Chapter Text
2nd of Wintermarch, 9:42
The Winter Palace is like a different cage.
I am in my chambers, which by all accounts are large and airy, and I’ve been pacing like an animal. I have the balcony doors thrown open for some air since I can’t tolerate windows being shut ever since Uldred, ever since that cage, and I feel like I’m about to disintegrate into nothingness or rip apart from all sides.
Upon our arrival, we had dinner in a dining room in this wing of the Palace. Some of the nobles have arrived ahead of the ball tomorrow, and some of them joined us for dinner. I was grinding my teeth throughout dinner, irritated by the sycophantic banter happening around me.
Eleanor had asked to sit beside me, and I was fine with that. In my eyes, she is far more preferable to any member of the nobility who was joining us.
Solona was a few seats down and across from us, getting pestered by a duke.
I could overhear a few things, but not much, considering how many conversations were occurring all around me, including my own with Eleanor about dragons, swords, battles, being a Knight, horses. Again, it was preferable to the alternative.
“You simply must visit my estate on Lake Celestine,” said the duke to Solona as Eleanor stuffed her face with a raspberry tart. Her curls had become unruly even though she had started the dinner with them in a braid, somehow. “I throw a grand party for Summerday. It would be so lovely to host you on my arm.”
I nearly crushed my wineglass in my hand when I heard that.
“Are you involved with anyone, my lady?” He asked her a few minutes later, and I did not hear her answer, though she did provide one that appeared to be more complex than one simple word either way.
I could have flipped the table; I was so furious.
Why must I be forced to witness this and pretend that she is nothing to me? Why must I suffer through this when her daughter sits beside me, or when Solona comes to me at night?
I’m at my breaking point, I think.
I really, truly am.
I thought I could do this forever when we first started. That first night, I figured I could do this if it meant not having anything else. But now I know better. I must have nothing from her if she cannot give me all of her.
I cannot love in half-measures.
I cannot give only part of myself.
I cannot devote only a piece of me to her.
Tonight. Tonight will be the last time I accept her in my chambers if she cannot accept any more of me.
I am pacing like a wild animal. I’m nearly tearing out my hair. What did she tell that duke? It’s going to take everything I have not to demand her answer.
Stop.
I tell myself to remember the time she came to massage me. I tell myself to remember the time she stayed for just a few minutes after.
She’s knocking at the door -
She must have sensed my anger when she entered, because she cut me off with a desperate kiss, her hands flying to my neck to help steady her as she leaned up on her toes.
“Cullen,” she breathed against me, and my hands went to her waist despite my own logic. “You’re still in full armor. I’ve my work cut out for me.”
She was working already on the fastenings of my pauldrons as she kissed me. I was filled with the scent of her, the feeling of her pliant body beneath my fingers, molding the curve of her back to me.
My anger was dripping away. I was not angry with her, even, was I? Or was it with myself, since I had decided I was not good enough for her? I could not really even tell.
We stumbled to my bed, one of my pauldrons clattering to the floor with a crash.
“I thought about you all dinner,” she murmured into my hair as I kissed her throat and she worked at my other pauldron. I guided her against the bed, but I didn’t trust myself to talk for fear of spouting off something jealous or needy.
“No one knows me like this,” she purred as my hands went to the laces of her dress. “No man knows me as you do.”
I groaned, almost unwilling to accept that. Unbelieving. How could such a thing be true if I only had a sliver of her magnificence?
And why was she saying this, anyway? Was it just to convince me to hang on a little longer, like she suspected my conviction that I was done with it all? That I couldn’t take this arrangement anymore?
Words like that… they would keep me on, string me along a little longer. I couldn’t fight them.
But I said nothing. I knew I’d be able to say nothing that would be helpful tonight.
My other pauldron fell to the mattress, and I lifted off of her, getting out of my cuirass with methodical precision as she crawled higher onto my bed, watching me. Maker, she was so beautiful, I could feel the fight leave me the longer I looked at her, the more I touched her.
I took off my vambraces and boots, and descended upon her, trailing kisses from the low neckline of her dress to her throat, then her lips with bruising strength. I wanted to mark her for tomorrow, claim her as mine – but I would never do this. I am not so barbaric, and though the thought is tempting, it will remain as a thought only. A fantasy. The Desire Demon would love that. Ugh.
I freed her from her dress and knelt at the bend of her knees, pressing a kiss to one of them, gazing at her as I tried to keep my doubts at bay.
This was going to be it, and she didn’t know it, yet. Was I wrong for that? Did I owe it to her to warn her, or would that be like a threat or an ultimatum? I said nothing, still, finding no words preferable to the wrong ones.
I eased her legs open and curved over her, running a palm along her waist as I ran my teeth along the slope of her shoulder and up to her ear. I gripped her waist, supporting her arch as she pressed against me, sighing. She was shoving my trousers down past my hips, arms trapped between us, and I pressed into her with a shattered groan.
Solona’s hands swept over me, threading through my hair, trailing across my chest, curling into my back. She hooked a leg over me and sighed, moaned. I was soon lost in the sounds, the feeling of her. If this were to be our last time, I intended to remember everything.
I slipped a hand through her hair, angling her head towards me as I thrust, nipping roughly at her lips. “You said no one knows you like this?”
She groaned and shook her head. “Only you. Cullen.”
I was delirious with need, could feel my control slipping in all manners, not the least being my tongue. “Do you want this?” My pace was quickening closer to the pace that I know she prefers.
“I do,” she gasped as I canted my hips into her in long, arcing thrusts, deep within her. “Please. I need you, Cullen.”
I half-huffed, half-growled against her chest as she trembled beneath me. I need you, too, I almost replied, though my words would have been a plea.
I felt her coil tighter, her legs shaking as my pace quickened.
“Tell me you need me,” I rumbled in her ear as I leaned onto my side, still holding her head in place as I reached down between us with my other hand and touched her. Maker, I had never been so – abrasive? Direct?
She cried out at my touch, and her legs clamped me tighter. “I need you! I need you. I need you, please.” She trembled as my control slipped away entirely, my desire running white-hot in my veins, nearly blinding me as I ran my fingers against her pearl, giving her the friction she sought as my thrusts grew staggered, my own release galloping towards me.
We both shattered together, ragged pleas mumbled in a string from our mouths as I barely kept myself from crushing her to the bed. A flush crept up my neck and flooded my face as I pushed off of her and lay down beside her. I suppose I was ashamed of my behavior in bed together. Perhaps the explanation for my behavior is my anger? Or my sense that this is the last time? I can’t say for certain.
Solona looked at me, flushed, swollen lips, skin somewhat reddened from the places where I had kissed her or touched her vigorously. She was a vision. Remarkable. Beautiful.
I felt badly about it, too.
“You have some pent-up energy.” She turned onto her side and tentatively kissed my shoulder, eyeing me.
“I’m sorry,” I said, and I meant it. “That was too -”
“It wasn’t.” She touched my chin. “If it was, I’d tell you, Cullen.”
I looked at her. I suppose she would, or hit me with a fireball.
Solona stretched out on the bed next to me and then slowly rose.
If I had any hopes of her staying (I didn’t), they were dashed as she got up and stepped into her dress. I pulled my trousers back over my hips and rose from the bed as well.
This is the last time, I told myself.
She slipped her arms through the dress’s sleeves, and I came up behind her to start tightening the laces, pausing first to press my nose against her hair at the side of her head. I looked over her shoulder at the mirror we were both standing in front of.
She was watching me as I laced her up.
I looked miserable. She looked… stoic.
I averted my gaze from her in the reflection to her back as she gathered up her hair, and I continued to work her laces. As I tied them, she turned back around to kiss me. I kissed her back, telling myself this might be for the last time.