"You're behind me, aren't you."
Silence.
"Rey, is that you?" he called again.
"Ben, I could use a hand if you're there. Or two hands even."
Rey's voice floated into his bathroom with a heady scent of rain and flowers. He finished drying off his hair, and threw the towel around his waist. Not seeing her, but sensing her proximity, he wondered how much of him she had just taken in.
Crossing the threshold into his bedroom, he found himself in a strange location.
"I'm sorry to ask, but I had to wear a dress for a fancy party put on by some of General Organa's allies, and now I can't get it back off by myself."
"Where are you?"
All he could see was cool mist that dampened his freshly dried skin. Under his bare feet he felt smooth stone blocks.
"Our hosts live in a monstrous glass house up on the hill, but they said they found the idea of having a Jedi knight of old, their words not mine, as a guest made them feel romantic, so my room for the night is apparently in something called a garden folly," Rey answered, sounding like she was struggling with something.
"It's a partially ruined tower," Kylo said, coming out of the mist to see that he was on a balcony over a decorative waterfall. Running clusters of pale wisteria dripped with steady evening rain from above him, deep purple hydrangea and lilac overflowing the rails, finishing the framed view.
From the balcony he saw candle light and a glowing stone hearth, a luxurious set of chambers with glass doors that could seal the little room off from the elements.
"I've never seen anywhere like this in my life," said Rey, "I didn't know places like this existed. There are trees outside with trunks so large that when I wrap my arms around them my fingers don't tou-goddamn dress. In here, Ben."
Off kilter in the surreal romanticism and soft lushness of the environment, he stepped hesitantly into the main chamber, adjusting his towel.
Rey turned to look back at him over her shoulder, and laughed at his vulnerable state.
"I'm so sorry, did you want to come back once you've had a chance to dress?"
He couldn't speak.
Kylo was attracted to Rey when she wore scraps of unwashed rags twisted around her athletic frame. This was an unfamiliar creature from a story, not his scavenger.
She had a full skirt of bold cobalt blue that brushed the floor, pale grey sleeves that wrapped down her shoulders and around and around her lithe waist, crossing blue and grey, finished with a lacy white sash and hair ribbons that were luminescent in the firelight.
"There are all these ties and buttons, and my friends are all back up at the main house. I'm alone here," she said, gesturing at her back, exposing her neck.
"I can help," he affirmed, trying to quash a wolffish urge to sink his teeth into the bare skin. Kylo steadied his breathing, reached for the first button. "And you're all alone here, you say."
"All alone," Rey repeated, her casual tone slipping. She turned her eyes to meet his. They were on fire. "It's almost like I planned it," she whispered daringly. He felt her hand shoot out and flick off his towel, leaving him naked. "I hope you enjoyed your shower as much as I did."
He caught an image of her watching him bathe, kitted out like a voyeuristic queen.
"I hope you know what you're getting yourself into, girl." He pressed himself to her back, nipped at her nape. Running a finger down the line of buttons, he used the Force to pop each one effortlessly, the knots around her waist melting away. Under the dress was nothing but her maiden body, supple and strong.
Thunder rumbled outside, and the storm became heavier. The wind carried drops of rain and torn flower petals in little eddies, but neither seemed to care enough to close the doors.
"We've been dancing around this long enough. You want me, Kylo Ren? Claim me. But it'll cost you half your soul," she said fiercely, now naked as him.
He swept her up in his arms, lightning illuminating the heavy four poster bed. Silk hangings fluttered wildly, and he wrenched them aside with his mind. He lay her on the soft coverlet, taking a moment to appreciate the exquisite offering she was making.
"That's a price I'm willing to pay," he finally answered, "to do all the unspeakable things to you that I've wanted to."
Kylo scaled the bed, hovering over her. His scars shone in the flickering light, his face a strange half mask, sending a wicked thrill through Rey.
Held immobilized by his strength, she tried to kiss him, but he resisted.
"We've waited too long for this, and my patience is thin," he growled. A mental consent check told him that she was thoroughly enjoying herself. He swept his fingers into her core and they sunk deeply into molten liquid.
She'd clearly started the party without him, likely while he been in the refresher. The thought of her in her finery, surreptitiously touching herself to the sight of his body, this seduction planned, sent him into a primal state.
"I see we can do away with the niceties." Kylo spread her legs, dipped his hips between them, and pushed home all at once. She gasped. There was no pain, but the invasion was unfamiliar, having him suddenly deep inside of her.
"Ben," she breathed, pressing her teeth into his shoulder to relieve tension when he began plunging in again and again.
"No," he corrected, cupping her chin with his palm so that she saw him. His dark hair fell wildly over his pale face while he continued to thrust, hers a tangle across the pillow. "No Ben tonight. You brought me to this fantasy land, so you get Kylo Ren, Death himself."
He supported himself above her with both hands planted by her head, increasing the intensity of his movements. Rey moaned, running her fingers down her neck, across her collar bones, squeezing her breasts, part desire part display. Thunder crashed, overwhelming the noise of her approaching orgasm.
He was unyielding, driving her towards that edge. Rey gave herself over to him, to be consumed by his hungry darkness, wanting him to have this of her. There would be times in the future they'd join gently, or with her dominant, but this first time was for breaking things down, and destruction was Kylo's specialty.
When she peaked, Kylo finally kissed her, stealing her breath as she came apart around him. He slowed his movement but didn't stop, working through her shuddering wet grip. A lustful idea crossed his mind and Rey mentally approved it.
Sweeping the small woman up over his shoulder, backside up, he took Rey outside into the storm. Catching her, bending her over the rail, he forcefully sank back into her warmth. The contrast of the cold rain and wind blowing around his skin, washing away the sweat, the stone pressed against her breasts, with the heat of their bodies was incredible.
His hands burned into her hips, hitting deeper at the new angle as he took her from behind. He was close, and a deep satisfaction rang inside of him as he realized Rey was again too. With a last erratic series of pounding thrusts he reached around and touched her furiously. Her hands reached back to still his hips as she crested, leaving long scratches across his backside. The unexpected pain sent him over the edge, a feral roar tore from his throat. He emptied inside of her, and he was faintly surprised how erotic Rey found the sensation.
Rubber-legged, both collapsed onto the dry carpet of Kylo's spartan quarters. They lay side by side breathing, soaking the fibres under them.
Before she was recovered, Kylo rolled onto his side and kissed her over and over, softly.
"You're my everything, Rey," he murmured into her neck, cleaning the stone grit from her breasts and waist with the cape he'd left on the floor before his shower. "You already had half my soul."
"And I'm keeping it," she said firmly. She dipped her fingers between her legs and then examined the white that coated them. "This too, apparently."
His fingertips brushed the wetness he'd left, grazing her swollen centre. She arched, her wet hair wild.
"Once more for me," he whispered, "if it's not too much." Touching her everywhere, mouthing at her breasts, her naval, he quickly brought her to a third and last orgasm with his fingers.
The little plastic and metal room had none of the romance of Rey's temporary forest keep, but Kylo was grateful to have made a memory here, something he could think about in this room when she vanished.
"Stay here with me tonight," he asked. Rey's expression was almost regretful.
"I don't know how we're to be apart after this. Maybe that's why both of us kept delaying the inevitable."
They spent the night pressed together in Kylo's bed, unable to let go.
Rey wouldn't know until the morning that the servants sent to check on her late in the evening found her chambers empty, flooded with rain, glass doors slamming in the storm, and reported her missing to their hosts and Leia. That they'd seen her dress and an unfamiliar black towel haphazardly thrown across the floor, the sheets used for coupling, but no sign of sleep. That Leia would privately call her to account the next day with piercing eyes that missed nothing.
Tonight was theirs, and tomorrow they'd begin to reorder their realities to make the arrangement permanent.