They were sparring.
Their fields bounced and sparked on contact and her hands parted the air like falling leaves. She comprehended every move for advantage he chose and countered with ones of her own, swift and perilous. Glorious.
Catching her by hard grasping of his claws was as futile as gripping flowing water. He adjusted and moved to cup, to encircle. Finally, finally he has her and spins with her onto the ground. Quick, quick the way his ancestors knew to do and she has no carapace to prevent him from fully bearing his weight down on her back with his keel. She makes a short blurt of surprise once he gets her ankles locked under his spurs and he parts her thighs with another instinctual movement. She uses no words. She struggles and there is a feeling of alarm that skitters from her field into his awareness and he trembles.
"Fierce one," he murmurs, pressing a mandible against her cheek. "Fierce one."
She seems receptive to his praise of her and he thrums from it.
"Okay. You win this round," she concedes, her breath huffing.
"I desire you," Saren declares.
He doesn't like it when she laughs.
"You do not."
"Shepard," he tries to keep his tones soft. "Fierce one."
Now was not the time to be proud. He is unused to being a suitor, but even he knows that this is how to do it, that you had to assure a woman of esteem and intent.
She sighs and it is not the sigh of prelude, of desire. She is annoyed.
"You don't need to make fun of me."
No, this isn't how it's supposed to go-
He rolls his hips, not caring to continue hiding his eagerness, pressing it against her.
"Is this sincere enough for you?" he asks as he rubs on her.
She's so soft! The rise of her buttocks are an unexpected treat and he enmeshes his field with hers, thrumming, fluttering his mandibles against her.
"Saren," she says. "Oh..."
Her field attunes with his, he feels her pulse racing as his own races for her and when he joins with her it's so- so-
Awareness slices into him with cold mercilessness.
"NO!"
His fist slams down hard onto the mattress as he snarls and his other hand closes over his cock. Desperately he keeps his eyes closed, racing against total consciousness- her hair, her scent, her voice gasping, pleas, not yet, not yet, more, more, more-!
He spills in his hand. And that makes him livid.
Anger gives new strength to his limbs. He struggles to his feet and drags himself ungracefully into the bathroom. He hisses with the effort it takes to lower himself into the hot tub. Some part of him notes that a shower would be easier but he ignores it. It hurts. He sits and activates the water jets.
His heart beats quickly still and he is not done.
He turns a little to a different angle to the jets, moaning at the sensations they cause on his waist. Like that, her fingers there, like that, and he touches himself. He could see her, working on his feet, making her way up, undressing him while he reclines and then, like what was whispered and speculated about in bars and barracks, she lowers her mouth on him-
He loses his seat as he spends in the water, slipping down, his head submerging. He struggles upright after that impromptu baptism, coughing.
"Saren?"
He freezes.
"Oh! You're in the hot tub! By yourself!" she walks in. "You must be feeling better!"
He looks down at the water.
"Not all the way," he finally says.
He feigns a lingering ache and limp and curses himself for the impulse. By habit Shepard dries him off and he has to struggle to keep his seam from parting for her. She's so near.
"Thank you."
Her eyes widen for a moment before she smiles.
Ah, Saren doesn't retreat from his truth, I am conquered.
As he sat and watched her in the kitchen putting together his cup of kava, thrilling agony, completely unlike the past torment from his lungs and legs bloomed in him. When he thanks her again, her eyes brightened and when he drank of that kava she had made it was like swallowing poison knowingly. It would work deep inside him, warping his thoughts, corrupting his senses, and he continued to sip it; thirsty, parched, seeking annihilation.
tbc