AN: Heavily, heavily inspired by the song Bloom by The Paper Kites and all the lovely scenery in the Call Me By Your Name movie.
"This is a meadow."
Azriel cocked an eyebrow, his face shifting between confusion and amusement.
"Yes," he nodded, the word a drawn out breath passing from his lips.
"This is a meadow," she breathed.
It was phrased more as a question than a statement, her voice tinged in unmitigated disbelief because he didn't get it. How did he not get it?
Her befuddlement must have shown on her face, for the shadows around Azriel twisted to shroud him in darkness. He frowned.
It had been so long since she last saw his mouth shaped in such a downtrodden manner that the sight disturbed her. A wave of longing welled up within, a fierce yearning to wipe the look of despair from his face and were it any other day, perhaps she would. She had never been stingy with her touches after all, especially when it came to him. Yet she refrained, as the intensity of the moment, of what he'd given, barreled into her.
"This is ameadow," she whispered. Then once more, to affirm it.
"My meadow."
She had to look away from him then, though it nearly pained her, if only to marvel at the sight that surrounded her. It was bare of flowers and still, she knew in her bones that it was no ordinary meadow. It was beautiful, not in the way it looked but in the way it felt. She could sense a world of history in the withered bark of the trees that surrounded the pasture, nestled as it was at the foot of the mountains, within the wide, expanse of forests that bordered the Night Court's territory. It was as if the woods had borne witness to the rise and fall of civilizations long past and yet had somehow managed to unflinchingly remain—the guardians to memories and feelings that the rest of them would never be privy to.
When they had left Velaris at the earliest hint of dawn, the sky was only turning the slightest bit of pink. Now, the sun peeked over the horizon, its rays beaming through the drops of dew that dotted the blades of grass spanning her—Cauldron, her—meadow. The light fractured, and a thousand rings in rainbow colors sparkled up at her.
It was beautiful, in the purest sense of the word.
It was a parcel of land he had purchased under her name, with all the papers and documents to prove it.
Yet—yet, it was so much more than that.
It was a place to call her own. It was a sanctuary. It was a home, one that no one could take away from her. And, perhaps the most marvelous thought of all, unlike what she had become accustomed to later on in her life, this was something that she was under no obligation to share.
But with him. . . she found that she wanted to share it with him.
She laid her hand on the nearest tree with measured gentleness. She needed something to anchor her as her knees trembled with the sheer magnitude of her gratitude—a gratitude that she was unsure of expressing, didn't even know where to start.
"Why," she croaked.
He took a step towards her. Then another, and another, and another, till the tips of their noses nearly grazed each other—closer than he ever dared. When he gazed at her, there was a storm of emotions he so rarely permitted others to glimpse behind his eyes. But for once, he bared it all and the weight with which he looked at her nearly took her breath away.
And then he answered her, and what little breath remained within her was stolen anyway with those five words.
"The world needs more gardens."
He said it in so soft an utterance, it was a mere whisper of breath against her lips. But she had felt the reverence in every letter, the plenary belief he infused in each syllable.
A belief in her vision—a belief in her.
She didn't even know he heard her that day or had been aware of her conversation. But he had always seen her, not just for who she was, but for all the things she wanted to be, too. He had shown her the garden the first time she arrived in the townhouse, had been the first to volunteer to save her from capture, had trusted her with Truth-Teller, which she understood was no small act when Feyre informed her of the rarity of such an occurrence.
He had befriended her even when he knew of her abhorrence of Fae-kind. He loved her, in that quiet, silken way that only Azriel could love.
She pressed her forehead to his—finally, finally, closing what little distance remained between them.
"Can I. . ." he whispered, as he closed his eyes and nudged gently at the crease in her cheek.
She hadn't even noticed she was smiling.
"Can I—" he tried again, his top lip ghosting along her own before retreating to that hairsbreadth of space between them. She almost chased him, if only to nip at those lips and chastise him for teasing her.
So close, she thought, not only referring to their physical proximity. That slight tension that constantly filled the air between them in a mere graze now settled over their atmosphere like a fog—heavy and encompassing. It was so thick she felt as if she could reach out and touch it, wrap it around them like a comforting blanket or a well-loved coat.
That was when she realized, as his chest expanded with the large breath he took and brushed briefly against her own, that he wasn't teasing her. Rather, he was steeling himself—to fall, to plunge. . . to dive right into her. Even if it meant he had to face rejection, it would still be her.
All of a sudden, expressing her gratitude was not a question of how, but a question of when.
And maybe he realized it too, as she diminished the space between them by wrapping her arms around his shoulders. The world tunneled, till it was only him and her and every point in which they touched.
"Can I?" He merely asked.
Her lips on his was her answer.
She had kissed Graysen, and kissed other boys before him. But she had never known kissing, at least not like this.
She thought kissing Azriel meant small, nips of affection peppered onto her lips. Though his hands were a tender caress against her waist, his kiss was the infernal opposite.
His kiss consumed her.
And she gave as good as she got—she gave everything.
When his tongue slid along the seam of her lips, she opened for him. He moved his hands from her waist and wound them around her while she rose on the tips of her toes to meet him till he lifted her to rest on the upper half of his body. Towering over him, she buried her hands into the abyss of his dark and lustrous hair before she locked her knees on either side of his hips.
He groaned, neck arching when her nails tugged at his scalp and her tongue slid against the roof of his mouth.
She never heard such a sound—so low and primal and greedy, had never elicited something of its like from anyone before.
She wanted to hear it from him again, and a baser, instinctive part of her knew how to do just that.
So she broke the kiss when the need for air became too evident, yet she ignored the entreaty altogether. She untangled her legs from his hips and took one, deep breath before assailing his neck with kisses, the kind that left purple bruises to last more than a couple of days. Every mark she left evoked that glorious din, the entire length of his body humming with every purr till she felt, rather than heard, the reverberations down to her bones.
As she forged a path back up to his lips, her hands trailed down to his back, to the panel of buttons that held the armor around his wings together. This time, he broke the kiss, a question piercing the haze of ardor in his eyes.
"I want this," she murmured, her pupils no doubt blown wide and her cheeks flushed from the heat of his ministrations. She slipped a finger behind a button till it slid through the slat and popped open. Azriel gulped. His shadows, which had pooled at his feet, began a creeping ascent up the length of his form. She frowned at the sight—he mirrored her expression.
"This isn't—" he let out a shuddering breath. "I didn't do this for that."
He withdrew his hands all together and it became clear to her then, why he stopped her. Yet despite it all, she couldn't help but let out a small laugh. His frown deepened at the sound, though she figured it was out of confusion than a complete lack of happiness when she reached up to thumb at the corners of his mouth, and he didn't quail from the gesture. Her giggles grew in resonance.
And when she calmed enough to be able to speak, she told him, "I know."
She wanted to sigh exasperatedly but refrained, from fear of off-putting him even further. She knew he meant well, but it seemed she could throw herself at Azriel any brazen way she wanted and still, he would not act upon it until she had explicitly stated her intent. It was any wonder how she managed to land her heart with the one male who didn't feel the need to possess her.
"I wanted you to have something that was all your own."
(And any wonder, what she did to deserve the endearment of someone so fierce but kind)
"I know."
He had been staring at her so intensely, she felt bereft when he looked away just then. He stared at the horizon, at the miles and miles of sky that stretched before them, and she pondered at what he saw there—if he felt the way she did, as light as the wind that rustled the leaves from their branches or would rather he was swept away with them, awayfrom her.
(Because she was broken, would always be just that little bit broken, and he deserved better.
He had always deserved better)
"It's not the world," he said and he looked so defeated at the knowledge that he couldn't give her that, even when she was fully aware of the impossibility of such a task.
"I know," she repeated. She ran a thumb over the defined curve of his cheek and he focused on her with razor sharp clarity. There was a soft sorrow to his amber eyes. She imagined it would always be there—marks in the shape of the hands that, as she had gradually, painfully, come to learn, have hurt and battered and bruised him. It would remain a part of him, as his tormentors ensured it with cruel alacrity, embedded onto his soul and bleeding through those orbs.
The way he gazed at her nowthough. . . there was melancholy, yes, but there such hope too—quiet and unassuming, yet much like Azriel himself, enduring.
"I don't need the world. I don't want the world," she declared, and meant it with all her own contused heart. She took a deep breath.
"I just want you."
He didn't say anything for a while after that. He was so still, as if even the breeze would not dare to touch him in this moment.
But she felt him expel a startled breath. She could hear his heart drumming beneath his ribcage in erratic pulsations. His cheeks had turned a lovely shade of red, to match the roses she planned to plant in her meadow someday soon.
But his eyes said everything—his hope filled them with a radiance to outshine even the sun, so infectious in its intensity, she felt her own hope multiply in droves. There was wonder in his gaze, his mouth suspended in awestruck, as if he couldn't believe the words. A sliver of sadness washed over her as she wondered if anyone had ever told him as much, if he had ever seen himself as someone worth yearning for.
"Say it again," he rasped, his thumb waking from its paralysis to trace the bow of her bottom lip. Her smile stretched near painfully across the breadth of her cheeks.
"I want you," she murmured and he trembled. She pressed her forehead against his again.
"My body could return to the dust from whence it came from because the world had crumbled and risen anew and even then," she laid her palms across his chest, the heat of him bleeding through her skin to warm the marrow of her bones. "I would still want you."
There was a ripple that made his spine and the sinew in his wings quiver as he released something of a cross between a whimper and a sob. There was so much urgency in the sound, an ardency that reverberated to her soul. So she opened her arms to him and he just. . . melted. There couldn't possibly be another word for it—for the way he sunk into her embrace, for how she molded the creases of her form to the lines of his figure, for what she felt, as if she had been locked but he was the key.
She didn't know if he believed her when she said it, but she was happy to spend the rest of her eternity avowing it over and over again. Whatever it took for him to believe her she was willing to do and do so gladly, because he wanted to give her the world despite knowing he couldn't and yet—
"My world is you, Azriel."
She murmured it into the skin of his neck, so softly she wasn't quite certain if even his Fae hearing had caught it. But he buried his face into the arch of her shoulder where she felt the faintest of splashes, and she knew.
"You've given me everything," she murmured when she broke their embrace, just far enough so that her eyes wouldn't cross when she looked up at him. She ran a hand through his satin locks. "Let this be my gift to you."
Shadowsinger, they called him. But with the sun looming over him like a natural spotlight, his silhouette was all aglow. His hair transformed from dark brown to a vibrant chestnut hue. Auburn eyes turned liquid gold as a current of vivacity speared through the halcyon that so often barred others from reading in his eyes what he truly felt. But for her he would allow it, for her he would strip down his walls, so she could see the very heart of him.
To the Shadowsinger wrapped in sunshine.
He licked his lips, and her eyes drifted to follow the movement before returning to their vigil, and her heart almost stopped.
(He always could arrest her with a single look)
His eyes had been wide with that unfettered hope, but now. . . now, swirling in its depths was this igneous desire, a fire waiting to be unleashed.
He uttered, in a voice that dripped with sin, "As you wish,"
Elain had never been much of a jumper—literally, figuratively, how many which ways it could mean, she had always kept her feet firmly on the ground. But when he slowly returned his hands along the sides of her waist, there was a blaze that seared through the fabric of her dress where he touched her. In his stare was an inferno, one she was sure promised wicked delights and she. . . well.
She wanted to burn.
Maybe he read the intent on her face because before she could even ask, he kissed her.
And if she thought she knew what to expect from the first touch of their lips then, she knew nothing, because this. . . this—
This was fire.
His kiss heated her blood, making it bubble, making it boil, making it sing. Her head spun with the way his tongue so expertly slid against her own, with how his fingers danced down the length of her spine, a trail of undone ribbons in its wake.
She should have felt clumsy with inexperience, shy and modest, and she did, except this was Azriel and always, he found a way to—not brush away or disregard her fears like most males, most people, had done in her life. Rather, he soothed them, his shadows a cool caress against her skin, calming her shaking fingers and her trembling physique.
When there was nothing but air and skin between them, Azriel pulled away. She thought it was so he could further take in her nakedness, ready as she was for his perusal, looking forward to enjoying it even, and she would have been offended at the concentrated way his eyes remained on her face, except he asked her, "Are you sure?"
Exasperated, she returned, "Are you?"
He spluttered and she found herself giggling once more. His mouth hung open at her cheek, before he twisted them into a playful smirk.
Then he was kissing her till her chortles quieted into buttered moans of pleasure, and he was laying her onto the ground, the grass seeming to part around her body so as to cushion her, his hand cupping the back of her head, hers resting on the firm, rounded, curve of his buttocks. He sucked in a sharp breath at the touch.
She had almost forgotten she even asked when he said, "I've never been more sure of anything in my life."
She smiled.
"I'm glad."
She could feel his arousal—the hard, length of him straining against her stomach didn't scare her as she had once thought it would when her mind would inevitably drift to this moment. In her earlier imaginings, she was married and her husband, human.
How wonderful, how blessed was she, that her reality was so much better.
She hummed against his mouth, lips chasing lips, skin seeking skin, heart syncing to heart.
"Please," she whispered.
He obliged.
Logically, she knew it was her Fae senses that heightened everything for her. Yet nothing could explain the way the colors turned brighter, the sounds more vibrant, the taste of him richer and the feel of the grass beneath her more lambent that she could nearly believe she were lounging atop a cloud instead of the damp earth she was truly on. When she breathed, her lungs filled with the smell of him and that of the forest around her because there was no separating them now, no telling whether the pine and musk came from the leftover morning mist sliding down the blades of grass or the drip of his sweat from the strands of his hair, which fell onto the corner of her mouth where she licked the droplet off.
He moaned at the sight of her tongue darting out to catch the stray sudor and she liked how even that sounded melodious to her ears. How she wished she could bottle the sound, bottle this moment, when it dawned on her—she didn't have to. Because every time she came here and took in the air around her, she would always be reminded of him and of this suspension in time, when there was nothing but her and him and the glorious way he moved inside her that perfect didn't even begin to describe it.
She could sense her release coming so she cupped his cheeks, her thumbs framing cracked lips as she gazed at him with all the affection her heart harbored shining through her eyes. She could have drowned in the ocean of desire and devotion that his eyes conveyed if she wasn't all ready drowning in the depths of his body.
She urged him to finish with her.
Once more, and as she was starting to realize, for always, he obliged.
And when their hearts had slowed and their bodies had fallen into repose, the wind a cool sigh that kissed their overheated skin, she took his hands in hers, entwined their fingers, kissed at the scars that peppered its flesh and that on his chest, and whispered, "Thank you," because it occurred to her that she had yet to say the words and she was, she was so, so, sograteful—for though the arid land had yet to floret, it was here that he had given her the courageto blossom.
He tipped her chin up, his lips sucking on her top lip, then her bottom lip in kind, before pecking at her eyelids, her cheeks and her chin. "And I you," he sighed, for while his fingers had planted and plucked at her to bloom, perhaps, beneath her careful touch, so had he.
And though he was a day early, he was forgiven for the gentle yet deferential way he spoke.
"Happy birthday, Elain."
And oh, how it was.
—the happiest.
AN: There was a call for more Elriel smut. I answered lol. Hope it delivered!
Special thanks to my bestie Selina (acourtoftruelove on tumblr so for all things SJM go on and give her a follow!) for being the greatest validation faerie ever and for all the aura fluffing!