Title: Perpendicular
Word count: 913
Rating: PG13
Genre: drama/romance
Characters: Guy/Marian
Summary/Notes: Impressions of first meetings and a first something else. Written for the 2010 GuyxMarian Secret Santa in LJ.
Guy doesn't remember the first time he met Marian. It was the day of the new Sheriff's arrival to Nottingham. The nobles had all gathered to greet Vaisey and Edward the former sheriff had rendered his chain of office to him.
She had been there, lost in the wall of silk and coloured wool and fur but it never crosses his mind. He had stood then on Vaisey's left side but the faces of the strangers being introduced to him and looking down at him, a common soldier, he hadn't retained. He doesn't admit it but fear had drained him that day.
.
He thinks the first time was at the council of nobles.
How smug he had been. There had taken place the beginning of the realization of all his dreams. There Vaisey—Sheriff Vaisey—declared him keeper of Locksley in the absence of its lord. Not just a soldier anymore, was he? He had made sure to peruse all the faces in his sight to see the expressions shift, to make a point. And there the sole female in the room had turned her furious eyes on him for only a moment. It had been enough to break his stride. She'd taken away his victory. The first time.
.
Marian recalls their introduction. She had made sure to mark both Guy of Gisborne and De Fourtnoy: the strangers that had appeared with Vaisey one fine morning and had driven her father and herself out of their home. Her heart had been set on revenge; and so while Gisborne had been snapping his head toward every sudden noise like a trapped animal so misplaced and a little pitiful, she had watched unobserved and closely for the first time and she had reconsidered. It had turned her anger into the grief that had shaken her whole and forced her to flee the great hall and go to her room. Bare, unrecognisable with all her possessions gone, it was as pitiful as he.
That first opinion hadn't lasted long of course but from then on Marian would occasionally look at Sir Guy and see the trapped animal. No human being ever responds to her touch like he does.
He is persistent. It bothers her that he doesn't give up, that she can see the emotion so stark in his eyes and wonders if her own eyes ever expressed so much. She is so easily in control for all that he corners her that she has stopped trying to evade him.
And then one day she isn't.
.
A fair. A market day so great, so chockfull of people that the inn beds are not enough. Makeshift camps fill the streets, fires are lit on every crossing and the ale flows so freely the children are making mud pies with the thing.
By nightfall there is singing and dancing. Brawls break out, pickpockets share their loot with the men whose pockets they picked and Marian has had some ale and taken a few turns at the reel. She is warm and flushed and thinks of nothing—nothing at all for a change.
She almost doesn't notice him but then again Guy's the only one with a sombre face.
He has to lean close to be heard. "Perhaps you should go home."
Marian wants to play. "Won't you ask me to dance?"
He shakes his head firmly no like she knew he would. "It's not proper..." She can't hear the rest.
Her anger takes her over like fireworks. She slides away like a ghost. Her steps carry her away from the lights and noise to feel the unrestrained night chill and clear her head.
But she doesn't want to calm down, not now, she wants to scream and she goes after him.
"What's proper about anything you do?" Her voice stops him short in a side street. "You go on and on about family and protection. Who will protect me from you? You never stop. Can you not find another lady to build a home with? A bigger home than Knighton in fact. If you'd like I can introduce you to a few beautiful noblewomen and you can take your pick and leave me alone."
"No—!"
"But you want me. Is it because I fight so much?" She closes her palms on his bare hands, then drags them to a comfortable height on his chest. "If you would only stop speaking what you think I want to hear and speak that." His arms chased the cold from her muscles and Marian loosened. "They way you look at me."
Guy's kisses are urgent. He nips, caresses, tries to distract. Marian's hands only have access to his nape but she makes him shiver anyway. He picks her up and she holds on, arms and legs. The grip of his fingers is almost painful on her pelvis but the movement he manages is maddeningly exactly what she wants.
For a moment he pulls his head back and Marian seeing the chance grasps his face forcing him to look at her. Guy breathes harshly from the mouth and his eyes are round and wild. Her thumb strokes his cheek and he breaks.
"Marian, I can't!" His hold loosens and Marian slides down, the satisfaction long from coming. The sadness strains her mouth only fleetingly—or does it. He sees.
The sheer surprise on Guy's face amuses her enough to compose herself. She walks away.
"Wait! What—!"
"Propriety Sir Guy. Goodnight."