Work Text:
I'm going to die a virgin, Solona thought fretfully.
It was, quite possibly, the stupidest thought to occur to her recently. Given her track record since Jowan had approached her for help, that was saying a lot.
The essential stupidity of the realization, however, did nothing to negate its fundamental accuracy.
Peevishly, she decided she blamed Wynne. That nosy, well-intentioned busy-body had taken it upon herself to correct what she regarded as deficiencies in the apprentices Chantry-restricted education. Knowledge, Wynne had explained, was less likely to cause harm than ignorance. It was a sentiment with which Solona whole-heartedly agreed. To that end, Wynne had debunked the myth involving good Fade spirits and babies. That was the problem. It was not that Solona had particularly bought the Chantry explanation for babies, but at least before she'd been armed with Wynne's information, she hadn't understood exactly what it was she hadn't experienced yet.
It was definitely Wynne's fault. She spent enough time around the apprentices that should have recognized that Solona's greatest failing was intellectual curiosity. Present the young mage with a puzzle, a riddle, a complicated spell or a complex potion formula, and she would not rest until she had unlocked all its secrets and mastered it. All her mentors had remarked upon the trait; Irving had fondly likened her compulsion to learn to the behavior of a glutton in search of his next meal. Wynne should have known this and not held out for her the crumb of knowledge that only hinted at the feast yet to be attained.
Since then, Solona had been haunted day and night by the thought that there was something she did not know and had not done. Not that there weren't opportunities in the Tower, of course. There were plenty of opportunities--for everyone else. The girls in the apprentice dormitories had tittered about it behind their hands to each other in front of their vanities in the bathing chamber. Sometimes at night one apprentice would sneak into the bunk of another, and then there would be soft sighs and muffled moans from beneath the covers. There might be two feminine voices gasping softly together as the blanket rustled and the other apprentices slept--or pretended to sleep, respecting the unwritten code mandating the polite illusion of privacy they attempted to maintain in their communal living arrangements--or dual masculine groans. Or there might be a combination of the two, blending together in a muted harmony that rang in Solona's ears until her hands sought her own body in academic investigation and attempted, with little success, to pluck those same notes from her own throat.
But no one had ever come slipping into Solona's bunk, nor entreated her to meet them in a hidden nook behind the towering bookcases in the library in the middle of the night. No girls giggled about their experiences with her when she was in the bathing chamber.
The other apprentices hadn't much liked Solona. Her insatiable curiosity had been off-putting for them. It made her blurt awkward questions and statements that others would have tactfully left unspoken. It made her disdainful of those who didn't seek every opportunity to broaden their knowledge, and also of those who failed to grasp concepts as quickly as she herself did. The only person in the Tower who seemed even remotely interested in her in a sexual capacity had been the templar, Cullen. He'd been attractive, and he'd spent a lot of time staring at her with a yearning look in his eye. But, elated from her triumph in the Harrowing, she'd offered him a chance and he'd refused, running away so quickly one might have thought she was casting Lightning at his backside.
She wondered if Lightning conducted through plate armor the way it did through most other metals. If so, why did templars wear metal armor, rather than leather? Did their boots have leather, or even wood soles to insulate them from the ground? And what happened if a target happened to be standing in water when a mage cast a spell using electricity? What if his companions also happened to be standing in water? Would it conduct to them as well, having the net effect of a Shock or even a Tempest spell, without the additional drain on the mage's mana?
And this is precisely why you are going to die a virgin, Amell. she thought scathingly.
She'd had only one true friend at the Tower, one person who admired her drive to learn, though he'd never excelled at it as she had. Jowan. He never seemed to mind her tendency to wander off on tangents, or the callously scientific detachment with which she pondered the potential for mayhem and destruction in the spells she learned.
For a long time, she hadn't understood why he never sought her bunk in the night nor invited her to seek his. When she had finally learned about Lily, she hadn't been upset. It never occurred to her to be jealous that Jowan had a lover. However, she'd been insanely jealous that he'd had an experience that she was still lacking. He'd been her friend, true, but if there was any one driving reason why she'd helped him when he came to her for assistance, it had been the possibility that in the process she might learn something new, experience something, even if only vicariously.
But Jowan had betrayed her. Not by virtue of being a blood mage, necessarily, but for having kept the knowledge he'd gleaned in the process to himself.
She missed him, missed her only friend, despite the fact that the bastard had nearly gotten her sentenced to The Aeonar, where she undoubtedly would have been cut off from any further opportunity to learn anything, ever again. Instead, she'd been forced to leave the Tower in the company of the Grey Warden, Duncan, to join his order. Solona couldn't decide yet whether or not this pleased her. Certainly there would be plenty of new experiences, but just how intellectually stimulating those experiences were remained to be seen. Then, also, at the crux of her discontent there was the danger that she might die in the coming battle. Death, while being a very new experience indeed, would unfortunately bring a rather abrupt and permanent halt to her quest for knowledge, leaving her scarcely better off than the fate Knight-Commander Greagoir had had planned for her.
Anxiously, Solona rose from her seat near the campfire and began to pace. This was simply not acceptable, that she should finally get her freedom from the Tower and be allowed to venture out into the world, where there was so very much to learn, only to die before she had a chance to even begin.
She looked over at her--what? New mentor? Companion? Commander? What precisely was he, now?--Duncan, where he slept on his bedroll. He was a kind enough man, she supposed. He'd saved her from Greagoir, after all. But he was much more concerned with her proficiency with things she already knew than he was with providing her opportunities to know more. He seemed a rather remarkable specimen, all told. Much harder and somehow more physically present than the other mages, or even the templars. He was a man who lived in his body, rather than in his intellect, or his spirit. That made him an excellent candidate, she was sure. She'd had a moment in the Tower when she'd nearly offered him the opportunity to help her crack the mystery of sex, but he was just forbidding enough that she had the nearly unheard-of (for her) impulse to think twice.
Perhaps she should have made the offer. After all, rarely did knowledge land conveniently in one's lap. Usually it had to be sought dedication and perseverance. Frequently it had to be dragged, kicking and screaming, beneath the light of examination. Besides, if there was anyone to blame for her present predicament, it was actually Duncan, not Wynne. All Wynne had done was open her eyes to the fact of the knowledge she was missing; Duncan was the one who had placed her in a position where she might die before she had a chance to acquire it.
Resolutely, she skirted the campfire and knelt beside his head, reaching out with the intent to jostling his shoulder to wake him. Before she could complete the gesture, however, she froze, unwilling to risk movement with the point of a dagger beneath her chin. Rather than the blunt request she'd intended to issue upon waking him, the only sound she could utter was a terrified squeak.
Just as quickly as it had appeared, the dagger was gone, and Solona nearly collapsed in relief.
"I'm terribly sorry," Duncan said with casual courtesy, rising from his bedroll, as though he had accidentally trod upon her toes rather than taken her head off. "I'm afraid waking me without first announcing your presence is...generally not advisable."
"I'llkeepthatinmind," she whispered in a breathless rush, lifting a trembling hand to the underside of her chin. She was somewhat amazed when her fingers did not come away streaked with blood where the point of his dagger had pricked her skin.
"Was there something you needed?" he asked calmly, stretching.
Her temerity fled, Solona rapidly shook her head of messy, light brown hair.
"You must have had some purpose in waking me. There's no cause to be frightened, Solona," Duncan coaxed, sitting on the ground across from her with a kind smile. "I promise you, all appearances aside, I'm not actually in the habit of impaling my promising recruits."
Remembering Wynne's diagrams, the young mage flushed. However, it did help her recall her purpose in waking him, especially when she tried to visualize the theoretical anatomical parts on him and found the mental image far from unpleasant.
"I'm troubled," she announced at last, her heart still racing. "By the upcoming battle, I mean."
"I see," Duncan nodded, suddenly solemn.
"I enjoy learning far too much, and I'm afraid that if I'm killed, I won't have the opportunity to continue to learn."
"I see," he said again, thoughtfully. "I wish I could reassure you that you're in no danger of dying, but I can't. We're going into a war, against an enemy that will devour this entire land if left unchecked. All I can do is assure you that if you do fall in battle, your sacrifice will not have been in vain."
"Yes, yes, I know all that," she waved her hand impatiently, frustrated that he should imagine her a weak-willed coward. "I'm not sure I'm particularly fond of the idea of dying for the sake of an ignorant, benighted, superstitious populace that came near to burning me at the stake as a child, but I'm certain that my opportunities to continue to learn will be as severely curtailed by the Blight as they would be by death. Therefore, I'll face the battle to come and die if necessary."
"Then what is your concern?"
"Before the battle, it's important that I learn and experience as much as I can. In case I never have the chance again."
Duncan shook his head. "I'm sorry, I'm not a scholar," he replied. "I don't see how I can really help you."
"It's just that...the other apprentices make such a fuss over it. And Wynne...Wynne felt it was so important she had to give us lessons about it, and the Chantry seems to think they need to lie about it and...gah!" At his puzzled stare, Solona gave vent to an impatient growl, beating her fists upon her knees. "Sex! I need to have sex!" she blurted. "I may die when we get to Ostagar, but by the Maker's arse, I'm not going to die without knowing what sex is all about!"
Beneath his beard, Duncan's lips twitched, and Solona closed her eyes in mortified defeat. "Of course. You're laughing at me. Why not? Everybody else does, at least when they're not being tempted to bang my head against a stone wall repeatedly to shut me up. Come to think of it, I may try that myself."
"Why approach me?" Duncan asked, and when she heard no laughter in his voice, she dared a glance at him. He wasn't laughing. In fact, his eyes were inscrutably dark.
"What are my other options?" she shot back, embarrassment lending an acerbic bite to her tone. "It's either ask you, or drag the nearest soldier to the first available tent once we reach the encampment at Ostagar. And you certainly have been around long enough to have experience. Besides," she shrugged awkwardly, "you're...pleasant to look at."
There was a long pause as Duncan digested her explanation. "I'm not in the habit of bedding my recruits, either," he finally said, his words oddly clipped.
Insight into the psyches of others was not skill at which Solona was particularly adept, which she figured was why it was only now occurring to her that she had managed to offend him. "You're angry," she murmured at last, comprehension dawning. "I've...insulted you?"
"Nonsense," he said dismissively. "What man wouldn't be thrilled to have a young woman declare she wants to have sex with him as an intellectual exercise?"
Solona didn't know how to answer that. She was forever offending people, and rarely knew how to apologize with any semblance of grace.
Abruptly, his shoulders sagged a bit, and he sighed. "I've angered myself," he said, shaking his head. "I'm old enough to know better, and yet...I still fully intend to comply with your request."
"You do?" she asked wonderingly.
"Oh yes," he shrugged with something that seemed to approach self-deprecation. "It appears you aren't the only one who wishes to seize what experiences you may in the face of an uncertain future."
She stood there a long moment, staring at him. Duncan waited, watching her, as she came to the realization that she had no idea how to proceed beyond the moment of gaining his approval. He held out a hand.
"Come here." At his tone, something deep within her belly plunged downward. She might have likened the sensation to fear, or nervousness, only she doubted either of those would feel quite so good. She turned toward him and had taken two steps forward before she even knew she had any intention of complying.
"Take off your robes," he instructed, his eyes intent and unreadable. He seemed to be taking her measure.
"Really? I mean, I--" Solona faltered, confused and suddenly unsure of her own wisdom in pursuing this whole thing. Her heart thundered in her chest as she contemplated standing before him in nothing but her flesh. How could she possibly expect to objectively observe anything in such vulnerable state?
At her hesitation, one of Duncan's eyebrows lifted ever so slightly, challenging--or perhaps mocking--her. "Sex can take many forms," he said crisply, as though lecturing, "Certainly, there's the perfunctory coupling intended to dutifully produce a child, but if that's all you're interested in learning about, then I daresay the scope of your inquiry is pathetically limited."
That stung, and she felt the hot flush of injured pride creep across her cheeks. "It is not," she said, lifting her chin. "I wish to know everything."
Duncan rose, stalking toward her. He'd removed his breastplate, gauntlets and greaves to sleep, leaving only the long, robe-like garment he wore beneath the breastplate above a woolen tunic and loose trousers. As he approached, he began pulling at the assorted ties closing the garment.
"There's also lovemaking, naturally," he said with an erudite air, and now Solona was quite certain he was indulging himself in some amusement at her expense, making light of her curiosity. She ought to be offended, she knew, but instead she was simply riveted as he continued to speak. "A slow, gentle, exploration, usually intended to express tenderness and affection."
He stopped speaking when he stood before her, close enough to touch. One large, calloused, impossibly strong-looking hand slowly stretched forth and threaded through her shaggy hair. Breathless, she leaned toward the touch, yearning for fuller contact. His fingers slid through her locks...and clenched there.
"Or there's fucking," he growled, the hard consonant of that final word enunciated so clearly it struck like a tiny blow. He jerked her closer in a sudden movement that nearly pulled her off her feet, until only the smallest breath separated her face from his. His voice was a low rumble that vibrated up and down her nerves. That dropping sensation in her gut was back again, and getting more intense with each word he spoke. "Hard, fast, frequently arising from nothing more than the need to satisfy the urges of the body without regard to emotion."
He released her as unexpectedly as he'd pulled her close. "So...which will best fulfill the intent of your inquiry?" he pondered, his tone low and soft, making a caress of the words that stroked across her nerves. Casually, he dropped the long outer garment. "Whatever you choose, they all involve some greater or lesser degree of nudity. Oh, I suppose I could just throw your robes up over your head and take my pleasure, but I doubt you'd find that very satisfying, intellectually or otherwise."
"All of it," she breathed, her voice unsteady. She wished her pulse would stop pounding the way it insisted on doing. Forming syllables into words, and words into sentences, took every bit of her concentration, for her mind was wont to concoct images of the descriptions he'd rendered.
"All of it?" his brows lifted slightly, and she thought she saw a small smile flit across his lips. "That's ambitious of you."
She ducked her head, embarrassed by his amusement and her own eagerness. Then inspiration struck. She crinkled her eyes, attempting to emulate the flirtatious smiles she'd seen pass between apprentices in the dormitories. For possibly the first time, made light of her own inquisitiveness, using his own words against him. "What sort of scholar would I be if I limited the scope of my inquiry?"
Something in the way he looked at her warmed in response to her attempt at flirtation. His dark eyes slowly moved down her body, taking in every curve outlined by her robes. Solona was pleased with the scrutiny, for she knew her curves were her only real physical asset. Even better, when he finished sizing her up, he was definitely smiling. "You may just be in for more of an education than you expect," he warned, drawing nearer. "If you don't feel ready to remove your robes, you may undress me," he bade her. "And...do it with your senses, rather than your intellect."
Nervously, she lifted her hands to the laces of the tunic where they were tied at his throat and tugged. She felt the friction vibrating along the string as one end of the laces slid along the other. With trembling fingers she pulled the edges of his collar apart, then reached down for the hem of his shirt, intent upon lifting it.
"Stop," he said softly, catching her hands in his. Afraid she had done something wrong, Solona began to pull back, but he merely drew her hands back to his collar and set her fingers at the place where his shirt parted, revealing his skin. "Use your senses," he admonished again. "Sex is about sensation, not erudition."
Tugging at her bottom lip with her teeth, she let her fingertips flutter over his exposed skin. He was warm, despite the cool night air, and his skin was surprisingly soft. Touching him was...pleasant. She wanted to feel more. Closing her eyes, she traced the ridge of his collarbone, the hollow above it, up to his neck where the bristle of his beard began. He obligingly tipped his head back and she explored the texture of his beard, coarse and wiry.
When at last she reached for the hem of his tunic again, it was with a purpose. She let her hands slide beneath it and pressed them to the skin of his abdomen. His skin quivered and twitched as her fingers brushed the sides of his waist. She could feel ridges beneath his skin, and she wanted to see them. When she lifted his tunic, he made no move to stop her, but instead ducked his head and raised his arms, aiding her in removing it.
His skin was striped with pale lines and marred by irregular, puckered scars, and yet it seemed perfect. Seeing the cause of those ridges her fingers had discovered, her eyes widened. The definition of his muscles beneath his scarred skin was wholly unexpected, and completely glorious. They descended from his chest to dip beneath the loose waistband of his trousers in a cascade of warm, living stone. She dragged her knuckles down his torso, feeling each ripple and bump, amazed at how hard and unyielding human flesh could be.
Lifting her eyes, she encountered the buds of his nipples, erect and centered atop a wide, flat pad of muscle. When she touched one, it became harder, smaller, and Duncan let out of low, subsonic groan. At the sound, she felt her own nipples tighten beneath her robes. She withdrew one hand to touch her own breast, felt the hard peak beneath the material. It was exquisitely sensitive when she touched it, even through her robes, and when she rubbed it a soft sigh of pleasure slid from her lips and her eyes fluttered shut.
When she opened them again, Duncan was watching her, his gaze riveted on her hand covering her own breast, his eyes hungry. At his look, everything from her waist down clenched in a delicious surge of warmth and tension. Duncan reached out, his hands deftly making short work of the ties of her robes and parting them to the waist. His hand slipped inside and slid up her ribs to cup her breast.
"Oh!" Her lips opened in a gasp, and she forgot to stare at him as her eyes snapped shut and her head fell back. It startled her to feel a corresponding pulse between her legs as his thumb passed over her nipple. The heat of his hand felt like a brand compared to the chill of the air on her exposed skin and she found herself arching a little to press her breast more firmly into his warm, calloused palm.
Now the soft sighs and moans that had drifted from the bunks in the dormitory made more sense, she thought wonderingly, astonished to hear an uncontrollable whimper emerge from her own lips as his fingers plied her nipple and his palm molded the soft flesh of her breast. He bent over and if his hand had been warm, his mouth was nothing short of a wet inferno engulfing her nipple. Each suck, each stroke of his tongue seemed to tug at something between her legs, creating a throbbing tension that was at once marvelous and unbearable. She realized her hands had taken hold of his head, pulling him closer to her breast and holding him there. She wanted him never to stop, and at the same time she felt a strange, writhing restlessness that needed something more.
She gave a low, despairing groan when he withdrew and reached for him, intent on drawing him back. The cold air caused her wet nipple to tighten almost painfully, and she made a wordless noise of protest, only to find it swallowed by his mouth as it closed over hers.
Her eyes flew open and her lips parted in another gasp as she realized that, without any warning or forethought, she was receiving her very first kiss. What should she do now? she wondered in a bit of a panic. Duncan slowly withdrew, pulling on her bottom lip with his own lips with a gentle suck before releasing it. Then his mouth returned, harder, firmer, slanting over hers in a way that made it impossible not to open her mouth for him. With soft tugs, his lips pulled on hers, and she felt a small swipe of his tongue before he let go to do the same with her other lip. This time she was ready for him, and when he puled her upper lip between his, she caught his lower lip and mimicked him, sucking softly, offering the smallest flick of her tongue against his lip. She felt, rather than heard, the low, pleased sound he made as she caught on to the game. The next time when he parted her lips, his tongue slid into her mouth.
She greeted it with her own, cautiously at first, then bolder, sucking on his tongue briefly before letting her tongue glide along his and when he withdrew again, she followed, seeking entrance into his mouth the way he'd intruded upon hers. He tasted lightly of salt from the smoked meat they'd eaten for dinner, with a hint of the raspy wine from the wineskin he carried in their supplies. This close to him, she could smell woodsmoke from the fire in his hair and clothes, and damp leaves from the ground on which they slept.
His kiss grew more aggressive, his tongue demanding entrance to her mouth rather than teasing and cajoling. She rose on her toes, her arms twining around him, yearning toward him. Her breasts ached where his arms crushed her against his chest, and dear Maker how on earth was it possible that something as simple as his mouth on hers was felt in so many previously-undiscovered places in her body? She wanted him to find them all, and find them now. Of its own volition, her knee rose, sliding up his thigh to bring her belly and hips, where a marvelous, frustrating, delicious cramping ache had started to bloom, into closer contact with his body.
Duncan groaned, breaking the kiss, his body growing still. Then he nudged his hips against her soft belly and she felt the solid, hard bulge there and understood what it was she was feeling. Her eyes flew open wide in surprise and she began to draw away but he held her tight. He pulled her closer, one arm behind her back with his hand cupping her backside while the other took hold of her knee and hitched it up higher on his hip. Cold air crept beneath her robes and she realized with surprise that her smallclothes were damp. Then he ground against her, claiming her mouth once more, and the pressure of his thigh between hers did something to that yearning ache within her, made it at once better and stronger. That, there, that pressure was the way to ease the ache, and she wanted, needed, had to have more.
Her hands discovered the joy of his back, his impossibly warm skin soft beneath her fingers, stretched over rippling, hard muscles. She devoured his mouth as greedily as he did hers, forgetting to think, to analyze. There was only feeling and sensation and hunger and need. She moaned softly with each shift and slide of his thigh against her sex every time he ground against her belly.
The taper of his ribs to his waist fascinated her, ridged as it was by those same unyielding muscles she'd so admired on his chest and she stoked her hands up and down his sides until they came to rest on his waist above the sharp edge of his hips. Astonished by her own temerity, she slowly slid her hands down and over the curve of his backside beneath his soft woolen trousers, and found the contour there delightful. He answered her exploration with another low groan that rumbled through her senses and ground against her more firmly, his muscles flexing beneath her hands, before he pulled away.
Duncan dropped her leg and let it slide down until she stood on both feet, whimpering at the loss of contact. He began to push her robes off her shoulders and suddenly nothing had ever seemed like a better idea than more of his bare skin on hers. Eagerly she withdrew her arms from the sleeves, but when he released the sash around her waist and the robe fell to the ground in a heap, leaving her in only her smallclothes, suddenly she felt cold and vulnerable and self-conscious. He allowed her no time for modesty, however, bending her back over his arm to dedicate to one breast the same attention he'd lavished on the opposite side earlier. His mouth tugged at her nipple, his beard prickled her skin, and with each sensation the tension inside her wound ever tighter, until her knees were weak and her hips moved in restless, unintentional jerks and wriggles. When gently scraped her nipple with his teeth, something akin to a scream echoed through the empty landscape around them.
"Please..." she whimpered, clutching his head to her breasts as her hands roamed the ridges and planes of his back. Duncan withdrew, all but holding her upright when her quaking limbs threatened to give up the job. His mouth glistened in the firelight when he raised his eyes to her.
"Please...what?"
Her mouth worked wordlessly as she struggled to put into words the incredible, unsatisfied yearning within her. Just what was she intending to ask for? When she'd wished to learn about sex, she'd never imagined any of this, never knew how it could drive all possibility of thought from her head beyond an echoing refrain of, "oh, Maker, more please!" and leave her with nothing but feeling and need and longing. As she caught her breath and struggled for sanity, she wondered if those apprentices in their bunks with their muted sighs had experienced this, and rather suspected they had not. Perhaps some pale shadow of this, a fumbling attempt to find this, but nothing she'd ever heard indicated this sort of urgency.
She wanted! But what?
She wanted that pressure she'd felt when his thigh had rubbed between hers. Remembering Wynne's lessons, she knew with the mechanics of the act, they would wind up there eventually, but she no longer cared about that. She needed the feeling again, that soothing of the hollow ache between her thighs.
She ducked her head. Was it permissible to ask? Would her lack of tact lead her into a trap that would bring this to a suddenly horrible and awkward end?
Duncan lifted her chin with his hand and dipped his own head, and she felt his mouth on her neck, kissing, sucking, nipping. She shuddered, her eyes drifting closed as her mouth fell open with a soft moan. "Please!" she gasped, sliding her knee up over his hip again, angling to press her sex against him, "Touch me!"
Her mouth found his again as he hand slowly stroked downward over her breast, her ribs. She sucked in her breath and shivered, tensing as his fingers glided down over her belly, her skin twitching. When he stroked the hollow where her hip met her belly, she yelped, jerking, caught somewhere between "pleasant" and "ticklish." Then his hands were at her hips, sliding inside her smallclothes and pushing them down. He cupped her backside for a moment, kneading, and then she stood very still as he pulled away to kneel and guide the garment down her legs.
Dear Maker, she could smell herself now, rich and pungent and earthy. Duncan's eyes closed and he breathed deep, kneeling there so near the source of that scent. When he opened his eyes, the intensity of his gaze unnerved her, and she wondered what she risked choosing this man, of all people, for he was no awkward apprentice and she sensed within him the potential to be dangerous indeed. His hands stroked up her legs, pressing between her thighs, urging her to open for him, and eagerly she awaited his touch. Then she gaped in astonishment as he leaned forward and his tongue stroked her damp curls. Her hands came up--to push him away? or draw him closer?--but then he ducked his head in earnest and she felt his mouth covering her sex and all thoughts of shock or embarrassment vaporized.
She felt his tongue, sliding over her folds, lapping at her. It was...pleasant, but not nearly the pressure she'd wanted when she'd asked for his touch and she thrust her hips impatiently, needing more. Then his tongue stroked over a spot at the base of her curls and she cried out, stumbling as her knees buckled for an instant. He grabbed her hips, steadying her as she swayed. Too much! Too good! she thought with an instant of panic, and then his tongue was back, laving that spot with slow licks, soothing her alarm as the intensity of that first sudden contact faded.
He increased the pressure of the strokes, alternating with slow licks and caresses. His fingers kneaded her buttocks as he held her hips, and that sense of "too much" began to recede. Now those firm strokes seemed just right, almost not enough. She felt heat spreading across her skin like a sudden fever, and that unbearable knot of tension in her belly pulled ever tighter. She clutched at his shoulders, barely able to remain upright and her hips writhed and thrust and ground against him, seeking more, ever, always more. Then his lips closed over that spot his tongue had worried and he sucked, hard. The night and the world splintered into prisms of electric light that penetrated her clenched eyelids. She heard her own soughing cry. She collapsed bonelessly against him and his strong hands kept her from pitching over, guiding her safely to her knees and into his arms.
There she trembled, shuddered, panted raggedly as she struggled to catch her breath. Duncan sat very still, supporting her against the warmth of his body when she would have lain on the cold ground. As she came back to herself, he coaxed her up and guided her to the bedroll. His hands on her were gentle, and yet she detected a tremor in them. She became aware of a dangerous, taut reserve in Duncan's touch, sensed something within him coiled and eagerly waiting to surge forth, held in check only by the force of his will. Whatever she had experienced just now, he had not shared in it, and she knew they were not done yet, however replete she felt.
She sat there on the bedroll as he stood over her, tense and quivering, waiting. When she lifted her eyes, she found her gaze irresistibly drawn to the bulge straining against his woolen trousers. With the urgency of her own need receding, she found curiosity gaining a foothold once more, and she wanted to explore that hardness she'd only felt against her belly before.
She lifted her hands toward him. "May I...see you? Touch you?" she inquired, and his eyes closed for a moment, almost as though in prayer, before he looked down at her and, taking her hands, guided them to his laces.
She unlaced his trousers, taking no time to explore as she had when she first began undressing him, and tugged the woolen fabric down over his hips, dragging his smallclothes with it. The fabric caught on him for a moment and then his erection sprang free, seeming impossibly large and solid before her wide eyes.
Duncan gave voice to a low sigh and a hum as her hand encircled him, and the sound pleased her, made her feel powerful that she could elicit it from him. She wanted to hear him make it again.
As she'd smelled her own arousal earlier, now she could smell him, stronger, heavier, muskier. With her fingertips she explored his erection, wonderingly, feeling him twitch and shudder. The skin was astonishingly silky and soft, and she liked the feel of it. She traced the bulging lines of veins from the wiry hair at the base of his shaft to the cowl of skin at the end. She wrapped her hand around him again and stroked, intrigued by the loose glide of that soft skin as she drew her hand up his shaft and then back down. The cowl parted and pulled away and she studied the slightly bulbous head that emerged.
When she reached the base, she gingerly ran her fingertips over the soft sac there and he made another sound of pleasure, somewhere between a sigh and a moan. She weighed it in her hand, felt the orbs within shifting as she gently kneaded before she took his erection in her hand and stroked again.
A drop of clear fluid welled in the slit at the tip of that head and with an inquisitive fingertip she gathered it, stared at it, and then brought it to her lips to taste it. It was salty and hinted of the essence of all the things she was smelling, and she wondered how he might taste if she took him into her mouth. Her lips parted, but before she could proceed, his hands were on her, pulling her away.
"I have only so much control, Solona," he cautioned her, and there was something dangerous in his tone, despite his attempt to smile, "and you've brought me almost to its end. Unless you would see your inquiry brought to a premature end, I would move on to other things."
She felt a tremble of fear--and something far more delicious--pass through her, understanding his intent. Nodding solemnly, she slid back, making room for him to kneel on the bedroll before her. Though his hands shook, he took her face between them and kissed her again, parting her lips with his tongue and thrusting within in a manner that was suddenly much more suggestive than it had been before. She breathed into the kiss, letting it soothe her sudden rush of nervousness, letting herself melt against him, becoming pliant. He tasted and smelled of her, she realized with surprise. A faint echo of the tension she'd known before awoke within her and she moaned softly into his mouth, welcoming his tongue with strokes of her own.
He crawled forward and she lay back until she was beneath him. He held himself over her, making no effort to settle his weight upon her as he knelt between her thighs. With one hand he stroked her breast, pulling gently at the nipple, caressing with his thumb, before his palm smoothed over the curve of her waist and his fingers dipped into her curls. She gasped as his fingers explored her, sliding between her wet folds. The tension in her thighs relaxed until she let herself fall open for him, flexing to meet his caress with a hesitant thrust of her hips.
He gently rubbed that spot his lips and tongue had so deftly manipulated earlier and she cried out as a sudden rush of pleasure shot through her like lightning, sharper than when it had been his tongue touching her. It was so intense it was nearly painful, and yet so very good. She thrust her hips against his hand, seeking more.
His slid his finger just slightly within her, slowly, and she whimpered, the intrusion at once deliciously welcome and frighteningly foreign. He withdrew the finger and slid it back in again, deeper. A second finger tried to slide in alongside the first Solona squirmed, feeling an uncomfortable pull and resistance. Soft mewls of protest escaped her throat. Still, she realized, she didn't want him to stop; a strange eagerness was growing within her to experience fully what his fingers were only hinting at.
He paused, his fingers resting just outside her, until she relaxed again. Then he thrust them both in, abruptly, firmly. She felt the resistance yield with a suddenness she could almost imagine she heard a popping or tearing sound. The discomfort renewed and doubled as she began to stretch. She made a frightened sound, attempting to arch and wriggle away against even her own will. Duncan met her slightly damp eyes, gauging her willingness to proceed, and Solona shook her head impatiently. She'd not come this far to give up now. She set her jaw, resolved to see this through. "Yes," was all she said.
He withdrew his fingers--odd, they were wet, when they brushed her thigh--and thrust them back in, over and over, until the stretching was gone and it was no longer uncomfortable. Indeed, it felt good, but just as pleasure began to blossom, he stopped.
"What--?" she asked in startled confusion, but he was crawling over her body, lowering and fitting himself between her legs. His weight upon her, she was surprised to discover, felt marvelous and safe and welcome.
She felt that hard, warm flesh she had explored slide against her, and the pleasure was back as he ground his erection between them, that soft, gliding skin growing slick with her moisture. Still, he hesitated, and Solona was intrigued to realize he was neither gentleman enough to offer to halt, nor brute enough to press heedlessly forward.
She drew a deep breath and fell back on the spirit of intellectual curiosity that had brought her to this juncture in the first place. "My understanding is that pain is somewhat inevitable. I'm not a coward. If I wish to learn--I must learn it all."
Duncan's lips twitched, and she realized that she had amused him once more. He did not hesitate again. He braced himself on one hand above her. With the other, he pulled her knee up and opened her wide, then his hand wedged between them and she felt him prodding between her folds. Instinctively she angled her hips slightly and he pushed forward, just entering her.
Despite her resolve, she gave a keening whimper, feeling tears start behind her eyelids again as she stretched, her flesh stinging again, and surely it was too much, had to be too much, how could she possibly take more? Even as she wondered, he gave a nudge with his hips and slid within a little more deeply within her. She bit her lip, convinced there couldn't possibly be any pleasure to be had here, but she was already stretching, yielding to the intrusion, the stinging starting to abate until he gave another push.
He paused then, unable to proceed as gradually as he had begun with his series of short pushes. Was this...usual, she wondered? She had imagined he would just enter her and be inside her, but instead, it was slow and difficult progress, to get him fully within her. Was he too large, or she too small? It seemed impossible that she could take him completely within her. It ached, her flesh stretching around him. Her body was tense, strung tight with the pain and the fear of worse yet to come.
He rested his forehead against hers, breathing deeply even as his body shook and she realized his skin was slick with sweat, felt a droplet roll off his forehead and onto her skin. Whatever discomfort she was feeling, it as clear he was experiencing anything but, and to distract herself as she adjusted, she whispered, "What is it like?"
"Tight," he growled, his breath hard against her face. "Please. Solona, I must--"
She drew a deep breath. "Yes," she said again. "Do it."
He thrust, hard, filling her completely. For a moment she fought him, contrary to her intentions, tried to push him off her body, push him away, push him out. Tears slid from the corners of her eyes down her temples and into her hair and she squeezed her eyes shut and waited. She heard him groan before he became still again, save for the persistent trembling through his body. Slowly the tension and the pain began to recede and in its place emerged a sense of fullness that didn't yet feel pleasant, but instinctively she knew it had the potential to become so. It seemed to fill that hollow ache she'd known before.
Slowly, Duncan began to move, drawing back before thrusting forward again. It was not entirely comfortable yet, but the pain was easing and Solona decided she could bear it until the end. The next time Duncan pulled back, he withdrew almost completely, and she felt strangely empty. He took hold of her knee again and pressed it closer to her chest, spreading her wider even as the angle of her hips shifted slightly. When he thrust forward again, her eyes flew open and--
"Oh, Maker!" she gasped, and there, eclipsing the lingering hints of discomfort, was pleasure. Suddenly nothing felt more right or welcome than his body inside hers, filling her, creating this wonderful pressure and fullness. At the deepest point in his stroke, he struck something within her that was at once unfathomably good and unbearably intense. On the next stroke, she instinctively lifted her hips, thrusting to meet him and hasten the resurgence of that feeling. She pulled her other knee up to get better leverage and reached down, grasping for him, her hands cupping his flexing backside in an effort to pull him into her, rising to meet each of his thrusts with a force of her own.
When his pelvis brushed hers, it was almost, almost enough to stroke that spot outside, but almost wasn't enough. She began to writhe when he was deeply within her, searching for friction, something to add to the sensation of him filling her, but she couldn't find the right angle and gave a frustrated moan.
"Solona," Duncan groaned, shuddering as his pace increased. He pulled back and reached behind him to grab one of her hands and thrust it between their bodies. Then he lifted his weight off her, bracing with both his hands and looked down at where her hand lay, watching.
Conscious of his eyes upon her, willing her to action, she began to explore and quickly found the hard knot of nerves she'd never really understood existed until he moment his tongue had found it. Her fingers circled it, rubbing, finding it slick and pulsing eagerly. When she discovered the right amount of pressure, she felt everything within her clench and seize, including the muscles engulfing his length. Duncan growled, a feral, uncontrolled sound, and pushing himself up, thrust again, hard and deep.
Her own growl echoed his, and then she was beyond thoughts of pain or discomfort or fear. She wanted more, ever more, and soon his hips were slamming into hers, adding pressure to the touch of her fingertips at that incredibly sensitive spot. Duncan's voice was an animalistic snarl in her ears, and she looked up into his strained, sweating face as he gave one last mighty thrust and then seized, shaking. She felt him pulse and twitch inside her, and wished she might have seen what had actually happened within her in that final moment for him.
As he subsided, sinking against her with his ragged breath harsh in her ear, so did she, her fingers slowing and eventually withdrawing. She hadn't reached that blindingly bright peak he'd brought her to with his mouth, but she didn't feel she needed to this time. Everything felt perfect as it was, and already her thoughts were turning to the possibilities that were yet unexplored.
At length, he moved aside, removing his weight from her, and she shivered as the night air was suddenly cold on her sweat-dappled skin. Duncan rolled onto his back, seemingly unmindful of the fact that he lay half-off the bedroll on the cold ground. Solona sat up and as she did so, she registered the fluids on her thighs, mingled with smears of blood. She touched her folds, gathered those pink-tinged fluids on her fingers, and stared at them in the firelight, awed for a moment at what had transpired. Movement brought twinges of discomfort that told her she'd be sore the next day, but she had to count the experience worth it.
Rising, she sought out her robe; it really was uncomfortably cold now that she had nothing warming her.
"So!" she said with a bright smile as Duncan sat up and began to gather his own clothing. She supposed she ought to be tired, but instead she felt energized, her mind was racing with possibilities and questions, and she felt ready to conduct an inquiry into each and every one. "Now that I've some basic knowledge of how sex works, I find there are far more aspects to investigate than I ever expected."
"I suppose you're going to tell me this requires deeper study?" Duncan studied her with a look that rested somewhere between amusement and wariness.
She nodded eagerly. "It is a long journey to Ostagar, is it not? Surely there's time enough to make at least a few more inquiries?"
Duncan stared at her for a long moment, and for a moment she feared he might refuse, but then he shook his head with a resigned smile. "At least a few," he answered. "But first, I need rest."
But--" he cut her off with a look, something perilous in his stern expression, and she realized with a frisson of fear that she ought not make the mistake of assuming him harmless or easily cajoled.
"Sleep," he commanded. "There will be other nights between now and Ostagar. Push me, and you'll get your first lesson in punishment."
The way he emphasized that final word, and the smoldering look he gave her as he pulled his clothing around him and lay down on his bedroll, made something spasm inside her. Quickly, she sought out her own bedroll and pulled the blanket over her.
Her last thought before she felt asleep by the flickering campfire was to remind herself to investigate what he meant by "punishment" before they reached Ostagar.