---

 
I was in a delirium, an impassioned frenzy to which I couldn't help but kiss her savagely, tenderly, as if to release us both from this sordid desire.  Static danced beneath her gripping fingers, surging through sinew and bone, summoning a tempest squall to further well inside me.  It thundered louder with each steady, deliberate thrust of virile hips until I was certain it would burst free from my skin to rain upon her. 

My head began to whirl, infernate blood seethed and pulsed inside her rosy core until it found release.  Eyes closed as if to dream.  A shuddering breath echoed her name as I pushed the entirety of my arousal into her body and finally loosed the lightning of this storm.

Afterwards, I was tender and attentive.  Harkening fingers continued to caress the hard bead between her thighs and my thrusts dwindled slowly - levelled with precise pressure - even as every fibre of my being prickled with gleeful ecstasy.  My thighs gingerly shook with each forward thrust and panting breaths plumed across her lips between feathering kisses.  Though I had tasted the sweet dew of her body, the pleasures found within, I could not be content until she’d felt the same, until I felt her walls crash around me.

When it had, I was content to hold her, to run my fingers through her hair, to kiss her with the softness of a lover truly adored.  I brushed stray strands of hair from her face and tucked them behind her ear.  Mixed eyes searched her face for any flicker of regret or rage, offence or slight as I finally found the courage to speak.

“Daesn'yri… are you alright?”  I’d murmur against her mouth before tasting it again with something beyond the need for the inflamed passion of our prior desire.  It was an endearing press of lips, deeper than lust could ever hope to be. 

It was adoration.  The same I felt within my breast.  The same I felt torn in twine when I looked at the state of her wedding gown.  The reason we were all gathered in this house.  I didn’t want to move.  To do so meant to watch her burn on a pyre whose flames were meant for another.  I couldn’t bear the thought of the fire singing her ropes of freedom.  Reluctantly - and only after I knew she was well - I rose and offered her the handkerchief from my pocket before attempting to fix my suits.

“We could sneak out of here.”  I mused while turning to face the door in a feeble attempt to give her some degree of modesty even if I’d just robbed it from her.  “I have a carriage outside.  We could go anywhere, Dae.”

---

The finality shook through her like an earthquake. Reverberating tremors as her breathless gasp reveled in the dark surprise of raw sensation. The entirety of her body coiled, clenched around him, fingers desperately clutching tautly at him. Madness consumed her, devoured the reason, the inclinations of right and wrong. There was nothing but they and this insufferable bedlam that razed her from the inside out. The room melted away, the reality that awaited like nosey patrons just outside its door. Everything. Everything but him. Everything but whatever this was. This being a tentative and meek askance, a fearful notion. Elysium and hell wrapped neatly together, inseparable, no mind how much she wished to untangle them and only take the good for once.

They came undone together, her cheeks reddeningly further with the lewd and indecent way her bodice reacted. Cradled. Clenched. Yet she could not stop it. Her grasp disrobed its talons, replaced instead with the gentle caress to tenderly soothe the fierce crimson etched into his skin. Tenderly listless. A weakness exposed in its totality. No voice broke the peace, only the regaining control of panting breaths and the occasional glissade of gingerly pressed lips to crease the silence.  His fingertips would dislodge the cling of gilded curls that lingered upon her facade. It was unusual, the way his dual eyes roamed her features. A gentle smile would dress her lips, her eyes slipping shut. It reminded her of the days of their youth, the golden waves of the dunes, of the soft blades of grass. Her favorite place among the Mother Wood.

“Daesn'yri… are you alright?” He would finally inquire, removing that veil of tranquility from them. Dark lashes would part once more following the gentle lapse of his mouth. Only further did her simper spire, sight once more blotted out. She wanted nothing more than to stay here, wrapped within the warmth of his encompassing arms, to drift into dreams. Any longer, and she may have, though his faint shift once more stirred her attention, back to the disheveled apparition of her gown. Her wedding garments. It was then that the absence of water from the shores became apparent, far too late to avoid the devastation of the wave that would crash against her in its wake.

It took her breath at first, this reminder. Submersed wholly within the bitter cold of the tsunami of reality. The voices from just outside returned, almost mockingly. Then: he was gone. It wasn't calloused, the way he let the cold wrap around her, but she wasn't sure if it wasn't worse. If she were to be honest, there was a hint of envy for the way he simply replaced his clothes. The way he adjusted his collar, the cuffs of his sleeves. How was she to do the same? Her face burned, the humiliation, the shame descending upon her, a suffocating regalia that wound itself about her shoulders as she held the offered handkerchief within her hands which curled into clenched fists. She could reconstruct her attire, but to right the wrong was impossible. A consequence of her own discretion. She wanted to cry, feeling the tears prickle behind glass eyes, a sickening feeling welling up to form the knot within her throat. But they never fell, never trespassed across the threshold of her lids.

“We could sneak out of here." Came his intonation as he turned his back to her. Leaving her to attempt to make herself presentable once more, and to quell the flood that was filling her. Her breath escaped her on a shaking sigh as she once more closed her eyes. “I have a carriage outside.  We could go anywhere, Dae.”

Didn't he know how much she wished he meant that?
That he wouldn't come to regret it.

For so long she had only yearned to be called his. Perhaps that's why this felt so... empty. He never came back for her. He hadn't recognized her. She was advised to leave him in the past as well by a family that no longer existed. She would have, perhaps she had begged him to stay with her upon news of their departure. But Arabella's health had held an iron grasp upon him. She refused to believe that had changed. In her heart she knew she would only be the second candle in comparison to his beloved twin.

When the first scream rang out from the world outside, she was almost grateful. Her fingers wove faster, refastening the beads of her gown at the brisk knock upon the door, followed closely by Sari opening the portal. A brief moment of shock enveloped her expression as her dark eyes landed upon the now undisguised Aeth, though it did not last, and thankfully no questions left her lips. "The two of you should leave." She was breathless as she pulled herself into the room and shut the door behind her, her lithe shoulders resting upon it firmly. "People have been poisoned. Guests are dying." Black eyes would once again flicker between the two of them. "Poisoned?" The word would escape her on a gasp, her hand clasped over her mouth. Without wasting time, the hand maid would procure the coat Dae had worn earlier, wrapping it quickly about her shoulders, dark gaze then cutting upon the man once more. "You need to leave. Now. Please, keep my lady safe."