reznikolai | I N B O X

[It's a little frightening, feeling someone else's emotions trembling inside your own heart. He doesn't know where his end and Alina's begin, because in this moment their separate hurts echo one another. It's the ache of wanting something, and being able to close your hands around it, but knowing you can never keep it.

Despite that ache, Nikolai can't help but sigh a smile at her petulant response. It is the farthest from how a queen ought to act, but in this moment that's part of why he loves her. Her unrefined honesty, her yearning for more choices than the narrow path placed before her. All of her unapologetic. It's because of those qualities that he could let go of all his masks around her.

(He doesn't think the word, love. He doesn't dare approach it, but he feels it anyway. That he has no control over.)]

Perhaps not. But it's the life I've chosen.

[With his thumb he traces over Alina's cheekbone. He thinks about what it will be like to return to that life when this interlude reaches its end. The Grand Palace will feel hollow after the coziness they've imbued their home with here. How long will it take him to stop expecting to see her when he looks up from his dinner? To stop reaching for her when he wakes up in the morning, alone in his bed? (Not alone for long, he reminds himself cheerlessly.) As he caresses her face, he doesn't know who he's trying to soothe, him or her.]

Today though...I am all yours.

[He can't promise her a lifetime, or any of the usual romantic little pledges that men lavish on women. But they have today, and tomorrow, and perhaps the next day.]

[ She collects his hand against her cheek with her own, closing her eyes to relish in the touch. It is not Zoya's fault that they are both marching towards different ends, but her presence is an acute reminder of the temporary nature of their arrangement.

Like flowers wilting as summer turns to autumn and to winter.

She turns to press her lips against his palm. ]

You are more self-sacrificial than a saint.

[ To lend himself to her when each day makes their impending separation more painful. She draws his hand to her chest, leaning into his seeking the comfort of embrace. She too is not used to openly seeking the comfort of another. Her survival instinct and stubborn streak are too strong. Her responsibility too heavy to ask anyone to bear with her.

But they can rest together along this long road. ]

And that is why you are a better king than Ravka deserves.

[ Brave and giving of himself. It was once ambition that drove him to the throne, and now it's something so much greater. He is strong enough to do what is right, proudly putting his duty in front of himself when it would be so easy to make other choices.

And in that moment, that is part of why she loves him. How cruel this universe is that it took until now to see it, to see him without his mask.

She murmurs into his chest: ] But please be mine for now.

[As she tucks herself into his chest, he wraps his arms around her, as if that might hold them in this impermanent moment. He cradles the back of her head, petting her hair.]

I don't know if it's self-sacrifice so much as stubbornness.

[Nikolai has long understood that he and Ravka are intertwined. They are one and the same. Turning his back on his country amounts to giving up on himself — when one drowns, the other goes under too.

Here and now, he reminds himself, as he often has since they began down this path together. When the weight of the responsibilities waiting for him in Ravka start to drag him into the the darker depths of his thoughts, she keeps him afloat. Tucking his chin to kiss her hair, to breathe her in, he exhales what might be a chuckle if it had any weight.]

It's far too lovely a day to be this melancholy, Alinochka.

[Nikolai slides his hands down her back and into the pockets of her shorts. Playfully, he grabs her rear and pulls her into a swaying pattern with him. This end of the beach is sparsely populated — a group of friends relaxing on a blanket here, another pair kicking through the surf there. They're granted privacy by their lack of titles and by this culture's habituation to public displays of affection. They are just another couple on the beach.]

[ How does he do that? Just charges forward even when the strings of fate that hold them in the positions the play for Ravka make themselves known. He doesn't shake them off, doesn't fight against them or run away like she's inclined to some days. He accepts them, stubborn and relentless in a way that deprives them of their power.

Still, she wonders what ambition he might have followed if he wasn't bound to the throne. Is that indeed what he wants? She is afraid to ask, because if she asks if he wants to be a king, she may have to answer if she would choose to be a saint.

It's not a question she intends to contend with today or maybe ever. Instead, she relents, softening into his embrace, grumbling in a way that is more exaggerated and playful than genuinely mournful. Her weight sinks against him as she loops her arms behind his neck, swaying from the ball of one foot to the other with him. They get to be so freely affectionate here. Even in the alternate impossible future they might have had together, she can't imagine the scandal a scene like this might have caused among the royal court. ]

I'll have you know I can be melancholy no matter the weather. [ She can't keep a straight face when he is already successfully cheering her up. ] Unless you have any suggestions for brightening my mood.

[His time here with her has only thrown into sharper clarity what he has decided to sacrifice for the sake of his throne and his country. It's another life that they live here, where they are not king and saint but just a boy and a girl. The longer he indulges in this life, the deeper he sinks into its little routines and pleasures, the harder it becomes to sever himself from it as he knows he must someday.

But today is not someday. Today they are still Kolya and Alinochka, free to do as they please without consideration for the consequences. Free to be reckless in ways he cannot entertain in Ravka. His only duty is to cheer her up, which he does by ducking in to sneak a soft kiss when she lifts her head from his chest. Her lips still taste like the sherbet they'd finished in tense quiet after parting ways with Zoya.]

Have I mentioned how lovely you look today?

[What a fine time to remind her, in case there remains any lingering soreness he must soothe after their encounter with Zoya. Flattery comes easily to Nikolai after so many years of navigating court, but his words carry a warm gleam of honesty that Alina should recognize by now. He continues swaying back and forth with her.]

Or shall I remind you of what an ass I made of myself on this very beach the last time we were here?

[When he had reunited with her — hungover, with his clothes clumsily cropped and his phone loaded with all kinds of damning evidence — he accepted her teasing with as much grace as he could muster. His eyebrows lift as if an idea has just struck him, and his grin turns sly.]

Ah, do you think I could do a better job of cheering you up if we found somewhere more private?

[He emphasizes the last word with a gentle squeeze of her ass through her pockets.]

Edited (sees a typo a day later) 2021-08-07 21:52 (UTC)

[ Her lips pull into an even larger grin, ducking her head as she stifles a laugh. Oh, she remembers... well, she at least remembers better than Nikolai apparently did, which is impressive considering how much Alina had imbibed that night as well.

Slipping her fingers through his belt loops, she tugs him to stay flush against her body, jerking in surprise but ending with a laugh as he gooses her. ]

Yes, if I remember correctly you promised to find a way to repay me in person after our little chat.

[ She presses up on her toes, dotting his lips with a teasing kiss. Of course he had repaid his debt several times over, but she has no problem lovingly taunting him about it now. ]

I hope you have somewhere more private than the rocks in mind. Somehow I think your judgement might have been a little off that evening...

[Nikolai has the grace to look sheepish as she pokes at one of the more questionable decisions he made that night. While he has little memory of, ah, getting a little too excited right there on the beach, the photo evidence stands as a testament to his reckless abandonment of propriety. And while he has repaid Alina with all kinds of favors in the intervening weeks, he doesn't bother to argue the point. He enjoys spoiling her with attention, now that she's so receptive to it.]

My judgment was drowning in a preposterous quantity of liquor. A rather gruesome death, drowning is.

[Over her head, he surveys the stretch of beach. Up the shore stands a cluster of wooden partitions housing showers, for beachgoers to rinse the sand and salt out before they leave. It's partially hidden by an explosion of bushes with broad leaves and bright yellow flowers. Nikolai cants his head toward the showers with a raised eyebrow.]

I have somewhere in mind...

[Drawing away from Alina, he turns his back to her and squats halfway to the sand. The look he tosses her over his shoulder is playful.]

Your steed awaits, my lady.

What are you—

[ She stops, laughing as he squats down and realizes he's offering to carry her, like one might carry a child. She rakes her brain trying to remember if anyone has ever offered her such playful affection and she comes up short. If they ever have, she was certainly too young to remember.

With a smile on her face, she climbs up onto his back. ]

A steed that's more noble than feral, I hope. I'm sorely out of practice riding and even the Little Palace horses acted like I didn't belong...

[Once Alina clamps onto his back, Nikolai reaches behind to support her thighs and straightens out. Across the sands they go.]

Now, don't be so modest. You've done quite well with riding here.

[Of course there's a suggestive curl to his words. He enjoys feeling her body pressing into his back, her arms wrapping his shoulders. After carrying the metaphorical weight of an entire country on his shoulders for years, it's freeing to have only the weight of one soul to worry about. As he walks, he focuses on that weight and lets it become all that matters right now.

Even when they cross the threshold of the showers, he doesn't pause to let her down. The floor is made of smooth slabs of white stone. The walls rising around them are more like wooden screens raised on metal legs, and the ceiling is simply the open sky. The wooden partitions form a central hallway that opens up to a few shower stalls on each side. Quiet envelopes the place, removed from the clamor of the beach.]

It sounds like we're alone.

[ Alina feigns a scandalized gasp as he makes salacious entendres at her with his less than innocent references to riding. The slip of her hand across his chest and the affectionate press of her lips to a spot behind his ear suggest that she really is anything but. ]

We better make the most of it then.

[ She whispers directly into his ear, holding back a lighthearted giggle (Saints, who ever thought Alina would be chipper enough to giggle). Her hand at his chest toys with one of the buttons on his shirt as she presses light kisses to his jaw and neck. ]

I have no intention of sharing you now that I've got you alone.

[He cants his head just a few degrees, inviting her kisses with a quiet sigh, just the barest shift in breath.]

And I have no intention of looking anywhere else but at you.

[Because her selfishness enables his, just as his enables hers. If either of them broke the circle, the reality kept at bay beyond would flood in and threaten to drown them. Right now, he doesn't want to think of the reality awaiting him in Ravka. He wants only to lose himself in her, in this thing that might be perfect if not for all the reasons it cannot last.

Nikolai turns into a stall at the end of the hallway. There, he finally eases Alina down to the floor. No sooner has he straightened again than he's turning to curl his arm around her waist and tip her chin up towards him for a kiss. The words even his clever tongue can't form, he puts into the hungry push of his lips. As he kisses her hard, he guides her backwards until he has her corralled against the wall.]

[ Alina meets him eagerly. She is bold in the way she opens her mouth to him. There is no finesse or teasing, she is hungry for him and the affection he feeds her so easily. She wants him to bull his way in between her thighs while clever fingers start making quick work of the buttons of his shirt. ]

You know that night, I couldn't stop thinking about you. [ She pulls back, speaking through panted breaths and half-lidded eyes. ] I couldn't wait for you to get back. I touched myself thinking of all the ways you would touch me.

[ She closes all the spaces between their bodies, feigning a doe-eyed look. Usually she is the one granting him mercy but perhaps she has not been on her best behavior recently. ]

Should I have been good and waited for you?

[Just as he has learned the geography of her body in all the time they've spent exploring each other — the days strung together into weeks, the weeks into tentative, hopeful, foolish months — so too has he learned the language of her body. He can read Alina's desires in the bold push of her lips, as if he might slip away if she doesn't forcibly pin his mouth with hers. In the impatience of her fingers pulling his shirt open.

Nikolai answers in kind, wedging himself between her delightfully bare thighs to let her feel the beginnings of his arousal, thick and hot through the light fabric of his trousers.]

You only would have been very disappointed if you'd waited for me.

[His low laugh rolls against her ear. As he seizes another kiss, his fingers make fast work of the fastenings holding her shorts up, letting them slouch down her waist.]

I left you high and dry that night... [He draws back only far enough to allow him to yank the shorts down her thighs, sending the garment to the smooth stone floor.] Or not so dry, I should think.

[Rolling his hips against her, filling in the empty space between them like a hungry stomach as they slot together.]

Edited 2021-08-28 19:50 (UTC)

[ Alina has gotten greedy, learning to relish the heavy and delightful weight of his body pushed against. Would she ever tire of feeling so openly desired? Chosen freely? She doesn't think so. But her thinking isn't even that deep right now, focused far more in the slide of Nikolai's lips, the slip of her tongue, the taste of him against her mouth, than fixating on all the improbabilities that had to line up for this moment. ]

No not dry.

[ She laughs her confirmation, kicking her shorts off her legs and losing a sandal in the process. Lifting one leg, she hinges her hips open, ass against the wall of the shower stall as she hooks a leg around him with precarious balance. ]

Just frustrated until I decided to use my own hands. [ But her tone is still teasing, a light air in her cadence, brushing her fingers against his bottom lip, trapping them there as she presses up for another kiss, hungry for him in all the same ways like she was that night. ] Remind me what yours can do?

[He has become quite good at pretending with her. Not in the way he had done so all those years ago, with so many masks in place he himself hardly knew which version of Nikolai was the true one — in this way they've invented together. This little fantasy that he can't help but wish were a viable path instead of a dead end.

Nikolai runs his hand from the hook of her knee to her thigh, squeezing the curve of her ass, playfully snapping the band of her panties.]

Next time we decide to be indecent in a public setting, you might consider planning ahead, Alinochka. Wear a skirt and forego the underwear.

[Taking another kiss, capturing her bottom lip with his teeth, he sets to reminding her of how well his hands treat her. He tugs aside the narrow stretch of fabric hiding her cunt and tests his fingers at her entrance. Already slick. Expectant. He strokes her, coaxing her further down the twisting path of pleasure.]

[ She swats at him, feigning scandal, but she is hardly protesting. Her head tips forward, burying it against his shoulder with a pleasurable groan. Her fingers curl in his shirt of balance as he slips his fingers between her legs and makes easy work of her while a stupid little fantasy intrudes into her mind. ]

Don't make promises you won't deliver on.

[ Of course she knows there is no threat of that. She doesn't make a habit of wearing many skirts, but she knows he wouldn't be able to keep his hands to himself if she tempted him at brunch.

But that isn't the image that holds her attention. She thinks of his him ducking out from underneath a long gown, his face smug and slick as she grips a marble column of the grand palace for balance behind her. ]

Ah— [ She swallows, trying to push it out of her head. ] You're the schemer anyway. And I can't make things too easy for you.

[A similar fantasy may be fluttering somewhere in the back of his thoughts too. She hardly ever wears skirts or dresses here, but in Ravka, if he could have made her his queen... Well, the Grand Palace has so many alcoves and out-of-the-way rooms they might put to better use. It would be easy enough to smooth her skirts back into place after they'd had their fun, to carry on as if nobody could interpret the real meaning of their flushed faces.

This is nothing more than an idle what if, of course. Alina's warm body under his touch, however, is incredibly vivid. He grips this present thrill in the fore of his mind. Her hands balling in his shirt, her lovely mouth groaning against his shoulder, her body blooming for him as he strokes her folds in a steady rhythm.]

I'm quite serious about my pledge of public indecency...

[There's a touch of irony in their talk of promises and pledges, when he cannot make the kinds of vows he most wants to offer her.

If she wants him to be hers, for now — if she wants to forget that it's only for now...he intends to do all he can to make that happen. He kisses her hair as he pushes a finger inside her, brushing his thumb against her clit.]

Mhm.

[ Her mouth opens against the skin on top of his shoulder, drawing a decadent groan as he slips a finger inside of her. She is warm, wet, and welcoming to him. ]

I wonder what else I could get you to promise me.

[ It sneaks out of her mouth against her better judgement. She doesn't have a whole ton of that to spare in the first place, but Nikolai's eager fingers easily coax her into admitting the little intoxicating thoughts that flit across her mind. ]

[Despite the open sky above them, the stone floors and closely enjoined walls catch her moan and echo it back all around him, its sweetness amplified. How can he help but answer her the way he wishes he could?]

I'll promise you anything you want...

[A reckless offer, a foolish offer, when there is so much he cannot give her. His hands are bound by their divided destinies.

But not these hands, probing her, teasing her. He withdraws his finger only for the sake of undoing his pants. Letting the garment slouch down his ass, he tugs down his underwear just enough to spring his cock free. Keeping Alina's panties pulled to the side, he presses against her. A roll of his hips, and his shaft slides tantalizingly across her entrance. Her slickness feels like a kiss against his hot skin. His breath catches in her hair.]

Be mine.

[ A greedy, hungry demand. A demand that she thinks can fill up all the lonely, empty spaces inside of her that she now wants singly and wholly filled by him. It lacks the caveat from earlier— the for now that made this a reasonable ask of him. She likes to think that they are the same, tells herself that the for now is implicit. In reality, it's as reckless and foolish as his offer to give her anything she wants.

These are not promises or pledges they can actually make to each other, and maybe there is a safety in a sorrow in knowing the impermanence that lets her admit she wants him to fill the aching place between her legs and in her chest. She guides him, wrapping a hand around his cock to settle at her entrance. She wants him, the desperate man who is still so generous with his pleasure, the man that whispers sweet and filthy things alike to her while he's buried inside of her. She wants him so badly that it actually hurts, more so when she has to contend with the fact that this will end one day.

But without that, she's not sure she would ask for something so greedy and impossible of him being hers. ]

I need you. [ Its a low whine as she lines him up to slot inside of her. ] Fuck me so good that I'll never forget it.

Edited 2021-09-04 04:45 (UTC)

[The rush is more urgent than usual, the rituals of affection curtailed. The setting of their tryst certainly encourages brevity. There's no time to spare for wandering through one another's touch, lingering at favorite spots here and there — not if they hope to minimize the chances of being discovered.

But more than that, it's the heavying sense that their time together is limited that provokes this desperation. A desperation to retreat into one another, as if that might stave off the day they both know must come. A desperation to forget they could ever be anyone else's.

With his grip firm on her thigh, Nikolai pushes inside her. A sigh strains in his throat. His lips seek hers, hungry for all those sweet little noises that spill out.]

Then you'll have me. I will never not be yours.

[A promise caught somewhere between lie and truth. Even when this is over, when he returns and she's another man's wife and he marries a Shu princess... He will still love her. Even if she doesn't know it, some piece of him will still be hers.

This is what eddies inside of him as he pins Alina to the wall by the steady force of his hips, and he steals a hand up her shirt to squeeze her tit, and he pours a stream of kisses into her lips. Forget with him. Remember him.]

[ Men have told her lies and half-truths before in hopes to make her theirs, so they could use her power and glory as a queen or a saint and claim it as their own.

This is not one of those times.

(It might be easier if it was).

Hearts and promises exchanged, Alina whines once again at the utter unfairness of it all against his lips. The stretch of him is sudden and blunt, but they do not have the time for the meandering affectionate exchanges, not in the life that she wants it. Neither of them owns their fate enough to give it freely to the other, and for a moment Alina is forced to contend with the fact that letting herself fall in love resulted in a sacrifice of her own making. She does not think the word love. She might think the word love.

People think ridiculous things in the heat of the moment. Men are supposed to make ridiculous promises seeking the warmth between women's legs, and the wet slide of bodies, a possessive hand at their breasts, a shower of shockingly affectionate kisses are supposed to make them believe. ]

I wish— [ Stuttered and stopped with the rhythm of her body, arms wrapped around him and clinging as she tries to pull herself into the whole of his grip. She is light enough and he is strong enough that it should work.

What does she wish? That it was true? It is, but it isn't. She wishes that fate and time were not so cruel.

(Maybe they aren't, she thinks belatedly. After all, fate and time gave them this.)

Her head curls into the top of his shoulder, panting heavily as her fingers dig into the skin of his back. Her traitorous heart cracks. ]

I want you to be happy.

[In the heat of the moment he has said all manner of things to her. Sweet things, obscene things. This is a little bit of both. Sweet at the first taste, but obscene the longer it lingers.]

I'm happy right now, Alinochka.

[With their bodies enmeshed, her head bent into his shoulder, her nails scraping his skin as if meaning to reach inside of him. This is where Nikolai finds happiness. In being chosen by her. In knowing that she will be there when he wakes up, when he comes home. For the present, he can't imagine finding this place with anyone else. Nor can he bring himself to be embarrassed by how dramatic that thought is as it settles in his heart. It's a child's stubbornness, a romantic sop's conviction. A king can ill afford to be either.

I want you to be happy too, he almost murmurs in return. But he already knows Alina finds her happiness. She will get to fade into quiet obscurity and devote her life to one man instead of to an entire nation. Just as she wanted.

Instead, in answer to her efforts to hoist herself into his grip, he hooks his arms around her thighs and lifts her off the wall. By pushing his hips forward and pulling her down onto him, he builds a powerful rhythm that reverberates through him.]

I want to make you happy... [The end of the sentence dissolves on a moan as he buries himself deep inside her.] I wish I could keep making you happy.

[A desire more selfish than hers. He isn't ready to let this go. All of her in his arms. All of them knotted up together. The desperate rush of it all — with his clothes hanging off of him, the edge of her pushed aside panties rubbing against his cock as he slides in and out — makes this pleasure more potent. Dizzying, intoxicating. He loves to think that she's trying to cling to this as fiercely as he is.]

[ Weightless in his arms, an ease at odds with the punishing pace he sets, both equally desperate for something the world has cruelly denied him. It makes no sense to think of a version of themselves where they are not King and Saint, but she thinks of it anyway, either posts that were abandoned or those that never were in the first place.

(She thinks she would have punched him if she ever met him as a corporal in the First Army, and that thought is more comforting than it should be.) ]

Don't stop.

[ Making her happy or fucking her? It probably doesn't matter if one permits the other. She feels the gusset of her panties rub across her clit as he moves, the friction hot across her even with the slick that's gathered. Saints, it's too much and not enough. She is going to be red and sore for days, and Nikolai, her kind, sweet, giving, infuriating, smug Nikolai will keep her in bed with his mouth on her cunt, his tongue slowly and languidly laving across her, pressing kisses to her thighs as he soothes her with filthy and affectionate whispers.

The contrast of it, the fact that he is both, that she has both, that for awhile she gets to pretend that she will forever have him and all of him, is almost enough to make her come. ]

Please. Please, please Kolya. [ She doesn't even know what she's pleading for, sounding more like a whine and a whimper than a cutting command. She feels at his mercy in his arms. ] I want you.

[ And how could he deny her when she asks so nicely? ]

Edited 2021-09-23 05:37 (UTC)

[I'm yours to command, he told her the first time they ever slipped into bed together. To be sure, he had meant it then — wanting her to feel completely comfortable as they crossed new territory, he let her lead the way. But now, months later, he feels the words at a deeper level. In the stuff of his bones, the molten liquid of his core. For now, he wants nothing more than to fulfill her every desire, dangle from her every word. For now, for now.]

You know me... [His words roughen with his breath.] I never stop.

[Nikolai is unrelenting in his efforts to fuck her well and good. Pulling her into him, he drives deep inside again and again. The sound of them, a cadence of bodies crashing together, fills the stall. He knows he's demanding a lot, and he looks forward to taking care of her later as she recovers. This, and this too. So many damned lovely little pieces of this life they've discovered.

At this greedy pace, it isn't long before he hits his climax. Suddenly, his grip tightens around her, his hips stutter in their rhythm.]

That's a good girl—

[A moan quakes from his mouth, quivering at her ear. As he spills his seed into her, he keeps pushing for as long as he can.]

I N B O X

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

definitely turning nsfw

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)