matilde & bastiano iii.

Matilde

Matilde delights in her own strength, her own cleverness. She delights in her own audacity, her courage, her wildness. Of course she chooses to run tonight, her entire body a concert of motion, a symphony. She catches his scent on every breeze, tries not to bark a joyful call-and-response every time she hears his horse's hooves in the distance.

Of course she is racing him. Her thoughts went the same way, just as his followed hers a moment before. She thinks of reaching his camp before him. She thinks of waiting for him as she did before, pulling him into her arms as before, feeling his hands on her as she has dreamt of every night since he climbed out of her window.

She is well into the hills and has found the river before she permits herself a howl. It is distant and ululating, wild and overcome. A few creatures call back to her from miles away, recognizing but not understanding. Hounds behind fences in the lowland farms and vineyards are set to barking, trying to reconnect with the tempered, tamed instinct they still carry.

Matilde does find his camp before he gets there. She is faster than a horse, more nimple. And he is, at least for now, much like the mortals who could not catch her, outsmart her, defeat her.

Except he has caught her, she thinks. She could no sooner escape him as a bird might escape a cage, a rabbit a trap. The thought should give her sorrow, but she's never been happier to be in one place, to be held so fiercely. To be caught like this is to wonder what running away is even for.

--

But she does not take off her clothes. She does not find his bed, or what passes for his bed, and lay herself out on it.

That was her bed. And this, at least for tonight, is his.

She waits, right at the edge of his encampment, still in the body of a wolf, until he approaches. Only then does she rise to all fours, and then onto two legs, awaiting him.

Bastiano

To call the encampment temporary or humble is to be generous. It is barely anything: a bedroll beneath a tree with a piece of leather stretched over it to shield to from a sudden storm. A firepit with kindling and wood but no sign of ash or previous fire. A loaf of bread and a wheel of cheese stuffed into a saddlebag; a couple waterskins. A wineskin, the romantic.

He is scarce minutes behind her. He must've ridden like the madman she once -- in another life -- accused him of being. She can hear hoofbeats coming long before he is in sight. The horse is lathered and perhaps at least a little disgruntled at the sudden midnight exercise.

Its hooves skid and clatter as it reins to a hard stop. Bastiano leaps from horseback, throws the reins over a nearby branch without a glance. He does not quite run -- quite -- but he advances about as fast as a man can walk, tearing his tunic from his body as he does. It is flung off somewhere. Then she is a woman again, and his hands are on her, pulling her to him. He lifts her as she kisses him.

Matilde

Her form comes so easily to her, when he arrives. A wolf and then a woman, the hood of her cloak thrown back, and then the cords coming undone as she reaches up, tugging a strand scarce seconds before he has her in his arms. The fabric falls heavily behind her as she's pulled into his arms, up against his chest, her mouth opening pantingly to his.

The idea of settling with him on his bedroll, eating bread and cheese, sipping wine and water as they keep one another warm, is intoxicating. She was charmed, yet again, upon sight of his camp. He knows not, even now, just how raw things where during her fosterage, how long it took her to train herself not to show surprise at the luxury she now lives in, how hard it is to feign indifference to the abundance. He doesn't know. He only just met her.

And she has been waiting for him since her first memory, her eyes opening to an unfamiliar sky, blood sticky on her skin. Some part of her has always felt some longing.

This longing. She has her hands on his chest now, gasping in pleasure at the feel of his skin under her palms. "Take me," she whispers, meaning to ask him to take her to bed, to his bed, invite her as she invited him. But only those two words make it out alive. There are laces at her breastbone, at her shoulders; she reaches for them, pulling them open, loosening her garment so it can be pulled quickly and simply down her body.

Bastiano

-- which he's all too happy to do for her. The laces open. The garment loosens. He grasps it and pulls, too impatient for finesse, for politesse. It would be fair to say he yanks her clothes off; but somehow that doesn't capture it. It's not a violent, careless thing he does. It's just the passion of the moment. It's just that he can't wait.

So then it's her skin and the night. And it's her skin and his. And his hands are on her immediately, skating over that startling softness, the perfection of a body that regenerates itself again and again. He has yet to set her back down. He puts his mouth on her, licks her collarbone, nips at her shoulder. He kisses her indiscriminately, finding a breast largely by luck; finds his bedroll also largely by luck and falls rather heavily to his knees.

The underside of that piece of leather, which she can see once he lays her down, is still furred. It's some sort of spotted cow; some strange breed of cattle they don't have down here in Italy. He must have brought it from home. He must have brought this gear with him, the stuff that make up this crude little camp. She has some inkling of his past; she must know that -- although he put on a decent enough show -- he is an utter stranger to the sort of luxury she lives in. He cannot even pretend not to be impressed, surprised, amazed.

He cannot pretend not to be moved by her, either. He cannot pretend indifference, that the sight of her doesn't set him afire. He nearly snaps the lacings of his trousers; kicks his boots so far away he'll have trouble finding them later. His underthings are simple, but hers take him an eternity, until he's sweating, until he's nearly growling in frustration, until she has to help him.

And when they're at last naked, he can hardly wait. He leans over her, braces his arms; kisses her with his eyes closed and his brow furrowed. He lets her guide him with her hands, because on some level he must think this gives her some control, some say in what they do and how and when. He scarcely trusts himself now, can't even keep from groaning aloud when she touches him, aligns him, takes him in.

Matilde

The laces at her shoulders and chest slide open, knots hitting eyelets, and the simple dress is tugged away, shrugged away, til her arms come free and wrap around him, til the roughspun cloth falls down her body and pools at his feet. Her legs wrap around him. She came to him in bare feet, and it should be no great surprise to discover her body naked beneath that plain garment.

She shudders to feel him, then, his hands running over her, her weight transferring to his strength as she trusts him to hold her aloft. She's as bare as a witch under the moonlight, arching her back as he puts his mouth on her. He's moving, feet towards the heart of his camp. They tumble to the bedroll, which elicits a happy, gasping laugh from her throat.

Names she has for him fall from her lips in curls and purrs as she lays back for him. Her hands slide up his abdomen as he fights with his trousers, banishes his boots. Later on she will notice the pattern of the leather above them, but right now all she can see is him. His broad shoulders. His bright eyes. The way he looks at her.

In the end she helps him with his underclothes, if only to speed the process along a bit. She's right there, she's so close, and he can veritably feel the heat of her skin rising to his own, almost smell her sex and the wetness that greets him when he touches her.

"Bastiano," she says again, still with that reverence, that whispered adoration, as he's leaning over her. She kisses him, and with that kiss pushes him back, up,

guides him to lie on his back. Her eyes are on him then, intent, in part due to her hunger for him and in part to make sure this is all right, this is desirable, this is pleasing. She hardly doubts that, but she is still careful with him: he holds her heart in every gaze, every touch, every breath. She licks her lips, straddling his lap, holding herself just above him. Her hand moves down his stomach, touches his cock, strokes him gently for mind-altering seconds before she places him at her opening, slides their bodies together an inch, and another, and another. Each slow roll of her hips makes her gasp, makes her eyelids flicker, until she's tipping her head back, her hands braced on his chest, her mouth open and her eyes closed as she takes him, wholly, completely.

Bastiano

Almost as soon as he realizes her intent he's moving to accommodate. There's no unwillingness at all: he rolls over, fairly flops down on his back, arches his hips up to get his drawers off. They get kicked aside too.

Then he loses the ability to think for a moment. She strokes him and his head falls back, his eyes close. "Oh," is all he manages, which is reverence of a sort too. His cock jumps in her hand. There's an answering, reflexive shiver through the taut sinews of his torso.

She climbs over him. If he still had a brain he'd remember what he'd asked her, the wicked light in her eyes, the naughty thoughts that flickered between them as clearly as if they'd found windows into one another's minds. But he doesn't have a brain right now. All he has are nerve endings, pounding pulses, shuddering muscles. She takes him in, and it is mindaltering. He makes a sound with every move she makes, and some are mere sips of breath; some are low groans that scatter off into the trees.

No one is up here to hear them. He doesn't worry about the noise they make. Her palms press to his chest and his hands cover hers, hold them there. She rides him and soon enough he moves in counterpoint, rising against her fall, meeting her rhythm as she sets it. Her eyes are closed but his are open now, watching her, watching her face and her expression; watching her breasts, her abdomen, the sleek coiling of her thighs.

Watching himself fucking her, too. Watching his hard cock slide into her and emerge slick and wet. It's almost more than he can stand, and this is when he pulls her down to him, kisses her like he's missed her mouth in the brief moments they've parted.

Matilde

The thought of riding him like this has distracted her every moment since the one where she laid eyes on him. They never got around to it that night; he had already tarried too long, after all. But they are out in the wild tonight, and she would argue that he essentially asked her for precisely this.

Every noise he makes is worth it to her. When he takes only a sip of air she circles her hips on him, tightens her cunt on him, as if to make him release one of those low groans. She takes his hands and moves them to her body, placing his palms on the undersides of her breasts. Her palms return to his chest, his heartbeat slamming against the heel of her hand. She doesn't hesitate or linger long, even to let the two of them get used to being joined again. She cannot help herself; she's riding him with rhythmic, firm rolls of her hips, and soon enough he's thrusting up into her, meeting her in that slow, aching pace she's set so far.

Their eyes don't meet for a while. Not when she's looking down at his cock, at the jump and twitch of muscle in his core, at the way his arms tighten and flex as he touches her. Not when he's watching her pussy on his body, the hardening of her nipples under his thumbs, the sweat building on her skin. Already she's fucking him a bit faster, making these needful little sounds with every slide, every clench, every shudder that goes through her.

She groans, though, when he pulls her down, kisses her like that. She clutches the fabric of his bedroll beneath them, nails digging in as her cunt bears down hungrily on his cock. She grinds against him as they eat at one another's mouths, biting his lower lip slightly as she draws back.

Now their eyes meet. Now he knows, though she says nothing, that she's about to begin fucking him in earnest,

if he can stand it.

Bastiano

He knows.

He can see it in her eyes. Same way he knew, could see in her eyes even when she wore a mask, that she was a wolf. That she did not belong there, in those fancy clothes, in that fancy house, even if she'd made herself unspoken mistress of all these things. That she was wild, that she was savage, that she knew the span of the globe beyond the city walls, that she knew the breadth of the sea, the depths of the sky, the hidden things he couldn't even dream of.

Same way he knew she wanted him while they played that scorching game of words. Same way he knew he wanted her from the moment he saw her, standing across the room, looking at the moon.

"Do it," he whispers. Needfulness and hunger are twin edges in his voice. The sibilant f makes him show his teeth: "Fuck me."

Matilde

Something about that -- the fact that he says it, the way he grants permission and then betrays his enthusiasm -- inflames her. A shudder runs up her body. He can feel it in her thighs, sees her breasts quiver. A single, hard grind then, and a moan from her that matches its. Her hands return to his chest, her spine stretching, arching as she begins to ride him, take him, fuck him, just like she wants to. Just as he asks for.

Within moments she's all but bouncing on top of him, crying out louder now, her voice higher. She sounds younger, somehow, exuberant, almost as if her own pleasure in this surprises her. Her cheeks are glowing with color, and there is a slickness of sweat on her thighs, along her lower back, beneath her breasts.

Matilde angles forward over him, her moans turning helpless. He's heard these sounds before, half-muffled as they were in her bedchambers, and he has heard this before, too: "Bite me. Oh, cuore mio, sto venendo! Sto venendo, ah!"

And she is, then, holding herself to him, chest to chest, crying out into his shoulder as she fucks him through her orgasm,

like she always does.

Matilde

[fml.]

Matilde

[it gud now?]

Matilde

Something about that -- the fact that he says it, the way he grants permission and then betrays his enthusiasm -- inflames her. A shudder runs up her body. He can feel it in her thighs, sees her breasts quiver. A single, hard grind then, and a moan from her that matches its. Her hands return to his chest, her spine stretching, arching as she begins to ride him, take him, fuck him, just like she wants to. Just as he asks for.

Within moments she's all but bouncing on top of him, crying out louder now, her voice higher. She sounds younger, somehow, exuberant, almost as if her own pleasure in this surprises her. Her cheeks are glowing with color, and there is a slickness of sweat on her thighs, along her lower back, beneath her breasts.

Matilde angles forward over him, her moans turning helpless. He's heard these sounds before, half-muffled as they were in her bedchambers, and he has heard this before, too: "Bite me. Oh, cuore mio, sto venendo! Sto venendo, ah!"

And she is, then, holding herself to him, chest to chest, crying out into his shoulder as she fucks him through her orgasm,

like she always does.

Bastiano

There isn't a shred of passivity to him. She starts fucking him like that and he's right there with her, cupping her breasts, kissing her mouth, thrusting right back against her. She's crying out, he's grunting on every thrust, she leans onto him, he plants his feet. Lifts his hips to fuck her right back.

Those cries of her start to sound helpless, like she's losing her hold on something even as she holds him tighter. So he holds her too. So he wraps his arms around her and she tells him to bite her and he does: bites her neck and then her shoulder, groaning against the grip of his teeth and the salt on her skin. He knows she's going to come, would have known it even if she'd said nothing, even if she wasn't making a sound. Would have known it

same way he knew she wanted to ride him, same way he knew she wanted to fuck him, same way he knows he's been looking for her as long as she's been looking for him,

by nothing more than the way she moves, the way she breathes, the clutch of her fingers, the grip of her cunt. "Come," he mutters -- half muffled, like no one ever taught him it's rude to talk with his mouth full; keeps fucking her while he urges her on, "come on my cock. Come on it. Come."

And then she is. And then he's still fucking her, gripping her by the hips, holding her there while he fucks her, while she grinds on him, while she shakes apart all around him.

Strange sort of tenderness overwhelms him when her limbs go loose. He slows, then. He slows to an aching slow rhythm, fucking her just to keep fucking her; slick of her pussy all over his cock, wet on his groin. He kisses her shoulder, and her neck, and her cheek, and her mouth. He kisses her until he rolls her onto her back, lays her out on that humble bedroll of his.

He slides out of her, then. He's hard as the earth they lie on. It's a stark contrast: the heat of him inside her, filling her, and then not. He's quick with his hands, though; touches her, slips his fingers into her, kisses her mouth as he strokes her. Maybe she knows too -- knows it from the way he looks at her, from the way he brings those wet fingers to his mouth, knows what he's after now. Maybe she knows it even before he gives her one more kiss and then

crawls down her body, pushes her thighs apart. He has his eyes on her face; wants to see her reaction. Wants her to see what he's doing as he traces his tongue -- the very tip of it -- between her lips, along the tender wet opening of her freshly fucked cunt.

Matilde

When her orgasm finally lets her back down, she's left panting against her lover's chest, their bodies joined, their sweat mingled, skin seemingly inseparable. She cannot tell where she ends. She feels his heartbeat as though it's her own. Her eyes are closed, coils of fine dark hair stuck to her hairline. There is a spot on her shoulder that is red from the imprint of his teeth, as if made to match the pink flush across her cheeks, her breasts, her thighs. She's trembling still, aware in some distant way of how hard he still is inside of her, how his own release has been postponed.

Yet she is too drunk on pleasure still to speak to him, to ask him why he waits, or how it is even possible that he could hold of like this. In the back of her mind she hears his words again, even more clearly in the aftermath than in the moment: those snarls of come on my cock, come on it -- and her body tightens up again with lust she almost can't bear. Still all she can do is whimper softly as he goes on fucking her like that, hypnotized by the slow thrusts of his hips and the quiet hiss of breath between his teeth as he moves inside of her. Besides: there is something intoxicatingly comforting about the way he goes on, and the way he kisses her, and the way his hands still roam over her, holding her close to him.

And something reassuring about the way he turns her onto her back now, finally. She aches at his tenderness with her, his gentleness, just as much as she thrills when he fucks her fiercely, ferociously as he did just moments ago. Her eyes open as he lays her back, finding him in the darkness. She reaches for him, intending to draw him close to her, wrap her legs around his waist, and welcome him. Her hands run up his arms, her touch grazing across his jaw.

Then he withdraws from her. Her body tries to clench on nothing, and she lets out a cry that seems so wracked with loss one might wonder if it feels like a betrayal. A breath, a heartbeat later and he's touching her, sliding his fingers into her pussy, her wetness instantly covering them. As he did before, all she can do is murmur: "Oh..." even if what she wants to ask him is why?

She writhes as he fucks her with his hand for those few, precious seconds, her cries fading into soft, panting breaths for air. She cannot think. She can barely open her eyes; she's so dizzy. But they do open, when his touch leaves her again. Her eyelashes flutter as she finds him again, sees him indulging in the slick he's taken from her as if it were cream, honey, the sweetest of sugars. Her breath feels heavy in her chest; yes, she knows what he wants. She knows what he's going to do to her now, what he's been waiting to do again since she cut him off early the first time. She cannot stand it, but she wouldn't dare deny him now.

Matilde licks her lips, watching him. Kisses him again, groaning at her taste as she licks it from his tongue. Her hand moves to the back of his skull for the length of that long, hungry kiss, holding him there but only to make sure that he understands: this is her blessing. This is her consent, her permission, unspoken but given nonetheless: yes. you may.

Her thighs part for him as he crawls down her body, settling between her legs. Her hands curl on the bedroll beneath her even before that first slow trace of his tongue, but tighten as he licks her. A noise leaves her, so high and so caught, that it barely escapes her at all. Her body responds to him in ways she's helpless to control: a shudder running through her from head to toe, her feet sliding up and down to either side of his body, her cunt quivering against his mouth. By the second time he licks her she's molten, melting, her hands caressing him wherever she can reach.

"You wicked man," she murmurs, the first words she's been able to form in some time, and they come in gasps as she writhes on what passes for his bed. "Are you going to make me come again?"

Matilde

[argh. hold of = hold OFF]

Bastiano

That kiss of hers means something. It means something that she gives it. It means something that he accepts it. Delights in it. He might have done it anyway -- licked her, used his mouth -- if she was simply passive, if she'd simply lain there heated and waiting, so long as she didn't push him away, tell him no. But it wouldn't have been quite the same. It wouldn't have been

quite so erotic, quite so maddening, if she hadn't stopped him. Laid that kiss on his mouth like a blessing, like a holy decree.

He is watching her when that first frisson of tension pulls through her like an invisible string drawn taut. He watches her eyebrows pull up and together, the exquisite shifts in her expression. His hand smooths over her thigh, holds her at the base of her leg, stabilizing. He licks her again and she melts.

He closes his eyes and he revels in it. Laps her wetness up like it's cream, like it's honey, like it's the sweetest of sugars. He spreads her open with his fingertips and he licks at her slowly, sinuously, moving from her cunt to her clit.

There he lingers. There he tarries, because -- they do have time tonight. A little time, at least. Tomorrow he'll report to his brothers in arms yawning, tousled, dark circles under his eyes, but it'll be worth it. Tonight is worth it.

She murmurs to him. He's on his stomach, so she can't possibly know how he responds to her voice, her gasping, the words. How his cock jumps like it has a mind of its own; beats a pulse like a drum.

She can see him pause, though. She can see that slow smile, somewhere between sly and playful. "You tell me," he says. It's delicate work, what he does then: the tip of his tongue, the tip of her clit. Circling, winding, until he has the flat of his tongue to her, fluttering.

And, pausing again: "Am I going to make you come again?"

Kissing her cunt, then. Kissing that wet, hot opening; slipping his tongue inside, all around.

"Am I going to make you come on my mouth?"

She can barely hear that. He's muffled; he doesn't hold back. He commits to this sort of thing. He's quite focused, see, and focused, his tongue draws a line up, back to her clit; faster now, firmer, toying with that tender little spot until he's not toying with her at all but fucking her, pushing her, trying to shatter her all over again.

It's a quick whisper this time, right before he's back at it:

"Do you want me to?"

Matilde

When she first took his arm at the ball all those nights ago, she felt a sinking certainty behind her breastbone that she was lost, lost. By the time he came to her, bared himself, touched the edge of his mask, she knew she would do anything he asked of her, give him anything he wanted, go with him wherever he wandered. It gave her a plummeting, chaotic feeling, like falling from some great height. If she were not so sure -- if she could not feel in the very marrow of her bones -- that he will not harm her, he would terrify her. How she feels for him would scatter her, make her reject him, push him away, beg him to stop whatever he's doing to her.

Done to her.

It's something, isn't it? The way she has let his mouth (and his perilous teeth) near her throat. How she, as much animal as woman, doesn't recoil when he crawls down her body, kissing her bared, soft belly. The way she opens for him, invites him, even when instinct would have her test him, send him through trials, make him prove his worth before he's permitted inside of her. It's a marvel, a creature like her letting him in so far, so deeply, so intimately. She never knew there were instincts deeper than survival, more vital than strength. She has learned. She is learning.

She lets him in, calls him in, finds that he belongs there. Inside of her. Beside her. With her.

And, as far as she can tell, he feels he also belongs right where he is: hands on her thighs, cock twitching on the bedroll, mouth and chin slick and warm, her hips coiling and circling as he drives her quite a long way out of her mind.

She cannot bear to be touched, and yet he touches her. She cannot stand another drop of pleasure, yet he laps it from her with seemingly insatiable hunger. She is going mad, and so of course he teases her, coaxes her, his mouth never parting from her cunt except for these few sweetly, wickedly mocking phrases.

Of course she doesn't answer, can't answer, while he's circling her clit with the tip of his tongue, enticing these ragged, raw cries from her. He can feel her pulse against his tongue, feels her quivering as he flicks at her, kisses her pussy as deeply as he's ever kissed her mouth. She moans, so loudly, only to bring up her forearm to bite herself. It isn't to muffle the sound; she needs something between her teeth just then, needs it the way she seems to need it when she's telling him to do the biting. Every fresh word out of his mouth is driving her wilder, until she's clutching at his bedroll, hips lifting to try and ride his mouth.

He stops for half a second to whisper to him and she all but screams. Her face is flushed and glowing, her expression taut with lust so intense it almost looks like pain. Or like bliss. Or something beyond both.

She never answers him. She means to, oh she does, she means to tell him yes, she means to call his name and perhaps one or two of the many other names she's given him, means to beg him not to stop, but words are past her now, unfathomable, impossible to navigate. All she can do is cry out like she does, open-throated and helpless and unmistakable, another orgasm taking hold of her, lifting her into a new and untenable experience of her body, of his body.

And all the while she's moving against him, not quite in control of how she moves or how fierce it is, how needful. She wants to touch him but cannot trust herself, so she grips the bedroll only as she rubs herself against his tongue, as she comes, as her cunt pulses and trembles beneath his ministrations. Her nails dig into the fabric; she almost rips through.

But then she collapses. It lets her down, and she goes utterly limp, her head falling back, her legs limp and thighs shaking, her hands still holding onto bits of fabric as though she's afraid she may tilt somehow and fall off the edge of the world. Her entire lower half is trembling. Her very breath is trembling. Even her heartbeat is arrhythmic.

Bastiano

He knew it. He knew she would come like this, ferocious and unfettered, helpless and lost. He knew she would be like this, a hot sweet wild thing twisting on what passes for his bed like a coil of flame, like a discharge of lightning.

He knew she would taste like this. He knew she would move like this, sound like this, clutch at the blankets like this, writhe like this, arch like this, ride his mouth like this. He knew she would come like this.

He knew none of this at all. He had no idea what it would be like to fuck her until he did. To taste her until he did. To love her, until he does. He had ideas, thoughts, fantasies, but they are utterly dwarfed by reality. They are blown away, burnt to white ash. What this is, what she is, is singular; staggering; he can't get enough.

He can't get enough of the taste of her. And he's still lapping at her, licking at her, loving her with his mouth -- he's still ravenous for her, merciless to her, until at last she simply can't anymore. Collapses, shaking; holding on to scraps of old fabric and wool like maybe, maybe, these things might save her.

He knows he has to stop, then. And he does, momentarily. Presses his brow to her belly, feels the quick little shivers deep in her flesh. Presses his hand to her for no reason he can explain -- fingertips over her clit, palm over her cunt. Perhaps it's meant to protect. If it is, it only protects her from his insatiability: when he kisses her, he kisses the backs of his fingers instead, fervently.

And then he levers up over her. There is something of the way he scaled her walls in this. The quickness and agility, the smoothly reined power. He climbs over her and moves between those shaking thighs; his knuckles brush her cunt as he strokes himself thoughtlessly, mindlessly, irrepressibly.

His mouth tastes like her when he kisses her. She's still only barely part of this world but he can't bear it anymore, can't wait:

"I need to fuck you." It's a low mutter; he says it like explanation, or perhaps an apology. "I need to come inside you," and he's pressing to her, guiding that cock back into her, sliding inside smooth and slow and powerful and barely, barely restrained. "Can you manage?"

Matilde

At the touch of his hand, she thinks he means to touch her again, and she can't bear it. She whimpers, almost pulls away, til she recognizes he's only covering her. She doesn't realize he kisses the back of his own hand in longing for her; her thighs close softly around his hand, self-comforting. She is panting, with the occasional gasp, still finding her way back from whatever plane she just reached.

Her eyes are closed then, but they open when he moves, drawing himself over her. She looks up at him with exhausted adoration, with recognition she can't name, only vaguely and distantly aware of the way he touches himself. She wants to smile but it barely curves her lips. She's lost. She's so lost.

She closes her eyes again as they kiss. She tastes herself again, kisses him slowly, trying to lean after him as he parts from her, telling her what he does.

Matilde laughs at him. Well: not at him. She just laughs, soft and pleased, perhaps a touch teasing: he certainly had his chance, didn't he? He's the one who wanted something else. That smile is tender, though, that laugh breathy and gentle. He is telling her he needs to come inside of her, and she shivers, and the shiver sets off an ache that makes her cry out, more helpless than before. She feels him pressing to her, and she puts her hand on his chest, trembling still. "A moment. Love... my love. I need a moment more."

Bastiano

Really, he's hardly waiting at all. The words are leaving his mouth and he's already fitting to her. But she stops him, puts her hand on his chest, and he

wants to howl, to be truthful.

He doesn't. He stops. He bows his head to hers, his breath escaping in a hot rush; his heart knocks against her palm and a slow shudder winds its way down his spine. She needs a moment. He needs ... something, something to keep his head from exploding. And his heart. And his cock.

His palms are flat to the ground. He waits. And after a while, he kisses her again, slowly and tenderly, more slowly and tenderly than he would have thought possible.

Matilde

Truthfully, she would understand if he did howl. It would break her heart, but she would understand. He doesn't, though. He rests against her, overcome, and one of her hands comes to rest on the back of his neck. It's a tender gesture, a point of contact that, at the moment, is all she can stand. She closes her eyes, keeps them closed, because the sight of him arouses her in a way she can't survive right now.

Kissing him, though; somehow that's different right now. The way he kisses her, the shock of his gentleness with her, the way their lips touch, tongues tasting. She sighs softly into it, fingertips drawing light spirals against the base of his skull, into that short-cropped hair of his.

It's only a minute, after that, maybe two. She's not human. She's not a woman. She's something else, and her heart doesn't quite return to baseline but it does slow somewhat, and her breathing steadies. Her blood begins to regulate itself more normally, but the truth is that she can remain in a heightened state far longer than any mortal. She is only rarely at true rest, total equilibrium. Her rage won't let her be any other way.

So her hand is finding his, palm sliding to meet his, fingers lacing with his. Her mouth moves on him, more heated, harder than a moment ago.

He knows, he must know, but when her legs wrap around him, he knows for certain what he may have only hoped.

Bastiano

He can feel everything right now. He can feel the night air moving over every inch of his skin. He can feel the coolness where sweat slicks his back, where it trickles down his side. He can feel her fingertips stirring every hair; conjuring the nearby, finer hairs on his neck to stand on end.

He can feel her kiss. The softness of her lips and the dexterity of her tongue; the shape of her flat human teeth. He can feel that kiss so keenly.

But not so keenly as he can feel her cunt. That wetness, that heat against the shaft of his cock; the occasional little clenches, involuntary, and so subtle that sometimes he can hardly tell whether it's her body that moves or his.

Then her hand finding his. Their palms meeting. Their fingers lacing. He grips firmly. She wraps her legs around him. He moans against her mouth, because he knows what this means. There is no mistaking it.

Not too long ago, when he wanted to get on top of her and fuck her immediately, he was so close to the edge. From fucking her with his cock, and then fucking her with his mouth. From bringing her off. From making her come so hard. From watching her come so hard. The intervening moments have given him some measure of equilibrium, but not very much. He pushes into her and he's moaning again, groaning deep in his chest like it costs him something to feel this good. His hand grips hers. His hand grips the bedding, too, which survived a trip over the Alps and months or years in the viper's nest of Florentine intrigue, but might not survive tonight.

He doesn't want to be far from her. He needs leverage to move. A compromise: his weight on his elbows, a sliver of space between. Not so far that he can't kiss her, which he does, consumingly. Not so near that he can't fuck her,

which he does, slowly at first; then faster, harder. The kiss tapers off. He fucks her with the same intensity, the same focus, as though his life or hers depended on this. His breathing is harsh, and his eyes are locked with hers. She can see everything she's doing to him in his eyes. She can see everything.

Near the end he can't anymore. He closes his eyes, and he cups the back of her head. Brings her up to him and kisses her with something almost like anguish; loses that, too, when he starts to moan. When he starts to lose himself, pounding her to the ground and then holding there, roaring against her mouth or against her neck or -- anything, anywhere he can find her, while every nerve in his body lights up, while every ounce of his intellect dissolves into primordial pleasure.

He is still holding her hand, though. There is that.

Matilde

It pleases her, how often he knows what she is telling him with a kiss, a touch, a silent urging. It pleases her as much as his words, his filthy and wicked murmurs whether in her bedchamber or spread out beneath a tree in the hills. She smiles into the kiss she's giving him when he answers her encircling legs with that heavy moan of his.

Truthfully, she doesn't expect this to be a gentle, slow fuck. She doesn't expect him to restrain himself any more than he already has. She's prepared for something far rougher, but that is not quite what he gives her. He pushes into her, fills her, and she gasps to feel him again. Does not tell him this is what she wanted all along: that she almost made him stop again, but didn't want to deny him something he clearly craves so deeply.

Her arms and legs wrap around him more tightly, hold him close to her as he kisses her like that, hungry, gripping her hand. She gasps when he moves, leverages himself up so he can fuck her, move against her. It's almost too much, and he can see it flashing in her eyes, her head tipping back. His mouth hits her throat; she lowers her head again, seeks his mouth, pants a breath hungrily against his lip.

When they can't kiss any longer she looks up at him, and he down at her. Their eyes stay together, their bodies, both of them bent to hunting the singular quarry of his pleasure now. She should hardly be able to move but she does, she does, fucking him back in counterpoint to those hunter's thrusts. Kisses him like that, her hands on his face, holding him deep inside of her body when he comes.

"Yes," she gasps to him, encouraging, when it starts to take him. "Yes, cuore mio, yes!" -- this last as he presses against her, into her, through her to the earth, burying himself in both.

Bastiano

When that blistering, scorching orgasm lets him go, it would not be unfair to say he collapses. Now it's he who can barely move. Now it's he who is barely coherent, sprawled over her like a felled beast, a heap of heat and heaviness, war-hewn limbs and war-hewn torso.

His ribs can barely contain his heart. His lungs. He still lets go the stray groan, moan, every so often. If she moves even a little, if her cunt so much as clenches, if his cock so much as twitches, he shudders like he might simply die. Or go mad. Or both. His hand isn't grasping hers anymore, but their palms still rest together. His fingers are loose. His eyes are closed, and his mouth is open, and when he has some semblance of sanity again he presses his open lips to her skin. Kisses, licks, tastes the salt of her sweat.

After a very long time, he rolls aside with a groan. The sudden coolness is almost too much. He opens his eyes to the stars, to the sky, to that ridiculous patched cowhide. Their legs are still tangled somehow. They're a mess. They should probably ... wash in the river. Something. He closes his eyes again.

Some time goes by.

And then some more.

And then he opens his eyes; turns to look at her. Raises his hand and, with the backs of his fingers, traces the outline of her face. They did not have time for this before. They have never had time like this before.

"Where do you want to go," he asks her softly, "after we've finished here?"

Matilde

He's not the only one shaking, panting. Her body still trembles around his, her pussy quivering on him. But she holds him all the same, her head turned to press her nose, her brow, her lips to the side of his neck, the crook of his shoulder. They hold one another, the night air starting to cool them. Soon they will want the fire, and to cover themselves in cloaks and one another's bodies.

Eventually he does have to leave her body. She is finally sated enough not to resent the loss too badly, and turns on her side as he flops on his back. Her hand comes to rest on his chest, protective, fingers curled lightly above his heart. They don't get up to wash. They don't get up to build a fire. She closes her eyes and rests her head on his shoulder, on his arm, while they both catch their breath.

Her eyes only open again when he touches her face like that, and her gaze finds his.

She smiles softly at him.

Whispers her answer:

"With you."

Bastiano

He smiles too. He cannot help it. It is an expression without guile, without pretense, pure and simple. His fingers are fascinated by the texture of her skin; he keeps touching her. Now the line of her cheekbone. Now the corner of her mouth.

"With me," he repeats softly, contentedly.

"Perhaps we'll go north," he adds after a little while. "It's been years since I've seen Offenburg. I could show you the town well my brothers and I nearly drowned each other in, playing. Or the lake where we fished in the summers.

"Or we could go to Vienna, if you like cities. It is not so large nor so important as Florence. But there is art there, and culture, and music. Probably blooddrinkers, too."

Matilde

If it were safe, she would have asked him to stay with her. Leave his strange army, come be her paramour, her lover, her guardsman,

her mate.

Her husband.

If she could, if it were possible in her position, she would have invited him to stay with her forever. She has no idea how many times she's done this. How many times he's found her, how many times she's asked him to stay. Make a home with her, a life, no matter what roles they each play in that life. She has no idea how many times he has, after years of wandering, found his home with her. In her.

Neither of them, even in the between-places of shadow and mist, have many memories of the year they had together at the very end of their lives, seeing each other for the first time with cloudy eyes, touching each other for the first time with weathered hands. Only a year or so together, then, the most joyful year of so very many.

Here and now, with true stars and a cloudless night sky, they have no memories at all. Just impressions, feelings they cannot explain but cannot resist. Still they touch each other the way they did once, a very long time ago, but their hands are young now, their skin taut, their eyes clear. Their whole lives ahead of them, this time. They have no idea what a gift it is, what a reparation,

and yet she still feels inexplicably grateful, all the same.

She laughs softly. Offenburg, his brothers, the lake. Vienna, music. And even vampires to hunt. She laughs again, brighter this time.

"Never far from the hunt, are you?" she murmurs, but it is hardly a question. She says it like she knows him. She says it because she does know him. She touches his cheek, too, unable to stop smiling at him. She does turn though, a bit, getting more comfortable. Looks up at the leather above them, then blinks, and frowns slightly, peering up at it with a quizzical expression.

"What sort of creature looks like that?"

Bastiano

There is a hint of self-deprecation in his laugh, but he answers earnestly. "I like to know I am making a difference."

She touches him, and his eyes close. Open again, slowly. Neither of them remember how many times, how very often, how many centuries, how many lifetimes. Neither of them know it now, but both of them feel it. Deep in their heart of hearts, they feel a connection, a recognition, something.

"I want to make a difference," he adds, softly.

Then she turns, and so does he. He looks at the stars. She looks at ... his raincover. And he laughs aloud this time. A quick little flicker of it before he is Very Serious Indeed.

"That pelt belonged to a great and monstrous beast I once hunted and slew," he deadpans. He can't hold it for long. A grin breaks: "A cow, mio amore. It is the hide of a rather large dairy cow from the far north of the Holy Roman Empire. Enormous udders, a lot of milk. It died of old age; there was no slaying involved."

Matilde

Something about that answer -- even before it is repeated, softer and with less laughter behind it -- hits her deeply. It occurs to her that he doesn't usually come right out and say it like that; not easily, not freely, not frequently. It makes her want to protect him all the more, defend him,

help him.

Her body is still feverishly hot to the touch, her fair skin still pink here and there. Even her fingertips and toes haven't yet cooled, despite their sweat, despite the night air. She doesn't ask him to build a fire, or move to build one herself. She doesn't move away from him, or seek to cover their bodies with the bedroll. The comfort she feels is evident in the relaxation of her form beside his: nude, in the wild, sated. Her hand is idly toying with his skin, lightly drawing her nails over his chest.

She gives a soft snort of laughter when he pretends it is a great beast. She smirks when he grins, finally, telling her it's a cow. She doesn't quite believe him at first, because she's never seen a cow with a pelt quite like this one, but he tells her it's from far away. He tells her how it died.

Matilde laughs again at the mention of udders, though. Her head turns; she looks at him, twisting to see him past the planes of his chest, curve of his shoulder.

"Tell me about your family," she says softly. "Your brothers. Your parents." And then, with a hint of difficulty: "What it was like, being a family."

Bastiano

He hears that note in her voice -- that hint of ache, too distant to be pain, too near to be poignancy. Almost unconsciously, his arm comes around her. He holds her.

"There were seven of us," he begins, "five boys, two girls, plus my parents. None of us have the true wolf, but we all know who we are. Most of us are still alive. My eldest brother died when he was just ten days old, though. None of us ever knew him. Next, our older sister. She married a tailor and learned the trade herself. Best dressmaker in Offenburg now, I'm told.

"Third was me. You already know my story. After me, twin brothers. One is at the university in Heidelburg. The other is a man of the cloth, in Leipzig. Sixth, another brother. Joined the infantry like me. One night he was guarding the horses and some bandits jumped him, killed him." A flicker of a grimace; an old and scarred-over hurt. "It was the most senseless thing.

"And then our youngest sister, just come of age last fall." He stretches a little under her, extending his back, straightening his limbs, relaxing again. "I suppose my father'll be trying to marry her to some rich merchant.

"I left home young. Been out in the world about as long as I was ever home. Truth be told I can hardly remember what it was like, but ... I think it was hard work, mostly. We're simple farm folk. My father herds sheep, plants barley. In the winters my mother sells ointments and tinctures to put a few coins in the coffer. We all pitched in, growing up. But it's funny, isn't it; most of the memories I have are of times of leisure. Rambling through the woods with my brothers. That one time boys from the foundry stepped out of line with our sister, and me and the twins straightened them out. Sledding down the hill behind our house in winter."

A small pause. And then his hand covers hers where it toys with him, traces patterns on his skin.

"Where do you suppose you're from?" he asks quietly. "Does anyone know?"

Matilde

Curiosity. Vulnerability, too: being curious about such things was discouraged. But he tells her. Wraps his arm around her shoulders, holds her to his side, and tells her about his four brothers and his two sisters, all kin, most surviving. She hasn't stopped stroking his chest but her hand pauses when he mentions his youngest brother's death. It's not much; a moment of honor, of respect for his remembrance. When he mentions his youngest sister it's on the tip of her tongue to offer to help with that: she has often arranged matches, and it is one of the ways she has gained influence over the years here. It's habit to think of it, but she stops herself from suggesting it. The sister is in Offenburg, and Matilde won't be staying here much longer.

Besides, she's distracted in the midst of the thought: he stretches, and she looks down at him, feels him against her body, and the smallest flicker of wanting re-ignites in the middle of her. When he relaxes she gets a little closer, a movement that -- if she were mortal, if her skin were not so very warm to the touch -- might indicate she's getting cold.

Still she listens, soaking in the memories he shares with her. He holds her hand. She feels, not for the first or dozenth time, that she's known him all her life.

His question doesn't seem to hurt her, as though the more she shares with him the more comfortable it becomes to admit these things: weaknesses, wounds, things she would never dream of revealing, usually. Things she thinks of so seldom she almost forgets that they make up her history. Her life.

She shakes her head. "You know how far and how fast we can run. I could have gone miles. Whole territories. I wondered. I wanted to look. But it was discouraged." She pauses a moment. "And I am not sure what I would find, if anything at all. The stories I have heard of other wolves like myself, ones who cannot remember anything from their life before... they are not happy tales."

There's a pause, while she lets herself be cradled close to him. "My mentor was also a Galliard. Her name was Alessandra, and she taught me the ways of influence and persuasion, whether by word or song or gift. I learned the history of my people from her, and the laws. Her elder sister, kin like you, was a courtesan. She had once been the mistress of a powerful man. She taught me how to behave in places like Florence. Their grandmother was responsible for watching over me otherwise. Someone had to teach me the foundations before I could learn anything else.

"I remember her brushing my hair," Matilde murmurs, permitting herself -- in a way she has not for a long time -- to indulge in memories. "Kept me from running away. Fed me, made sure I had clothes and a place to sleep." A brief huff of laughter, a tug at the corner of her mouth. "Made sure I kept dirt off my face."

Bastiano

You know how far and how fast, she says, and he makes a small sound of assent. Oh yes, he knows. He remembers, from not so very long ago.

"Sometimes we forget what we cannot bear to remember," he muses, or agrees. "Perhaps your mentors were right, and that stone is best left unturned."

She moves on, at any rate. He listens as she tells him of her mentor, a Galliard; of influence and persuasion, of history and law, of the arts of intrigue, seduction, etiquette in a city like Florence. He laughs when she does, a hint of astonishment in the sound.

"You seem so much a creature of Florence now that I can scarcely imagine different," he admits. "They've taught you well."

Matilde

"Bisnonna would tell you stories of what an animal I was, if she still could." She says this wryly, for the most part. It isn't grief he hears in her voice; just respect for one cared for, one passed on now.

She breathes in deeply, then climbs atop him. Not straddling, not preparing to saddle him up for another ride, just using his body like a bed as if she had a right to do this, to wrap her arms around him and rest her head on his chest. Her weight isn't insignificant; she's got those hips, those breasts, that firm musculature hiding underneath the softness. But even then she's smaller than he is, in this form. Her skin is paler. Female to male, and terribly warm.

Her arms fold slightly on his chest, her cheek propped on one set of knuckles as she peers up at him. "You seem... a loner. Even coming from six brothers and sisters."

Bastiano

She isn't saddling him up for another ride, but he doesn't know that. One can't blame him for touching her waist, holding her by the hips. One can't blame him for stirring beneath her, both voluntarily and not, before he realizes:

oh. They're not going anywhere. Yet.

So he relaxes again. One knee that has drawn up a ways relaxes again. She folds her forearms over his chest and he is reminded of a cat, of something carnivorous but sated, eyes hooded with satisfaction. He raises his hand to her face, combing her hair back tenderly, touching her lips.

"I suppose I am." Again, a musing agreement. "I suppose that was part of why I left my crowded, boisterous family just about as soon as I could. Which isn't to say I don't care for them, or miss them; I do. But I am fine, caring and missing from afar."

A few seconds of thought. Then, "I could say the same of you. You dwell in the eye of the social storm, but you seem to stand apart from it."

Matilde

Oh, she notices. How he responds. How he warms to her, how he touches her. She smiles. Of course there is a glint in her eye as he settles, as she goes on conversing with him. He strokes back her -- admittedly somewhat messy -- hair, and she falls apart somewhat, crumbling to pieces inside. Maybe it's because she was just talking about her bisnonna brushing her hair. Maybe it's because no one ever touches her so tenderly, or because she never wants anyone to.

And then he sees that, too. Sees her in the midst of a ball and remembers that she was alone, and stayed alone after he left, except for particular errands and conversations that were necessary. Sees that she kept to herself. Recognized it: a piece of himself, and a memory of her.

She smiles. She nods. "I have always felt... apart," she finishes, because 'alone' isn't the right word. Too keen, and perhaps too maudlin. "I do not mind it." Her brow furrows. "There are times when I have wanted a pack. Those to share myself with who would understand, both in body and spirit.

"Now I have met you, and I wonder if a pack was really what I longed for," she whispers.

Bastiano

It could be daunting: to be the sole focus of her waiting. To suddenly bear the weight of her hope and longing. It might frighten off a lesser man; once upon a time, lifetimes ago and for lifetimes on end, it may well have frightened him away.

Or her.

Now, though: he ... crumbles inside too, a little, and it shows in his eyes. A sudden ache, a slow measured intake of breath. Then he lifts his head and he kisses her, just as tenderly as he'd touched her hair, her face. He is not frightened. He feels honored beyond words, privileged and blessed. Set apart.

"Now you have me," he murmurs, "and I have you."

Matilde

Not for the first time, the press of his lips to hers makes her eyes close. She can't help it; she wants to lose herself in those moments of contact, those blessings. That is how it feels to her: like the hand of a priest on her brow. Like grace, freely given. Her eyes stay closed for a moment after they part, too. She stays in it for a heartbeat, before her eyelashes lift again.

She doesn't mean to rest a burden on him. To fixate. To obsess. But she has seldom longed for friendship or confidants, except for a certain awareness of something missing. Someone. She always thought it meant she wanted packmates beside her, a warm pile of fur, other wolves hunting alongside her. And yet now there is this, and the nagging edge of that awareness has faded. It feels right. It is no replacement for a pack, for a spirit-bond, for a hunt, but it is something else entirely, something far more vital, far more necessary.

It occurs to her that she likely could never have succeeded with a pack, before also having him in her life. There would always be a disconnect, a disappointment, a frustrated expectation she couldn't explain.

Having him feels like freedom.

Matilde sighs softly, wrapping herself around him, feeling his arms close around her. "You are mine," she whispers, "and I am yours."