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Daine clapped, hopping with excitement and suppressing a squeal on seeing the small brass plate affixed to Numair’s rooms.
Numair exhaled, relieved.
“So you like it?”
“It’s fair wondrous!” She said, jumping to embrace him and pepper kisses across his face.
The brass plate had, for several years, read “Numair Salmalin”, but now, “Veralidaine Sarrasri” had been engraved underneath.
A subtle pink rose beneath the caramel of Numair’s cheeks as he caught and lifted Daine for a more thorough kiss.
“I’m glad you like it, magelet,” he said. “I will admit slight trepidation, having our relationship, as it is, engraved into metal. You’re certain you’re pleased? It isn’t too much?”
Daine scoffed, smoothing a dark curl escaped from his horsetail.
“ You’re too much,” she teased. “What was your plan, if I hadn’t been so pleased?”
“Well, there’s a space there, see?” Numair nodded. “Simply add a parenthetical. ‘Numair Salmalin (and occasionally) Veralidaine Sarrasri.’ It would be practical, as you do not have a plate on your own door, and if someone were looking for you, I generally know where you might be found.”
Daine shook her head.
“Very practical, you. I love it. And you. You are certain having me in your rooms all the time won't be a terrible burden?”
“Our rooms,” Numair corrected, taking Daine’s hand to kiss it. “And as far as I can be certain about anything, I’m certain about living with you. If we don’t drive each other utterly mad when it’s cold, rations are scarce and bland, and we’re sleeping on the ground, I imagine we’ll get along famously in our cozy rooms, with a full palace’s kitchen of food, and sleeping on a down mattress so extravagant even I’m a bit embarrassed by it.”
Daine was inclined to agree--Numair’s bed felt like making love on air.
“Let me give you the key, before I forget,” Numair said, interlocking the fingers of his left hand with Daine’s right. He spoke a word, settling a bright black and silver haze over their hands before releasing her. “Draw this rune along with me,” he instructed, sketching in the air. Daine followed along, suppressing a giggle.
“Numair, that is never rune.”
“Not an ancient one, no,” Numair said with a crooked grin.
“That was our initials in a heart, you beautiful, soppy mage.”
“I’m a black robe mage, if I say it’s a rune, it’s a rune,” Numair sniffed in imitation of arrogance. “I thought it would be a good deal easier to remember than any preexisting rune. And it’s keyed just to us. I’ll key Kitten in, too, if she likes, but it isn’t as if locks stop her.”
Daine giggled, thinking of the withering look Kitten would give such a silly display of affection.
“Perhaps we can put in a little door, just for her? Rather like the palace cats have in Kalasin’s rooms.”
“You’ve not even stepped foot inside and you’re already suggesting remodeling” Numair sighed, feigning annoyance. “Perhaps I should call the engraver back for that parenthetical?”
Daine elbowed the taller man gently and crossed her arms, her face still aglow.
“I only tease. I want you to feel this is your home, too, magelet, just as my tower is also your home. I’m happy to make changes for your comfort and preferences.”
“You’re sweet,” Daine said, looping her arm around Numair’s waist. “But I’ve got no great inclination toward decorating and whatall. Never lived anyplace that merited it, really--Ma and Grandda’s house was practical as you please, my rooms by the stables are bare but for some books you gave me, a couple bundles of old letters, and a few pictures Kit and Jon and Thayet’s littlies made for me for midwinter last year.”
“All the same,” Numair said, his dark eyes sparkling with excitement. “And Daine?”
“Yes?”
“Will you marry me?”
“Someday,” Daine chided with a playful swat. “We been over this!”
“I’m aware, sweet, it simply begged asking before entering our shared living space,” Numair grinned. “Unlock the door, won’t you?”
Daine drew the sentimental ‘rune’ in the air over the doorknob, half-surprised when the tumblers of the lock rolled and the door cracked open.
“Why does it beg asking? You’re well aware it’s ‘someday’, an’ I’m not the least bit shy about telling you when I feel like ‘someday’ has rolled around.”
Numair leaned back, looking both ways, assuring himself they were alone.
“Because as I see it, your answer had bearing on how you ought to enter our home for the first time. We aren’t married yet, so it wouldn’t do to carry you as if you were my bride.”
“I can just step in,” Daine said, raising an eyebrow.
“No,” Numair said, leaning down to grasp Daine’s waist, lift and throw her over his shoulder like a sack. Daine erupted into peals of laughter, protesting gleefully as the mage carried her inside. “It’s simply bad luck for a bride to cross a threshold on her own feet.”
“I’m not your bride!” Daine cried, her face pink with being held upside-down, with being lifted and carried so easily.
“True, but if you’re to live here, you’re not simply a lover, either. For all of our near misses in luck, magelet, I thought it best to compromise in this tradition,” Numair reasoned. “Would you like the tour?”
“I’ve seen your rooms,” Daine sighed. “I practically live here as it is!”
“Our rooms,” Numair corrected. “And I asked if the palace staff could put in a few alterations to suit your new residence.”
“Will you put me down if I say yes?” Daine asked.
“Do you honestly want me to put you down, magelet?”
Despite her reluctance to admit it, Daine loved how easily Numair could carry her. His strength was hidden--for as lanky as Numair was, his body was all wiry muscle, born of hard work and travel alongside his studies. The thrill of his rare displays of strength was very nearly perverse, Daine thought--Numair was an honorable man, he would never use his strength, or his magic, for that matter, to coerce or harm her in any way. But in truth, he had the raw ability, the raw strength, to do whatever struck his fancy. He chose to be gentle with her in his bed, he chose to treat her as his equal. It was easy for a weak, less Gifted man to be honorable, she thought. Being carried was a sweet--and for longer than she cared to admit, arousing--reminder of the power over her he chose to keep sheathed.
“I’d rather not be upside down, yes,” Daine answered. “And maybe you ought not wear your arms out. If I’m half as happy with you after this little tour, you’ll have need of them.”
“Mmm. I can’t quite parse if that is a threat or a promise, sweet,” Numair said, setting Daine back on her feet. “I look forward to either, or both.”
Daine scanned the sitting room, which appeared largely unchanged, but for a few newly framed, bright, blotchy paintings, obvious collaborations between children and dragonet.
She smiled.
“They look like proper works of art, framed up like that.” She paused. “Did you have all my things sent over?”
Numair blushed again.
“Yes, but on my honor, not until you’d already agreed. I sent a message to Alanna, who had it handled. As I understand it, your bed is still available, your room still open, with rider-issued bedding and furnishings. I’m terribly sorry for the breach in your confidence, but she is one of my oldest friends, and something of an expert on headstrong young women.”
Alanna would understand the fear of being so reliant on a man, even if he was fair wondrous. But she had traveled alone but for her man at arms so much in her youth--the relationship Daine and Numair shared, practically living together, only sleeping separately, really, for years--would’ve driven the Lioness to madness.
“There’s no confidence to breach. You’re the one being a bit funny about us being out in the open, though I suppose having it engraved on our door is fair open,” Daine said. “I appreciate your taking care. I don’t want to put anybody out, though. Surely, a rider or somebody needs that space.”
Numair tilted his head in possible agreement.
“Perhaps leave it until such a time as a rider has real need of it. You’re quite likely to want a space close to the stables for training season and difficult births and such.”
Daine tilted her head backward for a kiss. All the same, she realized with a pang of sadness, her days of assisting in rider training were likely coming to a close. King Jonathon had been dropping hints about teaching pages as well as anyone with wild magic, and when she’d last seen Tkaa, he’d offhandedly mentioned how he looked forward to their work together.
The pleasant tingle of Numair’s lips against her pushed Daine’s worries away. “How about the rest, then?”
With a broad smile, Numair drew himself up to his full, considerable height, taking Daine by the hand to show her the changes he’d asked to be installed for her comfort. A cloak and a plush robe hung on iron hooks beside a stained-glass window she could easily push open, even with the feet of a bird. A loveseat, just large enough for an exhausted Daine to collapse into, sat next to them, as well as a basket of simples: wakeflower, salves for minor injuries, a few jars of dried fruit, a stoppered jug of water.
“In case you come in when I’m away,” Numair explained.
Daine smiled. He’d been planning this for a while.
“If I’d said no, would this still be here?”
“Certainly,” Numair said. “Even if we had simply remained excellent friends, I would’ve wanted you to be comfortable here. You recall the garish carpets in my tower, I expect?”
Numair’s tower was laden with thick, soft rugs which Daine had, more than once, dozed off on during a lesson.
“I’d not call them garish . They’re fair comfortable.”
“Which was my primary motivation for obtaining them. Your teeth chattered in the middle of the summer--I had to get something to be more inviting. You were quite keen on the rugs a merchant from Tusaine was selling, so I got a few to dampen the draft. It’s really no different.”
Kitten’s bed, a frilly, curtained affair ornately carved from an exotic wood Daine did not recognize, sat near the window, as well. It really was a noble’s bed in miniature, right down to the many small drawers built into its base, which, when Daine pulled open, revealed a hodge-podge of pretty stones, string and river-glass, odds and ends Kitten had taken a liking to and collected.
“Kit’ll love it,” Daine smiled, pressing her hand into the small, soft mattress. The bedding was already twisted, strewn with pastry crumbs. “She apparently does love it,” she laughed.
“Locks really can’t keep kitten away,” Numair agreed, leading her to the study. As promised, a bookshelf sat empty but for Daine’s few anatomy and natural science books. “Those are entirely yours, though, naturally, I am deeply pleased for you to peruse my books. did a bit of a weed on my library,” Numair explained. “After the past few years, I’ve very little interest in romanticizations of battle, and even less in the vilification of dragons. My cast-offs are still of historical value, I suppose, but they’re the university’s problem now.”
“You just didn’t want Kitten reading about dragon slaying,” Daine accused with a grin.
“Do you? Ghastly stuff, and horribly inaccurate, once you’ve met the genuine articles.”
“Too true,” Daine said, offering another kiss. “Take me to our bedroom.”
Numair blushed, taken by a small, pleasant shiver at the words ‘ our bedroom’.
“Just to show you the changes I’ve made,” he said with feigned sternness.
A wardrobe had been placed alongside Numair’s, holding Daine’s small collection of dresses gifted to her by Thayet. Her breeches and shirts folded neatly into a drawer underneath. A finely carved vanity table and mirror sat in one corner, empty but for Daine’s brush and a basket of headscarves and hair ties. Compared to the arsenal of hair lotions and specialized picks on Numair’s dressing table, her own appeared barren.
“I know, I ‘needn’t have’, magelet,” Numair said, as if reading her mind. “But on occasion, and after all you've done for the kingdom, I expect those occasions will become more frequent, you are required to tame those lovely curls of yours into something the court finds presentable.”
“I’m not presentable ordinarily?” Daine challenged.
“Oh, more than,” Numair said, embracing Daine around her shoulders to lay his face in her curls. “The same stuffy requirements calling for me to wear my robe and make a spectacle of myself demand your beautiful, wild hair be caged for an evening.” He kissed her hair, straying down to her neck. “But perhaps that isn’t such a bad thing. I’ve less competition if those visiting nobles aren’t allowed a hint at the true depths of your beauty.”
“Competition?” Daine laughed. “As if I’d want a noble, and as if one wouldn’t be fair terrified of me, if he made the mistake of attempting to court me.”
She sat on the bed, motioning for Numair to join her.
“Only a few changes, here,” he said, stroking her hair. “Nothing you’d notice right away. Just some charms against stains, tearing, clinging fur, certain smells and such. I’m not under any illusions in thinking we’ll sleep alone very often.”
“We could,” Daine offered. “You asked me to live here, it’s fair rude for me to assume you’d take on my friends, too. I could sleep with my magic closed off.”
Numair shook his head.
“It’s part of who you are, sweet--a wonderful, profound part, and I’d never wish for you to isolate yourself so. All the same, I’m quite fond of these sheets and would rather not replace them as often as all that.”
Daine wondered if her friends would visit quite as often, now that she was, in their eyes, mated. A few nights ago, a pine marten had wriggled into her bedroll, only to notice Numair, naked, his arms around Daine’s waist and under her head, the sweaty musk of sex clinging to their skin.
Excuse me, I should've let you know I was here the pine marten, Chomp, had apologized, sidling out of her bedroll. I didn’t know you were mated, much less that you were in a heat. I didn’t mean to interrupt. Some of us felt you and thought we'd like to come pay respect. I've a cousin in Long Lake, you know.
Daine had convinced the pine marten he was not interrupting anything, offering Numair’s loud snores (which Chomp had mistaken for a mating call ) as evidence. Chomp, as well as his mate, their kits, a raccoon and a few hedgehogs had curled up next to Daine’s bedroll and fallen asleep, but had left before she woke in the morning.
“It’s wondrous,” Daine smiled. “All of it. But you know I’d live in an old badger sett with you, if things came to it.”
“My, let’s hope they don’t. Despite your insistence on simplicity, I enjoy seeing you comfortable. But if you find anything unpleasantly comfortable, I’m more than happy to replace some of your dry fruit with hot peppers or throw pine needles in our bed, whatever you like,” Numair laughed, but it was a shy one, as if he worried he would frighten Daine away, after everything.
“Our bed,” Daine echoed. “Sounds fair lovely,” She lay back, pushing her boots off her feet, knocking them to the floor. Pulling the knot of her breeches laces loose, she watched Numair’s face battle between desire and worry. A tiny but deeply etched v wrinkled on his forehead. Daine rose to embrace him.
“I love it, all of it, I really do,” she soothed, kissing his cheek, his jawline, his earlobes. “What’s the trouble?”
“No trouble, magelet,” he smiled.
Daine pressed the wrinkle on his forehead with her thumb.
“Perhaps a few troubles. I’m happy--deeply, madly, stupidly happy--to love you, to be with you, to live with you.”
“But you haven’t lived with a woman before, an’ you got some silly notion that soon, I’ll get bored with sex an’ then in short order, I’ll get bored of you, I’ll move out, an’ our whole relationship--friendship, too--will be fair awkward and sad?” Daine offered.
“I hadn’t verbalized it in such bleak and frankly, precise terms, but basically, yes.”
“I love you, you complete dolt,” Daine said. “Should I give you a good shaking so you don’t forget? You’ve shook me plenty for scaring you.”
“If you believe it would help,” Numair said with a weak smile.
Daine grabbed the much larger man by the shoulders and shook him, slowly and gently.
“I’m not set to get bored of you, or living with you, or odd’s bobs, making love with you! If I didn’t want to live with you, I wouldn’t, as I got all manner of options that aren’t your rooms or your tower! I love you, Numair Salmalin! I choose to spend my life an’ my time with you just because you’re fair wondrous, you’re funny an’ kind an’ intelligent an’ I’m never, ever bored when I’m with you!”
“Strange,” Numair said, bracing himself against Daine's shakes. “The shaking was quite unpleasant, but I feel a great deal more at ease. Perhaps a good shake settles a vital lecture into the mind more effectively?”
“Save it for your knights in training, Master Mage,” Daine teased. “I’m done being coy.”
“That was coy?”
“You’re the one always pointing out how often I just appear to you bare. I’m fully clothed an’ was attempting flirting.” Daine argued, catching Numair’s collar to kiss him thoroughly. It was Numair’s turn to melt in her embrace, Daine thought. She felt her heart swell at the weight of him relaxing into her arms. She managed to work her hand beneath his shirt before he caught on, pulling the garment off himself. “But if you’ve still got your concerns, I’d be fair pleased if you’d just lay with me for a bit, let me kiss you an’ pet you an’ smell you.”
Breathless, Numair settled his hands on Daine’s waist.
“My concerns feel quite distant, at the moment, though there is little I would like better than to pet and kiss you for however long you’d permit me.”
“However long I’d permit you?” Daine chortled. “We’d both of us have to eat and work and whatall, eventually.”
“However long I am able, perhaps,” Numair smiled, standing, moving to the foot of the bed to tug Daine’s breeches off.
“You, too, Master Salmalin,” Daine teased, curling her legs out of his reach. “It’s only fair, with much you get to see me bare.”
Numair unlaced his breeches and wriggled out of them before crawling onto their bed.
Daine shucked her shirt and breastband with one lightning-fast movement, propping herself up to watch Numair’s achingly slow approach, feeling herself flood at the possibilities sparkling in his dark eyes. He nipped at her hip, lighting Daine’s body with little sparks of desire, unfolding her legs to settle between them. She moved to strip off her loincloth, but Numair waved her away.
“These are our rooms, magelet. No one will be wondering where you are in the stables, nor is anyone fretting that our journey is taking too long.” He said, nuzzling at Daine’s loincloth. “Under the circumstances, we can afford to take a bit more time than we have become accustomed to.”
Daine sighed, arching her hips up as Numair’s teeth snagged her loincloth off, as he pulled it down her legs.
“We weren't taking our time before?”
“Not half as much as we could,” Numair said, kissing Daine’s belly, nipping a tiny pad of softness just below her navel. “We weren’t rushed--most of the time, at least--but I certainly haven’t given you the time or careful attention you are due. There’s so much of you to explore, sweet! I haven’t even found all of your beauty marks yet.”
“You’re missing about three,” Daine breathed. “And you needn’t do that,” she nodded to where Numair lay, his head between her thighs. “You’re good at it an’ all, but I’m fair used to the size of you, now.”
“I thought you enjoyed my kissing you here?” Numair asked, pausing at the borderline between her belly and the wildness of her mound.
“It’s a fair bit more than kissing,” Daine teased.
“So it is, but I’ve still never heard a phrase for it that I care for,” Numair said, combing his fingers through her hair, coaxing her thighs open a little wider. “All of the collocations--’lick out’, ‘eat out’, ‘go down’--are a bit tawdry, insufficient in describing the act, at any rate.‘Cunnilingus’ sounds rather clinical, which isn't at all the effect I aim for. So on the whole, even though it’s rather misleading, I prefer ‘kiss’,” Numair concluded his linguistics lecture with a demonstrative kiss to the cleft of Daine’s sex.
“‘Course,” Daine sighed, leaning into his soft kiss. “Like I said, you’re fair good at it, just I’d thought it was to, you know, get me ready an’ all.”
“Oh, no,” Numair said with a wicked laugh. “This is no favor, magelet. I am wild for kissing and tasting you.” Snuffling his nose though the dense, curly hair of her mound, he inhaled deeply. “Goddess bless, you smell good enough to eat,” he groaned, nipping a kiss into her inner thigh.
“You’re a beautiful flatterer,” Daine sighed, her breath drawn short by Numair’s sensitive mouth closing around her clitoris.
“I am, but not in this,” he admitted, slipping fingers into the furrow of Daine’s vulva. “I often find myself with a taste for you.”
Daine arched her back, letting Numair take her by her hips. She shivered at the pressure of his soft, talented lips sucking gently, persistently; his tongue lifting her hood to tease the hidden pearl of flesh. Her arms jerked, wanting to pull him closer, to push herself against his eager mouth and ride, but held back. Daine exhaled a shuddering sigh, swimmy-headed, her sex almost sore with the exhilaration of allowing Numair control over her pleasure.
“I mean it literally. I sometimes get the strangest yen for your taste,” Numair said, surfacing for air breathily, letting his fingers replace his tongue, teasing Daine in the same small, tight circles he’d watched her rub with her own fingers.
“You’re being silly,” Daine sighed, struggling to keep her hips still, to let Numair take his time meting out this exquisite torture. “It’s not as if I taste like spice candy.”
“Better,” Numair insisted, raising her thighs to set her legs over his shoulders. “It’s such a complex, elusive taste. Piquant. And warm, and wet. May I?” He asked, holding up his index, middle and third finger. Daine nodded raggedly. With a smooth, effortless motion, Numair slid inside of her, searching. Daine fought to keep her composure in earnest, now, the heat of his lips having taken root, the pleasure of his fingers pressing in precisely the correct spot sent its own tendrils upward, the two sensations began to entangle. Daine’s breath came in shallow, irregular gasps; though she had twisted her hands into the bedsheets to keep from grabbing her lover’s hair, the twitching buck of her hips was beyond her control. With a strong, broad hand, Numair pinned them down. “Oh, and after you’re properly excited? I could drown in you a happy man.”
Numair could see Daine’s fair skin going bright pink, feel her muscles fighting to draw his fingers in with more force; a glistening, musky smile spreading across his face. She was so tantalizingly close. He could draw her out, make her beg and weep with the relief of release--but he wasn't as patient as he'd once been. Or, more likely, Daine had ensnared his heart so completely he'd rather watch her come than tease her half an afternoon. Burying his face in her sex, he held his breath. She flooded with her desire, her scent filling his nose, her singular sapor setting his senses ablaze. She squealed, biting the inside of her mouth. Numair let his concentration slip just long enough to send black fire to the doorway, sealing the room against sound. Daine squeezed his head with her muscled thighs, crying out, arms flailing, legs jerking beneath Numair’s tight grip. She fell backward, her breathing labored, a silly smile creeping across her face.
“That was fair incredible,” Daine panted. “I’d about like to send whoever taught you that something nice for my thanks. What’s polite? Some manner of fruit, I’d reckon? Arranged somehow, like flowers, maybe?”
“Fair incredible?” Numair chuckled.
Daine nodded.
“Better’n the last few times by a mile, an’ all of them times was fair lovely their own selves,” she heaved deep breaths. “D’I sound right out of Galla, just now? Did I have one of them…annur..anjer…brain thingies an’ forgot all my grammar? S’fair trade, I’ll take it,” she prattled.
“That seems a slight exaggeration,” Numair teased, raising to kiss his favorite beauty mark, at the top of her rib, just beneath her breast.
“Only slight,” Daine giggled. “You performed quite admirably, Master Salmalin,” she said in her broadest imitation of accent-neutral Tortallan Common. “It would please me to return the favor.”
“I will be pleased to receive your favor, good lady,” Numair smiled, kissing Daine’s hand as if she were a noblewoman. “As you wisely surmised early in this particular facet of our relationship, a crucial element of lovemaking is simply a matter of learning one another.”
“Does that make you my student?” Daine jibed, opening her arms to him.
“I suppose it does,” Numair answered, raising himself to hold Daine against him, to rub his broad, rough hands all over her, soothing her hypersensitive skin. “What lessons will you put me to, Mistress Daine?”
She grabbed one of his roving hands to kiss.
“You’re mine as much as I’m yours, Master Salmalin,” she smiled, leaning backward kiss his mouth, unaccountably pleased to taste herself on his lips. Daine could agree her own scent was was pleasing,as far as such scents went, but counted herself lucky Numair was so taken with her taste, which she found slightly salty but otherwise unremarkable.
“An’ I figure, fair often, we’re studying each other the way you might study a book. A real, real interesting book. I didn’t give you a bit of direction there, did I?”
“More than you realize,” Numair shrugged, his fingertips growing restless, tracing lines over her belly, her sides, teasing her nipples. "I've learned many of your tells. I can perhaps help you learn mine, if you are interested."
Daine shuddered happily.
“Say, Numair,” Daine whispered. “You feel like a bit more education?”
“Mmm. Teaching or learning?”
His bed-- their bed, she corrected herself with a satisfied smile, was treacherously comfortable, begging her to lie beside in the soft down, in the warmth of Numair’s arms, and drift to sleep.
“Both, more’n likely,” she answered. “There’s three more rooms here--four if you count the privy, with your gigantic bathtub.”
“We’re absolutely counting the gigantic bathtub, magelet,” Numair said. “It’s possibly the best thing in our rooms.”
Our rooms, both thought, though neither spoke it aloud, instead trading soft, knowing kisses.
“Start with the little room by the window, don’t you think?” Daine asked, raising on still-shaking legs. “That loveseat is pretty high-backed--you could prop me on it, if your arms get tired.” Daine held a hand out to Numair, who stood to follow her, too enthralled by her bare form to register he, too, was naked.
“You aren’t accusing me of attempting to love you to death,” Daine whispered, grazing her teeth against Numair’s neck as he lifted her, pressing her back against the wall. She wrapped her legs around his waist, crossing her ankles behind his back.
Together, they breathed a little gasp as Numair slipped into Daine with ease, her sex still wet and accomodating from his worshipful attention.
“I wouldn’t mind if you were,” Numair said with smile. His eyes heavy-lidded and dreamy, he cupped her firm, rounded buttocks, delving deeper. “I would die a happier man than I imagined possible.”