For Dark!Outlaw Queen Week - Day 1
The first few weeks, they fight like animals.
They fight so much that they end up going their separate ways, and she's left to wander the forest trying to look for a suitable place to crash while she decides how to get her castle back from squatters.
Somehow (she still doesn't really know how it happened), they end up crossing paths again, at sunset on their second day apart. This time, when he sees her, he doesn't bicker, doesn't even greet her, only grabs her hand and leads her away from the forest areas she's come to know.
She protests, wrenches herself free of his grasp and stands her ground. She's about to throw a haughty How dare you? his way when he interrupts her, with nothing but a look and a tentative run of his finger down her arm.
"What are you doing?" she asks, startled at the tenderness, and she will never admit it, but her heart skips a beat when he answers.
"I missed you," he tells her, narrowing his eyes curiously as he adds, "It's odd, isn't it? I can't stand you, but... I missed you."
"Yes, well, that makes one of us," she says, trying to sound bored, but her voice is a little shaky, surprised as she is at his revelation. Before he can get another word in, she asks, "Where are we going?"
He Ahs at that, and tells her it's a surprise, which makes her pulse race out of annoyance as much as it does out of wonder.
"Why would I go anywhere with you?"
"Regina," he calls her, the echo of her name in such a gentle tone bringing back memories of another man, so similar yet so different, a man who loved every version of her. "Please."
She huffs her agreement, pleased when she sounds inconvenienced enough for him to apologize, and then promise her it won't take long.
It does, though.
They trek through the forest for what feels like hours, trudging along muddy banks and upturned tree roots until they arrive at an area she's never been to before.
It's at the very edge of the forest, where the dirt and weeds gradually shift into wet sand and cobbles, that he stops. The rise of foam and the trick-trick-trickling of the stream before them playing a symphony that mixes perfectly well into the soothing gusting of the wind.
It's beautiful, and peaceful... and it's odd, Regina thinks, that he's brought her here.
She turns to look at him questioningly, and his answer is a sheepish smile that makes her heart flutter as she waits for a proper explanation.
"I don't want to fight anymore. I figured it might be a good idea if we just... talked."
Oh.
Oh.
He wants to... he... he wants her back?
Not that she was ever his to lose, but the fact that he seems keen on repairing their broken start in order to regain her company is quite baffling.
"Fine," she says, still not letting go of that bored, you're-being-ridiculous sort of tone she's so used to addressing him with. "Let's talk."
And so they do.
It's a little frosty at first. Mostly on her part. But Robin asks her little things he wants to know, prompts her for stories of her life she'd thought long forgotten.
They talk about horses, and she tells him of Rocinante, she tells him of what she did to her prized steed, how much it hurt to lose him. Robin places a reassuring hand atop both of hers on her lap, squeezes in quiet support, and then tells her an embarrassing anecdote of his own to get her to smile.
They talk about their preferences, their childhoods, their families, their rebellious teenage years... He learns her triggers, and she learns his (a common source of discord between them, seeing as they tread on each other's sensitivities more often than not). Little by little, they cover enough ground to get to the present, to this very moment, sitting on a log by the water, hands still held together as they get to know each other.
For all his sass and banter, he's still appreciative and attentive. Still finds the good in her, still seems to understand her like only one other man has before, and his gentle tone and soft laughter make her feel warm, and giddy, and... safe.
She doesn't notice how much time has gone by, but at some point the moon is high over the stream, its reflection a blurry rendition in the ever-moving current before them.
"We've been here a while," she notes, looking down at their hands, still joined and poised over her lap.
"We have," Robin agrees, "and we've not bickered once. I'd consider that a success, wouldn't you?"
She laughs humorlessly at that, but nods nonetheless, her hand turning palm-up under his so that their fingers can weave together.
There's a pause in their easy conversation then, a moment of quiet that she uses to finally look up into his eyes. Her heart does a little somersault when she stares into all that blue, and there's a familiarity there that shouldn't be, not with him, he's not the same man. But then, she's not the same woman, either. And somehow they seem to work, like pieces of two different puzzles that just so happen to fit into each other.
Regina realizes that part of her anger towards him has been that she's been trying to make him into the Robin she knew. But he's his own man, though the very essence of the man she once loved lives on in him, regardless of their different personalities.
And it's as she clings to that essence, as she lets her resentment evaporate and transform into a new appreciation for the man before her, that he finally bites into his seductive smile and leans in.
He doesn't ask. Robin Hood would have asked, her mind says, but she finds that this decisiveness in the Robin now crashing their lips together is something she quite enjoys, and all she does is kiss back with equal fervor; surrenders to the bruising passion of his mouth on hers, and moans when he pulls her closer.
He all but groans her name, Regina, like he needs to say it more than she needs to hear it, and it's all just suddenly so warm, so thrilling, that she can't resist it.
Regina wraps her lips around his bottom one and sucks, gently but firmly, a little tease to garner his reaction. A low, guttural Mmm breaks out of him, so she does it again, harder, feels his hands tighten at the small of her back, one of them roaming downward, until he can grab her thigh and half-hoists her up and onto his lap, chests pressing together as the kiss builds and builds.
Robin lets go of her lips for a moment, veers his head down to the line of her neck and licks a tantalizing path down to her chest, then back up, plunging his tongue into her mouth.
He tastes the same, exactly the same, like raindrops and salt and a dash of cinnamon, the dirt-and-pine scent of him an intoxicating spice in the cocktail of his kiss. She whimpers at the instant rush of feeling, at the delicious ache starting to form between her legs as she rocks her hips slowly, undulating her body in time with the greedy caresses of his hands up and down her sides.
"Robin," she hisses before she dives right back in, kissing him again and again, until they're out of breath and a little dizzy, her hands moving from where they'd looped around his neck (her fingers had buried in his hair of their own accord, a practiced move that has the same effect on him as it did on Robin), palms poised on his shoulders as she gasps for air.
Their chests rise and fall in quick breaths, and one of his exhales comes with a laugh, his head shaking incredulously as he looks up at her, one hand rubbing feather-light over her leather-covered thigh.
"Right," he says then, a mischievous glint in his eye, "I think we're going to get along just fine."