#iii. the rest of you (the best of you) belongs to me. ( baldwin x astoria )

[softersinned]

@montclair said: ❝ do you want me to kill him? ❞

In truth, she has never known silence. Prior to her death she could hear the ever-present rush of water, in the earth and in the body, its singing presence in the air. In the aftermath of her murder she hears everything, from the steady breath and pulse of the city to the uneven skittering of insects and the snuffling exhale of rats. When she was locked away, it was maddening, to hear the world as it changed and know she could not be a part of it, and in the rare moments when she could break free, it was overwhelming. It is easier, she's learned, with him.

The weight of his hand on her shoulder is a comforting one. She is more beast than woman, feral and ruined as she is, but his presence cuts through the haze of noise and hunger and blood. Astoria rolls her eyes up to him, her stained lips curling up into a smile of open relief as he looks down at her, and she's warmed by the sight of a smile offered to match her own.

At her feet, her prey moans, unconscious from the loss of blood but not dead, but neither one of them looks down. Instead, Baldwin moves his hand from her shoulder to grip her chin, and he brushes his thumb across her mouth to catch the blood gathered there. "Quite a change," he observes, "from your arrival."

She knows him well enough to hear the approval in his voice. Astoria feels herself leaning, just barely, into his touch, and it only reawakens her hunger, slaked though it had been by her hunt. A different hunger, this time, and some piece of her she doesn't understand urges her to sink to her knees before him and bare her throat, to offer herself up to be devoured, to be destroyed, but she tamps it down. "Did I do as you wished?" she asks instead, and Baldwin nods, releases her chin and holds his hand out to her to guide her over the body.

It has been a difficult road. No one taught her to pace herself as she fed, and so on the rare occasions she could hunt for herself she gorged, unsure of when she would next satisfy the ever-present agony of starvation. She drank until she was sick with it, and she was starved again when she was brought back under control and locked away once more. Baldwin's task has been a difficult one; of this, she has no doubt. For years she killed if left unattended or to her own devices. Then, it was only the pressure of his hand at the back of her neck, or on her shoulder, or in her hair that could drag her away once she'd begun.

The deaths were fewer, farther between, infinitely more deliberate with his guidance. This is the second time she's managed it on her own. The first, he had given her instruction; tonight, she remembered.

She takes the offered hand and steps delicately over her prey. No doubt he will wake in the morning with a headache and assume he simply drank too much the night before. "Leo expected you would have to kill me before you succeeded in teaching me," she points out dryly, and Baldwin chuckles humorlessly.

"And when he told you this, did you believe him?"

"In the moment, yes."

"And yet you still made your demand that he turn you over to me."

There is little need to breathe, but she still lets out a slow exhale. "Anything was better than that."

"Even death?"

She doesn't answer. Baldwin keeps hold of her hand to guide her out of the alley, and when they've reached the street again, he releases her. Her eyes land on his mouth as he slips the tip of his thumb past his lips, just enough to lick his skin clean, and that hunger returns, so powerfully she feels herself ache with it.

"Why did you never try to kill him?"

"Did he tell you that?"

Baldwin laughs, now, and he begins to walk, not bothering to look back at her to see if she'll follow. She always does.

The sound makes her near-euphoric, and she chases after it. "I tried twice. The first time he nearly killed me in response. Then he realized that there were things I feared worse than dying, and he kept me in an iron collar and chains, like a mad dog, until I learned my lesson."

For a moment, she thinks she sees a burst of fury in his eyes, in the set of his shoulders and his jaw, and Astoria tries not to linger on it. "And what lesson did you learn, my Duellona?"

"That the next time I tried to kill him," she says simply, as if it is the most obvious thing in the world, "I had best succeed."

He smiles, now, really smiles, and she feels the warmth of it spread through her body, feels the overwhelming desire for that smiling mouth on her skin, those perfect teeth sinking into her flesh, that tongue sweeping up her blood. Even digging her fingernails into her palms until she breaks the skin isn't enough to distract her from it.

For several minutes, Baldwin is silent, considering the information he's learned and his next words. She speaks of her past rarely enough that, even after two decades together, he still knows relatively little of the near-century that passed before she was brought to him. "He treated you abominably." Like a horse to be broken, and, when that failed, like a dog to be put down. "It's a wonder you didn't try a third time."

"Begging your forgiveness—I know he's your family—but if I tried a third time, even my own death could not prevent me from dragging him to Hell, in pieces if I must, at my side."

His eyes find hers again. "Do you want me to kill him?" The question is asked with all the gravity she might expect, and Astoria suppresses a shiver. She swallows, hard, and she wonders if she's being tested. She's certain that she is. She could lie, but somehow she thinks he would smell the dishonesty on her lips.

"Yes," she says simply, "but I want to kill him myself even more."

"Even if it takes time? Years? Decades? Centuries?"

Astoria smiles then, and she raises an eyebrow, steps closer to him as they walk, until they are nearly touching. "Have you not taught me patience?" she purrs in response, and he laughs again, and the sound makes her feel dizzy with need.

She listens for him the rest of the night, in the house they share. She listens for him and she thrills at the reminder that the world will never be silent again.

[softersinned]

@montclair said: [ TOUCH ] for sender to trace one of receiver’s scars

There is no piece of her that is unknown to him now. Every inch of skin, every strand of hair—she is his entirely, body and spirit and soul, and he knows her by heart, knows her better than she could ever have dreamed she'd be known.

Still, his hand hovers at her throat, eyes fixed on the faint discoloration of skin there. She belongs to him as wholly as any person could belong to another, and still, he waits, gaze shifting to meet hers as if to ask permission before letting the rough skin of his fingers fall to a reminder of her suffering. Astoria's lips quirk into a faint smile and she reaches up, cards her fingers through Baldwin's hair, and she nods, tips her head back. She knows he can see that the smile does not quite reach her eyes. There is no hiding, not from him.

Funny, though—she no longer wishes to be hidden.

"It was an early experiment," she says after a moment. Her voice is low and thick, and Baldwin's expression shifts to one of quiet concern at the sound of it, though he doesn't interrupt. "Not long after I was reborn. They hung me by my ankles and waited to see if I would bleed dry before it healed."

His hand settles at the side of her neck, thumb brushing over the scar.

"There is much I don't remember from my time there." Chained to the wall or the floor, half-starved and more than half-mad; memory is fickle in so long a life, and she wonders sometimes if it was a blessing or a curse that memory abandoned her for many of those months. She remembers the agony of the blade across her flesh, the heat of her blood pouring over her face, the scent of it as it stained her hair. She was weak enough in the aftermath that they bathed her, though she only remembers waking up clean. "But I think they tried it two or three times. They wanted to see how deeply they could cut without killing me, and how long it would take me to heal when I'd lost so much blood." Her hand falls from his hair, and she strokes the backs of her fingers along his beard, the sensation grounding as she speaks.

It feels like confession, but the eyes on her are not the hard eyes of God, and the wrath that will surely follow will not fall on her. Baldwin's hand shifts until it's curled around her throat, the line of his index finger to the tip of his thumb covering the scar in its entirety. When he doesn't apply any pressure she leans against him, as if to demonstrate to him that she feels safe with him, placing her life into his hands.

"And you survived it," he says after a long moment, and she can hear the rage simmering in his voice, barely held in check.

"I did. Leo tried to bite me there, a few times, but I wouldn't let him."

His lips twitch upwards into a crooked smile in approval of her resolve, though the anger in his eyes only grows. "You fought him?"

"Like a cornered animal." She's almost eager, now, as she recounts it. "He said that he had a right to discipline me and I nearly took his eye for it. The scar across his cheek? That was from my fingernails. He managed it once or twice, despite all that, but he could only manage it if he'd starved me first. Usually after I'd escaped." Her thumb moves now to trace along the curve of his lower lip.

Baldwin presses an almost absentminded kiss to her palm. "Good girl," he murmurs against her skin, and she flushes a pretty red, pleased with the praise. "I'll kill him for it."

"I wasn't yours, then," she reminds him, but her eyes are bright, and she is utterly enraptured. "Would it be permitted, to kill him for laying hands on what didn't belong to you?"

His eyebrows arch and the look he gives her says you have been mine from the moment of your creation, though the only words he speaks are, "I don't care. I'll kill him for it all the same."

Warmth blossoms in her belly and spreads, and she returns her thumb to rest on his lower lip, palm against his cheek. "I wonder, sometimes," she says, voice soft, "if your gods or mine crafted me with their own hands and they deliberately made me for you. And then I think that I prefer to leave fate out of it, and for everything to have been a matter of choice. I would have chosen you a thousand times." How magnificent, that the sight of his anger soothes her, that she can trust that the hand at her throat will never close beyond what she wishes?

Her thumb slips past his lips to press against the tip of one tooth, as if in invitation.

"There is an incredible comfort in knowing that you are the only creature in this world or the next who will know the taste of my blood again." Her voice is barely a breath, now, and she thinks that he could drain her of every last drop and it would still not be enough for her. The fire in his gaze is deeper, now, and changed, meant only, always, for her, and after a moment she tips her head to the side, bares her throat to him beneath his hand.

"Take what's yours," she urges. "I don't want there to be any piece of me you haven't claimed and enjoyed." She lowers her hand from his face to curl her fingers around his wrist instead.

There is a hunger in him as his eyes fall back to her throat. He does not question her certainty. He knows her, that she knows herself. His own hand falls as well, and he presses his palm to her back to guide her closer to him, the other hand moving to gather her hair over one shoulder before fisting in the red curls possessively. "What will you enjoy?" he asks instead, and he presses his lips to the curve of her neck into her shoulder.

"My blood in your mouth." She lets out a choked laugh. "My life in your hands." His lips trail up, until she feels his nose brush just below her ear. The pressure of his teeth against her skin makes her dizzy with need, and she takes in a sharp breath. He waits there as if to breathe in the scent of her, of her need, of her trust. He is a monster, a predator, a killer, and she guides him to the scars left behind and she urges him take, take, every part of me is yours. Her skin, her bones, her blood, her memory, her self, laid out for him to devour as he will. He will not find the acrid scent of fear or the metallic bite of her rage, as Elyssa and Leo once did.

Somewhere past the first drop of her blood on his tongue, his hand shifts back to her neck, thumb tracing over her scar with a tenderness that makes her ache.

[softersinned]

@montclair said: ❝ does the promise of war excite you? ❞

The tenderness and care of her attention is unnecessary, but she rarely acts based on necessity alone. The brush of the damp cloth over his knuckles, already healing, is gentle enough not to hurt, and Astoria can feel Baldwin's amused eyes on her. "You're trying not to laugh at me," she murmurs, low enough that only he can hear, and when she looks up at him through her eyelashes, he's wearing a crooked grin that makes her feel as though her heart might stop. "What is it?"

"Nothing," Baldwin answers at once, his tone perfectly pleasant, his expression the very picture of innocence. It only lasts a moment, though, and then the wickedness returns. He leans closer to her, voice dropping to a murmur. "It's simply odd to see you play nurse."

"What a rude thing to say," she scolds half-heartedly, and she bites back a laugh of her own.

"Apologies, wife. I must have lost track of the nurturing between the bouts of bloodshed and violent outbursts." She lets out a perfectly unladylike snort of laughter, and when she goes to dab at the blood on his knuckles again, he withdraws his hand. "No need to play the mortal. We're not being watched."

Astoria looks up at him then, lips curling up in a smile of her own, before she takes his hand again and bows her head, pressing her lips to his bloodied skin. After a beat, she gives up on all pretenses otherwise, and she licks the cooling blood from the back of his hand, her movements slow and deliberate as she drags her tongue over each knuckle. Once his hand is clean he laughs, and he shifts to cup the side of her face with a gentleness that borders on adoring.

"It's a wonder you ever convincingly played the part of a good Puritan wife," he drawls, and it's more compliment than tease, she knows. Astoria's grin only widens. He moves his hand, brushes his fingertips against the barely-visible scar on the side of her neck from his teeth. "Your hunger is particularly un-Christian."

"I have much to be hungry for, my love," Astoria reminds him sweetly, ducking her head to press a kiss to the soft underside of his wrist. "Give me your hand back. You just hit a man hard enough that you'd have broken your own bones as well as his, were you more fragile. It should at least look like it hurts."

It's rare that Astoria commands, rarer still that Baldwin obeys, but he does now. Astoria begins to wind the bandages around his hand, suspecting that he's only enjoying the chance to touch her despite the sheer volume of warmbloods around them. Bad luck, one of the humans had murmured, to have a woman on a ship, and his companion had laughed, punched him cheerfully on the shoulder, responded, Worse luck to tell him he can't have his wife with him.

There are more comfortable accommodations to be found than to sail with pirates, but the captain owed Baldwin a favor, and their arrival must not draw attention. Theirs is not a mission of peace, nor one undertaken at the family's behest: Astoria's revenge is all too personal, and Baldwin, ever the devoted husband, will follow her to the ends of the earth if she asks it of him. He'll certainly follow her to Spain to chase down a lead on her maker's location.

And if it means that, when one of the sailors eyes Astoria for too long, speaks to her with too familiar a tone, he does not hold back? So be it. They are both tense, equal parts eagerness to see justice served and unease at being so contained, and Astoria can hardly blame him for it, not when her only complaint is that she had hoped to do a bit more violence than she's been permitted. Her tongue sweeps over her lip to collect any blood she'd missed, and Baldwin takes her jaw firmly in his half-bandaged hand. So much for subtlety. The fabric falls, and she does nothing to catch it, or try and stop him; that he's tolerated any pretending at mortality is surprise enough.

"A few more days, Duellona," he says, voice soft, and she knows then with striking clarity that he's only permitted the bandaging and tending to keep her occupied for a moment, well-aware of her anxious energy and the overwhelming intensity of her need. Not for the first time, it strikes Astoria, just how lucky she is that he belongs to her as surely as she belongs to him. Who else could know her so well? Read her despite the care she puts into maintaining a mask? Who else could speak to her so gently but without pity, even while he holds her with an unyielding grip and studies the stain of blood on her lips and her tongue.

"I know." Astoria melts into the touch, closes her eyes for a moment. "Just a few more days, and then we'll know. And we'll have to wait anyway. See how connected she is, what the consequences of killing her will be..." Her voice trails off and she opens her eyes, shrugs a shoulder.

"You'll kill her," he promises sharply, "whatever the consequences. Don't forget who you are. De Clermonts are not denied."

"I won't start a war for the sake of revenge, cuore mio."

"Start a war. It is your right." Her lips curl into a slow, satisfied smile at that, and Baldwin chuckles. "Does the promise of war excite you?"

She doesn't answer, and Baldwin laughs again, louder this time. Heedless of their potential audience, she twists her fingers into the fabric of his shirt, tugs him close enough that she can press her mouth to his, let him taste the blood on her tongue himself.

[softersinned]

@balldwin said: sender kisses receiver to say hello.

There are certain tasks left to her, sometimes for her skill set, more often than either of them will confess for her patience where her husband has none. It's why she's been in Venice these last two weeks, the honored guest of Domenico Michele along with her stepson. Baldwin hadn't liked it, considering the circumstances, but he's always been protective, and she's always enjoyed it. This was no different.

"I'll be fine," she'd assured him before they parted ways, her hands settled gently against his chest, the smile on her face strained. She doesn't like this. She doesn't want to do this. All those centuries she took for granted that, in most circumstances, she would be able to remain with him, but now it's them making these decisions. And if he is back, if he can't die—

—awful, isn't it? Now the prudent thing to do, not for themselves but the family as a whole, is a brief separation, to gather allies as quickly as possible. "Nico will look after me if I need the help," she'd continued, not wanting to say it, knowing it needed to be said. "And Domenico knows better than to let anything happen to me. I'll be fine, and I'll be back soon." (Who was she trying to convince?)

She extracted the same promise from Baldwin and she kissed him goodbye, with a real fear that it might be the last time she did. Perhaps she worries too much, but if anything warrants that kind of fear, it's him coming back. Niccolò had squeezed her shoulder as if to comfort her as they watched him leave, ever respectful of his father's wishes, ever dedicated to his family.

(And because they need to consider it, now, she thinks that her stepson, who hovers near her as they approach Domenico's door, is as good an heir as they could ever hope to find.)

The planned three days turns into a week. The week turns into two. She and Baldwin speak whenever they can, and she does what she came here to do. She is a skillful negotiator, a diplomat in her own right, and Domenico knew her when she was a girl, clinging to her grandmother's skirts and listening in when she wasn't invited. It means that he has a soft spot for her, sometimes, in a way he does not with the rest of the de Clermonts: she never rejected his overtures of friendship. She never denied him. It means, too, that he forgets sometimes that she is as deadly as she is, that she and her husband are well matched.

She leaves Venice with an agreement between them, the promise that when the time comes next their families will be bonded. No doubt Serafine will be eager to see her mate turned, and sooner than later, and Constanta is clearly no longer an option. More than that, she leaves Venice with information: the Drăculești will rise, there is no doubt of that, but they will not do so unobserved.

Niccolò drives, knowing that if he allows Astoria to take the wheel, they may not make it to Sept-Tours in one piece. Baldwin arrived the day before, let them all know he was safe, told Astoria to hurry back to him, and she's been eager to follow his instructions; her stepson watches her with some amusement, but doesn't date tease out loud.

She knows that Baldwin hears the rumbling of the engine, the crunch of gravel beneath the tires, the moment they're on de Clermont grounds. (She imagines Baldwin inside, standing abruptly, ignoring Matthew as he speaks. She imagines Matthew's irritated aside, and Baldwin's simple response: I haven't seen my wife in two weeks.)

Centuries, they've had together, but even centuries don't soothe her unease when they're apart, or calm the hollow ache in her chest to be away from him. Nor do centuries dull the impatience to set eyes on him again, or the eager joy when she recognizes his shape so far in the distance, the set of his shoulders. She grips the seat of her car tightly enough that her fingers pierce through the leather, prompting a snort of amusement from Niccolò.

"Drive faster," she demands hoarsely, and he laughs out loud at that, but he complies.

Astoria sees the moment that Baldwin gives up on patience; it is, remarkably, the same moment she does, as well. She's opened the car door before it's come to a complete stop as he walks closer to where he knows they'll park. One moment, they're apart, and the next, they've crashed into each other, Astoria swept into his arms and Baldwin's hands under her thighs to hold her in place as she wraps her legs around his waist.

The car comes to a stop behind them, the passenger side door left open. Neither of them notice. The moment she's in his grasp she's taken his face in her hands, relieved beyond words to have him whole and before her, and Baldwin closes what little distance is left between them to kiss her.

Centuries, they've had together, and only two weeks apart, but their reunion is as sweet now as it's ever been. One kiss becomes a second and a third, neither one of them willing to be parted, and only the familiar sound of Serafine, standing in a doorway with Diana as she greets her stepbrother, clearing her throat can make them tear themselves away from each other.

It feels like an open wound is healing. Astoria lets out a quiet laugh, and Baldwin tucks his face against her neck for a moment, breathes her in. "He's been insufferable since he got here," Serafine reports cheerfully, and beside her, Niccolò rolls his eyes and laughs.

"One day with just him. Try two weeks with just her."

"Beasts," Astoria informs them, "both of you," and her daughter only grins wider. It's a rare moment of familiarity, of peace, amidst the chaos. Miyako is due tomorrow, with Lydia. Fernando and Sarah will follow shortly after, as will Freyja and Marcus and Phoebe. Gallowglass and Stasia, she thinks, are already here. It's been some time since the whole of the family was together. She's almost glad for it, though now, she doesn't care for anything except the lingering touch of Baldwin's lips against her throat.

"Should I get the others?" Matthew asks. "Should we start discussing our next moves?" But even before he's finished the question Baldwin has lifted his head and begun to walk, Astoria still held firmly in his grasp, Astoria's arms and legs secure around him. When he makes no move to stop in the doorway, Matthew lets out a noise of some disapproval. "Well?"

"Do what you want," Baldwin says, a bit impatiently. He still doesn't stop. "It's been two weeks since I last saw my wife. If you need to speak to me now you can do so while I greet her properly. I don't think she minds an audience."

"You might learn something," she calls over his shoulder, and Matthew simply shakes his head and turns towards his nephew.

It's certainly for the better, she thinks, once Baldwin's teeth are fixed in her throat and her blood is spilling over his tongue. Two weeks without him (only two, she knows, two weeks out of thousands) and she can't bear the thought of sharing him with anyone else.

[softersinned]

while condensing & updating those posts and specifically the ones abt her scars i got super emotional abt baldwin & astoria (shocking) so i went digging for this and now you've gotta see it too

it's abt the trust it's abt the devotion it's abt nearly being killed over and over and over again and then very deliberately and lovingly choosing to place her life, her secrets, her trust in the hands of someone who has a legal and cultural power of life and death over her because she trusts fully that he'll never violate that trust??? and literally this is for forever!! there's no way around it!! they are immortal and this is for forever!!!

[softersinned]

and like i know it seems as though astoria simply does not have her own will after she & baldwin are married but that couldn't be farther from the truth?? she views their relationship as a partnership above all else, with each of them fulfilling specific roles within their larger family. she can & does disagree with him, though this doesn't happen too often, as they're very similar in terms of their core values and general approaches to the world. she simply does so privately. this is especially true after philippe dies. to astoria, it matters more that they appear as a cohesive unit, and while she enjoys the power that baldwin holds over her under general vampire tradition (she is. absurdly and at times obscenely into the idea of baldwin as paterfamilias, with the power of live and death over her, and fully on board with that dynamic), she is far from powerless. they communicate regularly, including about their boundaries, and it's generally very, very healthy. it's a good relationship, a good partnership, a good marriage.

[softersinned]

@balldwin said: [ CLOSE ]: while standing remarkably close to one another, the sender is unable to stop themselves from running their gaze across the receiver’s body, lingering for a moment on their lips, before returning to initiate prolonged, intense eye contact.

Some piece of her wonders if she shouldn't find it disturbing, if the ease with which she has begun to adjust to her new nature is a sign that there has always been some sort of monster hidden within her. Strange enough that she's only really beginning her death now, thirty years after her rebirth; those first few decades she was a creature to be contained, an animal whose instincts made her worthy of little more than extermination, as she was so constantly reminded.

The blood in her mouth is intoxicating, sweeter than any wine and hot as it flows over her tongue. Baldwin's hand at the back of her neck makes her feel almost like a misbehaving kitten, but she finds she's grateful for the contact. It keeps her grounded. She is a creature of need, and little else, driven by her hunger and her desire in equal measure. When his hand tightens, a sure warning that the human in her arms is nearing a point of no return, Astoria reluctantly, but obediently, wrenches herself free, lifting her mouth from the wounded throat and looking over her shoulder at him.

She was beautiful, once, but even in her mortality she was beautiful in a way that all too often left people uneasy. The gold of her eyes, or the doll-like perfection of her features, or the way her mouth, wide and lovely, always seemed to show too many teeth. She is well-suited for monstrosity. Now, the honey eyes are clearer, the color almost liquid. Her features seem sharper, more defined. That lovely mouth drips with gore. Baldwin's hand stays fixed on the back of her neck and they watch one another in silence, his eyes roaming her face, settling on her bloody lips, and the heady scent of—of something fills the air. It smells familiar, though she can't quite identify what it is. Baldwin's grip softens when she sets the human down, still breathing shallowly and letting out a quiet moan, and Astoria stands.

"Good girl."

The praise is unexpected, and her cheeks burn a furious red, the color in part from being well-fed but primarily from the sudden flush of pleasure at the words. The eagerness to please him leaves her feeling unsteady more often than not, and it is in so many ways unlike anything she's ever felt before. Desire is nothing new. Neither is love. Whatever this is, strange and addictive as it is, it's beyond anything she knows, and she is swept helplessly into his power. Astoria wipes her fingers over her lips and they come back bloody; she licks them clean, as if unwilling to lose even a drop, though when she looks back at Baldwin he's watching her with renewed intensity.

"Thank you." She steps delicately around her prey; she's near dizzy with desire (for blood, for the hunt, for him) and she lets herself lean into Baldwin as his hand drops and settles instead on the small of her back so he can lead her elsewhere. She does not hunt alone, not yet. The last time she tried, she left a trail of bodies behind her.

A new scent hits the air and she frowns, eyes searching out the source—one of Hubbard's boys, turned before they were really men, all long limbs in the disproportionate measurements of adolescence coming to an end, frozen forever in time. He stands across the narrow street, watching them as they emerge from the alleyway, taking apparent note of the blood at the corner of her mouth and the protective set of Baldwin's shoulders. Whatever he sees on Baldwin's face must be enough to frighten him, though when Astoria looks up at him (her guide, her savior) he seems largely impassive.

Hubbard's boy flees. Baldwin pulls her into his side and winds his arm around her back, his hand curled almost painfully tight just above her elbow, just as he's learned she likes to be touched. She had been so adamantly against any sort of physicality that he'd taken careful note of when he was permitted to touch her, whether to be gentle or protective, whether to lay a claim to her or to leave her be. (Yes, it's beyond desire. She wants to devour him. Even then, she thinks, there would be some intolerable distance between them.)

Her eyebrows arch and her lips press together, and she wipes the last of the blood from her mouth, slips her finger into her mouth. Once it's clean she wraps the cloak she wears tighter around her, leans (perhaps recklessly) closer still to Baldwin. "Should I always expect that?" she asks dryly. "Hubbard's eyes and ears anywhere I hunt?"

"So long as we are in London," Baldwin answers, and he casts a glance towards her. "He doesn't like the thought of creatures here out of his influence."

"The de Clermonts don't always exercise their privilege for—" What is she? To his family? To him? "—strays?"

He lets out a humorless chuckle, and his eyebrows lift to mirror hers. "Are his watchful eyes not worth the knowledge that he hasn't tasted your blood since you were reborn?"

"Anything is worth that." She answers quickly, and she allows herself a moment's sentiment on the matter, sneaks one hand from the confines of her cloak to settle over his and squeeze. Almost at once, she's back under the fabric, and she pretends not to notice that Baldwin's hold on her has tightened. "So long as I haven't caused you trouble."

He laughs, then, but he doesn't answer. For several minutes they walk in silence; she didn't know London well enough to navigate it alone in life, and little has changed in death. She relies on his guidance in practical matters as much as the existential. The quiet is comfortable, but she finds herself beginning to miss the sound of his voice. "I didn't expect to enjoy it so much."

"Blood?"

"Hunting." He turns her down another street and she shivers a bit in his grasp, her mouth watering at the thought of another hunt. "I never liked it before."

"The distance from the hunt itself," he asks, "or the act?"

She frowns, turning the question over in her mind. It's not one she's considered before, but it makes sense. "I don't know." It's an honest answer, if an unsatisfying one. "I never imagined I would enjoy killing so much, either."

His eyes flicker to her again, and they stop walking. They're only a short distance from his home (their home, she supposes) and the street is empty; if they speak softly, they will have a measure of privacy, rarely afforded to him or anyone near him. The perils, she supposes, of being a de Clermont. "Are you ashamed of it?" he asks finally.

"No." Astoria answers quickly, too quickly; she should have had to think about that. She wonders if she should be embarrassed by her disinterest in questions of morality. She pauses, and Baldwin unwinds his arm from around her shoulders, moving to stand in front of her so he can watch her. "My coven always pretended at some stewardship over the humans of the city. As if we were their parents, stepping in for God to guide them when He could not. As if God never killed His own. As if God never turned His back on His own."

He chuckles darkly, steps closer to her. She cranes her neck to look at him, and she grips the inside of her cloak to keep her quivering hands from reaching for him. This close, his scent is overpowering, and she wants to sink into it. "I never had much patience for Catholics," he murmurs, more to himself than to her.

"They weren't God, no matter how much they wished they were. And they'd think me unholy if they knew me now, as if their God would be any more welcoming of them." She tilts her head slightly to the side, only just baring her throat in an unconscious gesture of ease with him. "Is it really so different from my grandfather's pleasure in hunting a stag?"

"They might tell you human life is more precious."

"My life is precious. And I must eat."

He grins at that, widely enough to display his teeth. She's captivated for a moment, and she inches forward unconsciously. "How very monstrous of you."

"Better monstrous over dead."

"Monstrosity suits you, cara."

"More than anger?" she teases, remembering their conversation mere weeks before, when he'd helped her home while she bled all over his hands.

"I can appreciate both."

"What of your gods? Are they so—"

"Capricious? Inconsistent?"

"False."

Another laugh, and she feels its rumble in the pit of her stomach. "Are any gods so false? Ask me again in a few more centuries, and perhaps I'll have a better answer than whatever you know now."

Her gaze shifts to the door; his eyes follow. "Before Alain left, he said something about Scotland."

"Mm. Ireland, after. My father has need of me elsewhere."

She lets out a noncommittal hum and pulls her cloak from her shoulders, folding it over one arm to give herself something else to think about, then asks, trying to keep her voice from wavering or showing any of her fear, "And where will I be, when you're gone?"

He looks back towards her, sudden and sharp. She meets his eyes again, hesitating, and he raises his eyebrows. "I am neither a witch nor a Catholic. I keep my word. I told Hubbard you were mine. I told you the same. You will be with me, wherever I am. Where else?"

Astoria's lips part but no sound comes out. I told Hubbard you were mine, he says, as if it is the simplest thing in the world. She is aware, now, of how close they're standing, and she swallows, hard, as he seems to realize the same thing. There's that scent again, and her hunger, as his eyes sweep across her frame. They linger on the curve of her shoulders, her long fingers; she thinks for a moment that it's almost as if he can see her shape beneath her dress, the way he takes in every inch of her. For a long moment he considers her before he looks back to her lips, and she moves to wipe her mouth in case she's missed any of the blood there but he catches her wrist before she can.

(Almost like he doesn't want his view obstructed.)

His eyes meet hers again and the scent is overwhelming, and her knees feel weak as she stares back at him. His eyelashes are maddening. She has dreamt more than once of the shape of his profile. She thinks about his eyes, his mouth, so often she thinks she should perhaps be embarrassed by it. She wants nothing more than to reach for him now. Instead, they are still, long enough that she loses track of time, long enough that she thinks she will become a creature of need and nothing more, long enough that the sun begins to creep over the horizon and wash the city in a pale blue glow.

Down the street, a door opens, and she starts, looks towards the source of the sound. The spell between them is broken, now, and he turns towards his own door and walks to it, Astoria trailing behind him, breathing him in as she does. You will be with me, wherever I am, like the thought of being parted from her is absurd. Surely it's not that.

She wonders for a moment if desire could have a scent, if it would smell like the woodfire and saddle leather she craves.

[softersinned]

@balldwin said: kissing them to shut them up

"I just think if a man ever interrupted me with a kiss I'd strangle him."

Hardly a romantic thing to announce, particularly on what she thinks might be a first date. Then again, is it a first date, really, given that they live together? That they're a solid year into a relationship that neither one of them (that's a lie, it was her the whole time) admitted was a relationship? A relationship which, for months now, has been largely exclusive, beyond the occasional date the other ruined as some sort of fucked up courting ritual? They've lived together for a few years now. They've ended up in bed more times than either one of them could dream of counting, whether for sex or sleep, and are so intensely intimate with one another even in the most casual interactions that when they finally, finally started calling this what it is (again, it was Astoria failing to be honest about it in the first place), several friends exchanged money in what was, apparently, a particularly lively betting pool.

But she's nervous. Honestly and truly nervous, the kind of nervous that has her forgetting that they have known each other for years, loved each other for years. It's not even really a date, if you qualify a date as a planned outing: they'd made dinner plans that had fallen apart when they both ended up studying late and missing their reservation, and so they'd picked up food to bring home with them. The empty plastic containers are sitting in the sink to be dealt with later; they'd parted to brush their teeth, only to look tiredly at the clock on his side of the bed and tumble onto the mattress in clothes that said comfortable more than sexy. And they'd been too exhausted to do anything after that besides turn on the television and flip idly through the channels until they found something worth having on in the background while they talked.

It's the strangest thing. She could talk to him for hours without getting bored; she's never once wished she was somewhere else when she was with him, always preferring his company to solitude no matter how much she'd like to get away from the world. Years of friendship and cohabiting haven't dulled her enthusiasm to be with him, to share every detail of her day and hear every detail of his. He fascinates her, he thrills her, and if she could she would gladly spend every waking hour as his rapt audience.

So where did it go? Why was it that the second she thought of this as a date, a real date, an official date, their first date, the butterflies she usually felt in her stomach turned into a tempest? She's curled up beside him as per usual, her legs thrown over his lap and one of his hands on her thigh, fingers just barely under the hem of his own shirt (one of a number she's "borrowed" to sleep in), the other in her hair, twisting copper curls around his fingers. Arsenic and Old Lace is far enough in that she really should have a better understanding of the plot, but she's never seen it before now, and she's so magnificently distracted by everything about him from the smell of his soap to the angle of his jaw to the soft fabric of the worn shirt he'd slipped into that the majority of the film has absolutely refused to take root in her awareness. It's a classic, he'd said, when she asked him to stop at this channel. It's a mystery, she'll have to confess later, when he asks how she liked it, because I could not focus if my life depended on it.

The silence feels awkward more than easy, mostly of her own making, though Baldwin seems as cool as ever. Is he reading her mind again? Somehow aware that she needs the stability? She blurts it out, reduced to commentary on what's happening immediately on the screen, and Priscilla Lane breathes out a passionate oh, Mortimer! as Baldwin's eyes meet hers, an amused smile playing at his lips.

"I see." His tone is serious, even grave, but there's mischief in his eyes. God, she loves it when he looks like that. She could write poetry about that particular expression, though she's really never been much for poetry. (Well, the writing of it. She's a sucker for Yeats.) "So if we're mid-argument I shouldn't cut you off like that?"

"Absolutely not. Not unless you're into choking."

He laughs, tightens his grip on her thigh, fingers firm enough that she thinks they might leave a bruise. The very thought has her dizzy with desire and utterly euphoric, and it takes her a moment to process his next words. "Even if you're being annoying?"

"I," she informs him haughtily, though her tone is perhaps a bit too breathless for her to expect him to take her seriously, "am never annoying. I am a delight."

"And if you're wrong?"

"I'm wrong even less often than I'm annoying."

His smile becomes wicked. Teasingly, he tugs at her hair, just hard enough to get her attention and leave her with her toes curling and her eyes wide. "I didn't expect you to discourage me from kissing you," he tells her, and she clears her throat twice before she can manage sound.

"I have important things to say," she tries faintly, mostly because he's dragging his teeth over his lower lip and it's frankly a wonder she can manage anything when she's focusing this much on his mouth.

"Extremely important," Baldwin agrees, voice dropping, his tone shifting from light to what she can only describe as smoldering. This is what the romance novelists are always going on about. "And if I want you to shut up so I can hear what's happening in the movie we're supposed to be watching?"

She's barely managing a whisper at this stage. All those butterflies are beating their wings against her ribcage and she's almost light-headed with want, the awkwardness melting into something infinitely more natural for her. "I think we could probably make an exception," she breathes, "so long as—"

And as instructed he kisses her, the hand in her hair tightening and the hand on her thigh guiding her down to press against the bed and pin beneath him. She responds at once, arching up against him and bending her knees to bracket his hips between her thighs. When his lips move to her jaw, her throat, she lets out a strangled, wordless sound, and a high-pitched whine follows when he bites sharply at the juncture of her neck.

"Here's an idea," she gasps, "we could forget the movie entirely—"

"Astoria." His lips move against her skin, breath hot, voice vibrating. "Shut up."

All nervousness is gone when she answers him. "Make me."

The movie is forgotten quickly enough. And, for the record, she's not quiet at all.

[softersinned]

@balldwin said: kissing the top of their head as you hold them

There is nowhere in the world as safe as where she is now. Their wealth is a shield; so, too, is the influence, the unmitigated power, of the de Clermont name, even in times such as these. Sept-Tours is itself a fortress, or as good as one, though the recent breech has them all on edge. But none of that matters much now—she's safe because she's here, in their bedroom, in their bed, her back to his chest and his arms wound around her middle and her fingers tracing gentle patterns against his skin.

It's rare, now, that she doesn't know what to say. Five hundred years of life, nearly four hundred and fifty spent with him in some capacity or another; they know one another better than either could have dreamed. Astoria knows every freckle on his arms, every scar on his chest, knows the beat of his heart and the pattern of his slow breaths no matter the circumstances. She has watched him give life and take it away, has watched over him through unimaginable grief and offered what comfort she could. But now she's struck speechless, watching Baldwin try to make sense of the roiling storm of fury and hurt.

If she could fix this for him, she would. She could fix the most immediate problem. Kill Diana, kill Matthew if the need arises, and put all of this behind them. But it wouldn't soothe the greater hurt of Philippe's half-truths, of digging up the dead to bring back with them. Decades without his father now and his freshest memory of him will be of a betrayal—not the vow itself, but what it meant that he was never told. Baldwin's left hand moves to catch her right forearm, tracing the outline of his sword inked into her skin, before his grip loosens enough to move to the wolf's head on her right hand. It's a small, repetitive motion, something familiar within the hellish homecoming they faced.

She lifts their joined hands and presses her lips to his knuckles; the faint smear of waxy crimson left on his skin prompts a soft, humorless chuckle from behind her. His right arm tightens around her, and when he bows his head to drop a kiss to her bare shoulder, she only leans into him more, as if to try and close whatever microscopic distance might remain. Any display of vulnerability on his part feels rare, and she is never unaware of the deep trust it requires.

"What do you need?" she asks, voice soft, and he lets out a weary sigh. Decades, his father's been gone. Philippe's death maimed him in a way nothing else had; denied a final goodbye, lied to time and again as to the nature of his passing, left with a fractured family and half the tools he needed to protect it and blamed time and again for being the wrong man. (He is a better man, a better father, a better husband, a better leader than Philippe ever was; she believes it firmly, her certainty on the matter as much honest conviction as the devoted love of a wife. Nothing has passed these last seventy years that has made her think otherwise. His family, however, doubts the possibility; she can't blame them for their loyalty to their missing patriarch, but she's sick of the venom that accompanies it.)

And now, he comes back to haunt them, his memory disturbed in unimaginable ways, and the reminder of how little he cared to provide for Baldwin after his death on display. No matter how Matthew laments his role in the family, he was the favored son, Baldwin so often cast aside for a man made into a weapon—

—she is, perhaps, uncharitable in her remembrance. She doesn't care. She is Baldwin's mate first, and a de Clermont second.

"I don't know." This, too, is a rarity: Baldwin always knows. He is a consummate strategist, forever half a dozen moves ahead of his adversaries, and right now, he's lost, the weight of his grief and his anger overwhelming, even if only for now. Soon enough, they'll return to his father's—his, now—study, and reconvene, the king and his consort holding court. For now, they have privacy, however brief. Let Diana and Matthew try to sort out a temporary solution to the tension they created; a family dinner organized by the newest de Clermont means that Astoria can remain here, with Baldwin, her duties temporarily delegated elsewhere.

She lets out a soft, sympathetic hum, and Baldwin's grip on her hand tightens. She can only hope that the quiet comfort of her presence does something to help. I'm sorry, she could tell him, I'm sorry that they have no respect for your grief when you've given them such room and understanding for theirs. I'm sorry that they're so quick to reopen the wound of his death and expect you not to need to heal. I'm sorry that they treat you with such disdain. I'm sorry that I can't prevent it. I'm sorry that he failed you, time and time and time again.

But none of it is new. Instead, she turns her head so she can press a kiss to his temple. She's told him all of that a hundred times by now and she knows it can't heal those reopened wounds. You are twice the man he was, she would tell him, if she thought it would help him at all to know someone else felt anger at Philippe on his behalf, but not yet. Not now. Not when it's so fresh. All she can do is love him enough that he has somewhere to land.

Baldwin lifts his head, only to tuck his nose into her hair, press a kiss to the top of her head. It's only then that she moves; in a moment she's turned in his grasp, nudging his thighs together with her knees on either side of him so she can seat herself comfortably in his lap. He brushes his knuckles along her jaw and she settles her hands against his chest, lips pressed together in a small, sympathetic smile. When he curls his hand around her wrist, she sees her lipstick still visible on his skin. (If he asked her now, she really would kill the both of them, without a second thought.)

Baldwin releases her wrist and winds his arms around her waist, pulls her closer, buries his face in her shoulder, and she holds him as tightly as she can. "I love you," she murmurs against his hair, and it's an inadequate phrase to explain how she feels for him, but it's the best she has, the only spell she can cast against any fear he might feel that he has to face this alone.

[softersinned]

@balldwin said: ❝ something is on your mind. what is it? ❞

She's not thinking about it.

One of the many, many wonderful things about him is that he doesn't push. She sits silently on his bed, legs tucked underneath her and lip bitten bloody, and he doesn't say a word. In fact, the only thing Baldwin has said since she walked through the door to his bedroom, freshly showered and looking exhausted, was are you cold? When the answer was no, he'd simply made room for her to sit, so that she could speak if she was ready and not feel crowded if she wasn't. Astoria doesn't ask about the conversation he no doubt had to have with his stepmother when they got out of Philippe's car, Baldwin's lips pressed together in a thin line as he slung her school bag over one shoulder and picked up the bags she'd packed an hour before, one in each hand. His stepmother had simply watched them, nodded a graceful greeting to Astoria, and when she asked, her elegant voice noncommittal, what was happening, Baldwin had practically growled in response, while Philippe kissed his wife in greeting and grimaced apologetically.

"She'll be staying here for a bit." He'd softened then, looking at Astoria, nodding towards the interior of the house. "There's an empty room near mine. Come on."

The conversation had no doubt resumed while she was in the shower, which was, in and of itself, quite a feat. Getting undressed was a painful series of contortions, with her left arm in its sling and a not-insignificant portion of her body bruised; a knock on the door to her bathroom (her bathroom!) had revealed one of Baldwin's younger sisters. Freyja, at fourteen, was near as tall as him, but she'd been non-threatening as she pulled the door closed behind her. "He said you might need help," she explained, "come on, then—"

She hadn't asked questions either. She'd only climbed into the shower behind Astoria to help wash her hair and her back, and she didn't ask questions about the brutal shocks of purple and black across her skin. When she'd finished she helped her out of the shower and wrapped her in a towel, helped her get dressed again before changing her own soaked pajamas, and helped Astoria unpack in the bedroom. Neither Philippe nor Ysabeau came to speak to her after that—"Father thinks you need to rest," Freyja had offered to explain his absence, as if predicting her unasked question—and after Freyja finished she simply went back to bed with a yawn, waving off any of Astoria's attempts to thank her.

It's late. It's late enough that she doubts either of them will be in school in the morning; even if they went, how could she focus on anything? It takes all her effort not to think about the past twenty-four hours, and she's afraid that if she slips, she'll lose herself. And so, instead, she sits in silence, and Baldwin watches her with all the careful concern of a best friend. Not for the first time today, she thinks that she's luckier to have him than she's ever known before.

("I need you to put your father on," she begged, a sob caught in her throat and her hands shaking so badly she nearly dropped the phone. "It's important. It's really important. Please don't ask me about it." And he knew her well enough to understand that this request wasn't one she made lightly, and he complied—and when he and Philippe arrived the first thing he did was catch her when her knees gave out, and hold her upright while she tried to find the words she needed to explain everything.)

It takes a few tries before she can manage any sound, and he looks almost startled to hear it, though he settles at once when she puts together a full sentence. "Thank you," she says, voice hoarse and rasping. "For getting Freyja to help me."

Like his sister, he waved a hand, her thanks clearly unnecessary. "Do you have everything you need?"

"I do." The bedroom is perfect and beautiful and, best of all, close to his, so if (when) she's frightened out of her mind by nightmares or flashbacks or an unholy combination of the two, she can find him easily enough. "Thank you for that, too."

After a beat, Baldwin shifts forward, just barely. "How badly are you hurt?"

"Compound fracture in my elbow," she recites, her memory of the rare hospital visit clear as day. "Bruises and abrasions consistent with falling. Everything else is healed." A muscle in his jaw twitches at everything else, as if he's imagining what that could be, and Astoria reaches forward with her good hand to catch his. His grip is firm, tight, but not overwhelming.

"Will you be able to sleep?"

"Ibuprofen and an ice pack and I'll be good as new," she says with a tired laugh, and the corners of his mouth twitch upwards. She opens her mouth to speak, then hesitates, and Baldwin squeezes her hand in his.

"Something is on your mind." The thing about Baldwin is that he is her best friend; they are as good as two halves of a whole, sometimes, perpetually in each other's heads. It had been an instant sort of chemistry between them, the foundations for a deep friendship laid the moment they met. It is, now as always, a gift, a blessing, but there's something terrifying in being so known. She'll never have to be alone again if she doesn't want to be; there is no one in the world who knows her so well, not even herself. "What is it?"

Best to rip off the bandage, she thinks, and so she asks without preamble, now that she's been given permission. "Will you cut my hair?"

He loves her hair. He doesn't need to say it for her to know. His eyes flicker to it now, and she can practically see the understanding dawn there: it's the first time she's had it down in a couple of years, now, and the hand around hers tightens further. He considers it for a moment, then asks, "Now?"

"Please."

"You're sure you want me to do it? I could wake Freyja again." She grips his hand tighter, now, and she shakes her head vehemently. Honesty is always a little bit difficult, and right now, it's worse than usual.

"Right now," she says, voice near inaudible, "you are just about the only person I'm not afraid of at all. I don't want to cut all of it, and I can see a hairdresser to clean it up if you're worried, but I need it gone. Will you help me?"

"Of course," he answers at once, and he stands, helps her stand as well, leads her to his bathroom.

She's small enough that he can stand behind her and cut her hair comfortably, and he draws it back into a ponytail, the hair tie just below her shoulders. Astoria watches him in the mirror as he makes sure to straighten it, and when he brings the scissors from the medicine cabinet in his bathroom he hesitates, as if to give her an out.

"I'm ready," she says softly, and she watches as he begins to cut, his expression somber and his focus unwavering. When he's finished, she feels lighter, though she notes with some alarm that her reflection is crying.

No, not her reflection; just her. Baldwin sets the discarded hair on the sink and walks around her to face her, and at once, Astoria leans into him, her head against his chest and her shoulders shaking, her body racked with sobs. He's careful to avoid her injuries, and one of his hands curls against the back of her skull, the other splayed out across her back, his hold gentle but strong.

For several minutes, neither says a word. She only cries, and he holds her, as if she were the most precious thing in the universe. After the first minute he leans his head forward, nose tucked against her hair, and he takes in a slow breath.

"Thank you," she breathes when the sobs have subsided enough for her to speak. She takes in a slow, shuddering breath, and he holds her a little tighter against him. "For this. And for coming today."

"Of course I came," he answers at once. "You asked." The rest goes unspoken—I would do anything for you—and she hopes he knows that the sentiment is returned. She thinks he does. They stand in silence for a few minutes more, until he drops a kiss to the top of her head and steps back, one of his hands moving to tip her chin up, the other toying gently with her hair, drying in a mess of frizzy curls. "I like it," he says, and she lets out a watery, hiccuping laugh.

She's adored him practically since the moment she met him, well aware of the devotion they'd developed towards one another practically upon their introduction, but she's never loved him as much as she does right now. It's worth pushing her luck, she thinks, though she knows how he'll answer before she asks the question. "Could I stay here tonight? I'm afraid to sleep."

The only answer he gives is another kiss to the top of her head. When they reach his bed again, her hair left behind on the sink, he gestures for her to climb in first as he closes his door and turns off his light. It's about his warmth, his comfort, the knowledge that if anything came for her it would have to go through someone else to read her. He is the only person in the world she doesn't fear at all. He is the only person in the world she trusts to see her at her worst.

She falls asleep within minutes of settling in beside him, her head on his shoulder and his arm around hers, and she doesn't wake when Ysabeau and Philippe open the door to check on the both of them and Baldwin whispers, scowling and furious, that they needed to be careful not to disturb her. When she shudders in her sleep, the utter hell of her dreams too much to bear, he only holds her closer, tighter, her confidante, her protector.

The first thing she thinks when she wakes the next morning is that she's never felt safer than she does in a world where her godparents no longer exist and she can wake beside the person she cares about most, and no one, she knows, has ever loved her as selflessly or as well as Baldwin does.

The second thing she thinks is that with him, perhaps, living—really living—might not be so terrifying after all.

[softersinned]

@balldwin said: a last kiss before one goes away

"And you have to leave?"

He is patient as ever, looking equal parts amused by her reluctance to let him go without a spectacular sulk and reluctant to leave her himself. "Yes. I have to go."

"And I have to stay here?" The tone of Astoria's voice suggests that she's not about to listen to what anyone says she has to do, and he knows her well enough to interpret it as just that. Baldwin lets out a laugh at that, winding an arm around her shoulders and pulling her close enough that he can drop a kiss to her temple.

"You could try and join me," he answers honestly, "but my father's given orders, and he's not a man who suffers insubordination."

She sighs, this time sounding agitated to the point of murderous. "Fuck your father," she says shortly, "and fuck his orders," and she's about to let loose other (rather colorful) commentary on her father-in-law when Baldwin's laughter returns, a rich rumble she feels in her chest. Oh, she'll miss that sound. She draws herself up to her full height, attempting to look somewhat menacing despite the way she has to crane her neck to meet his eyes. "What are you laughing at?"

"You are," he chuckles, grinning widely, "a de Clermont woman now, through and through," and she's met Ysabeau and Stasia and Freyja enough now to recognize that for the compliment it is. Stubborn, willful, challenging. The sort of woman that made the family beg Philippe to stop creating daughters, or, at the very least, a woman fit to share their name. If she listens closely, she thinks she can hear the distant peal of Philippe's laughter as he no doubt eavesdrops.

From a practical perspective she knows that she's better here, at Sept-Tours. She's still young; two centuries of life is hardly any time when facing the potential of thousands. And Baldwin is the eldest living son, the head of the family should anything (God forbid) happen to Philippe; and as his wife, she'll follow in Ysabeau's footsteps as the de Clermont matriarch. She'll be responsible for the running of the house, for the care of the family, for him. And now, with the men gone, is as good a time as any to learn.

When he explained what it meant to be his mate, fifty years before, he'd been careful to emphasize that it was choice. That what they were was not fate, or nature, but choice: her choice to love him, to remain with him, to dedicate herself to him above all else, as he did for her. The moment she became his wife was the culmination of those choices. The pull she felt towards him, the physical need, was the result, not the cause; still, it feels like something larger than her own capacity for decisions is bleeding at the thought of him leaving.

A year, at least. Perhaps longer. What is she meant to do in the meantime? She'll write, of course, and so will he, but she fears his scent will fade from her things, that this raw ache in her chest will only become worse with each moment they're apart. She'd always thought the Christian mystics mad but she understands now the religious devotion to something greater than herself, and the fearful agony of being parted from it.

She hears a wordless, impatient shout, and Baldwin sighs, lets his eyes move from her face towards the source. "You have to go," she says, "I know. I don't like it, but I know."

He bows his head forward, buries his nose in her hair, breathes in as deeply as he can. His fingers tangle in the mess of her loose curls, and for a moment she wonders if he'll leave at all.

"Make sure you miss me dreadfully," she instructs him sternly, and she feels him chuckle against her hair. "Come back to me quickly, and safely, and mine."

Fifty years. Fifty years she's had him, and fifty years they've spent together; were she still mortal it would barely be what she could fit into a single lifetime. Now, it's barely a blink of an eye. If she has to sacrifice some time with him, so be it; she'll have endless time when he returns.

"I love you." Astoria fists her hands in the lapels of his coat and she looks up at him as he straightens. "More than I could say no matter how much time we had. Promise me."

"I will come back," he swears, and he takes her face in his hands and kisses her fiercely. "And I love you."

She closes the distance between them again, already feeling an aching emptiness at the thought of his absence, and only the impatient clearing of Ysabeau's throat from across the courtyard can make either of them move.

She watches him leave, stands rooted to the spot until he's past the horizon.

[softersinned]

@balldwin said: [ HAIR ]: sender slowly reaches out to catch a loose strand of the receiver’s hair and tuck it gently and securely back behind their ear, letting their touch linger afterwards.

"Get rid of her."

She says it without malice, but it's clear she means it. In fact, she thinks it's a victory that she's managed to hold off on commenting this long—he knows better than anyone in the world how to get under her skin, and Astoria's certain that was his goal all along.

Their friends no doubt believe it as well. Baldwin's arrival, half an hour after she got there, drew attention. It always did. He has a gravity to him, and when he walks into a room, it's impossible not to look. Well. It's impossible for her not to look. She's always aware of him. Living together has done nothing to slake her need to be around him as often as possible; they studied for their exams together this morning, sitting at opposite ends of the couch and exchanging notes as they finished with them until, finally, she moved to curl up against him, her legs thrown over his lap as they read from the same book. It's been only a few hours since they were in the same place, and already, she missed him. She actually missed him.

Pathetic, sneers one corner of her mind. Romantic, counters the other. She tries to ignore them both.

Someone said his name and she looked up, her ongoing conversation already forgotten, her lips curling up in a ready smile—and then there was another redhead following him, greeting everyone shyly and clinging to his hand. He introduced her, and Astoria immediately forgot her name, even when Baldwin took his customary seat beside Astoria and his date tried to make conversation. On her other side, Sachiko took in a sharp breath and immediately averted her gaze, and the rest of their friends gathered around the table followed suit, careful not to make eye contact with Astoria while she seethed for a moment. Or five.

She knew Baldwin well enough to recognize the little smirk he wore as a celebration of his victory: he knew exactly what he'd been doing, and he knew the moment he succeeded. Dinner continued without further incident, even if Astoria didn't speak much and spent a solid half of the meal with her hand on Baldwin's leg under the table, fingers drumming against his knee or settling on his thigh.

("Poor girl," she overheard Sachiko murmuring to her fiance. "She hasn't got a clue." And she knew them well enough to know that when her fiance let out a sympathetic laugh, it wasn't at her expense: she and Baldwin have been playing these games for a while now, and all of their friends know. Yes, poor girl, poor girl, but all the sympathy in the world isn't enough to make Astoria behave any differently, and she really doesn't have that much sympathy.)

Beside her, Baldwin laughs, and he leans forward, elbows on the bar top, shoulders hunched. He's bent forward, his lips near her ear, close enough that even in the noise of the restaurant, they don't need to speak particularly loudly to be heard. She enjoys the intimacy, despite her irritation, and no doubt he knows that, too.

"She's having a nice time," Baldwin counters, though she knows that he's only pushing her buttons further.

"Good for her. I'm not. Get rid of her."

"You're terribly impolite."

"I don't like her hands all over you."

"Bold words from you, considering why you ordered a dish you could eat one-handed."

She snorts, raises her eyebrows. "I didn't hear you complaining."

"I wasn't." He looks almost as though Christmas has come early, his eyes bright with mirth, his lips quirked in one of his infuriating grins. She's unflappable, most days, but she never fails to rise to the bait when he's the one pushing her. "And I'm not now. You seem agitated."

"I am."

"Why is that?"

Astoria spares him a withering glance, and his smile only widens. "Get rid of her," she repeats for the third time, and Baldwin sighs, pushes himself up from the bar.

"Fine. And what do you propose I do after that?"

She deliberates for a moment, as if weighing her options. As if there's any question as to what she wants right now. "Well, after that, you take me home and see if we can make it past the front hall."

"Oh?"

"Though between you and me," Astoria sighs, and she slips off the stool, her unfinished drink abandoned and a bill left behind in a generous tip, "I don't know that I'd trust my self-control to get me that far."

"Really. And why is that?"

If this is a game, she's losing. She doesn't care. She wants to write her name across his skin—this belongs to Astoria Grim, do not touch!—and she knows he wants the same, and so she has, for once, abandoned any interest in winning. She knows this ends with them together, wherever it starts. What she doesn't know is why she keeps delaying the inevitable, why she keeps putting off the thing she knows will make her happiest.

"Because," she answers, and she looks towards where their friends are sitting, with Baldwin's date captivated by a story someone's telling, "I don't like to share, and I don't want to wait to remind you of that." For a moment, she's silent, considering, and this time the agitation feels a little too real, a little too raw. She wants this too much, too badly. Constantly denying it is only hurting herself and she can't locate the source of her fear. (Not of him. He's just about the only person in the world she has any real reason to fear, and she knows that he's just about the only person in the world she can trust to never hurt her. But the fear is there all the same.)

He frowns at her silence, and his hand catches her arm, falling to curl against the inside of her wrist. He doesn't push (he knows her too well to imagine it'll have any effect) and she bites her painted lip.

"How long are we going to keep doing this?"

At once there is a tenderness to him—subtle, perhaps, but present all the same. Baldwin releases her wrist to reach up instead, and he pushes a curl back from her face, tucks it gently behind her ear. His fingers drag along the line of her jaw after that, and, potential audience and his own date be damned, Astoria responds at once and leans forward to kiss him, softer, slower, sweeter than she intends.

When he pulls back from her kiss he takes a step away as well, towards the table so he can say his goodbyes and pass hers along as well. "You tell me, Duellona," he answers, voice as careful as her kiss. "Wait by the car."

She turns to do as she's asked. Baldwin's date stares daggers after her, but Astoria can't bring herself to care.

They don't even make it inside. When they do, they don't make it past that front hall. Much later, when they're curled up in his bed together, both of them sore and satisfied, she asks what his date's name was, and she laughs when he tells her he doesn't remember.

(And when he falls asleep wrapped around her, she almost, almost tells him the truth.)

[softersinned]

@balldwin said: [ HAIR ]: sender slowly reaches out to catch a loose strand of the receiver’s hair and tuck it gently and securely back behind their ear, letting their touch linger afterwards.

He can feel her eyes on him in the dark.

He always seems aware of her in a way that would, from someone else, make her feel surveilled; from him, it simply suggests that he is merely degrees away from omniscience. A more impressionable mind might have made him a new god, but Astoria is, at the moment, taking too much vicious pleasure in the promise of her damnation to cede control of her soul to anyone else.

Something about him suggests that he may take it all the same. She is not so unhappy with the thought as she would have imagined she would be.

Tonight he stands in the gardens below where she sits and he tips his head back as his guest leaves, eyes finding hers through the black of night. For several long moments they are silent and still, and then in the space of one breath to another he's gone, and she can hear the door close from three floors away. It is out of courtesy for her that Baldwin walks slowly and allows himself to be heard—it gives her time, should she wish it, to cover herself more, or prepare for another person's arrival. Were she still a warmblood she would be cold, perhaps even modest, but he has seen her half-mad and hunched over her prey, dripping blood and gore, and she has little enough shame where he is concerned. Her bare feet press firmly against the railing beneath her, and the night's steady breeze lifts the hem of her nightgown a fraction of an inch before letting it settle against her calves again.

"So," he says by way of greeting, and he walks through the room to the balcony where she sits, "you have recovered from—earlier?"

His delicacy, though unnecessary, is appreciated all the same. Astoria waits until he is standing beside her at the railing, his hands set against the stone several inches from where she's laid her feet, before she looks at him. She leans forward, winds her arms around her legs, tightens her hand around the handkerchief she's holding.

To call it a surprise would have been an understatement. She would have imagined he was dead by now—she saw him last fifty years before, and he was only a year or two younger than her, and human. And he had never had enough sense to hold his tongue when he should have, nor enough cowardice to shy away from the urge towards self-sacrifice in the name of patriotism or, worse still, the right thing. And he had seen her, called out her name in disbelief, crossed the wide street to reach her and take her arm with surprising strength for a man of his age.

It was funny, in its own way: once, she had imagined they would spend their lives together, and today, she had spent years without thinking of him once. Far enough from her that she hadn't realized he was still there, Baldwin had paused in surprise at the intrusion, and when Iain Blackwood's wizened hand gripped her arm, his nostrils had flared with a sudden anger. "Astoria," Iain repeated, and when she looked at him she wore a pleasant but confused expression, and she gently detached his hand from her arm.

If she looked closely she could see it then, that beneath the years and the laughter lines, he was the same man who had once told her that, if they simply waited long enough, he could divorce his wife and take her instead—one of the few advantages of Henry's bouts of evangelism, he'd insisted, and fuck the Pope and God Himself, too, but he would have her for his wife. Astoria had laughed at that and told him not to speak nonsense, and that week, Celia told him she was carrying his child, and there was no more talk of marriage. Now, he stared at her in wonder, disbelief, while Astoria patted his hand warmly.

"I'm terribly sorry." She spoke with a perfect English accent, indistinguishable from the native Londoners she had met while she and Baldwin were in the city. "But I think you have mistaken me for someone else."

He shook his head. "Astoria Grim," he insisted adamantly. "I know you."

To deny any connection would have made him doubt her further. She shook her head and squeezed his hand. "My great-aunt died when my father was a boy. He always said I looked like her." And she laughed sympathetically, though her stomach was churning, and she felt rather as though she might be sick, as the son that Iain had crept away from rushed to catch up to them. "Did you know her?"

It felt wrong, to lie to him, but it seemed to work. Iain took a step back, looking dazed, as his son caught his arm again. The Astoria that he remembered would have been his age. She would have spoken with the melodic lilt of her Swedish grandfather's influence. She would never have turned him away. "I did," he answered, and he offered a vague apology before he covered his son's hand with his own and turned away from them.

She waited until they were out of sight to let herself feel it. Now, there is nothing to feel, though she runs her thumb over the fabric of the handkerchief, folded over her index finger, and she looks up at Baldwin and lets the corner of her mouth quirk upward into a crooked smile. "I have," she confirms, and Baldwin looks pointedly at the handkerchief she's holding.

"What is that?" he asks, though he already knows, and Astoria turns her hand and opens it obediently, holding the cloth in her palm. Quietly, she lets out an embarrassed little laugh, and she stretches his hand out for him to reach. When he plucks the handkerchief from her grasp, she clears her throat, eyes flickering away from him.

"I'm sorry. I should have asked."

Once they were gone, she had closed her eyes, taken in several deep breaths, but the sheer number of people in the crowded street did nothing to soothe her frayed nerves. From where he stood Baldwin could, no doubt, have seen just how she was beginning to lose control, and it doesn't surprise her that he saw what followed: that she had pulled the handkerchief from where she kept it tucked inside her sleeve and lifted it to her nose, and she breathed in the scent there instead, faint though it was.

"Did it help?" Baldwin asks in the present, and Astoria clears her throat again, cheeks coloring a gentle pink. From what she's seen, it's rare for a wearh to blush, but she always seems to manage it when his eyes are on her.

"It did." She speaks quietly, but she speaks the truth: the moment she'd breathed in his scent of woodfire and leather she had felt safe again, and steady on her own feet. The fear was gone, and when she opened her eyes they were no longer swimming—and she felt, as she so often did at his side, like herself again. She looks at her knees, afraid that if she meets his searching gaze he'll be able to uncover the secrets she has yet to even tell herself.

She knows what this is, or she knows enough: five years with him and they are rarely apart. He has been an excellent teacher and guide, and more patient with her than she would ever have imagined he could be. He does not seem to resent her presence, or that she still cannot hunt entirely on her own, and certainly not without supervision if she does not mean to kill. On the rare occasions that she sleeps, she dreams of him. His scent is her anchor to the world, and her heart, damaged and cold as it is, seems to be utterly, entirely his. How inconvenient, and, at once, how wonderful, to know that her ability to fall so absurdly in love had not died with the rest of her. That to be away from him makes her feel as though there is a knife slipped between her ribs is no doubt the result of being caged so long; who could expect her to come out of it sane? But at its core, she knows what it is, just as she knows that whatever she felt decades ago for the man she saw today, it has not prepared her for this.

Inconvenient, to say the least; she cannot talk herself out of it and so she simply ignores it as often as she can, though in moments like these she wonders if he can smell it on her. Baldwin only watches her, silent in a way that she's learned by now means he wants her to continue without having to be asked, and Astoria lets out a petulant little sigh, though she's smiling (albeit guiltily) when she looks at him again. "Had you been looking for that?" she asks, though she knows that's not the information he's waiting to hear.

"Yes. I had expected an error by our staff, though perhaps I should have anticipated a bit of theft."

"That does seem like an oversight on your part," she says, quite sincerely, though she laughs a moment later and shakes her head. "It's the only one I've taken. I doubted you'd miss it. It helps keep me—" Her voice trails off for a moment, and she reaches back for something to do with her hands. Impatiently, she gathers her braided hair and begins combing it out, fingers working through the tangles there.

Even in the dark she sees Baldwin's gaze shift, settling for a moment on a particular red curl hanging from her finger. It is perhaps the second or third time he's seen her hair loose, and he seems to understand the gravity of such a vulnerability with him—but she has no use for modesty or shame with him, and with his attention diverted she pushes forward. "It keeps me from getting overwhelmed. Usually, you're there, and that helps, but when you're not—it's a poor substitute but it's useful all the same. One scent I know well keeps me from going mad when presented with a thousand."

"I see." He drags his gaze from her hair back to her face, and she feels suddenly and terribly (wonderfully) exposed.

"It reminds me that I am not where I have been. And that as long as I'm with you, I am safe." That seems to surprise him, though she can't be sure, as she looks at his hands after only a moment of meeting his eyes. "Even after years, I'm not quite used to it. I trust you—" And here she laughs again and looks back at him. "—God help me, I trust you with my life and my freedom alike. The reminder that it's you looking after me is a welcome one."

Baldwin grins, suddenly, and she feels all the air being knocked out of her lungs at the sight of it. "Quite a change from the certainty I'd let Father Hubbard drink from you," he points out after a moment, and it prompts yet another laugh. Quickly, so quickly she thinks she imagined it, she could swear she sees him close his eyes as if to savor the sound of her laugh.

"Well, you see, I've learned the truth about you."

"Have you, now?"

"Mm." She leans forward as much as she can without losing her balance on the railing. "You like me."

He chuckles, and the rich rumble of his voice is a song. "Maybe, for the moment, you're of more use to me alive." But he's still grinning, and she can recognize his tone as—teasing. How magnificent, that he'll tease her like that, that he knows her well enough to be certain she'll take it as it's meant. How beautiful, that he seems to enjoy making her laugh.

"Oh, I certainly am, but it's still true. You like me. And you won't let anyone harm me, even myself. It's alright," she adds, and she settles back against the wall with a smug little smile. "I like you, too."

"Do you, now?"

"Very much. There is not another soul in this world who's taken care of me like you have."

The confession is unexpected. Baldwin's expression seems to soften, though perhaps it's the low light.

"When I need to remember that I am alive, and still myself, I think of you." She looks out over the gardens again, but she's drawn back to him, the beautiful line of his jaw in the dark. "Cuore mio. You are my sanity and my safety." His eyebrows raise at the Italian, and she laughs low in her throat. "That's what you are, isn't it? If you had turned us away that day, I would be dead, or mad. That I am still myself, that I still exist at all, is because of you." And if I were to be separated from you now, I'm not certain I would know how to remain myself. She swings her legs around and shifts so that her feet are on the stone floor of the balcony, and she looks up at Baldwin and smiles. "Will you take me out? I'd like to hunt."

For a long, long moment, he is silent, watching her. Slowly, as though he was reaching out to soothe a frightened animal, he reaches for her, and he tips her chin up, brushes that same errant curl he'd been watching before behind her ear, as if to grant himself an unimpeded view of her face. His fingers brush against her cheek, and his expression seems almost tender, but he says nothing. After a beat, he drags his finger along her jaw before he lowers his hand.

"Do you want to dress, first?" he asks, and she stands, shaking her head.

"If anyone sees me, they'll assume I'm some restless spirit," she says with a little laugh, and she tries not to think about how gentle his touch was against her skin, or how badly she wanted to lean into it, or that she feels oddly, impossibly cold now that he's released her. (She glides across the floor quickly enough that she has to wait for him at the door. She does not see him lift the handkerchief, still in his hand, to his nose and breathe her in.)

She wakes the next morning after an hour or two of sound sleep, soothed by having drunk her fill mere hours before. When she opens her eyes the first thing she sees is an unfamiliar scrap of fabric on the bed beside her—and when she breathes in his scent on the cloth it is almost as if he is there with her.

[softersinned]

@balldwin said: [ TUG ]: the sender tugs the receiver close against them by resting a hand against the small of their back, pulling them flush against their body.

She wakes at the first blush of morning, a sliver of the sky visible from a gap in the curtains and glowing a pale violet. It catches her off guard some mornings, when she wakes here, and if she asked him to move the bed he certainly would, but the moments afforded to her now are precious and rare, and she guards them. She remains still for a long moment, listening for a change in his heartbeat, and when she hears none she turns, slowly, slowly, to face him, taking care not to disturb his rest.

          The older she gets, she’s been promised, the deeper she’ll sleep; as it is now even the subtlest change in the light can wake her. Some part of it is, no doubt, the natural consequence of a long period of adjustment. Even as a warmblood, Astoria loved mornings, and she woke early even on the days she could sleep in. And she would climb quietly out of bed and tiptoe in bare feet across the floor of her bedroom to the balcony, where she would sit, balanced carefully on the railing, her knees drawn to her chest and her arms around her legs and her hair loose as she watched the sun climb and color ripple through the sky.

          A few of the habits of her first life have remained with her—the way she holds her breath as she settles again, watching him for any sign of change, is one of them. But Baldwin sleeps, and after several minutes she relaxes.

          It’s not the first time she’s woken in his bed; she doubts it will be the last. Last night, as she has half a dozen other times, she leaned in his doorway and waited, a crooked smile playing at her lips, her curls damp but drying behind her, wearing a nightgown and nothing else. The woman he had been entertaining, perhaps expecting to stay the night, had stared back at her with open hostility; she looked to Baldwin, obviously expecting some sort of defense, but he’d only laughed under his breath and stood to gather her clothes. Astoria had noted with some pleasure that they were nearby, no doubt left there in anticipation of her arrival.

          (She’d excused herself when he arrived home with her, feeling agitated and ill at the thought of hearing what she knew would follow, and had gone out to hunt, asking the woman to attend to her to have a bath prepared in two hours’ time. He didn’t keep her as a prisoner or demand to know of her comings and goings, and so she took her time, savored the hunt. Perhaps she should have anticipated it but instinct drove her to seek out something, anything that reminded her of his scent, of saddle leather and fire, and it took her out of the city, towards the woods where a pair of highwaymen had settled in for the night. For near an hour she watched them, made noise only to stoke their growing fear. The savagery of their wounds would suggest an animal attack of some kind; she left them with enough blood in their bodies not to prompt suspicions that the attack was the work of wearh and came home with her cheeks flushed and blood soaking the front of her dress, hidden beneath the cloak she kept held closed around her.)

          (She heard the movement on the second floor slow when she entered and she smiled in spite of herself—she had felt his eyes on her through the window when she left and she could feel his awareness of her now, could practically hear the sharp intake of breath when the sweet perfume of blackberries and plums, colored by the heady scent of blood, reached him. As he could no doubt smell when she reached the top of the steps, deliberately taking her time and allowing the wood to creak beneath her feet. As he could no doubt smell when she unwrapped the small bar of white soap and began to wash the blood and dirt from her skin and hair.)

          And when the unwelcome guest was gone, shown out by the same woman who had drawn Astoria her bath, Astoria climbed into the bed beside him without a word and settled in to sleep, pressed close against him, determined to overwrite his lover’s scent with her own. He’d been amused by her jealousy and possessiveness, as he always was, and welcomed it.

          It’s something softer that directs her now. The sliver of light takes on a warmer tone as the sun climbs slowly higher and she settles her gaze on his sleeping face. These days it’s easier to understand what it is she feels for him—desire, certainly, and hunger, and need, and she understands all of this well enough without much thought, though the intensity of what she feels leaves her breathless at times. But there is something else, something that overrides even desire, something warmer. She thinks of the mornings in Henry’s court that she woke alongside Iain and remembers thinking that she understood love and she realizes now that what she felt then was a pale and poor imitation, and that she was a fool to believe she understood much of anything.

          The slope of his nose drives her to distraction. The curve of his cheekbones could make her mad. One morning she found herself so enamored with the freckles on his forearm that she idly began to count them. Yet another morning she searched out the shadows cast by his eyelashes. The sound of his heartbeat, his breath, his blood is a song—and as a witch she heard blood singing to her all the time but as a wearh the only blood that sings is his, slow and sonorous. She used to imagine she heard God in the water around her but this sound is infinitely sweeter than God’s voice could ever be.

          You sound like autumn, she’d told him once, finally finding the words to describe it and delivering them with absolute wonder, like the last thunderstorm before snow. It had been her favorite sound, and she had been certain that after death, she’d never hear it again. That first time she recognized it she cried, leaving streaks of pink down her face that he swept away with his thumb,

          She listens now, and she watches the way his face glows in the warming light. When he wakes she’ll have to share him with the world: he will be a de Clermont again, and everyone and everything will demand his attention. He’ll find the woman she drove away last night, or someone new, to tease out that jealousy again. Or perhaps he’ll focus the staggering weight of his attention on her and revel in the way he can throw her off-balance, like no one else. No; she hadn’t been in love, then, even when she and Iain laid tangled together and made promises they had no hope of being able to keep. She had been infatuated, but it hadn’t been love.

          This—so profound a physical sensation it leaves her weak at the knees, so deep that it reaches into her body and makes a home in her bones—this is love, and it is incomparable. He is incomparable. And when he wakes she will do what she must and share him with the world, and bite her tongue when the urge to tell him that she loves him so much she doesn’t know how she can bear it, to have all of that love inside of her, begins to overwhelm. But in these moments he belongs to her, and only her. He is Mars at rest, fierce even in his slumber like a sleeping lion, and beautiful. She thinks of the artists she loved as a girl, the sculptor her grandfather patronized and the way he could coax the shape of a face beneath a veil from a block of stone, and she thinks that even the most delicately detailed of his creations ugly and crude in comparison.

          She’s about to try and chase another hour’s sleep when his eyes open. The first thing he sees when he wakes is her face, her hair a mess around her and her features framed by that same sliver of light by which she’s been admiring him. Mars gazing upon Duellona, the god at rest beginning to stir. The corners of his mouth quirk upward and the sight makes her breath catch in her throat.

          Someday she’ll tell him everything. Today the words are nowhere to be found, though she lets her lips part as if she hopes they’ll come out all the same—but no words suffice when she wants to tell him that he is her heart and her ribs and her lungs. Baldwin rolls onto his side and tucks an arm under his head as he does, his other hand coming up to take her chin and his thumb stroking a slow and tortuous line along the curve of her lower lip. When her breathing is sufficiently ragged and her cheeks are flushed with pink, he releases her, lets his hand skate over her arm and down to her side before he settles it at the small of her back.

          Gently, he pulls her closer, as close as he can, until they’re chest to chest and she’s staring up at him with wide dark eyes, her pupils blown so wide there’s barely a ring of honey gold left around them. And then he rolls onto his back again and draws her with him, so that her head comes to rest on his chest; he moves his hand again to catch hers and he rests both against his sternum, and when she looks up at him again his eyes are closed as if he intends to fall back asleep. She hooks her leg over his, settles comfortably against him, and he lets out a quiet huff of laughter.

          She could try to speak now, but she thinks it would shatter the peace around them, and so instead she remains silent. She falls asleep again minutes later, with her ear pressed to his chest and her fingers laced into his, and the sound of autumn storms filling her head.

[softersinned]

@balldwin said: ❝ be careful. one could take your words for treason. ❞

She will, in time, get used to the French court.

She misses Venice—the wine, the clothes, the art, the language, the reflection of the sun over the canals and the shadows cast by the ever-changing architecture she knew so well in her youth—and she misses the mild winters to which she's grown accustomed these last several years. But this is where he's been summoned, and so this is where she remains: however much Astoria might miss Italy, were she in Venice without him she knows she would miss him more.

And for all of Venice's many, many attributes, it cannot compare. It is missing the only thing that matters.

When he looks down she's watching him, her hair a mess from the constant, idle motion of his fingers through her curls and a smile, infinitely soft and infinitely warm, on her lips. She's folded her hands over his abdomen, chin resting against her fingers, and when he tugs lightly at her hair to urge her to move and meet him it's only a moment before she's touching him again, as if any separation is too long and too painful. Not that Baldwin seems to mind this—and she shifts beside him and at once she's leaning forward to kiss him again, her hand against the side of his neck, his hand still in her hair.

Truthfully, it's a wonder either of them has done much of anything besides this. They've been reunited for only a matter of days, so few she could count them on one hand, and the thought of being without him even for an hour makes her ache. The hand not in her hair comes to settle at her hip, and he pushes gently until she's on her back and he's pressing her against their bed, his fingers slipping out from her hair to guide one of her legs around him.

"Louis will eventually want you introduced to his favorite mistress." He delivers the words with a tone of some disdain, though whether that's aimed at Louis or his mistress, she isn't sure. In response, Astoria simply pulls him closer to her.

"Not his wife?"

"Maria Theresa's power in court is negligible at best." Baldwin ducks his head to press his lips to her throat, and he scrapes his teeth lightly against her skin. He seems pleased at the whine which follows, and when she shivers delightedly, he strokes a slow line along her thigh, and he grins against her neck. "Though you would be a good companion for her."

"Are you pairing off Catholics again?" she teases, and he lets out a low laugh.

"She seems miserably alone. She was regent about a year ago and now that her husband is back, she has been forgotten. The court ignores her. She gave birth to a son mere months ago and she is hardly present. You would, of course, want to refrain from mentioning that your marriage is—" He pauses, searching for the right word.

"Functional?" Astoria supplies, and at once, Baldwin catches both of her wrists and pins her hands above her head.

"Is that how you would describe this?" He hovers above her, and when she reaches up to kiss him he pulls back, just out of reach.

"Are we not functional?" she demands, laughing, and Baldwin keeps one hand at her wrists, the other gripping her side and pressing her down.

"Hardly a ringing endorsement," he murmurs.

"Blissful," she says, squirming uselessly under him, "passionate, euphoric, divine—"

"Better," he answers, but he still won't let her kiss him.

"I'll have to refrain from speaking of you at all," she promises, "or I'll have no chance of appearing to be anything less than hopelessly in love with you and unconditionally devoted."

That does the trick, and he brings his mouth to hers, lets his hand drag down to her hip. When he pulls away again she lets out a frustrated whine, which only prompts another of his smiles, and for a moment Astoria feels as though all the breath has been squeezed from her lungs, staring up at him with naked hunger.

"I think," she says, a little hoarsely, "I should be offended that you're thinking of Louis when I have you occupied right now."

"The point, wife, is that we will eventually need to leave this bed."

"We've already left this bed today," she argues, and she wiggles her hands as much as she can, points vaguely in the right direction. "Or have you already forgotten breaking the table?"

"I have not. But even so, we will at some point be expected to make our presence at court known. The king is a demanding creature."

"Fuck the king," she retorts venomously, and Baldwin laughs again, releasing her hip to take hold of her jaw and kiss her again.

"Be careful," he warns, voice low, lips trailing along her throat. "One could take your words for treason."

"My sincerest apologies, my love." She arches up against him, lets out a breathless laugh. "There is, of course, a simple solution to my thoughtlessness."

"Oh?"

"I certainly can't speak treason if I can't speak at all," she says, rather reasonably.

God, she loves the sound of his laugh. And he reduces her to desperate, needy whimpers and the repetition of his name like a prayer, and all thought of the king and his court vanishes from both their minds, replaced only with a constant refrain of mine, mine, mine.

[softersinned]

@balldwin​​ said: [ CHIN ]: as they stand close to one another, the sender hooks a finger and tenderly lifts the receiver’s chin, tilting it up so that they can look at one another, and running a thumb across their skin lightly. 

Drink ye all of it, for this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.

          Their hostess is, Astoria thinks, a saint; Johanna, the wife of Baldwin’s younger brother, sits across from her at the table silently as she watches her guest agonize. Between them sits a pomegranate in a simple wooden bowl, perfectly ripe and waiting to be opened, and beside it a letter in an unfamiliar hand bearing instructions. Beside all of this, a chalice, filled near to the brim with hot blood freshly spilled.

          Astoria’s lips had drawn back into a grimace, and she had looked to Johanna, a stranger a mere hour before, in evident distress. “How did he know?” she asked, and Johanna’s smile had grown sympathetic.

          “He knows everything,” she’d answered gently. She has been infinitely gracious, considering that Baldwin (and, by extension, Astoria) had been dispatched to Spain only days before, told to get there as quickly as he could to handle something, the details of which Astoria was not privy to but which she had gathered was related to the Congregation’s demands more so than the family’s endeavors. Baldwin had seemed surprised to see his sister-in-law so far from her husband, more so when Johanna rather warmly informed him that Philippe had left instructions for everyone—but for Astoria first.

          And Philippe’s instructions are simple: they are not to leave Johanna’s house until Astoria has completed her task. The blood smells intoxicating, distracting in its spice and sweetness, and her hands shake with the effort to leave the cup untouched. “Whose blood is it?” she asks hoarsely, and Johanna references the letter between them again.

          “A priest,” she says after a beat. “Philippe selected him—oh my.”

          “What is it?”

          “He says that the priest kept a girl in chains while he exorcised her, until he killed her, just a year ago—oh, dear, are you quite alright?”

          The shaking in her hands will not subside. The scent of the blood is all the more troubling, now that Astoria knows its source, and her mouth waters, and she’s certain that she stinks of hunger. She clears her throat and she presses her palms to the table, and she tries twice before she can speak.

          “And Philippe’s instructions?”

          “Peel the pomegranate for Baldwin, in the presence of the priest’s blood. Every seed must be delivered to him, unbroken. You will be forgiven for the first six you crush, but for no more. And the blood must remain untouched.”

          “And if I fail?”

          Johanna doesn’t answer. Astoria thinks she can guess all the same.

She leaves a trail of crimson in the snow behind her, and she wonders if that’s what he’ll follow to find her. If he bothers to look for her at all, that is; she could hardly blame him if he didn’t.

          She wouldn’t look. No; if she took in a stray that turned around and made this kind of mess, she would wash her hands of it. Baldwin is many things, all of them worthy of her admiration, but he is not endless in his capacity for patience and understanding. And it’s not as though she knows how to explain it, anyway.

          You see, she imagines saying, as she twists her bloodstained fingers in her hair, loose curls tangled from a hundred passes of her nervous hands, I couldn’t stop myself. I was so frightened, so angry, that it was as if a piece of myself ceased to exist and all reason was lost to me. Surely that will go well. Surely he won’t cast her aside after that, send her back to Leonardo to be put back in her cage—

          “—nnn, no,” she whimpers, and she pulls at her hair as if to ground herself with the physical sensation of her pain. “No, no, no, no—”

          —assuming she can survive it, of course. If she’s put back in a cage, no matter how lovely, she thinks it will kill her. She shakes her head and she tucks her elbows in like a shield around her head, bowing forward until her elbows hit her knees.

          When did she lose her shoes? The red on the snow is from her feet, bare and bloody, though she doubts the blood is hers. Besides the blood there is a trail of dead, and Astoria closes her eyes as tightly as she can. Her dress is soaked with gore, her mouth and chin and neck stained with it as she indulged with a savagery she can only describe as animal. If Leonardo locks her up again, and she can’t hunt, he’ll stop feeding her, too, make her utterly dependent on him.

          “No,” she says again, and she presses her heels against the cold stone floor and pushes back with her legs, scrambling across the floor until her back hits a wall. “I won’t, I won’t, no, I won’t, no, no, no—”

          Her voice picks up volume with each word, though it sounds raw, even monstrous. And that’s what she is: out of control and unreliable and monstrous, and the merciful thing to do, she fears, is put her out of her misery.

          Christ, she wants him. It’s the only thought that breaks through her fear: she wants Baldwin with her, though she hasn’t the faintest ideas as to whether he’d comfort her or shun her. No, that’s not fair. Baldwin has shown her shocking kindness, but oh, she hasn’t done this before.

          This is why Leonardo locked me up, crows a voice in the back of her mind that sounds like her own, unfit to leave the house unfit to walk amongst the weak the defenseless I am filth filth filth no NO NO NO.

          She hears footsteps and she draws her legs back to her chest and she hunches her shoulders as if to anticipate a blow. There are two men standing in the doorway to the church but only one who smells familiar, and when the source of the scent approaches her it’s with surprising patience.

          His fingers gently guide her own from her hair, and he takes an elbow with each hand and guides her to stand. She doesn’t fight him, but she looks at him from behind her hair, messed as it is, and she knows her eyes are wild and that she looks horrifying. He won’t harm her; he’s shown no inclination to strike her or discipline her, and she doubts he’ll start now. She waits for the fear to return but it doesn’t.

          Baldwin’s arrival is a blessing. At once, she feels calmer, and that frightens her, too—how little control she has over herself in any direction, how dependent she is upon anyone else, even him, to feel like herself again. He lifts one of his hands from her elbow and he presses a single finger under her chin, tipping her face up towards his even as she tries to avert her eyes.

          “Are you hurt?” he asks, and she shakes her head. Her own hands continue to shake, and she grabs her skirt with both hands, fists her hands so tightly in the fabric she feels one of her fingers push through it. Baldwin’s eyes stay on her face, and when she raises her own to meet his, he looks—

          —relieved? No, that can’t be right. She really is mad.

          “Tell me,” he says, voice low and more comforting than it has any right to be, and he traces his thumb along the swell of her lower lip with a tenderness that leaves her winded.

          Is this a game? He can be cruel, she knows, but he’s never been cruel to her, so why start now?

          “I thought I saw him.” It sounds childish and petulant and immeasurably foolish, but it’s the truth. “Evander. I thought I saw him. There was—him, he, he had the same face. Wasn’t him. Was a human. Oh. Oh, God, I wasn’t—”

          “Why did you think it was him?”

          “Face. Voice. Even the way he moved. Must have been a coincidence, but I had to kill him.”

          “Why did you have to kill him?”

          He’s not scolding her, she realizes belatedly. The questions aren’t meant to trap her. He asks earnestly, as though the most important thing now is that she learn how to answer.

          “So he couldn’t take me back.”

          “Back to what?”

          “I was in chains for eight years.” Her voice grows smaller, almost childish. “And he enchanted them so I couldn’t break free. I broke my own arms trying to escape and he let them heal wrong so he could break them again to fix them. Strung me up and bled me. Ran me through with—anything with a blade, anything he could use, to see what I could withstand—killed my sister. Left her to rot just out of my reach—the monastery stank of decay and I had to watch—and I smelled his blood and he was with his friends and I couldn’t stop until they were all dead or I’d never be safe again and I—”

          She trails off and she looks at him desperately.

          “I won’t do it again,” she says with a sudden ferocity. “I won’t live in chains again.” She lifts her chin. “And if you send me back to Leonardo I won’t go. I won’t be locked away, either.” Her next words are less defiant, and there’s real fear there. “He only wants me when I’m too weak to push back and I won’t be weak, not for him, never for him again.”

          She sounds mad. Perhaps she really is.

          “I don’t intend to send you back to him.” There’s a ferocity in his voice, too, one that matches her own. “And I don’t intend to lock you away.”

          “I know. I’m sorry. I was frightened. I wasn’t—I wasn’t myself. I’m not myself. I’m—you’ve looked after me. I’m not in danger. Not from you. I know. I know.”

          Astoria’s voice changes when she speaks of him. She’s noticed it only recently; there’s a tone she adopts only when speaking to Baldwin, or about him. And his presence soothes, and his scent reminds her of home.

          All she needed to feel safe was to be with him again. She feels it already.

          “Alain.” The summons is directed at the other man, forgotten to Astoria in the intensity of her own emotion. “Deal with this.”

          Alain. One of Philippe de Clermont’s men. No doubt he’ll report back that she’s unreliable, even dangerous. Baldwin continues to speak, but she loses track of it, hit with a wave of dizziness that has her stumbling, her hands flying out to catch him and take hold of him as though he is the only thing that can keep her afloat.

          What will she do when he tires of her? She already feels half-mad when he’s away from her, like there’s a physical pain in her chest at his absence, no matter how long it lasts. No doubt that without him she will take those last steps away from reason and the ache she feels will widen into a chasm and she’ll fall into it and be wholly lost to herself. Baldwin catches her, an arm winding around her waist, the hand at her chin moving to her throat, and she knows that she should not want to give him such power over her but it’s the only thing she wants, to know he could kill her, to know that he won’t.

          What is happening to her?

          “Home,” she asks quietly, desperately. “I want to go home.”

          But if he asked her to stay here with him, surrounded by blood and death and the evidence of her countless failures, this would be home, too.

It matters more than she thinks it should, that Philippe someday approve of her. Even so, she thinks nothing of Philippe as she breaks the fruit open gingerly. The first seed she touches bursts in her hand, and she closes her eyes and waits until the quiver in her hand halts. Five more chances to do this right.

          She is a weapon, a blunt instrument. Her strength cannot stand up to most wearh but it is profound enough to be problematic. One by one she plucks the seeds and drops them carefully in the bowl, and she tries not to breathe too much.

          But it’s not strength she needs now. It’s control. Control, endurance—another seed breaks, rivulets of red draining from her palm and leaving sweet trails along her palm and wrist. Four left. “Does Baldwin know of this test?” she asks, and Johanna shakes her head.

          “We can tell him when you’ve finished. But Philippe wanted it this way, and he is—not the sort of man you question.”

          She thinks of Baldwin, the power in his hands, the way he held her chin like she was something infinitely fragile. She takes each seed with painstaking caution and care, and she thinks of him. The scent of his skin, even under the gore she left there. His fingers, careful as they worked the tangles out of her hair and helped her scrub the blood from the strands. His voice as he promised that he would not send her back to anyone who locked her away, who starved her, who made her feel so helpless—

          One more seed breaks, only when she thinks of what it would be to be without him. She thinks she would be less herself.

          When she’s finished Johanna offers her the blood, but she declines it, leaves it for her hostess to drink. Instead, she brings the bowl through the house, along with the letter, until she finds Baldwin—he’s sitting at a desk, a pen in one hand, the other running idly through his hair as he thinks, and she feels her breath catch and her chest tighten and she simply stands and watches him in silence.

          She very nearly drops the bowl, and all her hard work.

          What has he done to her?

          His eyes rise from the papers in front of him and he frowns at the bowl until she deposits it in front of him. His fingers brush hers as he takes the letter, and his jaw tightens as he reads it, but he remains silent until he’s finished. When Baldwin looks up at her, she thinks, for a moment, she can see a hint of pride in his face.

          “How many broke?”

          “Three.”

          “Good girl. You exceeded his expectations.”

          She laughs at that, ignores the way her stomach flips and her throat feels tight and her palms begin to itch and her fingers want to reach for him. They stand in silence for a long moment, until he gestures to the bowl.

          “Sit,” he instructs. “Eat. And I’ll tell you why we’re here.”

          When did he crawl under her skin? Carve out a home for himself inside her bones?

          It feels right, to sit beside him and listen, turned toward him with an openness she shows no one else. It feels as though the space has been left empty for her.