3. [xestsemon au]

[birdhousesoul]

Anders has some idea Hawke and Malcolm will be in the village today, only he's not sure when. This place doesn't run on clocks. Things happen when they happen. In the meantime, he goes about his business. Unless anyone has a surprise woodchopping accident, he ought to have today to himself for a change, with no one in the village environs known to be sick or at the point of giving birth. It's a day for doing chores that take more time.

The planks of the clinic floor are in need of scrubbing, the hearth needs a good sweeping out, and after accomplishing both these tasks, Anders feels he himself is in need of scrubbing. This is ordinarily accomplished with a bucket of water and a rough cloth. He's had a square wooden tub made for soaking in, one he keeps in the clinic with a privacy screen shielding it from the main room, but he seldom gets to use it himself; it's more for allowing people to soak things that need soaking, swellings or cysts or pulled muscles. Today he has time to fill it.

He doesn't get into the bath until after he's already scrubbed clean, though, with said bucket-and-cloth method. In a place where it takes considerable effort to collect and heat the water for a bath, you make good use of that bath once you've got it. You don't pollute the water unnecessarily. It can be used by more than one person, and after that, the water can be used for laundry. He misses the station showers, sometimes. He misses the hippie laundry. Anders takes his time sitting in the water and absorbing its heat, every once in a while idly using a little fire magic to re-warm it, secure in the knowledge that he's not going to be needing an untouched mana pool for anything soon.

By the time he hears the door creaking to signal Hawke's arrival (and Malcolm making a curious noise in answer to that creak), Anders has only just hauled himself out of the tub and into a fresh pair of pants. He's drying his hair with a somewhat ragged linen towel as he steps out from behind the screen. "All right," he says, "your turn." And smiles, as it ought to be a pleasant surprise. They didn't plan any bath day. "Give him here." Malcolm's small enough yet that a basin suffices to wash him, and he's far too small to put in a bathtub.

Comments

[questionablewit]

This is familiar, an echo back to the White Room, long ago now, when he gave her a backrub that gradually metamorphosed into something else. I never could resist the urge to try my luck, he'd said. Even when it means pushing my luck.

Something they have in common, she and Anders. And not the only thing at this moment, given the way his fingers slide along areas that really don't need shampooing even if they are in the near vicinity of her hair, the way his breathing's changed to something harsh and ragged. She's painfully aware of him sitting behind her, the heat radiating from his chest and arms and hands.

Malcolm's asleep. Teo's by the front door and would warn if anyone approached. If Anders was having a bath himself, he doesn't expect anyone else. It's as private a time as they ever are granted.

It's very, very hard for Hawke not to push her luck. Her arms have wrapped around her knees during all this, and she locks her hands together, mostly to keep herself from doing something stupid with them. Like capturing his hands and moving them to the places she'd rather they were caressing.

But she can't stop her breath from catching when he touches the shell of her ear. Or that spot on the side of her neck, the one that used to make her moan if he used his mouth on it. Even Hawke doesn't have that much self-restraint, especially not in these conditions.

[birdhousesoul]

Because the liquid soap really doesn't lather much at all, there comes a point all too soon when Anders can't keep rubbing at Hawke's scalp. There's nothing much left to rub into it. He'd just start making tangled nests. This time, he hands the pitcher over her shoulder for her to refill. He doesn't want to risk brushing against her again.

Only when she tilts back her head for the rinse as he directs, the long line of her throat fascinates him, and he swallows hard around the lump in his own throat. With an unsteady hand he pours the magic-warmed water, and strokes away the residue as before with the other, and when that's done, Anders doesn't know what else to do. He can't go on washing her hair forever.

Sooner or later she's going to have to get out of the tub.

Even if he retreats to the other side of the screen, even if he drapes a towel over the top for her to retrieve, when she emerges dressed, he'll still be as he is. There's really no way to hide it, not without drawing more attention to the fact he's hiding it. Hold a book open on his knees to shield his lap? Right, it's a completely logical time for reading.

He staves off the immediate question by insisting on another two rounds of hair-rinsing, and all the while, he's puzzling over this, only succeeding in annoying himself. This is ridiculous. She's the mother of his child. He's seen every inch of her before, and she's seen him with an awkward tent in his trousers more than once. There is no reason to be anxious that — that what? That she might know he wants her? For all the past behind them, the betrayals between them, they're still human. He's still a man. It's reasonable for him to react to the presence of a naked and desirable woman within arm's reach.

It's reasonable for him to go and fetch the towel, and come back with it, and hold it open between his outstretched arms for her to step into. It's not at all a problem that this is what he chooses to do. And it's certainly reasonable that when she acts on this wordless instruction, he wraps his arms about her with the towel, rather than let go.

Perhaps it stops being reasonable when he lowers his lips to her neck, tasting clean-scrubbed skin, half-afraid she'll stop him, half-afraid she won't stop him.

[questionablewit]

Hawke doesn't consider reason. Until now, all she's considered is how to prolong the moment, and whether or not she can--should, is permitted to--act on it. When his mouth finds her skin, she has her answer.

She's confined in the towel, her arms trapped to her sides by the cloth and his embrace; she can't reach for him. And standing passively while he tastes her neck, however tantalizing, isn't enough. She steps forward into his hold, pressing against him--that awkward desire he's been struggling with is a known quantity now, oh yes--and lifting her face to return the favor, nipping at his neck.

[birdhousesoul]

It would be so much easier to pretend this isn't happening, or that he'll pretend it didn't happen once it's over. Keep absolutely silent, move as in a dream. Make it quick, to minimize the chance that the baby will awaken and cry and break the illusion. Fast and forceful, up against the wall. That would be easiest.

But he can't. There is the baby, on the other side of the screen, likely to wake any time; and there's something more. He just can't. Anders is trying to develop something like a free-standing, independent conscience of his own, and he needs some excuse for what he's doing, otherwise he'll have to tear himself away from Hawke, absolutely the last thing he wants to do.

They've been taking care of one another through the past months. There must be a hundred little ways Hawke has helped Anders to settle in, and some major contributions as well, just as he's been helping her with things that take two people to manage. Anders has always excelled at justifying things he wants to do, and this is how he justifies what he's doing now: it's a logical extension of what they've already been doing. They're taking care of one another. Since she left the station, he hasn't taken any lovers, serious or casual; hasn't taken an interest in anyone who isn't Hawke. And he's fairly certain she can't have done, either, what with being hugely pregnant for months, and then acting as sole caretaker to an infant and a wounded mabari. She wouldn't have had the energy to take an interest in anyone.

So they've both been half-starved for closeness, and it's only sensible they should deal with this need the way they've dealt with other needs. Perhaps they can't trust one another, but they can trust one another more than they can trust anyone else.

That's the justification. It's enough to go on with. It doesn't have to explain everything — he knows he loves her, hasn't stopped loving her; he knows he can't forgive the way she left, any more than she can forgive what he did in Kirkwall or how he went about it — it only has to explain why he's allowed to kiss her. After that, everything else follows.

"Let's make a little wager," he suggests. "If we can finish this without any interruptions at all, I have to wash the baby. If we're interrupted, by anyone or anything, you have to wash the baby." As he speaks, Anders unwinds the towel that's been holding her arms in place, and uses it to rub her dry, back and shoulders and thighs, and he kneels under the pretext of drying her calves but he kisses her navel while he's there. "And if we start fighting and interrupt ourselves, that counts as a draw, no one wins."

[questionablewit]

The casualness of his offer catches Hawke by surprise, as if this is nothing unusual. At the same time, the casualness is appealing, because she'd like for this to be nothing unusual. She leans into every touch, savoring it even if there is towel between his hands and her skin.

"I'm willing," she says lightly. "Although given Malcolm and Teo, I'd have to say the odds are significantly in your favor." Since her arms are free and he's kneeling at her feet, she indulges in the urge to play with his hair. The air's dried it since his bath, mostly, and it's still loose, soft against her fingers as she trails them along his scalp, drifts down to trace the rim of his ear.

[birdhousesoul]

"That's the beauty of it." Anders considers not pointing this out, but he has to do it, just to make sure she fully appreciates the genius of his improvised plan. "The longer this lasts, the more likely it is we'll be interrupted." He trails ticklish kisses down her belly, and nudges one of her calves to suggest she widen her stance. "So we both win, either way."

[questionablewit]

"By that logic, I should encourage you to be as quick as possible." Her skin is flushed, and surely that's just the heat from the bath. Surely. She's not self-conscious in front of him, can't be, they know each other much too well for that. Her body is much the same as it ever was; a few new scars, and stretchmarks from the birth, hardly something you'd want to make a statue out of--the life she's always lived isn't easy on a body--but she's never cared. Nor has he, does he, given how he touches her. She catches her breath in half a laugh and half a sigh at the kisses, and spreads her legs without fighting him. "I can't say that's my first inclination, even to win a wager."

[birdhousesoul]

Says the woman who proposes to eat herself as a soup. Anders only chuckles, a low hum of soft laughter against the verge of her curls. "Shhh. My logic is impeccable. I'd only hold out longer, just for spite." He reaches for her hand and shapes her forefinger and second into a crook like the fork of a dowsing rod, which he places to advantage, pressing the pads of those fingers to either side of her cleft and guiding them to pull upward. "Aren't you helpful," he murmurs, holding her hand in place for a moment to make sure she understands completely how he wants it to stay, and nuzzles at her knuckle before he tilts his head, kneels lower. She's holding herself exposed for his attention and he savors the sight first, to whet his appetite and hers before the tasting begins. Flushed from the water's warmth, yes, and swollen with want, and the sweet little hood pulling away with the pressure of her hand to bare her for his tongue.

She's as delectable as he remembers. His fingers clench the inside of her thigh above the knee, and the towel has fallen to curl about her ankle, quite forgotten. Anders knows when to tease her with the tip of his tongue, when to lave her with flat broad licks, when to simply breathe.

[questionablewit]

Hawke's idle play with his hair becomes a grip almost at once, because she has to grip something and nothing else within reach is safe. His hands on her legs support her to an extent, but his mouth, Maker, she's open wide for him, he can reach every sensitive place, and does. She struggles to hold back her reaction, but tiny whimpers of pleasure and need escape her. It has nothing to do with their wager, which she could care less about, but an interruption would mean he'd have to stop, and she doesn't want him to stop, ever.

But it's too much, it's too good, it's been so long, and her hand is shaking when she tugs his hair. "I can't keep standing if you're going to keep doing that," she says between shuddering breaths. "I'll fall over. Knock over the screen. Land in the tub and drown and never notice. Hopefully you don't want to win that badly." She babbles because she doesn't want to beg, not yet.

[birdhousesoul]

Anders stops just long enough to answer. "Can't have that, can we? So we'll move." Simple answer. He knows she can't suggest it herself, because it's his bed, and even though he's suggested she nap in it with the baby on some prior occasions, she's never shared it with Anders himself.

This place is so small, it would be difficult to find room for much furniture; but there's a box bed built into one wall, closed off with a coarse curtain rather than panelling, more for warmth than for privacy. The straw palliasse inside has been recently re-stuffed, the sheets relatively fresh, the blankets aired. Still, the predominant scent inside is of wool, with the fainter whiff of an herbal mixture to repel moths, rosemary and mint and sage. Anders pulls back the somewhat scratchy blankets so she'll be able to lie on the smooth sheet beneath, and holds the curtain open for Hawke to climb into the bed. They both clamber in with precipitous speed, Anders stopping only long enough to shed what little he's been wearing before following her into bed and letting the curtain fall closed.

"I forgot what we were doing. You'll have to remind me." Not all light is shut out; it's dim, but she'll be able to see his smirk. "Or you could show me."

[questionablewit]

This is better. This is much better. Instead of standing above Anders and trying to concentrate so she doesn't lose her balance, Hawke's now stretched out beside him, all the length of his body against hers. All the length of him pressing against her hip, giving the lie to his words. As if Anders has ever forgotten or not known what he was doing in this context. The laugh burbles out of her. "Oh, so now you're going to steal my lines and use them against me?" Don't tell me, show me. And she does, her hands wandering every inch of his skin she can reach, and delighting in the search.

But show and tell is more fun than show or tell, so she leans up on her elbow, bending over him to kiss and nibble her way along his neck. "Since you're forgetful, you should know that you were teasing me mercilessly. Kissing your way from my neck downwards, rather like this." His skin smells like the soap she's been using, but with something else, the musky-male scent of Anders. Just the smell of him alone arouses her, even without other senses inflamed, and there's more hunger than finesse as she tastes her way down his chest, shifting until she's kneeling beside him. "With the occasional distraction along the way." She darts her tongue into his navel, and one hand slides down to hold his hip. "But also with definite purpose in mind."

She takes a moment to just breathe on his shaft, anticipating and making him anticipate, before she circles the head with her tongue--once, twice, then taking the tip of him into her mouth. And then she stops, looks up at him with twinkling eyes. "Is all this sounding familiar yet, or should I continue?"

[birdhousesoul]

Anders has never been too proud to steal someone else's lines, if they're good lines. He'll also spoil the punchlines of other people's jokes. At present, he's hard-pressed to say much of anything, humorous or otherwise.

When she stops, though, he regains some small measure of composure, enough to laugh a little breathlessly, and answer. "It rings a bell. Vaguely." And it's at this moment his doubts resurface, edging past desire. He has less of a problem taking care of her than letting her take care of him, in any context. This context is especially fraught. "You don't have to." It's not a trade. She doesn't have to do what he was doing.

[questionablewit]

Hawke looks up and smiles at him, a sweet expression on her face. She's very happy to be here, where she is, where they are, and it shows. "I know I don't. But I'd like to." She bends her head just a bit, eyes still holding his, and runs her tongue across the tip of him, savoring the salt she finds there. One of her hands wraps around the base of his shaft. "You can stop me anytime you want. You know that. But I love the way you feel in my mouth, in my hand. The hardness of you." Her hand tugs on him gently, more a suggestion of what she could do than anything else. "I love knowing you react this way to me."

[birdhousesoul]

In truth, Anders would react this way to almost anyone doing what Hawke is doing to him right now. Unless it was Oghren and he knew it was Oghren. If it were Oghren and he didn't know that it was, that might still work. Anders doesn't know. No, wait, if it were Oghren, the fumes would peel a layer of skin off Anders' — Why is he thinking about Oghren again? Probably in an effort to prevent himself from behaving in a horribly inconsiderate manner. Anders forces himself to breathe evenly.

"If it's what you want." He's helpless not to acquiesce. He remembers just how good she had gotten at this, with long and enthusiastic practice, over their years together. "If you really — ohh." Whatever she just did, he loses the will to object, or to speak at all. His head falls back against the meager pillows, eyes sliding closed in ecstasy.

[questionablewit]

Hawke's not a master of the art of giving head, and wouldn't claim she was, but she has at least two things in her favor. First, she enjoys it, which makes all the difference. Second, while she might not be a master of cocksucking in general, she is a past master of knowing what Anders likes. She still knows where to find every sensitive part of him, when to lick and when to suck, when to tap him with her tongue, when to hum, when to take him in deep. When to circle the base of him with thumb and index finger and squeeze, to hold back his pleasure enough that she can prolong all of it. Where to do all these things for maximum effect.

She doesn't go for maximum effect so much as show off, demonstrate her skills; proving to herself that she still knows him as well as she thinks she does, or perhaps just wanting to please him as much as possible for as long as possible. That's most likely of all, that the small bit of restraint is a attempt to prolong things, because tempting as it is to see if she can make him lose control entirely and come in her mouth, there are more satisfying ways this can end. For both of them.

Still, she enjoys herself for a good while, reveling in his reactions, the minute clenchings of his abdominal muscles, the way his breathing changes, his fingers twitching and digging into the bed. Even the smallest movements are writ large for her, fraught with significance, and she cherishes every one.

There's a long history between them of her teasing him to the brink and then waiting to see how he reacts, and that's what she does now, carefully releasing him from her mouth and hands and then crawling back up the bed to stretch herself alongside him again. The expression on her face as she leans on her elbow, looking down at him, is decidedly smug.

[birdhousesoul]

With a growl, he rolls onto her, bowling her over onto her back. "You minx." She's brought him too far for patience now. Blindly he gropes above her head for one of the thin pillows, and when he finds it, he shoves it roughly under her hips, or rather under one hip, relying on her to lift herself and reach to smooth the other side. "Open," he demands, and when she does, he pauses only long enough to take himself in hand and guide himself into the warmth between her thighs. There's no hesitation, no teasing, just a forceful thrust, followed by almost complete withdrawal, and another plunge, and another.

[questionablewit]

This is why she so loves to tease him the way she does, because of this, the part where he takes what he wants from her, where they're both lost to need. Her hips rise up to meet his thrusts, taking him in hard and deep, and her hands grip his shoulders for leverage. She has to bite her lip to keep from crying out at how good it feels, the wildness of it, the complete lack of restraint. Can't make sound. Or at least, not much, a few whimpers escape despite her efforts, she can't help that, and her eyes are squeezed shut in concentration.

[birdhousesoul]

Anders is determined not to make any noise that might wake the baby, and to muffle both Hawke and himself, he covers her mouth with his own, an expedient that almost immediately becomes a major undertaking in its own right, a deep plundering kiss. He drives into her ruthlessly, as reckless on his own account as hers. Breathless grunts of exertion can't be drowned by any kiss.

Even so, even in this abandon, Anders doesn't forget what's crucial. The pillow was for that, and also the way he rolls his hips against her at the conclusion of every push inward. It's as selfish as anything: he wants to make her come, he wants to be the one who does that for her.

[questionablewit]

It's their first kiss in almost a year and a half, and there's nothing gentle about it. His mouth tastes of her, her mouth tastes of him, sex and ferocious hunger as their tongues mimic what's happening below.

It's the final piece she needed, and it's not long before the devastating combination of kisses and Anders' skilled thrusting pushes her over the edge. Her cry of ecstacy is caught by his mouth, her shudders of release are caught by his body, stretched over hers, all of her is held and watched over. She surrenders with nothing held back, clinging to him as she comes.

[birdhousesoul]

Anders follows suit quickly enough, driven past endurance by the flutter of her muscles around him and the tense muffled noise she makes into his mouth and the sweet hot slickness of her as he pounds her into the rustling mattress. He's been abstinent for far too long; it's practically a miracle he lasted even this long in bed, his first time back in the proverbial saddle. That he didn't simply spend himself in her mouth is itself tribute to Hawke's knowledge of his body, able to tell when he's getting too close.

He knows how to be quiet, and he is, mostly. When the last shudder has wracked him and left him panting in its wake, he rolls off her heavily. "Maker," is all he can say, astonished.