Fic: Ancient Magic (Jack/Ianto NC-17)
Title: Ancient Magic
Author: wynkat1313
Pairing: Jack / Ianto, OC
Rating: NC-17 NC-17 for sexual content and some violence
Word Count: 7949
Warnings/Enticements: Near character death, magic, explicit sex
Spoilers: Mentions of events in EW
Summary: The first time I spoke Gwyn’s name out loud was the night my tad died. Standing in the park on the edge of the council estate, under a full moon, I threw my head back and called out to the King of the Tylwyth Teg to take me away or bring my tad back and make my mum stop crying every damn hour of every damn day.
Disclaimer: I don’t own the boys or their toys, I only wish I did.
Prompt: Written for temporal_witch and her request in the Mistletw Prompt Fest (whose link is breaking LJ code today for some reason)
Characters: Jack / Ianto (other team members optional)
Genre: Fluff, smut, angst, romance, h/c - mix or match at least two
Festive Theme: Winter Solstice, moonlight, memories, loneliness
Author’s Note One: Um… I’m not sure how to classify this story. It’s not an AU, though it’s dangerously close. It is fluff, mostly. But not. Um… yeah. Also I managed to most of Temp’s desires into one story, not sure if that’s good or bad. Hope this works for her
Author's Note Two: Mind the end notes, I've put all the translations in there for your viewing pleasure. :)
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There is a legend that says that on the longest night of the year the kings of the seasons must fight to ensure the health and vitality of the land. I may have grown up in the hills and valleys of Wales with its rich history of myth and legend, but I’ve always considered myself a practical person who didn’t put much stock in such magical nonsense. Even working for Torchwood hasn’t changed that. We deal with aliens and all the odd things the Rift throws at us day in and day out. But none of it is magical. It all has an explanation. I maybe have filed away more than my fair share of temporarily unexplained Rift Junk, but I know, deep inside, that some day, I, or one of my successors, will find that odd bit again, connect it with some random piece of data, and the mystery will be solved. The file will be put in its proper place, and the world will go on unchanged by any recourse to magic.
So how is it that I, one Ianto Jones Archivist and Support Staff for Torchwood Cardiff, found myself at an ancient Celtic tomb, on the winter solstice, face to face with battling kings, and wrapped all about in Welsh magic?
I have no bloody idea.
Except of course, I do work for Torchwood, I’m shagging Jack Harkness, who is his own kind of indefinable not-magic, and I’m bloody fucking Welsh.
I tried. I really really tried to ignore the myths my mum liked to tell about the Tylwyth Teg, the Good People, those folk some people call the faeries. I read books about maths and science and history at the dinner table, when I could get away with it. I poured video games and rock and roll into my brain as soon as my cousin Gwain introduced me to the one and MTV gave me the other. I did anything and everything to prove that her stories where just stories without power. But that was a lie, like so many other lies in my life. One I told to protect myself from what I most wanted to believe, that the Good People did exist. And that if I called to their King at the right hour, on the right night, he would come and take me away from the hell I thought my life was.
At 'r brenin chan Tylwyth Teg, a at eiddo banon
Gwyn ap Nudd
The first time I spoke Gwyn’s name out loud was the night my tad died. Standing in the park on the edge of the council estate, under a full moon; I threw my head back and called out to the King of the Tylwyth Teg to take me away or bring my tad back and make my mum stop crying every damn hour of every damn day.
But his name is not enough. You have to give him more. You have to be more for him to take you with him.
I thought I had put the Good People and magic behind me when I moved to London. Mum slipped away into her faerie tales and Rhiannon had Johnny and the kids. I didn’t need magic and magic had never done me any good anyway. Technology was the true king now-a-days, and I had a job working in the heart of technology’s court: Torchwood One.
Until the curtain was pulled aside and the monsters broke all the mirrors.
At 'r brenin chan Tylwyth Teg, a at eiddo banon
Gwyn ap Nudd
sy acw i mewn 'r choedwig
The second time I called to Gwyn ap Nudd, King of the Tylwyth Teg, was the night I moved Lisa into the Hub of Torchwood Three. I wanted him to take us away from the nightmare the Cybermen had brought into our lives. I wanted to be free of the pain of watching Lisa slip further and further away from me with each metal breath. Then Lisa had opened her cloudy eyes and smiled her false smile at me. She told me with her upgraded voice that she still had hope, still loved me, and had faith in me. She begged me to keep going for her. The prayer died on my lips, unfinished.
Third time I called to Gwyn ap Nudd was on the night of the winter solstice, from the heart of Maes-y-Filiast, the enormous megalithic burial chamber that the English call Tinkinswood cairn, under a full moon, and a blue full moon at that. Third times a charm as they say. Bloody magic. I called to him for myself, to take me into his court, not because I was afraid, or sick of living, or wanted him to fix anything. I called to him because I was dying and it was the right thing to do, at the right time, on the right night.
I lay in Jack’s arms, feeling my blood and my life seeping out of the bone deep slashes an alien had torn through my chest. Jack railed at fate and begged me not to die, but we both knew enough about wounds and the short-lived lives of Torchwood employees to know that this was my final night. And in that moment I stopped being afraid of death and magic and everything my mum had tried to tell me about the Good People. I let Jack take my weight, closed my eyes, and offered my many times stalled prayer up to the Tylwyth Teg’s Lord of the Hunt.
At 'r brenin chan Tylwyth Teg, a at eiddo banon
Gwyn ap Nudd
sy acw i mewn 'r choedwig
dros cara chan 'ch chychwïor
caniatewch ni at chofnoda 'ch yn cyfanheddu .
And the Lord of the Hunt came. Under the silver moon, to that holy place, he came to me.
He stepped out of the mist, a giant of a man wrapped all in black, his head crowned with antlers. He paced silently towards us, three whip-thin dogs bouncing around his feet as he moved. One dog was shinning white in the moonlight, one was blood red, the other was as black as its master’s cloak. A few meters in front of my outstretched legs he stopped.
“You remembered the old words young one,” The King of the Tylwyth Teg said with a smile. “You call to me rather than run from death, this is a brave thing.”
I coughed and struggled to sit up right. “I’ve had a good teacher, and a few harsh lessons,” I said gripping Jack’s hand.
“Indeed,” Gwyn ap Nudd bowed from his waist, sweeping his hands out to his sides, acknowledging both Jack and me.
“Why are you here?” Jack demanded.
He was so lost in his grief that he couldn’t feel the magic building around us. He didn’t understand what was happening. I wished I could explain, but I barely had the strength to address Gwyn.
“You know why,” Gwyn replied, nonplused.
“No.” Jack clutched at my arm. “No. You can’t have him. Not now. Not so soon…after…”
“After Toshiko Sato and Owen Harper.” Gwyn nodded. “Time does not favor the valiant. You should know that they are safe and, as far as any human can be after such lives as they have lived, happy.”
Jack gasped. “You’ve seen them?”
“No, but information about those who have crossed the boundaries between your world and mine is available to those who know how to look for such.”
Jack hung his head, the moment of joy and hope that had burst through him, gone in a flash.
I reached up to cup his face. “It’s okay Jack.”
“No! No it’s not.” Jack let me go and pushed himself into Gwyn’s face. “I won’t lose another team member. Not tonight. Not him.”
Gwyn reached out a hand to cup Jack’s cheek, covering the skin where my hand had been just a moment before. “That is not for you or I to decide.”
Jack pushed Gwyn’s hand away. “You have the power. This is your hunt. You say who lives or dies. Leave him to me. Just pass him by and leave him to me.”
“Jack…”
“No!”
“And why should I grant either of you such a blessing?”
“Jack… don’t do this…”
“Because he’s worth saving. He does everything for this damn world, for this city and asks for nothing but life in return. Isn’t that enough?”
“You know it is not. It never is. Was it enough when the Time Lord asked you for your life in defense of a metal world lifetimes from here?”
Jack rocked back on his heels, balled his hands into fist, and tried to stare down the Lord of the Wild Hunt.
Gwyn looked down at me with a sigh, then back to Jack. “A deal then; a challenge.”
Silver light flashed, cold and crisp. In Gwyn’s hands was a shinning sword as long as his arm, and on his head, fitted between his antlers, was a silver circlet.
“Best me, and you may keep him.”
Light flashed again, gold and warm like the sun in summer. In the ground before Jack, point down, was a second sword, twin to first in all but color. Hanging off its hilt was a golden circlet.
“If you are truly a defender of life, filled to the brim with the golden light of time, then stand against me in the ancient challenge; Summer King to Winter King”
“He’ll be dead before we make a single move!” Jack waved a hand towards me.
“I vow that he will suffer no further ill effects while we fight. Should you win, he remains with you, the sun reborn. Should I win, he joins me, and the clouds obscure your light for a time.”
Gwyn raised his sword. “Do you agree?”
Jack looked over at me.
I didn’t know what to believe any more. We were so far beyond our Hub and the alien hunt that had dragged us out of bed and what passed for normal in our lives. For all I had called to Gwyn willing to step from life to death, if someone was going to give me a choice, I found that didn’t want to die. I didn’t want to leave Jack to his memories and his silent suffering, but I also didn’t want him to play the romantic fool for me. What do you say to someone in such a moment?
“You don’t have to do this Jack.”
“Yes… yes I do.”
Jack tugged the circlet off the sword hilt and placed it on his head. He took his greatcoat off and draped it over my shoulders, still warm with his body heat. Then he picked up the sword in both hands, took a stance, and faced the King.
With a quiet word, Gwyn sent his three dogs to sit beside me. Beyond the mist-cloaked circle other dogs howled and horses pawed the damp ground. Gwyn raised his sword high above his head, and the restive noises stopped.
Gwyn lowered his sword, and with his other hand undid the sliver stag’s head clasp that held his cloak in place, then draped the cloak over my legs. The fabric was cool to the touch, but did help keep the chill from getting into my bones. With another whispered command, the white dog inched behind me and offered its flank as a back rest.
Gwyn ap Nudd turned back to Jack, moonlight glinting off the silver circlet. He raised his sword in both hands and saluted Jack. From behind us, the towering bulk of Maes-y-Filiast’s capstone cast moon-gilded shadows on what was now a battle field.
I would like to be able to say that I remember each and every move that Jack and Gwyn made as they circled and feinted, testing each other’s weaknesses and strengths, but I don’t. While Gwyn’s magic kept me on Jack’s side of the living, I had lost so much blood that I was barely conscious. I slipped in and out of awareness as the two fought.
Each time I opened my eyes the scene before me was different. Each one slipping and falling or tumbling out of the way as their swords clashed and separated. Cuts marked each body, but I never saw who drew first blood. Each was breathing hard, working to the height of their skills, looking for a way in through the other’s defense. And all the while each fighter was growing more and more to represent the king whose crown they wore.
At one point I opened my eyes to see gods dancing before me rather than man and fey. Gwyn’s body appeared to be carved of bone and limed in silver. As he danced past me, cold air and hail stones followed, only to be melted away by the warmth of Jack’s golden light and the summer wind that moved in his wake. With each sweep of the Summer King’s sword Jack seemed to take on more of the King’s mantle. His movements were lithe and fluid, like a sapling freed from the husk of its seed, and his skin shimmered with sun-kissed light.
I awoke a final time to the howl of the dogs to see Gwyn on his back between my feet and Jack standing over him, the point of his sword grazing Gywn’s frost-colored neck.
“Yield,” Jack commanded.
“You must complete the kill,” Gwyn said quietly, dropping his sword and letting his arms fall open at his sides.
“Yield.”
“No.”
“Damn you! Yield!”
“Jack…” I understood his reluctance to kill an unarmed being, but I also remembered the twists and turns of myth. “You have to do it.”
“No.” Jack choked back a sob. “There’s been too much death.”
“It must be this way,” Gwyn said. “Trust me.”
Jack starred at Gwyn for a long moment, then took a shuddering breath, drew the sword above his head, and plunged it into the king’s heart. All around the clearing dogs howled, horses neighed, and spirit voices cried out in undulating waves of sound.
As the sword entered the pulsing muscle I felt a burst of energy, like a sonic boom, press out from Gwyn’s heart and then explode across Maes-y-Filiast. Tendrils of silver and gold light followed, pouring out of the open wound.
As I watched, the strands of light did not blend to form one cohesive color, but rather coiled and twisted around one another, the sword, and Gwyn’s body like vines of living light. Gwyn sighed once, rising up around the sword, then collapsed onto the ground. As he did, the light lines flew from his body, across the gap to my feet and began to wrap around my legs.
The combined energies of Summer and Winter spiraled up and along my body attending to my wounds as it went. It was like nothing I have ever felt. Not even the electrical charge of Lisa’s blast that nearly killed me, felt like this. This was fire and ice, light and dark, life and death, breathe and the absence of breathe, all coiled into one moment that went on forever. Every nerve-ending reacted and then overloaded in an instant. And then the twisted strands of light found the wounds in my chest.
I howled past my throat’s ability to make sounds as the torn edges were dragged back, toward each other, knitted into place, and life energy was force fed into my body. I surged up, shaking, the light behind my eyes blinding, then fell into Jack’s waiting arms.
“It’s okay, I’ve got you,” Jack murmured, over and over as my heart found its natural rhythm and the blood stopped screaming in my ears.
Moments later the twin lights washed out of me with a sigh, and only the barest of tingling of sensation thankfully, to spill back into Gwyn. The King’s body shuddered several times and then stopped moving.
Stillness settled over the cairn. Even the dogs were silent, hovering around their master as though waiting for something they could not explain to us humans. The mist lifted, revealing the many-shaped Wild Hunt that had been watching beyond the circle of power. They too were silent, waiting and watching.
Clouds passed in front of the moon hiding its silver light. In the darkness the swords of the two kings flashed silver and gold. A moment later all color vanished, the moon showed her face again, and Gwyn sat up. His three dogs barked with joy, leaping up and around him, licking his face and wagging their tails, looking, despite their other-worldly colors, like normal dogs.
Gwyn hugged each dog in turn, then turned to face Jack and me, a gentle smile on his angular face.
“You’re alive,” I said, surprised and yet not.
“Yes,” Gwyn nodded.
“How?” Jack asked.
Gwyn laughed. “You will not like the answer.”
“We work for Torchwood and catch alien’s for a living,” Jack insisted.
“Magic.”
“No such thing,” Jack scoffed.
“You can believe in aliens and time travel but not magic?” I asked Jack with a quirk of an eye brow for both him and myself. It seemed I was starting to believe in magic after all these years.
“I don’t have to believe that aliens or time travel exist; I know they do. The one we see every day and the other I’ve done. Magic is…”
“Not real…” Gwyn offered.
“Um…” Jack looked around the cairn, at the grass that fairly glowed with magic, at the dogs in their red, white and black coats, at the host of the Wild hunt with their non-human, but also non-alien shapes, and shook his head, bewildered.
I chuckled, and after a moment Jack joined in.
“Thank you,” Jack said to Gwyn.
“Thank you,” Gwyn replied, bowing his head.
Jack frowned. “I don’t understand.”
“What is tonight?”
When Jack continued to look confused, Gwyn turned to me. After a moment of thought I looked at Gwyn with wide eyes. “Of course,” I said, and then turned to Jack. “Tonight is the Winter Solstice. The longest night of the year.”
“Ok?” Jack asked, clearly not getting the significance.
“Tonight,” Gwyn replied. “And each solstice night, the kings of summer and winter fight for the health and honor of the earth. This night you stood as the land’s king in the oldest sense of the word. And through your actions my blood was spilled, thus renewing the cycle.”
“I’m no king,” Jack said.
“A title does not make a man a king,” Gwyn said. “You have been this land’s champion, both in word and deed.”
Jack looked out over the field, speechless for once.
After a time Jack turned back. “And Ianto’s life?”
“My gift. To you both.”
Gwyn turned away, his eyes and body seeking something beyond the burial mound. After a long moment he shook himself, the tips of his antlers sawing through the darkness like silvered finger bones, and turned back to Jack. He nodded in my direction. “He should not be moved until morning. The energy of the healing will need time to complete its work and it is better done here where the land is seeped in holiness.”
“There are some blankets in the SUV…” Jack began.
“No need,” Gwyn cut him off. He waved a hand to the host behind him. A jingle of tack and rustle of leather announced the moment of several forms descending from their horses. Gwyn glanced down at the supplies piled in their hands and nodded. With deft movements and silent communication the attendants marked out an area directly in front of the cairn’s with torches, blankets, pillows and a basket provisions. When they were done, they hefted the body of the alien, whose exploits had dragged us into this strange night, and returned to their horses as silently as they had come.
Gwyn helped Jack move me onto the blankets, then retrieved his cloak, swinging it smoothly over his shoulders and pinning it into place.
“Nothing will bother you here within the Summer King’s circle. When the sun rises you will know, even if the clouds should obscure the view. The circle will settle back into the earth and it will be safe for both of you to leave.”
“And that’s all?” Jack asked.
“Yes.”
“What about the Summer Solstice? Do we have to do this all over again? Or next winter?”
“No,” Gwyn said, though there was a sadness in his eyes as he spoke. “But should you have need of me, either of you, come here and call my name three times and I will answer. You have each earned that much of me.”
With that the King of the Winter Hunt bowed to us and walked to his waiting mount. He leapt onto the coal black charger and waved the hunt off into the night, dogs barking at their heels.
As the hunt left I could feel the energy of the summer circle lock into place around us. The air warmed and there was the smell of fresh grass in the air. Around us lightning bugs appeared, flashing on and off in their primordial rhythm.
Jack turned in a wide circle, looking around in wonder and then final stood before me and smiled.
I held out a hand. A cluster of lightning bugs settled with a buzz and flash of golden light in my palm. I smiled and shook my head in wonder. It had been ages since I had seen a lightning bug let alone held so many in my hand. It was like being in the most perfect garden ever invented.
“I think I’m starting to believe in magic,” Jack said, sitting stiffly beside me.
“Hard not to on a night like this.”
“True,” Jack nodded watching in fascination as the lightning bugs danced along my hand. He tilted his head to look at me. I knew the gash was still there across my chest though the edges were closed and felt like they were healing with each passing minute. “How are you feeling?”
I tossed the bugs into the air with a gentle flip, then ran a hand along the wound, feeling the repaired edges. “Sore mostly. And tired. I’m just as glad to not have to go anywhere yet. I’m not entirely certain I could make it back to the SUV at the moment, to tell you the truth.”
Jack nodded.
“How are you?” I asked.
We both looked down at a slash in his trouser leg. Blood had stained the edges where Gwyn’s blade had cut into the muscle. Jack prodded the cut and winced.
“Right mess we are,” I said, chuckling.
“Yeah.”
“Drag that basket over here and let’s see what they left us.”
“Why me?”
“Newly risen from the dead here. Hello?”
“Please, I do that all the time.”
“Wanker,” I tossed a handful of grass at him.
“You know it.” Jack grinned over his shoulder at me as he crawled toward the basket.
“Get the damn basket before I toss you out of your own circle, your Majesty!”
We ate in companionable silence for a time, feeding each other bits of bread and fruit, roasted meat and slices of cheese. It was the closest thing to a romantic evening we’d ever managed. Leave it to us to need an alien and a king of the Tylwyth Teg to make that happen.
After a time I pulled a bottle of golden liquid out of the basket and passed it to Jack, who whistled appreciatively. I looked over at him with a raised eyebrow. Jack turned the bottle to face me. On the front was a silver and gold embossed image of a Stag’s head.
“So?”
“So…” Jack replied, cracking the wax seal on the bottle and taking a whiff of the contents. “Oh yeah,” he said with a smile. “There’s a little distillery in Scotland that makes something much like this, and I’m willing to bet you a month’s wages that I now know where they got the idea for the recipe! ”
“My salary or your’s?”
Jack winked. “Gwen’s.”
“Now that’s a deal. Rhys’ll pitch a fit if she comes home with any more designer boots. Huh. There’s only one cup,” I said digging in the basket.
Jack leered at me. “I guess we’ll just have to make do then.” Jack took the cup from me; a silver chalice studded with gemstones, and poured a measure of the golden liquid, then held it under my nose. “Smell.”
I sniffed at the liquid. “Honey?”
Jack nodded.
Jack took a sip of the golden liquid and leaned in to kiss me. As our lips touched and mine opened, the honey-whiskey slid between us to fill my mouth. Jack’s tongue followed the liquid.
I closed my eyes, swallowed, and as the whiskey blazed down my throat, battled Jack for every last drop of the fiery liquid in our mouths.
“That…was…” I said, trying to catch my breath and having no idea where my brain had dissolved to.
“Good stuff, huh?”
“Mmm.” I nodded, my eyes still closed.
I heard Jack dipped something in the chalice and then his index finger was painting my lips with the honey-whiskey. I let my head fall back, lips curving in a soft smile. I licked my lips with a sigh as his finger slipped away. A moment later Jack’s finger was back, painting them with whiskey again. His mouth caught mine in a kiss before I could lick away the potent liquor.
“So tell me,” Jack whispered, as he teased my lips with another finger tip of whiskey. “What else does the Summer King get besides a sword, a crown, and a handsome man for the Solstice?”
I sucked Jack’s finger into my mouth, pulling the sweet liquid off with my tongue. I could tell when Jack closed his eyes, his whole body melted into mine and he forgot his question. I smiled and worked at keeping all his attention on the tip of his finger. I dragged the edges of my teeth over his knuckle and ran the tip of my tongue along the sides of the twitching digit. He moaned deep in his throat and offered a second finger to my mercies. I suckled at his warm fingers, hungry for the taste of him and the fire of the whiskey, then bit down just enough to make his cock, and mine for that matter, take notice.
While Jack was lost in sensations, I returned the favor and swirled my fingers in the chalice then pressed two wet fingers between his lips. Jack moaned and sucked greedily at my fingers.
“The King,” I said, my voice breathy and dark. Jack opened his eyes to find me watching him. His pupils were blown so wide his eyes were nearly black. The desire coiling out from him toward me was almost tangible. I swallowed around his fingers and he groaned as I pulled away. “The King gets his lover, body and soul, and together they feed the land.”
Jack stopped breathing. His whole body tensed. He stared at me, uncertainty creeping in along the edges of desire. We never said such things to each other. Love. Lover. Beloved. Those were words for other people, not for us. Another lie I have kept so very well.
“Of course all those old legends insist that his lover has to be a woman, but somehow I don’t think the land or the gods give a damn so long as the respect and the magic are there, do you?”
I pulled my fingers from his mouth and sat up straight. I felt caught in Gwyn’s magic and the power of the night, yet terrified that if I said the wrong thing or did the wrong thing, this moment would shatter and I would lose more than I had to give.
I raised a hand and ran it lightly along Jack’s jaw. The feel of his skin on under mine was like fire. It burned and feed me at the same time.
When Jack said nothing my heart twisted. I felt like and idiot, and yet everything around me was telling me not to give up, even if it was all just an illusion for this one moment of displaced time created by the Tylwyth Teg.
“Just for tonight,” I said. “Let that be us - King and Consort,” I stumbled over the last word but held on to Jack’s gaze. Jack for his own part seemed to be having trouble breathing. “No alien’s or death or fear. Just the magic that Gwyn left for us. In the morning, if you want, we can share a cup of retcon and forget this ever happened.”
I tossed out the last line, like it was the simplest, least important thing in the world. I offered it to Jack as though it was just a passing fancy. One more lie added to the pile.
Jack reached out to stroke my check and I leaned into the blazing heat of his hand.
“I take my coffee black, thank you very much,” Jack said at last.
My eyes had to have been shining like twin torches, but I managed to keep my voice level. “Of course, sir.”
Jack stood up, and with a few easy moves, was standing nude before me. I had to smile at that. Jack without clothes was like a cat in a patch of sunlight, happy and purring. Jack smiled back at me, knowingly, and knelt to help me with my clothes and the remnants of my jacket. When my shirt and waistcoat were gone, he stopped to trace the healing gash on my chest, his face lined with sorrow.
“Don’t,” I said, putting a hand over his.
He looked up at me, fear in his eyes. He searched my face and whatever he saw must have satisfied him because the light returned. He leaned in and kissed me, soft and playful, all smiles and laughter. Then with his help, because damn if my chest didn’t hurt and make it hard to move, my trousers and pants slid away, and I was as nude as he was.
“Let’s do this right,” he said settling back on his knees.
I would swear that the energy in that circle contracted at his words. Everything was waiting once more, waiting with such need and desire that it was hard to breathe. I nodded and offered him the chalice.
Jack took a deep breath and held it to my lips. “Will you drink of Summer with me?”
I nodded and took a sip.
Jack took another breath and then smiled at me. “Will you stand as Consort to the Summer King?”
I swallowed several times and then placed my hands over his on the chalice. “Yes.”
Jack released the chalice into my hands and winked at me. I rolled my eyes, he really was too cute for his own good. I thought about what I was supposed to say now. I looked around at the circle. It was warm and lush, green and gold. Summer at its most idyllic. While we had been eating and talking, flowers had appeared in the cracks of the cairn stones and amongst the grass. They were bright splashes of color and fragrance that added another layer to the feeling of being in a sacred grove.
Just beyond the circle, darkness and moonlight still held power. We were truly cut out of time and the everyday. We were in a summer that would end with the sunrise. All we had was this moment.
I took a deep breath to compose myself, then looked at Jack and nearly dropped the chalice. He was shinning with an internal glow just as he had been during the fight with Gwyn. He was Jack, but he was also once again the Summer King.
I raised the chalice to his lips. “Will you drink of Summer with me?”
Jack the King smiled and bowed his head to take a sip. When he raised his head, my Jack looked out from his eyes, with a wicked gleam, nearly daring me to go through with what I had started. Right. Well, two could play that game. I smiled back, no longer confused or afraid of the outcome of my actions. I offered Jack the chalice once more.
“Will you accept me as Consort to the Summer King?”
Jack the King smiled broadly and placed his hands over mine. “Oh will I ever.”
Together we raised the chalice to his lips, his eyes never leaving mine. He took a sip and then licked his lips with a grin.
I started to take the chalice away, to place it beside the basket, but stopped. Something in the circle was not complete. There was one last step to take. I looked up at Jack. He nodded, clearly having felt the ripple as well.
After a moments thought I poured some of the whiskey onto the grass. “For Summer and Life.”
Jack nodded again, looking pleased, then took the chalice from me. He thought a moment, looking around the burial mound and the land beyond. He held the chalice up toward the entrance of Maes-y-Filiast.
“In honor of Winter and Death,” he said, as he poured a measure of whiskey onto the grass before placing the chalice down beside the picnic basket.
Jack surged toward me, hunger in his eyes. He hooked one hand around my neck to pull me toward him. “Mine,” he growled low in his throat.
“Your’s,” I acknowledged. Forever, said my heart.
We kissed. More a press of need than any gentle seduction on either of our parts. The whiskey and the magic had done their job. We were each burning hot inside and out. Our tongues met in their own battle, chasing each other from mouth to mouth, seeking out those spots we knew would draw moans out of the other.
I reached my hands around Jack’s waist and pulled him to me, clawing at his skin just for the sheer joy of feeling the heat and flesh of him. I didn’t care that it hurt to press his skin against the wound on my chest; I just wanted to feel him, to be inside him, and for him to be inside me. But Jack must have heard me hiss in pain because he pulled back. He changed the angle of the kiss, never stopping, but moving us apart enough to make his way along my jaw and down my neck.
Jack dipped his head lower, kissing and licking along the healing wound across my chest. With each touch of his lips and stroke of his tongue I shivered and burned until I was crying with pleasure and pain. Each touch more intense than mere lips could be.
Jack raised his head. “Are you okay?”
I felt like I was vibrating along every never. My heart was racing and I could barely fill my lungs with enough air to breathe. I had closed my eyes, overwhelmed with sensations and had locked my hands on his arms for balance and strength. I couldn’t think or speak, all I could do was throb with need and pain and desire.
“Ianto…”
I took a deep breath and opened my eyes, trying to see Jack through the blazing fire in my head.
“Talk to me.”
“Hard to…explain,” I gulped at the warm air. “Intense. It hurts but it doesn’t. It feels amazing and terrible all at once. It’s as though you’re pressing something into me with each touch.”
“Like this?”
Jack held me upright, his arms taking the weight of my blissed out body, and kissed my shoulder, a bare patch with no injury. I sighed but not in the near mindless pleasure of before.
I shook my head, sinking into the feeling of his lips. “Different.”
“Like this…”
He kissed his way across and back to the wound. As soon as his lips touched the nearly scarred over gash I cried out again. Jack sucked the thick tissue into his mouth making me writhe in his arms. He let the skin back out slowly and traced the markings of the scar with his tongue. I could only whimper.
“You should…oh gods… ” I dragged in a deep breath between moans, “…market that.”
Jack chuckled. “With you as the display model, we’d be rich over night.”
I lifted a hand to bat at him. “Prat.”
“Beautiful.”
“’Am not…” he cut off my protests with a smoldering kiss only to leave me breathless and weaving on my knees in the middle of the circle.
“Don’t move,” he said, crawling back to the basket. Really? I wondered. Where was I going to go? We’d already short circuited my brain with a few kisses and a bit of Fey magic. Moving was the last thing on my mind.
Jack came back with a small bottle in his hand and a huge grin on his face. “Gwyn’s people know how to stock a basket. Oil,” he said holding up the bottle. “It’s even warm.
“I want to see your face when you come, but I have a feeling the magic will work better if we are both upright while we do this. You up for that?” Jack asked nodding to my chest.
“I won’t break,” I said, with more certainty than I felt. Though if I did break I didn’t think it would be because of our choice of sexual position.
“It might hurt.”
Lord but the man could be a dolt at times. I pulled him toward me by his neck, because that never ever gets old, nor does the look on his face when I take what I want. I licked and bit my way toward his ear and then made him shut up. “Stop worrying and fuck me.”
Jack can be an idiot, but he does obey orders. His fingers were slathered with oil and pressing into my ass moments later. I held on, chewing at the join between his neck and shoulder, loving the sensations of his fingers pressing and stretching me wide open. Then we were both moaning as I started to fuck myself on his fingers, impatient to feel movement and that perfect pressure against my prostate.
Jack pulled his fingers out, shushing me with a kiss as I moaned over the missing fullness. He slicked up both our cocks and with a little cautious maneuvering helped me rise up over his thighs and slide down inch by glorious inch onto his rock hard dick.
We stayed like that for awhile, my arms around his neck, his around my back, holding me tight to his chest, my own throbbing cock, oil-slicked and burning between us. We touched our lips together, gentle and soft, no longer fighting for control, just brushing and breathing with each other. I licked his lips, tasting honey and wood-smoke and dropped my head back with a sigh. He pressed kisses to my out-stretched neck, making me shiver and moan.
Then Jack began to move, ever so slowly drawing down and out and then pushing back in and up. Over and over and over. Wave after wave of languid bliss pushing and pulling at my ass and my cock as we glided in and out of each other’s skin.
I could feel the pressure building inside of me and around us. I could almost see the air shimmering with tension.
“Can you feel it Jack?” I groaned into his neck.
Jack just closed his eyes and pressed back into me.
I could feel it, just there beyond the range of human awareness, there was something. A wave of gold and silver something glowing with power and energy. It was spiraling in around us with each thrust. I felt the energy tighten down as he moved and as I met him thrust for thrust.
“Jack…” I begged.
“I can feel it Ianto,” he gasped.
Jack pulled out again inch by inch and I felt the pressure in the air around us change again. We were both so close. Everything was so close. But something more was needed. Jack must have felt the need as well because he changed the pace of the dance. He went from gentle to hard in a moment. He slammed into me, and we both forgot to worry about my injury as the pleasure pushed us to the edge of reason.
“Jack…oh god ohgod! Jack!”
“Just a little… further,” he moaned.
Jack slammed into me again and again, and then everything coalesced at the point that was us and exploded outward. I came screaming Jack’s name over and over again, clamping down around his cock and dragging him over the edge into the blazing light.
“Guide it!” Jack shouted through the heat. “Hold on, and guide it with me.”
I clutched at the sound of his voice and clawed my way back to consciousness enough to feel the magic boiling around us, looking for direction. We had brought the energy of life and now it needed focus. I struggled to pull up the words of my childhood, praying that whatever came out of my mouth would be the right thing.
“Buchedd achos Buchedd
Besgi 'r Dirio
Besgi 'r Boblogi
Feddyginiaetha ni pawb”
Sunlight poured out of us, spilling into the ground like the thickest richest semen ever found. It soaked into the earth and crawled across the countryside filling nooks and crannies. I could feel it spreading out around us. I could see, with my eyes closed, watching an inner map that blossomed like the land itself, as every inch of Wales was filled with the warmth of the summer sun and the potentiality of new life.
I sagged in Jack’s arms gasping for breathe and laughing at the same time. I felt drunk and high and oh so well fucked. With that same inner map I could see Jack glowing green and gold in my arms, the very essence of life.
I took another breathe and my laughter turned into tears that I couldn’t stop.
“Shhhh,” Jack whispered. “It’s okay.”
He lifted me off him and settled us both onto a pile of pillows while I cried for everything that had ever lived and died on earth. Every flower and plant, every animal, every child and adult everywhere at any time was suddenly in my heart and pouring through me.
“So much life,” I sobbed. “So much death.”
Jack nodded, and kissed my hair, and held me close.
“Can you feel them? Can you see them?”
“Yes,” he whispered. “I see them all.”
“The price of the Summer King.”
Jack shook his head. “No. The power of the Summer Consort. To see all that has come before and all that may yet come to be. To know the cost of life and death.”
I turned my head into his chest and let the tears flow, let the sorrow pass out of me, back into the earth where it belonged. I tried to remember that I was merely human, not some god-form like Jack or the Summer King he had manifested. That I was just boring old me.
“You are never boring,” Jack said, tugging my face toward his.
“Borrowing magic to listen to my thoughts now?” I teased.
“Whatever works.” Jack nipped at my bottom lip, and even as worn out as I was, I could not help but moan as the contact stirred a response in my groin. “Power only flows where it has a common pathway. The Consort could never have come to life in you if some part of you were not already in alignment with the King’s Consort.”
“Reading up on magic are we?”
Jack just looked at me with that look that everyone else gives him when he is trying to avoid a conversation. I really hate it when he uses that look on me.
“Fine,” I said, sitting up to look down at Jack’s sweat-streaked body. “If I accept your reasoning, which I am not completely certain I do, then the same holds true for you. You could not have worn the Summer King’s mantle and defeated Gwyn, if you were not exactly what Gwyn named you - this land’s champion.”
Jack closed his eyes, breathing deeply. I could feel the tension spiral around his heart. He didn’t want to be anyone’s champion; he liked his life without labels.
I straddled Jack’s hips and watched his eyes open in surprise. I pressed a finger to his lips silencing whatever protest or joke he was about to utter. The energy of Summer was pressing against us once more. Some how it knew all the pain and confusion that Jack and I were both struggling with, and was there waiting to help.
I threw my head back and stretched out my arms, feeling golden light well up in the palms of my hands. I opened my heart to the Consort and let Him speak through me to Jack and to the King.
At 'r brenin chan Haf, a at eiddo chyfeillacha
Jack Harkness
sy ‘ma i mewn 'r choedwig
dros cara chan 'ch chychwïor.
Cadw ni 'n ddihangol i mewn 'ch arennau
Jack shook under my legs, his cock standing at attention once more, rubbing gloriously along mine. He cried out, part throb of bliss, part pain. I wrapped my hands around both our cocks and fed all the energy that was pulsing around us into both of us through that aching point.
It was like be at the center of a lighting bolt or the heart of a firestorm. Jolts of electricity shot through me from my groin up through my chest into my head and arms. I was blind with sensation and the sound of Jack’s voice calling my name through his moans. His hands joined mine on our cocks and the pressure increased, shutting off any coherent thought I might have had. I was spinning, burning, flying, and dying all at once. We moved together stroking up and down along our shafts, pressing the energy higher and deeper into ourselves and the air around us.
Then Jack’s voice changed. His welsh for once even better than mine. His moans became words bringing me back down to earth and to him.
At 'r chyfeillacha chan Haf, a at eiddo brenin
Ianto Jones
sy ‘ma i mewn 'r choedwig
dros cara chan 'ch chychwïor.
Cadw ni 'n ddihangol i mewn 'ch arennau
His words were like a key in a lock. Every muscle in my body clenched and then released in one rippling wave of light and heat, sweat and come. I screamed because there was no other option. I was being ripped open and filled to capacity at the same time. And Jack was right there beside me exploding and crying out as we came all over each others hands and chests.
When the sun broke through the clouds on the morning on the 22nd of December, Jack and I were still asleep, tangled in each others arms and wrapped in a blanket of magical warmth. We awoke long enough to take note of the change in the day and the opening of the Summer King’s circle. We poured a portion of honey-whiskey onto the dew-damp grass in thanks to both the King and his Consort, then wrapped ourselves in blankets and went back to sleep. Wales, and Torchwood, could bloody well wait a few more hours. We had already done our bit for King and country, as it were, and figured we deserved a bit of a lie-in for once.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
End Notes:
All Welsh translations in this story are by:
http://www.translation-guide.com/free_online_translators.php?from=English&to=Welsh
What this means is that the words are accurate but are not necessarily grammatically correct.
Call to Gwyn ap Nudd
"To the king of Spirits (and to his queen)
Gwyn ap Nudd,
you who are yonder in the forest,
for love of your mate,
permit us to enter your dwelling."
This is from the 14th Century Latin:
ad regem Eumenidium et reginam eius: Gwynn ap Nwdd qui es ultra in silvis pro amore concubine tue permitte nos venire domum"
Source:
Medieval folklore: an encyclopedia of myths, legends, tales, beliefs, and customs ed. Carl Lindahl, John McNamara, John Lindow. Oxford University Press, 2002. p. 190.
The distillery really does exist it is Meikles of Scotland Limited in Newtonmore, Scotland. The golden liquid they make is called Stag’s Breath It is amazing and bloody hard to get in the US but well worth the effort! http://stagsbreath.co.uk/retail/default.htm
Ianto's words to chanel the energy into the Land:
Life for Life
Feed the Land
Feed the People
Heal us all
- blessing by Wynkat1313
Ianto and the Consort's Words to Jack and the King:
To the King of Summer (and to his Consort)
Jack Harkness,
you who are here in the forest,
for love of your mate,
Keep us safe in your arms
-modified invocation by Wynkat1313
Jack and the King's words to Ianto and the Consort:
To the Consort of Summer (and to his King)
Ianto Jones,
you who are here in the forest,
for love of your mate,
Keep us safe in your arms
-modified invocation by Wynkat1313
Info on Gwyn ap Nudd for those who are interested:
http://www.joellessacredgrove.com/Celtic/deitiesg-h-i.html
Info on Maes-y-Filiast / Tinkinswood
http://www.stonepages.com/wales/wales.html
Author: wynkat1313
Pairing: Jack / Ianto, OC
Rating: NC-17 NC-17 for sexual content and some violence
Word Count: 7949
Warnings/Enticements: Near character death, magic, explicit sex
Spoilers: Mentions of events in EW
Summary: The first time I spoke Gwyn’s name out loud was the night my tad died. Standing in the park on the edge of the council estate, under a full moon, I threw my head back and called out to the King of the Tylwyth Teg to take me away or bring my tad back and make my mum stop crying every damn hour of every damn day.
Disclaimer: I don’t own the boys or their toys, I only wish I did.
Prompt: Written for temporal_witch and her request in the Mistletw Prompt Fest (whose link is breaking LJ code today for some reason)
Characters: Jack / Ianto (other team members optional)
Genre: Fluff, smut, angst, romance, h/c - mix or match at least two
Festive Theme: Winter Solstice, moonlight, memories, loneliness
Author’s Note One: Um… I’m not sure how to classify this story. It’s not an AU, though it’s dangerously close. It is fluff, mostly. But not. Um… yeah. Also I managed to most of Temp’s desires into one story, not sure if that’s good or bad. Hope this works for her
Author's Note Two: Mind the end notes, I've put all the translations in there for your viewing pleasure. :)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
There is a legend that says that on the longest night of the year the kings of the seasons must fight to ensure the health and vitality of the land. I may have grown up in the hills and valleys of Wales with its rich history of myth and legend, but I’ve always considered myself a practical person who didn’t put much stock in such magical nonsense. Even working for Torchwood hasn’t changed that. We deal with aliens and all the odd things the Rift throws at us day in and day out. But none of it is magical. It all has an explanation. I maybe have filed away more than my fair share of temporarily unexplained Rift Junk, but I know, deep inside, that some day, I, or one of my successors, will find that odd bit again, connect it with some random piece of data, and the mystery will be solved. The file will be put in its proper place, and the world will go on unchanged by any recourse to magic.
So how is it that I, one Ianto Jones Archivist and Support Staff for Torchwood Cardiff, found myself at an ancient Celtic tomb, on the winter solstice, face to face with battling kings, and wrapped all about in Welsh magic?
I have no bloody idea.
Except of course, I do work for Torchwood, I’m shagging Jack Harkness, who is his own kind of indefinable not-magic, and I’m bloody fucking Welsh.
I tried. I really really tried to ignore the myths my mum liked to tell about the Tylwyth Teg, the Good People, those folk some people call the faeries. I read books about maths and science and history at the dinner table, when I could get away with it. I poured video games and rock and roll into my brain as soon as my cousin Gwain introduced me to the one and MTV gave me the other. I did anything and everything to prove that her stories where just stories without power. But that was a lie, like so many other lies in my life. One I told to protect myself from what I most wanted to believe, that the Good People did exist. And that if I called to their King at the right hour, on the right night, he would come and take me away from the hell I thought my life was.
At 'r brenin chan Tylwyth Teg, a at eiddo banon
Gwyn ap Nudd
The first time I spoke Gwyn’s name out loud was the night my tad died. Standing in the park on the edge of the council estate, under a full moon; I threw my head back and called out to the King of the Tylwyth Teg to take me away or bring my tad back and make my mum stop crying every damn hour of every damn day.
But his name is not enough. You have to give him more. You have to be more for him to take you with him.
I thought I had put the Good People and magic behind me when I moved to London. Mum slipped away into her faerie tales and Rhiannon had Johnny and the kids. I didn’t need magic and magic had never done me any good anyway. Technology was the true king now-a-days, and I had a job working in the heart of technology’s court: Torchwood One.
Until the curtain was pulled aside and the monsters broke all the mirrors.
At 'r brenin chan Tylwyth Teg, a at eiddo banon
Gwyn ap Nudd
sy acw i mewn 'r choedwig
The second time I called to Gwyn ap Nudd, King of the Tylwyth Teg, was the night I moved Lisa into the Hub of Torchwood Three. I wanted him to take us away from the nightmare the Cybermen had brought into our lives. I wanted to be free of the pain of watching Lisa slip further and further away from me with each metal breath. Then Lisa had opened her cloudy eyes and smiled her false smile at me. She told me with her upgraded voice that she still had hope, still loved me, and had faith in me. She begged me to keep going for her. The prayer died on my lips, unfinished.
Third time I called to Gwyn ap Nudd was on the night of the winter solstice, from the heart of Maes-y-Filiast, the enormous megalithic burial chamber that the English call Tinkinswood cairn, under a full moon, and a blue full moon at that. Third times a charm as they say. Bloody magic. I called to him for myself, to take me into his court, not because I was afraid, or sick of living, or wanted him to fix anything. I called to him because I was dying and it was the right thing to do, at the right time, on the right night.
I lay in Jack’s arms, feeling my blood and my life seeping out of the bone deep slashes an alien had torn through my chest. Jack railed at fate and begged me not to die, but we both knew enough about wounds and the short-lived lives of Torchwood employees to know that this was my final night. And in that moment I stopped being afraid of death and magic and everything my mum had tried to tell me about the Good People. I let Jack take my weight, closed my eyes, and offered my many times stalled prayer up to the Tylwyth Teg’s Lord of the Hunt.
At 'r brenin chan Tylwyth Teg, a at eiddo banon
Gwyn ap Nudd
sy acw i mewn 'r choedwig
dros cara chan 'ch chychwïor
caniatewch ni at chofnoda 'ch yn cyfanheddu .
And the Lord of the Hunt came. Under the silver moon, to that holy place, he came to me.
He stepped out of the mist, a giant of a man wrapped all in black, his head crowned with antlers. He paced silently towards us, three whip-thin dogs bouncing around his feet as he moved. One dog was shinning white in the moonlight, one was blood red, the other was as black as its master’s cloak. A few meters in front of my outstretched legs he stopped.
“You remembered the old words young one,” The King of the Tylwyth Teg said with a smile. “You call to me rather than run from death, this is a brave thing.”
I coughed and struggled to sit up right. “I’ve had a good teacher, and a few harsh lessons,” I said gripping Jack’s hand.
“Indeed,” Gwyn ap Nudd bowed from his waist, sweeping his hands out to his sides, acknowledging both Jack and me.
“Why are you here?” Jack demanded.
He was so lost in his grief that he couldn’t feel the magic building around us. He didn’t understand what was happening. I wished I could explain, but I barely had the strength to address Gwyn.
“You know why,” Gwyn replied, nonplused.
“No.” Jack clutched at my arm. “No. You can’t have him. Not now. Not so soon…after…”
“After Toshiko Sato and Owen Harper.” Gwyn nodded. “Time does not favor the valiant. You should know that they are safe and, as far as any human can be after such lives as they have lived, happy.”
Jack gasped. “You’ve seen them?”
“No, but information about those who have crossed the boundaries between your world and mine is available to those who know how to look for such.”
Jack hung his head, the moment of joy and hope that had burst through him, gone in a flash.
I reached up to cup his face. “It’s okay Jack.”
“No! No it’s not.” Jack let me go and pushed himself into Gwyn’s face. “I won’t lose another team member. Not tonight. Not him.”
Gwyn reached out a hand to cup Jack’s cheek, covering the skin where my hand had been just a moment before. “That is not for you or I to decide.”
Jack pushed Gwyn’s hand away. “You have the power. This is your hunt. You say who lives or dies. Leave him to me. Just pass him by and leave him to me.”
“Jack…”
“No!”
“And why should I grant either of you such a blessing?”
“Jack… don’t do this…”
“Because he’s worth saving. He does everything for this damn world, for this city and asks for nothing but life in return. Isn’t that enough?”
“You know it is not. It never is. Was it enough when the Time Lord asked you for your life in defense of a metal world lifetimes from here?”
Jack rocked back on his heels, balled his hands into fist, and tried to stare down the Lord of the Wild Hunt.
Gwyn looked down at me with a sigh, then back to Jack. “A deal then; a challenge.”
Silver light flashed, cold and crisp. In Gwyn’s hands was a shinning sword as long as his arm, and on his head, fitted between his antlers, was a silver circlet.
“Best me, and you may keep him.”
Light flashed again, gold and warm like the sun in summer. In the ground before Jack, point down, was a second sword, twin to first in all but color. Hanging off its hilt was a golden circlet.
“If you are truly a defender of life, filled to the brim with the golden light of time, then stand against me in the ancient challenge; Summer King to Winter King”
“He’ll be dead before we make a single move!” Jack waved a hand towards me.
“I vow that he will suffer no further ill effects while we fight. Should you win, he remains with you, the sun reborn. Should I win, he joins me, and the clouds obscure your light for a time.”
Gwyn raised his sword. “Do you agree?”
Jack looked over at me.
I didn’t know what to believe any more. We were so far beyond our Hub and the alien hunt that had dragged us out of bed and what passed for normal in our lives. For all I had called to Gwyn willing to step from life to death, if someone was going to give me a choice, I found that didn’t want to die. I didn’t want to leave Jack to his memories and his silent suffering, but I also didn’t want him to play the romantic fool for me. What do you say to someone in such a moment?
“You don’t have to do this Jack.”
“Yes… yes I do.”
Jack tugged the circlet off the sword hilt and placed it on his head. He took his greatcoat off and draped it over my shoulders, still warm with his body heat. Then he picked up the sword in both hands, took a stance, and faced the King.
With a quiet word, Gwyn sent his three dogs to sit beside me. Beyond the mist-cloaked circle other dogs howled and horses pawed the damp ground. Gwyn raised his sword high above his head, and the restive noises stopped.
Gwyn lowered his sword, and with his other hand undid the sliver stag’s head clasp that held his cloak in place, then draped the cloak over my legs. The fabric was cool to the touch, but did help keep the chill from getting into my bones. With another whispered command, the white dog inched behind me and offered its flank as a back rest.
Gwyn ap Nudd turned back to Jack, moonlight glinting off the silver circlet. He raised his sword in both hands and saluted Jack. From behind us, the towering bulk of Maes-y-Filiast’s capstone cast moon-gilded shadows on what was now a battle field.
I would like to be able to say that I remember each and every move that Jack and Gwyn made as they circled and feinted, testing each other’s weaknesses and strengths, but I don’t. While Gwyn’s magic kept me on Jack’s side of the living, I had lost so much blood that I was barely conscious. I slipped in and out of awareness as the two fought.
Each time I opened my eyes the scene before me was different. Each one slipping and falling or tumbling out of the way as their swords clashed and separated. Cuts marked each body, but I never saw who drew first blood. Each was breathing hard, working to the height of their skills, looking for a way in through the other’s defense. And all the while each fighter was growing more and more to represent the king whose crown they wore.
At one point I opened my eyes to see gods dancing before me rather than man and fey. Gwyn’s body appeared to be carved of bone and limed in silver. As he danced past me, cold air and hail stones followed, only to be melted away by the warmth of Jack’s golden light and the summer wind that moved in his wake. With each sweep of the Summer King’s sword Jack seemed to take on more of the King’s mantle. His movements were lithe and fluid, like a sapling freed from the husk of its seed, and his skin shimmered with sun-kissed light.
I awoke a final time to the howl of the dogs to see Gwyn on his back between my feet and Jack standing over him, the point of his sword grazing Gywn’s frost-colored neck.
“Yield,” Jack commanded.
“You must complete the kill,” Gwyn said quietly, dropping his sword and letting his arms fall open at his sides.
“Yield.”
“No.”
“Damn you! Yield!”
“Jack…” I understood his reluctance to kill an unarmed being, but I also remembered the twists and turns of myth. “You have to do it.”
“No.” Jack choked back a sob. “There’s been too much death.”
“It must be this way,” Gwyn said. “Trust me.”
Jack starred at Gwyn for a long moment, then took a shuddering breath, drew the sword above his head, and plunged it into the king’s heart. All around the clearing dogs howled, horses neighed, and spirit voices cried out in undulating waves of sound.
As the sword entered the pulsing muscle I felt a burst of energy, like a sonic boom, press out from Gwyn’s heart and then explode across Maes-y-Filiast. Tendrils of silver and gold light followed, pouring out of the open wound.
As I watched, the strands of light did not blend to form one cohesive color, but rather coiled and twisted around one another, the sword, and Gwyn’s body like vines of living light. Gwyn sighed once, rising up around the sword, then collapsed onto the ground. As he did, the light lines flew from his body, across the gap to my feet and began to wrap around my legs.
The combined energies of Summer and Winter spiraled up and along my body attending to my wounds as it went. It was like nothing I have ever felt. Not even the electrical charge of Lisa’s blast that nearly killed me, felt like this. This was fire and ice, light and dark, life and death, breathe and the absence of breathe, all coiled into one moment that went on forever. Every nerve-ending reacted and then overloaded in an instant. And then the twisted strands of light found the wounds in my chest.
I howled past my throat’s ability to make sounds as the torn edges were dragged back, toward each other, knitted into place, and life energy was force fed into my body. I surged up, shaking, the light behind my eyes blinding, then fell into Jack’s waiting arms.
“It’s okay, I’ve got you,” Jack murmured, over and over as my heart found its natural rhythm and the blood stopped screaming in my ears.
Moments later the twin lights washed out of me with a sigh, and only the barest of tingling of sensation thankfully, to spill back into Gwyn. The King’s body shuddered several times and then stopped moving.
Stillness settled over the cairn. Even the dogs were silent, hovering around their master as though waiting for something they could not explain to us humans. The mist lifted, revealing the many-shaped Wild Hunt that had been watching beyond the circle of power. They too were silent, waiting and watching.
Clouds passed in front of the moon hiding its silver light. In the darkness the swords of the two kings flashed silver and gold. A moment later all color vanished, the moon showed her face again, and Gwyn sat up. His three dogs barked with joy, leaping up and around him, licking his face and wagging their tails, looking, despite their other-worldly colors, like normal dogs.
Gwyn hugged each dog in turn, then turned to face Jack and me, a gentle smile on his angular face.
“You’re alive,” I said, surprised and yet not.
“Yes,” Gwyn nodded.
“How?” Jack asked.
Gwyn laughed. “You will not like the answer.”
“We work for Torchwood and catch alien’s for a living,” Jack insisted.
“Magic.”
“No such thing,” Jack scoffed.
“You can believe in aliens and time travel but not magic?” I asked Jack with a quirk of an eye brow for both him and myself. It seemed I was starting to believe in magic after all these years.
“I don’t have to believe that aliens or time travel exist; I know they do. The one we see every day and the other I’ve done. Magic is…”
“Not real…” Gwyn offered.
“Um…” Jack looked around the cairn, at the grass that fairly glowed with magic, at the dogs in their red, white and black coats, at the host of the Wild hunt with their non-human, but also non-alien shapes, and shook his head, bewildered.
I chuckled, and after a moment Jack joined in.
“Thank you,” Jack said to Gwyn.
“Thank you,” Gwyn replied, bowing his head.
Jack frowned. “I don’t understand.”
“What is tonight?”
When Jack continued to look confused, Gwyn turned to me. After a moment of thought I looked at Gwyn with wide eyes. “Of course,” I said, and then turned to Jack. “Tonight is the Winter Solstice. The longest night of the year.”
“Ok?” Jack asked, clearly not getting the significance.
“Tonight,” Gwyn replied. “And each solstice night, the kings of summer and winter fight for the health and honor of the earth. This night you stood as the land’s king in the oldest sense of the word. And through your actions my blood was spilled, thus renewing the cycle.”
“I’m no king,” Jack said.
“A title does not make a man a king,” Gwyn said. “You have been this land’s champion, both in word and deed.”
Jack looked out over the field, speechless for once.
After a time Jack turned back. “And Ianto’s life?”
“My gift. To you both.”
Gwyn turned away, his eyes and body seeking something beyond the burial mound. After a long moment he shook himself, the tips of his antlers sawing through the darkness like silvered finger bones, and turned back to Jack. He nodded in my direction. “He should not be moved until morning. The energy of the healing will need time to complete its work and it is better done here where the land is seeped in holiness.”
“There are some blankets in the SUV…” Jack began.
“No need,” Gwyn cut him off. He waved a hand to the host behind him. A jingle of tack and rustle of leather announced the moment of several forms descending from their horses. Gwyn glanced down at the supplies piled in their hands and nodded. With deft movements and silent communication the attendants marked out an area directly in front of the cairn’s with torches, blankets, pillows and a basket provisions. When they were done, they hefted the body of the alien, whose exploits had dragged us into this strange night, and returned to their horses as silently as they had come.
Gwyn helped Jack move me onto the blankets, then retrieved his cloak, swinging it smoothly over his shoulders and pinning it into place.
“Nothing will bother you here within the Summer King’s circle. When the sun rises you will know, even if the clouds should obscure the view. The circle will settle back into the earth and it will be safe for both of you to leave.”
“And that’s all?” Jack asked.
“Yes.”
“What about the Summer Solstice? Do we have to do this all over again? Or next winter?”
“No,” Gwyn said, though there was a sadness in his eyes as he spoke. “But should you have need of me, either of you, come here and call my name three times and I will answer. You have each earned that much of me.”
With that the King of the Winter Hunt bowed to us and walked to his waiting mount. He leapt onto the coal black charger and waved the hunt off into the night, dogs barking at their heels.
As the hunt left I could feel the energy of the summer circle lock into place around us. The air warmed and there was the smell of fresh grass in the air. Around us lightning bugs appeared, flashing on and off in their primordial rhythm.
Jack turned in a wide circle, looking around in wonder and then final stood before me and smiled.
I held out a hand. A cluster of lightning bugs settled with a buzz and flash of golden light in my palm. I smiled and shook my head in wonder. It had been ages since I had seen a lightning bug let alone held so many in my hand. It was like being in the most perfect garden ever invented.
“I think I’m starting to believe in magic,” Jack said, sitting stiffly beside me.
“Hard not to on a night like this.”
“True,” Jack nodded watching in fascination as the lightning bugs danced along my hand. He tilted his head to look at me. I knew the gash was still there across my chest though the edges were closed and felt like they were healing with each passing minute. “How are you feeling?”
I tossed the bugs into the air with a gentle flip, then ran a hand along the wound, feeling the repaired edges. “Sore mostly. And tired. I’m just as glad to not have to go anywhere yet. I’m not entirely certain I could make it back to the SUV at the moment, to tell you the truth.”
Jack nodded.
“How are you?” I asked.
We both looked down at a slash in his trouser leg. Blood had stained the edges where Gwyn’s blade had cut into the muscle. Jack prodded the cut and winced.
“Right mess we are,” I said, chuckling.
“Yeah.”
“Drag that basket over here and let’s see what they left us.”
“Why me?”
“Newly risen from the dead here. Hello?”
“Please, I do that all the time.”
“Wanker,” I tossed a handful of grass at him.
“You know it.” Jack grinned over his shoulder at me as he crawled toward the basket.
“Get the damn basket before I toss you out of your own circle, your Majesty!”
We ate in companionable silence for a time, feeding each other bits of bread and fruit, roasted meat and slices of cheese. It was the closest thing to a romantic evening we’d ever managed. Leave it to us to need an alien and a king of the Tylwyth Teg to make that happen.
After a time I pulled a bottle of golden liquid out of the basket and passed it to Jack, who whistled appreciatively. I looked over at him with a raised eyebrow. Jack turned the bottle to face me. On the front was a silver and gold embossed image of a Stag’s head.
“So?”
“So…” Jack replied, cracking the wax seal on the bottle and taking a whiff of the contents. “Oh yeah,” he said with a smile. “There’s a little distillery in Scotland that makes something much like this, and I’m willing to bet you a month’s wages that I now know where they got the idea for the recipe! ”
“My salary or your’s?”
Jack winked. “Gwen’s.”
“Now that’s a deal. Rhys’ll pitch a fit if she comes home with any more designer boots. Huh. There’s only one cup,” I said digging in the basket.
Jack leered at me. “I guess we’ll just have to make do then.” Jack took the cup from me; a silver chalice studded with gemstones, and poured a measure of the golden liquid, then held it under my nose. “Smell.”
I sniffed at the liquid. “Honey?”
Jack nodded.
Jack took a sip of the golden liquid and leaned in to kiss me. As our lips touched and mine opened, the honey-whiskey slid between us to fill my mouth. Jack’s tongue followed the liquid.
I closed my eyes, swallowed, and as the whiskey blazed down my throat, battled Jack for every last drop of the fiery liquid in our mouths.
“That…was…” I said, trying to catch my breath and having no idea where my brain had dissolved to.
“Good stuff, huh?”
“Mmm.” I nodded, my eyes still closed.
I heard Jack dipped something in the chalice and then his index finger was painting my lips with the honey-whiskey. I let my head fall back, lips curving in a soft smile. I licked my lips with a sigh as his finger slipped away. A moment later Jack’s finger was back, painting them with whiskey again. His mouth caught mine in a kiss before I could lick away the potent liquor.
“So tell me,” Jack whispered, as he teased my lips with another finger tip of whiskey. “What else does the Summer King get besides a sword, a crown, and a handsome man for the Solstice?”
I sucked Jack’s finger into my mouth, pulling the sweet liquid off with my tongue. I could tell when Jack closed his eyes, his whole body melted into mine and he forgot his question. I smiled and worked at keeping all his attention on the tip of his finger. I dragged the edges of my teeth over his knuckle and ran the tip of my tongue along the sides of the twitching digit. He moaned deep in his throat and offered a second finger to my mercies. I suckled at his warm fingers, hungry for the taste of him and the fire of the whiskey, then bit down just enough to make his cock, and mine for that matter, take notice.
While Jack was lost in sensations, I returned the favor and swirled my fingers in the chalice then pressed two wet fingers between his lips. Jack moaned and sucked greedily at my fingers.
“The King,” I said, my voice breathy and dark. Jack opened his eyes to find me watching him. His pupils were blown so wide his eyes were nearly black. The desire coiling out from him toward me was almost tangible. I swallowed around his fingers and he groaned as I pulled away. “The King gets his lover, body and soul, and together they feed the land.”
Jack stopped breathing. His whole body tensed. He stared at me, uncertainty creeping in along the edges of desire. We never said such things to each other. Love. Lover. Beloved. Those were words for other people, not for us. Another lie I have kept so very well.
“Of course all those old legends insist that his lover has to be a woman, but somehow I don’t think the land or the gods give a damn so long as the respect and the magic are there, do you?”
I pulled my fingers from his mouth and sat up straight. I felt caught in Gwyn’s magic and the power of the night, yet terrified that if I said the wrong thing or did the wrong thing, this moment would shatter and I would lose more than I had to give.
I raised a hand and ran it lightly along Jack’s jaw. The feel of his skin on under mine was like fire. It burned and feed me at the same time.
When Jack said nothing my heart twisted. I felt like and idiot, and yet everything around me was telling me not to give up, even if it was all just an illusion for this one moment of displaced time created by the Tylwyth Teg.
“Just for tonight,” I said. “Let that be us - King and Consort,” I stumbled over the last word but held on to Jack’s gaze. Jack for his own part seemed to be having trouble breathing. “No alien’s or death or fear. Just the magic that Gwyn left for us. In the morning, if you want, we can share a cup of retcon and forget this ever happened.”
I tossed out the last line, like it was the simplest, least important thing in the world. I offered it to Jack as though it was just a passing fancy. One more lie added to the pile.
Jack reached out to stroke my check and I leaned into the blazing heat of his hand.
“I take my coffee black, thank you very much,” Jack said at last.
My eyes had to have been shining like twin torches, but I managed to keep my voice level. “Of course, sir.”
Jack stood up, and with a few easy moves, was standing nude before me. I had to smile at that. Jack without clothes was like a cat in a patch of sunlight, happy and purring. Jack smiled back at me, knowingly, and knelt to help me with my clothes and the remnants of my jacket. When my shirt and waistcoat were gone, he stopped to trace the healing gash on my chest, his face lined with sorrow.
“Don’t,” I said, putting a hand over his.
He looked up at me, fear in his eyes. He searched my face and whatever he saw must have satisfied him because the light returned. He leaned in and kissed me, soft and playful, all smiles and laughter. Then with his help, because damn if my chest didn’t hurt and make it hard to move, my trousers and pants slid away, and I was as nude as he was.
“Let’s do this right,” he said settling back on his knees.
I would swear that the energy in that circle contracted at his words. Everything was waiting once more, waiting with such need and desire that it was hard to breathe. I nodded and offered him the chalice.
Jack took a deep breath and held it to my lips. “Will you drink of Summer with me?”
I nodded and took a sip.
Jack took another breath and then smiled at me. “Will you stand as Consort to the Summer King?”
I swallowed several times and then placed my hands over his on the chalice. “Yes.”
Jack released the chalice into my hands and winked at me. I rolled my eyes, he really was too cute for his own good. I thought about what I was supposed to say now. I looked around at the circle. It was warm and lush, green and gold. Summer at its most idyllic. While we had been eating and talking, flowers had appeared in the cracks of the cairn stones and amongst the grass. They were bright splashes of color and fragrance that added another layer to the feeling of being in a sacred grove.
Just beyond the circle, darkness and moonlight still held power. We were truly cut out of time and the everyday. We were in a summer that would end with the sunrise. All we had was this moment.
I took a deep breath to compose myself, then looked at Jack and nearly dropped the chalice. He was shinning with an internal glow just as he had been during the fight with Gwyn. He was Jack, but he was also once again the Summer King.
I raised the chalice to his lips. “Will you drink of Summer with me?”
Jack the King smiled and bowed his head to take a sip. When he raised his head, my Jack looked out from his eyes, with a wicked gleam, nearly daring me to go through with what I had started. Right. Well, two could play that game. I smiled back, no longer confused or afraid of the outcome of my actions. I offered Jack the chalice once more.
“Will you accept me as Consort to the Summer King?”
Jack the King smiled broadly and placed his hands over mine. “Oh will I ever.”
Together we raised the chalice to his lips, his eyes never leaving mine. He took a sip and then licked his lips with a grin.
I started to take the chalice away, to place it beside the basket, but stopped. Something in the circle was not complete. There was one last step to take. I looked up at Jack. He nodded, clearly having felt the ripple as well.
After a moments thought I poured some of the whiskey onto the grass. “For Summer and Life.”
Jack nodded again, looking pleased, then took the chalice from me. He thought a moment, looking around the burial mound and the land beyond. He held the chalice up toward the entrance of Maes-y-Filiast.
“In honor of Winter and Death,” he said, as he poured a measure of whiskey onto the grass before placing the chalice down beside the picnic basket.
Jack surged toward me, hunger in his eyes. He hooked one hand around my neck to pull me toward him. “Mine,” he growled low in his throat.
“Your’s,” I acknowledged. Forever, said my heart.
We kissed. More a press of need than any gentle seduction on either of our parts. The whiskey and the magic had done their job. We were each burning hot inside and out. Our tongues met in their own battle, chasing each other from mouth to mouth, seeking out those spots we knew would draw moans out of the other.
I reached my hands around Jack’s waist and pulled him to me, clawing at his skin just for the sheer joy of feeling the heat and flesh of him. I didn’t care that it hurt to press his skin against the wound on my chest; I just wanted to feel him, to be inside him, and for him to be inside me. But Jack must have heard me hiss in pain because he pulled back. He changed the angle of the kiss, never stopping, but moving us apart enough to make his way along my jaw and down my neck.
Jack dipped his head lower, kissing and licking along the healing wound across my chest. With each touch of his lips and stroke of his tongue I shivered and burned until I was crying with pleasure and pain. Each touch more intense than mere lips could be.
Jack raised his head. “Are you okay?”
I felt like I was vibrating along every never. My heart was racing and I could barely fill my lungs with enough air to breathe. I had closed my eyes, overwhelmed with sensations and had locked my hands on his arms for balance and strength. I couldn’t think or speak, all I could do was throb with need and pain and desire.
“Ianto…”
I took a deep breath and opened my eyes, trying to see Jack through the blazing fire in my head.
“Talk to me.”
“Hard to…explain,” I gulped at the warm air. “Intense. It hurts but it doesn’t. It feels amazing and terrible all at once. It’s as though you’re pressing something into me with each touch.”
“Like this?”
Jack held me upright, his arms taking the weight of my blissed out body, and kissed my shoulder, a bare patch with no injury. I sighed but not in the near mindless pleasure of before.
I shook my head, sinking into the feeling of his lips. “Different.”
“Like this…”
He kissed his way across and back to the wound. As soon as his lips touched the nearly scarred over gash I cried out again. Jack sucked the thick tissue into his mouth making me writhe in his arms. He let the skin back out slowly and traced the markings of the scar with his tongue. I could only whimper.
“You should…oh gods… ” I dragged in a deep breath between moans, “…market that.”
Jack chuckled. “With you as the display model, we’d be rich over night.”
I lifted a hand to bat at him. “Prat.”
“Beautiful.”
“’Am not…” he cut off my protests with a smoldering kiss only to leave me breathless and weaving on my knees in the middle of the circle.
“Don’t move,” he said, crawling back to the basket. Really? I wondered. Where was I going to go? We’d already short circuited my brain with a few kisses and a bit of Fey magic. Moving was the last thing on my mind.
Jack came back with a small bottle in his hand and a huge grin on his face. “Gwyn’s people know how to stock a basket. Oil,” he said holding up the bottle. “It’s even warm.
“I want to see your face when you come, but I have a feeling the magic will work better if we are both upright while we do this. You up for that?” Jack asked nodding to my chest.
“I won’t break,” I said, with more certainty than I felt. Though if I did break I didn’t think it would be because of our choice of sexual position.
“It might hurt.”
Lord but the man could be a dolt at times. I pulled him toward me by his neck, because that never ever gets old, nor does the look on his face when I take what I want. I licked and bit my way toward his ear and then made him shut up. “Stop worrying and fuck me.”
Jack can be an idiot, but he does obey orders. His fingers were slathered with oil and pressing into my ass moments later. I held on, chewing at the join between his neck and shoulder, loving the sensations of his fingers pressing and stretching me wide open. Then we were both moaning as I started to fuck myself on his fingers, impatient to feel movement and that perfect pressure against my prostate.
Jack pulled his fingers out, shushing me with a kiss as I moaned over the missing fullness. He slicked up both our cocks and with a little cautious maneuvering helped me rise up over his thighs and slide down inch by glorious inch onto his rock hard dick.
We stayed like that for awhile, my arms around his neck, his around my back, holding me tight to his chest, my own throbbing cock, oil-slicked and burning between us. We touched our lips together, gentle and soft, no longer fighting for control, just brushing and breathing with each other. I licked his lips, tasting honey and wood-smoke and dropped my head back with a sigh. He pressed kisses to my out-stretched neck, making me shiver and moan.
Then Jack began to move, ever so slowly drawing down and out and then pushing back in and up. Over and over and over. Wave after wave of languid bliss pushing and pulling at my ass and my cock as we glided in and out of each other’s skin.
I could feel the pressure building inside of me and around us. I could almost see the air shimmering with tension.
“Can you feel it Jack?” I groaned into his neck.
Jack just closed his eyes and pressed back into me.
I could feel it, just there beyond the range of human awareness, there was something. A wave of gold and silver something glowing with power and energy. It was spiraling in around us with each thrust. I felt the energy tighten down as he moved and as I met him thrust for thrust.
“Jack…” I begged.
“I can feel it Ianto,” he gasped.
Jack pulled out again inch by inch and I felt the pressure in the air around us change again. We were both so close. Everything was so close. But something more was needed. Jack must have felt the need as well because he changed the pace of the dance. He went from gentle to hard in a moment. He slammed into me, and we both forgot to worry about my injury as the pleasure pushed us to the edge of reason.
“Jack…oh god ohgod! Jack!”
“Just a little… further,” he moaned.
Jack slammed into me again and again, and then everything coalesced at the point that was us and exploded outward. I came screaming Jack’s name over and over again, clamping down around his cock and dragging him over the edge into the blazing light.
“Guide it!” Jack shouted through the heat. “Hold on, and guide it with me.”
I clutched at the sound of his voice and clawed my way back to consciousness enough to feel the magic boiling around us, looking for direction. We had brought the energy of life and now it needed focus. I struggled to pull up the words of my childhood, praying that whatever came out of my mouth would be the right thing.
“Buchedd achos Buchedd
Besgi 'r Dirio
Besgi 'r Boblogi
Feddyginiaetha ni pawb”
Sunlight poured out of us, spilling into the ground like the thickest richest semen ever found. It soaked into the earth and crawled across the countryside filling nooks and crannies. I could feel it spreading out around us. I could see, with my eyes closed, watching an inner map that blossomed like the land itself, as every inch of Wales was filled with the warmth of the summer sun and the potentiality of new life.
I sagged in Jack’s arms gasping for breathe and laughing at the same time. I felt drunk and high and oh so well fucked. With that same inner map I could see Jack glowing green and gold in my arms, the very essence of life.
I took another breathe and my laughter turned into tears that I couldn’t stop.
“Shhhh,” Jack whispered. “It’s okay.”
He lifted me off him and settled us both onto a pile of pillows while I cried for everything that had ever lived and died on earth. Every flower and plant, every animal, every child and adult everywhere at any time was suddenly in my heart and pouring through me.
“So much life,” I sobbed. “So much death.”
Jack nodded, and kissed my hair, and held me close.
“Can you feel them? Can you see them?”
“Yes,” he whispered. “I see them all.”
“The price of the Summer King.”
Jack shook his head. “No. The power of the Summer Consort. To see all that has come before and all that may yet come to be. To know the cost of life and death.”
I turned my head into his chest and let the tears flow, let the sorrow pass out of me, back into the earth where it belonged. I tried to remember that I was merely human, not some god-form like Jack or the Summer King he had manifested. That I was just boring old me.
“You are never boring,” Jack said, tugging my face toward his.
“Borrowing magic to listen to my thoughts now?” I teased.
“Whatever works.” Jack nipped at my bottom lip, and even as worn out as I was, I could not help but moan as the contact stirred a response in my groin. “Power only flows where it has a common pathway. The Consort could never have come to life in you if some part of you were not already in alignment with the King’s Consort.”
“Reading up on magic are we?”
Jack just looked at me with that look that everyone else gives him when he is trying to avoid a conversation. I really hate it when he uses that look on me.
“Fine,” I said, sitting up to look down at Jack’s sweat-streaked body. “If I accept your reasoning, which I am not completely certain I do, then the same holds true for you. You could not have worn the Summer King’s mantle and defeated Gwyn, if you were not exactly what Gwyn named you - this land’s champion.”
Jack closed his eyes, breathing deeply. I could feel the tension spiral around his heart. He didn’t want to be anyone’s champion; he liked his life without labels.
I straddled Jack’s hips and watched his eyes open in surprise. I pressed a finger to his lips silencing whatever protest or joke he was about to utter. The energy of Summer was pressing against us once more. Some how it knew all the pain and confusion that Jack and I were both struggling with, and was there waiting to help.
I threw my head back and stretched out my arms, feeling golden light well up in the palms of my hands. I opened my heart to the Consort and let Him speak through me to Jack and to the King.
At 'r brenin chan Haf, a at eiddo chyfeillacha
Jack Harkness
sy ‘ma i mewn 'r choedwig
dros cara chan 'ch chychwïor.
Cadw ni 'n ddihangol i mewn 'ch arennau
Jack shook under my legs, his cock standing at attention once more, rubbing gloriously along mine. He cried out, part throb of bliss, part pain. I wrapped my hands around both our cocks and fed all the energy that was pulsing around us into both of us through that aching point.
It was like be at the center of a lighting bolt or the heart of a firestorm. Jolts of electricity shot through me from my groin up through my chest into my head and arms. I was blind with sensation and the sound of Jack’s voice calling my name through his moans. His hands joined mine on our cocks and the pressure increased, shutting off any coherent thought I might have had. I was spinning, burning, flying, and dying all at once. We moved together stroking up and down along our shafts, pressing the energy higher and deeper into ourselves and the air around us.
Then Jack’s voice changed. His welsh for once even better than mine. His moans became words bringing me back down to earth and to him.
At 'r chyfeillacha chan Haf, a at eiddo brenin
Ianto Jones
sy ‘ma i mewn 'r choedwig
dros cara chan 'ch chychwïor.
Cadw ni 'n ddihangol i mewn 'ch arennau
His words were like a key in a lock. Every muscle in my body clenched and then released in one rippling wave of light and heat, sweat and come. I screamed because there was no other option. I was being ripped open and filled to capacity at the same time. And Jack was right there beside me exploding and crying out as we came all over each others hands and chests.
When the sun broke through the clouds on the morning on the 22nd of December, Jack and I were still asleep, tangled in each others arms and wrapped in a blanket of magical warmth. We awoke long enough to take note of the change in the day and the opening of the Summer King’s circle. We poured a portion of honey-whiskey onto the dew-damp grass in thanks to both the King and his Consort, then wrapped ourselves in blankets and went back to sleep. Wales, and Torchwood, could bloody well wait a few more hours. We had already done our bit for King and country, as it were, and figured we deserved a bit of a lie-in for once.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
End Notes:
All Welsh translations in this story are by:
http://www.translation-guide.com/free_online_translators.php?from=English&to=Welsh
What this means is that the words are accurate but are not necessarily grammatically correct.
Call to Gwyn ap Nudd
"To the king of Spirits (and to his queen)
Gwyn ap Nudd,
you who are yonder in the forest,
for love of your mate,
permit us to enter your dwelling."
This is from the 14th Century Latin:
ad regem Eumenidium et reginam eius: Gwynn ap Nwdd qui es ultra in silvis pro amore concubine tue permitte nos venire domum"
Source:
Medieval folklore: an encyclopedia of myths, legends, tales, beliefs, and customs ed. Carl Lindahl, John McNamara, John Lindow. Oxford University Press, 2002. p. 190.
The distillery really does exist it is Meikles of Scotland Limited in Newtonmore, Scotland. The golden liquid they make is called Stag’s Breath It is amazing and bloody hard to get in the US but well worth the effort! http://stagsbreath.co.uk/retail/default.htm
Ianto's words to chanel the energy into the Land:
Life for Life
Feed the Land
Feed the People
Heal us all
- blessing by Wynkat1313
Ianto and the Consort's Words to Jack and the King:
To the King of Summer (and to his Consort)
Jack Harkness,
you who are here in the forest,
for love of your mate,
Keep us safe in your arms
-modified invocation by Wynkat1313
Jack and the King's words to Ianto and the Consort:
To the Consort of Summer (and to his King)
Ianto Jones,
you who are here in the forest,
for love of your mate,
Keep us safe in your arms
-modified invocation by Wynkat1313
Info on Gwyn ap Nudd for those who are interested:
http://www.joellessacredgrove.com/Celtic/deitiesg-h-i.html
Info on Maes-y-Filiast / Tinkinswood
http://www.stonepages.com/wales/wales.html