Middle Ground

Chapter 12

A/N I was planning on posting the entire story before graduating but two weeks ago my study advisor suddenly said: "Why don't you finish it all right now? It saves time and money and I think you could do it."

As a result, unfortunately, I have no time foranything. I will try to post whenever I have the time but I tend to forget about things when I am busy or stressed so feel free to stalk me about it when it's been too long.

In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this. I didn't have time to tweak much but NastElilBuggr gets the credit for the things you do like :)


She was running late.

She was running late for her meeting with Fiyero.

Her mission had been more complicated than expected and normally that wouldn't have been a problem but she'd been seen by the Gale Force.

Stupid. She hadn't expected them to see her, really. They were all over the city and they rarely spotted her. Besides, it was nearly the weekend and they'd all seemed drunk.

They'd seen her though and raised the alarm and within a matter of minutes dozens and dozens of green-clad boys had been aiming rifles at her. Luckily, she'd already been up in the air by then. They could shoot, but they couldn't aim as well when the target was up so high and not one bullet had so much as touched her. A lucky escape, even if skill had been involved.

Normally, she would have headed to one of her hiding places now, to lay low for a few days, until the Guards relaxed a bit more, patrolled that area a little less and then she'd try again. Today, she was supposed to meet Fiyero. Somewhere along the line meetings with Fiyero had started taking precedence over her work. It endangered her work more even than it endangered her. She was able to focus on her job at all times, she knew the importance of focus and a clear mind but it was moments like this, when she felt she was done, safe, almost out of the warzone, that her mind wandered. And it always wandered back to the same person.

She'd agree to meet him in yet another apartment he'd found somehow, one that he'd told her was owned by Avaric's family. She wasn't comfortable with the idea that they knew the owner, and he knew them. Not what they were doing and certainly not that they had found access to his property, but he was a link to a past that she had tried to leave behind. He hadn't really been an enemy, nor had he been her biggest tormentor back at school, but he was a connection to a life she no longer had. She would have preferred to keep it all separate, her former life and who she was now. But then, Fiyero had seemed fine with it, had been the one to find it in the first place, and they'd used a few times now. Nothing had happened. Avaric never came and the location was ideal. Especially now that she needed a place to hide and the heart of the city was a place they'd never look for her.

Especially now, when all she wanted was to get to where Fiyero was. Soon. He'd worry. Oz knew what he would do. So she'd disregarded her safety-plan in favour of meeting Fiyero to assure him she was fine. And because she needed to know that he was too. She hadn't seen him there, but then she hadn't exactly had time to focus on finding him among them.

She flew faster than she should, the wind was strong, she might be seen but she didn't slow down.

She flew through the open window and landed, rather ungracefully. She barely had to time to straighten herself and take of her cloak because a hand wrapped around her shoulder to whirl her around and before she had time to utter a protest, his lips were on hers.

She made a noise in the back of her throat but even she wasn't sure what it was supposed to mean and he didn't seem to care much anyway. The hand on her wrist was now on her back and his other and was fisted in her hair, pulling her head back as his lips moved down to her neck.

She gasped and took a stumbling step backward but he just moved with her and kept her going till she felt the wall against her back. His body moved into hers and his mouth was back on hers, his lips moving over hers, begging for entrance.

She knew, on some level deep down, that she could stop this. She was clearheaded enough still to put a stop to what was happening, what was going to happen. Instead, her lips parted and she felt his tongue slip through. It was enough to make her moan and her hands found their way to his chest, up to his shoulders and around his neck.

He pushed her into the wall even harder and she could feel the length of his body pressed up against her. Tensed and tightly coiled muscles, hard and soft at the same time. His hands moved through her hair, down her back and lifted her up. He walked a few steps and, holding her up against him with one arm around her waist, opened a door somewhere behind her with his other.

She didn't notice much of the movement, too busy with his lips and her hands in his hair, but she noticed the bed as she fell back into the mattress and he moved over her.

She put her hands on his chest and pulled back as much as she could.

"Fiyero."

How did he manage to do that to her voice? There was nothing left of it.

He pulled back too, panting and blinking the desire out of his eyes. She could tell he'd acted without being fully aware of it because he looked at her, at their position and she saw shock settle in his eyes.

She wondered for a moment if this was where he'd stop; where he'd tell her they should not, could not, would not do this; where he'd ask her if she wanted this, if she was sure.

She watched his face and waited for the words to come, but instead she saw his eyes cloud over, darken with an emotion she couldn't truly name because she'd never seen it before, not like this, but she didn't get time to mull it over because his hands were on her body again, dragging her up and yanking her back against him.

His fingers yanked through her hair, got tangled and pulled back her head to give him access to her throat and neck. She couldn't focus on anything else anymore.

Gone was the illusion that this should not be happening. That this had not been coming for a long time, since the moment they met again in those damn, fated, glorious woods. It had been an illusion from the start, anyway.

His hands were impatient, frustrated and rough.

She didn't mind because hers were too and she didn't waste time with buttons as she tore at his shirt and pushed it over his shoulders. She moved forward, sliding her legs over his as she straddled him. He automatically fell backwards, reaching to take her with him, but her hand slid behind his neck to stop his movement and pull him back up.

His body was flush up against hers and she almost thought she could feel his heartbeat, fast and irregular, beating against her chest. It was her own in the same erratic pattern, however, and she took a second to look into his eyes, brown locking on blue, but no more than a second before she was back where she had been; her lips on his neck, the skin hot and sweaty, and her teeth biting a little too hard to be friendly.

His hands moved all over her, tearing at buttons at the back of her dress. She should be worried about being in such a state of undress, about being naked in front of a man, in front of Fiyero, in a matter of minutes, but she wasn't. He wanted this as much as she did and after all these weeks, these months, of circling this moment, she wouldn't waste it with insecurities he'd only talk away in the end.

Instead, she reached back and grabbed grabbed the collar of her dress, helping him moving it down her body. She took in the perplexed expression on his face before it was replaced with a hunger that made her shiver. Her hair fell past both their faces like a curtain, as they stopped for a moment, only a moment of her hands on his bare chest, and his on her back, gliding down over smooth skin, until it reached her dress again, and the moment of quiet was gone. He moved quickly and fluently, pushing her backwards onto the mattress with his body, ripping down her dress as he moved, and what felt like hours later, hours too late, months, he was moving over her, his bodyweight pressing her down and his skin hot and sweaty against hers.

She felt something akin to pain, waited for it, but it didn't register. His hands were moving and they were doing things she couldn't place. She couldn't fight her body as it went with him, followed his fingers wherever they went. She pulled back from the kiss her held her breath in, but he wouldn't allow it, and re-captured her lips, his teeth pulling at her bottom lip.

She made a sound she was sure she'd be embarrassed about later, a growl that had never left her throat before.

Thoughts disappeared altogether as he moved inside of her and built up to something, someplace he seemed intent on taking her, she knew her head was shaking, her breath came in hitches from between parted lips and her chest was heaving.

It was too much. He was too much. Too much for her to handle.

She hadn't known, had had no idea, that things like this existed.

What a person could do to another, how she could lose, no, give up, control like that.

She whispered something, his name probably, as she felt her body pull her down into a whirlwind of something she couldn't fight and let go of everything else.


Thank you for reading. Leave me your thoughts :)