Prompt: #40 Touch

Summary: She's got to show him that touching her thus, was unacceptable.

A/N: The Dragon Knight Series

Contages is Latin for, "contact; a touch".

Contages

"Take that! You clunk of junk!"

"That the best you can come up with, Grunt?"

The night's natural silence is broken with the clashing sounds of colliding metal and the occasional discharge of a high caliber firearm. There is the sound of metal cracking open, bones breaking, men cursing and all the usual mayhem that accompanies the sounds of battle. All sounds that she loves immensely. The only minor difference is the almost comical commentary that accompanies each blow and the equally eyebrow raising retorts from each of the friends as they fight. The camaraderie and candid words exchanged were proof of just how well bonded each of them were to each other. She secretly envies what they have. She has never had anything like that.

He is the one that catches her eye first and the one that keeps it. When before, she had paid him no mind whatsoever when her objective had been only on the Prince. Now, he captured her attention more than the Prince ever had. He has her keen focus whenever he is in proximity. She cannot pinpoint the exact moment that, that had changed. But, he was the first and only man to ever touch her. Not in a physical sense, but on an emotional level that she had never known she had within her. His unwanted and brutal observations breeched emotional walls that she has erected all her life. They were things that nobody had ever taken the time to notice about her and he saw them so clearly. As if she had not hidden them at all. Men, especially, never took the time to really see her or to find her as nothing more than a vessel in which they could try to slake their lust or an opponent for them to best. How he had seen her, the real her, when no one, not even the Wise One had, was incredible and frightening. They had always pressed upon her that the enemy was stupid. She has come to the conclusion that they are crafty, intelligent and lethal in a way that was more damaging than any blade could ever achieve.

As she watches his large, muscular frame move with surprising agility and stunning strength, she can concede that he has conquered her. It is a fact that she will only admit to herself, of course. The admission bubbles forth a deep resentment towards him for so effortlessly crushing her walls as easily as he crushed the armor of the Wise One's minions. She hates him as assuredly as she cares for him. Through him, she has discovered a side of herself she had not been acquainted with and exposed her to the deplorable vulnerability that she was suffering. The vulnerability of feelings. This, had nothing to do with anything but her. Which was also something new, when nothing had ever been solely about her, ever.

So, she waits until he has been separated from the others and is surrounded by five grunts before she leaps from her position on the low rooftop she has been watching him from. She lands right behind him in the very circle they have entrapped him in and a part of her is surprised that he does not instinctively swing his huge battle axe towards her as she stands.

"This one belongs to me!" she hisses at the helmet faced grunts. Her weapon is poised to strike any who dare make a move on her prey.

"You should be sneaking away now, Knight," he says, sounding disgruntled. He slowly lowers his weapon but he's smart enough not to release it entirely as the grunts turn their focus on the other three. Not even when they are left alone does he lower his weapon. Proving that he wasn't stupid at all. "Didn't Stella tell you, you were free?"

"You really think that I would run?" she demands incredulously. "You're an idiot if you really believed that."

"Giving you the option was important."

"Not when you already knew what I would choose," she challenges him with a steady grip on her sword. She was back in her knight's armor and for the first time since coming, feels she is on solid footing with him.

"I did," he answers bluntly. "But I can't say I didn't hope for different."

"You imagined I'd find myself a little cottage, somewhere and start a herb garden and weave baskets?" she scoffs.

"I didn't want to choose between killing you or not," he admits honestly.

The sudden, queer pinching sensation in her chest makes her feel short of breath at the implications of his words.

"So you knew there would be no reformation for me," she concludes and does not understand why this makes her feel so sad.

"It was never about changing you," he reiterates again. "Never. It was always about opening your eyes to the man you serve so blindly."

"So all of you come up with this crap theory about how his goal is to kill all of us?"

"It's not a theory, Knight," he says with a shake of his head. "It's not a theory anymore, anyway."

"You expect me to believe that about a man that has taken care of me?"

"Has he really?" he throws at her challengingly and takes a step closer to her. "He gave you a place to stay. He made you into a killer and he lied to you all the while. He was never been tender or loving or careful with you, has he? Cause that's not caring."

"How dare you!" she shouts resentfully. "You think you see so much but you're just as blind. Your people are the reason the world is so ravaged. You and your idiotic worship and patronage to Etro. Don't you realize how stupid that is?"

"It's got nothing to do with that."

"It has everything to do with it," she cries. "Don't you realize what she's done?"

"She gave us a heart," he says gently. "She gave you one too."

"And I hate her for it!" she shouts, taking a swing at him in anger in order to try and keep him at a distance.

"No, you don't," he says gently.

A warm hand brushes moisture from her cheek and it is only then that she realizes that she is crying. A resentful growl escapes her lips as she takes another swing at him and this time, her blade catches against his side. She's not sure why she is so stunned when she takes in the sight of his torn shirt and bloodied wound a moment later. She gapes at it in shock for many beats before she meets his compassionate stare. Why was it compassionate? Why wasn't it furious for injuring him? Why did he never react as he should?

"There," he says with acceptance. His eyes say what his lips do not need to. That he had known she would one day hurt him like this and he has already forgiven her for it. He has already made peace with it.

Forgiven her so easily and she thinks he's a fool and the most fascinating creature she has ever beheld.

"Did you know that you were not the first one the Wise One sent to kill Noct?" he asks. The change in subject is so sudden that she merely frowns at the question. "A week before you came to Nihilsomno, they tried to kill him and Stella while they'd been lost in the woods. Then he tried to get Stella to kill him. That failed too. Then he sent you. You were the back up plan and you failed too. If you go back, there's no telling what he'll do to you."

The words sound so ludicrous, but the sincerity and conviction on his face give her pause. Liars were good, but she knew him. She knew him and she knew he wasn't lying or keeping anything from her now. It dawns on her that he never really had been to begin with.

"Don't go, Knight," he urges her, clutching the sound at his side and taking a step towards her.

"Stay back!" she cries with another swing to deter him, but he avoids it this time. "You're just trying to confuse me in order to change my loyalties. You've been playing me from the beginning."

"You willing to take the chance that I'm lying?" he asks. "I have no reason to lie to you."

Both their ears perk at the sound of an approaching airship. She can tell from the many shouts and the distinctive sounds of the engines that it was from the Wise One. Had this convoy been sent to rescue her? It is only then that she remembers to notice the things around her.

"They've come for me," she states, trying to sound haughty and smug but only managing to sound regretful and unsure. "Why would they come for me if he wanted me dead?"

"He knows now that you're a weakness."

"To him?" she exclaims with a strangled laugh at the absurdity. "The Wise One needs no one."

"To me," he replies.

"What?"

"Because of how I feel about you."

"Like an orphaned stray that you wanted to release back into the wild," she accuses bitterly.

"You really don't get it, do you, Knight. You don't see what's between us."

"All I see is that you are my enemy and you failed," she says with a sniff that does not sound indignant at all. The pinching sensation in her chest grows more painful with every lie that she forces past her lips. "Why do you think you're special then?"

"If you're my weakness, it's an advantage over Noct."

"You're a fool."

"I think you know aggravating me isn't gonna work," he chides.

Actually chides her at a time like this!

The airship is coming ever closer. She estimates that she has about a minute left before she can make her escape. But why does she still hesitate?

"You can't expect me to believe you fancy yourself in love with me," she manages to scoff for real this time. Even when she feels a measure of excitement in her heart.

"I don't fancy anything," he says. He knows how much longer they have too, by the urgency she can read in his features.

"You don't even know my name," she says incredulously. It still smarted that he had never asked.

"Yeah, I do," he replies.

"Liar."

"Never."

"You're an idiot, you know."

"Yeah, but not the way you're thinking," he replies, looking up at the hovering airship.

It starts to fire down in an attempt to hit him but he still delays long enough to give her another pointed stare that she cannot decipher. There were far too many emotions in his gaze that she could never weed through them all. Without warning, he runs to her, snatches her body so that it is crushed against his and his mouth is on hers before she can even fight him off for taking such liberties. His kiss is not gentle nor is it brutal. It is a passionate mix to prove his point. Whatever that point maybe but she can actually feel all the emotions she has just seen in his intense stare a moment earlier. She finds herself giving in to the need to drink them in from his lips. Then he is releasing her too soon.

"Stay alive, Selene," he says. "You stay alive."

Then, he is gone with his friends and there are hands grabbing her with voices shouting at her to move. But, even though her feet move, she stares at where he had been and still feel the imprint of his hands about her bare waist and the ghosting heat of his lips on hers.