heorte | when i go towards you it is with my whole life.

It's a cruel thing, but it is a true thing too. That is why her words land as they do, become the kind of blow that comes as a crack and raises up a stinging sort of pain in its wake.

And there is that same unconscious flinch of movement too, the way Ellis' body shifts as if to rise and create distance between them. The floorboards creak beneath his weight as he rocks back, hands twisting one over the other before the restless impulse passes into stillness.

"I'm sorry," comes quietly, steadily into the wake of that reaction, all absorbed in the span of a few moments. There are things he might say after, that he didn't mean to be unfair, to ask her to be unkind. But what he meant to do and what he has done are separate things. He draws in a deep breath, head shaking a second time. The tangled snarl of uncertainties are shunted aside, boxed and walled off.

A last turn of his hands, bent fingers obscured behind one palm, before Ellis dredges up a searching question, "Will you tell me how you'd have me?"

"I have already," is quite instant, and so it must be the truth unvarnished for she requires a pause to generate any sense for tact. Indeed, she is still frowning a little; had she been after his apology?

"And in Kalvad you would be required to ask my father for permission and then we would stand up in front of the parish and there would be a fine little party and you might get me some little token and I would give you a very handsome purse on account of my family's name. But we're not in Kalvad and I like you as you are. And," she hastens to add, for it makes her point quite well. "I'm very poor on a Riftwatch stipend, but you don't see me apologizing for being unable to provide you with the proper coin. So clearly we are, at the very least, shorting one another entirely equally."

All this, she says in a rush as if attempting to outpace the little measure of guilt or sympathy which threatens to find her. She has wounded him. She can see that much. But it's an important sort of cut, she would insist. Like hacking out something poisoned.

"I want to have you how you are. Not how you think I deserve to. The latter is far too much responsibility for us both."

Here is a truth: Wysteria has had him for ages. Long before he finally kissed her in her little kitchen in the wake of a terrible dream.

He wants to tell her that again, but in a better way, so she understands what he means by it. But the words catch in his throat. So instead, he lets the lingering sting of the slice her words created carry him upwards, straightening rather than turning as he rises. Ellis is not sure this is true, that they are shorting each other equally, but it is kind of her to say, and he is not such a fool as to contradict her.

"Alright," comes first, as Ellis catches up one of her hands. It is good to have hold of her. It roots him here in this room, in this moment, his focus narrowing to Wysteria's face. "You have me. And once we leave here, we'll say our vows, so we can belong to each other properly."

What else is there for him to do but give over to her what she's had hold of already?

He still wishes to find her a ring. But she'd wanted his intentions, and here they are: he will be her husband, and they will weather what comes together.

"And so we are clear, and there is no misunderstanding, you didn't persuade me to anything I have not already wanted."

If she persuaded him of anything, it's that he would create more damage by holding onto his doubts than trusting Wysteria.

There is a brief but real fear which manifests as he rises that he will draw back and she will have no hold on him to with which to counter a retreat. And so his taking her hand is of great relief. Her grip instantly turns very fierce indeed, tightening in sync with the promise he makes her.

It's a very selfish thing to be motivated by. That, good. He will be fully hers. He may be a Warden, or a member of Riftwatch, or a tamer of cats only on loan, and it will be very benevolent of her to allow for all of it at once. And she will be his, anchored so firmly to something in this world that she imagines it will somehow be more difficult to remove her from it. He won't allow the Fade to swallow her back up. Those will be the rules.

With her face tipped up to study him, Wysteria says, "That's quite the relief. Because I was prepared to argue with you further, but I believe we're meant to be leaving very early in the morning."

"Yes, and I have to lock the doors, and bank the fire, so we might go to sleep," Ellis agrees, thumb drawing along the back of her hand. All of these tasks mean drawing his hand from her grasp, so he lingers instead, watching her face.

What had he ever done in his life to deserve this? Wysteria, prepared to dig her heels in and keep hold of him, even when he would let a myriad of doubts and worries propel him from her. She is a miraculous occurrence.

Ellis bends to her, nearly without thinking anything else beyond that he is so painfully in love with her and so fond of the look on her face and the strength of her grip on his hand. He might say again I love you but instead it bleeds from him, telegraphed in the open, supple quality of the kiss, his hand held tightly in hers.

It is, she decides in that moment, the sort of kiss she likes best from him. Not that there has been anything at all wrong with the brief way he sometimes kisses the corner of her mouth or how gently he sometimes bends to her, or even the heated shape of his mouth that afternoon as they'd lain in that sweet patch of clover. But this masters them because it's feeling and impulsive, because she can't taste the hum of his thoughts on his lips. Because it's both very simple and very full all at once, pleasingly certain. Or maybe because when he kisses her this way, she is pleased with herself afterwards—how clever she must be to earn that kind of affection—, and there are only a few things Wysteria loves more in the world than a sense of her own accomplishment.

After, with her face turned up to him still and her mouth lingering against his, Wysteria bats blindly at him with her spare hand.

"Go then. And be quick, or I will get cold and become cross with you all over again."

(It will only be once he is briefly gone from the room that she will clamber in under the covers of that grand bed, and there between the blankets indulge in the impulse to kick her feet a little and muffle a laugh into one of Lady Paget's very fine down pillows. Yes, she is quite pleased with herself.)

The swipe of her hand doesn't deter him from one last soft press of his mouth to hers, then a last kiss to the corner of her lips, before he straightens and departs.

The door of her room is locked. The balcony entryway to her room is nearly closed, left propped open for easy of Wysteria's return. And the glass doors to his own room are securely closed behind him, drapes falling over the windows.

Lastly, the latch is turned at his own door. The house has fallen silent. And Ellis returns to the chair drawn up alongside the fire to sit, and begin unlacing his boots. The work of his hands is smooth and methodical, but his eyes return to her, over and over.

They've shared a bed before. It is not that. It is all that's been said, and alongside it, the simple fact of her presence. Even without declarations and marriage, having her there is a particular kind of delight.

Somewhere in there, she has removed the fistful of pins from her hair and set them aside on the absurdly ornate side table so that here as he unlaces his boots she is doing the opposite—winding her pin curled hair into a braid across her shoulder, half buried under the smooth sheets and blankets and the very fine coverlet. She can do it automatically without looking at all, which means it's very easy to observe him there in the chair by the fire and to occassionally catch him looking and be pleased all over again.

She is, she thinks, very patient. She waits until he has removed both his boots before pssting at from the sea of overstuffed pillows.

"Ellis," is a very soft little call, quieter even than the tone she'd taken when they'd been speaking only just minutes ago as if the distance across which she is addressing him makes it more likely for her to be heard beyond the door.

Wysteria extends her hand toward the edge of the bed. She pats there in invitation.

He is very far away.

It is a hard invitation to turn down.

So he simply doesn't.

Boots set neatly beside the chair, the only minor delay is in the stop Ellis makes to tend the fire and secure the grate. And then he is settling where she'd indicated, perched one side of the comically opulent bed. He shakes his head over it. Weeks of time spent here and he still hasn't grown used to the bedding. And now he needn't bother, apart from—

"I could lose track of you in all this," is a low, clucking sort of complaint, as he unfastens his braces and works them down over his shoulders.

They've slept in narrow beds, and on the ground, and all other manner of less comfortable accommodations, but Ellis prefers all of them to this bed, he thinks.

"Nonsense," she snips back, twisting a little to wriggle her way deeper under the blankets and amidst the pillows. Her extended arm withdraws, and she looks very self satisfied studying him from her veritable nest. "I have every confidence in your ability to mind me. Though if you're truly so concerned, I suppose you might keep an arm about me. For a little while. And consider that neither of us will stand any chance of becoming over warm and kicking anyone in their sleep."

Not that anyone would ever do such a thing. And if they have, then it has been done entirely unconsciously and is entirely to blame on being very used to sleeping in a reasonably large bed (for the furniture in the Hightown mansion is not so stately as this, but not at all poor) all to herself.

A muffled chuckle from within the folds of his tunic, before the shirt is drawn entirely off. Ellis holds it in both hands for a moment, clearly considering the trajectory between the bed and the vacated chair, before tossing it to land haphazardly across one of the arms.

"A generous offer," he tells her at last. "I'd be happy to take you up on it, as I was planning on keeping you close one way or another."

He'd very much wanted her to stay. That surely isn't so hard to guess at, considering all that had passed between them since she'd arrived. He runs his hands briefly over his face, inhaling deeply, before he stands to work at the buckle of his belt.

There's no hesitation, but there is a slow, fluid motion to the work of his hands. It leaves enough time for objection, or instruction. For whatever Wysteria would prefer he look like, when he climbs into bed with her tonight.

It's hardly the first time she's seen him so. But it strikes her that it's the first time she has marked with such clarity the dark shape drawn onto his chest, the banked fire light and the lamp on the table more than generous enough to see by. The moment she takes to consider it means he is well on his way to being free from his belt before she even marks it.

"Well." Her attention rises from the work of his hands. Well. "Then I will sleep in the middle of the mattress. That way I can tip you out of the bed more easily should your dreams trouble you."

See, look. She has done him the courtesy of having memorized all the vital rules.

Then, as if compelled by the rise and fall of his shoulders or perhaps some line of sinew in a forearm, she adds— "It's very pretty, you know. The mark you wear there." Her hand touches briefly at the neck of her chemise to indicate his tattoo.

Half-way to some sort of agreement or gratitude at the reminder that she recalls what she’s meant to do for him if he’s seized by the sort of nightmare that doesn’t wake him, the second observation catches him off guard. His own hand lifts from the laces of his trousers, mirroring her as his fingers skim along the ink on his skin. Not necessarily to obscure it, only as if—

Reminding himself. Yes, it is there. His fingers remain for a moment before dropping, Ellis nodding to her before turning his gaze back to his work.

“Prettier than the rest, aye.”

The newly acquired trio of marks from their excursion in the crumbling manor have joined the rest of the scarring on his body. By comparison, the thin lines of ink are easily the most graceful marks set into his skin.

It’s hard to say whether the tattoo or the scars or the fact that he is drawing the laces of his trousers open prompts him to lean over the blow out the lamp on the table. It doesn’t diminish the light in the room, only leaves them with the firelight to cast everything in shadow and gold as he works his trousers down his thighs, steps out of them one leg a time before folding them and casting them to join his tunic.

“Here, let me in,” is a ridiculous thing to say considering how much space there is in this bed.

In the half light, Wysteria's eyes are comically round and her attention on him very keen—a silent and rapt sort of curiosity which a sense of propriety (diminished behind a locked door, and the fact that she is in his bed already, and what he has promised her) doesn't quite check. The suggestion of his bare knees in the shadow is almost funny.

"—Oh. Yes of course," is the softest squawk. The heavy collection of bedclothes is turned back to encourage his entry.

"I think a Warden must have scars. It gives everyone else a sense of what they ought to be grateful for."

Here is what they might do: He might stand just here, shadowed and lit by turns in the firelight, and let her look her fill. The proposal comes to mind and is dismissed as he climbs into bed beside her, to be obscured by lavish bedclothes and plush duvet. There is a rustling of sheets as he shimmies along the mattress to settle beside her, in spite of ample room elsewhere.

Wysteria might have been very comfortable in the middle of this bed, with only the smallest chance her foot might have knocked into leg or hip or ankle in the night. But instead, Ellis puts himself directly beside her, as he would have done were they in a narrow bed in someone's hayloft.

"Which is what?" Ellis asks, some dark sort of humor in his tone. It's been a very long time since people were grateful for Wardens.

She might have every intention of explaining what she means—how surely no one trusts a soldier without no interesting battle scars, and that must be the case for Wardens too even despite the rather bruised nature of the order's reputation otherwise—, but then he is very close and radiantly warm beside her. All save for—

"Your feet are ice!" is a barely muted squeal. Under the coverlet, her knees draw fractionally up to flinch away from the incidental cold touch.

"The floors are hardwood," is somewhere between protest and amusement. Beneath the blankets, his fingers find her hip on the way to taking her hand. A brief, lingering pressure there, before Ellis turns onto his side to face her. His feet are obliging angled away. "They'll warm."

And it's some kind of novelty, to think about cold feet when their usual fare is so far removed from such a weightless concern. Ellis is thinking about Wysteria objecting to the presence of ants, of sweeping sawdust away so they might lay down together.

"If you'd rather not take your chances, I can sleep on the chaise."

"You'll do no such thing," she grouses back at him, faux sullen as she allows her legs to straighten to their original place. Meanwhile, her hand in his turns so as to get a better grip on him in return. "What would the point of that be? After all that effort of going around locking doors. We might as well simply switch rooms if that were the case. Or not have bothered at all. Honestly, Mister Ellis."

Don't be absurd.

She might continue on in a similar vein for some time if she wished to. Instead, Wysteria gathers up his hand in hers, drawing it up to set his knuckles against her neck and the soft underside of her jaw. It's a gentle thing, and might indeed be a perfectly chaste way of reeling him a little closer to her if not for their general states of mutual undress.

"As I was saying. I think your scars are dashing. There is a sort appeal, you know. To a person being as you imagine they ought to be. And you can't very well imagine a Warden without thinking of one or two great marks on them. Even I know that much."

Had Wysteria not had hold of his hand, Ellis might have let it fall to where he knows a scar has been slashed across her chest. The very tip of it peeks over the edge of her chemise.

"So I needn't collect anymore?" he questions, low and teasing, as his thumb lifts free to run along her jawline. "You find the present assortment satisfactory?"

They are just close enough that Ellis has some sense of her, even with the blankets and all to obscure the lines of their bodies. He can think of how he might fit more closely, how his arm might settle about her waist.

He can also think of how much he likes looking at her in such a setting. He is fond of looking at her regardless of where they find themselves, but there is some especially rewarding aspect of seeing her in his bed. Even if the bed is not truly his, and if he would rather try to lay down with her with the ghost clattering around the bottom floor of her house, or in the narrow slip of bed waiting for him in the Gallows.

Her laugh is small in that drawn narrow space, more breath and the shift of her ribs under the line of his forearm than it is real sound. His low tone has reminded her that she's meant to be quiet, and that if they're going to have some conversation here in the almost dark that it should be done softly.

"Yes, very satisfactory." She tips her chin down in answer to the path of his thumb, saying firmly there against the calloused edge of it, "You must avoid any others."

"That's a tall order."

The nature of who he is, how he fights, makes the collection of further scars inevitable. Yes, there are long stretches of time where Riftwatch's work keeps him from the kind of scrape that will turn to a desperate scrap, but inevitably, some occasion arises where Ellis need put himself more directly into harm's way.

He thinks to say Is there some penalty for if I fail? but surely they already know all the downsides to his acquisition of injuries. Instead, his eyes move over her face, taking her in, lingering a moment on her mouth before observing the sweep of his thumb along her jawline. The singular observation stands.

So it is.

She knows it perfectly well, and so will only pretend at asking for him to commit to avoiding danger. Besides, if she were to even consider making such a request then she might have to be willing to bend similarly. Imagine—her agreeing to stay fully out of all harm's way. Who would be ridiculous then?

Instead of insisting she only looks at him in the low light, her face half in Ellis's own shadow and he breath warm across his knuckles. When she turns her hand and his in it, it's to press a soft little kiss to the back of his hand. Beyond the context of this shared bed, it would be only sweet—a little silly, uselessly teasing. But it's a different thing to put her mouth on him here compared to anywhere else. She thinks so, anyway.

Despite all the time that's passed since he kissed her that first time, the moments when Wysteria initiates in this way always catch him by surprise. Even such a small thing, her mouth against the back of his hand, carries such weight. He feels it reverberating through his body, a leaping sensation that crackles from the point she'd placed her lips up along his arm, shivering across his skin.

This close, the intake of breath is very easy to note.

"Wysteria," is said softly, a murmur between them. A question.

They aren't married. Ellis has always insisted on certain limits between them regardless. But they have still never done this, even in all the times they've shared a bed.

His soft use of her name doesn't waylay her. What it does accomplish is the sharpening of the point of her attention, something of the playful spark in her expression veering sideways into a more fixed curiosity. The shape of her pulse, conveniently placed near to his wrist, jumps faintly. For the bed is very large and he is cinched in close alongside her and doesn't need to be. And the line of his arm is warm and so is the soft sense of his breathing. In the low light, she can just make out the faintest shadow of the line her nail had scratched across his cheek. Between it and his hand at her jaw, she is reminded of the earlier set of her thumb against his mouth.

The tip of her chin rises just a little—

"Will you kiss me?" isn't a tentative question even if she asks it quietly and follows it briskly with, "You may say no if you would prefer otherwise. But if you cared to, then I suppose I wouldn't mind."

Humor pulls at his expression, both for the idea of denying her and for the way she's phrased it. I suppose I wouldn't mind.

"I'm not in the habit of telling you no."

Consider: the agreement they've come to on this very night.

He doesn't leave her room for comment, regardless. He tightens his arm around her. They are already satisfyingly close, but Ellis narrows that slight space between them to a sliver before he lifts his head from the pillow to kiss her. It's a careful thing. Maintaining that space, returning his hand to her jaw without dislodging her grip, setting his fingers gently along her neck as he settles his hand.

It's a soft kiss. Not lacking in intent, just—

Soft. Considered. Attentive. Easily directed and easy to break off.

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