marlowemuses | This will be happily ever after...

Damen felt the brush of Laurent's mouth, the warmth of his breath, the softness of his cheeks; allowed himself to lean into it all, yielding to the touches as if it was Laurent courting him. It was a new feeling for him.

"Pick one," he suggested, inordinately pleased by the praise. (The flick earned Laurent a muttered grunt and a grin.) "And you shall choose your own reward for your efforts. Even a terrible poet is worthy of some laurels." Damen raised a hand to the side of Laurent's face; with the greatest of delicacy, he spanned forehead to jaw with the breadth of his touch. "Not to influence your choice, but a kiss might be a fair prize."

"Aren't prizes meant to be something that I can't normally get freely?" Laurent said, warm and happy at their flirtation. "We're doing terribly at this talking thing. It seems both of us have our mind on other things. One other thing in particular."

Shifting against Damen, Laurent closed his eyes and let his mind and body rest. "Tell me about the capitol and your palace."

Damen let his hand drop away. "I seem to be out of practice." Laurent didn't look upset, at least, and the way he said 'both of us' was reassuring. (Just...no kiss. How disappointing.) "Very well, I shall stand the reigning champion of awful Akielon love poetry."

He adjusted his embrace as Laurent burrowed deeper into his chest; the crook of his arm wrapped Laurent's shoulders, and the other arm he carefully wound around Laurent's waist to encircle him completely. The question was considered for a few moments before he spoke, trying to do justice to his home.

"I envy you your first glimpse of Ios. Better poets than I call it the place between cliff and sky, marble and stone gleaming bright as a beacon. I have seen it all my life - but each time I return, the White City seems more beautiful than I remember it." Damen could see it in his mind, and the words rose to his lips in those treasured pictures. "Clean and perfumed by the salt of sea breezes, green and blue among the white - it's as if the marble halls sprang from the limestone and rose toward the skies..."

He glanced at Laurent, suddenly self-conscious. "I'm no better at this than I am at poetry. You will simply have to see it for yourself."

Laurent smiled as Damen spoke, charmed by his passion. He trailed his fingers along Damen's arm, enjoying being held like this, like he was important to Damen.

Pleased by Damen's self-consciousness, Laurent shifted in his embrace, winding his arms around Damen's shoulders and pressing his forehead against the side of Damen's head. "For the first time, I think I'm actually looking forward to it. It sounds lovely. And you aren't such a bad poet after all."

"I hope you are." Embarrassed but pleased, Damen gave Laurent a cuddling squeeze where he'd settled in Damen's arms. Now that it had been brought to his attention, he realized he was used to taking physical gestures as something to react to and escalate. This time, he tried just returning the gesture, a soft nuzzle of his head against Laurent's.

"It's different than Vere," he said, trying not to think of it as a warning. "Warm, of course. You may have to adjust your wardrobe in order not to pass out from the heat." Damen let out an amused breath, although there was some truth to it too. There was a reason Damen dressed the way he did. He wondered to himself if Laurent's style would change at all in his new kingdom.

"Perhaps we can vacation in the north during midsummer. Winters in Akielos are very mild. I can still take a morning swim on most days." The water was a little chilly, yes (most would say freezing), but Damen had been classically trained in all sports, which were done in all weather.

Laurent grinned a little, finding it much easier to be infatuated with this gentle, playful Damen. "Are you a little less... massive... when you swim on those days?" he teased, kissing Damen's cheek and then turning Damen's head to steal a kiss, and then another.

"Do you want," Laurent murmured against Damen's lips, but then he was interrupted by a growl from his stomach, which made him laugh. "Ah. Breakfast?"

Flushing in spite of himself, Damen tipped his head in Laurent's direction. "Never," he muttered, the softest of smiles against Laurent's cheek, his lips, the impish corner of his mouth. He was captivated by just how demonstrative Laurent could be, an affectionate and very private version of that witty, flirtatious young man he'd fallen for.

Did he want--? Yes he wanted, so much, he didn't even know where to begin. But taking care of Laurent came first. Damen opened his mouth, only to be interrupted by a knock on their bedroom door. "I have miraculous timing," he said with an arch of a brow at Laurent. "That's breakfast."

He called permission to enter, and two servants came in, eyes humbly downcast. One bore a tray loaded with pastries, breads, little bowls of honey and cream, fruits, and nuts, the other a full service of tea.

Damen nodded in approval. "We will breakfast in bed this morning - you may set it there - " He indicated the table beside Laurent for the tea tray, and the broad space of bed in front of them for the food.

"Thank you," Laurent said, starting to reach for the bedside table, where he usually kept a little coin purse to tip the servants, but he wasn't in his own bedroom. Flushing with embarrassment, because showing appreciation to his servants was important to him, Laurent sat back again, trying to remember their faces so that he could arrange for something small later.

Thanking them again as one of the servants poured him a cup of tea, with cream and sugar the way he liked it, Laurent accepted his cup and settled back against Damen's side, happily nibbling at an indulgent fruit pastry in between sips of tea.

Damen noticed the gesture and wondered at its intent. In Akielon tradition, to even serve members of the royal household was held a great honor and mark of distinction. But Laurent's kindness was something he respected about his husband, and he certainly wouldn't stop him in his efforts to reward those who served them.

"Is there anything else you'd like?" he inquired of Laurent. "Today, or in the future?" He took note of how Laurent liked his tea, as he accepted the mug of steaming coffee for himself. Damen didn't often indulge - he was wary of relying on stimulants to get his body to function - but this morning seemed like a good exception to the rule. He took it black, of course.

"For breakfast? No." Laurent smiled, feeling at peace with his life and hopeful about his future for the first time he could remember. "Just that kiss."

He let his head rest on Damen's shoulder, basking in the domesticity of their morning. "Do you like to read? Or is it mostly the swordplay, wrestling, swimming, and... I don't know, I'm envisioning you mostly naked on clifftops, oiled and flexing, roaring into the wind. Is that the sort of thing you do in Akielos?"

His eyes glinted, lips tilting playfully as he glanced over at Damen.

Damen's face lit from within. "There will never be a shortage of those," he promised, and the hand around Laurent's shoulder traced the curve of his arm tenderly like he was touching Laurent's hand.

Now that they were alone again, he settled back into the comfortable snugness they'd achieved between them. Laurent's head on his shoulder felt indescribably right. It was as if the space there had been perfectly carved for his husband to lean against.

Damen couldn't hold back a grin. "Is that how you like to imagine me? I'd hate to destroy your fantasy." There was a glittering look in his eyes, as though it pleased him very much that Laurent might be thinking of him in such a primal state. "When I'm not beating my chest atop the cliffs of Atros, I like to ride out into the city, and farther when I can manage it; to be amongst my people, see how they live and what I might do to help. That was until...several months ago."

When his father was murdered, when he became King suddenly.

"Now, I'm afraid most of my reading is of the official sort. Legal documents, treaties, trade agreements, endless papers to sign." Damen stroked the inside of Laurent's elbow, thoughtful. "That, too, I would welcome a well-read husband's aid in handling."

Laurent nodded, licking crumbs and fruit jam from his fingertips. "I shall. With endless opinions upon such official documents, no doubt. I'd like very much to ride out among the people from time to time. I think it's important for a monarch to do so. And, likewise, occasionally I shall try to lure you into sneaking out with me, cloaked, to see the hidden sides of your cities."

Lulled by the touches, Laurent tilted his head and studied Damen from up close, content--for the moment--to just cuddle with his husband.

Polishing off a biscuit with honey, Damen looked well satisfied with Laurent's plans. The final suggestion drew a crook of his lips. "I should like to see you try. I suspect you will succeed very easily." How appealing it seemed, leaving behind the pomp and circumstance of royalty and simply being Damen and Laurent for a while.

He felt Laurent's eyes on him before he quite saw how focused that perusal was. Damen raised a brow at him. "What are you thinking, husband? I know there must be something in that tireless mind of yours." He said it fondly, but with an edge of curiosity. He wondered if Laurent's perception of him had changed at all in the past hours.

"How much I like you, when you're like this," Laurent said. "Teasing and fond. Both affectionate and respectful. It's very soothing."

Reaching up to ruffle Damen's hair, Laurent smiled at him. "Will you kiss me now, if I ask it of you? I think I'd like to just kiss for a while."

A flush stole into the bronze of Damen's cheeks. "You're not so bad yourself, it turns out." He'd made so many assumptions about Laurent over the past weeks, even more over the last few days. Seeing him like this gave Damen hope that he had not chosen unwisely at all.

The face that tilted down towards Laurent's betrayed how much that invitation meant to him. Damen swallowed hard, opened his mouth to say something, closed it suddenly, and simply nodded once. His hand curled around Laurent's face and tipped it at an angle towards his own. Some things just didn't need talking about.

The touch of his lips was amazingly gentle. One might have thought that, given permission, Damen would have kissed like a charioteer racing through the desert. One would be wrong. His mouth moved whisper-light across Laurent's, half-chaste, and yet the softness itself was a kind of suggestion, like velvet brushing bare skin.

Laurent returned it just as soft and suggestive, reveling in the sweetness of the gentle kiss. When Damen kissed him like that, he wanted to yield, to trust, to let himself fall and believe that Damen would catch him.

"Will you move our breakfast tray aside, my king?" Laurent asked, with a warm, playful spark in his eyes, so that this time, the title was affectionate, reverent, tempting. "And then, if you please, will you kiss me again? And again."

Nipping at Damen's lower lip, Laurent gave him a mischievous smile, all teasing and temptation.

Was there anything he wouldn't do for this man? Damen felt hopelessly, perfectly lost to the look in those eyes, the sound of the endearment murmured from his lips. He silently nodded once more, shifting and rising up onto his knees to lift the tray to the top of his own table. The edge of his chiton rode up as he moved, exposing thighs as thick and browned as the trunks of young oaks.

Mere moments later, he'd returned to the lure of Laurent's nipping kisses. "You're very good at this 'would you like to' business," Damen murmured, and Laurent was back in his arms. "Would you like to...be in my lap for this?" His mouth moved across the fullness of Laurent's.

Laurent shivered a tiny bit, nervous but also hopelessly tempted by the suggestion. "All right," he said, nose brushing against Damen's. His arms slid around Damen's shoulders, fingers tangling in the hair at the nape of Damen's neck.

Wary and uncertain but willing to trust, Laurent watched Damen's eyes as he settled across Damen's lap, thighs pressed tight on either side of Damen's hips.

"Damen," he murmured, teeth grazing over his own lip.

Attuned as he was this time to Laurent's reactions, Damen allowed him to take things at Laurent's pace, rather than his own. He remained still and patient while Laurent moved into his lap, a quiet sigh of - contentment? yearning? - for the pleasure of the weight of him there.

His eyes fell to the pearly white line of teeth biting into the flesh of tempting lip. Was Laurent trying to drive him to madness with temptation? Damen breathed in, deliberately, deeply. "Kisses," he said, as if reminding himself, as if reminding Laurent of what he'd asked Damen for; those were the terms they'd agreed to for the moment, and he would abide by them.

He cupped Laurent's face in one big hand, fingertips curling behind his head, and drew him in. His mouth moved softly, as gently as before, slowly exploring the canvas of bottom lip, slowly wooing. All of his attention was on Laurent. What did Laurent like about their kissing? What made him breathe heavier, shift towards Damen, make a sound?

Laurent sighed at the gentle kisses, letting himself become lost in the pleasure of Damen's mouth against his own. He yielded more and more to Damen's lead, parting his lips in invitation.

Yearning for him, Laurent's arms tightened around Damen's neck, pressing close to him as the pleasure and lust of the kisses lowered his resistance and increased his greed and hunger for Damen, his Damen, his husband.

The more Laurent responded to those soft kisses, the softer Damen's lips became against his. They made love to Laurent, tender and attentive; he could have pressed for more, but he didn't. Even the part of lips became another chance to coax rather than to plunder. Damen found he enjoyed drawing out Laurent's responses, making him flush and yield and lean into the twine of their mouths and bodies. It was better this way, when Laurent undeniably wanted it.

A hushed sound groaned in Damen's throat. He spread his hands over Laurent's shoulder, the back of his head, curling his fingers there. He had mastery of himself, his mind, his touches; but one part was impossible to master. He nudged at Laurent's chin, tipped his forehead against his husband's. "I...don't know what to ask for," he breathed. "Help me."

Laurent laughed very softly--not mocking, just with warm, shared humor at their situation. "Me? You're the experienced one here."

Laurent kissed the tip of Damen's nose, soft and playful. "What do you want to do with me? Make a suggestion, an offer. I don't know what you're willing to do. I don't know what sort of thing I like."

"But you're the one I want to please," Damen said, completely naked in his honesty. It didn't matter that he had more experience at any of this; if anything, it was just a detriment to how easily he could and had driven Laurent away with his too-hungry need.

"What I want with you," Damen admitted, "is to touch you bit by bit. Find the things you like. Explore you with my hands...my mouth, if you will let me..."

He wasn't like Laurent; his negotiations weren't smooth and veiled and subtle, obliquely couched in pretty words. What he lacked in finesse, he made up for in earnestness, in complete devotion to Laurent's pleasure, his dark eyes burning with it.

Smile widening as he watched Damen's face, Laurent brushed the tip of his nose against Damen's, playful and happy. "I'd like to try that."

He still felt nervous, but he liked the idea of Damen exploring him and finding out what he liked.

Offering up one of his wrists, Laurent watched Damen's eyes, guarded and nervous. Trust was difficult, but he yearned for Damen, and thought that Damen might just be worth it. "My king."

He could feel Laurent deliberately offering up himself, in spite of the way he watched Damen like a hawk. Such trust was a precious thing. Damen was more aware, now, of just how precious.

He plucked at the laces, but instead of simply turning to the other sleeve when the first one was loosened, Damen slid the silky fabric up. Pale skin seemed to gleam more suggestively from the billows of the sleeve than it had when Laurent was disrobed. He cradled his lover's wrist in one hand, raised it to his lips, let his breath trace over the pulse at the base of thumb and hand. It beat a vulnerable rhythm, full of life and heat. Damen kissed its thrumming stream beneath the delicate skin.

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