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]

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.