Disclaimer: Not my characters.
-
-
-
-
-
He has nothing to offer today.
No news. No flowers. No trinkets to show how he has been thinking of her.
Just a bone-tired body, dripping with rain and desperation.
Wet and weary and disgusted, he shies away from her when she reaches to help him strip off his sodden clothes. He doesn't need to look to know her disappointment in this miserable wretch who keeps coming to her in need of repair. If he were man enough, he would change things. He would have something of consequence to offer. He would come back whole or not at all.
At the thought of never returning, he glances up to find her looking a bit cross, a snit brewing behind her eyes. Good, he thinks. He has had it coming a long while now.
"Tell me what's happened," she commands, though gently. Much too gently.
He toes off his shoes and sets them by the fire to dry. "Since when? A lot has happened since I saw you last."
"Since you left then," she replies, impatiently pushing his stiff fingers aside to unbutton his shirt. "Gods, Theo, you're freezing. Where have you been?"
"London, Edinburgh, Cardiff … lots of places," he answers wearily.
"And what did you do there?"
She asks as though he'd just come back from holiday.
"Murder, mayhem, atrocity," he answers, his voice brimming with disgust. "The usual."
Her hands, her soft, tiny hands -- her fine, pale, clean hands drop away from him. He is filth, and undeserving of their attentions or care.
And she knows it.
She looks down at her hands and primly wipes them on her robes as she turns away from him to pace the room. She paces and she prowls in agitation, occasionally looking up at him with sharp, calculating eyes, her brilliant mind assessing and reassessing their situation. And she is magnificent. Always at her best when a crisis is at hand, he has certainly kept her well in recent times, with the war at its bloodiest and he in the middle of it. Dead in the fucking middle.
She finally stops her voyage through the quagmire of their existence, separate and mutual, as her methodical mind leaves nothing unnoticed or unevaluated. She looks at him shrewdly and calmly, resolved.
What would he give to possess such confidence?
"Come here, Bunny Rabbit," she calls firmly, but affectionately.
He swallows the lump in his throat and crosses to her like a child about to bury his face in his mothers apron.
She leads him to the bathroom and draws him a bath. She undresses them both as the water runs, and soon stands before him wearing nothing but the silver chain he has no longer has any clear memory of seeing her without. She steps into the water first and sits down at the end of the tub, spreading her legs and holding out her arms in invitation. The water feels scalding to his chilled flesh, but he gets in without complaint. He sinks into her arms and legs and impossible compassion.
Where did this angel come from? What has happened to his goddess of vengeance? Will she not now pin him with the strength of her righteous wrath and drown him in this sweet smelling water?
"You're so cold," she says softly, scooping hot water in her hands and running them over his chest and shoulders.
But the cold on the outside is nothing compared to what's on the inside, and he wonders if he'll ever be warm again; if he'll ever deserve to be warm again.
"You kept your promise," she informs him. "You came back."
"Not all of me," he admits. He's left something behind everywhere he's been. The good parts. The decent parts. She deserves better than the shit that's left behind.
"Is there any news of him?" she asks softly.
He stares ahead blankly. "None that I have been privy to."
She doesn't believe, still, and he hasn't the heart or the faith or the acuity to persuade and console her with beautiful fabrications tonight.
With her arms around his chest, cradling him between her thighs, she tucks her head down to kiss his neck and along his jaw. And it hurts. It fucking hurts so much that he can hardly bear it.
"I'm a murderer," he states. Though the knowledge is agonizing, his voice is flat, dull, as though the words hold no meaning.
She doesn't react. Not physically. Not in anyway that shows she understands who this man is that she has her slender legs wrapped about. Not in anyway that shows that she is still herself.
"Did you hear me?" he asks insistently.
Her arms and legs tighten and she buries her face in his neck. "I heard you," she replies softly.
"He thinks I do it for him." He almost whispers his bitterness. "I do it for you."
She is still for a long moment, her arms and legs still holding him tight. "You're trying to make me angry," she says finally, coolly. "You want to be punished. You think it will make you feel better."
"Won't it?" he asks, his voice brimming with hope and disgust.
"No," she says softly, factually, and she pours more water over him. "Punishment needs to fit the crime."
Poignant, as always, his Hermione. And, gods, it hurts. It hurts so deep and so right and so true. If he doesn't die in this war, she'll kill him. She'll tear him to pieces with bare hands and bare words. Even now she kills him with bareness, her naked body pressed tightly against his.
Again, she runs her warm hands over his chest, and again she kisses his neck and jaw. He turns his stormy blue eyes to hers, misty and mystified, to find her meaning. Is this his punishment? This excruciating, desperate, impossible love?
It is at once hot and cold, monstrous and beautiful, fleeting and eternal. Glimpses chipped from moments carved out of ages.
He sits still, held by her arms and her legs and her lips; by her breath and her words and her transitory faith.
It's not what he deserves. It's never what he deserves.
It's what he doubts and desires. It's what he cherishes and fears. It's what he comes back for even when he has nothing left to offer in return.
Her verdict. Her sentence.
His absolution.
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
A/N: Thank you so much for the reviews for the last chapter. A little bit of feedback really goes a long way. I've had this vignette on the burner for months and could never seem to find the words or the mood or the bloody will to dig into my veins and draw out the conclusion. Ugly metaphor, I know, but sometimes that's how it feels when a piece refuses to write itself ;)
So, thank you for inspiring me. I hope you'll let me know how you feel about this vignette and/or the overall arch of the story.
Are you still in for the rest?