Another request from a friend. I wasn't entirely sure whether this was a hard T or a soft M, but since has been strict about M's lately, I rated it M just in case.

There is no lemon in this fic, it's just heavily implied. If you want explicit this is not the fic for you.

That being said I own nothing, all characters belong to QuinRose, many of whose licensed doujinshi have been picked up by Seven Seas Publishing. Go buy them. They're so much better as far as character accuracy than the Hoshino Soumei manga.

Enjoy.

The snow started suddenly, far too suddenly to be natural. The normal temperature in Wonderland rarely strayed from mild, but a cold wind had sprung out of the north, carrying with it dense, wet clumps of snow. Needless to say, Ace had quickly taken Alice's hand and set about finding some kind of natural shelter; in wind and pelting snow like this, a normal tent wouldn't do.

A rocky overhang served the purpose well. It hid a shallow cave, deep enough to be useful but shallow enough that the dim, cloudy light could reach all the way to the back wall.

Alice settled on the (thankfully dry) dirt floor, rubbing her frigid arms with equally cold hands. She hadn't been expecting weather like this. It had taken them a long time to find suitable shelter and she was chilled to the bone. "Ace, c-can't you hurry up w-with the c-campfire…?" she muttered through teeth clenched to keep them from chattering uncontrollably. Usually she wasn't so grouchy, but after being dragged halfway around the world and then caught in a blizzard, she figured she had reason enough to complain.

The knight in question was rummaging through his travelling pack, looking for anything flammable. It appeared that most of its contents had already been emptied, and still the knight was empty-handed…oh no.

"I don't have anything we can burn~" Wonderful. Just wonderful. His tone and his smile were both way too cheerful for their current situation.

"N-Nothing at all?!"

"I have flint, but the tinderbox got wet, and the weather's way too harsh right now to even think about gathering firewood."

"You've g-got to be j-joking…" She was tempted to just push her useless companion out into the snow regardless, but saw that he was telling the truth. An ever-shifting curtain of white cascaded violently around their meager shelter. That was a little insane, even for the hardy knight with his thick red coat. She shivered as the cold wind shifted directions briefly, sending icy chills along every inch of her exposed skin. After a few seconds, the dampness of her clothes had also managed to seep into her body, only worsening the tremors running through her body. This still wasn't the worst situation she'd ever been in on Ace's travels, but it was remarkably uncomfortable. She was about the coldest she could ever remember being. Every slight movement brought a new fold of her frigid clothing into contact with her skin, which was trying feebly to warm itself, prickling up into gooseflesh.

Ace had, in the meantime, shrugged off his coat, dyed a dark maroon by the melting snow on it. It had done its job well, keeping the majority of his clothing dry. Too bad not all of us walk around prepared for a freak blizzard, she thought, somewhat bitterly. Her face heated a bit despite how cold she was when she realized she'd been watching him undress, a corner of her mind admiring the way he moved, even in such a simple action. She quickly averted her eyes.

The outsider snapped back to herself when Ace knelt in front of her, his ruby eyes and smiling face suddenly much closer than they had been before. Before she could react, the palms of his hands were pressed against her cheeks. What first struck her was their size; she'd never noticed before how large his hands were. They were warm and slightly damp, as if he'd been keeping them in his pockets. She remembered vaguely that he had been wearing gloves. He must've taken them off at some point. His left hand felt rougher than his right, striped with callouses from years of handling a sword. And while she had been lost in these ridiculous details, she realized he had been speaking.

"…-r face is really cold, Alice~, that's not a good sign. You need to get warmed up, quickly."

"W-Well, how do you suggest d-doing that?" Not only was she still shivering, but now she was flustered. Soon enough she'd be completely incomprehensible. She sought, a bit frantically, for anything other than the knight's face to turn her eyes on and finally settled for a rather uninteresting rock in the corner of the cave.

Thankfully he stood and his hands left her face, which suddenly felt cold without them, despite the blood rising in her cheeks. After a bit of rummaging he returned with a large, nondescript brown blanket, one that she was actually very familiar with. He always brought it on these 'adventures'. Somehow, unlike the tinderbox, it had escaped the worst of the snow. A small, unoccupied corner of her mind decided that this was a very convenient coincidence. That would be just the sort of thing Ace would plan…

He knelt in front of her again, the blanket draped around his own shoulders to keep it out of the way. "First off, we need to get you out of those wet clothes~" His hands, warm and agile despite the weather, worked quickly at her apron.

Alice, her own fingers numbed beyond use, could only push at him uselessly and voice her protest. "A-Ace, what are you doing?! Stop…! J-Just give me the b-blanket, I'll warm up fine like that…"

Either he actually listened to her protests or simply had other priorities, but he removed only her apron. It had kept her a little dryer than she could've been, but her dress itself was pretty damp too, and the snatches of wind that swirled into the cave still sent icy pangs through her.

"Now we'll get you bundled up and close to something warm~" With no further prelude, he pulled her close, wrapping the blanket loosely around both of their shoulders in the process.

The first thought to cross her mind was how delightfully warm Ace was, and how much she wished there was less clothing between them, so she could be even closer to that unbelievable warmth. But she quickly realized what she had been thinking and shoved it forcefully from her mind. She certainly wanted nothing of that sort. She was just cold and tired and her mind was wandering wherever it pleased.

The second thing she noticed was exactly how he had chosen to hold her. He had pulled her into his lap so she was straddling him, her thighs parted around his hips, and her own hips resting heavily a bit above his folded knees. Sitting like this meant they were practically on eye-level with each other. As if this wasn't compromising and embarrassing enough, his hand, which had been resting supportively on her lower back, had now begun to creep closer to her tailbone…

Her face was burning as she shot Ace the worst glare she could muster at such close range. "Where are you touching?! S-Stop it…!" She found that the entangling blanket and her own position were making it difficult for her to reach the offending hand.

"Just trying to make sure you're comfortable," was the excuse he offered. Cheerily. Far too cheerily. "Are you warming up some now~?"

"A little," she answered, grudgingly, looking away a bit from his far-too-close profile. His hand had ceased its southward wandering and was now travelling back up along her spine.

"A little, hm? But you still feel pretty chilly…"

"I am, but I'm warming up quick-…Ace!" His hand had reached the nape of her neck, where it had pulled her soaked, stringy hair gently out of the wrap of the blanket. The obstacle removed, it had grabbed the zipper of her dress and begun to tug down on it, slowly and patiently. Almost 5 inches of her back were bared now, cold and clammy from her wet clothing.

"Your dress is wet, right? And you're still cold. Wearing damp clothes like that isn't going to help you warm up any~" He continued to pull the zipper down, past her bra strap, exposing more and more of her skin.

"Ace, stop!" She pushed against his chest, ineffectively. She couldn't reach either of his hands, and his closeness stifled much of her movement. Yes, there was no way he hadn't planned this. Somehow even the inclemency of the weather was his fault. All his fault.

"Why? I'm trying to help you, Alice." His voice dropped, not in pitch, but in tone. Something shifted in his manner as his fingers trailed along her freshly uncovered skin, passing unevenly along the cold ridges of her spine. She found she couldn't come up with a response.

The zipper stretched all the way to just a bit above her tailbone, and he tugged it down the entire way. Soon afterwards, his hands began to work at peeling the dress from her upper body. She hindered his progress as well as she could, and in the end he only pulled the garment down to just above the cups of her bra, exposing her shoulders completely. Very grudgingly, she had to admit that she was much warmer with the clothing removed. The blanket and Ace's body heat were doing their job well; she'd stopped shivering almost completely, though her hands and feet were still chilled, coming slowly and painfully back to life.

"You're warm now~?" The knight's voice was hardly above a murmur. Outside, thunder rolled through the air, a dark, out-of-place sound muffled by the snow.

"Y-Yes, a little warmer…"

"See, it's working. One last thing though~" He had pulled out a flask, from where she had no idea, and poured the contents into his mouth. The empty container was tossed to the side with a muffled clink. She wondered briefly what he was doing, and realized too late, when his lips had already collided with hers. His tongue parted her lips easily and she found herself practically choking on something bitter and sharp that burned every surface of her mouth. She swallowed it with difficulty, realizing as the liquid ran down her throat what it was: alcohol, strong alcohol. She felt dizzy and weak as the drug began its work, warmth melting and spreading from her core into every inch of her body. What was it with the men in this world forcing her to drink things…?

The outsider coughed sharply, trying to clear her throat of the substance. Her body was relaxing without her consent, leaning more heavily on Ace's sturdy frame. "What was that…?!" she asked, although she already knew. She'd never had alcohol that strong before in her life, and she was feeling the effects quickly, more quickly than she'd imagined. Part of her was glad that she had something to lean on, with her head spinning as much as it was…

"Alcohol~! You're probably pretty warm by now, hm." He was still smiling, still cheerful.

"Yes, very warm…" And she was. Even her numbed extremities felt almost normal. "That's not a very knight-like thing to do though, forcing me to drink something so suspicious!"

"I was helping you though!"

"You could've found another way to help me…" She huffed, her face pink from the alcohol and everything else that had transpired today. She was still positively less than thrilled about the position she was in, and the fact that half of her upper body was exposed, but somehow that seemed suddenly less important…Surely the drink was clouding her judgment. But she couldn't bring herself to move…

"Well, I do know another way to help you. But you'll probably like it even less~"

"Don't just assume that I'll-" Her words were cut short by his lips pressing against hers once again. She pushed feebly against his chest, trying to get him to stop, but he only pulled her closer, and his grip was far stronger and steadier than her own.

It was a long kiss, long enough to make her even dizzier. His lips moved against hers, searching, trying to elicit a response of any kind from her. Finally she yielded a bit, just the slightest relaxation, but he felt it and took it as permission to continue. The hand resting in the middle of her back pulled her closer, and she noticed that at some point he had undone his own shirt, so that her exposed upper chest was now forced into contact with his heated skin. It felt sinfully good, that touch, his firm grip, the restrained hunger of his kiss; but this was going farther than she wanted it to, even in her foggy state. It wasn't that she didn't care about him or trust him that much – she did, certainly –, and it wasn't that she disliked what he was doing – it felt better than she could've dared to imagine. But she was nervous about this sort of thing. In the first place, she didn't know what she was doing. She'd only ever read about things like this, never experienced them, and she was more than a little afraid of where this could lead. All anyone had ever told her was that this was wrong, shameful, something to be regretted even as one indulged in it.

She pulled away from him as best she could at such close range, her face burning, the cold draft through the small cavern doing nothing to cool her now. A heavy, damp heat had filled the blanket-wrapped space they occupied. "Ace…"

He offered no excuse for his behavior, merely hummed and investigated her face. Even now she couldn't meet his eyes. "I told you that you wouldn't like it, didn't I?"

"No, I-" She thankfully cut off her traitorous denial before the thought could be finished. "You're not behaving very chivalrously."

"Hm….you're right." One hand was tracing small, hot circles on her back, while the other rested on her bare shoulder. His lips had moved to hover near her ear, every quiet word setting it tingling with the touch of his warm breath. "But you make it so hard for me to be chivalrous sometimes, love~"

"…I…well…um…" She honestly had no idea how to answer that. Her mouth opened, waiting for her brain to provide a suitable response, but none came, and she promptly closed it. Here was a man – an attractive, well-muscled man at that – telling her that he was attracted to her. Physically attracted to her, not just emotionally. It was so beyond anything she thought possible that she had no prepared responses. She was simply dumbfounded, blushing darker with each passing second, and continuously berating herself for having nothing to say. She was certain she looked like an idiot. Right when any other woman, any woman who deserved to be lusted after, would know exactly what to say.

Ace could see her emotions spiraling downwards in her teal eyes. But rather than sinking with her mood, he felt a rush of warmth for the young woman in his lap, and a rising amusement in his chest. He loved her most when she was like this, so baselessly self-destructive… He chuckled quietly as his lips sought the outsider's yet again and found them. She refused to respond, out of frustration or a sense of worthlessness or morality. He would just have to tease her until she either folded or took some initiative.

"You're pushing me away, how cruel…" The knight's lips trailed away from Alice's, moving along her jawline, down the side of her neck. Everywhere they touched grew hot, and he left a burning trail across her skin. He longed to taste her, and did so, his tongue flicking out against the sensitive skin of her throat.

"A-Ace, what are you-" Her words cut off in a gasp as he began to suck on the skin, trying to taste more of her. She felt the cold brush of teeth and a sharp but somehow pleasant pain before he moved on. He investigated every inch of the considerable amount of skin he'd already exposed, his lips travelling slowly and deliberately, leaving sporadic red marks behind and drawing stifled sounds of pleasure from the outsider. Even though she was inexperienced in this area, it was obvious that he was goading her. The part of her that decried the immorality of what she was doing had long since quieted amidst the humbling rush of desire and the shuddering heat pooling in her lower abdomen. Now her frustration lay in the fact that she was tamely sitting and letting him do this to her. She didn't know what she was doing, but hell, she was going to do something. Whatever she felt like.

She placed her hands on either side of the knight's face and brought his lips crashing up against hers. It was a little awkward, yes, and probably rougher than she'd intended; in other words, it was fairly obvious that she wasn't sure what she was doing. But the feeling was there, and Ace was more than willing to teach her.

He changed the angle between them a bit, deepening the kiss and bringing her closer. He could feel her hesitate, and she almost pulled away, but her stubbornness drove her on. Whatever she felt like…what did she feel like doing? She felt like…she wanted to know what he tasted like. Her face turned dark red just at the thought. He had deepened the kiss further and his tongue flicked across her lips at intervals; her blood rushed into her face and a dull roar filled her ears, but she responded nonetheless, her own tongue moving to touch his a bit timidly.

The knight willingly parted his lips further for her, an invitation to continue. And she did, driven by curiosity and something she couldn't recall feeling before and could only guess was "desire". Mostly she tasted the alcohol he had forced down her throat, its burning taste still lingering. But overall it was something she felt she should be able to describe, but as soon as she tried to recall what it might be, she was at a loss. All she could think was that it suited him; it was him. She relaxed a bit, moving more into the kiss as her hands trailed down to his shoulders, gently pulling his shirt further down his arms to expose more of his skin and lithe musculature.

For his part, he was beginning to lose his patience with her. Of course she was too wrapped up in her own new experiences to notice, but her pace was driving him absolutely crazy. He wanted more of her, faster, and she insisted on dragging her feet like this…this would not do at all. He broke the kiss and removed his shirt completely with a practiced motion; it was only getting in the way at this point.

Alice's attention snapped quickly back to Ace's hands when they began to, again, tug down on her dress, this time intent on removing it completely. Now that she wasn't absorbed in kissing him, she noticed how ragged his breathing had become; his face was even a bit flushed. And farther down…

Her already pink face turned even darker. How she hadn't noticed that sooner, she had no idea. Instinctively, she tried to move away, but only succeeded in being pulled closer, right where she didn't want to be.

The knight obviously wasn't expecting this either; the sudden contact drew an audible gasp from him, followed by a deeper, more animal sound akin to a growl. That was all the warning the outsider got. She found herself promptly pushed onto her back, the blanket beneath her and Ace's shirtless, well-muscled physique above her. She clearly saw the lust flickering darkly in the depths of his ruby eyes, and for a moment, she was almost frightened again. "A-Ace…?"

Her tone was breathless and nervous and it worried him a bit. He really didn't want to force her, but at this point, he wasn't sure if he could stop himself regardless of what she said or how she screamed.

She didn't want to admit it, but… "…..I'm scared….." Her voice was scarcely above a whisper. She was scared, more than she wanted to be. Not just scared of the pain, but scared of the intimacy, the closeness. Scared of getting close to someone, closer than she'd ever gotten before. Scared of what would happen if one day she woke up and he wasn't there anymore. How she would feel. How she would cope. Last time she had tried to love she had almost never wanted to love again.

Luckily Ace seemed to pick up on everything she implied, and a little more that she was too confused to even tie into coherent thought. When his lips met hers again, he seemed to be saying simply:

I am too.

When Alice woke, the red light of evening was glinting beautifully into the cavern from the blanket of snow outside. The storm had long since passed. She was tangled in the blankets, a dull ache radiating through her entire lower body. That was less than pleasant…

After a moment, her sluggish senses picked up on the smell of smoke, the crackling of a campfire. Silhouetted against the orange glow was a form she knew well, his back still bare although he had at least put on some pants. The sight of him sent a warmth through her chest that almost made her forget her physical pain for a moment.

Seeming to notice that his lover had woken, Ace rose from his seat by the fire and knelt next to her, pressing a kiss softly to her temple.

She glanced up at him, still not quite awake, a drowsy smile on her face. "You're still here…"

"Of course I am." He laughed quietly, something like a true smile spreading across his features. "I love you, after all."

She closed her eyes, content where she was. If she didn't move, the pain wasn't too bad. "Love you too, Ace…" she murmured sleepily.

Her companion sat down, cross-legged, and ran his fingers through her hair. She didn't sleep but dozed quietly, enjoying every moment of this time, because she somehow got the feeling that this might be the only time she would ever feel this way.

She had no idea where they were. God only knew how long they had been away or who needed them for what. Neither of them knew exactly what they felt, they just chose to pack it into a word like "love", hoping the other would understand. They were both hopelessly lost, in ways that were mutually understood only between them. No one else could hope to be a part of the meaning that hung there. There was no one around to understand, regardless, as they were out in the middle of nowhere. It was lonely.

But sometimes, it almost felt like lonely might be good, as long as they were lonely together.