Author's note: This chapter is rated M, and will be posted as such. It is intended to be read as a separate work from my T rated story called "Season of Mists." If you have a problem with that, then don't read it. For those of you who have been following my T rated version of "Season of Mists," please wait for the T rated version of this chapter to appear, which will happen soon, I promise. This one's just a little spicier. Ok, straight Tabasco served over deep-fried habanera pepper rings. At least, it's the spiciest writing I've ever attempted and actually posted. This is my entry into the KAEX challenge, and I hope I've followed the rules, and Sultan is certainly happy (I've let him out to have a beer), but once again, This is a Mature chapter intended for Mature readers, and if you are not a Mature reader, then DO NOT READ THIS. Wait for the T chapter update, or don't, but don't say you weren't warned. It is K&A, per the KAEX challenge, but Lance gets a nod as well, just to throw in a pairing alert. (Hey, it's me!) If you want to skip straight to the sex, then you want to skip on down to about section three. Just so you know.

Playlist: Michael Jackson. (Hangs head in shame) and Edwin Starr, "Never Met a Girl…"

And all standard disclaimers apply: I do not own Voltron, etc. etc.

Season of Mists Interlude:

Chapter Four and a Half:

No More Waiting

Most of the time the Isle of Mists was a monotonous gray, covered with a thick white mist. Allura sighed. She should be grateful; the mist had spared Nyle, the last known Water Mage on Arus, and presently her tutor, from Zarkon's attacks. The Isle of Mists was, in fact, one of the few places that had escaped Zarkon's notice entirely. Most of the time its isolation depressed her, but it was perfect for her studies in the water magic of the mind that had passed to her with her royal blood, something that would not have been possible if Zarkon had succeeded in destroying the entire Lochlan clan, of which Nyle was the last, and only survivor. Except for his baby daughter, Kate. She smiled. Nyle needed help with Kate, being barely three weeks a widower, and she already loved the baby girl, loved holding her, loved dangling her long blond hair in her face as if it were the most exciting toy in the world, and did not mind it when Kate, entranced, tugged on it and stuffed it in her mouth. She hoped her own daughter, hers and Keith's, would be half so good, half so adorable.

Our daughter, she thought fiercely. Mine and his. She wanted that more than she wanted anything except the man himself. Her arms ached for them, sometimes, for her Keith and the children she would bear him, one day, and one day started now, had started long ago, before the stars were born, but they were wasting it…

No more waiting.

"There's no reason why he should remain blocked, Allura," Nyle told her that day as she worked through the basic exercises he was teaching her. She was shaping mist into balls, her eyes closed, but talking to Nyle all the while. He insisted that she must be able to perform these basics even while distracted; they would not move on to anything more advanced until she could. Eventually, they would fight each other while she formed shapes in the mist. Until she could do that, she would not be ready to learn anything more advanced, he insisted; as Royal Princess and a pilot of the Voltron Force, she was the Team's only magical defense, and had to be able to use her powers in the heat of battle, as second nature, no matter what was going on around her.

"But Kiari's mental block…" she began, but he cut her off. She split one ball of mist into two.

"Good. Now make them smaller, tighter." He watched a moment. "Kiari's block on his mind dissolved long ago, unlike yours. There is something he doesn't want to face, to let out, and I don't know what that is." Nyle sighed. "Until he can do that, then true healing will not be possible."

She split the two into four. "What can I do, Nyle?" she almost wailed. She was so tired of Keith's walls, so tired of his defenses, and the way he hid it all behind his rigid sense of honor and protection.

"Make them glow," Nyle commanded. Eyes closed, she tried, and was rewarded with her tutor's murmured approval even as sweat broke out across her brow. Nyle sounded amused. "He carries the Sword of Altaire, you know," he said, "and only the Kings or Queens of Arus have ever done that before him. And you are the Royal Princess. You carry the blood, he carries the Sword… he watches you as if… as if you are the last light in a very dark night, and you might go out, at any moment. Some would call it fate." Eyes still closed, she did not see him drop to his knees in front of her. Her mist balls broke apart as he gently held her shoulders. His blue eyes, almost the exact shade as hers, were piercing when she opened her own. "And you feel the same. Tell me you don't."

She said nothing.

He pushed her sweaty hair off her forehead and chucked her under the chin. "You are being silly, Allura Blue," he said, using the name that used to drive her crazy when they were children, when she had been betrothed to him practically out of the cradle, before Zarkon had destroyed their world and all the rules had changed. And now, a man from Earth with dark hair and eyes was holding Nyle's newborn orphaned daughter so that she could learn water magic, and she loved him, with all her heart and soul, and Nyle was a very good teacher and friend, and nothing more; he was still mourning his wife, a commoner, a refugee from the attacks, and he would never, he told her, marry again.

"I'm taking the block off your mind for longer today. Through the night. You have to get used to having total control of your mind again, Allura Blue, but you must come to me immediately if the burning starts again." He smiled at her crookedly as he heard Kate wail somewhere off in the distance. "If Keith lets his walls down, for any reason, remember that you will hear him, sense him, exactly as you did before you absorbed that Robeast's attack, and before the witch… ensorcelled him, unless you use the shielding exercises we have practiced." He looked towards the sound of the wailing, muffled and distorted by the mist. "Stop being silly, Allura Blue." His eyes looked ancient and lost as they studiously avoided the cairn, his wife's beachside grave, in the distance behind them. "Life is much too short for that."

"But tradition decrees…" she sputtered, hating it that she suddenly sounded like Nanny.

"Cat was as common as common could be," he said sadly. "Our marriage was certainly against tradition. Maybe even the law. Especially considering… well, you know. Us. But I loved her, and I would give anything, anything at all, to have one night, even one hour, even just one smile, from her again. The old Arus died ten years ago, Allura. We get to make a new one. Don't waste your chance." He stood up, brushing sand from his knees. "All I'm saying is that there is no one on this island but you, Keith, myself, and a squalling newborn, whom I am going to be up all night with either feeding, or diapering, or trying to catch naps in between the two, and I probably would not notice if a Robeast landed on my head. We're on the Isle of Mists, Allura Blue. This place is literally off the map. I'm still not sure how you and your commander found it, in fact. Do what you want, what you need. No one will know. Not even me." He walked down the beach a few paces before calling back to her, "I'm going to get Kate. Stop being stupid, Allura Blue. It doesn't suit you."

She stared at the water for a time after that, and then at Nyle's dead wife's grave. Nyle was almost exactly her age, and his wife had died, painfully, hemorrhaging after childbirth, and the only reason he was still drawing breath was because of their daughter. She thought of the fresh mound that covered the massacred bodies at Lake Aeylene. Cat had been one of the very few survivors. She shuddered, trying to imagine a life without Keith, without his steady watchfulness, the way he had of making her want to be the best person she could possibly be, his strength that was spiritual as well as physical, his rare smiles but dancing eyes, his wild hair that practically begged her to run her fingers through it…

And she was up off the beach and running towards the castle, towards her rooms that adjoined his. His idea. Security issues, he insisted. She raced for a bath, perhaps something to eat and then, when night fell, she would find him. If he even looks at me wrong, I might lose my nerve, she thought. She would keep to herself until nightfall. No excuses this time. Life was much too short. No more waiting.

VVVVV

Keith divided his attention between the sleeping baby and the couple on the beach. Kate was a good baby. She only fussed when she wanted something, and that seemed to consist of exactly three things: baby milk, a clean diaper, or human comfort. It had been Nyle who had shown him how to care for his daughter, showing him how to mix the formula with the carefully sterilized water and pointing out where he kept the scrubbed and boiled bottles. "I'm a Water Mage, and I can purify anything wet, but I still have to boil everything. It makes me paranoid, otherwise," the much too young widower said ruefully, shaking his head.

Keith merely nodded, unsure of what to say.

"Diapers are here, you can toss the dirty ones here, and if she's still crying, just hold her. She likes to hear heartbeats." They were in the Castle of Mist's cavernous kitchen, which was lit by a series of candles scattered across a long table down the middle of the room, and a huge fireplace that was always kept going, even if it was only banked embers. There was no electricity of any kind; the Isle of Mists had truly been blasted back to the Bronze Age when Zarkon attacked the mainland. "Plenty of hot water, though, being a Water Mage and all," their host had said cheerfully. Nyle had also shown him the pantries, which held a huge variety of shelf-stable food. "Since no one survived but me, we have a bit of a surplus," he tried to joke. "Oh, but I do make fresh bread. Twice a week. Cat showed me how. Insisted life without bread was less than human."

Keith had to admit, the bread was good. And if Nyle thought him strange, the leader of the Voltron Force with battle callused hands cradling his tiny daughter while he taught Allura how to use her powers even as he drained the Robeast's poison from her, the man said nothing about it. And Kate seemed to like him fine. She liked his hair, especially, and he had sometimes been caught with his face right up against hers, her tiny fists pulling on his not-regulation dark hair, trying to drag it into her mouth. Allura had seen him more than once, and laughed out loud, and then gotten this look on her face like she was going to cry, and it made him feel like his stomach had dropped out of his body. He could stand anything but her tears.

But as Kate slept, from the gray stone tower of the Castle of Mists he watched Nyle kneel and grip Allura by the shoulders on the beach below him, and was shocked by the fierce wave of possessiveness that rocked him.

Touching her. Allura. Gripping her shoulders, maybe hurting her. What if she was hurting, and he was stuck here, in this tower, with a sleeping baby, and could do nothing about it? Even worse, maybe not hurting her. Maybe she wanted him to…

Get a grip, Kogane. Nyle was her teacher. That was all. It probably had something to do with the balls of mist that were swirling around them.

And then the mist balls shattered, and Nyle was almost touching her face with his, brushing back her hair tenderly, reaching out to touch her face, and Keith felt his heart explode with an emotion he did not recognize. How dare he?

Kate started crying, which was the only thing that kept him from charging the beach. He scooped her up, shushing her, wondering if she could feel his racing heart. The words stupid and Allura Blue floated up to him through the mist-white air, and his heart exploded again. He hated it that this man had once been betrothed to Allura, and hated it that he didn't know what obligations that placed Allura under now, under Arusian law, and hated it even more that he was too afraid to just call up the castle and ask. And most of all, he hated it that this man had a history with her, had shared jokes with her, had played with her, had known her as a little girl, and even had a nickname for her. Allura Blue. It was so damn cute, and it was all Nyle's.

And he knew, now, about the pepper cheese. Lance had told him during one of his late night check-ins with the castle. He imagined a young Allura, rolling on the floor with a young Kiari, pulling hair, red tangled with gold, kicking and scratching, and all over this man. Boy. Whatever.

And had he just called her stupid? Why hadn't Allura punched him? He had certainly taught her how… unless… she didn't want to…

"I'll take her now," the man himself said from the arched entrance to the tower, his approach as silent as the mist itself. If Nyle had been a soldier of Doom, Keith would be dead now, and so would tiny, and suddenly quiet, Kate. Allura sat alone on the beach below them, staring at the waves.

"Good lesson?" Keith choked out as he handed Kate off to her father.

"Best yet," Nyle assured him, a little smugly, Keith thought. "She's going to be quite formidable. But by the gods, it's tiring." Nyle yawned hugely as he snuggled his daughter to his chest, purple shadows vivid under his blue eyes. It was hard, Keith thought, to be mad at a man who had just lost his wife and was struggling to raise his daughter alone. Especially when that man was as easy going as Nyle. Keith was familiar with losing loved ones, as was everyone else on the planet. Besides, Keith genuinely liked the Water Mage, and was grateful beyond words that he was helping Allura, that he could stop the burning in her mind. He took a deep breath as he felt his calm being restored.

And felt it shatter again as Nyle said, "Allura will be wanting an early bath. I'm going to meet her in her bathing room, to heat her water, of course. After that, well," Keith could have sworn the man looked smug. "I doubt you'll see me until morning. Kate doesn't sleep through the night yet, you know, so… help yourself to whatever you find in the kitchen. Oh, and have a good night," he added, almost as an afterthought. Keith was too enraged to do anything but think the words bathing room and meet her. He didn't notice as Nyle melted quietly from the room. Instead, he looked for Allura down on the beach, but he didn't see her. He stormed off to his rooms, which adjoined hers, for security measures, of course, in the grip of the familiar rage he kept thinking he had conquered forever, but kept rearing its ugly head. Good thing he's not warming my bath water, Keith thought. I might drown him in it. And I think I'm going to need a cold one, anyway…

VVVVV

Nyle Lochlan, last Water Mage on planet Arus, smiled to himself as he set the princess's bath water to almost boiling. A light sheen of sweat broke out on his forehead, and Kate looked at him quizzically. She got that look, sometimes, when she was in the direct presence of the mind magic that ran through her blood. He had wondered if, because Cat had not been of noble blood, their daughter would not have the power. Kate was showing signs to the contrary already, however. But then again, maybe it was just gas. It was hard to tell, with babies.

It took more energy to heat water from this distance, but there was no way he wanted to run into Commander Keith Kogane after the way he had just baited him. He knew the depth of Keith's feelings for Allura, and hers for him, and he knew the feelings he had just provoked in both of them. He knew the commander was a trained killer, and he knew Allura was bare inches from losing her nerve. No, he thought. It's a good night to settle in with my daughter, a good book, some Rhesian wine, and stay the hell out of the way.

VVVVV

Princess Allura looked longingly at the decorative bottle that held Rhesian wine. Like everything else here, it was beautiful, but decaying; the glass was a peculiar iridescent blue that she had never seen anywhere but the Castle of Mists. It was the exact shade of the ocean surrounding them, on one of those rare bright days when the mists cleared and the waters teased her by showing, briefly, their turquoise and blue-green colors. But the bottle was also decorated with a fine silver netting that had seen better days, fraying around the edges and a bit tarnished. The wine itself, Allura knew from guilty experience, was light in color and very bright, like liquid diamonds, but it was heavy in flavor and viscosity, more like a red wine that tasted like crushed flowers and had been bleached by the sun. She frowned at it. It was the easy way out, and she knew it. And what would be his reaction if she went to him, despite his misgivings and gods-blasted sense of honor, smelling of wine? He'd tell her no, but gently, reasonably, and send her away. She stood up straighter, princess-like, in spite of herself. Tonight she was having none of that. Tonight, there would be no more waiting.

She checked to see that the basket she had grabbed from the kitchen was where she had left it. She knew he had gone straight to his rooms before she returned from the beach, and had likely not eaten. How many times has he brought me a plate from the kitchen, when I worked through dinner, or was so exhausted from P.T. I couldn't drag myself to the table? she wondered. So she had stuffed some of Nyle's phenomenally delicious bread into a basket along with a tin of some kind of spreadable cheese and some dark imported chocolate. The Lochlan clan did not eat flesh, and fresh foods simply wouldn't grow on the rocky, mist-shrouded island, but there were plenty of other kinds of food, much of it quite good, even if it was canned or vacuum- sealed, and the bread alone was enough to live on. If Nanny ever tasted it, she would swoop down and chain Nyle to the ovens in the kitchen of the Castle of Lions, even if he was technically a Duke.

She stepped into her bath with a sigh of gratitude. Nyle had made it boiling hot for her, just as she liked it, and she scrubbed herself with rose-scented soap quickly. She was afraid if she soaked too long, she would lose her nerve. And she was nervous. Her hands shook as she held the soap and her breathing was shallow. The enormity of what she was about to do was beginning to sink in, and she thought longingly of the wine. Maybe I'll just add it to the basket, just in case, she thought, dunking her hair quickly in the rose-scented water. She shook as she stepped from the bath and toweled herself dry, so roughly her skin turned slightly red.

Dear goddess, what am I doing? she half-thought, half-prayed as she slipped a rough woven cotton nightgown over her head. Its long bell sleeves covered her wrists, and its hem brushed her knees. It was not what she would have chosen for… for her first… she blushed. But she liked the texture, and it was all she had that was clean, and it was white. White. The color of purity. Her breathing quickened, but not in a good way. Dear goddess, what am I doing?

You are going to walk in there and offer food to the man you love. You are going to offer him half a loaf of bread, and take the other half for yourself, in a ritual as old as time. That is all, Princess. And what comes, will come. You both have more important things to do than waste time fighting fate.

Allura shivered. It was a bit too detailed an answer to have come from her own head. Keith might not believe in prayer, but she did, and she knew better than to fight fate or direct answers to prayers. And she could certainly feed him. That, at least, she could do without losing her nerve. Taking a deep breath, she grabbed her basket and pushed through the door connecting her room to his, forgetting the wine as she went.

VVVVV

Keith had shoved all the heavy furniture in the room against the walls, leaving a large clear space in the middle. He was halfway through his Tai Chi routine when he felt her standing just beyond the threshold of his door. It was unlike him to end his evening with Tai Chi practice. He was usually so exhausted from fighting the forces of Planet Doom or from patrols or conference meetings or taking the Lions for one last run or checking on her that he collapsed into sleep whenever he could get it. But not tonight. Tonight, he felt unsettled, like the space around him crackled with lightening-infused air. Her presence did not help. He wanted to continue in his movements, despite the fact that she was standing there, because he desperately needed to calm down after his encounter with Nyle, after what he saw on the beach between them, but he couldn't.

He stood, with his back to her, clad only in loose sweatpants. She wished he would continue in his movements; his sinuous muscles seemed to take on a life of their own. She loved them, not just because he was the first man who had ever let her look closely at his body, standing still as she stared, even though she could tell it made her uncomfortable. That had been so long ago, it seemed… She felt incredibly safe with him, watching him with his head down, his shoulders moving slightly as he panted. "Keith," she said, her voice wavering slightly as she noticed all the heavy furniture he had moved. Bread, she thought. I'm only here to offer him bread… "Is this a bad time?"

He didn't move, his breathing heavy, but not with exertion. Tai Chi was a very gentle exercise, centered more in the mind than the body. His nerves were rather frayed, and he was trying to get himself under control, both from the interruption, and from some other unsettling emotion he could not yet name. She smelled like cotton and bread, his bread, but she had come to share it with him, and he was hungry, so he turned to thank her, to take it from her, and he saw what she was wearing.

She had obviously just stepped from the bath. She was wearing a nightgown of rough, loosely woven cotton, and as a consequence, it was quite…sheer. He would have thought it too big for her, but it clung to her entire body in ways that made his pupils dilate. That was when he caught her scent, and something primal was unleashed within him. She smelled like roses. That was wrong. Allura, his Allura, smelled like lilies. Roses were his smell, the smell of his soap, and while some part of him knew that just meant she probably had rose scented soap stocked in her bathroom, the other part of him, the primal part that refused, tonight, to be tamed even by cold baths and moving heavy furniture and Tai Chi, roared within him.

"Are you hungry?" she asked innocently, holding half the loaf of bread out to him. She was so maddeningly, intoxicatingly innocent. It was part of the problem. Did she even know what she was doing to him in her nearly see-through, form-fitting cotton nightgown? Had she walked down to the kitchen in it, to get this bread? Had he seen her in it? Had he seen the way it clung to her thighs, to her hips, the sides of her breasts? He grasped the bread, half of him powerless to do anything else, the other half screaming a primal Mine! She is mine, now and forever…

For once in his life, for perhaps the first time, the primal part won out.

"Yes," he exhaled, a long, drawn out sibilant sound, like a snake, he thought, the snake in the garden… "I'm very hungry…" and he pulled her to him, her damp, cotton-clad form fitting against his tightly, and he took her bread from her, tossing it, with his, back into the basket where she had set it by the door. "But I'd rather eat it later…" he whispered, his lips suddenly touching hers, his eyes so dark his pupils appeared almost black, and she shook in his arms, and he understood, then, that she wanted this too, that she was scared, but she trusted him, and he felt awed by this beautiful woman in his arms who had been given to him to love, to protect, and tonight, to calm and to claim.

"Sshh," he whispered, drawing her closer, resting his head on her damp hair and planting a kiss there. "Is it time, Allura? Are you ready for this?"

She could only nod into his chest, her arms wrapped around him, her hands digging tightly into his sides.

"Are you afraid?" he asked, cradling her to him.

"Yes," she whispered, looking at him finally, and he did not see the kind of fear he was worried about there. "But only that you would say no, and send me away again."

"This may change things… will change things…"

"Stupid things… outdated things," she hissed. "Here on this island, there is no one to know but us, and one sad man who would give anything to have even one second of what we have a chance of having, because he had it, and lost it, and he knows its value, and I will not let our fate be his," she said, vehement, and shut him up the best way she knew how.

She stood on her tiptoes and kissed him fiercely. Her fingers twined in his black hair, pulling him down to her, and she was not gentle, she was not shy. She pressed her mouth firmly against his, startled and thrilled by the rough texture of his lips against her soft ones, and she wondered how his lips would feel across her body, and she thought about his calloused hands, moving across her, and shivered…

"Yes," he whispered again, gathering her up in his arms, her damp cotton nightgown the thinnest of barriers between their skin, ready to carry her to the bed when he realized he had shoved it into a corner behind a dresser and a chair. "Damn," he said softly, still holding her while she giggled at him. "Lovers are never at their best when it matters," he quoted, holding his near-naked princess close to him.

"Who said that?" she asked, holding on to his neck for dear life.

"I'll be damned if I can remember right now," he said, and sank down to the floor with her in front of the fireplace. He placed her carefully in front of it and knelt beside her. She lay still, her eyes luminous, as he traced her body first with his eyes and then lightly with his hands. He carefully arranged her arms over her head and rolled her on one side towards him, her back to the fire. "This should do nicely," he whispered as he stretched himself out in front of her. "Between me and the fire, you should be plenty warm," and he leaned in to kiss her, capturing her hands with one of his own, pinning them above her head gently. "But we should get you out of those damp clothes…" he whispered.

Her eyes were suddenly heavy as she looked at him, the flickering firelight highlighting all his chiseled features: his jaw, his square shoulders, his broad chest… she arched herself impatiently, trapped in one single, powerful hand, as rough and callused as she knew it would be. She felt a liquid fire at the core of her that she hadn't ever felt before, and she whimpered, straining towards him.

"Ssshh," he whispered against her lips. "Patience. We have all night… and we've waited so long…" He drew back, gazing at her body through the cotton. "I want to look at you," he said, "and this damp, rough thing is in the way. Tell me, Princess. Are you awfully attached to it?"

Mutely she shook her head no, fascinating by the way the muscles of his abdomen flowed smoothly downward into the waistband of his loose pants. His chest was dusted with fine dark hair that trailed downward, and she wanted to pull on the waistband, to see where it led, what he looked like… she could see his obvious desire for her, outlined against the fabric of his sweatpants, and she moaned, straining towards him, wanting and melting all at once.

"I'm going to tear it off you, then," he said carefully, not wanting to frighten her. He reached out with his free hand and worked the loosely woven fibers apart at her neck until he could get a finger through, and, still holding her arms with one hand, he tore through her nightgown until it hung open to her waist. In the firelight, she gleamed pure, rosy gold. Her breasts strained towards him, as if begging to be touched, and her erect nipples made him gasp. He was going to lose control, and soon.

He flipped her on her back and straddled her hips in one fluid motion, leaving her breasts completely exposed in the firelight. She found herself with her hands released, but she still couldn't move very much, because he was sitting on her, and she could feel his rock-hard erection through his loose pants, pressing against her belly. He looked like a dark angel, his wild black hair like a halo around him, his face cast half in shadow by the flames. Her hands, finally free, roamed up and down the tightly strained muscles of his chest and abdomen, stopping shyly at his waist, before slipping one single hand under the waistband of his pants, feeling the skin between his hips, the soft nest of hair there, and then she felt him, the hard length of him, pressed against her, and she slipped her trembling hand around him, petting, stroking, her fear and shyness gone completely as she wonderingly felt the soft skin of him sheathed across a throbbing hardness, the length of him straining against her, and still, she could not see that part of him, trapped beneath him as he straddled her…

At her touch, he hissed and arched his back, his entire body shuddering, and when he looked back down at her, her breasts completely open to him, golden in the firelight, his eyes were heavy, molten fire. "Allura," he said, his voice strangled and hoarse as he reached for her breasts, his calloused hands moving in circles around them. Her hand under his waistband continued to tease him lightly, uncertainly, and he bit his lip, holding her petal-soft breasts under his calloused soldier's hands, his thumbs moving up to rub her erect nipples, and she gasped this time, her eyes locking with his, hazy with desire. She's so soft, he thought as she arched her breasts against his palms, his thumbs moving faster, in circles, across her swollen nipples.

His hands…so rough…a warrior's hands… my warrior…

He looked at her in shock, then groaned as she moved her other hand under his waistband, her stroking not quite so shy now. His eyes rolled back into his head as he arched his back once again and thrust himself into her hands…

Fire, fire inside me… didn't know… she was thinking.

He was hearing her, some part of him realized dimly. The barriers were down. …that it could be like this… he finished for her raggedly, thinking the same thing.

She did not seem surprised to hear him again, after so long. She was pretty much beyond coherent thought, and he was there, with her. Keith, she begged. Need… And her eyes bore into hers, because he was her first, and she did not know what she needed, not exactly.

But he did, and it would be enough.

Fire, he tried to explain, engrossed in the way her hair spread out around her, catching the reds and pinks and golds of the firelight. We must kindle, before we burn, he thought, and leaned down to claim her breasts with his mouth, shifting himself so that he no longer straddled her, supporting his weight with his arms, leaving only his mouth free as he tasted her petal-soft skin, inhaled its scent…

Allura wrapped her ankles around his and gripped his shoulders, pulling herself up against him. She rubbed her hips against his rock hard erection. Now, she begged. Please. Keith.

He released her breasts and pushed her gently to the floor with a groan. "I want to see you. I have to see you. I've dreamed of this…"

"Since forever," she whispered back. "I want to see you, too."

He had some misgivings about that part. He didn't want to scare her, the size of him coupled with fear of the act itself…

Don't be silly. You would never hurt me. Not in a bad way.

It will hurt, at first, he thought, excited, protective, and fearful all at once.

Running and weight lifting hurt me too, at first, but I couldn't do without them now…

"Minx," he whispered, and lifted himself up, one eyebrow raised in something like a challenge. He held himself patiently above her while she rolled down his sweatpants, hearing her gasp when the fabric hit his knees. She knew a moment's fear. How will we ever fit together? But they would, they were made for each other, and she touched him again, the entire swollen length of him, and felt him shudder. She gulped, but then pulled him back down on top of her, pressing herself against him, her hands finding him again, stroking him, his clothes gone completely, and as she pressed her lips against his, he grasped her nightgown and tore it completely off her body.

He rolled to one side as she lay beneath him, stoking her breasts and belly with his roughened palm.

Burning, Keith…

Ssshh… all of you, I want to see all of you, have all of you…

He traced her taut belly with his fingers, stopping at the nest of golden curls between her tightly pressed-together legs. "Ssshh," he whispered again, moving his lips over the skin of her lower belly, kissing his way across her hips. He stroked her thighs with his calloused hands. All of you, he coaxed, and she complied by relaxing against his hands as he parted her legs, followed by a series of kisses along her inner thigh. She could feel his wonder, his anticipation, as he looked at this part of her, and she lay still for him, her fingers running themselves through his wild, dark angel's hair, and she gasped when he gently bent one knee and pushed it back so that she lay spread slightly open…

She lay underneath his hands and his gaze, perfectly still and trusting, her pale thighs rosy in the firelight, her pink folds and crevices open completely to him now, him and him alone, and he felt rocked by a tidal wave of possessiveness and desire that threatened to sweep away all sense of self, all sense of restraint. Mine, he thought. Mine and none other… and he felt her wordless agreement, her desire to belong to him completely, and she arched herself up, whimpering, searching…

And met his gentle fingers, stroking each and every fold of her, tracing her soft opening with the lightest touches of his work-roughened hands. She shuddered at his touch and cried out his name. Please, she was screaming He slipped one finger gently, slowly, inside her, and felt her clench tightly around it. He moved his finger more and more quickly until she shuddered and cried under him, and he looked at her then, her eyes glazed and half open, and he touched her as lightly as a butterfly's wing on that small, round bundle of nerves, his fingers pressing and tapping rather than rubbing, until she arched her hips and called out his name, her thoughts wordless longings as she cried out, rigid against his hand. Only when she relaxed against him, when she could think again, when she thought, Keith, my Keith, please…let me feel you… did he release her and roll on top of her, blue eyes locking with dark ones.

Allura, he thought, and covered her mouth with his own fierce, needy kisses. "Are you ready?" he gasped between kisses. She nodded her wordless assent as he used his teasing fingers to spread her slightly wider and positioned himself right inside her opening, moving the swollen length of him slowly into her. He leaned into her, cradling her head against his chest as he once again twined her fingers in his, whispering, "I don't want to hurt you, love, but if I do, it will pass," and he slid slowly into her, groaning deep in his throat at the tightness of her, freezing himself when he felt her squeeze his hand fiercely. "Ok?" he asked, not moving, until she whispered his name and used her free hand to push against his thigh, urging him deeper into her. He continued his slow movement, sweetly torturous for him, while he fought against his body's urgings to pound himself into her, until he felt her begin to move against him, wrapping her thighs around him, urging him deeper. He complied, burying himself fully within her tight, throbbing opening, a strangled half-moan, half-sob escaping his throat as he began to quicken his thrusts, drawing himself out and then plunging, again, into the fullness of her. She made soft little moaning sounds in the back of her throat, her fingers still entwined with his with one hand, the other hand digging into his thigh, urging him into her faster, harder. She pulled back from his shoulder to look at him, and he felt her shudder beneath him, every muscle in her body taut, her hips making one last desperate push against him, as she cried out her pleasure and buried her face in his chest. Kissing the top of her head, he buried his face in her hair and increased his thrusts, her thighs tight around his, her breasts pressed firmly against his chest, and, as she clutched him close to her, he pushed into her, impossibly deep, one last time, before he held her tight and lost himself in the waves of incredible pleasure that came from his release.

They stayed that way for a while, slowly coming back to their senses while he remained buried within her, and she pressed against the length of his body with her own. She reached her hands to his face, capturing him for another long, deep kiss, before he withdrew himself from her and rolled to one side, watching her with one arm propping him up, the other resting on her stomach. He was smiling, deeply content, and humbled at the enormity of what they had just done, but he watched her anxiously for any sign of remorse or sadness. She merely covered his hand on her stomach with one of her own and stretched languidly, her toes curling up as she arched her body, and then relaxed. She was smiling, looking at him with suspiciously wet eyes.

"Feel ok?' he asked her, a bit anxiously.

She shook her head, incredulous. "I don't know whether to laugh at you or tickle you to death," she said, rolling on her side to face him. "No, I do not feel 'ok.' I feel wonderful; I feel tingly, and…and a little sore…and glowing…" she rolled into him, wrapping her arms around his waist as she did so. "Do I look tingly? Do I glow? Do I look different?" she demanded.

He smiled into her hair, content. "You always glow. Now, the tingly part… I'm not sure what 'tingly' looks like…" she elbowed him in the ribs. Seriously, though, Allura. Regrets?

Only that it took so long, she shot back. And that you chose the worst possible time to redecorate…

He laughed and squeezed her tightly against him. She was his. He was never going to let her go.

"That will be hard to do, since your bed is lost in here somewhere, and I don't want to sleep on the floor," she whispered gently into his chest. "Unless you want to sleep with me…" she added shyly, almost inaudibly. She was tracing her fingers across his chest, playing with the light dusting of curling dark hair she found there, when, as if sensing her shyness, he pulled her chin up so that she had no choice but to look him full in the face.

"Don't you dare feel embarrassed, or shy, or ashamed," he pleaded. "I love you. If anyone else ever so much as looks at you in a way I don't like, I'm going to kill them," he promised her solemnly.

"Death threats are so romantic," she teased. He scooped her up, carrying her across the threshold into her room and into her bed. He pulled her tightly to him and then pulled the blankets around them, no other barrier between them but their skin.

"You've been hanging around Lance too much," he said, snuggling into her hair.

"Yes," she said, thinking of their absent friend while she snuggled naked in Keith's arms. "I keep hearing he's a bad influence…"

"Undoubtedly," Keith whispered back, thinking of him too, before turning to the woman in his arms and crushing her to him tightly.

I love you, Allura.

I love you too.

No regrets?

No! And stop asking me that!

A few minutes later, he was smiling. The beautiful, bewitching Princess of Arus, the woman he would kill for, still snored. And she was his, all his.

VVVVV

In the Castle of Lions, Lance McClain sat bolt upright in bed. He was soaked with sweat and his skin was burning hot, exactly as if he had been in the grips of some kind of fever dream, but he remembered no dream, none at all, and he was utterly confused as to what was wrong. He had never felt this way in his life. He was stumbling towards the bathroom, intending to douse his face with cold water and maybe go seek out Dr. Gorma, when an intense wave of sexual desire and need came literally from nowhere, rocking him to his knees. He would have fallen over on his face had he not been standing in the doorway of his bathroom where he could grab the doorframe. What the hell is wrong with me? he wondered, as yet another, stronger wave of desire and this time, pleasure, washed over him.

Oh shit, he thought, comprehension dawning. Oh, hell no. He pitched sideways on the floor as wave after wave of sensations that were not his own washed over him. He wanted to cry. He wanted to scream. Goddamn this bond. He had fought the good fight. He had done the right thing. He had given her up, and would live with the pain of it forever. But most of all, he wanted this to not be happening to him. And he was grotesquely enjoying himself. How can I not? he thought against gritted teeth, writhing on the bathroom floor. At least there are no images. Thank God for small favors…

"Easy, Fireheart," said a concerned voice from his doorway. "It's a good thing I know the shape of your thoughts enough that I could feel your pain." She was beside him in seconds, her hand on his forehead as he writhed.

"Make it stop, please God, make it stop," he begged, looking into her concerned green eyes with wild blue ones. "The blocks…they're down…"

She sighed. "It's all in the shielding," she said, putting her hand on his forehead. "Someone has been unforgivably derelict this night… possibly me…has this happened before?"

He felt his head begin to fill with something like cotton as he shook his head no, and as she touched him, felt his thoughts, she gasped at the force of them. Before she could finish shielding him completely, another wave of pleasure and desire hit them both, at the same time, and Kiari gasped as if she had been punched in the stomach. She looked at him, shocked, comprehension dawning as yet another wave hit them.

They're getting stronger, Lance thought desperately.

"Let me finish the shielding," Kiari said, her breathing heavy, her eyes glazed, and as she reached for his forehead, his head feeling slightly more cottony, her other hand grasped the old Academy T-shirt he invariably wore for pajamas and pulled him right up against her. He noticed that she was wearing a thin silk gown of some kind. Panting heavily, he grabbed her right there in his bathroom floor, scooping her up against him as need coursed through them both. He could feel her trembling with it.

"As you say on Earth, fuck the shielding," she said, shocking him thoroughly, and reached for him as he threw her down on his bed.

"Is Saran going to kill me for this?" he asked as he tried to kiss her and rip off his T-shirt at the same time.

"Only if he finds out about it," she whispered, their hands switching so that his T-shirt came off in her hands, and her silk gown split open in his.

He was on top of her, kissing her, lost in her red hair. "He'll find some other reason…only a matter of time…never use dirty socks as a gag…"

She flipped somehow, so that her piercing green eyes bored into his blue ones from above him. "You talk too much, Lancelot McClain," she said, stopping his mouth with hers, pleasure and need and desire and desperation that was not entirely theirs coursing through them.

Oh shit, he thought. She found it out… And it was the last complete, coherent thought either one of them had for a very long time.