A/N: In which Rannve and Onmund get into a spot of trouble, which leads to a moment that Rannve is not expecting.

I know I've made you all wait a long time for this. I hope you all enjoy ;)

Chapter Thirty Five | Frenzy

They ended up walking for another day in the direction of the Tower of Mzark, which they could see in the distance as it rose up over the glowing mushrooms and derelict buildings. The fact that the tower was so enormous was really the only thing Rannve was thankful for, right about now. She had no doubt that they would be completely lost otherwise. Her sense of direction was all skewed in this dark cavern, where the stars did not shine and the sun could not reach. She felt blinder the longer they spent here, and more aggravated when it appeared that they were hardly making any progress at all. It almost seemed as if the more they walked, the further off the tower was, as if the magic of this place was going to her head.

Rannve was getting aggravated, and when she was aggravated, it meant that she was impatient. Not a good combination, really, because when she was impatient, she did reckless things that she usually regretted.

Besides the frustration of being stuck in this cavern, which was steadily getting more and more dismal and losing its enchanting appearance every hour, they were also running low on supplies. She'd been careful to ration their food throughout the journey, but there was only so much rationing one could do before it all disappeared, and they were getting dangerously close.

She was also tired. Dreadfully tired. It seemed that the more they walked, the more exhausted she became, and it hardly mattered how much sleep they were able to get in between the legs of their journey. She wasn't sure if it was Blackreach itself or an exhaustion born from some internal place within her that made her long for pillows and blankets and a real bed, but it was a potent yearning that crashed through her every time she unrolled her bedroll onto the cold, hard ground. And it was bad. It was bad because the more tired she became, the more she began entertaining certains…thoughts. Thoughts that she had been trying to push away for weeks now.

They were warward things, almost sinister in their complexity and in the way they sprouted up out of nowhere. They came to her at the most inopportune moments. When they sat down to eat and her eyes would drift to Onmund's mouth while he spoke about the things they had seen that day, all she could think about was how his lips might feel against hers. When they made camp for a few hours of sleep, she wondered about the feel of his chest against her back, his arm tight about her waist, his breath spinning sleepily against her neck. She thought about his eyes, the crysal blue of them, which reminded her of sunlit icicles. She thought about how piercing they were, sometimes, and how they might look when they were half-lidded and darkened from desire.

She thought about desire, too, when she was too tired to ignore the snippets of daydreams that plagued her. How how he'd look splayed out beneath her, arching into her body. His face a blushing mess, his eyes bright with want, his hands gripping her hips tightly, and his hips – Gods, they would roil into her from below, spluttering but fervent –

"Rannve? Are you feeling alright?"

She shook her head so thoroughly that Onmund thought she might sprain her neck, and he watched curiously as she cleared her throat and looked away from him, pressing a smile into the folds of his robes. She'd been looking at him again, like she wanted to devour him. She had been doing that quite a lot lately. Despite his own exhaustion, he would have been blind not to notice.

"You look a little sick, is all," he offered, stretching out his arms over his head as he blinked over at her. He grinned crookedly in a friendly manner, though his eyes blazed knowingly at her from beneath his lids. Oh, he wouldn't tell her that he suspected he knew what she was thinking about, but neither could he deny the giddy feelings in his chest whenever she got caught.

Rubbing her cheek, Rannve muttered, "Fine. I'm fine."

He hummed lowly and siddled closer to her, lifting a hand to touch her shoulder as he mused, "You face is red. Are you sure? If you're in pain, I can summon a healing – "

"No, no healing spells," she adamantly cut in before he could finish, and Onmund bit back a smile. He remembered all too well how she'd responded to his Restoration magic before. He thought he knew what was going on, at least in hindsight. At the time, he'd been as bewildered as ever, but…well.

He'd do anything to see that look on her face again. The messy desire strewn over the contours of her expression. The wild way she'd blinked at him, as if she wanted to both jump into his arms and tumble away at the same time. It was endearing.

He chuckled and murmured, "Alright, Rannve."

Okay, so maybe he did drag her name out just a little, and maybe his voice was pitched low on purpose, and maybe he had done it with the express intention of seeing her shiver. He certainly wasn't disappointed. The look she sent him then was half frustrated, half alarmed, as if she wasn't sure what she felt or why she felt it, and the way she gripped the hilt of her sword in response was reward enough. She was clearly affected by him.

Rannve let out a sound from the back of her throat that sounded slightly exasperated. She pushed forward, focusing her attention on the path ahead and the tower in the distance and…and – Onmund surrounded by sheets, wrapped up in her arms, watching her kiss down his body with eyes that blazed a dark blue and a blush that he couldn't possibly tamper down, especially when –

"Rannve!" Onmund hissed, catching her elbow quite suddenly. The movement stopped her progress and forcibly doused her frustratingly vivid thoughts with a figurative bucket of cold water. The alarmed tone his voice took on further splintered through the fog of her own exhaustion when Rannve snapped her head up, only to find that she was staring right into the face of a sleeping Centurion. They were hardly ten feet away from it. The whirl of its machine cradle was constant, and even though the automaton had his head bowed to the floor in mechanical slumber, it felt as though he was staring right at them.

Her lips parted, body freezing up. It was a strange thing, to be so close to a dwarven automaton and yet not have it notice you. It was clearly still in working condition. Besides the noise of the machine pumping energy into its frame, little bursts of steam fluttered into the air every few seconds, almost as if they were the exhalations of a breath. Yet the glowing blue eyes remained closed, its metal eyelids shutting out the sight of its would-be enemies.

She shouldn't have been surprised to see it, really. Despite the fact that Blackreach was unlike any place she'd ever been inside of, it was still the product of Dwemer civilization. They'd stumbled across that dwarven sphere on their first day, so why not a Centurion too? It was just a little surprising that she hadn't noticed it before. She'd practically walked right into it with such hapless inelegance that she was shocked her usually sharp mind had not been aware of its presence until Onmund had to spell it out for her.

They stood there as if frozen, both staring at the Centurion. The fog began to return, biting at their minds as if trying to pull them back beneath the caressing lilt of exhaustion, and for some reason it seemed to Rannve that they did not need to move. That they were perfectly safe here, out in the open, ten feet away from an enemy who would surely decimate them in their current state, had it the sense to open its metallic eyes.

Nothing at all happened for nearly an entire minute. The seconds dragged them under, and it felt like an eternity of standing and staring, but there was no such thing as eternity for the Dragonborn. The only eternity she was destined for was the one that would immortalize her name in tavern songs.

Their luck, which was already so delicate and haphazard, shuddered out.

As if somehow aware that it was being stared at, the Centurion moved. Its limbs shifted minutely, metal plates scraping against the cradle that surrounded its form. Its head began to lift, eyelids fluttering open, and Rannve was mere moments from signing her life away when Onmund surprised her for a second time.

Before the automaton could become fully cognizant of the world around them, he was dragging her back, pushing her forcefully against a crevice in a nearby rock, and hurtling after her. The shadows were nearly complete – complete enough to hide their forms, it seemed, when the Centurion's eyes at last opened and glowed with blue awareness. Its head swiveled side to side, looking for whatever had disturbed its slumber, but evidently, it did not find the cause. It merely stood there as if lost, one step from the metal dome that held its frame, and only fifteen or so feet from the huddled forms of Rannve and Onmund.

She barely noticed him at first, so intent was she on watching the Centurion from over the jagged shoulder of rock that hid them. She was waiting for it to walk towards them, waiting to hear the thunderous noise of its footsteps as it hunted for whoever was witless enough to awake it. Her heart was thudding erratically in her chest, and she was so swept up in the Centurion's presence that she hardly seemed aware of Onmund at all.

That all changed, of course, when she felt him exhale slowly in relief, probably because they seemed to have evaded the Centurion. An errant thought hit her that he really shouldn't be so relieved yet – they weren't in the clear, just well hidden for now – but the moment his breath fluttered over her ear, her mind took a rather sudden turn.

Before that moment, she had not realized just how close they actually were. But time rarely lingered in the spaces of a moment, and soon, she became aware of several things that she had overlooked before.

He was pressed against her, diligently. His body was utterly flush with hers in his attempt to hide them from view. She could feel the soft cotton of his robes against her hands as she gripped the fabric at his chest – an action that she had not even realized she was doing until now. His heartbeat rattled through him beneath her fingertips, perfectly matching the shallow breaths that she felt against her ear and neck. His head was bowed over her, so close that if they turned just a little, they would find themselves in some cliché reenactment that came right out of a gooey, romantic novel. (Er…not that Rannve had any interest in books like that of course - )

"Onmund – " she breathed, intent on telling him to move away a little because Talos, his proximity was doing strange things to her body. Dangerous things.

But he only shook his head and whispered, "Shhh…" in her ear.

He was right: they needed to be quiet else the Centurion become aware of their position in this cramped little alcove of rock. But by the Nine! The soft little hush of his breath made shivers spiral through her, and she was embarrassed to say that she trembled into him a little bit. She was even more embarrassed when the full force of her wayward daydreams came back with a vengeance.

All at once, she was imagining what his voice sounded like when it was swept up in a moan. The way his body might arch from her kisses. The way he might look with her head between his legs, eyes a molten blue and fingers fluttering everywhere, not knowing what to grasp as pleasure bloomed fiercely inside of him. Or – Talos, what it might be like to see him wrangle with some of that endearing confidence she knew he had. Perhaps he might use it on her, roll her into the mattress and show her exactly how talented his mouth was –

Her eyes suddenly careened into his, and the way Onmund was staring at her made her heart jump in her chest. It almost looked as though he knew exactly where her wayward mind had gone off to. There was a gleam of intelligence in his gaze that unnerved her. It made her grip his robes tighter, press her head into the jagged rock behind them, and inhale deeply. It made his eyes flash because there was something that looked like understanding in them, and along with it, a generous heaping of reciprocation.

Now that was frightful. And by the Gods, it was so completely enticing too.

"Onmund…" she whispered, so quietly that her voice was barely a shard of a sound, a little thing that held so much within its subtle tones. Yearning, longing, the sheer need to move a bit closer, to just give in.

Talos. She wanted to. So badly.

He swallowed thickly, stared at her for a long heavy moment in which the reverberating thuds of their hearts seemed to rise up above the alarm of the Centurion, who still stood only yards away from their hiding place, head swiveling and bronze fists clenching as steam billowed from its frame.

He stared at her eyes, at the rare, expressive quality of them. At the way he could see exactly where her thoughts lingered. At the desire that orchestrated an entire symphony in the gleaming silver gaze. He stared at her mouth, the way it was parted just so, the tremble of her lips just centimeters from his, the warm spin of her breath against his own mouth. He stared at her body, at the way she was subtly arching into him. At the thinly veiled language that he could read so clearly, for it was a language that only lovers knew.

And, Gods help him, he knew that it wasn't exactly the right time for this, but when would it be the right time? She was always so adamant about brushing off her feelings for him and he knew, somehow, that he would never be this close to her again. It was, as they say, a once in a lifetime opportunity. Onmund never claimed to be overly ambitious, but he wasn't about to let this chance pass him by. So – in a rare display of confident boldness, he raised his hand to tilt her face up and edged closer, making absolutely no attempt at concealing his intentions.

He lingered for only a moment, staring at her with piercing eyes, waiting to see if she would deny him. He wasn't about to take something that wasn't freely given. That was not his way. And yet…

And yet, her eyes only flashed with more yearning, more of that addicting desire, and, well, he never claimed that he had much restraint, either. Not when it came to her. He leaned closer, until his lips brushed against hers, and – Rannve let out a breathy sigh and clutched him tighter, tipping her head back and kissing him so solidly that he felt his very heart tremble inside him.

It was like a floodgate within him had torn open. All at once he was pushing her up against the rock wall, tangling his hand into her hair and inhaling the scent of pine as though his life depended upon it. His mouth plied against hers, heady and fierce. This was not an awkward kiss exchanged between classes at the College, in the shadows of one of the pillars in the courtyard, more breathless from the fear of being caught than the desire to kiss in the first place. It wasn't like the sweet embraces he had shared with a local girl back home, the childhood sweetheart he had once imagined himself marrying, back when he had resigned himself to such a fate.

For the life of him, he couldn't remember her name right now. He couldn't remember anyone that had come before Rannve. He knew only her, tasted only her, until her name was spinning through his mind with every pass of her lips – lips that were not awkward at all, but wild and needy and raw and unforgiving about it. And they were not breathless because they were afraid of getting caught by errant professors – they were breathless because neither of them could fathom the sheer need that spiraled through them, intense and overpowering.

She clenched at him, raising one hand to tunnel itself into his hair, pushing his hood off in a fervor of desire. Her other hand quickly joined the first, and he had to hold back a breathy moan at the way she tugged at his hair. Her nails bit into his scalp but it didn't hurt. It only cemented in the reality of the moment.

He was kissing the Dragonborn. He was kissing Rannve.

And she was kissing him back with so much desire that he could barely even breathe.

He'd never been kissed like this before. He'd never been the object of so much passion. Never instigated such astounding ardor in another. And yet Rannve unfurled for him like he was suddenly the center of her universe, like he was the very thing she had searched for her entire life.

Gods above, he was helpless in the face of it all, and…he seemed to have no control over his actions any more.

Before he even knew what he was doing, his hands slid to her hips and he pulled her against him, grasping her rear with tight fingers and moaning breathlessly against her lips as he shifted his pelvis into hers. And though the armor that covered her form surely got in the way, the heady whimper that left Rannve's throat a moment later was consuming – as was the way she ground her hips into him before he could truly compose his wrought nerves from the sound she made.

This was what she'd been hiding from him. Suddenly he didn't blame her so very much for it. He doubted they would have made nearly as much progress on their journey had she not exercised some self-restraint. He would have given into her just as completely as he was now, and he wouldn't have tried to stop it at all.

"Rannve," he gasped quietly as she dragged his bottom lip between her teeth and nipped at him. Talos! His blood was boiling.

Sweet Divines.

Then, suddenly, a great lurching noise sounded through the stillness of their alcove, and the thudding sound of the Centurion began to march across the path, and Rannve was clamping her hands around his face and pushing his head away from hers so that she could peer around the corner. The Centurion was heading right towards them, though from the censured way it was moving, it didn't seem to know what it was looking for.

She breathed out and turned to Onmund again, and all at once she was taken aback at the sheer need in his expression. She swallowed tightly at the sight of it. It was all consuming, as if he was seconds away from pressing their bodies together and continuing right where they left off. And – while she couldn't deny, anymore, that she dearly wanted to do just that, it…probably wasn't the best course of action at the moment.

She pushed him back just enough to slide out of his hold and grab his hand, dragging him forcibly around the rock and away from the Centurion's path. Then, the first moment they were able to, they both darted off into the shadows and left the automaton to its blind search.

And – fingers just as tangled as their hearts, not even the shadows could hide the intensity of their feelings as they rose up within them like soaring, crashing waves.