wonderland

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

"..before we go drugging ourselves to get a baby from Phoebe." Remi repeated with a boyish grin, the absurdity of it all crashing down upon him suddenly and making him feel quite giddy. Joining in with Ronin's laughter, the alchemist rolled against the hunter and then placed himself astride him, peering down with a mischevious expression.

"From a midwife? Whose boyfriend dumped her and then died?" Remi shrugged, leaning down to warmly kiss Ronin's lips (and ignoring the strangely earthy-smell that had begun to linger on Ronin's skin).

"It is my first wedding, I did not know that we would be getting things." He replied with a half-shrug. "Or you know, each other being all we will ever need and all that. Oh, and I am magic." Remi added on with another chuckle.

RONIN

Ronin sighed contently against Remi's lips, shifting a little as the other man swung himself astride him and peering up at him with mischief in his eyes and a crooked smile on his face. "You say that, but even from a midwife whose boyfriend dumped her and then died it doesn't sound so typical." He shrugged his shoulders, letting his hands glide over Remi's thighs so he could hook a playful finger in the waist of his pants.

"I'll give you the magic thing. You are magic," he agreed with a charming wink. "But you've been to enough Northaven weddings to know that gifts are normally given. It's not so surprising that it happened at ours. But you are enough for me, though. In case you forgot."

don't close your eyes
something beautiful is still alive

Coding base by Sky!

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

Remi tilted his head with a playful scowl as Ronin's thumbs hooked beneath his waistband. There was hardly ever a time Ronin's fingers against him didn't immediately ignite fire, and if the ex-captain had any hopes of going back to sleep after this conversation, he'd watch where those fingers wandered.

"And you would give a wicker woman a run for her money, with that amount of sap." Remi countered, though his blush was evidence of his true thoughts on Ronin's cheesiness.

"Oh am I? Mmm." He hummed happily, dragging one of Ronin's hands to his lips (ignoring the slight tremor) and pressing a kiss to the pad of one of his fingers. "I suppose this is the sort of thing we might have talked about before we were married. Threesomes, extra children, all that." He said with a casual shrug. It was true, they probably should have had some sort of talk about what forever might look like, but Remi wasn't surprised at all that they were more or less on the same page thus far.

RONIN

"Well I have slain a wicker woman or two in my time. At least I don't make you hallucinate. Not too badly, anyway." Ronin grinned up at his husband, teasingly pulling at the waistband of his trousers; he knew exactly what it might lead into, and hey - he had napped enough for the time being.

Still, he didn't object when his hand was captured, successfully hiding the way it shook a little. He let his smile soften to something warmer at the feel of soft lips against his fingertips. "Oh, probably," he agreed with a chuckle, relaxing further into the pillows.

"We should talk, though. About the blight... about everything else." the Jigano thing. The Wessex and Edrei thing. The everything.

don't close your eyes
something beautiful is still alive

Coding base by Sky!

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

Remi's hips easily yielded to Ronin's skilled fingers, the alchemist letting his eyes fall shut for a moment as he let himself simply revel in the easiness of simply having his husband beneath him. "Don't you though?" Remi mused. "You are painted as if with oils, the way I see you. And you have taken to glowing." The alchemist had in fact checked on Ronin multiple times with the spy-glass Safrin had given him, just to make sure.

About the blight... Remi's heart all but stopped beating, the warmth in his belly extinguishing as his jaw tightened. Pressing his forehead against the flat of Ronin's palm as if wanting to simply sink away into the hunter's firm hands, the alchemist nodded.

"Deimos and I ... well. It was Jigano's idea originally, to go back into the Spire. With enough mastered elements, apparently, the poison down there can be taken care of. Jigano had suggested bringing Rory and himself along, as well as Vai. There might be a way to avoid that though..." Remi continued, placing Ronin's hand against the side of his face, capturing it between his cheek and his shoulder as he sighed softly down at his partner, wondering how warmly (or not) his idea would be received.

"With amulets like the ones I made for Zariah, there is no need for Rory to come. We could capture his magic within and use it. The unicorns can guard the stairs and provide healing, and Deimos and I can work on the plants while Vai cleans the air. If Safrin was made sick down there, perhaps eradicating the poison would help." Not overly optimistic, still there was a willful hopefulness in Remi's voice that bordered on the heartbreaking.

RONIN

"Mm... I suppose that is true. At least they are nice hallucinations though, right? I wish I could see the way you do, even if only once. It sounds like the sort of magic that even most Abandoned have never heard of." That and perhaps he would be able to understand Remi a little bit better if he was able to see the world through his shattered sight.

The glowing, at least, he couldn't help - and it was little surprise that, as they began to talk of the blight and Remi explained his suicide mission plan that a quiet, feverish light began to pulse in Ronin's chest. Running his fingers through Remi's hair and letting him catch his hand anew, he stroked a gentle finger along his cheek.

"Were that I was stronger," he muttered. "I would happily come with you to find out. At least if we're in a dangerous situation we can be there together." But no. Ronin would be stuck at home again, sitting it out, feeling tired and frustrated and unwell. "The plan sounds solid though. Takes away a lot of the danger."

don't close your eyes
something beautiful is still alive

Coding base by Sky!

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

Remi shook his head slightly, his smile growing crooked. He had gotten used to the way he saw now, but for how handsome and opulent Ronin looked, the remainder of the world was bleak and without life or colour. Things moved and swayed as if from a vast distance. It made those Remi cared about all too easy to discern, but it made the rest of the world horribly fall away as well.

Unable to help the adoring smile the dimpled his cheeks seeing Ronin glow, Remi leaned further into Ronin's hand like some yeilding animal. Would that Ronin could hear him speak as the attuned could, he would almost certainly be an animal just now. "You could stay with the unicorns." Remi said with a shrug, trying not to make the suggestion sound as placating as it likely did.

"Mmm. After what happened...what Jigano did, I suppose I do not really trust him. I've...remember things. Things I did not notice before. I am not sure I would want him there if things were to go wrong." Jigano's usefulness aside, the bard had proven to have rather questionable morals, at least in the alchemist's eyes. That sort of calculated manipulation was not something he was at all drawn to, much less respectful of.

RONIN

"The unicorns, he says," Ronin murmured with a grin that was only a little offended (and playfully so at that). Shifting to sit up a little so he could lean back against the wall with his husband in his lap, he let his free hand rest contently on Remi's thigh, the other still caressing his cheek as he listened. "It's better than at home," he admitted. "Perhaps my projection could even be of use, if you need extra eyes on the most dangerous parts of the place," he suggested.

How well the astral version of himself would do against poison was anyone's guess, but he could at least attempt it. Then he wouldn't feel so useless. Nibbling at his bottom lip as he heard out Remi's caution regarding Jigano, he gave a reluctant but understanding nod. "In that case, I really do not want you to let you go alone. You or anyone else."

don't close your eyes
something beautiful is still alive

Coding base by Sky!

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

Remi grumbled an inappropriate note of hungry approval as Ronin shifted beneath him, the alchemist raising up ever so slightly to permit his husband to slide backwards. "Oh, I suppose. You could not be hurt that way..." The alchemist's shoulders shrugged. He'd not be the one to tell Ronin to stay behind, to decide just how much his partner could bear. "From what Deimos said, it is mostly bugs. Jigano wants to see...a snake guardian, that guards a portal? I believe it is the one Roana went into, the one that leads to the Greatwood." The alchemist's tone was flat. He cared very, very little about Jigano's herpetology quest. It was the blight that held his sole focus, and of course the man it was slowly killing.

"Can you even trip, as a projection?" Remi chuckled. "Do you walk? Or just...float about?"

RONIN

"There would be someone there as well, then, to fetch more help if things went wrong," he murmured in quiet agreement, already internally telling himself he would go. "But only if you promise to help me down the steps. The last time I went down there by myself I tripped, fell, got a concussion and married you." The grin he gave Remi was shit-eating, yes, and whilst he regretted absolutely none of it, he was still not keen to keep hitting his head on stuff.

His brow furrowed at the mention of the snake guardian, having heard Jigano speak of it in passing when they had met. "It guards a portal that leads to the Greatwood...? I mean... the Greatwood is just outside." He shrugged.

"Can I... trip? I mean... I can but it would be on purpose. I can't affect the space I'm in - I can move, talk and listen. That's it," he explained as best he could.

don't close your eyes
something beautiful is still alive

Coding base by Sky!

say it's here where our pieces fall in place

Remi's eyes lit up with amusement, his lips forcefully pulled into a look of surprise and disdain as he (gently) punched Ronin's shoulder. "Up until our wedding, I would say that was the best sex we have ever had. And an engagement." He said with a sniff, still pretending to be offended.

With a snort, the alchemist raised a brow as if to say exactly. "There is also no guarantee that the portal will not lead to another world entirely." Remi added with a touch of wariness. He'd already had his life turned upside down going from one world to another. Unless Ronin and Aoife and everyone else were firmly at his side going through, there was almost no way the alchemist would bother risking what he had, for what might simply be a glorified trip a few hundred feet.

"Mmmm." Remi said, nodding as one of his fingers softly and distractedly stroked against Ronin's arm, where it had remained after having punched him.

Ronin tried to keep up the skeptical look he'd pasted onto his face, but it dissolved into smiles and laughter as Remi so blatantly brought up the resulting sex from both the engagement and the wedding. "When you're right, you're right," he conceded all too easily, pretending to wince dramatically at the featherlight punch to his shoulder (obviously he was all too happy to make a scene about it). The talk of other worlds and what was to come was entirely too serious, really, when his husband was sat so wonderfully in his lap, and so Ronin shook off his reverie and reached forward to cup Remi's cheeks in his hands. "I love you," he said warmly, leaning in to try and kiss all his worries away. After the events of Royal Flush It was done. The notice posted, the viper's nest escaped, but not exactly a success. Ronin managed to make it all the way home, in fact, before he lost his ever loving mind. He kicked over a barrel as he stormed into the training area, seizing Emmett's axe (he couldn't not treat it as a weapon after what had happened to the boy) and lopping one of the dummies' heads off. He booted it at another dummy for good measure when it hit the floor. Chest heaving, head swimming, Ronin dropped the axe and swore under his breath. Then, slowly, his attention moved to his hands - hands shaking with blight tremors. He squeezed them into tight fists, gritting his teeth. "For fuck's sake," he hissed. taliesin a long and lonesome road

Sitting up straighter and gloating happily at his victory, the alchemist nodded with bright smirk. Indulgently leaning forward, more than happy to be lead at anytime by Ronin's fingers, Remi inhaled with a shaky smile before letting himself be kissed. "Gods I love hearing you say that." He whispered against Ronin's mouth, before ever so softly biting the ex-captain's lower lip. "Even if I am quite sure you are doing it just to shut me up."

////

Remi was Remi-ing about the house. He should go to his shop, or his own guild, but he was quite sure this was the first place Ronin would return home to. Besides, he'd be kidding himself if he thought he'd get any work at all done while Ronin was out Ronin-ing. Instead, he paced back and forth, absently moved things about in the house, started to draw or write and immediately forgot what about, finding himself staring blankly down at the floor while feeling his husband's heart thundering against his clenched fingers.

The sound of muffled crashes and thumps from outside immediately drew Remi's gaze and within seconds he was out the door, trotting towards the training arena. His own heart was in his throat as his eyes scanned over Ronin. From a distance he appeared as he normally did, though upon closer inspection and with a gaze that had been trained as of late to notice specific things about his partner, his husband seemed anything but alright.

"I take it the talk did not go well?" Remi asked, leaning against the railing behind one of the dummies. Much as he might have liked to console his partner, something told him that punching the training dummies might be more of what Ronin needed.

nobody hangs hard times on the wall

Coding base by Sky!

"No the talk did not go well," Ronin replied sharply, his blue eyes ablaze as he turned to punch the body of the now headless training dummy (even if his hands were useless, they could still achieve something as fists). It took a few swings for the base of the dummy to break, but it wasn't particularly reinforced anyway, so it went splintering and creaking down, leaving a heavily breathing Ronin with bruised, red knuckles. "I'm fucking king," he said exasperatedly, booting the dummy for good measure and seizing the axe again so he could go to town on it. Hit them while they were down and all that. "And I get to be fucking punished for some arbitrary bullshit that I don't even understand! And when did Wessex get such a stick up her arse Remi? Huh?" he growled. taliesin a long and lonesome road