway." Her fingers flex lightly against his shoulder as she looks down at him, firelight flickering gold across her skin, satisfaction and affection tangled together in equal measure.

i scream for whatever it's worth
"i love you" ain't that the worst thing you've ever heard?

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!