joudama (stopthatgirl7) wrote in kinkfest, @ 2008-03-01 18:08:00 |
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Current music: | Grégory Lemarchal - A corps perdu |
Entry tags: | a: stopthatgirl7, f: kushiel series, march 01, p: joscelin/phedre |
A Moment of Creature Comfort, Kushiel Series (Phédre/Joscelin)
Title: A Moment of Creature Comfort
Author/Artist: stopthatgirl7
Rating: G. I DON'T KNOW HOW THAT HAPPENED, EITHER. *headdesk*
Word count: 666 (...I'm not making that up.)
Summary: Outside, there was a storm brewing, and it was a night, truly, where I was glad to be inside with a warm fire and the warmth of Imriel's cheek against my knee.
A/N: There was supposed to be porn. I planned porn. I had porn in my head when I decided to do this. And yet, when I started writing, it just wouldn't do it. I'm confused, too.
Original prompt: “by candlelight – We existed in the shadows, our light and darkness merging into the body of our love.”
A Moment of Creature Comfort
Outside, there was a storm brewing. It had all the markings of a fine storm, one that would last half the night, if not more, and in the morrow leave the ground a fine, soggy messy and the trees half stripped bare.
It was a night, truly, where I was glad to be inside with a warm fire. A warm fire and the warmth of Imriel's check against my knee and the softness of his hair beneath my hand.
It was rare the boy slept soundly--rare for any of us, really--and I was loathe to move lest I wake him. So I let him sleep, my fingers twining absentmindedly in his dark hair. If he dreamed, it was not of Drujan or the zenana, and it gave me a small bit of peace to know this.
And, I thought wryly, it gave me no small peace to enjoy the moment of creature comfort, of something warm and soft and trusting sleeping against me, trusting to me to keep him safe. Too often dreams gave way to nightmares, for all of us, but only when we were together did things seem safe.
When Imriel was in the grip of a nightmare, I worried. When he was awake, I also worried at times, albeit less. But when he slept like this, quietly content and trusting, I felt the fear around my heart lessen, and something else take its place, many somethings, tangled and confused. Joy that he seemed almost...whole, happiness that he was healing, warmth that he trusted us, trusted me, this much, and at the base of it all, a sick kind of despair, that he should ever have come to a point where such a simple thing as sleeping at a mother's--or mother-figure's--knee should be the cause of such joy.
Too much, he had been through too much, and too young, and as I gazed down at his face in the flickering firelight, I could see shades of the child he should have been.
Ahh, but the weight of Kushiel was heavy, even for thin shoulders such as these. If there had been another way to halt the evil that had been about to be unleashed upon the world, I could not easily think of it. And thinking of other paths, of things that could have been, were useless in the face of gods and angels. Had there been another path, things would not be as there were now, Hycinth free and Imriel's cheek warm against my knee.
I knew this, and I found comfort in these things, but ah. The price had been so heavy.
"He should be a-bed," Joscelin's voice said softly, from the door frame.
"Yes," I said, agreeing because he was right. "But I don't want to wake him to send him," I finished, slightly ruefully. Joscelin smiled faintly and came over silently, as if he glided instead of walking, and carefully lifted Imriel as if he weighed nothing, and settled the boy against him. Imriel shifted slightly in his sleep, settling against Jocelin and making a faint, contented sound as he buried his head against Jocelin's neck.
Something in me stirred at that, something that seemed to fill with a simple kind of contented joy. This was my family, as odd and full of shadows as it was, and these moments were like candleflickers of light against the shadows all of us had within us.
"I'll put him to bed," Jocelin said, leaning his head against Imriel's in a way that showed he hadn't thought to do it, it had just happened.
I felt the smile tugging at my lips, and nodded. Then added softly, "And then join me in ours."
Joscelin's lips twitched upwards, and there was something warm like candlelight in his eyes as he nodded in a contented acquiescence.
There was a storm raging, and we were full of shadows, but, in this moment, all I felt was light.