They were let down onto a crowded dock at Brest the next afternoon. On land, Verity felt much better, taking deep breaths as she walked up and down the street, waiting for Mr Armiger to finish directing a man with the luggage. She watched people, wide-eyed, enchanted by hectic confusion of the wharf and the delightful foreignness of everything. She spoke not a word of French, which made everything seem twice as foreign and wonderful.

Mr Armiger joined her. It was past four, but warm still, and they decided to walk to the hotel. It gave Verity a chance to look at the town, and get her legs used to walking on hard ground again. Outside the hotel, they were stopped by a white hand waving at them from a carriage window, and Mrs Walthrope jumped down without waiting for her driver's hand.

"Are we staying at the same hotel then? How lovely! I will get to know you better. We must dine together. We must."

"Oh yes," Miss Walthrope added with a quieter eagerness, clambering down from the carriage. "Oh yes, we must!"

Verity was faintly curious, and faintly annoyed. She distrusted Mrs Walthrope's prying friendliness, but she wondered what it was about Mr Armiger's father that made him so opaquely determined to avoid the subject. Surely it could be no more horrible than having a weak, drunken, traitorous cardsharp for a father?

Mr Armiger looked at Verity questioningly. "It is our honeymoon," he demurred. "Perhaps another time."

"Oh, don't refuse on my account," Verity protested, her curiosity outweighing her annoyance. "It's only one meal! I can share your company for that long at least."

"In that case," said Armiger, "I'll gratefully accept, and see you both in the dining room at eight."

However, when they were away in their hotel bedroom, she sorting clothes that needed washing, and he finding his shaving implements, he was half in the mind to send Mrs Walthrope an apology and a refusal.

"With the wedding, and the sea sickness, and all the travel, I feel like I've hardly had a chance to treat you like a bride. I should have told her to give me her address instead. It's not fair to you to have to put up with Jane – I mean she's very charming, but she does make one put up with her. She enjoys it."

"I don't mind," Verity said, shooting him a glance from the corner of her eye to make sure he wasn't watching her while she bundled her soiled underclothes into a pile. He wasn't. He was carefully spreading shaving cream on his jaw at the washbowl. She watched, fascinated, as he opened his razor with a flick of the wrist, and began to scrape down his jaw.

She had never yet seen him do this. Of course it was only natural that a man had to shave, or else tolerate whiskers, but it was the first time she had seen him do it. She bundled her underclothes away in a soiled dress, and shoved them in a corner of her day bag, out of sight, and turned to watch him properly.

One cheek was done. He scraped carefully at his throat, tipping his head backwards and exposing the line of his neck, and the angular bulge of his Adam's apple. It was a delicate operation. His wrist turned this way and that, to get at the little hollows beneath his jaw. Done.

He moved to his right cheek, his head tipping down again. He caught sight of her in the mirror, and his hand slipped, and he cursed. A tiny bloom of blood appeared on his chin.

"Are you hurt?" Verity asked, coming to him. "You're bleeding."

"Yes." He dabbed at his chin with his handkerchief. "It's just a little nick. Don't worry. You scared me, watching like that."

It felt like an accusation, and she blushed. "I have never seen you shave before."

"No?" He almost smiled at her. He threw down his handkerchief and began to shave the last of his cheek. This stopped him talking a moment, but when he was done, he added, "The novelty will wear off, I hope."

"Naturally." Verity was cold as he washed his face. She felt that it bothered him, and wasn't sure why that bothered her. "I expect I'll get used to all your manly behaviours in time. But for now, I'm not used to manly behaviours from anybody at all, so you'll forgive me if they make me stare. I am simply not accustomed."

For some reason, that made him laugh, his shoulders shaking, into his towel. He threw his cloth down on the table and pulled her suddenly close against him, arms around her shoulders. He smelled like soap, and his cheeks were slightly damp against her own as he laughed into her hair. He kissed her cheek, still laughing, and then pulled back far enough to kiss her on the lips. It was a kiss with some hunger in it, and she had to clutch at his waist to steady herself, finding it taut and warm beneath the fabric of his shirt.

He withdrew, but kept his hands at her shoulders, tangled in her hair.

"What manly behaviours do you mean?" he teased, looking down at her. "That?"

"Oh, that." Verity looked shyly down into his shirt, and saw her hands were still at his waist, but somehow lacked the energy to move them. "Yes, that. And others. Shaving. Swearing. Trousers. Cravats. Soap – yours smells different from mine. All of these things. I'm just not used to them yet."

"And how long do you think it will take?" He dropped his head so that his lips brushed her forehead when he spoke. "It might be sad if you ever got too used to the kisses." And he dropped another on her forehead.

She didn't think, in that moment, that she would ever get used to them. Her stomach was full of a very strange sort of cold fire, and her hands at his waist were shaking.

"I – I must wash." She got her hands off his waist, and pulled away from him.

"Verity?"

She ignored him, and went to find her toilette things.

"Verity." He followed her across the room and she stopped still, remembering the soiled underwear in her bag, and not daring to open it.

"It's not fair to me either, you know," he said, speaking from behind her. "I like Jane, but I had plans for tonight. I had planned to dine with you in private and quiet, and to talk with you, and just you, and flirt with you, and just you, and then to take advantage of the splendour and privacy of our bedroom suite."

"And how...would you take advantage of it?"

"Oh," he said blandly, "I'd get a full nine hours sleep in the softest bed in the world, and wake to the smell of French chocolate brought by a French maid."

She turned with her mouth open in surprise, and his eyes went up and down her figure with a strange little half-smile on his face, before he met her gaze, and the smile became a full one, and he stretched out a hand to take her own.

"I'll confess, I had planned to seduce you tonight. My plans are awry. And I am peeved."

She felt the strength in the bones of his fingers, the warmth in his flesh. She felt light headed, light stomached, light bodied, like only his hold of her hand kept her from floating away.

"It's only... a meal... It won't take all night."

"But it might take all night for me to get you to like me, see? I might need that hour." He pulled her hand to his and kissed her fingertips one by one. Each kiss left the same cold fire in the veins of her hands.

"I... don't think it will take that long," Verity said faintly, as his kisses began to climb the inside of her wrist, until they were stopped at the cuff off her sleeve.

He held her hand in his a moment, staring at it, as though perplexed by the preventative sleeve. Then he raised his eyes curiously to her face, and she found herself tilting her head upwards for him to kiss again, and he did. After another two or three kisses, she had her hands once more at his waist, squeezing slightly against the firm flesh, and then exploring upwards, to the warmth and strength of his back, feeling the muscles shift under her hands. Her closed eyes saw only phantom starlight.

"Mmmph," she said.

"Mmm?" He released her lips but kept his face close to her own so his breath brushed her cheek. "Verity?"

She flushed, her breathing coming fast. No words came to mind. In their absence, she could think of no answer but kiss him inexpertly on the lips. He responded in kind.

A few moments later, his hands found her buttocks, and then her thighs, and she gave a shriek as he jolted her suddenly up into his arms. Now the phantom starlight was everywhere in her body, blooming out from her legs, splayed about his warm, athletic waist.

"Oh!" She balanced herself awkwardly about him, holding to his neck and shoulders. "Oh! Am I not too heavy?"

"No." He kissed her collar bone. "No, but I am being too hasty. Forgive me." He walked awkwardly to the couch and sat down in it, in a rush, still carrying her. "Now, you should probably close your legs, my dear, and allow my attention to be devoted to your mouth. That is where the lesson of love making begins. I was hasty. I skipped some chapters, and we must return to them, in order."

She giggled. Despite the solemnity of his words, he had no poise or grandeur. His unsteady breathing interrupted every few words, his face was flushed, and his hair was deranged about his forehead. She kissed a loose, grey-black curl, and scrambled around, with his hands aiding her, until she was sitting in one corner of the couch, her legs across his knees.

His lips dropped to hers. The lesson resumed.

Some time later, in the distance, a clock chimed seven. Verity pushed herself away from her husband, startled.

"Oh! I must get washed! And dressed!"

"Must you?" said Mr Armiger sadly, pulling her closer again. "Must you?"

"Yes!"

He let her go with a sigh, and she whirled about the room to find her clothes. Helpfully, Armiger offered if she needed help to undress, but did not move from his position on the couch, watching her gather her things.

She gave a nervous glance at the dressing screen in the corner, and he must have seen it, for he added,

"But I'm being too hasty again."

When she was standing naked behind the dressing screen, she remembered the feel of the phantom starlight his touch caused inside her, and her heart beat faster. Her nudity and her blush hidden by the screen, she called:

"But you must - must – continue the lesson after dinner. There's still some things I don't understand."

More kissing! I get self-conscious writing kissing scenes. There's not much you can really say about kissing beyond 'He kissed her' and 'It felt good'. But that's not exactly suitable for this kind of story, is it? Thanks for all the support, guys, all the reads, and votes, and comments <333