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Marlon had never considered himself a pessimist– more like a cheerful realist. There were certain facts about his life, he reasoned, that would never change. The ache in the muscles and bones of his bad leg would deepen and tighten when rain was headed toward the valley. Gil would always snore in the bunk below him on the nights Marlon stayed in the Guild. He would attend each season’s festival, make small talk with the cute rancher, and watch as her eyes flickered toward the town mayor.
These were realities of his life. He accepted them as they were, with as much grace as he could muster.
Which is why it was so strange to find himself here, next to the silo outside Marnie’s ranch, kissing her like his life depended on it. And even stranger for her to be kissing him back, one hand bunched into his shirt to pull him down closer to her height, another resting on his hip.
A late autumn wind, carrying with it the promise of winter, whipped dead leaves around their ankles. Marnie pulled away, looking up at him with her big brown eyes, hair falling out of her long braid. “You know,” she said, “We could even go inside the house.”
He tucked a couple of flyaways behind her ear, thanking Yoba for the years of adventuring that let him keep his voice calm even when his pulse was racing. “You cold?”
Her brown eyes met his, with the glint they always had whenever she made a joke. “Could be warmer,” she said, and took him by the hand.
He still wasn’t sure how anything could possibly be this easy. Sure, he’d known Marnie for over twenty years, ever since she came to the valley. He’d even entertained a wistful what if kind of wondering when he saw her dressed in her festival best, a magnetism he couldn’t deny. But ultimately, he’d known her the same way he’d known everyone in Pelican Town– by appearance, by the most superficial parts of their personality, by the greetings they’d give when he came into town, and little beyond.
So the fact that Marnie was sweet-natured, cheerful, with curves that always drew his eyes for a second glance— that he had always known. But that she was brave, and strong from years of farm work? That she could startle the seriousness out of him with a well-placed quip? That a friendship, a shared language of stories and banter, a light and unspoken trust, might form so easily between them if he only pursued it?
That, he hadn’t expected.
He was used to working hard, grinding around pain, weighing risks, assessing trade-offs, the lesser of two evils. And he was used to doing it alone, especially these past few years when he and Gil were the last two adventurers living in the valley. But then this fall, teaching Marnie the basics of swordsmanship and adventuring in the valley after her run-in with some tigers slimes? That had just… been good.
And tonight? Watching her dispatch her first slimes ever in the mines, wholly focused, a growing comfort with her blade and with the scarier places around Pelican Town?
That had also been good. And in this case, by good he meant, well, extremely hot.
He almost wouldn’t have trusted the goodness of it all if it wasn’t for the reality of her hand in his as she led him around front and into the ranch house. They paused, hushed and giggly, in the front hallway to take off their shoes– dusty with the dirt and coal of the mines– and leave them among the pile of boots, shoes, and a pair of small, sparkly pink slippers he had to assume belonged to Jas.
As he added his own muddy boots to the pile near the door, Marlon felt strange, for a moment, like some kind of intruder. He’d known Marnie for twenty years, but here he was, in her parlor for the first time ever. This was her home, the ranch she’d made her life’s work, with animals and stray relatives and plentiful hay bales to sit on. This was her kitchen, where she and Marlon hastily, quietly, scrubbed hands and faces of the dirt of the mines, exchanging whispers and smiles. This was the hallway that led to bedrooms where her family members slept.
He’d never raised animals of his own, unless you counted the cranky old cat that had come and gone as it pleased when he was a boy, or the gelatinous, angry slimes that clustered in their little hutch out behind the Adventurer’s Guild. His business had more to do with death than life. He’d never raised a family of his own– just tried his best to do right by the various adventurers that came and went through his circles. He’d never had a house of his own, like this, just a bin full of swords and a top bunk at the Guild.
The contrast made him ill at ease. Still, he was here, with Marnie, and by some kind of miracle, she was leading him to her bedroom. She shut the door, then crossed the room to flick on a lamp on her dresser, filling the room with soft light. He looked around as she came back toward him. Blue walls, neat little rug on the floor, a healthy plant. A far cry from the dust and chaos of the Guild if he’d ever seen one.
She came in close. “Welcome to the ranch,” she said, voice husky as she reached up to tug at the pulls on his cloak.
He let her take the heavy object, full of all the tinctures and healing items and rings and weaponry he kept for adventures. He wouldn’t have trusted anyone else with it. She hung it on a hook on her door, next to her fuzzy pink bathrobe. They looked strange paired there together, but strangely sweet.
When she turned back toward him, she took one look and burst out laughing.
He glanced down at himself. “What,” he said, “Two swords is too much?”
“Two swords and a knife,” she noted, stepping toward him and resting a hand on his waist, next to the sheathed iridium dagger.
“It’s very important to be prepared, Marnie,” he told her, taking on what she referred to as his teacher voice, even as he pulled her back in. “Let's take a scenario. What if your blade is hilt-deep in the chest of a serpent when another one comes straight at you?”
She unbuckled his sword sheath, ran her hands up his chest on her way to lift it off. He tried and failed to maintain an even facial expression. “And the dagger’s for your third hand, I suppose,” she continued, nonchalant, as though she wasn’t driving him crazy with the now-practiced way she handled the straps and blade.
He unbuckled the baldric he'd given her from her waist, carefully guided her out of the leather straps that held the old cutlass he had watched her become accustomed to over the past few weeks. “Well, the knife’s for when you get too tired to swing a longsword.”
She looked up at him, face suddenly serious, pausing at the dagger belt’s clasp. “If things are ever that bad, you’re running, right?”
The worry in her eyes made him ache, somehow. She had taken off his eyepatch earlier when they were kissing in the caves. He felt a little naked without it right now, with her eyes searching his face. He was scared by how good it felt to have someone worry over him. He wondered what she was thinking. What tonight was to her. He had to play this at least a little cool, right? He didn’t want to overwhelm her with the twenty years of if onlys rattling around in his head.
“Right,” he said, clearing his throat. “Gotta know when to cut your losses.”
“Just checking,” she said, and stood on tiptoe to plant a quick kiss on his lips before pulling off the last of the weaponry.
He stretched, rolling his shoulders, trying to shake off the brief moment of insecurity. Even if he was feeling a few dozen more emotions than usual, he was at least used to the comforting rhythm of the flirting, the fucking, the adrenaline-fueled post-fight trysts. At least there were more exciting things to take off each other than swords. “You’ve got a great home,” he said, keeping his tone casual, even as he eyed the buttons on her dress, thought about how it might look better on her floor.
“It’s old, but Robin’s done a great job keeping up with it.” she said. With a mock-serious expression barely disguising a grin, she added, “Still, it’s a creaky place. We should probably try and be at least a little quiet.”
Marlon took her in– the flush still in her cheeks from the chilly night air and the walk home from the mountains– the small welts on her hands where the corrosive slime had burned her as she fought– the rumpled corduroy dress he’d come to associate with watching her wield a sword– and his heart pounded. “I’ll see if I can manage,” he said, before cupping his hand around her neck and leaning down to fit his mouth against hers.
This was different from their earlier kiss in the mines. That had been passionate– hurried– urgent. Most of Marlon’s past romantic endeavors had taken place in tents, caves, motel rooms in unfamiliar and war-torn towns in the Gotoro Empire– all places where he had to keep one ear out for danger. Had to seize the moment, because it might be his last, have a moment of beautiful but rushed and fumbled, temporary connection with another person.
But this– a bedroom in his hometown, with the soft glow of a lamp on her dresser, and a glass window that muffled the howls of the wind outside– with a woman who had been an acquaintance for decades, a friend for a season, and now, who knew– pressed against him as they kissed, long and slow– this was different. Less urgency, less stress, the promise of a warm bed, a full night.
He slid his hand underneath one of the straps of her outer dress, eased it off her shoulder. He broke away from kissing her for a moment– first to check if that seemed okay by her, and then, when she grinned up at him, to trail kisses down past her jawline, down her neck, down toward the little V of throat above the buttons of her blouse.
He felt her pulse speed up as he started working, one-handed, on the small, fiddly buttons. He wasn’t doing particularly well at it, given that his other hand was working her hair out of what remained of its braid. “Why’s this got so many buttons?” he murmured as he worked a little more of the blouse off her shoulder.
She chuckled, shaking her now-loosened hair out. The heady, mingled scent of her shampoo and the evening’s sweat filled his nostrils. “I’ll help you out,” she said, stepping back to unbutton the dress and blouse she’d been wearing on their adventures.
“Race you,” Marlon said.
They undressed quickly, neither of them worrying too much about being sexy amid the practicalities of the process (though Marlon certainly didn’t intend to tear his eyes away from Marnie as she shimmied out of her dress). Some part of him kept wondering when this would stop feeling, well, easy.
But hell, even though the circumstances were new, Marnie was still just as good to talk to and joke around with. Their conversation, their light little teasing, Marnie’s laugh when Marlon kicked off his pants and revealed the second dagger in an ankle sheath– it was as natural and easy as breathing, the same it had been all fall.
Well, not quite the same. He raked his eyes up and down over her body as she reached behind and unhooked her bra, giving him a grin with heat behind it as she dropped the practical garment to reveal generous breasts.
His heart pounded. So did his cock. It wasn’t like his mind hadn’t conjured up some of these images. But he had tried to brush them aside. Daydreaming, at best, just made you feel worse about what you lacked, and at worst, got you killed.
This was no daydream. He grabbed her, and, tired of the stooping that came with their height difference, lifted her onto the bed. To his amusement, she let out a little shriek of surprise. “Thought we had to be quiet,” he said in an exaggerated whisper.
She rolled her eyes. “C’mere,” she said, and pulled him down onto her.
He kissed Marnie now, slow and dirty, relishing the feeling of skin against skin, the scent of her shampoo mingled with sweat. He caught her breasts in his hands, enjoyed the sigh of pleasure that came from her as he pinched and rolled her nipples between his fingers. Deftly, deliberately, he tucked his leg in between her thighs, letting her find some sweet pressure.
He was both surprised and thrilled by her excitement, the fact that she seemed, somehow, to be as eager for this as he was. Once her rocking against his knee has become more insistent, her breath more urgent, he ran a hand up her inner thigh and let his hand rest on the warmth of her center. “Can I touch you?” he breathed into her ear.
“Please,” she said, the brokenness of the word putting it somewhere in a gray area between generous invitation and desperate plea.
He grinned, and as he worked her over with his fingers, he tried his best to muffle the little moans escaping her with deep kisses. The last thing he wanted was to cause undue stress by waking up her family. Another strange thing about being in a house instead of a cave, in his hometown instead of a remote wilderness.
For some reason, the mayor jumped into his mind. Lewis must’ve been here, too, in this bedroom. Must’ve kissed these lips, caressed these thighs, run his hands through this soft, wavy hair. A rush of possessiveness hit Marlon in the gut. How could anyone be so stupid as to take this gorgeous, hardworking, funny, kind woman for granted? For so many years?
“What?” Marnie breathed, looking up at him.
Marlon shook his head, realizing he had broken the rhythm he’d been working with his fingers. “You just look really pretty tonight, is all,” he said. His heart was pounding. Enough thinking. Time for doing.
He kissed down her chest, stopping to nip and suck at her nipples, enjoying the feeling of her hands tangled into his shock of graying hair. He continued down her sweet belly, maneuvering his way down the bed as he let his hands run up and down the lengths of her, working his way down toward–
Shit. He tensed and stilled, a hiss escaping him as he rotated his knee a little too far out to the left. White-hot nerve pain lanced through his leg, hip to ankle.
“Marlon?” came Marnie’s voice from somewhere above him, concern in her tone where a second ago there had been only pleasure. Yoba be damned.
“One– one sec,” he said. His eyes were shut tight, his face pressed against her thigh. He tried to release a long breath, another, slowly working his knee and hip back to an alignment he knew wouldn’t aggravate the nerve pain that ran from the base of his spine all the way down to the side of his foot. Leg pains were normal for Marlon. There were a few specific motions that triggered them. Working around those motions– avoiding them with care– it was all second nature. Core to how he moved, core to how he fought. Leave it to him to get distracted enough in the pleasures and anxieties of this moment to forget to be careful.
“Your leg?” she said. The old mattress creaked as she pushed herself up to a sitting position. Lightly, she rested one hand on the back of his head.
He let that contact soothe him, let his mind organize all the different sensations of pain he’d been dealing with for twenty-five years now: the re-knitted muscle and bone from where the giant serpent had slashed him with its tail– the impinged nerve from the disc that had burst when the cliff gave way beneath the two of them– the calf cramped from overcompensating for the surrounding muscles– the dull ache in the hip from the limp that enabled him to get around.
He let the pain fade from the blaring of sirens to background noise, as he had learned to over many years.
He was most of fifty, but sometimes he wondered if he’d already put a lifetime of wear and tear on this body.
When the spike of nerve pain had receded somewhat, he pressed a kiss to Marnie’s thigh, then rolled over onto his back. He looked up at her, and was both touched and alarmed to see the worry on her face. “You all right?” she said, and touched his arm.
“Sorry about that,” he said, and put on what he hoped was a winning smile.
“Your leg,” she said, this time not a question.
He sighed. “Acts up sometimes. Especially if I’m a bit distracted.” He raised his eyebrows conspiratorially, tried to play it off. At least the pain had been dulled back down to its normal ache. Lying down and standing up– anything that kept his spine straight– that was the ticket.
“I’m so sorry,” she said. “Did I– is this too much?”
It was strange seeing her suddenly apologetic, nervous, after the confidence of before. A reminder that she had not always been lucky in love. He wanted to reassure her, smooth out the concern on her face. “Not at all,” he said. “And nothing to apologize for. Just something that happens sometimes. You live with it.”
“Does that ever happen when you’re in the caves?” she asked.
“Not too often,” he says. “Had to adapt my fighting style around it a long time ago.”
She still looked troubled. That feeling, again, of seeing someone worry for him. It made his heart beat something fierce. It made him feel, somehow simultaneously, both a warmth and a vulnerability.
He reached up, brushed her hair off her shoulder. “Truly,” he said. “I take precautions. Out when I'm fighting is when I'm the most prepared.”
A reluctant grin appeared on her face. “Guess I should have rounded up some monsters and brought them in here so you’d feel more comfortable, huh?”
Marlon laughed, surprised at the degree to which she’d intuited his own imposter-like feelings in this warm, homey space. “What can I say? It’s my expertise.”
She took his hand in hers, kissed his palm. A warm flutter went through him at the sweetness of the gesture. “We should stop if you’re hurting,” she said. “Or take a break.”
He looked up at her– the flush still over her collarbones and cheeks, the red mark he’d sucked into her neck darkening, the kindness in her eyes– and decided that in this supine position, he could make do. “I’d rather forge onward,” he said, and pulled her down onto him.
She laughed in surprise as she landed against his chest– a delightful little peal. “Brave soldier,” she said in that voice that was at once teasing and affectionate, and kissed him.
He let her sink back into it for several moments before he gripped her by the hips and maneuvered her up toward his face. “Marlon,” she breathed.
He ignored the shock of pleasure that ran through him at the sound of his name in her voice, and settled her onto his face. “This work for you?” he said roughly, words muffled by her thighs as he inhaled the scent of her.
There was an audible hitch in her breath. “As long as you’re good.”
“Hell, yes,” he said, and grasping her buttocks firmly, he licked a sure, firm line up her center.
It was good that he had a strong grip, because her hips bucked into his face, a guttural moan ripping out of her. She slapped a hand over her mouth. Fuck, she really needed this, didn’t she? Buried beneath her thighs, he grinned, and got to work.
Because if there was one thing he had expertise in aside from monsters, it was this. You had to do something during all those long nights in strange lands, right? There was nothing that quieted the mind of all its mortal fears and insecurities like some good old pussy-eating.
All those thoughts and worries that had kept coming to the surface– what could go wrong? What if it was all just another temporary thing that would fade into memory and leave him once again feeling a loneliness he hadn’t even noticed until Marnie marched into the Adventuring Guild and asked to learn how to swordfight?--
Yeah, those thoughts were harder to call to the surface when he was busy working his tongue over her clit.
He would have happily stayed here in this soft cave between her legs forever, the bed softly creaking as she rocked into him, the shadow of her cast by the lamp moving in the corner of his peripheral vision.
When her moans had reached a near-desperate pitch, he removed a hand from its iron grip on her ass. With a somewhat awkward but determined motion, he worked it under his chin, and pressed two fingers deep into her tight warmth. He crooked them, pushing up against the roof of her, moving in time with the pressure on her clit. There– he felt her whole body shudder, heard her breath catch and stop as she stiffened and came. He hummed with pleasure, refusing to let up the motions of his tongue, wanting to keep her riding that wave as long as possible.
Finally, she put a hand down toward his cheek and stilled him. She shimmied herself down onto his chest and pressed her face into his shoulder in a gesture he found so painfully endearing that he could hardly bear it.
“All good?” he said hoarsely, wiping his hand across his mouth.
“Fuck,” Marnie said into his shoulder, before rolling over and away from him. She threw an arm back over her head. “That was, um… wow.”
Marlon allowed himself the luxury of a moment’s smugness. He remembered Lewis giving him a Stardew Hero Trophy years ago. Seeing Marnie next to him in bed looking wrecked in the best kind of way felt like a bigger triumph.
It was funny to notice himself thinking of the mayor again. For so many years he’d tolerated jealousy, an ache not unlike the one that radiated down through his leg. He wasn’t proud of the savage sort of vindication he felt pounding in his chest now, but he couldn’t deny its existence.
Too many feelings to convey into words. Instead, he rolled over to give her a long, filthy kiss.
When he pulled away, she looked up at him with heavy-lidded eyes. “Want me to return the favor?” she said, voice husky.
He took in a shaky breath, imagining Marnie’s lips wrapped around his cock. It sounded pretty wonderful. Hell, even just hanging out with Marnie talking about swords and monsters for the past few months had been wonderful.
But he didn’t feel like sitting back, not just yet. He was full of energy. He wanted to spend the night trying to pour in some of the affection and attention that she’d been starved of for the past several years. Wanted to make up for lost time. Wanted to see the look on her face when she came. “That sounds nice,” he said in a low voice, running a hand up her thigh, “Or I could fuck you, if you’d like.”
A visible shiver ran through Marnie. “That sounds good, too,” she said. Then added, with a little quirk of her eyebrows, “Rain check on the blowjob.”
He couldn’t ignore the little flicker of hope and nerves that pricked at him at those words. Even separate from the promise of sex, the idea that this thing between them might still exist after tonight felt almost too good to imagine. He had tried not to think beyond this night. He lived in the moment– it was all you could do, as an adventurer. The singular moment you were in, and maybe the next if you were lucky, and careful with your footwork– that was all that was guaranteed to you.
He stood up (careful with his leg, now), stretched. Made a face at Marnie when she grinned at his old man calisthenics. Then he caught her by the chin, kissed her again, long and slow. Though his hard-on had somewhat flagged when his leg was actively in pain, he felt it pulsing now as she melted into the kiss, allowed him to tug her toward the edge of the bed.
He had, with the eye of someone used to scoping out the resources in unfamiliar territory, observed that her bed was the perfect height for fucking while standing– a position that wouldn’t be as likely to set off his Rube Goldberg machine of pain. He pushed her gently down onto the bed, pulled her toward him so that her legs could rest against his hips. “This okay?” he asked, running a hand down her calf, careful to be gentle around a red welt from where corrosive slime had burned her.
Down on the bed, she pushed her hair out of her face, away from her shoulders. “As long as it works for your leg,” she said, and smiled up at him.
Somehow, the warmth and trust in that smile put him completely at ease for the first time that night. If he was truly in the moment, why worry about what came after? He was here, he was now, and in this moment, he cared about Marnie and she cared about him. He let out a breath. Yes. He was here, in a moment that was… shaping up to be his favorite in quite some time.
He pulled to the edge of the bed, her the backs of her thighs flush with his waist and chest. He rubbed his dick up and down the outside of her entrance, enjoying the smooth slide through her slickness, the tiny whimper that escaped her with each leisurely stroke. Yeah, this being present in the moment thing was the way to go. Stopping to smell the roses.
“Thought you said– you were gonna– fuck me,” Marnie said, little inhalations interrupting her every word as he rubbed the head of his cock against her clit.
He grinned. So much for being in the moment. It was funny, watching Marnie intersperse the genuine care she gave to everyone around her with a willingness to give people shit. It made the moments of sincerity and compassion that much more impactful. “Maybe I wanted to enjoy the view for a minute,” he said.
“Sweet talk will get you nowhere,” breathed Marnie.
“Think I’m already where I’m trying to get,” Marlon said, and decided that as much as he was enjoying teasing her, he couldn’t really take it anymore himself.
He worked himself into her, inch by inch. Marnie’s head tilted back as she relaxed her legs, letting him slide inside. His breath shuddered as he came back out, then pushed in, slowly, deeper, all the way to the hilt.
Marnie let out a garbled string of curses. He kept his slow slide going, out and in, deeper still, wanting to somehow stretch this moment out and make it last forever.
Still, when she whimpered, he increased his rhythm, just a little— and was rewarded with a sweet moan. The sound jumped straight to his center. Okay, maybe he’d increase his rhythm a lot.
Important to always take your surroundings into consideration. He reached toward her face, taking the time to skate his thumb across her lips before he covered her mouth. “We being quiet enough?” he panted with effort, even as he braced his other hand to her hip to strike into her more firmly, the bed frame groaning beneath them.
She nodded feverishly, hair splayed behind her like a fan, eyes closed with pleasure. He was pretty sure she would have nodded no matter what he asked. He leaned over, breath coming hard, trying not to lose control, not just yet. He wanted to get her there again.
He splayed the hand on her hip across her thigh, gripping tight, letting his thumb put some pressure on her clit as he sought a new angle to thrust into her. Her hips bucked up at that, her eyes flying open as as a wave hit her, the walls of her pulsing, squeezing Marlon so tight he saw stars. A choked-out curse, or maybe just a moan, ripped out of him. Fuck, no going back. Not on any of this.
He let go of her mouth so he could brace her shoulder against the bed and drive into her core with his last desperate strokes. Everything tightened– pulsed– and gave way in a rush of feeling as he came inside her.
They stayed there, breath coming hard and fast, in a moment that might have been seconds or hours. Marnie reached a hand up toward his face, caught him by the cheek, ran her thumb across the bottom of his scar. A rush of emotion filled him. He managed to hold steady through it, though it was a close thing.
He leaned down to kiss her, and then– with barely enough presence of mind to remember to move carefully around his hip– pulled himself out of her. She moved back onto the bed, gestured for him to join her with open arms, a flushed face, and a smile.
He clambered into bed beside her, flopping his head down directly onto her chest. She tightened her arms around him.
He let out the deepest breath he’d released in quite some time. Like some long-held tension had drained out of him. They’d crossed a line together that he’d worried about crossing, and they were both still here. Like nothing had changed about their ease and rapport, except that now they were tangled together in Marnie’s bed, instead of sitting in the woods or perched on Robin’s fence in the mountains.
Beside him, Marnie let out a long, low chuckle.
Marlon flung his arm across her stomach, blissed out and barely verbal. “’S so funny?”
“I’m just happy,” she said.
The simplicity of the sentiment clicked into place. Happy. She was happy. That was that feeling that he’d been feeling so much lately.
“Me, too,” he said, and putting aside his desires and fears of what might come next, he pulled her in and kissed her there in that moment– and the next– and the next.
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