this madness of now

walked out this morning and i wrote down this song.
i just can't remember who to send it to

The sand, the ocean, the smell of brine...it was all he'd wanted for so long. Fate was cruel that way, but that's nothing new.

Waking up on the beach wasn't new either.

The ashy remnants of all that the proceeding night had burned down to seemed impossibly small in the garish light of morning. There were bones that instead of crippling his soul merely looked unimportant, haphazardly arranged as they were. They weren't Aoife. They weren't his rage. They weren't anything. Stretching his arms over his head and glancing around to see the beach empty of his husband, Remi merely pulled in a long breath through his nose, breathing it out in a steady stream.

Wherever Ronin had gone, he'd be back. Remi was infinitely sure of that. And so, with a last look at the charred remains of a life unlived, the alchemist kicked at the embers to scatter them as one might do to any old fire. It wasn't disrespectful after all, because it wasn't anything. It wasn't her.

Creating a shirt and pulling it over his head, the alchemist made his way towards the docks. If he couldn't catch them something for breakfast, Remi was fairly certain he'd manage to find something to trade for it.

Ronin hurtled down the beach with a mad little smile. And when he spotted the lonely little bit of coastline and the silhouette of his husband upon it, he let out a mad little laugh. He had awoken with the fingers of dawn, unable to look at or face the smouldering pile of bones that was, for all intents and purposes, the last remnants of a life they had lived together. A life long gone. So he had gone for a walk. The mare pulling the wagon was unhappy with the pace, and Ronin would feel maybe a fraction bad for it sooner or later, but for now the wide wheels were making good progress on the sand. And what’s more, the merchant who had stepped away to relieve himself would have no chance of catching him now. ”Remi!” he called across the beach in a voice rough and raw and ridiculously amused, hoping to get his husband’s attention. RONIN Darkness is a funny thing. It creeps up on you.

walked out this morning and i wrote down this song.
i just can't remember who to send it to

Who'n the fuk is'iss chump? The merchant asked distractedly at the idiot racing a wagon down the beach. Uninterested in the politics of this place, Remi ignored the question, politely nodding his distant disapproval. Trading a bit of coloured cloth for a fish wrapped in sweetly-spiced seaweed, Remi turned at the sound of his name.

Though he wasn't emerging sun-bronzed and naked from the sea, the sight of Ronin like this still stole his breath just the same. Blue-eyes bright and hair boyishly tousled, Ronin looked like a character from any story when it was too early to tell who was the villain and who the hero.

Offering the merchant an unapologetic nod and easily navigating down the rickety stairs back to the beach in a single leap, Remi glanced from the mare back to his husband with a shameless look of delight as they neared. "I have caught and seasoned this lovely breakfast all on my own, and you bring me a sweaty mare and some rickety boards?" Tutting under his breath he flashed the hunter a darkly disapproving look.

Remi was lucky that Ronin knew how to stop the his wagon, and the mare got the message easily enough and they rolled to a rickety halt on the beach. ”Caught it did you? And I suppose that lovely fishmonger up there would attest to that?” It was with a broad and much too bright grin that Ronin jumped down from the seat, sauntering across the sand to his husband and sweeping into an exaggerated bow. ”I have brought you a marvellous present, thank you very much. You are being quite ungrateful.” Straightening up, he drew closer to Remi and gestured grandly to the structure behind him. ”Is this not at least as good as that contraption you were making?” The dark disapproval was met with an equally dark smile of amusement, and Ronin leant in to steal a remarkably sweet kiss from Remi’s lips. ”Tell me you like it - go on.” RONIN Darkness is a funny thing. It creeps up on you.

walked out this morning and i wrote down this song.
i just can't remember who to send it to

The fishmonger, glaring daggers in their direction, would absolutely not attest to it. However with a quick glance over his shoulder, the alchemist nodded. "I'm wounded that you would trust someone you hardly know over me." He countered, watching Ronin saunter his way with devilish intrigue.

"A present? Oh, is it in the pile of boards then?" Though his eyebrow game would never be what Ronin's was, still Remi's brows came together in a roguish arch as he mimed looking over his husband's shoulder to see what might be within the wagon.

Once that kiss might have melted Remi, and would certainly have weakened his knees. Now it only inspired a heated smile. "I loathe it." He whispered against Ronin's receding lips, amusement coating the words. Grinning, he offered the mare a bit of sweet grass suddenly in his hand, patting her neck before glancing down the beach where cries of thief! were slowly floating their way.

Unhurried and unbothered by this, Remi glanced back towards Ronin. Fingers trailing along the wooden boards, the paint was changed from rusty-red to an equally unappealing green. This was in no way meant to head off any future disputes about the wagon's ownership of course. "You know, I think I would like to eat my breakfast on the road. How about you?"

It wasn't right, the way Remi said loathe sent a bolt of heat low in Ronin's belly, but the hunter still found himself with a similar teasing warmth to his smile as the other man parted from him. "Good," he muttered, waving a hand at the inside of the wagon; it looked like it had been a spice merchant, the inside of the vehicle cluttered with little jars of salts and seasonings, with a bed that might just squeeze two tucked in at the back. Not that Ronin had cared - he'd just seen something he thought Remi would like and grabbed it for him. The cry in the distance didn't hurry Ronin along either, and as their new home made its way from rust red to moss green, he patted the mare's nose. "You know, I think I might just join you." So saying (that one's for you, Odd) he hopped back up into the seat and invited Remi to get himself comfortable in the wagon. "In your own time, sir." RONIN Darkness is a funny thing. It creeps up on you.

walked out this morning and i wrote down this song.
i just can't remember who to send it to

Despite passionate shower and floor sexcapades, the love Remi had once had for his husband had been soft and fertile. It had been yielding and kind, selfless and devoted. Now, baptised in blood, Remi's love is a hardened and grasping thing, selfish and voracious; so too is his desire for the hunter. But we'll get to that soon enough.

Indeed Remi did take his time, glancing lazily down the beach and just able to make out a rather ruddy-faced man bellowing all sorts of obscene things as he shambled awkwardly down the path. "He seems to have a limp." The alchemist observed mildly, hauling himself into the wagon. "Shame he hasn't a wagon to make the going easier. Ahh well. I had hoped for a quieter breakfast. If you would." Nodding at the mare, as if all of this was mere happenstance and not at all a casual getaway, the alchemist rested his feet upon the boards (barefoot now), utterly relaxed in the sun.

"His limp is not my wagon's problem. The fishmonger will probably give him a hand." Or a leg. Ha, ha. Clicking his tongue and urging the mare onwards, Ronin made sure that Remi was comfortable before he picked up any reasonable speed. They headed up the beach and onto a sandy road flanked by palm trees, sun beaming through them to bask them in warmth and light. Out on the sea, ships bobbed merrily on by. "I do hope you're planning on sharing that," Ronin quipped to his husband, raising his eyebrows and casting a glance sidelong at him. "If it means so very much to you that you have a quiet breakfast, I will get us to stop somewhere hidden in these trees. How about that?" RONIN Darkness is a funny thing. It creeps up on you.

walked out this morning and i wrote down this song.
i just can't remember who to send it to

"Not the wagon, not ours." The alchemist agreed with a crooked smile. The mare listened reasonably well given the morning's events of which Remi could only guess at. As the trundled along, the alchemist forcibly banned his thoughts from wandering into places they ought not. Like the beauty of this place, the lives that might have been led here if only they had arrived by wagon and not magical exile.

Coyly the alchemist glanced at the fished before shrugging, a shit-eating grin spreading rapidly across his lips. "You know, if you did care so much about my quiet breakfast, you'd not keep ruining it by talking." Remi pointed out, though he very much liked the idea of being hidden in the trees. "It's probably a good idea. We should take care to hide the wagon as well. Thieves and all that." He added, before pulling in a lungful of warm, salty sea air.

"What's that? I can't hear you over the sound of your quiet breakfast." Ronin had turned his head back to face the road (an understandably important part of their journey) but the broad grin was easily audible. "Ah yes, you're quite right though. Wouldn't want this valuable thing being stolen now, would we?" He chuckled. They travelled a short while longer - enough to lose the section of beach they'd arrived on at least, and Ronin did not allow himself to think of what they had left behind - before the wagon slowed and moved off road, into a prettily shaded patch of trees. Soon enough they were hidden from the path and anyone passing, but the sun was bright enough and the sky clear enough to easily navigate back. "There," he said. "I hope it pleases you." RONIN Darkness is a funny thing. It creeps up on you.

walked out this morning and i wrote down this song.
i just can't remember who to send it to

Grumbling with feigned surliness at that, Remi tapped the side of the wagon to indicate pride in his paint job. As he did, flecks of said paint peeled off and fluttered in the breeze. Frowning, not having been one for poor workmanship in the past, he merely shrugged. "And have to walk like a pair of commoners?" He scoffed in agreement. The pair of them would never be common again, no matter how low they fell.

Nimbly exiting the wagon with the practiced movements of a man who had grown up in one, Remi turned to the interspersed palm-leaf canopy overhead. With a wave of his hands the fronds knitted themselves together as new greenery cluttered up the path the wagon had made. "You really have an eye for finding secluded hiding places. Surely no thieves will find us here."

Once they had safely stopped in the middle of the glade (for lack of better word), Ronin also exited the wagon, though not nearly as gracefully given he had never really been in one. The ones he had been in had been for military use and fairly straightforward. Folding his arms and looking absurdly proud of himself as Remi did all the work in hiding them further, Ronin gazed up at the canopy above them and nodded in confirmation. "I couldn't have done it better if you had done it, if I do say so myself," he said breezily, before glancing sidelong at his husband. "So shall we continue this charade, or shall we cut the bullshit and I'll just have you for breakfast instead?" RONIN Darkness is a funny thing. It creeps up on you.

walked out this morning and i wrote down this song.
i just can't remember who to send it to

Raising a brow at the mental acrobatics needed to follow that particular statement, the alchemist felt his breath catch in his throat upon hearing the next one. "So much for my quiet breakfast then." He muttered, sounding not at all disappointed about it. Tossing the fish into the grass—near the mare as it happened, who pinned her ears unhappily at this—Remi stripped his shirt off in a fluid motion as he advanced towards Ronin.

Their bodies had changed as had the men within them, but there was still something between them. Something Remi now knew instinctively regardless of everything else, though he couldn't give it a name. Whatever it was though, he longed to twine it between his fingers and stretch it long towards infinity until he heard Ronin whimpering his name.

Reaching out a hand to curl it against the back of Ronin's neck, Remi gave the hunter a look that was half-wince and half-snarl. It was restraint and provocation all rolled up into a fleeting glance. "You." Was all he could say, maybe all he needed to say, before he leaned in to hungrily capture the hunter's lips as his hands roamed down to the hem of Ronin's own shirts, eager to remove it.

So much indeed - for there was nothing quiet about their lovemaking on an ordinary day, let alone at a time like this. A time when everything had changed so fundamentally that it was questionable as to whether they were really together or just going through the motions. But for all that doubt, it vanished into a haze of love and lust and heat at the sight of Remi removing his shirt, Ronin watching the alchemist with a near predatory gaze as he moved closer. (And let Remi be the judge of how well he played predator). ”You,” he breathed in return, no wince or snarl upon his lips, only desperate need for Remi’s touch, for the sweat on his skin and his name in his mouth. Ronin craved him, like a man adrift at sea who spots land, like a wanderer in the desert that has reached an oasis. Melting hungrily into the kiss, he fumbled with his own shirt and settled on tearing it open rather than waste time with buttons. His hands roamed freely and wickedly after that, cupping and squeezing Remi’s ass and roaming along the bare skin of his chest. ”I want you,” he mumbled into the kiss, caring not whether he would be had or would do the having. RONIN Darkness is a funny thing. It creeps up on you.