Chapter 12

The two warriors, two leaders, had debated, discussed, yelled and argued until they had finally come to a consensus. It took a lot of convincing for both sides, but eventually Arthur turned over his trident to Diana, who in turn traded her battle ready armour for something more... Romantic.

They had washed the stains out of the dress she had worn on what should have been her wedding day. She was not entirely sure she felt comfortable wearing the gown, and the way Arthur was looking at her made even less certain.

"You're... breath taking," he said and for a minute Diana wasn't sure if he remembered those words, the last words he had ever said to her as her fiancé.

She flushed, her cheeks taking on a deep red hue as she looked down, trying desperately to keep the smile from her lips. She brought up a hand, still shackled with her bracers, a constant reminder of the past enslavement of the Amazons, as well as a reminder of the kind of future that would lay ahead of her if she is unable to avoid a marriage to Triton.

He knew her secret, no doubt, she had figured, a result of the witch Circe. The purple haired sorceress had been a rival of her mother's for Ares' attention and love, several times being taking the title of consort, but ultimately, the God of War was won over by the war waging Queen of the Amazons. He knew to control the Queen he merely needed to bind her wrists, and hold the other end of the rope, bets were doubled if he was able to bind her with her own lasso.

"I," Arthur stuttered for a moment, his blue eyes taking her in, from head to toe. Unlike the day of their would be wedding, her hair was loose, laying around her shoulders, the diadem of the Queen of the Amazons resting on her forehead. The lasso of truth, the one weapon she was never without unless completely bare, was wrapped around her waist. "I was being honest," he added, his voice taking on a slight tone of reproach as he felt that he was being mocked by her silence. "Use that if you think I am lying," he suggested with a smirk, gesturing to the gold around her mid section.

Her cheeks flushed deeper still. "From someone who can breathe at the bottom of an ocean trench," she said with a smirk, her blue eyes flicking up to look at his, the same coy smile she had given with the line when she delivered it on their wedding day flashing across her generous lips. "I'll take that as a compliment."

He smiled at her, reaching a hand out to brush her bare shoulder, brushing back some of her dark hair with the back of his fingers. Her skin was warm, soft and smooth against his calloused hands. It was a familiar gesture, though it had been a long time since he had done it, and Arthur couldn't remember if he had ever used this particular move on Diana. From her shoulder, his fingers danced up along her trapezius muscle to her neck, under a wash of her dark hair.

Diana's heart was beating rapidly as she became painfully aware of what Arthur was planning, and for the life of her she did not want to stop him. He was drawing himself closer to her, both fo their heads turning to the side as they prepared for a kiss, one that was years in the making.

She wondered if he still tasted like salt and sweat.

He wondered if she still tasted like pomegranates.

Their lips inched closer, and as they picked up each other's scent, their pheromones, working to wash away the years between them. The war was a thousand years away, right now they were just a man, and a woman. Closer, closer still. She could feel his breath across her lips, could he feel her hunger?

Four eyes, eyes that had once held such hatred for the other, burnt with the passion of love and loathing, fluttered shut as lips met for the first time in an age.

At first it was a soft peck; two pairs of dry, soft lips testing the waters. Yes, they had kissed each other before, but it was so long ago that they were barely the same set of lips any more. He let her lean into the kiss first, allowing her control. So far as he knew, with no lovers after him, and none before, he had been her only romantic partner, which was suffice to say she had never had a lover in that sense.

Her lips warmed, his opened, meeting in the middle as her arms came up, warm and strong around his shoulders, hands hungrily crawling up his shoulders as he pulled her body tight to him, feeling the heat through his scale mail armour and the thin fabric of her dress. When they finally broke, eyes opening as the two lovers looked at each other, faces still quite close.

"I must say," she said in a bare whisper, her eyes looking down at his chest, broadened as he developed, as age came and turned him from a youth into a man, and the war turned him from a man into a machine built for the perpetration of violence and death. "I prefer this to your... traditional robes." She let a private smile cross her mouth, her eyes looking up at him, face tilted just a little down.

"What?" he chuckled, brushing the hair at the back of her head. "You didn't like my man skirt?" A rare chuckle, once thought extinct, escaped his lips as he let the comment pass over him.

"These pants and your shirt are much more... fitting," she smiled, giving him a quick kiss on the corner of his mouth. "In more way than one," she blushed, her shoulders shrinking up as she turned her head to the side, nudging a kiss to his cheek, then another on his ear.

"Well, I do think you look beautiful regardless of what you wear," he said, turning to look at him. "Or don't wear."

She blushed deeply, remembering she had caught him taking a peek at her while she was changing out of her wet armour. At the time, she hadn't known what to make of it. Part of her simply attributed it to her aunt having been right about the male gaze, and how it would turn to anything pretty without preference or exception; men were indiscriminate creatures, crass and uncultured.

"Perhaps we should... get back to the plan," she hesitated, not knowing where to go with his comment about her naked form.

"Of course," he said with a light cough, looking her over as he let her go, a space, a cold and open gap, opening up between them. He brushed her hair back away from her face, giving her one final kiss, gentle and soft between her eyebrows. "You look amazing," he said, once more. "Triton will be blinded by your beauty," he continued to charm her.

"Let's hope he is that foolish," she said, taking his hands and kissing his knuckles.