A/N: Spice again? Well, yes. Why? Because they deserve it before I put them through the wringer. Poor dears.
Chapter 9 Content Warnings: nightmares, mention of parent death, sexual content
Chapter 9: all i have, i give to you
Addie
"What do you like about him?" Addie stretches her legs out into the sun, stone warm at her back and her belly full as she leans against the courtyard walls.
Lola shrugs. Her cheeks are dusted pink, but that could be the day's heat. One can easily get a flush from the late spring afternoon sun.
"I don't know that it's any one thing," says Lola, tilting her face into the sun. "I like that he's gentle and always says hello in the mornings, even though he's got to be tired from the night shift. I like that he's a bit awkward. I like that he greets me with a bow, like I'm some kind of lady. Maybe that's silly."
Gentle, awkward, overly polite. Add in 'idiot' and this could nearly be a description of Caspian.
Addie presses her lips together, only because Lola's eyes are closed as she soaks up high noon.
"It's not silly," Addie finally mumbles. "He seems polite. Charming enough, in that gangly way."
Lola's smile spreads, brightening every feature even as she squints against the sun. "Exactly. And I like that he talks to me about anything and cares what I say. Stories of Perla's spatula aren't for everyone, you know."
Addie giggles despite herself. "No, they're not."
Lola toes Addie's calf, her dimples deepening. "And I like that he sends his family something twice a fortnight. I like that he always finds some trinket or pretty flower for his sister - she's about half our age. I like that he cares about his family even though he hasn't seen them in two years."
Family man. The notion stings somewhere Addie doesn't want to acknowledge. Instead of answering, Addie pushes her toes at a loose cobblestone.
Lola bumps her shoulder, brings her back to earth. "I like that he wants to get to know you."
What in Tash's hells?
Lola giggles and turns back to the sun. "I knew you'd say that."
Perhaps she shouldn't grumble so obviously, but Addie chooses not to help it. "I didn't say anything. Why?"
"You're important to me," says Lola. "He wants to know anyone who's important to me. Besides, if he passes your judgment, he must be a good one. I'd like us all to be close."
Oh.
A lump lodges in Addie's throat as her eyes sting at the corners. She tries three times to get words past her lips.
"We'll see," Addie manages.
If Lola hears the new emotions warbling her voice, she has the grace not to point them out. But sitting there in the late afternoon sun with Lola's hand resting on hers is peaceful.
That must be the reason Addie lets her mouth run away with her again.
"So things're official? You've, er, sent his seed up to root?" Addie cringes at once. What a way to put it.
Lola's eyebrows pop up before her surprised little giggle explodes into a barking laugh. "You put it so gracefully, Addie! Yes, we have. It's nice, with all those awkward firsts out of the way."
Maybe she's got lucky, but Addie's firsts haven't been awkward. Well, not once they stopped dancing around the question and she just did it. Still, Addie hasn't found a useful book for exploring all the ways their bodies can fit together in Caspian's study, and testing her luck at the castle library would land her in the stocks. Lola, however, should know some things.
Addie smooths down her skirt and brushes away a flour handprint on her thigh.
"What's there to do about his end of things? I mean, there's kissing and grinding, and the rest. But what else? I'm sure there's more to do than just, ah, sex." Addie flushes hot as hellfire, but she can't be blamed if the afternoon sun is finally getting to her.
Tash, she'd almost rather ask Caspian. At least with him, she can play on the attraction. She doesn't feel things like this ridiculous heat in her cheeks when Caspian looks at her like she's everything.
Lola's lips twist to hide another laugh with marginal success.
"There are." Her twinkling grin softens before Addie can turn red again. Lola regains that far-off look as she blinks up at the passing wisps of clouds. "Explore each other. Use your hands. Your mouth, if you like. Try things together - anything, really. That's the real fun of it."
This, at last, she can relate to. Addie's mouth curls upward as she recalls some of her past successes in trying things. "Especially surprising him. Breaking the manners, you know?"
Lola quirks an eyebrow. Perhaps it's a trick of the light, but Addie could swear Lola's smile takes on a certain familiar wickedness.
"Precisely. If something pops into your head, ask if he'd like to try it. Never any harm in asking."
Lola's right. Addie's yet to ask Caspian a sensual question bold enough to turn him red; she's let their bodies do the talking so far. But the thought of Caspian red-faced, flustered, and too intrigued - too desirous - to worry with propriety is entirely too tempting.
The moon is high and bright by the time Addie makes her way to the study. Walking the castle halls with her hair long and loose doesn't bring the same jitters it used to, even though she sticks to the servant passageways. Ever since Bruna happened upon her cap, sneaking about lost its edge even if the necessity increased. It doesn't quite feel like sneaking when at least one other person has a good guess of where she's going.
Tonight is different when she slips through the bookshelf door. Caspian isn't in his chair; he's not anywhere in the study. Frantic mumbles sound from his bedroom - not loud enough to hear from the hall, but clear as anything now that she's inside.
Addie shuffles by the door for only a moment. Then he cries out for his father, and Addie stuffs away what little of propriety remains between them as she hurries into Caspian's room.
He's calling for his father, thrashing with the blanket and sheets tangled around his legs and his chest exposed to the night. Addie's beside him in moments, flinging aside the bed hangings and shaking his shoulder. His skin is feverish and clammy through his thin nightshirt as she gently shakes him.
"Caspian, wake up. It's just a dream."
Caspian jolts and his eyes fly open. Addie's hands are quick to smooth the hair stuck to his forehead and cheeks.
"It was just a dream," Addie croons. When she's screamed herself awake, Lola always croons comfort softly, repeats it wasn't real and strokes her hair until she calms. "Just a dream. You're okay, Caspian."
He shivers beneath her palm, wide-eyed and breathing too fast as his heartbeat thunders against her fingertips. Finally, his eyes focus.
"Addie," he chokes.
She brushes the hair from his neck and perches on the edge of the bed. Caspian reaches for her instantly, his hand warm and tremulous against her thigh even through her skirt. A few weeks ago, the weight of his hand so close to her skin would feel strange. But lately, Addie rarely bothers to wear underthings when she visits Caspian.
Addie's hands fall away from Caspian's face to stroke along his shoulders as he sits up. He breathes long and deep until the quivers wracking his body subside. The frantic look in his eyes takes twice as long to dissipate. When at last he seems calm and awake, she asks if he's alright.
Caspian's sigh is bone-deep exhaustion. "Yes," he murmurs. Nothing else; no explanation, no details, nothing but a single word that rings hollow in Addie's ears.
She drops her hands down and twines their fingers together. "You don't seem alright," she says. "Want to talk about it?"
"Not really. Maybe. I don't know." Caspian brings her right hand up to his lips and kisses from the back of her hand to the side of her wrist. "I don't know," he repeats. "It's always the same."
Addie brings their hands to his cheek, guiding him to meet her eyes. His still skitter to and fro, caught somewhere between her and the dark. "Sometimes it helps," she says. "But you don't have to."
Sometimes.
Back when Lola was around to listen.
Caspian lowers their entwined hands to his lap, his thumb tracing slow circles against her palm. It's just this side of ticklish, not quite enough for Addie to pull away. Caspian stares as if their joined hands are the most interesting thing in the room.
"It… it always begins the same. My father is asleep in his bed, surrounded by shadows." Caspian shudders. "Sometimes he wakes for water and chokes on poison. Other nights it's a chestful of arrows, or a dagger. And always… every time, no matter the method, there in the shadows is… someone. I can never see who. But…"
Addie squeezes his hand tight when the patterns against her palm stutter to a stop. "But?"
Caspian's eyebrows knit together until they almost form a single line. "But it feels like my uncle. I don't know; they never found the killer."
Miraz?
It's not unbelievable, given Lord Miraz's reputation and the slowly dwindling nobility. Sometimes the soldiers would joke about Lord So-and-so going missing - must've been the bloodthirsty forest ghosts, they said. But to hear it spoken aloud in the dead of night is another matter entirely.
Addie strokes the back of his hand. "It was only a dream, Caspian."
He clutches her hand tighter. "Is it?"
There's no one listening in here, not if they whisper. Addie stills. "I don't know," she admits. "But it wouldn't surprise me."
The silence in the room isn't as comfortable as their other silences. Those are filled with the whisper of turning pages, Caspian's quill scratching out notes, the promise of goodnight kisses and desire. This is… cold. Pale at the edges, like moonlight - dim illumination without warmth.
So really, she can be forgiven for startling when Caspian speaks again.
"Do you dream?"
Addie tries not to flinch as practiced lies tempt her tongue. She used to talk about them with the other maids in the room sometimes, but after Claudia dismissed them as silly and useless and Anna told her to let the past go, she learned to keep quiet. Lola was the only one who always listened, but even she had her limits.
And anyway, these days Lola spends her nights elsewhere.
Addie shrugs. "Sometimes," she says. "No nightmares, though. Not really."
Caspian tugs her closer. It's the easiest thing in the world to rest her cheek on his shoulder and let his warmth radiate between them. "Tell me. Well, if you like."
The return of his usual polite self is enough to lighten the defensive pinpricks tightening her muscles. Addie doesn't quite relax, but she coaxes her shoulders down from her ears.
"They're more strange than anything else. Sometimes it's all a blur. Other times it's just me. Once there was this strange bird. Loud, like a dragon I guess, breathing clouds."
It sounds silly, but when Caspian tilts his head with that academic frown pinching his mouth, it's worth it. "Clouds? Strange indeed."
Addie shifts to face him and tucks her head tighter into his shoulder. It's a lovely pillow, if not entirely comfortable for longer stretches of time. "Another time there was a room flooded with music. Bright music, the dancing kind with crooning voices. Sometimes it would skip a little."
Caspian's hand is an anchor around her waist as the latest dream presses behind Addie's eyelids. The memory slips out before she can think better of it.
"Lately, it's been raining fire and thunder. Sometimes a whistle came first, and sometimes a boom. I've never felt the ground shake like that."
Caspian strokes her waist, a careful line over the fullness of her hips. Addie swallows the memory away and shrugs with what she hopes is a convincing smile.
"Not my favourite one. But the others are good." She reaches for the hand at her waist and tangles their fingers together, his arm around her back and hers around her torso. His solidity staves off the tremors sprouting under her collarbone. "What about you?"
"Only ever the one, though the method varies," says Caspian, his breath a furtive thing against her hair. "Perhaps you've put some better ideas into my head."
That's something. Addie snuggles closer, because the room is chilled and because wanting to is a good enough reason on its own. When she wraps her other arm around his waist, Caspian completes the circle around hers. It's a relief, to sigh away the night's hauntings together.
Addie doesn't think when she moves. She's just getting comfortable, just trying to steal more of Caspian's warmth. In hindsight, however, the whole thing is stupidly predictable.
Addie shimmies into Caspian's side - innocent enough, by her standards. But when she nestles her calf between his legs, her thigh presses to his hip.
His gasp echoes in the quiet room. Caspian goes rigid, but the way he looks at her is anything but distant, princely manners. The moment Addie looks up, his lips cover hers and the dream fades away in the insistent press of his mouth.
Addie tightens her leg. Caspian shivers, entirely different from his earlier trembling. This is a hungry man straining to swallow the moan tickling up her throat, his hands hot as a hearth as they roam her waist.
She's usually the one on top, if they're sitting down and there's much sense of up and a down. Addie's taken good time to practice kissing Caspian perched on his lap. She's good at that, good at knowing how best to roll her hips. She's good at pressing into him when he has her up against a wall or a bookshelf, when they're nearly the same height.
None of that prepares her for how easily she fits against him as Caspian rolls on top of her, how quickly her legs encircle his waist to hold him where she likes. He fits effortlessly between her legs.
The sound of a prince swearing with her spread out on his bed echoes with forbidden recklessness. There's no excuse for how sinfully Caspian's staccato exhales rumble over her, how his half-formed compliments flood her core embarrassingly fast. A throbbing ache flares between her thighs, something she can only satisfy by wrapping both her legs tight and meeting his every thrust.
Caspian's mouth breaks away with no warning. Addie readies a complaint, but then he descends to her neck and something like a keen erupts from her throat. How in all the hells has she never let him - never asked him - to do this? The goosebumps tickle a bit, but the way every kiss echoes down her body is so worth it. Addie clutches him until her arms ache as the pressure low in her abdomen builds.
One of his hands settles on her hip and shifts the angle just so, and oh, it's not fair how quickly it spikes at the apex of her thighs. Addie's mouth falls open on his name, breathless and needy enough it'd be mortifying if Caspian wasn't every bit as vocal as she.
His other hand lands higher than perhaps he meant it to, the bottom of his palm grazing the top of her breasts before he jerks it away. Addie tastes the apology as it forms on his tongue. So she claws his back hard enough he looks back at her.
"If you don't do that again," Addie mutters, "I'll strangle you myself."
Caspian's smile tightens his lips. She kisses each corner of his mouth, storing away this smile as yet another version to keep close. Of all his smiles, this might be her favourite - the bright, sudden look of a man lost and found all at once.
This time, his hand lingers. The hot press of his palm sends a desperate wave writhing under her skin, sharp and heavy and perfect. Addie squirms up against him when his hips slow, desperate for friction, instinctively seeking the best source.
And yet, it's not just that. The heat, the hunger, all the sensations she's drowning in seem to have as much to do with Caspian himself as his body. She's never quite needed anyone's touch like she needs his. She never really wanted anyone to touch her like this before now.
His mouth returns to her neck as he squeezes gently at her chest. Addie's hips stutter toward him, desperate to feel if this affects him too.
Even without the hard evidence throbbing between them, Caspian's nonsensical garble would've betrayed the truth. There's something heavenly and primal in hearing what she does to him, in knowing she's not alone in this and neither is he. She needn't worry about seeming silly when he's so hard just from this.
Caspian's kisses travel lower, down her neck and whispering across her collarbone. Addie tangles a hand in his hair, urging him on as best she can without having to speak. Caspian descends further still, maddeningly slow, like each kiss is a question and he's waiting for an answer.
"Don't stop." Addie tugs his head lower, and just like that his lips cover her other breast. She arches up into his touch, desperate for more - more sensation, more skin, more of his lips across places she's never let -wanted - anyone else venture before.
Caspian covers her in heady, open-mouthed kisses over every trace of skin. But it seems to Addie that her dress is cut much too high.
His chin nudges at the fabric, and that decides her.
Shoving her dress down isn't easy with Caspian covering her so completely. Addie squirms and tugs at her sleeves and pulls on her dress for long enough it turns awkward. At least, until Caspian finally gets the idea that he should help unless he wants to get accidentally elbowed. It's much quicker once he catches on - a few good yanks and she's bare from her ribs up.
For his part, Caspian stares like an absolute idiot. His mouth pops open, then closed, then open again like his brain can't catch up with the sight. In Addie's humble opinion, it takes far too long for Caspian to lift his hands from the fabric bunched at her hips. But the moment his hand finds her skin and her nipple grazes his palm, the wait is worth it. Instinct has her bending up into his palm because it's not enough, these gentle, tentative touches.
"Caspian, please," she whines.
There's something about her using his full name. When Addie has the coherence, it's wonderfully efficient for getting Caspian out of his head and whatever poems he might be composing up there. Thankfully, Caspian gets the right idea as soon as she snaps him out of it; his mouth is on her in moments, too fast for her to take a breath, to ready herself for the sudden crest of feverish need scorching her from the inside out.
The sheer force of it leaves her a shuddering mess on the bed, unable to do much of anything but pull him closer and gasp encouragement so he doesn't get caught in his head again. She likes him right here, lost with her.
When he closes his lips and sucks, Addie's world tilts on its axis. The graceless upward rock of her hips is something beyond her control, a frantic attempt to satiate the sudden sharpening pressure in her core. Caspian's whimper is everything. His vocalisations, the proof that his desire matches hers, only sweeps her closer to the edge. It dangles just in reach, just out of reach, caught on the indecision tickling rudely at the back of her mind. While Addie knows well by now how Caspian tenses and sighs through his finish, he's not yet acquainted with hers.
Would it be so bad to let go, just this once?
Addie lingers on the choice even as it rapidly spirals beyond her control. Perhaps she could rein it in if she wanted. Perhaps she should.
For some reason, she doesn't.
Caspian's mouth switches to her other breast, his hand replacing the pressure of his lips. When he rolls her stiff, pebbled nipple between his fingers and grinds down into her just so, there's nothing she can do to stop the wave as it crashes and sweeps her doubt away like insignificant sands on a distant shore.
Addie rocks through the spasms, the stiff anticipation softening to the relief of her climax. As she comes down from the high, she realises belatedly that the spasms are different this time with Caspian hard between her legs. Perhaps it's his closeness, or heavy scent of their combined arousal, or the inescapable awareness of how their bodies fit together. With every inch of him tight against her core, Addie realises she's pulsing around nothing, around an empty place that hungers to be filled. She knew, logically, that he fit there. She never thought she'd want him to so badly.
Not half a moment later, Caspian releases that telltale shudder as his body stiffens above her. His teeth graze her nipple and send another wave down her legs, even though she just found the other side of the ocean.
Apparently she can ride more than one wave in a night, if she likes.
Addie usually soothes him after. Caspian always turns boneless when she combs through his hair, and watching him melt from her post-climax kisses quickly became a favourite practice. But that was before she discovered she can still hunger after her own, that her body can awaken so soon at the slightest touch. If anything the need sets on her faster now, fuelled by the sensitivity still lancing raw over her skin.
Except Caspian is collapsed over her bare chest and apparently unable to continue. Addie breathes deep and reminds her arms how to move so she can wrap them around him as he sprinkles countless little kisses over her heart. She can figure out this second wave on her own time.
Caspian mumbles something unintelligible against her skin.
"Hm?"
It takes him a moment, but Caspian manages to lift his head and blink sleepily up at her, his eyes dark and sated. "Are you well?"
She can't help but laugh a little; she's never been better. Ever the courteous prince, even with her in his bed at Tash knows what hour of the night. Perhaps early morning by now.
"Yes," she whispers. "You?"
He nods lazily. The graze of the light stubble across his cheek does nothing to abate the coil tight in her belly; it spikes enough to cover her skin in little pricks, but Caspian must be too tired to notice. So much the better, she muses.
"You were trembling," he murmurs. "I wanted to be sure."
"Same thing that happens with you," Addie explains. "Just less messy. Mostly."
That wakes him up. Caspian lifts his head and stares like she hung the moon in the sky herself, all boyish eagerness and fascination. His hands don't wander but they squeeze her hips, curiosity lingering in the reflex.
"I'll show you sometime," Addie says. "It's more on the inside, but the spasms are similar."
Caspian's eyes darken with something softer than hunger. Even so, he stays still and doesn't apparently have the sense to realise how her body still yearns for his touch.
"I would like that," he whispers.
His head drops back to her chest. By the time Addie finds her voice, his breathing is slow and even.
"Me too."
She waits until she's sure she won't wake him by moving. The sky beyond the windows is soft grey streaked apple-red with the coming dawn. It's a miracle she hasn't dozed off yet. Though with her skin still echoing with the memory of desire, she shouldn't be surprised.
Addie threads her fingers carefully through Caspian's hair. It's easier to indulge in tenderness when he's asleep. The temptation to linger until he wakes itches at her fingertips, but then the maids would notice her missing. She's never stayed out all night before.
If she hurries, she can steal an hour of sleep before returning to help Bruna. Addie makes slow, careful work of disentangling herself from Caspian. He slid to the side a bit, but half of his body still lays heavy on hers.
It's a delicate process, slipping from under Caspian without waking him. At first, he clutches her tighter. But Addie stretches and plucks a pillow from the far side of the bed, and it helps to give him something to hold. She slips from his hold almost too easily.
Addie sucks in a sharp breath when the cool air hits her skin. As annoying as it is, however, it's useful for a good spike of wakefulness. Addie tugs up her dress quickly, but she can't resist brushing her lips across his cheekbone before she leaves.
Chapter 10 Preview:
"You will be the death of me."
Her hand flashes out, grabs the front of his shirt, and pulls him down with surprising force. This time, their goodnight kiss is blistering and desperate.
"Then I'll fetch you from the afterlife myself," Addie whispers.