Obdurate Heart – XXIII
Yet again, a short chapter…don't kill me for it, or you can consider your ass haunted.
"Conscience is the inner voice that warns us that someone might be looking."
- H. L. Mencken
Obi Wan's eyes opened with difficulty to show him a blurry and distorted world, a sudden shiver running through his body. Was it dark out? Silencing a would-be groan, he lifted his head off of Maul's arm and pushed himself up slightly, eyes scanning about the room in mild confusion. Though there wasn't much of his circumstance to question. Naked, groggy, and sharing a bed only really meant one thing. Numbly, he looked over towards Maul, who returned his gaze with a careless look.
Obi Wan swallowed thickly and gaped down at his own bare chest. "H-how long have I…?"
Maul rolled back a shoulder in something between a shrug and a stretch. "Under an hour. Perhaps half."
Obi Wan felt his breath steady in relief, pushing himself stiffly up into a sitting position and rubbing his head. This is madness. I cannot truly be here. Said his mind in wonder, but his memory provided him with a bold, uncensored truth. Truly I did not just allow a Sith Lord to bed me! He shuddered and quickly reached over the bed for haphazard scatterings of clothing.
"Is the act not normally meant to relieve one of stress?" Maul queried as he watched Obi Wan sit over the edge of the bed and pull his pants on.
Obi Wan picked up his tunic and draped it on loosely as well, putting a hand to his face and able to say nothing for the moment. He heard Maul slide up into a sitting position behind him, a strange pause settling in the air.
"…I…" Obi Wan began uncertainly. "…I feel like a fool even now. Turning my back to you, I mean." He said aimlessly, fingers fumbling slowly to redress himself. "Knowing that you could easily try to kill me."
He felt Maul move a little closer, and he was tempted to think that his spoken suspicions were about to come true. A moment later, he felt hands rest harmlessly on his shoulders. "And yet your back is indeed turned." Maul pointed out.
Obi Wan felt the hands knead slightly into his shoulders, and he suppressed another shudder. "I must go."
The hands went still, then cautiously drew away from him.
Obi Wan stood up and walked out of the room without looking back.
As he passed back out of the chamber, the guards still stood at their posts dutifully, only sparing him a nod of acknowledgement if he should look in their direction. Their faces were unchanged, but he wondered what went on in those heads of theirs. Had they heard the argument? Had they heard anything afterwards? Once he passed, did they turn to one another with bewildered whispers and revolted outrage? He kept his head low and the flushed color of his skin hidden as he walked away from them into the looming twilight.
The air felt cold against his skin, and he couldn't bring himself to be convinced that it was due to any change in season. Warmth had left him, but he did not understand whether it was idea of the act itself, the guilt he felt, or simply the sudden removal from the heat of another body. Pulling his clothes tighter around his form, Obi Wan attempted to allow the echo of his footfalls drown away the discomfort that welled up within him. The veil was lifting all the same. He suffered no lingering delusion regarding the reality of his situation. Not when so much incontestable evidence lay on his very skin. His mouth tasted different. His body was tainted with many breeds of fluid. He could feel the lingering aches and tingles in his lower back as he moved onward.
What have I done?
His quarters seemed phenomenally smaller than it had the last time he had left it. In the oddest sense, he was almost afraid to be back here, as though this place were a person and the first he would be forced to admit to what he had done. Unthinkingly, he collapsed into his bed, fingers fondling the folds of sheets that had not been stained with sin. He had given in, that was really the worst of things. To anger, to passion, to some strange, sickening allure. This was not a forgivable error, and it certainly did not help that the pit of him experienced an incomprehensible feeling of satisfaction. As though some weight was finally lifted from his shoulders, some tension broken, some dark secret finally spoken aloud. Even as the world around him had become twice the danger it had once been in a matter of moments. …He slept that night, nevertheless.