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Solas idly rubbed his chin as he perused the old manuscript on his desk. It was a rare manuscript written by a Tevinter Enchanter, and this likely explained how the manuscript was startlingly accurate in some ways, yet incorrect entirely in others. When the Tevinter Imperium had so casually scavenged the ancient elvhen ways, one could not expect them to steal every morsel of magical knowledge in a completely accurate fashion.
He turned the page and read the end of the passage: ‘The act of passing through the Veil is much more about changing one's perceptions than a physical transition. The Veil is an idea, it is the act of transition itself, and it is only the fact that both living beings and spirits find the transition difficult that gives the Veil any credence as a physical barrier at all.’
Not entirely true. But also not incorrect, Solas thought. Despite himself, he was mildly impressed by this Enchanter Mareno’s description of the Fade. He sat forward to pick up a plume, ready to start a new list of books he needed the librarian to procure.
“Don’t move,” Nare said urgently.
Solas looked up and met her ocean-coloured eyes. She was sitting across from him with a chalk stylus in her fingers, and though her arm was shielding the parchment she’d laid on his desk, he could see the tentative lines of a sketch.
He blinked. “Why should I not move?”
“I’m drawing you,” she said. Then she smirked and tucked an errant strand of russet hair back into her bun. “Or, well. I am attempting to, I should say.”
Solas gazed at Nare appreciatively. At her behest, he’d begun teaching her the basics of figure drawing a few months ago. Every time he saw her sketching, her lovely face creased with concentration as she tried to put his words into action, his heart twisted with a bittersweet mixture of pride and regret – regret that more people in this world weren’t like her.
Then again, if more of them were like her, then his future would all be that much more difficult to bear.
He brushed the macabre thoughts aside. “That is a good challenge,” he said. “May I?” He leaned forward to better see her parchment.
“No!” She hastily covered it with both hands. “I’m not done yet.”
“I would still like to see,” Solas said gently. “I am always interested in the progress of your work.”
“No, not yet,” she insisted. Then she lifted her chin. “Sit back, please, Solas. I need my subject to be still.”
Her tone was dignified, but her eyes were crinkled at the corners. Solas smiled in turn before respectfully bowing his head. “As you wish, Inquisitor,” he said, and he settled back in his chair.
She beamed at him, and they each returned to their tasks – or at least, Solas tried to return to his. But he couldn’t help but watch her from the corner of his eye. Her brows were creased in concentration as she sketched with brisk short strokes, and seeing her so focused was both unusual and dear; she was normally so active and full of movement, radiant with energy and purpose as her quick-thinking mind jumped from task to task. These quiet moments when Nare was drawing were some of the few times when she was settled and still.
He loved her activity and the brisk purpose with which she approached her everyday tasks, of course. But these moments of quiet, of time shared together despite their separate activities, were… unspeakably precious. And as it often happened, a dizzying sense of unreality poked his mind at the thought of how very together he and Nare felt.
He, Solas, the wolf who walked alone, being together with someone in this staid and static era: he had never expected this. He had certainly never intended it. And yet, here they were.
Nare glanced up at him, likely to capture some aspect of his expression or his pose. Then she smiled. “You look happy,” she remarked.
I am happy, he thought. Truly, he was happier than he had ever expected to be since the moment he’d awoken in this tranquil time. He only wished he could savour this happiness without its inevitable edge of bitterness.
Once again, he pushed the melancholy thought aside. “Is my happiness a problem?” he said playfully.
She smiled. “It is, actually. When I started this sketch, you were frowning. You should go back to that.”
He smirked at her playful tone. ”Perhaps you should use your imagination, then. Push your artistic bounds.”
Nare’s eyes widened. “But you told me before to try and draw what I see! Which is it? Should I be trying to draw what I see, or drawing from my imagination?”
He chuckled. “You make a fair point. I will resume my frown if it will assist your efforts.”
“Good,” she said pointedly. “Thank you.” She shot him a mock-annoyed look, then returned to her drawing.
Solas forced his face into a serious expression and dropped his gaze back to his manuscript. This time, he actually did manage to return his attention to the text.
Just as he was finishing a remarkably inaccurate paragraph about the nature of healing spirits, Nare sighed loudly. Then he heard the distinct crinkling sound of a parchment being rumpled.
He looked up to find Nare in the midst of crumpling up her drawing. He hastily reached out and placed a hand over hers. “Wait,” he said.
“It’s terrible,” she complained. “I need to start over.”
“That is not a reason to discard what you have already done,” Solas insisted.
Nare gave him a pleading look. “But it’s awful. I don’t even want to look at it.”
“Nare, we have spoken of this,” he said sternly. “You should not destroy your initial attempts. This is a record of your progress. If you throw this away, you will not be able to see how you improved.”
She gazed at him in exasperation. “You’ve been trying to teach me to draw for months. Do you really think I’m making progress?”
“Yes, I do,” he said.
She raised her eyebrows skeptically. “Really?”
“Yes,” he said firmly. “Your improvement is… gradual, but it is clear.”
She scoffed. “Gradual, you say.”
“Yes, gradual,” he said seriously. “That is the normal way of learning this skill.” Then he smiled slightly to lighten the mood. “We cannot all be naturally gifted artists.”
She laughed, just as he’d hoped. “No need to be cocky, hah’ren.”
An instinctive spark of heat warmed his belly at her irreverent nickname. “And there is no need to discount your attempts, da’len,” he retorted.
She grinned at him. She was a portrait of warmth, warm gilded skin and warm auburn hair and the warmth simmering in her beautiful blue eyes, and Solas smiled helplessly back at her.
Finally she sighed and toyed idly with the corner of her wrinkled page. “So I suppose if I folded this into a paper crane and threw it up into the library, that would make me a bad art student.”
“Yes, Nare,” Solas said with a playful sort of patience. “That would make you a very bad art student.” Confident now that she wouldn’t crumple her drawing, he settled back in his chair.
She was quiet for a moment, and Solas lifted his gaze to look at her.
His pulse thudded in his throat. Nare’s eyes were on his face, and her lips were slightly parted, and it wasn’t just warmth that he saw in her face now; it was heat, a focused and expectant sort of heat that Solas knew well and liked very, very much.
He didn’t know what had piqued her shift in mood. Nevertheless, he boldly returned her stare.
A tense, delicious moment later, she swallowed and dropped her eyes to her parchment. Then she started to fold her wrinkled drawing.
“What are you doing?” Solas asked in a low voice.
Her eyes darted to his, and he admired the naked interest in her gaze before it returned to her briskly moving fingers. “I’m, um. I’m folding this into a paper crane,” she said.
Her voice was slightly tremulous now, and to Solas’s observant ear, it was another obvious sign of what was on her mind. He wasn’t sure exactly how her focus had shifted from art to an activity that was considerably more… physical, but as always with Nare, he was happy to play along.
He lifted his chin slightly. “I thought I said that would make you a very bad student.”
She nervously nibbled her lower lip, then glanced at him once more. “And what if I did it anyway?” she asked.
A lance of heat spiked through his abdomen. Disobedience, he thought. Now he could see where she was going with this.
He reached across the table and placed a hand on her paper. “If you do this anyway, you will be disobeying your teacher, da’len.”
His words seemed to be exactly what she wanted to hear; a charming flush of pink was rising to her cheekbones now, a perfect match for the quickly-rising interest that was bringing his body to attention.
She swallowed hard, and Solas studied the bobbing of her throat before she spoke. “And what, um… what would you do with a disobedient student?” she asked.
Another rush of desire bloomed in his belly. It was a dark and restless sort of desire, a naive sort of desire that hearkened back to days long-gone when he was young and proud and just as cocky as Nare had playfully accused him of being.
Solas wasn’t that man – that child – anymore. He could never return to the simple ferocity of those early days. But Nare had a special talent for bringing his pride to the fore. Despite himself, despite the nearly-countless years he’d lived and the countless sorrows he’d survived, Solas couldn’t help but relish in the reminders of his youth that his Dalish lover always seemed to rouse.
He rose from his chair and folded his hands behind his back. “I am not sure,” he said mildly. “There is a multitude of ways that I could deal with a disobedient student.” Slowly and purposefully, he began to pace around the desk toward her.
She straightened on her padded stool. The movement was subtle enough to be unconscious, but to Solas’s well-trained eye, her body could not have said ‘touch me’ any more clearly than if she had cried the words aloud.
He took a step closer to her. “I could ignore your behaviour in the hope that you would cease acting out,” he suggested.
She gazed at him for a moment, then looked down and continued folding her paper.
He chuckled softly at her blatant disobedience. “I see,” he said smoothly. “In that case, I could take the parchment from you and keep it safe. Insist that you commence a new attempt.”
Nare continued to fold the paper. Solas smiled to himself, then came to stand right behind her.
He leaned over her and planted his palm on her parchment, then lowered his lips to her ear. “Or I could punish you,” he murmured.
Her sharp little intake of breath was all the confirmation he needed. Solas turned his head slightly and brushed his lips over her earlobe.
“Is that what you desire, Nare?” he asked very quietly. “Punishment?”
Her reply was instantaneous. “Yes,” she whispered.
Yes. Such a simple word, and one that she gave him so readily day after day. Solas should never have accepted this word from her, should never have offered it to her in turn, but every time she said it or breathed it or cried it out to the ceiling in a fit of rapture, he had no choice but to do whatever she asked to make her say it over and over again.
He inhaled the scent of her neck and savoured her shivery exhale, then stepped back and politely held out his hand. “Come with me, vhenan.”
She took his outstretched hand and rose from her stool, and together they made their way into the Great Hall. Solas casually folded his hands behind his back as they strolled toward her quarters. Nare’s expression was calm and pleasant, but her cheeks were tellingly flushed, and Solas watched with a mixture of admiration and amusement as she smiled and murmured greetings to the people they passed, acting for all the world as though her mind wasn’t on the warmth that he knew was pooling between her legs.
They continued toward her quarters at an unhurried pace, and Solas pretended not to notice the restless flexing of her fingers. She unlocked the door that led from the Great Hall into her quarters, and Solas politely followed her inside.
Once she had locked the door behind them, she turned to face him, and he took her chin in a gentle grip.
She inhaled sharply, and a flare of want lit his body at the sound. He lifted her chin. “Go upstairs and remove your clothes,” he said.
“What if I don’t get them off fast enough?” she asked. Already she was panting, giving her question a breathless and eager tone.
“Then you will bear the consequences for disobeying me again,” he informed her smoothly. “Now go on.” He released her chin and gave her bottom a playful little smack.
She jolted and arched her spine. “Solas,” she gasped.
All at once, he understood the full picture of what she wanted. Disobedience. Punishment. A gentle slap to her bottom that made her call out his name…
A lightning-hot rush of excitement surged through his limbs and pulsed through his cock. Once again, Nare was surprising him with what she wanted. And once again, her desires were riling something deep within him, something playful and reckless that he’d thought was buried and gone, withered and worn down by the terrible things he’d done and the sheer crushing passage of time.
She was staring at him, her collarbones rising and falling with desperation. Solas lifted her chin once more. “You should not still be standing here,” he said sternly. “Go upstairs and lay yourself bare for me.”
A brilliant flash of a smile lit her face, and she turned on her heel and ran up the stairs. He watched her go, her bare feet swift and silent on the steps, and for a wild and predatory moment, he was tempted to pursue her. To be the Dread Wolf they had always accused him of being, to chase down his delectable and fleet-footed prey…
He forced himself to follow her at a more sedate pace, torturing himself instead with the fantasy of capturing her and pinning her to the floor. He was certain she would allow it – no, that she would outright beg for it, would beg him to pin her down and to take her hard.
Another time, he thought. Right now, Nare wanted something slower, something they both could savour as he stretched it out for as long as she could stand. And Solas could never resist giving Nare exactly what she begged him for.
He continued up the stairs and into her bedroom, and another pulse of amusement and arousal warmed the inside of his chest. She was standing half-naked in the middle of the room with her back to him, dressed still in her light Dalish trousers, and Solas admired the delicate lines of her shoulder blades as she tugged at the laces of her trousers.
She glanced over her shoulder at him. “I couldn’t strip quickly enough,” she said. “I’m sorry, hah’ren.”
She wasn’t truly sorry. He could tell from the blazing excitement in her face. She was purposely flouting his command to invite the consequences he’d threatened.
And he wanted nothing more than to deliver those consequences.
He tutted softly and came up behind her. “I’m disappointed, da’len. I was expecting to see every inch of your skin.” He reached out and trailed the tips of his fingers along the center of her back.
Her spine curved enticingly beneath his fingers, and she pulled in a shuddery breath. “I… I tried,” she said. “But it seems like I tied my trousers really tightly this morning.”
Solas almost laughed. It was the weakest excuse, and he loved her for it. “That is a shame,” he murmured. “And something else that I will have to punish you for, it seems.” He reached up and began pulling the pins from her bound-up hair.
Her chest rose and fell with increasing fervour as he plucked the pins from her hair. When he finally released the last of the pins, her hair unspooled into a curtain of waves to the middle of her back.
He gently ran his palm over the thick auburn mass. Then, very slowly, he started to gather her hair in his hands.
She clenched her fists convulsively, and the sound of her whimpering inhale set his nerves ablaze. He purposely grazed the back of her neck with his fingers as he collected her hair, and by the time the smooth russet strands were gathered in his fist, she was gasping for breath and shifting her hips.
Fenedhis, he had barely touched her. His hands had hardly touched her body, and already she was so eager. Her want for him was so clear, more transparent than the most pristine eluvian, and he’d been alone for so long before they had met, and… and he just wished he could tell her how grateful he was that she wanted him this much. How rare it was for him to feel wanted and loved and seen.
His heart was pounding in his throat and in his cock, a nearly-painful pulse of love and lust and longing, and he could see his longing mirrored in her body and in her face. But he didn’t want Nare to long for him. He wanted Nare to have him, to have exactly what she wanted for as long as he could give it to her.
So he pulled carefully on her hair, exactly the way she liked. A mewl of pleasure left her throat, and she leaned her head back against his collarbone.
Solas exhaled sharply through a dizzying surge of lust. Her throat was exposed, and he wanted to bite it. Her spine was arched and her breasts were lifted high, and he wanted to drag his teeth over her nipples and her belly and devour her until she was screaming his name.
Be calm, he told himself. He was not the bold and greedy youth he’d once been, no matter if Nare constantly tempted him to cede to that side of himself. He was Solas, calm and measured, her patient hah’ren who would give her the precise punishment she was pleading for.
He passed his fingers lightly over her hardened nipple. She jerked and cried out, pressing her breasts even higher in a wordless plea for his touch, but he couldn’t give in to her body’s demands just yet. Instead, he ran a teasing thumb beneath the swell of her breast.
A desperate sob burst from her lips. “Solas,” she begged. “I – I want…”
He gave her hair a gentle tug, and she gasped and pressed her lips together. He brushed his lips over her ear. “Do not tell me what you want,” he said. “That privilege was lost when you chose to ignore what I taught you today.”
She nodded eagerly, and Solas stroked the silken skin of her breast. “Now, da’len, I will punish you. Then we will see if you can follow my instructions more carefully than before.”
“Yes,” she whimpered.
He pulled her hair again. “Yes, what?” he whispered.
“Yes, hah’ren,” she blurted.
He nodded in satisfaction, then nipped the side of her neck and pinched her nipple. She cried out and twisted her hips, and Solas hissed in a breath as her bottom grazed his throbbing cock.
Not yet, he told himself. He subtly shifted his hips away from her bottom and slid his hand down her belly. Her skin was jumping with tension as she panted for breath, and when he hooked his thumb into the edge of her trousers, she let out another needy mewl.
He started tugging at the laces of her trousers – laces that came easily untied, to his amusement. He grazed the tip of her ear with his lips. “Now da’len, you must listen carefully. This is my first instruction to you.”
“I – I’m listening,” she panted.
He eased her trousers down over her hips until they pooled at her feet. Then he skimmed his hand from her hip over the roundness of her ass.
He gently squeezed her buttock, and she arched her spine in supplication. “Please!” she cried.
“Listen to me,” he said quietly. “I will strike you, right here.” He tapped her buttock.
She nodded eagerly. “Mm–”
He tugged gently on her hair, turning her head slightly to look her in the eye. “I will strike you, Nare,” he said seriously. “And you will tell me the instant you wish for me to stop.”
She stared at him for a moment. Her lips were red with anticipation, and Solas could only imagine that her mouth was a mirror for the rosy flush of her lower lips. He could only imagine the desire that was undoubtedly seeping down the inner margins of her thighs even as they spoke – that desire that he wanted so badly to lick off of her skin…
But he wouldn’t have any of that, not until Nare agreed to stop him. She might be the one begging, and Solas might be the one giving orders, but in this realm, Nare was the one in control.
Finally, at last, she nodded. “I will,” she promised. “I’ll stop you if I need to.”
“Excellent,” he whispered, and he took her lips in a gentle kiss.
Then he spanked her.
She jerked and moaned into his mouth, and Solas stroked her tongue gently with his own before spanking her again. The sound of his hand on her skin was sharp, a crack that was punctuated by her sudden gasp of pleasure.
“Oh gods,” she moaned. “Solas…”
He gently kissed the corner of her lips. “Place your hands on the bed and wait for me,” he whispered. He released her hair and gave her bottom a gentle pat.
She stumbled over to the bed, then placed her palms on the mattress and looked over her shoulder at him. Everything about her posture was a plea, the arch of her spine and the look on her face and – fenedhis, yes, that trickle of lust shining between her parted legs.
The wanton hunger in his chest writhed at the sight of her, but he forced himself to approach her slowly, stripping off his tunic and his undershirt with a leisurely care that belied the reckless lust clenching his gut. When he was bare from the waist up, he stopped behind her, just within her line of sight, and began slowly unlacing his breeches.
Her wide blue eyes fell to his cock as he pulled it free. Solas wrapped his fist around himself, and her lips fell open on a tiny moan.
He ran his palm along his length. A ripple of pleasure poured through his abdomen, but he forced his face not to register it. He was her hah’ren, calm and measured and in control; he was not the rambunctious and roaring youth that was roaring to just fuck her already.
He stroked himself once more, then once again, and Nare’s face twisted with want. “Please,” she whined.
Solas paused in his stroking and looked her in the eye. “I know this is what you want, da’len,” he said. “But you have not yet earned it.”
She nodded. “I know, hah’ren,” she panted. “I should be punished.”
“You should,” he said softly. He settled himself right behind her and placed his hands on her hips.
She lowered herself to her elbows and widened her stance, and Solas swallowed hard. She was ready and primed, flushed and slick with want, and he could imagine himself taking her right now, sliding deep inside of her and clawing the cries of rapture from her throat…
No, he told himself viciously. He smoothed his palm over her bottom, then spanked her.
She jolted and cried out, a visceral little cry of pleasure. Solas spanked her once more, then slowly slid his cock along her heated cleft.
“Fuck!” she gasped. Her fingers twisted in the sheets, and when she jerked her hips back toward him, he spanked her again.
A sob burst from her lips. It was a sound of sheer and complete desperation, and Solas’s manhood pulsed with an almost painful surge of want as he rocked himself slowly through the creamy silk of her cleft.
He spanked her once more, harder this time, and Nare let out a little yelp.
He paused. “Are you all right?” he asked, then subtly cleared his throat. His voice was roughened with lust, and he barely sounded like himself; he sounded like his younger self, his lust-driven and hedonistic self, the self that was new and bright and blazing with curiosity about everything that a corporeal form could provide.
“Yes,” Nare gasped. She looked at him over her shoulder. “Please, I – I want more.”
He stared into her eyes, lust rising even further at the desire and desperation in her beautiful face. He slid his cock through her heat once more and spanked her again.
She cried out and clenched her fingers in the sheets, and Solas rocked himself against her, his hands on her hips as he teased himself and her in equal measure by sliding through her slickness without slipping inside. With every slow thrust and every needy gasp that left her lungs, his own hunger grew, the reckless and greedy hunger that had become a foreign voice to him, but which Nare’s own hidden wanton voice had drawn to the fore.
He spanked her once more. The sound was loud, a whip-crack of skin on skin, and Nare arched her back viciously.
“Fuck me!” she cried, and Solas nearly did. That reckless voice of his long-lost youth was howling now, teased and tempted and starving for the woman splayed before him, and… fenedhis, how he wanted to fuck her. He wanted to sink deep inside of her until she was boneless and sobbing with pleasure, and then he wanted to take her again and again until the only word she could speak was his name–
“Solas, please, fuck me!” she wailed.
Fuck her, the hedonistic voice whispered.
“Not yet,” Solas hissed.
Nare whipped around and stared at him, and the sheer excitement in her face was almost enough to break him.
With a huge effort of will, he stepped away from her and jerked his chin at the bed. “On your hands and knees, da’len,” he said.
His voice was a guttural growl, roughened with too much hunger and not enough restraint, but Nare didn’t seem to mind; she crawled swiftly onto the bed, and by the time Solas had stripped himself bare, her breathing was so sharp and short that he was surprised she was getting any air at all.
He stepped up beside the bed and studied her. Her back was bowed, her beautiful rounded curves presented to him like the most succulent offering, and his mouth was watering at the sight.
He smoothed his palm over her reddened buttock, and she keened and twisted her hips. Then a thread of liquid lust dripped from her swollen folds and down toward the mattress, and Solas lost control.
He surged forward and gripped her buttock, then slicked his tongue between her legs. She cried out in shock and pleasure, stumbling forward onto her elbows as Solas shoved her forward to better access her fragrant flesh.
He shamelessly buried his face in her sweetness. Gone was his measured calm and his discipline; he was hunger now, hunger and desire and greed and all those demonic traits that twisted the spirits who were drawn unwillingly into this world. But Solas didn’t feel twisted. He didn’t feel corrupted or ruined or wrong – how could he feel wrong, when the scent and taste of Nare’s slick folds were gracing his lips? How could he feel anything but perfectly and precisely right when she was mewling with pleasure and pushing her fragrant and delicious flesh back against his questing tongue? He wasn’t corrupted, no; he wasn’t wisdom twisted into pride, or rebellion twisted into tricks and lies, or even the solitary apostate who sat in the rotunda with only his books for company. He was hers, Nare’s lover and her vhenan, and here in her bedroom, bent behind her and licking the pleasure from her body with smooth firm strokes of his tongue, being Nare’s beating heart was the only him that mattered.
He dug his fingers into her buttock, lapping hungrily at the swollen bud between her legs until his lips and chin were coated with the taste of her. Then she sank her fingers into her own brilliant red hair.
She gasped in a deep breath, then released it with an exquisite cry. Her hips jerked convulsively as she came against his tongue, but before her climax could ebb away, he pressed one finger inside of her.
She clenched her fingers in her hair and cried out in a broken voice. “By the Dread Wolf’s mercy, take me!”
For a split second, Solas froze, and the old Elvhen curse crossed his mind. The Dread Wolf take you: a curse that he so resented, and one that could be interpreted in such a different way when it was delivered in Nare’s crystal-clear voice.
She pulled her own hair, then clawed at the mattress and arched her back as she babbled in an increasingly desperate blur of words. “Solas, please, I need you to fuck me. Please Solas, please hah’ren, please…”
Do it. The ravenous voice of his youth was goading him, a taunt that complemented the temptation of Nare’s pleading words, and Solas was finally ready to listen. He crawled onto the bed behind her, forcing her to shift forward on her hands and knees, then roughly gathered her hair in his hands. With one hand on her hip and the other one wrapped in her russet hair, he rubbed the head of his aching cock against her entrance.
She sobbed again. “Solas, please, take me!”
And so he did.
He sank himself inside of her and pulled her hair. A gasp of ecstasy burst from his lips, and Nare cried out as well, but her cry was hoarse and roughened by the arching of her neck as she leaned back into his tugging hand.
He tenderly stroked the line of her spine, then spanked her. She sobbed with pleasure and thrust back against him hard.
An ecstatic rush of heat fanned out through his abdomen to his chest, and he gasped again at the exquisite feeling. Then Nare was bucking back against him, and he was thrusting forward to meet her, his eyes darting madly from his fingers in her hair to the dip in her spine to the meeting point where their bodies blended together.
Solas fucked her hard, taking her just as she had asked. He was the maligned Dread Wolf taking his prey, his willing and pliant prey who was arching her spine and presenting herself for his pleasure–
Not my pleasure, he reminded himself. It was her pleasure too, her pleasure that was prompting her to welcome the pounding of his cock as he fucked her, but her pleasure was equally his, her exquisite cries like a catalyst for his own simmering climax, shoving his lust and his longing and his desperation higher as he slammed into her and dug his fingers into her hip.
He pulled her hair again. “Rise for me,” he commanded.
She reared back on her knees until she was flush against his chest. Solas released her hair and clasped her throat instead.
She sobbed and scrabbled at his wrist, and he pressed his lips to her ear. “Nare,” he breathed.
She let out a wordless little moan, and he nipped the side of her neck. “You are exquisite,” he told her quietly. “The most rare and brilliant temptation I have ever known.” He thrust into her again.
She moaned as he sank inside of her, then flashed him an exhilarated smile. “You sweet talker,” she panted. She burst out a breathless little laugh, and Solas’s head spun for a dizzying moment. She was so beautiful, her taut and curving body and the sweat darkening the hair at her temples and her uninhibited smile. She gave herself to him so freely, her bashfulness melting into uninhibited want as her clothes fell away, and she trusted him so completely, showing him the true desires that hid beneath her dignified Inquisitor’s mask, and… Mythal save him, he loved her. It wasn’t right, and it shouldn’t be possible, but he loved her more than anything his millenia-old memory could conjure.
He stroked her throat and pumped his hips. “Ar lath ma,” he groaned, and he licked her neck.
She craned her neck to the side, then gasped when he bit her neck. “I – ah! I love you, too, Solas, I–” She broke off with a wild cry. He was driving into her in a fast and furious rhythm, one hand at her throat and the other around her waist to keep her upright as he slammed into her in a blur of love and pleasure and voracious desperation.
All at once, the rising roar of his climax smashed over him. He turned her face toward him and kissed her hard, pouring his pleasure and his praise into her tongue.
She eagerly accepted his kiss, stealing his pleasured moans with the sweetness of her tongue. When he finally came to a slow and sated stop, he couldn’t bear to peel his lips away.
In the quiet calm of their completion, Solas continued to kiss her, slow and gentle kisses to savour the shape of her lips as they pressed against his own. When they finally collapsed onto their sides in a tired but happy tangle of limbs, he pulled her close and kissed her some more, unwilling to release her just yet to the world that awaited them.
He eventually peeled himself away from her tempting lips to speak. “Did you enjoy your punishment?” he murmured.
To his amusement, her sex-flushed cheeks turned even pinker, and she shyly dropped her gaze. “I… yes, I did,” she said. She let out a bright little laugh and idly stroked his chest. “Did you, um, enjoy giving it to me?”
“I did,” he assured her softly. He tipped up her chin to face him. “And if there is anything else you desire, you need only to tell me.”
Nare lowered her eyes again, but her smile was broad. “All right,” she whispered. “I’ll… I’ll try.”
Solas smiled fondly at her shyness, then leaned in to kiss her once more. He knew Nare, and he knew her many faces well. She was confident and bold as the Inquisitor, and she was cheeky and sweet as his student. But here, in the privacy of their time alone, the privacy afforded by their bare bodies and the bed they shared, she was the most delicious dichotomy: shy and halting at first, but easily goaded into a burst of mindless and uninhibited lust that goaded him in turn, coaxing him to loose a part of himself that he’d long thought locked away. This freedom to show himself – or more of himself than he had in countless years – was one of the reasons he loved her.
And it was one of the things that made their union so terribly bittersweet.
As he often did, he brushed the sadness aside. Not now, he thought. In the years to come, there would be plenty of time for sadness; too much time, a veritable ocean of time during which he would drown in his infinite regrets.
For now, he was with Nare. With his legs tangled with hers, his head pillowed on the cloud of her tangled red hair, Solas was exactly where he belonged.