I wouldn't love me neither

HOTARU

She wants so badly to say he’s right. That he doesn’t deserve her, that she wishes she’d never woken from her stupor if only to avoid having her loyalty thrown back in her face the way it has been. But she can’t. The curse she bears is that when she loves someone, her claws are clipped, blunted and discarded. The barbs removed from her tongue. A being of strife and self-indulgence made docile and complacent for those few who find their way past her defenses, incapable of ever raising hand or word against them again. As such she is only as powerful as the protections around her heart. It was her own fault they were found lacking, that she let him in even when her anxieties whispered to her that she could not compete. She can’t fault him for finding happiness in someone better than her, someone she has loved in the same way and whose qualities she knows too intimately to discredit. So instead Hotaru doesn’t speak. Lets the words die in the air between them, buried somewhere in the waters at their feet.

And the hesitation in his admission of love is merely the final nail in a coffin she’s been building since the moment they’d cocooned themselves around her that first night. Hotaru should have run so much farther that next morning, but even she knows her heart was already gone before they’d pulled her into their bed. She closes her eyes and is grateful that neither of them are privy to the painful shards in her smile; forgiveness is not easy, but holding on will only hurt more. “I know you do,” she comforts, voice serene and sounding far away to her own ears. She has her answer. But you love him more.

And such has been the story of her life. It is a pain she should be accustomed to, and old friend. A shadow that lingers in the empty spaces of a room once occupied, reduced to her sole companion. Nevertheless it burns anew, finding tinder where she had believed herself barren and burned.

His kiss burns like alcohol in an open wound, but it’s cleansing in the same way. Cauterizing each laceration he imparts, where he rips himself from her and leaves an echoing shape of himself. At least he does her the honors of burning them closed, lest she bleed out when he lets go. It will scar; ugly, disfigured, branding her as unwanted to any others who may see her. People like Wessex who will not want that which has already been tried and tested and found wanting. She pours herself into his kiss regardless, embraces the sting like a masochist baring their back to the crop. When he pulls away, she regrets that there’s no hiding the salt on her cheeks now - at least he does not comment on it.

Nate’s mouth at her throat is an achingly familiar sensation. Hotaru tilts her head back to the sky, baring the length of her throat to his lips. Blinks the tears back until the blurry edges go clear once more and she is left clear-eyed and hollowed out. Her hand rises from his cheek, pressing behind his neck and drawing him into her. “It’s okay,” she whispers. Consent, acceptance. And a lie that she weaves around them, convinced if she says it enough times, she will relieve him of his burden of guilt. Even if it will not absolve her own pain.

Pull you in, but don't you get too close
Love you now, but not tomorrow

NATE

”I... I think...” Nate sighs, working his jaw as he tries to get through the words, tries to offer some reassurance, after the knife he’d driven into her ribs. It would be better to pull away now, to cut them apart cleanly. It would be better to not have to separate at all. Licking his lips, Nate closes his eyes tries again, too cowardly to even look Hotaru in the eyes when he twists the knife. ”I think I... always will.” Theres no way to explain how important she is to him, no way to explain what her love means. ”You’re the only woman I’ll ever love.” He mumbles quietly, as if it means anything at all now.

Every movement Hotaru makes only spurs him on, only has him pulling her closer against him, like he can prolong this moment into forever. It’s okay, she says, but still Nate hesitates, knowing it isn’t, knowing this is a bandage, a surgery meant to cauterize the parts of them away from each other. Leaning back into the water, pulling them both deeper into its warm embrace, Nate let’s put a soft breath, and sinks his teeth into her neck, one last set of scars to remember him by.

Pleasure surges through him, intense as it ever is, but Nate keeps a firm grip on himself, his arms only just barely tightening around Hotaru, one firm hand slipping down along her spine, and settling on a hip. One last hurrah, in a way. One last memory to cling to a cherish. As if he isn’t going to come out to bother her, isn’t going to make this as hard as he possibly can. It’s just what he does.

I am tasting myself
In the mouth of the sun

HOTARU

She wishes he would just kiss her and let it end. Let their bodies do the talking so that his words won’t follow her into her dreams to haunt her so much longer than the echo of his touch will ever manage. It’s cruelty, to pull her apart like this. But she’s incapable of telling him to stop, even as she burns and withers into nothing in his arms. What can she even say? There is no gratitude to be had in this. No relief. Only the added burden of distinction, of being chosen and cherished and still let go. Abandoned. It is a hurt that has haunted her from birth, and she presses into his kiss to hide the way hot tears spill over in abject agony as history repeats itself once more. A different world, a different love, but still the same ending.

Even still she trusts him to hold her up, to buoy them as he clutches her close. Trust like theirs is not so readily undone. And it is not her choosing to end this. She is not the one holding the knife that frays and tears their strings apart. Instead she is left to rot and simmer in the love she still holds for him, taking what she can get even as each piece lacerates her palms. Ashamed to be brought so low and desperate by love, but incapable of resisting.

At least the bite of his fangs washes the rest away into a muted haze. Here, there is nothing but pleasure. Preternaturally created, and as such easily overwhelms the emotions that would otherwise make it impossible to feel this way naturally. It’s a blessing. Hotaru arches into him with a barely-there wounded utterance of his name, a last pleading prayer on a sinner’s lips as they face the executioner’s blade. She can only hope he will carry her lightning with her for some time more. That he won’t forget her so easily with her magic residing in his veins. Hotaru doesn’t hold out hope for it, but it’s enough to let her drown peacefully in the waves of euphoria instead of fighting against them.

Pull you in, but don't you get too close
Love you now, but not tomorrow

NATE

This is how he starts the healing process, for the both of them. By washing the pain away, covering it with something bright and shiny and right. Creating a moment that will last forever, that neither of them ever hve to leave, if they don’t want to. Lying to both of them, though every stolen second makes it harder and harder to disbelieve. A soft noise groans out of Nate, vulnerable and sharp, hungry beneath it all, and his hands clench around Ru tighter, holding her like he’ll never let her go. She’s leaving, and he simply can’t accept that.

Hands that a very good impression of being naturally warm stroke over the abandoneds back, those clutching, clinging things replaced by holographic facsimiles that seem to hum in the water around them. Nate slips away, severing the euphoria so he can suck a dark mark into her throat, like a beast desperately trying to stake its claim. Panting against her throat, he shifts, letting his head slip the other direction, a wet hand lifting to tangle in blonde tresses and tease Hotaru’s head in the other direction, guiding, firm, but so gentle. She’s made of glass, she’s delicate in his arms, despite all the ways Nate knows this isn’t true at all. He wants to believe it, wants her to believe that he believes it. Wants to give her some tool to punish him with, even if all the intention robs the point away entirely.

While one hand caresses her head, the other finds its way to her breast, Nate’s fingers sharper here, in a way she’d shown him she liked their very first time together. Kisses press against her shoulder, softening her up for another bite, another desperate groan leaving Nate, muffled by pale skin. His hips roll up against her, muscle memory and despite want, and his fingers twist in her hair.

I am tasting myself
In the mouth of the sun

HOTARU

She tells herself the same; that this will be a bright spot to get her through the mourning, a bandage hastily slapped over an open wound. But will it be? Or will she trace the fresh patterns of his teeth alone in bed and muffle the sounds of her tears into a borrowed pillow, hiding her grief in a home that's not hers? Will she be able to feel any sort of arousal without remembering the warmth of the water around them, the salt on her own lips and the scent of iron in the air? Hotaru already knows he will haunt her after this. Even if he moves on, his afterimage will stay, tethered at her side by a leash made of her own damnable love. Not enough rope to hang herself with, but enough to chafe. To tie her down. Merely another obstacle overcome and forgotten in the wake of perfect union that she had not been able to provide.

But this? She can provide this. Her body, if nothing else. Nothing more than a last hurrah, a cheers, and it burns as surely as any alcohol would if they'd done this the acceptable way. She gasps as his hands are replaced, and yet she remains suspended smoothly, his grip never faltering as he travels down her neck. Marking her in ways she has always wanted, but which come too late; ephemeral and bound to fade. How fitting. At least as she tilts her head back beneath his guiding grip, the tears fall into her hair instead of down her cheeks. As if her body refuses to forget the torment beneath the pleasure, and seeks to taint even this.

At least there still is pleasure. Her legs come to embrace his hips, to pull him close in the same instinctive way he moves against her, despairing anew that she cannot return the favor in any meaningful way. Hotaru gasps, voice twisting midway into a crooning cry of pleasure as his hand pinches and gropes on the right side of pain, back arching to press both shoulder and breast further into him. "Please," she begs, though she's not sure what for. And even if she does, at least the true meaning is easily concealed behind the variety of other answers this moment could create. Please, more. Please, don't leave me. Please, forgive me.

Pull you in, but don't you get too close
Love you now, but not tomorrow

NATE

Please, she murmurs, sending a shudder running through Nate, that urge to serve, to satiate the begging tongue rising up. He doesn’t know what she wants. He knows exactly what she wants. He can’t give it to her.

So he tries in a dozen other ways, with teeth and fingers brushing over skin, leaving marks in the naive hope that one of them will be permanent. Perhaps it’s his revenge, to cover her in pieces of him, and then leave anyway. Perhaps it’s simply a silent wish, a reminder that she can come back, that they can make something work. Nate pulls back again with a gasp, shifting like he might seek out Hotaru’s lips and thinking better of it.

It’s too close, he can’t be seen, he can’t see her. He isn’t sure which one would be more painful. So instead, he slips lower, false arms still holding her tightly in place while his lips trace a path down her body, teeth sinking in wherever there’s softness, just for a moment. Marks are left over her heart, along the planes of his stomach, and as he begins to sink fully beneath the water, on her hips and thighs. Nate can pretend this is what she’s been begging for, a skilled tongue, a tireless, breathless pleasure pressing between her folds and swirling around her clit, while two pairs of hands caress her.

I am tasting myself
In the mouth of the sun

HOTARU

His silence is more damning than the way he hesitates to kiss her. She can hear his voice, recalled from so many other nights like this; crooning teasing responses, or hushing her into impatient stillness. The words never come, but his mouth is restless all the same, and she arches beautifully into the sure and steady grip beneath her even as some part of her brain wonders at this new creation of his. Her head tilts back to the sky, breaths hiccuping unevenly as he leaves marks over her heart. Not there, she wants to beg, but her tongue is thick and only capable of letting out soft, hurt noises of pleasure. But her flesh gives so easily, turning pink then purple beneath his ravenous mouth and branding her with the cruel lingering marks of his last moments of loving her.

Hotaru's hips jerk as he explores further down her navel, instinctively jolting as her nerves alight with the promise of ecstasy. Her cheeks burn hot as his dark hair swirls into the water, something intensely erotic about the way he slides beneath - heedless of air - to press his tongue against her clit. An aching bolt shudders between her walls, feeling empty and needy, as the bud beneath his mouth alights with sensation. Her legs reach for him, instinctively trying to wrap around his shoulders and pull him close as she cries her pleasure in chorus to the waterfall. With his hearing blocked by the water, she allows her moan to peter out into a broken noise, eyes squeezing shut and tears hot on her temples as her neck throbs in tandem with the pulse between her legs. It is erotic, and bittersweet, and beautiful, and the most painful thing she has ever experienced.

Pull you in, but don't you get too close
Love you now, but not tomorrow

NATE

Slipping below the water comes so easily, Nate managing a smile as he slips away completely. If he were a better man, he would drown beneath Hotaru. Instead, his breathlessness is merely another tool in his box, another way to press pieces of himself so deeply into her heart he will linger there forever.

It’s better like this, so close and yet just too far to hear properly, to see properly. Hands warmed artificially by the water rise up, moving over Hotaru’s chest again, Nate’s skilled fingers focused on the buds of her nipples this time. If he can wring every bit of pleasure from this, it can be a sweet parting, a beautiful final note. A false hand slips down her back, fingers tingling with a breath of electricity as they slip between his legs from behind, two of them slipping inside of of her. It might not seem like it, might just seem like he’s trying to have his cake and eat it too, but Nate is committing every moment of this to memory, is forcing himself to live through moment so he can hold onto his forever. His lips purse in the mockery of a kiss as he sucks Hotaru’s clit hard before his head turns, and fangs tease against the quick beat of her heart where it pulses through her thigh.

A momentary distraction, before he returns to her clit. This is all for her now, there’s nothing else that Nate will take, no more pain that he’ll inflict on her. Instead he drags his tongue in the vague shapes of letters, never once deleting or giving Hotaru a moment to catch her breath.

I am tasting myself
In the mouth of the sun

HOTARU

The extra pair of hands makes her slip - makes her mind fuzzy, makes everything soft at the edges that even the heat of the water cannot achieve. If she just closes her eyes...tilts her head and imagines...

A deep chuckle, hands that are calloused instead of electric where they pinch and pull. Warmth that comes from a body, not the water at her back. She arches into the pressure against her nipples, lips parting on a gasp and -

"Sun-"

Her voice snaps halfway, eyes flying back open. No. No. The sensations might be similar enough to be confusing, but she can't let them fool her. Can't make this any more painful than it already is, if she expects to survive it. Before her mind can spiral further than the stab of pain that half-choked name inflicts, pleasure is washing it away. Making it duller at the edges where it pierces into her, numbing the raw entry points.

A hand skirts down her spine and the fingers that sink into her and press against her walls are just as good as the real thing, and her thighs just barely clamp shy of strangling Nate between them as the emptiness - at least here - is finally chased away. Her breath hiccups as he sucks at her clit, skin jumping instinctively at the tease of fangs that do not pierce. Hotaru's mind is a frenetic collage of reactions and feelings, the jump between sensations and unfulfilled promises of others getting her to the edge faster than she'd expected. The motion of the fingers inside her has her rocking her hips down in tandem, water sloshing over her navel and across her breasts. Even that feels like too much when he won't give her a break, so much as a moment to breathe.

She doesn't want it. Gods, she's grateful for it, for the way everything reduces back to white noise and the climb of pleasure as fingers thrust in approximation of something she's never been able to have from him. Hotaru feels weightless in the water, toes curling and breath panting across her reddened lips until - finally - she has to reach for something. Hands going to the dark hair like a cloud of ink beneath the water and tangling hard as her hips arch and her orgasm slams into her with no further preamble. "Nate!" she cries helplessly, one last call of his name even if he will only hear it in muted and distorted forms. Hotaru's thighs tremble where they encase him, still rocking down against him to chase her own oversensitive shudders until it verges on painful. Only then does she slow, dreading the clarity that too much pain will bring.

Pull you in, but don't you get too close
Love you now, but not tomorrow

NATE

While he doesn’t hear the aborted cry, Nate does feel that there’s something missing, something that could be added to this experience. It’s a feeling that suits the melancholy of this parting, his own mind too stubborn and unfeeling to be distracted by pleasure without prodding. Without throwing himself entirely into Hotaru’s pleasure, hands flesh and energy racing over her skin, his mouth and tongue ever attentive.

Hands twist in his hair, and for the first time Nate jerks, a groan bubbling out of him, almost drowning out Hotaru’s cry in his ears. Slowly, false fingers fade away into nothingness, leaving the abandoned empty again. Some part of him thinks perhaps it’s for the best if he stays below the surface of the water, if he lets her slip away without another word, but this is a moment where he can’t quite contain himself. Knees come up, giving her something to lean against while Nate straightens, rises above the surface of the water.

Arms wrap tight around Hotaru, pull her close against his chest in a tight, damp hug. ”I love you Ru.” Nate murmurs again, shifting her so her back is to him, his arms loosening. ”I... I’m sorry.” The apology is quiet, breathless, and his arms slip away entirely, letting her go free.

I am tasting myself
In the mouth of the sun

HOTARU

As he jerks beneath her grip she lets all thoughts vanish beneath the pulsing waves of her orgasm. Finally her mind is quiet. For a few short, blissful moments, there is nothing. Not even familiarity, or old memories, or happier feelings. Just the shudder of her limbs and the hummingbird heartbeat in her breast. Everything reduced down to sensation.

Then it all comes back.

Not in a rush, but a trickle. The electric fingers disappear, leaving her aching and void, the hand supporting her leaving her to float alone in the water. Until Nate shifts and begins to emerge, there is a moment of fresh hurt, a prelude to the emptiness that they both know is coming. Only he has someone to go home to - she doesn’t. As they shift, she tries not to lean on him as much as she wants. Their time of indulgence and weakness has passed, the line has been drawn and she can pretend no longer. Especially not when Nate is saying the two worst phrases he possibly could, grinding down what few shards remain of her heart.

As he turns her away and his arms pull back, Hotaru fights to breathe. Soundless, gasping heaves that don’t seem to fill her lungs are all she can manage. From the other side of the basin, Atlas’ alarm rings like a muted bell. Is this a panic attack? Gods, she hasn’t had once since she was a child. Were it not for Atlas’ immediate mental support, Hotaru likely would have betrayed herself. Instead, her numb lips part, and she finds herself speaking as if compelled. “I love you too.” But her throat closes around any further notions of forgiveness. She’d meant them when she spoke them minutes ago, but they die in her chest this time.

Hotaru moves first. On legs that shake like a newborn fawn’s, though at least the resistance of the water hides that well enough. Her hair hangs wet against her spine, revealing far too much of her face which she keeps carefully blank as she moves for the shore. Methodically grabbing her clothes and pulling them on, not daring to look back. Refusing to be the one left behind this time - at least not physically. He is merely the newest in a line of lovers to have walked away, but just as she had with Sunjata, Hotaru refuses to let either of them make her watch them leave. There is only so much cruelty she will accept from them out of love.

As she dresses, her fingers find Nate’s clothes abandoned by her own, and they pause and linger over the oil-slick black of his jacket. Without asking - and aware it’s at least not his prized original - she grabs it and bundles it in her arms beneath her own winter coat. Atlas emerges from the water, head low and liquid eyes melancholy as they shift between Nate, Pemota, and Hotaru. But he comes to her side, as he always will. Hotaru shakily reaches for his mane, needing to hang onto him to remain standing but aware she’s incapable of mounting him with how she currently feels.

Hotaru looks back only once, and only because she has one last thing to say. “Goodbye Nate.” No endearing name, no apologies or forgiveness, nothing more than goodbye. And then she turns away, hand gripping tight to her companion, who leads her forward as if knowing that left to her own power, Hotaru wouldn’t have been able to walk in the opposite direction of her beloved.

Pull you in, but don't you get too close
Love you now, but not tomorrow

NATE

If he had need to breathe, it would stick in his closing throat. Silver tongue he might have, but it has always been clumsy around grief, leaden when it comes to loss, and this is sharper than any other he’s felt since coming to Caido. Death, at least, is simple in its finality, is a wound that scars and stops aching with time. This is not death, this is something that bleeds and bleeds, something he cannot staunch, for all the skill he has.

Greedy hands very nearly follow her up, offering support and strength where she shakes, wanting to offer more. The look on her face, hollow, pained, stops him dead, has his limbs slipping silently back into the water so Hotaru can’t see the way they clench. Does it matter if it’s shame or heartbreak on his face when she doesn’t look at him? Does it matter that his eyes close against fluid tears?

Pemota follows after Hotaru, as silent as her master, but more bold in her attempt to soothe. Stars fade before they truly fall on the abandoned, but waves of gentle calm still lap against her rocky shores.

Nate hears her voice, impossible to miss, if only because he is straining to hear it, aching for some balm to alleviate his pain. His eyes snap open, tears that have remained stubbornly unshed finally carving trials along his cheeks. ’Goodbye.’ He mouths back, unable to force his voice to sound. His unblinking gaze stays locked on her figure until it disappears, one final service to her, and the first act of guilty flagellation.

Done ;~;

I am tasting myself
In the mouth of the sun