long shadows

RONIN if there's one thing i'm good at, it's surviving Nosing into Remi's curls further (and thus at Oria and her bundle of clover), eventually Sugar seems to come to the conclusion that the little spriggan is not a threat - quite the opposite in fact - and she sniffs at the clover with enough force that it will pull it out of Oria's hands. They are perfectly in scale (if not in miniature) to a human and a real dragon, and it is definitely something Ronin is going to investigate further when he isn't so hungry. "There, see? It's not so hard to be friends," he remarks, offering Remi out his bowl of stew and setltling back on his stump to eat his own; Sugar naturally engages in her what's yours is mine attitude, swooping back to the Huntsman to partake. He's just feeding a hunk of meat to the dragon when adventuring and Hak Etme come into it, Ronin tilting his head and grinning. "Well, how could I possibly say no to an offer like that?" he inquires. "Will this just be a date between the two of us?"

are you really going to talk about timing in times like these?

Not minding at all that the flower is pulled away by Sugar's breath—it had always been intended as an offering—the small spriggan trills her joy and reaches out experimentally as if to pet Sugar's nose.

Luckily Sugar has decided that eating is more interesting than posturing with a sentient stick such that Remi can actually enjoy his stew. 'This is amazing.' The alchemist notes, sounding particularly cheerful. Leaning back into his chair and looking properly relaxed, Remi shrugs his shoulders a touch carelessly. "At this point, who could we bring that wouldn't either be a liability, or cause tension?" Amalia tended to have points of view that didn't always align with theirs, Sunjata was strong enough but not on the same footing as Remi just now, Seren was...well, Seren. Phoebe had stormed out of their meeting earlier and didn't seem much for adventures, and Ianto wasn't the adventuring sort.

"Would it be so bad if it were just the two of us?"

remi

Styling stolen from Sky (obviously)

RONIN if there's one thing i'm good at, it's surviving "Why thank you very much," Ronin says, offering a sunny smile right back at his husband as he shares his stew with the dragon now perched on his shoulders like a small housecat. "I may have left the meat a little more raw than I'm used to - but you know, I'm finding a taste for it." Tongue in cheek remarks about his dragon shift are all he can manage right now, but it's something. Remi relaxes and Ronin watches him relax with something almost like relief in his posture and in his expression. It's been long enough since he last saw the alchemist as carefree that he wants to cement this in his mind that he might remember it forever. "I would love it if it were just the two of us," he remarks easily, laughing as he's nudged by Sugar for more food. "In that case - when are you thinking of going?"

are you really going to talk about timing in times like these?

The words likely have their intended effect, and though there's already a spoonful of stew on the way to his mouth, Remi pauses just long enough to beam across at his husband before taking a bite. "I remember there was a small town we used to pass through, where they would put the meat in raw and let the broth cook it." He mumbles conversationally around bites of food. "You could always do that if you could stand letting me eat first." The alchemist suggests with a boyish smile that quickly disappears to allow for a bite of potato.

For Remi's part, he feels as though the waters of Frey's breath have been breathed into his soul, such is his relaxation and general state of agreeability. "We could ask someone else to come along I suppose. I was thinking about this, when speaking with Juniper and Nephele...but if this is a relic will we have to...tell someone? Give it to someone?" Not expecting Ronin to have an answer to this, Remi just raises his eyebrows consideringly for a moment before helping himself to more food.

"Well...with the skyport done...my schedule seems free. How about yours?" Sunnily Remi grins across at Ronin, looking both young and old all at once, and very, very happy.

remi

Styling stolen from Sky (obviously)

RONIN if there's one thing i'm good at, it's surviving "I'm not sure my appetite could cope," Ronin teases, though he does give it some consideration. "This is growing on me, though. Maybe I can just accustom myself to your wilder tastes." He winks, offering Sugar up a bit of carrot only for her to take the chunk of meat on the way to his mouth instead. "If you were anyone else, I'd be reaching my hand in there to get that back," he informs the dragonling, who nuzzles him obnoxiously for his trouble. He hasn't really given much thought to what they would do with the relics after they find them - if this is one such thing. "I'd like to say the old rule of finders keepers applies here," he says with a chuckle. "But I've got a feeling that the Order would want to at least know, if I were to find something. I suppose that just means we need to make sure that you get your hands on the relic first, mm?" He grins. It doesn't matter how his schedule looks - with Remi smiling like that, all of a sudden he's absolutely free for anything his husband wants to do. "I'm sure I can make time for you," he says, hiding his own grin behind his bowl as he sips at the broth. "Your smile is one of my favourite things," he says suddenly, as if the words have just leapt out of his brain without his permission.

are you really going to talk about timing in times like these?

'They will be your tastes soon enough.' The alchemist chuckles with an easy shrug. Whatever Ronin might prefer with a man's mouth and teeth and tongue, a dragon's preferences wouldn't be so easy to enjoy. Already Remi had seen Ronin nibbling on peppermint bark far more often than he used to thanks to the luxere.

Reaching up to itch at the back of his neck, where before Remi's expression might have turned dark and hostile, now he only grins. "I suppose this is the part where I say I would like to see them try?" He shrugs. "But we are not in this alone, and I suppose...well...it is not as if I need more ways to kill someone if indeed that is what these weapons are for." Remi adds with shocking consideration for the needs of those who might fight at their sides.

"Mm, I appreciate that." Raising his bowl to mirror his husband in slurping away at the broth before Ronin's words have his hands stalling. Glancing across the fire, undone by small moments like this even before Mort's touch had softened his harder edges, Remi tries and fails spectacularly to hide his smile. "I think your eyes are among mine. I would say your smile, but...It has grown a touch crooked these days. I am not sure if you have noticed." Remi replies with a playful shrug of his shoulders.

remi

Styling stolen from Sky (obviously)

RONIN if there's one thing i'm good at, it's surviving "You don't have to make it sound so foreboding," Ronin says through a chuckle, setting the bowl down in his lap so Sugar can have her fill of what's left of the broth. More used to his husbands prickliness now than his sweetness, to hear that he might give the Order some consideration in whatever they find out there in the desert is enough to almost have him dropping the bowl he's holding. "My husband has become a sage," he tells Sugar with a smirk, the dragonling gurgling her version of a fuck off I'm busy. "We'll have to see what it is first." This is directed to Remi, of course. "It might be a useful, non-killing non-weapon. You don't know." It's really fucking unlikely, but he can dream. By the time Remi gets over his unexpected compliment Ronin is already blushing, and if he was asked he'd not be able to say quite where the words came from. And to have it returned? That crooked smile flashes across his face, Ronin setting down the bowl now so he can rise to his feet and hold out his hand for the Lullaby. "It was always crooked," he says. "You just never noticed before. But if you are right, I wonder if it has affected my kisses?"

are you really going to talk about timing in times like these?

Rolling his eyes at Ronin's not-compliment, the alchemist considers. "Maybe a magical pillow that gives you an excellent night's sleep so that you're prepared for the next day's battle." They could both use such a pillow, so perhaps the wait-and-see method was the better one.

Glancing at the offered hand, Remi sets down his own bowl of food where he's quite sure Sugar will happily attend to it once she's done with Ronin's. "I absolutely did notice before." Remi counters looking a touch victorious as he laces his fingers through the Huntsman's. "And it absolutely has. Sometimes when I kiss you—" Leaning forward, the alchemist meets Ronin's lips softly and tenderly with just a brush of his tongue for good measure. "—sometimes it feels as though half of your mouth is quite annoyed at being kissed, your lips are so thin." He murmurs sweetly, his green eyes shiny with laughter.

remi

Styling stolen from Sky (obviously)

RONIN if there's one thing i'm good at, it's surviving "Oh, what a thing that would be," Ronin says, already sounding excited at the prospect of digging through the desert to come away with a comfy pillow. He's not even being sarcastic about it, though he'd happily admit that he gets an excellent night's sleep anyway when he's tangled up with Remi. "Or maybe it's a talisman that stops people from getting within five feet of you. That would only work if you could make exceptions, though. I couldn't cope standing so far away." His thumb brushes against the back of Remi's hand, the Huntsman meeting his kiss with a sudden flurry of butterflies in his stomach, as if this is their first one. "Mm?" Drawing back, an expression of exaggerated horror comes over his face, Ronin slipping an arm around Remi's waist to tug him closer. "No, that can't be right," he says, his tone grave. "Come now, kiss me again. I promise it will be the least crooked kiss you'll ever have."

are you really going to talk about timing in times like these?

"Can you imagine if all the relics turn out to be the sort of thing Ianto would have sold out of his wagon? Useful but only to an extent?" Remi grins, very easily able to imagine it. Such would be the will of the gods and in line with the ominous warning they'd all received, to be sent on a scavenger hunt for lacklustre oddities.

Taking a stumbling step forward as he's tugged towards Ronin, Remi intentionally lets himself collide with his husband as if caught entirely off-balance. "Can you even promise such a thing?" So saying, the alchemist leans forward but with intentional and obvious slowness. His eyes remain on Ronin's even as their lips very nearly touch. In an effort to make a liar out of his husband, the alchemist reaches a hand out to grasp Ronin's hip as he breathes in a soft gasp against his husband's lower lip, daring it to grow crooked and ragged.

remi

Styling stolen from Sky (obviously)

RONIN if there's one thing i'm good at, it's surviving "Please don't," Ronin almost begs, laughing softly and shaking his head. "That's just the sort of cruel trick the gods would play on us. Or maybe they're the sorts of things that were useful once, but now they've been lost or left out to rot, they're just a bit weird and strange." They'll just have to wait until they're out at Hak Etme to see, but rest assured the Huntsman will privately be hoping that it all turns out... useful. Yes, useful is probably the best word for it. Ronin wants to say that he can promise such a thing, blue meeting seaglass green as their lips almost touch - and then Remi goes and ruins it, his gesture causing Ronin to break into a smile. "Sabotage!" he hisses, leaning in nonetheless for a sweet and very enthusiastic kiss, his arms slipping more securely around the Lullaby. "I love you," he murmurs into the kiss. "You're wonderful and I love you, and I don't ever really want to let you go."

are you really going to talk about timing in times like these?

Ha! Remi might have announced had Ronin's lips not stolen his ability to do so. Humming decadently into the taste and feeling of his husband's kiss, the alchemist lets himself be held close without protest. "Well then I suppose I will just have to resign myself to a lifetime of crooked kisses." He laments, before leaning forward to steal another.

"Dinner and desert." He muses to himself, his tongue lingering along Ronin's lip as if Remi was trying to get the last bit of sweet cream off of the rim of a glass. "I should let you make dinner more often." It's an absurd sort of joy that rebounds from the alchemist's touch. The swirls of his emotions are dashed with colours that are a bit too bright and don't quite blend together as well as one might expect. Like a toddler picking only the most appealing shades and splattering them over a canvas, so too are the alchemist's emotions just as haphazardly coloured. 'I love you so much.' He gushes, unprompted. "And finding new ways of feeling that love."

remi

Styling stolen from Sky (obviously)

RONIN if there's one thing i'm good at, it's surviving "I suppose you will. I hope you don't mind," Ronin murmurs, his smile only growing to feel the other man lean into him, and he melts into another kiss without any hesitation. The emotions all but roar out of Remi, enough to make his knees weak, though luckily enough he has someone to hold onto that he might keep his balance. And for a second they could be right back where it all started in the old guildhall, being seen by sightless eyes in blushes of colour, every kiss tasting of something new. Ronin's fingers slip up and through Remi's curls quite without his permission, the Huntsman gently resting his forehead against the other man's, and he all but beams at him to hear his declaration of love. It never gets old - it never will. "I'm torn between wanting to pull you into the boat and asking if you want to head into the Sea of Branches for a drink. Can you make the decision for us, please?"

are you really going to talk about timing in times like these?

Oria nimbly evades the fingers that have come crawling through the curls toward her, treating it as some sort of game. "Well, you have been promising me that drink for quite some time." The alchemist points out. Given that he was still covered in dirt from his meeting with Mort though, a quick trip to the boat was still in order.

'Come along. You can pick out something for me to wear." He murmurs, tilting his head slightly to press a kiss to the tip of Ronin's nose before gathering his husband's hands in his own to tug him toward their little floating home.

'I was thinking of this—'s Remi says once they're inside. Holding out a shirt made of linen with moss-green accents on the collar and sleeves for Ronin's approval, the alchemist reaches over his head to boyishly pull his shirt off. This has Oria chittering with glee and frustration both, and once the fabric is free and clear of her home of curls, she neatly leaps from Remi's head to one of the windows.

remi

Styling stolen from Sky (obviously)