Day One: Wee Hours (Arthur/Morgaine)
Giftee: lit_chick08
Title: Wee Hours
Fandom: The Mists of Avalon
Pairing: Arthur/Morgaine
Rating: M
Word Count: 649
Prompt: The night they spent together during the Great Marriage. There had to be a reason neither of them could ever quite forget it (beyond the unintentional incest).
He dreams through a curtain of mist, colors and textures blurring and melding and whirring until he gives up trying to discern shapes or figures. A drum-beat, steady and uncompromising, penetrates the hazy air. He knows the sound, he remembers the pounding of hands and mallets on stretched deerskins- it lingers in his senses, along with the weight of antlers on his brow, the sticky slick of paints and dyes and bloods on his bare skin, the tang of berries and the richness of venison coating his tongue.
A man. A king. A god. And yet, when he looks upon his shadow on the wall or his misty reflection in the lake, he sees a boy. Not a leader, not a ruler, not a deity- just Sir Ector’s ward, the stripling boy trailing along after Cai, all skinned knees and knobbly elbows and ungainly limbs. Just Arthur.
He wakes with a shiver. The darkness is too thick to reveal anything; only the clicks of his eyelids when he blinks tells him that his eyes are open. A cold sweat dampens his skin, and the pelts beneath him stick uncomfortably to his back. His heart pounds in his throat- it is a familiar sensation held over from childhood, this waking in the dark with a panic seizing his heart. His earliest memories feature warm embraces, soft lips on his brow, a comforting hand in his hair and the coo of sweet melodies in his ear, soothing away the nighttime fears. Once upon a time, he convinced himself that his gentle protector must have been his mother, but he knows better now. The hands were too small, the arms too thin, the hair too dark...
His vision begins to adjust to the blackness surrounding him, and he can barely make out the outline of the priestess’ body as she lies at his side. He reaches down to catch a lock of her hair; in spite of its wild, curly thickness, the strands are fine, and they slip easily through his fingers. He cannot rightly remember whether she’s fair or dark- there’s little from the evening before that he can verify with any certainty- but for reasons he cannot begin to understand, he finds himself imagining (and hoping) that the waves he grasps and combs are inky-black. She smells of strange herbs and earthy perfumes, of dried blood and berry juice...and of something unnameable, something that pokes at the corners of his mind, teasing and tickling and vanishing before he can pin it to a meaning or a memory.
As he draws her closer, he feels the press of her breasts against him, and his cock stiffens at once. He thinks for a moment to take her again, here in the dark- either as God and Goddess or as man and woman, it scarcely makes a difference to him... But her breaths are steady and peaceful as she sleeps, and he hasn’t the heart to wake her. There will be time enough for that, he tells himself, willing away his natural impatience.
She stirs, and her face tilts into his neck, her lips parting over his pulse point. Arthur’s heart quickens, and he measures his breathing in an effort at restraint-
And then her arms wrap around him, warm and soft and comforting and sweet. The flutter of familiarity appears again, and he manages to grab hold for just an instant- a chill, strange and pleasurable all at once, creeps up his spine-
Then it disappears again, slipping through his fingers as easily as the girl’s sleek hair. But Arthur doesn’t fret; a buzz of satisfied drowsiness stills his mind and slows his heart, and he breathes a sigh as his eyes grow heavy once more. He gathers her close, limbs twining with limbs, and gives himself over to sleep, to the darkness, to the warmth and softness and indescribable peace.