i guess time is my enemy

SUNJATA

the flood

snow glistens on the ledge, whiskey on the bed
shake it out and light a cigarette

“Oh, he certainly does.” Sunjata agrees easily, a hum of amusement leaving him as he focuses on her and the comments, until she brings up Seren and the whole idea of him being her best friend, mermaid, and pirate. And he snorts lightly at the declaration that Weaver gives him. “Mhm.” He rumbles, as if he were aware, but it sounded different coming from Weaver than from young little Seren. “I think I was the first person she met aside from her father.” He explains, nose wrinkling slightly as he tries to recall.

But then her hand reaches out to trace the membrane and he shudders, shifting it away as she withdraws her hand and he offers her his feathers on a silver plate, a shawl, a blanket without needing one between the way she soaks up his heat. His voice grows tougher and she tells him she’s not as mean as that, a small half smirk crossing his face as he scans her face, searching for the lie within it. “Sure.” He hums to her, flashing her a wink with that same amused smirk.

But she takes some of the feathers anyway, like a dragon to stuff away into her hoard, and he lets her. The feathers are easily picked, flexing a bit with the sensation of her hands nearby, and he nestled into the pillow a bit more — neck flushed beneath the scars and tattoos, listening to her speak. The purr to her voice is absolutely noticed, and his hand moves from her side to learn her hair, aiming to pull the long dark hair from her face to run his fingers through, keeping that blanket of feathers over her. “Something good?” He asks quietly, running that forked tongue of his along his lower lip.

“I got you to stay with me.” He teases her lightly, a wink sent her way once more before he settles and tries to pull her a bit closer against him. “So I guess the good thing is I won’t have to wonder if I find you in a ditch, frozen solid in the morning.” He tilts his head back to look at her with all of that roguish charm and amusement. “Your turn.”

miss me when you, you wish you weren't right
shake me all out if i'm wrong, for you, for you

The problem with the world is that everyone is a few drinks behind

”Poor girl,” Weaver teases lightly, finger slipping forward to bop him on the nose lightly before retreating. ”I told her you were my boss, and she was disappointed to find out that I was not also a mermaid pirate. Serving food and drink is far less exciting.” She’d left out the details, of course, that she owned a bar in Halo, that her job was far more than just food and drink. Still, she’d been impressed with the little girl, with her willingness to learn, to fight, her ability to comprehend that such things were not just for play.

He seems not to believe her, that she isn’t so mean. Apparently she really does have quite the good reputation after all. Apparently she wears her mask well, this hard exterior that is cruel and unkind, in many ways. She is so much softer than that, so much kinder, though she is unafraid to do what needs to be done. ”Well, not unless you deserve it,” she hums, playing right into the girl she has crafted so well. So well, in fact, she is that girl. Perhaps he’d say he does deserve it, though she would disagree. Doing terrible things didn’t make them terrible people, necessarily.

His hand comes up to her hair, fingers lacing through the strands which have long since fallen from their braid. There’s almost nothing of the braid left, and she reaches up to pull the band loose, freeing the remaining strands, allowing him access to the long dark tresses, tangled, splayed around her face and neck. ”That tongue is kind of weird,” she teases, noticing as it slips back out, a grin on her face. She refrains from poking at his lip, though.

”Oh, cause you had to try so hard?” she says, her voice a little harder on the edges, though in a very teasing manner. He pulls her closer, and though they are pressed tightly on the couch, she finds ways to slip a little closer still. One leg shifting slightly to meet his, her head slipping into the crook of his shoulder, her hands against his chest, fingers resting against the warm muscles. ”I have stumbled home drunk for far longer than you have even lived here. Every man in this town knows if they touch me they will find a knife somewhere they do not want it.” A clear enough threat, though it’s not necessarily directed at him. Besides, he already knows she’d do exactly that, if she wanted. He already knows she would not be here, if she did not want to be.

She dims the fire slightly, letting it cast its light but reducing the heat. She does so easily, without looking its way, just a thought, and with it Maea creeps into her mind, somewhere on the fringes. A friend that never was. A love that never quite was, either. A girl who would not get to find out where life might take her. Gods, her mind was nowhere good. ”I have a pocket full of beautiful feathers to add to a cloak,” she teases instead, trying to pull something good from a mind that cannot quite find it.

Weaver

SUNJATA

the flood

snow glistens on the ledge, whiskey on the bed
shake it out and light a cigarette

She pokes him in the nose and he wrinkles it at her, the freckles along his cheekbones moving with the gesture as he shakes his head to her. “Serving food and drink isn’t part of a fairytale, I can understand the disappointment.” He shoots back to her, a wink granted before he hums a quiet chuckle. But he watches her as he pointedly doesn’t believe her, that small smirk growing a bit at her comment. “And what if I did deserve it?” A question paired with the slight raise of his brow; the roaming of his hand as it moves to run through her hair.

She loosens the braid, undoing it completely and he tangles his fingers into it a bit more, running it through his fingers. Her comment ignites an almost boyishly crooked smirk as he focuses on her again. “It is not. Not if you know how to use it.” He hums, amusedly sticking his tongue back out at her, taking a moment to let each side of the fork move independently from one another with a wiggle of his brow.

But it disappears once more at her comment, a surprising bark of laughter leaving him as he pulls her closer and she nestles in, legs tangling with one another, feathers draped over her like a blanket of sorts that soon would shift again. “I’m honored to not have a Weaver approved stab wound.” He replies, turning his head toward her to scan her face again, amusement lingering within him as his hand pulls away from her hair then, to run his fingertips along her side.

The fire begins to dim, and he can tell as the darkness sets in — so he shifts a bit, giving her a bit more space, but able to wrap both arms around her, adjusting his head to try and rest it along the crook of her neck, the feathers giving way for the bat wings again, able to keep the heat in better with her wrapped up in his arms even despite how sensitive they were. “We’re pretty shit at this whole thinking of good things, aren’t we?” He muses, lips hovering above her neck, the warmth of his breath raking along it.

miss me when you, you wish you weren't right
shake me all out if i'm wrong, for you, for you

The problem with the world is that everyone is a few drinks behind

She chuckles. ”It is definitely not part of a fairytale, but then again, neither am I,” she says, not sounding particularly displeased at this fact. ”Well, not unless I am the villain.” She would feed you the poisoned apple, would prove to be the dragon in disguise. ”Oh, if you did deserve it, odds are you would deserve something worse than having a blood feather plucked.” A knife, a scythe, fire, something equally painful but less obvious. Sometimes that was the worst. There was something cathartic about physical punishment, but it hurt a lot worse to have your heart take the beating instead.

She closes her eyes slightly as his fingers tangle into her hair, arching a bit into the touch like a cat. Though as he sticks that tongue back out, the suggestion clear, she can only laugh. She curls her nose slightly at it. ”Still weird.” Maybe really enjoyable if she couldn’t see it, but it’s an odd feature on him. Well, actually, maybe it suits him just fine. ”Also, that is terribly unfair,” she adds, a fake whine in her voice.

”Well, not yet,” she says with a sly smile, clearly teasing as she curls in closer to him. It seems unlikely she’s going to stab him, enjoying this particular night a little too much. She should care, she should go home, but ah, Weaver is a selfish creature when there are no living hearts to break. His fingers trace along her side, sending a slight shiver through her at the touch.

He shifts to give her some space, which wasn’t necessarily what she wanted, but his arms still wrap around her, the feathers turning into the bat wings again. The wings are warm, covered in a soft fur, almost as good a blanket as the actual furs. They are made better simply because they are his, and she has always preferred to sleep curled next to someone then curled in merely her own blankets.

”We are,” she agrees. ”Perhaps there are too many bad things hiding the good ones. Perhaps I’m just too drunk to think properly.” She chuckles, giving him a playful little shove with her elbow, gentle, recalling how pointy they are. She is entirely too aware of his breath against her neck, the closeness of his lips. ”But if asked, I would say it is a good life. Despite the shit.” Honestly, would she change any of it? Only the death, if she could, but that too she could live with. It made life all the sweeter.

Weaver

SUNJATA

the flood

snow glistens on the ledge, whiskey on the bed
shake it out and light a cigarette

“I’ve been called a villain more than I can doubt.” He offers her with a rogue smirk. “A monster, a demon. An incubus apparently.” He admits, lip quirking briefly into a frown in distaste, in this predicament likely not something to say with the way things are going. But whether or not he believes it to be true (he doesn’t) it’s still something he’s been called. “In the end, I’m just me. Whom a lot of people have a vendetta against.” He offers instead, trying to lighten the mood again.

But his fingers are in her hair, watching the reaction it pulls, the way she arches into him. And he has to take a moment to focus again when she speaks in response to the forked tongue. “Mm well, I could always show you.” He contemplates, flashing her a playful grin before he’s stroking her hair once more before abandoning it when she mentions he hasn’t earned a Weaver approved stab wound, a curl of his lip to that. “I’m not afraid of a bit of blood.” The tone of his voice a bit rougher here again, a bit huskier.

And really, like Weaver, he should be letting her head home. He shouldn’t be inviting her into the mess and tangle of his life, even for a night. But he’s drunk, lonely, and it’s always been a form of coping for him, long before anyone else, before Lusea, before everything. So he shares his warmth with her, draping her in his wings and warmth, lips hovering at her neck as he fights to keep from indulging, humming a breathy, rough laugh against her neck. “It’s hard, you know. To think of the good things when everything turns to shit.” And for him, it was. Any plan of a future got nixed.

He stops planning, stops deciding. It’s easier that way, with far less disappointment.

“I’d take Caido over Korofi any day.” He murmurs, raising his hand to her hair again to try and ignite the same feeling as before, pulling her against him. “I’d take this night over the original one I had planned any day.” He replies, lips ghosting over her skin when he speaks before he swallows hard and pulls his head back to scan her face. The steel in his eyes smolder, darken with an unreadable gleam, unsure what exactly she wants out of this — knowing there are boundaries and unsure how far over the line he can step.

But gods how he wants to.

miss me when you, you wish you weren't right
shake me all out if i'm wrong, for you, for you

The problem with the world is that everyone is a few drinks behind

She snorts at the mention of an incubus. ”There are worse things,” she says with amusement in her voice, though it’s clear it bothers him. Her joke is meant to soften his distaste, because despite their current situation, she doesn’t much care what others say or think. Though she has not known him long, she knows him well enough. They are not that different, really. Villians in their stories no matter what they do. Sometimes it is simply easier to become what everyone expects of them. Some would argue that they did it to themselves, their reputations, and that is true. But at least for her, she simply views the world differently than those that sit on their pedestals. ”Well luckily for you, I have no such vendetta, and I’m likely better than them anyway.”

He offers to show her the tongue, which would be less show and more feel and the heat at the idea, the displacement of her traitorous heartbeat...fuck. ”I am very tempted to say yes, Jata,” she says, giving up on his entire name because it’s too much work, too many syllables, to be bothered with at this point. ”I should not say yes.” But then again, they are both villains. Does it matter if they do the right thing?

At the mention of not being afraid of blood, she grins. ”What, do you want to be stabbed?” she teases, pulling her leg toward her hands and slipping a knife from somewhere down around her ankle. ”I can oblige,” she says, the knife casually rotating in her hand, the light of the dim fire glittering off the steel.

What stops her, from saying yes? It is not some fear of regret. No, in fact with him, it is so very uncomplicated that it would be easy. There are no expectations, no strings attached. They’d wake in the morning and talk and he’d be on his way, and they’d see each other again as if nothing at all had happened. Yet Maea flicks in the corner of her mind. So much love. A girl that deserved so much more. Did it matter now, that she was dead?

”And yet before they turn to shit, they are good.” Her voice is quiet, her fingers slipping up to trace his collarbone, his neck, his jaw. ”There is the VlamVloed. There is the Kraai. There are lovers and loves. There are family and friends. There are nights like tonight that do not matter but glitter in our memories all the same.” No matter what happens, there is nothing bad about tonight. They could fall asleep now, and it would be enough.

She chuckles at his last comment, sliding closer at his pull, burying her head against his neck, her lips almost touching his skin. ”I’d fucking hope so, or I will go home,” she says with a harder, still teasing, edge to his voice. ”As far as I’m aware your previous plan did not involve me.” He pulls his head back slightly, and she meets his steel gray eyes with her own amber ones, fire dancing in them. Her hand come up to his cheek, her thumb grazes his lips. ”I still might say no,” she whispers, uncertain how far she’d cross the line, though clearly, it has already been crossed. Her hand slips to the back of his neck and she leans forward to kiss him.

Weaver

SUNJATA

the flood

snow glistens on the ledge, whiskey on the bed
shake it out and light a cigarette

A nod is given toward her as she lightens the sour tone of his voice, of the thoughts that invade his mind with the incubus comment. And he focuses on her instead when she mentions that she isn’t one of those people, snorting lightly at the implication. “You are better than them.” He agrees, flashing her one of those characteristically charming smiles of his. But he teases her once more, steel gaze flickering along her face when she responds, using a shorthand of his name that most did now.

And he hums thoughtfully, breath laced with the scent of smoke and alcohol. “I shouldn’t either. And yet…” He trails off, because it’s always been a coping mechanism for him, unable to remain left alone with his own thoughts for too long before the spirals hit. This was better, easier, less of an attempt to drown himself away when he can drown himself in someone else.

He’s thankful when the shift happens, when her question hits the air and he flashes her a fanged grin back. “Ah, a woman after my own heart.” Another tease, following her motions to run his hand down her side to his own leg, pulling a small dagger out and letting it glint in the light with hers. “Depends on if I deserve it. After all, I do have my hands on you.” He purrs to her, shifting the blade a small amount while his other hand flattens on the small of her back.

But the blade is placed back when she goes to speak again, and he pulls her against him, his head at her neck and the warmth radiating from her and pouring into her that pulls away when her fingers brush along his collarbone, along his neck, and he almost vibrates with the sensation when her hand reaches his stubbled jaw.

He’s half tempted that even those things have had their share of shit, but he refrains. He refrains from mentioning the VlamVloed getting trashed when he’d cheated on Phoebe with Nate. Was this different? If Maea was dead? Not gone? He recalls when Lusea went missing and he’d slept with Hotaru — a promise of no strings attached, just a way to avoid the shadows that crept into the mind, the self destructive spiral Sunjata was so incredibly good at.

He pulls her close, her head finding and brushing by his neck, and he shivers lightly under the sensation despite not being cold in the slightest. “It didn’t. That’s why this is far better.” He purrs to her, the smoldering steel of his gaze finding the fire within her own amber ones, her thumb brushing along his cheek before his lips. “You can say it anytime.” He assures her, before her hand is moving to the back of his neck and she pulls him in, lips meeting his. And it should feel wrong, it should feel like he should stop it if only for the sake of the memory and the reason he’s here in the first place.

But Sunjata is weak and has never been good at remaining within boundaries, and his one hand finds her hair again, tangling as he leans back toward her, giving into the kiss, the other moving to stroke along her side again, the bat wing remaining a blanket to cover her that opens up to the cold when his hand reaches the curve of her hip and he tries to pull her closer into him.

miss me when you, you wish you weren't right
shake me all out if i'm wrong, for you, for you

The problem with the world is that everyone is a few drinks behind

“Glad you agree,” she purrs, catlike in the way she strokes her own ego. In some other life she was a cat, certainly. Curiosity that will one day get her killed. A back that arched into a touch. That superior feline attitude. Besides, fuck them. Fuck them all with their high horses and their rose colored glasses. Fuck them all for thinking they are ‘good’ when it’s such an arbitrary word anyway. They just hide behind lies, behind false niceties, behind deception and the guise of ‘doing the right thing’. Not like her and Sunjata. They just did what needed to be done. Sometimes it was dirty, sometimes it was messy, sometimes it was damn wrong. Someone had to do it though.

She hums a murmur of approval. “All good stories start with booze ‘and yet’, don’t they?” She sounds almost nostalgic, almost regretful, and almost hopeful all at once. There’s no reason why besides her conflicted emotions, besides the ghost of Maea in the corner of the room.

Fuck, they were the villains after all.

She’d said no to Loren when he’d been drunk and in need of distraction. It should not be different, but it is. Even then there’d been a part of her that wanted to wait for him, that wanted to stumble into that damn Launcelyn when the stars aligned in a different way. Perhaps she’d missed her chance, but if he was happy with Sam, it was enough. Sunjata though? Heis comfortable and fun, and it feels okay. It feels almost right.

He slides a hand down her side to his own leg, his grin literally fanged. He brings out his own knife, which is no real surprise. She grins, her smile not literally fanged but she gives the same impression anyway. At his words, she twirls the knife against his chin, the point resting gently against his skin. “You seem to be insisting,” she says, voice a low growl, a dangerous purr. If he is the incubus, then she is the succubus.

She pulls the knife away, slipping it back into its place. Just in case. She does not say that the good things do not have their share of shit. Only that they are good first. Already the Kraai brought argument after argument with her and Korbin, and it wasn’t even technically open. Still, there was good. It was the location for this, which was only the beginning of a whole new story.

“What were you going to do?” she asks, a tease in her voice. Though she doesn’t really care, because he was not doing it now. He was here, curled against her, breath hot against her skin. His answer doesn’t matter, and it’s swallowed by the kiss. The kiss that doesn’t feel wrong.

Gods, it should though. Gods, she could care. She should care that she’s a distraction to him, except this is nothing more for her. She should care that this is Sunjata, the man she told Maea she had no interest in (true enough, except that she’s not blind or prude). She should care. But she doesn’t.

Maea’s ghost disappears.

He tugs her closer, and she slips into the spaces between them, a leg coming up to wrap on top of his. She slides beneath the bat wing that wraps around her, the fire flaring in the hearth though she doesn’t intend it. She melts into the kiss, no idea if there will be more, content not to worry about anything but the taste of him, smoke and vodka now. Her hand tangles in his hair at the nap of his neck, her nails against his skin, and she presses herself closer.

Weaver

SUNJATA

the flood

snow glistens on the ledge, whiskey on the bed
shake it out and light a cigarette

“Only the best ones do.” He responds in kind. Only the good stories started with the idea of not doing something, only to inevitably give into it. The thoughts spark over his mind, sluggishly, like most other things. But like before in the darkness of the tunnel, with a pair of piercing eyes and a ring on his own finger, Sunjata simply doesn’t care.

They absolutely are the villains. But at least they’re in it together.

He pulls out his knife now, and her own gets pressed against his jaw under his chin, in the soft space there and his smirk grows a bit wider, fangs on display once more. “I’m definitely not saying no.” He hums back to her, thriving with the danger it presents, pressing into the blade ever so slightly before she moves it, though a small red line does form where he had. It’s no matter though, like he’d told her; he wasn’t afraid of a bit of blood.

But the blade is moved just as his is, and his hand is roaming through her hair and along her side, and he can feel the flush begin along the back of his neck only adding more heat to the already spanning warmth. He told her he didn’t need the furs, he hopes she realizes how much of a furnace he is. She might have fire at her fingertips, but he’s a flood. A flood with heat, a flood with nothing left behind. And as soon as their lips meet, the question unanswered because what did he plan on doing?

Curling up on the couch, left alone to his drunken thoughts. And that doesn’t sound like a good night at all.

She melts into the kiss, her leg slipping around him and his hand lowers further, past her hip to her leg to keep her there as he pushes back into her. The hand in her hair tangled again, the same as her own at the nape of his neck, the scent of smoke and vodka from her as well, and it reminds him starkly of Lusea in such a way that he can’t help the light shudder down his spine, pulling away from the kiss briefly with a playful nip to her lower lip before trailing the kiss along her jaw if she lets him, searching for her neck to bury his face into.

This is Weaver, and he has to treat her as such. So he stuffs down all those thoughts, humming against her skin. “It’s almost too bad there isn’t a bed in here.” He rumbles against her neck, a smirk lifting the corners of his lip. “We just have to make do, hm?” So saying, he tries to shift them a bit to get her further under him in the span of the couch, pulling away to scan her face and ensure she still wants to continue.

miss me when you, you wish you weren't right
shake me all out if i'm wrong, for you, for you

The problem with the world is that everyone is a few drinks behind

She could blame the booze right now. Certainly the influence is there, and though she can feel it crawling through her veins, she knows she’s not drunk enough to truly blame the alcohol for any of this. No, this is simply her. It is raw, foolish desire. It is all the things she never thought she’d actually do. She hadn’t lied to Maea that day. She meant it, when she said Sunjata was all Maea’s. She meant it, when she said there was no threat from her. All that had been true, was still true, and yet. Ah, and yet... And yet his hand in hair, his fingers skimming her side, they feel so damn good and maybe she is tired of trying. Maybe she is tired of caring. Maybe for a moment she understands why her brother’s mood is so sour because it’s hard. It’s so fucking hard to try, to love, to care, to keep going when everything crumbles down around you.

And yet still, if you asked her, it is a good life. No, good is the wrong word. Good is a useless, stupid word. It is a beautiful life. He is beautiful, scars and all, mistakes and all. This moment is beautiful, despite the wrongness that she cannot feel, because it feels right. Ah, no, here is where good is a useful word. It feels good. Fuck it all, because if she boils it down to the bare bones, does the rest matter?

He presses into the knife, drawing a tiny prick of blood. Not much, but enough that the healing magic thrums in her veins. She can feel the small wound, though she leaves it, letting him choose to bleed. It is cathartic, after all, and this was a night for catharsis. Maybe they should just play with the knives. Maybe playing with each other was playing with knives. What else were they, if not weapons made flesh?

He is a furnace against her skin, and she doesn’t mind the way she burns at his touch, the way the fire leaps in the hearth as his fingers trail along her side. His hand slides below her hip and he presses into her, her breath hitching in her throat as she meets him there. He shudders and pulls away just slightly, nipping at her lip, and there’s nothing about the gesture that is wrong but still, she slips her hand to his jaw, her eyes looking for his, her voice soft. ”You can say no too,” she tells him, not that she necessarily wants that (even if she should want that), but somehow it feels important to give him the option, to give him the out. Whether he takes it or not is his own choice.

Her hand slips away though, tilting her head back to give him access to her neck. ”We have access to beds,” she says, voice deeper than normal, a little smokier. ”Or a nest,” she says, allowing him to shift them so she’s underneath him now, one hand waving vaguely in the direction of the furs on the floor still. The place she had, truly, intended to sleep. He pulls away slightly, asking permission, and she simply slips her hand into his hair in response, pulling him back to her.

Weaver

SUNJATA

the flood

snow glistens on the ledge, whiskey on the bed
shake it out and light a cigarette

He shudders with a million thoughts colliding into his mind, pulling away with a playful nip at her lip when she catches his jaw in her hand — smoldering steel meeting fiery amber. And he hears the words that leave her lips, some part of him indulging in the idea of it. That he has the option to. Still doesn’t mean he wants to, not as he forces those thoughts out of his mind and focuses entirely on her. Weaver. Not Lusea, not Maea, not any of his other partners. Weaver.

She’s offering up her neck and he knows he shouldn’t, but he wants to dive in, to lay claim to those marks he so proudly sports himself. But he withholds himself, telling her in the means of the action itself that he doesn’t want to say no. His lips find her neck, soft kisses with the threat of those fangs behind them, momentarily at least before he’s humming against her skin and pulling away ever so slightly. He shifts her, scanning her face and a rogue smirk crosses his at her comment. “I’ll take the couch over the nest.” He purrs though it’s edged in a bit more of a heated growl than anticipated, especially when he scans her face to ensure she’s okay with this and she tangles her hand into his hair, pulling him back in.

And the thrill starts again, his lips finding her neck, shifting her a bit more to prop himself up above her to not crush her, one hand trailing up her side again but pausing at the base of the shirt she wears, slipping under to drag along soft scarred skin. His kisses grow a bit more intense, a playful nip here and there, traveling down to her shoulder to give a gentle kiss to the tattoo that peeks over. He indulges in her a few long moments, before he pulls away again, hands moving to try and slide the shirt up and off.

He should be backing off, not giving in. But perhaps it’s what they both need — a release, a share of the burden of their loneliness that can’t be tempered otherwise. She might be fire at the end of it, but he’s certainly water. And he’s ready to get burned, to flood her back, to dive into the thick of it until nothing but smoke and mist remain in the wake.

miss me when you, you wish you weren't right
shake me all out if i'm wrong, for you, for you

The problem with the world is that everyone is a few drinks behind

There are so many shouldn’ts in her life. She shouldn’t hunt alone, but she does. She shouldn’t drink nearly as much as she does, but she doesn’t stop. She shouldn’t curse, shouldn’t fuck, shouldn’t be who she is, and yet she is all those things and more. She shouldn’t be here, pressed against him on this couch. She shouldn’t be burning against him, with him. But she is, and does it matter when in the morning all their sins will be washed away? There are no other keys to this room. No one else will ever know. It is their life to live tonight, beneath the shadows of secrecy and pleasure. It is their burden to bear or perhaps, their burden to shed.

His lips leave soft kisses on her neck, though she can feel the fangs still there. Her hands slide to his back, fingers light as they trace the muscles and scars on his hot, tanned skin. She lets her nails drag slightly, not hard enough to cut, but enough to feel the threat of them, like his fangs, all the same. She may not have his shifts, but she could threaten all the same. ”Gods, you really would make a terrible Halovian. Your loss,” she says in a breathy voice, distracted by the feel of his body pressed against hers, the weight of him on top of her.

His hand slips beneath her shirt, and she takes in a breath at the feel of those fingers against the scars on her skin. Her lips find his ear, nibbling on the lobe, though otherwise letting him explore her neck, her shoulder, the tattoo for Erebor. When he pauses to tug her shirt off, she lifts herself up slightly, wiggling herself out of the undershirt with his help. There’s still the bra, but she unclasps it, tossing that to the side too. Maybe she should have known from the beginning, from the time when they’d started tossing clothes to the ground so casually without a second thought, revealing skin and scars and ink.

Her hands run along him to his neck, lifting herself to him, sucking in his lower lip to bite, gently, at the skin. Tonight, they could burn. They could burn together, rage inside the inferno of pain and pleasure. Tonight, they could wash it all away. They could drown together, lost to the flood. In the morning, they could rise from the ashes. They could go on, and maybe, just maybe, it would hurt a little less.

Weaver

SUNJATA

the flood

snow glistens on the ledge, whiskey on the bed
shake it out and light a cigarette

Her hands find his back, running along scars granted from shark bites and fights, and he hums against her neck with the sensation of her nails – goosebumps rising along his skin in their wake. And it’s tempting fate, really, when it comes down to it. They’re both weapons, both made to be so much more than they needed to be, than they probably wanted to be. It’s no surprise, or at least shouldn’t be, that they delve into this together. A moment to remove the masks and the facades.

Her breathy voice grants a breathy laugh from him as he presses against her. “Good thing I’m not trying to be.” He murmurs back into her skin. He’s an Outlander, from a place that flooded, with sands and deserts and dunes, of sunshine and droughts. He’s never seen snow before arriving to Caido, never experienced the bite of the cold. He wouldn’t last here – but he hardly lasted in Korofi either. Still, as his hands slide up under her shirt, her lips find his ear and he tilts into it a bit, testing the waters with playful soft bites along her skin.

Nothing to mark, not yet anyway. He doesn’t know if that’s something she’d want, regardless of what he does. So he continues on, pressing kisses to her shoulder and the tattoo before pausing to lift the shirt off. She helps, and soon enough the shirt is discarded with his own, the bra unclasped and tossed without care either. He rises a small amount to view her, scars and all, the smolder in his gaze becoming smoke as her hands trail up to his neck, remaining in place just to see what she chose to do.

It’s worth it, he thinks, as she lifts herself against him, chest to chest. His hand moves to the small of her back to help support her, lips finding her own and offering a quiet growl in response at her bite to his lip – he knows he’s going to burn himself into the ground tonight. He also knows he won’t be alone. A small secret between them, nothing attached, nothing else on his mind except for her and the roaring fire between them, the one in the hearth, and the fact that he can’t get enough.

So he pulls back against her hands, pulling her with him to sit back on his heels a bit – sweeping that forked tongue along her lower lip – perhaps just to be a shit about it, perhaps to show her that it could certainly be fun. And with a few moments of shifting a bit more, he tries to lean back and readjust his legs so she sits in his lap, freeing his hands to roam along her body from hip to chest, lingering, playing, preparing the mental ways to devour.

miss me when you, you wish you weren't right
shake me all out if i'm wrong, for you, for you

WEAVER

she was beautiful
in the way a forest fire was beautiful

Is it tempting fate, or is it simply fate, this night? Does the distinction matter? They are not two halves of one whole. There is no poetry in this, no love, just desire. There is no destiny in the stars for them, save that someday when they have burned all they love to the ground, they might be the only two left. For they kept surviving, despite it all. They are both the same thing, steel tempered in scalding fires, beneath the hammer of their lives. They clash against one another, steel against steel, and there is something beautiful and glorious in the sound, the feel, of it. They are weapons, whether they ever wanted to be or not, and they live for the battle, for the taste of blood.

It is a good thing indeed, for him. He is not meant to live in the grasp of the cold, where even his flood might freeze. Not like her, a girl made of fire and ice both, of infernos and blizzards. She belongs here, in this frozen wasteland, for it cannot stop her. It brings her to life instead, gives her reason to burn all the more brightly.

She leans into the bites he places along her skin, along all the scars. So many of those scars were friendly fire, but her and her brothers never practiced with wood. What was the point, because someday you’d be in a real fight with steel on steel, someday you’d feel the sting of that sharp blade against your skin, and when that day came, you needed to be ready for it. You needed to be used to the threat of a little blood, to the bloom of pain. Like him, she is not afraid of a little blood. Instead, she hums her approval, a soft purr in the back of her throat.

He pulls back to look, her bra gone, her breasts and scars and the soft but subtle muscles of her abdomen on full display. She lets him look, unashamed of what she is. Then she’s pulling herself up and close, pressing her chest to his, his hands supporting her back. Her mind goes quiet, nothing but him filling it. Him and the fire in her veins, the fire in the hearth that crackles and thrives with the magic that’s flared to life beneath the heat of him.

He sweeps that weird snake tongue along her lip, and she pulls back just slightly, a shudder that might be pleasure or disgust (maybe both) running through her at the feel of it. She grins that fanged grin at him, mischief in her eyes. She follows as he pulls her back, shifting so she’s sitting atop him, legs folded beneath her. Her hips move like a wave against him, teasing, encouraging. Her lips find his, sucking in that lower lip of his again, biting harder this time. She may not have fangs or a forked tongue, but she’d find ways to match him all the same.

something to be admired from a distance