~Dany~

I blink open my eyes which feel heavy and swollen with sleep. Pale lemon sunlight streams into the chamber from outside where the day hints at a bright wintery crispness.  Jon isn't beside me and the bed is ice cold where he should be. 

A little flare of loss sparks but dims almost immediately as I push onto my back and let out a warm sigh of contentment, my thoughts tangling through the memories of last night.

It causes a smile to spread over my face and a blush to rise to my cheeks.

I had not considered he might be a skilled lover.  Had not dared hope for such a thing.   He had been a soldier of the night's watch since he was a boy and the vows spoken when he donned his cloak prevented him knowing, and indeed learning, a womans body.

How eagerly had he broken his vows, I wonder. Who was she? Had there been more than one? I imagine scores of wildling women beyond the wall —  surely only a man who had known many women could know how to pleasure them so? — Jon taking each of them rough and wild beneath the stars. Jealousy spears through me, ugly and hot.

No. I will not give rise to it. Not this day, when my body was softened and weak from him. 

Yet, I cannot help but wonder if I had pleased him as he had I? As they had pleased him.

The recollection of the force of his own pleasure, his release, the feel of it as it spilled inside me, the scraped raw sound of his throat as he did convinced me that I had. I must have. For men could not fake such. This I knew. 

Dany.  He had whispered tenderly against my lips, my skin. 

I had forgotten. Forgotten what it felt like to be known by that name.  To feel as though I was truly known. As though some other soul in this fragile chaos of existence knew me. I had been Khaleesi to some. Mhysa to others. Whore. Mother of Dragons. Breaker of Chains. Now I was Queen to any who stood before me.

To Jon I would be Dany.

I would again be Dany.  A name I thought lost to me forever.  

I can still smell him here. In the furs. Upon my skin. In my hair. Under my nails. I can still feel him between my thighs, the echo of him in the tightness between my legs and breasts.  A small groan of desire escapes my throat. 

Where is he? 

Sitting up on my elbows, I gaze around the chamber. The fire burns still, tamed and gentle, and on the small table sat before it I see a plate covered with a length of bleached fabric. A jug and a cup next to it. My stomach growls fiercely, gnawing at me from the inside.

Slipping my feet out of the bed, I gaze around for something to pull around me, and note my nightgown discarded upon the rug. The sight of it torn and ruined causes another stab of heat between my thighs, in the pit of my stomach.  How would he be with me now? Would the dark hunger of last night have receded to be replaced once more by the hardened northern warrior? I like both looks on him. Though the appearance of him in the soft glow of candlelight, his skin slicked with sweat and his eyes drunk and lust-filled pleased me beyond reason turning my mind and body soft. 

Standing, I lift the top layer of fur from the bed and pull it around my shoulders and cross to the table and the plate of food. Bread and thickened cream with a small pot of honey to pour on top.  As I'm chewing gratefully on the soft bread, there's a small knock on the chamber door.

'Enter,' I manage through mouthfuls.  

Missandei appears a moment later, behind her, four unsullied carry a steaming hot basin into the chamber and place it down before the fire. They bow to me and exit wordlessly. Missandei hangs a length of cotton over one end of the basin and comes toward me, her gaze weighted with study. Whatever look she sees on my face causes a smile to tease her shapely mouth. 

'You slept well, Khaleesi?'

'I did,' I smile back.  Her smile widens as she nods and moves to the chest. I watch as she retrieves a deep red gown and shakes it out to loosen the creases from it. 

'You have seen him this morning?' I ask her as I lift the light wine.

She flicks her gaze to mine. 'Your husband?'

I nod.

'Briefly, as he made his way to the camp, your grace, yes.'

'And how did he seem to you?'

She thinks on it a moment. 'Serious, Khaleesi.  As he always appears to me.'

I think of the smile he had given me last night as we talked silly tales of what could never be.

But he would always dream of the silver-haired maiden who had stolen his heart.

The soft laugh that breaks from my throat is almost a stranger. Had I dreamt those words? Spoken to me from soft lips leaden with spent desire.  No. I was certain I had not.

At my outburst, Missandei turns her head, perplexed, a smile peeking at the corners of her mouth. 

'He is not always serious,' I offer, lifting a shoulder and biting back the girlish grin.

'He does appear much changed in your presence, it is true,' she muses.

'How so?' I sit up slightly, curiosity lighting my whole body. 

She considers this, carefully.  'He looks at you quite unlike how he looks at anyone else,' she says.  When she sees the look on my face she pauses, and searches for a different explanation. 'As though his eyes deceive him, or as though he cannot quite believe you are real.'

My breath thins in my chest, fluttering precariously, a gluttonous warmth filling me.  Suddenly I have a longing to see him.  To touch him. To have him touch me. 

I rise from the chair and cross to the bath, Missandei abandoning her task to aid me into it.  Sinking into the warm fragrant water I let out a soft contented sigh and rest my head back upon the basin's edge. 

'You spent the night with your love, I hope.' I ask her, soft.  She took great care not to flaunt it, Grey Worm too, stealing nights when the occasion allowed.  With many of the men distracted with the wedding feast I hoped they had found the time to steal away together.

'Yes, Khaleesi,' she says as she begins to wash my arm, shoulder to elbow with a soft brush of the cloth. The tenderness in her voice is whisper-soft.  'Before he was called away.'

'Called away?' I frown, turning my head. 

'To oversee the departure,' She nods.

'Whose departure?'

Missandei frowns, her hand stilling. 'The departure of the men,' she says, hesitant. It sounds like a question. When my eyes narrow further she continues, slowly, carefully. 'An order... came in the night... from the King.  The men were to prepare for departure at once.'

'An order from.. The King?'

'You did not know?' Her voice is frightened almost.

My entire body hardens to cold stone. He sent an order for my men to depart? For the wall no doubt... Without my leave.  He had barely waited until our bedding to assume control of my armies. The betrayal stings, anger curling my fingers into fists beneath the water.  With a surge of bitter fury I move to stand.

'Bring me my gown,' I command her. 

***

My blood riders barely kept pace with me as fury spurred me toward the great camp - or what was left of it.  A number of the tents had gone, the fires around them smouldering or cold, around a quarter of the camp having slipped away during the night or early dawn.

The sight of the flattened ground where the tents should be only fuels my ire, yet the sight of him, kingly and handsome as he stands with Tyrion and two of his own men, sends a lick of treacherous heat raking across my body. My heart speeding and my legs weakening, I slip down from the saddle and approach him.  

Tyrion sees me first, and then Lord Davos, Jon — with his back turned — the last to understand what the sudden pensive look on the other men's faces signal.  He turns to me slowly and my breath falters as his dark gaze meets mine.  His hair is pulled back in a knot, his cheeks and lips pink from the cold, his eyes softening warmly at the sight of me. 

It is your army he wants, not you, Viserys's voice reminds me. Look how quickly he took it from you.

As I come closer he opens his mouth to speak first but I speak first.

'I would know at once why you ordered a quarter of my men away while I slept.' My voice is hot and breathless from anger and the ride and it causes Jon to blink in surprise.

The flicker of warmth in his eyes does not dissipate but a crease of worry ruffles his brow. 

'I thought it best to start preparations for our departure as soon as possible,' he says as he comes to a stop in front of me. 

I raise an eyebrow up at him. 'You thought it best? And what of my thoughts? Were they of no consequence to you?'

Over his shoulder I see Tyrion shift on his feet, Lord Davos bringing his hands together, his mouth firming into a line. 

'Perhaps we should discuss this, in private?' Jon suggests softly.

I blink, incredulous. 'Oh, so now you wish to discuss it?'

When he bites softly on the inside of his lip I ignore the flash of memory that comes from the action. His mouth sucking wet and rough on my hardened nipple, the scrape of teeth across my hot skin. I swallow. 

Please, his eyes say.

I give him a lingering look before storming past him, past Tyrion and Lord Davos too, towards my tent — one of those which is still standing.  As I pass I throw Tyrion an accusatory glare. 

I do not turn to check that Jon is following me, but the sound of crunching across snow a moment later tells me that he is.  Pushing through the opening of my tent I march across the freezing space with my arms folded tight across my chest. 

My back still turned to the entrance, I hear him enter a moment later. He stops close to me. I feel it.  The heat of him, the sound of his breath slow and even, the lingering scent of him curling around me like ribbon.  When I spin to face him there's a look in his eye that makes me forget a moment why I'm so angry. It reminds me instead of words spoken soft under candlelight and smiles given by kiss-worn lips. In fact, he is so indescribably beautiful that for a moment I simply stare back at him, stunned. 

Then I remember.  Viserys's voice reminds me.

'How dare you presume to command my army without my leave.'

A faint rise of his eyebrows. 'Your army.' It does not sound like a question, but I answer it all the same.

'Yes.'

'I thought they were our armies?' It's said so simply, so directly, so seemingly without forethought or assumption that it takes me by surprise.

'I am your Queen,' I tell him, pointlessly. 

He nods. 'Aye, you are. But I understood this was an alliance, Daenerys.' There's an accusation in his tone that I do not care for. 'I understood that when I accepted your... proposal... it gave me some rights as king.'

'An alliance means that we are allies, Jon. That we make decisions together, that we decide where to send our armies, together. To wake and find that you have sent a quarter of my men north to fight this unbeatable dead army of yours — that is not an alliance.  It is the action of a usurper.'

A deep crease appears between his brows then, bewilderment clear in his eyes.  'I have not sent any men north.'

'Then... where have you sent them?' I blink, confused.

'South. Home,' he explains. 'You said you had no wish to remain in the north. I sent the order to Tyrion while you slept to have them prepare for departure at first light.'

'Oh...' A swell of warmth and gratitude floods into my chest, dulled by my folly. Pride and nothing more moves me to speak my next words. 'Still, you should not have given the order without first discussing it with me.' My voice no longer has the heat of rage it had sported a moment before — it sounds hesitant to my ears. Prideful and weak. 

He holds my eyes a moment, something unspoken glimmering behind the black. Disappointment, regret, a faint tremor of anger perhaps.

'Very well,' he says with a curt nod.  'I shall give no further orders without your leave.' He lowers his eyes and dips his head into a slight bow. 'Now, if that is all — I have things to prepare.'

A horrible emptiness clutches at me. At the formality.  I want to go to him.  Smooth away the frown from his face, smooth away this quarrel from between us.  But again, pride stops me.

'That is all,' I say softly.

When Jon lifts his eyes to meet mine a shard of coolness lingers in them, so different from the heat that burned in them last night.

I soften my own expression, my mouth too, parting my lips as I try on the sound of an apology.  What he did he did because he thought it would please me. Because he thought it was what I desired.

Before I get the chance to utter a word however, he turns on his heel and strides from the tent, leaving me entirely cold and completely alone. 

It is some moments before I hear the tent open once more, and my heart lifts at the idea that he might have returned. Instead I find Tyrion coming toward me, a rather sheepish look on his face. But as he gets closer I note something like mild disapproval in his eyes.

'You should not blame him for giving the order,' he says. 'But I who saw it carried out.'

'You assume I do not blame you?' I scowl at him. 'How easily you rushed to take orders from another. What sort of hand does that make you?'

'Forgive me, your grace, but the words 'The queen desires to return south, ready the men to depart at sunrise' seemed an entirely reasonable command to me?'

'It is not the command that displeases me, Tyrion, as well you know.'

'No. It is the very idea that someone but you should dare utter it,' he replies. My eyes snap to his, my fingers curling tight.  He does not flinch from my glare, though after a moment, his eyes soften, pleading. 'Jon Snow is a proud man.  Yes, he is soldier of the nights watch and used to taking orders, but he has also led men and armies and was named king by his people. He all but gave that up to marry you. If you question every decision and command he gives — even when they are aligned with your own interests — how do you consider he might begin to feel about this alliance?'

I close my eyes on a sigh. I often hate the constant reason in him.

'So then I should permit him command my armies without discussing it with me?' I ask him. 'What next? Let him rule the seven kingdoms without me too? Would that be preferable to you? A king in place of a queen? Men do so prefer to follow the commands of other men after all...'

'Oh, do not be absurd,' he scoffs as though I have said something particularly childish.  'You are the queen this realm needs, no one is in any doubt of that — least of all me.' His gaze sharpens, warning and reason piercing through me. 'But Jon Snow is the king you need, your grace. I am more convinced of that than ever.'

***

I leave Tyrion to continue with the disassembly of the camp and ride the short distance back to Winterfell slowly, Rakharo and Javarro close behind.  We would be ready to depart come sunrise the following day according to Tyrion; an early start on the morrow would ensure we reached White Harbour in good time. 

Lord Manderly and his men would ride with us. He had offered to host us for the night in his home, but I had graciously declined, eager to board the ships and return south as soon as possible.  When the realm was more settled, I planned for Jon and I to take a tour of the seven kingdoms as Queen and King; I was keen to see the far flung corners of this great land and its people with him by my side. I had informed the sour Lord Manderly, that during this campaign would we be more than honoured to take him up on his offer.  This appeared to placate him somewhat.

Winterfell's main yard is a bustling throb of activity, though as I look around it I see no sign of him, though I do see the tall red-haired wildling near the kennels, talking loudly with wide hand gestures and the occasional choke of laughter.  I start across the yard toward him smiling warmly at any northerner who passes. They lower their heads as they always do, avoiding my eyes as they always do.  Will they ever see me as their queen? 

I suppose not if Sansa has the say of it.

As I approach him, the tall wildling straightens up. He does not avoid my eyes as the other northerners do, infact he stares at me boldly, a smile bright in his eyes. 

'Tormund, is it not?' I ask as I approach.

He nods, slowly, holding my eye as he bends the upper half of his body into a slight bow. 'That is one of the names they call me.'

I smile. 'And what are the others?'

'I would tell you but I would not like to be beheaded for offending the ears of a Queen.' His mouth lifts up into a playful smirk which makes his blue eyes glitter under the snow-bright sky. 

I raise my eyebrows and nod once.

'Then I shall call you Tormund,' I say.  'I am looking for Jon...'

'Yes, I bet you are,' he grins. The grin and the inflection causes a blush to rise to my cheeks. 

'Well... have you... seen him?' I ask.

He holds his hand out to his waist. 'About this high, never smiles, and whines a lot about being a bastard? I have,' he nods.

I bite back a smile and incline my head, expectant.

'Oh, have I seen him now, today? Aye, I saw him. He went to say goodbye to his dead.' He points across the yard to a set of solid gates, beyond which I see only darkness. Thanking him, I turn and head across the yard toward the gates of Winterfell's crypt, the cold nipping at my cheeks and lips as I do.

The snow has started again, light speckles which disappear into the softened mud beneath my feet. The large steel gates are heavy, but I need only pull them open a little way to allow me to slip through the gap inside.  The air is colder here than it is outside, and staler, a mottled stagnancy which feels thick in my throat. A little way ahead, the ground begins to descend downward, lit only by a faint orange glow flickering from below.

I keep close to the wall as I feel my way down, the glow growing brighter and brighter as the light from outside fades behind me. As the ground levels out beneath my feet, I have to catch my footing, my boots sounding too loud on the chilled stone floor.

It's only then that I consider that perhaps I should not disturb him down here while he says goodbye to his dead. That perhaps I should leave him alone and wait for him above.

Convinced then that I should not be here, I'm about to turn back when I hear it. Hear them. Voices. Two of them. 

Jon's certainly, and someone else's too.

My breath dances in front of me as I listen hard for the other voice, for anything other than the fact it is higher than Jon's. Female then. Suddenly I know whom it belongs to.

Leaning my head around the wall which veers slightly to the right, I see them. At the far end of what I can now see is a large crypt holding the tombs of what can only be the bones of every dead Stark. 

Jon and Sansa. Standing still beside each other, a measure of distance between them as they both stare up at the same statue. 

I know I should turn and go.  I know I should leave this sacred place where I do not belong and let them be alone, but I can't seem to move my feet. I can't quiet the curiosity pulling my body towards them, urging me closer.  It's louder than the guilt I feel at eavesdropping, louder than the promise of the shame I would feel if they turned to find me here.

Holding my breath I move closer, then closer still, to a large alcove cleaved into the wall. Moving into the shadowed cover, I press my back against the wall and lean my ear toward them. I close my eyes and try to slow my breathing, laboured from fear and guilt and anxiety.  Perhaps I'm still too far to hear their exchange?  That relieves and deflates me all at once. 

But then she speaks. 

'Is this where you've come to tell me goodbye?' Sansa's voice is flat and cold like the stone walls of the crypt. It contrasts with the deep rumble of Jon's voice when he speaks; it warms me and the dead air around us. Soft and filled with great tenderness for his sister. 

'I do not want to leave things like this... he would not want it.'

'He would not want you to leave,' she says. 

'I have to,' he sounds pained, apologetic, and it almost cleaves my heart in two. 'You know I have to.'

The guilt in my bones intensifies, blocking out everything else. My fault. This chasm between them was my fault. 

'You have to because you married her. You married her because you wanted her.'

It's an accusation. I hold my breath.

'I married her for the north, because it is what any king would have done. It's what Robb would have done.'

Another slice across my chest. So then I was his duty. I was not the silver-haired maiden who stole his heart, I'm the woman he married for the good of his people. Nothing more.

'Robb died because he chose to marry the woman he loved, and you have clearly learned nothing from his mistakes,' she hisses.

'Robb died because we were betrayed,' Jon snaps.  'Because our family was betrayed.'

There's a heavy silence for several moments before he speaks again.

'It is an alliance, Sansa... Why can't you understand that?'

'I saw how you looked at her in the Godswood.  At the feast,' she accuses, sharply.  'I see it in your eyes even now.  You care for her. That is not an alliance...'

I cannot recall taking a breath in some time, my hands trembling from cold and something else. 

'She is my wife and my queen,' Jon says, heavily. 'She is your Queen.'

I wait for her treasonous tongue to refute him, to deny it, but she says nothing. Instead there's another silence, lengthy and weighty like the one before it. 

'If she had not come...' Sansa says.  It sounds like a question.  'If she had not come for your hand, and it had been you and I... Would you have wanted me then?'  My hand flies to my mouth as the gasp threatens to tumble from my mouth. Gods no. No. No. No. 'Would you have desired me then?'

This time there is no pause. 

'No,' Jon says without hesitation.  'I would never have... not like that.  To think of it... to suggest it... it is... no. You are my sister, Sansa.' 

Her voice when it speaks then is sharp and soft like an assassin.

'And yet it is strange, for I have never seen you as a brother, not truly. You were my father's bastard by some nameless whore and now you are less than that. Now you are as he is to me... dead.' 

When I hear footsteps I press myself deeper into the wall of the darkened cavern.  A shuffle of fabric, a few more footsteaps, heavier, then a soft scuffing across the stone.

'You do not mean that,' Jon says, his voice shaken. 'I know you do not. You are angry with me, hurt, but you do not mean that.' My heart clenches tight for him, pain wracking through me as tears flood to my eyes. 

'Goodbye, Jon.  I wish you good fortune in the wars to come.'

As her footsteps grow louder the urge to run and hide takes over me but I can't move. I need to remain still.  A slight breeze brushes against me as Sansa walks past, and as I turn my head I see her head in the air and her chin raised.  I wait for Jon's footsteps to follow after her but they don't.  Soon, Sansa's footsteps begin to fade, their weight changing, fading further, as she begins to climb the incline toward the gate.

As the silence bleeds through the tomb my mind returns to Sansa's words. Their cold delivery and suddenly everything makes a horrible kind of sense. A strange sort of hopelessness washing over me with it.  Her disdain for me.  Her reluctance for this marriage.  The look of anxiety in Jon's eye as he entered the chamber last night as Sansa left it.  His words to me after.

Her anger is not with you, it is with me. There were words spoken between us — she did not like mine and I did not like hers. 

Whatever Sansa's feelings for Jon are, he does not share them. But I also know that he does not care for me, for he had not confirmed it when given the chance. He sees me as a duty, nothing more. Which means I must be more careful with my own heart.  I must navigate this thing, this marriage between us, like an alliance in truth.  I could not afford to give my heart and soul so carelessly as I had been about to do. I had gotten lost in the promise of him after a single night and already I am weaker for it.

What is he doing? So still and silent is he.  I feel guilty again for being here. For having listened to this. 

As gently as I can, I edge out of the recess and move back the way I came, back towards the corridor that will lead me up and out of this place.  But as I do I cast a look backward to see him on one knee, his hand resting on the pommel of his sword, his head lowered as though in prayer.

Longing pulls at me, the desire to comfort and hold him, to ease his suffering. Suddenly I care nothing for how weak it would make me.

Would he want my comfort?  Jon Snow is a proud man.

I cross the small gap between the alcove and the corridor soundlessly and softly pace back the way I came.

I am not far ahead before something stops me. The sliver of a touch upon my neck, a gentle whisper of a breeze against my ear, a soft yearning in the pit of my stomach. 

Without another thought I stop and turn back toward him, making no attempt now to conceal my footsteps.  As I round back into the main chamber of the crypt he stands, turning to face me, his eyes wary. Had he hoped it was Sansa returned? He holds my gaze as I move toward him, and it appears to soften the closer I get to him.

Breaking his stare I cast my gaze around, taking in the sombre statues of the Starks properly for the first time. They seem to be eyeing me with doubt and suspicion, the same stone cold eyes of the north.

'I thought I should come and say goodbye,' Jon says, speaking first.

I nod as I come to stand in front of the statue  before which he had been kneeling, before which he and Sansa had had their exchange. 

A man with a dour expression and long sloping nose stares straight ahead. Hair which hangs loose to graze his jaw, cold stone eyes, thin lips. Eddard Stark. 

There is little of Jon in him that I can see.

'Is it a good likeness?' I ask, as I continue to stare up at the carving of his father.    

'Aye, it is.  My father was a man of few words.' 

When I look at him he smiles a little, his mouth and eyes faint with amusement.  It causes a rush of such feeling that I feel momentarily breathless. That he could find softness for me now. Warmth. Humour even. Longing blooms and grows outward, stretching towards him. I am powerless against it. You are weak.

I turn so that I'm pressed into the front of his body. 'I have yet to get used to sharing my rule,' I tell him.  'I'm asking for your patience and help while I learn to do so.'

'You have it' he says, soft, his gaze dipping to my mouth. 'Whatever you need from me, you shall have it.'

I smile as a flutter of breathlessness moves over me. He is the King you need, your grace. I am more convinced of that than ever.

'I also need your forgiveness for my words earlier,' I glance down. 'It was pride. That is all.' 

He sighs, soft. Then brings a hand to my chin and tilts my head up towards his.  'There is nothing to forgive. I should not have given the order without first discussing it with you. It wont happen again.'

Reaching my hands up, I smooth my hands across the loop of metal which holds closed his cloak.

'You would not require to discuss those kinds of orders with me if you were Master of War.'

He frowns. 'Master of War?'  There's something like derision in his tone.

'High Commander of the armies of the realm — or whichever title you please.' 

'I don't need another title, Daenerys,' he says.

'But the realm requires someone to help prepare our armies for a war against the dead, who better than their king? Who better than someone who has fought and killed them?' 

'Dany, I do not need a title to do that.'

Dany. My heart lifts, sings almost. I tilt my head and offer him a slight pout, my gaze playful.

'Then, you are refusing me?' When I capture my lower lip between my teeth and bite down, he narrows his eyes slightly, heat flaring in them.

'I am starting to think there is very little I could refuse you,' he says softly.

Boldly, I slip my hand between our bodies and let my gloved fingers graze over the front of his leathers.  A small groan breaks out of his throat as I feel him harden under my touch. 

'What are you doing?' He hisses, his voice thick suddenly.

'I did not like waking to find you gone...' I tell him as I move the palm of my hand flat against him. When his breathing turns quick, I look up at him from under my lashes.

'Here?' It's bitten out, shock and awe clear in his tone.

I drop my hand as the blush creeps to my cheeks. Gods what must he think of me?  To touch him so, here, before the tombs of his family. Shame washes over me.

'I am sorry, I did not mean to dishonour the memory of...' I step back out of his body but he reaches out quickly and captures me, his hand sliding around my waist as he pulls me back against his body. 

He brings his mouth close to mine but doesn't kiss me, merely tempts me with his lips, hot like fire as they dance over my own. 

'I have not known a queen to apologise as frequently you do,' he says, his pink mouth arched with a soft smile. 

'What other queens have you known?' I reach up to press my lips to his, moaning softly as his tongue slides into my mouth to stroke and caress my own.

He turns me then, forcing me backward so that I hit the stone wall of the crypt, and then he brings his mouth to my neck where he traces the curve of my jaw with his lips. His hands climb my body and he pulls open the neck of my coat to kiss and suck at the exposed skin.

I want him to take me. Here. Without shame or burden. I want him to throw me to the ground and claim me in the dirt beneath our feet. The fierce ache between my legs demands it. I could not give him my heart but I could give him my body. Over and over again. Willingly.

'Dany...' he pants against my throat, my pulse fluttering wildly beneath his tongue. When he finds my mouth again his teeth scrape and bite at my lips, rough and coarse, while his hands move to grab and shove at my skirts. Wet heat pools between my legs when suddenly he drops to his knees before me and shoves the thick silk up to my waist.

'Hold them,' he commands. Half-dazed, I bring my hands to obey, gripping hold of the weighty skirt and bundling it up at my waist.

Exposed to his lust-filled eyes, he takes a moment to drink me in before gripping the backs of my thighs and pulling me toward his mouth.  My shoulders resting against the tomb wall, he edges my knees apart and the cold air rushes up inside me, cooling the surge of heat between my legs. Then, he lowers his head and runs his tongue up the seam of my sex.

I gasp loud.

My legs almost buckling beneath me, he grips my thighs harder, holding me upright, before repeating the action with his tongue. This time when he reaches the tiny bundle of nerves at the peak, he sucks it hard into his mouth before plunging his tongue deep inside me. My body bucks violent and wild as the scream peels from my throat.

'Jon... please...' I beg as he pushes his tongue in and out, as his lips suck and kiss, as his teeth scrape and nibble. My mind tries to grab onto a single thing to steady it, to anchor it amidst the mindless pleasure offered by him. I focus on the sconce flickering dimly on the opposite wall, the slight shuffle of my feet beneath me, the shadows dancing off the stone around us.

Across the crypt a statue of a girl looks on, no older than I, perhaps younger, her hands clasped demurely in front, her bud-like nose elegant and regal, her mouth pretty and full.

His mouth is magnificent.  A torturous implement. The pleasure builds and builds until it drags me over the edge where there is nothing but white pleasure, melting over me, bathing the darkened corners of the crypt in purest white. 

All the while the stone cold eyes of the girl look on and on and on.