makinglies | Respite

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faerun

Respite

The lake is dark and calm with a small breeze by the time they arrive at its shores. The stars above reflect perfectly in the still waters before them, and a small copse of trees lines one side, starting on their side of the river and jumping along the other side.

Chris takes a moment to re-prepare the spell he hadn't been able to cast in five years and gestures vaguely to the area around them as a suggestion for what the others can do. Gathering in the forest, sitting on a nearby over-turned log, it didn't matter to him. What he needed was an hour without interruption.

He settles down on the ground and presses his hands together as he closes his eyes to focus on the image in his mind. Within minutes, the white, shimmering outline of a large building forms in thin air. The gentle glow of its light barely spreads from the growing structure.

As promised, it takes the full hour before the slowly filling-in form is complete and finishes with a jaunty, echoing click.

Chris takes a breath, now sitting in front of the stoop that looks annoyingly like the one he'd passed earlier in the night, and gets back onto stiff legs as the glow fades away, leaving smooth, but otherwise unremarkable, white stone behind.

"Here we are. Home for the next however long we need. I'll start working on food and water next." Once they're inside, anyway, which is why he takes back his things from where he'd left them and leads them into the temple, marked only with the carving of ravens on the black wood of the double doors.

Inside is something just shy of opulence. The same polished white stone makes the walls, though black and gold veins course through the marble. The floor is the inverse, a black stone with white, shimmering speckles like a night sky if looked at for long enough. A single window faced East high up on the wall. The temple was alight with sconces at regular intervals along the walls, illuminating an open area that held all the offerings of comfort Chris could think of.

A large hot-springs-like bath, complete with a miniature waterfall, took up the left side of the room and ran into a smaller, similar bath at dog-height. Next to it, covered by a retractable screen, was a shower. Along the back wall, a raven's head emblazoned the white wall in black and watched out over a set of tables, chairs, and a couple of sofas. The majority of the center was clear for walking, but the right edge and right side of the room held a deeply inset pit of pillows, cushions, and blankets in various soft (black and purple) fabrics.

Finally, in the middle of the right-hand wall, there were two closed doors that, when inspected, revealed one room with a large, soft chair and rug, while the other room was made of nothing but stone with jars, pitchers, and plates on shelves along two walls and a cork wall perfect for catching daggers on the other side.

"I hope it works for everyone. I didn't...I didn't make separate bedrooms this time. I didn't figure we would need them tonight."

♥

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She offers her hand and thats all the sign he needs to take it in his and hold on for dear life. He has to be careful not to squeeze too hard.

"I'm so sorry, Love," he starts, forcing himself to meet her eyes when he wants to bow his head. "I know you want to focus on us, on me, and I haven't let you out of a misguided belief it wouldn't help. I focused on you too much, put too much pressure on you to figure things out when there is so much else to worry about... its unfair. I was unfair to you, and its not the first time. I'm so sorry."

Worrying his lower lip for a moment, he brings his other hand around so he can touch Amelia's fingers with both. "I... I want you so badly. You and Chris both, I want to be in contact with the both of you constantly so I-I know you're both actually here, but I'm afraid of smothering you. I'm afraid of doing something for the wrong reasons or at the wrong time or keeping you from feeling or doing what you need to because you're too focused on me. But that's very selfish in its own right, isn't it."

The breath he lets sounds like the echo of a sob and he swallows it back instead, trying to steel himself. "I never ment to make you feel useless or unimportant, Amelia. You're the complete opposite of that. I can't seem to function properly without you."

It's an odd thing, hearing him tell her something much like she said last night with the same conviction she had as she sobbed against him while tucked into his side.

'I'm not myself without you anymore.'
"I can't seem to function properly without you."

It hurts, too, knowing he feels similar and has been so afraid of doing her wrong that he kept her at arms' length. Things are so much worse for him than he's let on if he's questioning himself like this, if he's questioning what she or Chris want to do for him because of it. But he admits his faults and what he's done, and there's nothing in her to be angry about it. With everything out in the open between them, they can make amends and start moving forward together. Isn't that what matters most? Isn't that what she wants above all else?

She cautiously draws him closer by their joined hands, reaching up with her free one to touch his face. She wants so desperately to tell him she forgives him with a kiss, but holds back. They have to talk about a few things before she can say what she really wants - 'Love me the way you used to, please.' - so she starts with the most necessary words.

"I know you didn't mean to hurt me. You would never choose that, just as I would never choose it in reverse. I'm hurting and I miss you so much, but I know you meant well and didn't want to make things worse." Even if her heart aches in a way that feels like it's worse, she knows it's not. "I forgive you for all of it, but can we... can we talk about what we both want from one another? Please? I want to be with you again and I don't want to keep feeling like we'll never get there."

Maybe that's her loneliness and lingering grief talking. Maybe it's the desperate pull of thwarted moments haunting her. Hells, it might even be some lingering need for them to fall into bed together like they said they would when he crossed the planes to find her. Whatever it is, she needs them to break through it because she is desperate to have him back completely after all the shit they've been through.

If she feels like they'll never get there, he's done more to wrong her than he thought. Wolfe turns his face to kiss her hand, eyebrows drawn up in worry. "Can I tell you first? Or do you want to get it out?"

He doesn't know which will be better, he just knows both are going to hurt. "Gods know I miss you, too. I've been so lonely even with you right there..."

"I've been so lonely too, even when I know, I know that's unfair to us both." It's only been a day since they got each other back; nothing can be solved or settled yet when he was ripped away from his life without recourse. She shouldn't be expecting anything or assuming things will even be the same as they were before.

She brushes her thumb across his cheek as she nods. "I'll listen first. I... I need a moment to pull my thoughts together." Otherwise she might cry and distract him with tears that aren't his fault.

He replies with a brief nod and hugs her gently over to the table to sit down. He sits, anyway; he doesn't make her do the same.

"When they take people, they keep them in a sort of... Holding area. It takes some time for people to fade away and so LIEs does what they always do and has everyone have as much sex as possible before they're no longer of use. There's no pretense anymore, they just pump people full of aphros and shove them in a room." He knows he's separating himself from what happened by saying 'they' and 'people' instead of 'I' and 'me', but in order to not be overwhelmed, this is how he has to tell it because for the next part he has no choice.

"I didn't even really... I hallucinated while I was there, so I don't remember who any of it was with. I imagined you and Chris. That's all I remember, sleeping with one or both of you and then waking up to neither of you there. To the knowledge that you never had been and that I would probably never see either of you again."

He swallows, holding her hand tightly enough his fingers are trembling. He lowers his head, forehead gently bumping her stomach. "I did and you're here and I want nothing more than to love you the way I always have... But then I'll wake up in an empty room with three other empty beds and nothing but the sound of my own broken heart beeping away on a monitor."

She appreciates not being asked to sit because the heavy way he moves makes her nervous. Not for what he's about to say but for how it so clearly affects him. It's easier for her to hold his hand and cradle him against his chest when she stands at his side, to protect him from thinking what was done to him makes her love or want him any less than she does. It doesn't make it easier to take in the gruesome details of what they did to him or what he imagined to survive the literal sexual torture he was subjected to.

LIEs is lucky they're gone from Duplicity or she would have burned the whole fucking city to the ground for this. Between her, Chris, and Jon, they would've made the city long for the simple mess of the Creator's mansion over what the city would've become.

Her tone stays soft and comforting as she runs her fingers through his hair, the touch always ending with a brush of her thumb across his neck; an extra half second of contact that they both likely need more than words could describe. "You worry that all this - our escape, Faerun, the temple, the vials, all of us - is just another painfully beautiful dream?" Something to bolster his heart against the next round of torture that will inevitably come. She frowns softly, drawing her fingertips from his neck to his chin but not asking him to look up at her. This is difficult enough and if he doesn't want to face her or thinks he can't, she won't make him.

"I'm sorry you went through that, love. No one should have to. Our memories... I'm glad you were able to help yourself by envisioning us, but Wolfe--" Here she does try to encourage his eyes to hers. "We're not some projection of your mind. Chris and I would never force you into anything you didn't want, and you've asked us to wait and it's why we have. We're here with you, just as Jon and all the girls, four-legged or flying, are. How can I help you feel that and settle your heart where it belongs - with us and not trapped in the city we left behind?"

"I know its not. Logically, I know there are too many complications and worries for it not to be real, but we've been tricked so many times I can't get it out of my head. And it isn't just that," he looks up at her finally, chin resting against her instead of his forehead. "I want you more than ever but what if its for the wrong reason? What if it's because I'm just... conditioned to want sex all the time now? Part of me wants to make sure I can still control myself."

It sounds so idiotic when he says it aloud that a faint flush creeps up the back of his neck. "It's ridiculous, but it won't leave me..."

It's a fair worry. If all one knows for a time is to have something they enjoy in the worst or wrong ways, it's difficult to transition back to having it simply because they want it. Because it's with her, though, she has an idea to help him through this.

"It's not ridiculous, not in the least." She smiles softly at him, cupping the back of his neck as another physical reminder of her presence. "But what if we choose to do this together? What if we choose each other because of love? No fighting to stir up want, no teasing or flustering until we can't resist anymore. Just us, alone or with Chris if he wants to join us, where we take things slow and speak often about how much we've missed and still love each other. We can share the smiles and joy but also the awkwardness from remembering the steps of our dance but being out of practice. We can laugh with each other, even cry if we need to." Dreams know she will the first time they make love.

A beat, and she ducks her head for a moment, cheeks flushing a light pink. "You'll have to go slow for me no matter when we do this. The one forced encounter aside, I haven't been with anyone since they took you. I'll need to be properly eased into having you again." His girth was never an issue when they were with each other several times a week, but it's going to take time to get back to that kind of familiarity.

That sounds wonderful and his heart flutters in his chest at the thought. No pressure, no desperation, no second guessing. Just them, at their own pace, with their own desires of how it goes. Sex again as an expression of love and affection and not desperation or imprisonment.

He watches her face as she says this, his own expression softening from sorrow to ease. How simple it is for her to come up with something immediately that will help them both. Nothing forced, not anything they need to work through with hardship, just them figuring it out with patience and support. Together.

Flames, he hopes Chris will see it that way too. It would be wonderful to show them how much they've been missed together, but he doesn't want to push too hard when Chris said he needs a couple of days. Will that be alright with Amelia, if he asks that the first time for their new lives be with the both if them?

Then she makes her comment on his size and he can't help but look up into her face, as taken aback as he is flattered. "No one? Really?"

"Aside from the once after the SLUT Center, which was..." She trails off, not wanting to bring up again how it was after her breakdown over it earlier. Instead she shakes her head a little and offers a slightly rueful smile. "I didn't want to be with anyone for weeks after. And then the few times I thought that maybe I could, I was scared to take the chance. I didn't want it to be--" A huffed laugh. "I didn't want it to be for the wrong reasons, like being covered in aphro'd paint or having been to the SLUT Center. The people I thought about deserved me wanting them for them, just as you want for yourself now."

It's why offering this suggestion to him is so easy. Yes, they could have had sex multiple times already and she would have been glad for it. But they didn't because the moment wasn't right and that means they can do this their way, for love and to be complete again, nothing more and nothing less.

"We're really very similar in a lot of ways, aren't we," he chuckles a little, tugging on her just slightly, enough so she knows he'd like her to sit in his lap, but she's not obligated.

Either way, he kisses her hand again, this time pressing his lips to her knuckles as one would for royalty. "You're amazing. How you settle my heart so quickly... Gods, I'm a fool for not having talked with you about it from the beginning."

She settles into his lap readily when tugged, arm encircling his neck as if this were a night at Shadows' Rest and not in a temple made by their cleric on their first full afternoon in Faerun. It's not lost on her that they've once again found their way here after a difficult conversation rather than something easy or nice. Their lives are always going to be like this, aren't they?

So long as she doesn't become a problem now that she has no past.

With a slightly too heavy exhale, she forces the thought down and leans close to kiss his forehead. "Everything has been difficult since we got here. We need time to settle," to figure out who she is, "and find our feet. I wish it had been easier to get here, but I'm glad we have all the same." She nuzzles her forehead to his and doesn't pull away.

"You should talk to Chris, too, when you're both ready for it. He deserves to know what's in your heart and your head the same as I do."

"I did, a little. Not... exactly this, though. I should tell him," and he will. If anything, this conversation with Amelia has proved to him that even if its hard, it will only help.

He closes his eyes for a moment, feeling her forehead against his but feeling that heaviness in her too. He also needs to listen. Not everything is solved, no matter how much better he feels. "Talk to me, Love. You're still having dark thoughts. Can I help?"

This, too, is something familiar that she needs even when it twists her into complicated and painful knots. Wolfe's gentle nudges and listening ear are important to her, always have been, though right now they catch on edges she's not ready to grind down. Tomorrow requires her to be as sharp and hard as she's ever been, and if she falls apart now she's not certain she'll be ready to stand tall. That, and she doesn't even know where to start.

"Not yet, but that's not your fault. I have too many thoughts about how we got here and what it means, and if I start to pull at them I might fully unravel before it's safe to do so." She smiles ruefully to herself. "I need us to get through tomorrow in the Shadowfell before I can try. Please, give me a little time. I already feel lighter from having talked to you about us and finding our way back to each other. The rest... For me, it has to wait, at least for a few days." Then, maybe, she can have her existential crisis in peace.

The urge to push is there, but she's doing as they've found works for them and giving him a time when he can bring it up again. Instead of worry and disappointment, its a quiet pride that comes into his expression when he kisses her forehead.

"Alright, thats very fair. I'd never forgive myself if my pushing at you meant you were devoured by zombies anyway," he tells her, almost as a joke, though the words themselves are true. There's no way his Amelia Royer, with all her skill with blades, could ever be bested by a few zombies.

"Do you think we should talk to Chris before or after?" More like should be talk to Chris about what happened to him before or after. Anything physical will need to wait, out of respect for Chris' own boundaries.

"If he's willing to talk about this, then I'm willing to talk tonight. If he wants to wait for any reason, then we wait." They'll have plenty of time to talk while they're on the road to their next stop to being added to the Weave. Even if it means she has to douse herself in the coldest water or darkest thoughts imaginable to keep herself from reaching for Wolfe, she will.

"I don't want to rush things for any of us. I..." She huffs a tense, self-deprecating breath. "It may be difficult to hold back how much I want to be with you, but I can and I will. Chris deserves to know the truth and hear what I've proposed for us before any of us do anything we could regret."

"I don't understand how you can make the things that plague my heart seems so simple to speak on," he praises her, nuzzling her cheek and holding her close. If he keeps on like this he might have a bit of a physical problem but Matron take him - (somehow, easier to think than Gods in general over Maker, probably for the sound) - he can't bring himself to let go. Not when she's so close and when she's said she needs him as badly as he needs her.

"I think the reason for his annoyance at the lake earlier may have been over us anyway, so likely for the best," he agrees, then frowns a bit. "I hope he's alright. He's been gone some time, and Jon said he'd gone off towards Deismyr."

"I thought that might be it, and I want to apologize to him for it. I didn't mean to make him feel pushed out, or that I was ignoring what he and I had talked about - that I needed to tell you about going to the SLUT Center and what happened after before we were intimate. Dreams, I feel like such an asshole for even possibly giving him that impression." She sighs heavily. "And then at the way I fought him at the table..."

He shouldn't forgive her. He should kick her out of this temple and never let her back inside. She's trying and it never shows because of how terrible she is.

Her lips pull into a worried frown. "I hope he's all right. Going to Deismyr feels like he's trying to break his own heart for what he could see there, knowing he can't have it." Maybe she's wrong and he'll stay far enough away that it won't matter, but it's still a painful possibility, especially with Chris when this was supposed to be his land and the Guardians his people to give to them.

"I didn't even put that together, that he knew." That makes more sense as to why he would have been angry, and not just simple jealousy. Still, no need to dwell, not when Amelia will apologize when he comes back, and let him know that Wolfe knows now too. "But we're all running high emotions right now. I think it will be alright."

That will, anyway. His eyebrows furrow a bit. "He's... probably looking for the pain, honestly. It helps him, sometimes. Usually its physical pain but I'm sure he feels he can't ask for that right now, not when he feels responsible for us. I couldn't give it anyway, not when I'm trying to conserve my magic."

In fact, Chris hadn't asked for anything of that nature from him since the first time they did it. He does wonder if he did something wrong, but Chris has often felt like he shouldn't want pain, probably because of how many of his people have reacted to it in the past. Now, Wolfe just hopes Chris can be safe and get what he needs.

"I just hope he doesn't get caught and cause no end of confusion."

"He's smart and he's fast when he needs to be. I want to believe it'll be all right." Choose to believe them. She believes Chris could be all right, that he could get away, but he could also want to be caught for so many reasons. All of which would make their lives impossibly difficult.

She sighs, closing her eyes as she rests her forehead against his. "I have so many things to apologize for. He's had nothing but my worst for months, save my help in getting us out of Duplicity." He never should never forgive her for any of it, either. "I'll keep trying to make things better, but it may get worse before it gets any better."

"I think your rough edges will rub together in the coming months, yes. Neither of you do well with situations you can't control and whatever happens with Jon and I will be that to an extent, and I'm sure you'll stress and fight because of it, but I have faith in the both of you that you'll still find your way back to each other." He laces his fingers with hers and let's his eyes close, enjoying her closeness, her scent, how her hair tickles his nose with his face so close. Even the way he can tell she's thinking darker thoughts she doesn't want to voice yet is welcome just in the way he's here to perceive it at all.

"All he wants is to see you try. I know you do, but he needs to see it. You came up with your signal, when you run your fingers down each other's arms, right? Maybe another signal like that one of you can give when the other is pressing buttons? Something that will help you realize when you both need to step back and regroup."

It works for him when Chris forces him to look at him, or calls him by his full name. Matron, its embarrassing when he does that, but it works.

That's a good idea, actually. Dreams know she needs something like that more than she'd ever care to admit. What she wants and what she needs are often very different things that are at odds with one another.

"I'll talk to him about that. We'd both benefit from that kind of signal." Because too often they don't mean to hurt one another and still do. Even if she feels like all she can do is to hurt him, she has to try to help them as much as she can. Another sigh as she gently squeezes the fingers twined with hers. "After I apologize for earlier. He needs to know when I listened and when I didn't so we know where to work with one another." If he'll even work with her at all.

She shakes her head, keeping her eyes tightly closed. "Everything is so much right now, Wolfe. I'm sorry it'll mean I continue to cry on you at random. I promise, unless I'm smiling as I do, it's never your fault. Please believe that."

"I'll try," he replies quietly, glad she took his advice into consideration but sobered with the prospect of Amelia's tears. "I'll do my best to give you no reasons to cry on my account, at least, but if you need to cry, I say cry. It's better than suffering in silence, and we always seem to feel a bit better after a good cry."

He nuzzles against her again. "You don't need to apologize for tears, My Heart. I'm sure I'll shed my share as well."

Lowering his voice, Wolfe sounds more serious, his words heavier and mournful. "I still want to. Every time I think about that place they held me, how it felt, how so many people we love - I love - went through the same thing with no rescue, I get a lump in my throat."

He feels so guilty. He wouldn't trade it, not with his family here, but being the survivor again where others died and shouldn't have... Its a weight that never really goes away.

No. No, this is exactly the kind of thing she doesn't want to think about right now. If she thinks on it too long, she'll ruminate on she's lost so many people in addition to her own past. Her nails dig into his hand unconsciously as her entire body tenses.

"Stop. Please, don't-- not right now. I can't." She can't or those tears threatening to fall will become a flood she'll want to hide from everyone. "I love you and I'm grateful to have you, but I can't think about all we've lost right now." Someday she'll be able to, but not today. Not this week. Maybe not until they're in the Wave. She doesn't know other than not now.

"You're right, I'm sorry, I shouldn't-" He blinks rapidly and clears his throat, trying to find that fleeting peace he had just moments ago.

He finds it in wrapping his arms around Amelia, in setting his chin on top of her head and encompassing her in his arms. Arms that are perhaps not as defined as they were a month ago, but still strong enough to keep her together. To keep her whole, and here.

He finds it in tilting her head up to look at him with a gentle nudge, in the kiss he presses to her mouth that's full of longing and affection and everything that he's missed for so long. Too long.

As ever, Wolfe finds his peace in the love he can show his partner.

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cw: dubcon/noncon, altered mental state

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