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Disclaimer: This is a work of fan fiction, written solely love for the works of J R R Tolkien. The characters, settings, places, and situations used in this work are the property of the Tolkien Estate, Tolkien Enterprises. The author receives no money or other remuneration for presenting this work but the pleasure of enjoying the Professor's creations. This work is the intellectual property of the author and may not be copied or redistributed by any means without the explicit written consent of the author.

Genre: Haremfic, AU and smutty.

Warnings: This fic was written for select ladies in Frodo's Harem and others who follow my work. It was not written to offend anyone but to comfort me. It may not appeal to all readers.

Rating: NC-17 (explicit sex) - though you must expect that from me by now.

It is your birthday.

The deceptive cool of this late summer morning belies the heat that will fill the day come afternoon. You stand before your looking glass absently brushing your long, curly locks noting the way each strand glimmers in the early morning sun. This precious time has always been your favorite. Hobbits by nature are late risers and perhaps you are odd in that respect, but you have always treasured the morning. It is the calm before waking when the world belongs to only those who are brave enough to venture forth into it. It is a time for quiet reflection, for a solitary tea in the empty garden, for silence and planning and for appreciating the hum and industry of the wakening world around you.

You dress in silence. No fancy garb for today, just your practical and common garments. As per custom, today you may have the squire to yourself, if he is willing, and oddly, you do not feel very amorous. You feel.... Well, actually, you aren't sure how you feel. Unsettled, lost, and weary perhaps, but underlying these feelings is an odd melancholy that seems fit to break your heart in two. You fear something but you can't seem to put your finger on it.

In the kitchen you make yourself a cup of fragrant tea and find a scone from the previous morning in the breadbasket - it is breakfast enough. The world outside beckons you and you drift out to catch the dawn's gentle rays in the hopes that something will be able to lift this fog of sorrow that seems to have taken up residence in your heart.

The view from Bag End West's front garden is breathtaking. The sea is far off, but you can see its misty grey-blue line at the edge of the horizon. The smial is set into the side of a hill, with an encircling embrace of trees that have been pruned up high. They let in the sunlight and the cool breezes from the sea, but keep off the worst of the midday heat. The front garden is cluttered with seats and benches nestled amid mounds of flowers so fragrant that they fill the senses and little chalk lined paths that wander to and fro through the well-tended plants. The garden faces east - towards your home far across the sea - and though you would not live in any other place but this, there are times when you enjoy the memories that eastward view calls back to you. From the garden, a long sweeping lawn drifts down towards the cliffs. A path skirts the few vegetable patches, the wheat field and finally the scattered mounds of heather and gorse on its way to those cliffs. At the edge of the cliffs, at the very limit of your field of view, is a small cluster of stunted and twisted trees that struggle vainly to keep their hold amid the toss of wind and spray.

As you watch that small, faraway wood you feel a sudden pull to walk amid those trees. Yes, that will be a good place to spend today - far enough for the solitude you feel you need but still within sight of this place - and the hobbit - you love more than your life. Perhaps there you can wrestle with the worries that plague your heart and which none of your sisters understand or share. There you can be as alone as you have been feeling lately and if it is HIS wish to come to you today, then he will know where to seek you. You sigh and sip your tea in the fragile dawn.

~*~

The crash of the sea below masks the sound of his footfalls until he is just behind you. He calls your name and the mere sound of his voice speaking it fills your heart. You turn and smile at Frodo as he walks slowly to the cliff side to stand beside you.

The wind never stills here, but it is gentle today and lifts the dark curls from his neck and forehead in graceful, teasing fits. He peers down the cliff to the beach and ocean below but is careful not to get too close to the edge. As most hobbits, he is not over fond of heights but his fascination with the sea is lifelong. He cannot pass her by without at least a look. Your smile broadens as you watch him gazing contentedly out over the water, his eyes catching the sun and shining more brilliantly than the blue canopy of sky above you. How can you be sad when the one you hold so dear is standing beside you?

He looks good today. He has few bad days any more, but there are occasions when he shines more brightly than even his usual glow. His clear skin gleams with health and the bloom on his cheek comes from within and is not pinched from the surface by wind or cold. He has dressed in nothing but his pants, braces and a thin cotton shirt - mindful of what the day will probably feel like later - and the outline of his lean body is described against the fabric with every firm gust of air. He stands easy beside you, his hands in his pockets, looking eastwards as you have been, and as your eyes take in his beloved form, you think how very good it is to see him healthy, contented and satisfied. Even the melancholy cannot darken your heart when you see Frodo this way.

"Good morning," he repeats, and you flush, realizing you have not yet answered his first greeting.

"Yes, I believe it will be," you say softy. He looks at you then with an odd mixture of curiosity and amusement and smiles.

"Since this is your day, I will leave our arrangements up to you. Did you have anything in mind?" he asks.

You laugh but it is not a joyous sound. There is in fact a note of bitterness that you did not realize you felt touching it. Frodo cocks his head at that but allows you to speak. "I did not have any plans Frodo. I simply felt the call of the sea and knew I had to come here. I...I did not make any other 'arrangements'."

Frodo has been studying you thorough this conversation and his nimble brow creases as he ponders. You don't mean to cause him consternation, but you cannot help the way you feel. It has been this way since the elves announced that the last ringbearer, his companion, would be arriving. Frodo seemed to have already known about it. The other ladies had been delighted, preparing a room and garden just for the new arrival’s use, but you… Only to you does the news seemed like a death knell, a doom and blackness laid upon your shoulders. It has sundered you from your sisters and made you fear Frodo will turn from you as well. You falter and grow silent, the sorrow building up inside you until you almost sob. He frowns once, quickly and then, looks thoughtfully at you.

"Then do you mind if I suggest the activities?" You nod and his smile returns broad and suddenly mischievous. "I feel like playing," he says with a wink and a twinkle in his eye. "Just like we used to as children. Games like 'catch as catch can', 'foxes and hounds' and 'blind man's bluff'. I want to run and laugh till I am weary and I want you to join me!"

You are literally at a loss for words. This is possibly the most astonishing thing you could have ever expected from him - but for some reason, you do not find the notion preposterous. Seeing him before you, his lithe frame crackling with eagerness to be up and away, you are filled with an answering yearning. Yes, the simple joy of play. How utterly perfect. Your conflicted mind is caught unprepared by the enthusiasm you feel at the notion. At least for a time your anxiety will be set aside while you answer his energy with an unabashed giggle. Frodo does not wait for your affirmative but takes your hand and together you dash off towards the wood.

It has been many years since you last felt like this. Time stands still and in the merry sunlight the two of you are cocooned in a realm of pure magic. For this all too brief time you are children again - and in that warm space, the child you were comes hesitantly forth. With tearful gratitude for her and for he who drew her forth, you surrender to the game. Now there is nothing but the whir of energy and breathlessness and the pure enjoyment of the moment. You will not tire; for the spell Frodo has cast provides a boundless well of vigor that spurs you on to follow him. You will not sorrow; for the child you were knows nothing of worries, conjectures and schemes - she has a wisdom you have long forgotten and knows only the truth of this joyous moment.

You wrestle and chase after each other, darting between the trees and patches of sunlight without a care. The sweat builds upon your bodies and you can feel the heat radiating from his lean waist as you wrap yourself around him in a flying body tackle. He is strong and fast and laughs merrily as he wriggles out of your hold. You hike your skirts up to tie them out of your way and pelt after him. Next you catch a rumor of his sleeve, but he twists away, a limber dancer in the shadow of the wood, but you round on him at the next opening and he is caught, stumbling against you as you catch him by the braces and pull. Then it is his turn to catch you. You laugh and dart away, desperate to evade his long, clever fingers. You have become the child you were and for this endless moment think it more natural to have your lover throw pine needles into your hair than caress your cheek.

You have no idea how long you have played but the sun is beginning to climb higher. Soon even the energy of your game is not enough to keep you both going through the warming day. You chase him to the edge of the cliff and he comes up short beside a curious rope swing the elves have hung there from a tree. It is woven of hithlain and of an open design that seems rather too insubstantial to hold even one of the compact and sturdy hobbit folk. It is time to rest and you both know this without speaking. He flops down onto his back beneath the swing and smiles contentedly as he closes his eyes. You have had enough of the ground for the time being, having spent a goodly portion of your chase sprawled flat after just missing him, and you examine the swing with interest.

It is oddly made and not woven, you notice, but tied at intervals. It is more like the nets that the elves use to catch fish from the sea. The cords are grey, fine and silky smooth and as you stretch it out you begin to see how it is fashioned. It is like a chair, with a higher back and lower front, but loose and shapeless. It seems it would conform to any body that lay in it. You stretch the strands out and tentatively climb in.

It takes a moment to get settled and another to come to terms with the feeling of being suspended over the ground with nothing but a few bits of fiber between you and a tooth-jarring bump, but settle you do - and as you lean back and the soft strands support your head, you realize how incredibly comfortable this seat is. You sigh contentedly and close your own eyes, letting the growing breeze dry the sweat that covers your body. You could most certainly become accustomed to this.

A lazy foot plants itself on your bottom and you give a squeak as Frodo pushes you into motion. You crane your neck to see him below you, but his eyes are still closed and his foot is back on the ground, looking, if possible, as if it was innocent of the shove you just received. You giggle and relax back into the swing, enjoying the gentle swaying motion and squeaking appropriately each time that errant foot gives your slowing body another shove. The morning is turning into a perfectly perfect day.

How you ended up dozing, you can not recall but the sun is high when you open your eyes again. The tree above you moves fitfully with the onshore breeze and patches of sunlight drift lazily across your face. You turn and catch sight of Frodo asleep on the ground below you. He has one knee bent and an arm propped under his head. The other is dropped carelessly to the side. He is warm and alive; a vision of robust health, but something about this vision pains you. From the elegant sweep of his noble brow to the generous curve of his tempting lips, he looks far too lovely to even be real. Ethereal - like an illusion that would disappear upon waking or when reality makes an unwelcomed intrusion into your daydream. Your heart seizes with a pang of the fear that has worried it for months and the chill of it chases all sleep from your mind.

He is so fine, so perfect he is almost untouchable, and even though you have touched him before, you wonder if perhaps that closeness was more your fervent wish than his actual desire. He has not often held you; with as many sisters as you have, your opportunities to express your love have been few, and you worry that perhaps you have never seen his true heart. Perhaps he does not love you? Cannot. You have overheard your sisters laughing and giggling among themselves about seeing Frodo with the new one who will arrive, but the talk chills your heart. What your sisters jokingly tease about is painful history for you not mere speculation. You think they would not laugh so blithely if they had ever loved and lost as you have. Suddenly you ache for a return to the innocence of that morning. Your child self did not doubt him but the return of self-consciousness means a return of your woes.

You love him without measure - that is a truth of your existence you have never doubted for one moment of your life, but what of him? From the dim recesses of your memory the source of your fears is like a thick and inflexible scar. Your first could not return your love, for he wanted nothing that you could offer, so you swallowed your torment and released him. When you look at Frodo the pain of that old heartache fills you afresh. You fear you will lose him as well and a part of you dies inside.

That former parting took much of your heart. It has never truly healed. In loving Frodo, your wounded self limped back and opened to him as it would open to no one since. He has become everything to you, but you would not hesitate to release him to his heart's desire - just as you did to your long ago love - only this time there would not be enough left of your shattered soul to do more than push your limbs to the cliff behind you. You could never see him with less than what he truly wants, just as you could never see him in pain or anguish, and even if the truth of it kills you, you must know his heart.

You cough meaningfully and his crystal bright eyes open to the day. His face curves into a languid smile and you cannot help answering with one of your own.

"I should say, we have slept a little," he whispers. "The sun is high. Are you well rested?"

You nod, wondering how you will broach the questions wandering about in your mind. You do not have to, for he seems to know more about your disquiet than you dreamed he could.

"And is your heart still troubled?" he asks with soft kindness. You blink once in surprise at the direct question, but are grateful he has asked it. You close your eyes and feel sudden tears filling the space behind them. Your nod is a short, sorrowful movement and you turn back to settle into the swing.

"Tell me..." he asks from beneath you. You sigh.

"I am not certain why I feel this way myself, Frodo, but I find I have to know this... I have to know..." You sit up in the swing and draw your feet under your skirts. Like a little girl at school, you fold your hands primly in your lap and bend to a close examination of your fingertips. Frodo waits, taking a blade of sea grass and pulling it from the culm to chew on the tender, succulent end. Another sigh and you force yourself to continue. "Are you....happy with us here?" you begin. "Frodo?" You turn to look at him over your shoulder. "Will you ever leave us?" The sorrow in your halting voice makes him still to listen. "Will you... Is there... any heart you would desire more than...?" You can no longer look at him. "I…I know I am the only one troubled by this. Perhaps because I am not the most fair, nor the most witty... And my fingers fumble at the harp and my voice is not fit for singing..." The words tumble out of you in an awkward rush but you cannot stop them once they have begun. Tears scatter on your cheek as you speak but Frodo says nothing… allowing you to finish instead of interrupting. At last you hiccup and wipe your hand across your eyes to dry the tears and hide your shame at speaking so personally.

You hear Frodo rise and now his maimed hand caresses your hair. "So that is what this was all about," he sighs. He moves your arm away and tips your chin so that you are looking directly into his face. "Such a silly thing you are..." His hand trails along your cheek in that way the playful morning has almost made you forget that it could. Your heart flutters like a wounded thing. If he were not so deeply embedded in your soul, these doubts would not rip you apart. "In answer to your first question, I would have to say 'yes'. I am very happy here. And in answer to your second, also yes - someday I will leave you - and someday you will leave me. We may live on the blessed isle, but we are mortal yet and have not the lives of the Eldar. As is our gift, we will pass even from this place in our own time."

"I did not mean in death," you answer evenly and he nods, understanding.

"I know what you meant," he assures you. His hand drops from your hair and he looks far out at the distant horizon. He is pensive, but hard and unyielding - as strong as the rock at your feet. "I do not know what you have heard, but I am as you see me. Just a hobbit, nothing more; and one who is still discovering his humble place in this world." He looks at you then with a beneficence that washes over you like a warm rain. Comfort and safety follow in its sweet wake; the same feelings you once felt in his home, with your sisters, but when he turns back to the sea, the feeling fades and you are keenly aware of its loss. "I came here to heal and to learn," he says. "I will never be one of the wise, but I do know this; if you would look for my truth, look to me and no other." He pauses and a light seems to fill him from within - a light of strength reborn and of knowledge and acceptance. "In great pain I wrote my tale in the Red Book so that it would be a history and memoir for our people. You have read it. Those are the truths of my life - would you take the whispered word of someone's fancy over those of my own hand?"

You feel suddenly very small in his presence and your eyes return to their deliberation of your fingertips. "I should not," you say in a voice almost too small for your own ears to hear. "But I love my sisters and take even their whispers to heart."

Frodo chuckles and a blush warms your cheek. "Silly creature!" He pinches your nose. "Remember what you learned from the morning!" Then he laughs mightily in the sunlight, the joy in the sound spilling across your discomfiture till you are smiling despite it. "If you can not trust your wounded heart, then trust the spirit within you. It knows me. It knows my love for you is as boundless as yours for me. Did you doubt yourself as we played?" You look up and the sight of his sweet face smiling down at you pierces your heart. He holds your very soul in his gentle hands - and has from the moment you first knew of him. You gave it to him freely, thinking it safe to do so, not even imagining you might one day meet, but now that he is before you, flesh and bone, heart and sinew, you feel his power over you. He could kill you with a word - or lift you beyond the clouds with a smile. "Trust that spirit," he murmurs reverently and then bends to take a kiss from your trembling lips. His touch is sweet fire that lights a blaze in your belly and a stabbing need in your loins. "It knows," he whispers and, with tender longing, he takes your lips again.

This time his kiss is long and slow and swallows you up like maelstrom.

"Another thing I have learned..." he sighs, parting from you at last. "Is the value of play." His hand still cradles your cheek and you blink, emerging from the fog of desire he has laid upon you. "We become so complex, so wrapped up in manner and propriety, that sometimes we forget how to reach our own hearts." The twinkle returns to his eye and he very deliberately pulls the bow out of your bodice lacing. "Your spirit knew mine this morning. Without a word said between us, you understood my heart. What we played was a game of children, but there are other games we might try…" You feel a charge like lightning crawling up your back. His half lidded eyes glow brilliantly in the scattered sun and his lips glitter as he pulls them into a crooked, suggestive smile. There is energy in his lithe frame, just as there was in the morning, and it has the same primal power you felt in the dancing game of tag.

But this game has much more purpose. Your eyes rest on the buttons of his shirt; cloth covered and precisely spaced and you marvel at the detailed neatness of him. Your fingers reach for those tempting restraints, but before you can touch one, his hand snaps back and slaps your finger. You start… very surprised, and look up. He is still grinning but with cocksure daring that seems to beg for a counter. You reach again and he slaps your hand again - and smartly this time! You are aghast and yet some part of you knows this game. It remembers and drags itself from the deep recess where it has lain dormant and wounded for far too long. It knows what must be done.

You sit up straight in mock indignation and push him away so that you may clamor out of the encumbering swing. Frodo waits just long enough to allow you to regain your feet before he is back, tugging at your laces as if he had no ulterior motive on his mind.

The answer to his actions is timidly suggested from deep within you. You know this inner voice, though it has not spoken in many long years. It is the voice of that child that you were, the one who was called back to you in the morning by the simple ritual of play. Frodo reached your innermost spirit by the only route you left unguarded and now it heeds him despite your defenses. You reach up to his shirt again, in spite of his raised eyebrow and, in a motion too quick for him to block; you grasp it with both hands and rip it apart.

Buttons fly in all directions and his pale body is bared to the sun. He is taken aback for a moment, delightedly so, and in that brief space of his surprise, you take your opportunity. You run.

He responds so quickly he might have been expecting your escape. His hands grasp at your flying skirts and you squeal with delight as you feel them being pulled. This will not stop you. The button pops and you wiggle free of the fabric just in time to avoid Frodo's other hand grasping at your bloomers. You laugh merrily and skip away, leaving him atop the remains of your garment. He looks up, his excited eyes peering at you from a tangle of dark curls, and leaps up in pursuit.

This time the game is different. It has the same power and, you are surprised to realize, the same innocence of the morning, but this time you feel the might of a great purpose being awoken by your play. The child's game called back your wounded spirit, but this one is calling something beyond either of you. Something far greater and more terrible than anything you could have imagined. As you run laughing through the wood, one small, half clothed hobbit being chased by another, you are aware of great forces being stirred into motion and of the low hum of a song that seems to well up from the earth itself. And yet, you are not afraid. Your spirit knows this song and seems aware of its part in the melody. Instead of feeling fear, your heart sings with joy that you will be able to touch this music again at last. Warm hands circle your waist and you twist back to capture the bare torso of your captor in your arms.

Frodo laughs and tickles you till you have no breath for anything but laughter yourself. He has also, somehow, gotten all your laces undone and buries his face in your bosom. You are strangely not surprised when his soft mouth makes a loud and rapacious raspberry against your breast. In this bright energetic space, it is entirely expected and the sensation makes you laugh so hard that your sides ache. You want to tickle him in defense but when you reach down to his belly more buttons meet your fingers. Buttons are such poor defenses. You dispatch his trousers with the same efficiency as his shirt and reach inside knowing just where a tickle will give you the biggest response.

He jumps, but seems as if he is expecting your touch there as well. The raspberry turns to a playful bite and you grasp him firmly, both in warning and invitation. It is not time… yet - there is more play to be had. Another impassioned kiss and you are off again, dropping both your bodice and blouse as you skip away still laughing. Frodo kicks off his now button-less trousers and follows you with the persistence of a hound on a scent.

The song is building. You can feel it in the air now as well as reverberating through the ground at your feet. This is the oldest and most primal strain the world has ever known and you know your part in it. This is the song of life, and of creation and you can touch the beginnings of it in your very soul. The mood of the melody, which began bright and joyous, is changing and you must follow the tide of it. The time for play is ending. The prelude is over and the consummation must begin.

His hand captures you again, but you can no longer flee. You round onto him and find yourself pressed against his warm, naked body. You move together, bare flesh on bare flesh, dancing with him in a glade in the sun. It is a dance of joy and of energy and of arousal. You jump and surge with him until the rhythms fill you both. Even your hearts beat as one. His body is firm and his movements quick, but with each turning the dance brings you closer. He pulls you to him suddenly and with eager purpose, but your spirit, heeding the music that pounds in your blood, knows you must not surrender yet. You are the hunted, he, the hunter, and he must wrest his goal from you. You are compelled to struggle but desire has lit its flame in your belly. He must prove he is strong enough to bind you, but beneath the melody of the chase, you hear harmonies of sweet submission. You will fight him, as you must, but you ache for his victory.

Your struggles likewise seem to stir him. He has always been such a gentlehobbit, but the heat of this primal song pushes him into a frenzy the like of which you did not think him capable of. He captures your hands and kisses you with an almost bruising fierceness. The fire inside you answers him, but you have not succumbed. His feverish hands peel the last scrap of your clothing from your shaking form and you cling to him to keep your feet. Now, as naked as he is, you feel him risen, engorged and eager. He is there, demanding against your enflamed body and you cry out, desperate both to evade him and to feel his flesh deep within you.

He takes your mouth again, no longer asking, but claiming what he desires. You move with him, protesting and demanding with the same passionate, utterances. Rough bark against your back shocks you for a moment but that crack in your defenses is enough for this hunter to take his prize. You are pinned between hard wood and frenzied hobbit and before you can summon the strength to struggle you are pierced by him. Taken. Impaled upon him. Your cry is echoed in a mighty surge of the great song. You have been taken but the adversary proved himself worthy and even in defeat there is delicious bounty. You groan with undeniable pleasure to embrace it. He thrusts against you with animal quickness and you gasp again. Then, in a voice as husky as a rutting stag's, he grinds his words into your ear.

"Do you still doubt?"

You are past the capacity to answer him, but as the song swells around you both, you hear your own voice echoing its rhythm. This writhing dance is as ancient as the world itself. You hear his spirit singing with yours even as you feel the lean power of his thighs striving against you. He has taken you to the ground and cool moss soothes your scratched back. The song controls your bodies and you drown in the sensations that complete submission to it provides.

In that space of heat and power you suddenly perceive him. His spirit, the being that he is, and all that he was. Suddenly you know - though he loves many and deeply, this act is for you alone. This is truth, and nothing, not your sisters' most ardent enthusiasm nor the arrival of his dear friend can change it. This moment and purpose, this dance of life, is what all the battles were fought for. This is the meeting of will and heart amid the powers and chances of the world and it has a power of its own. Its like created you both, in separate sparks of passion tossed amid the whirlwind of creation, and only in a joining like this can either of you hope to reach it again.

He lifts your hips and you arch against him, giving him everything the song demands he take. He is lost to the music now. His eyes shine brightly but seem to see things beyond his focus. His mouth is curled into a grimace of effort exposing strong white teeth clenched fiercely together. He is flushed and his body is rigid but you hear the music he does and move in perfect synchronization with it. Even your soul knows this dance and so you take the individual steps without the need for thought. It is all emotion and instinct and as your mind drifts free, your spirit entwines that of the one you love more than life. For this brief time you know all that he is.

So many layers, so many depths of passion. He does love many and some more deeply than even you, but to each he gives what their heart needs. Only to you has he given this thrusting dance - and only with you will he share it. It is almost a shock when you see in his heart that he would consider this gift unthinkably inappropriate to give to the one you fear. It would not be welcomed or wanted. But, though he shares this depth with you, there are also reaches to his soul that you will never touch. To each he gives a love that suits their measure, and in that way he may answer all who love him. This is what you needed to hear and you know the truth of it. The reassurance you feel cannot be measured. You will never lose his love to someone you could not hope to compete with, you will never again feel the hopelessness these fears have shrouded your heart with and you will evermore be able to share your love with others knowing that this part of him will always be yours, come what may.

He feels your acceptance, or perhaps it is only that the music has changed and he knows the time has come. His bellow of culmination rocks the little glade and as the song rises he fills you. His seed streams into you, a thousand little rivulets of sensation and you reel with your own climax. If you have ever felt this enraptured you have no memory of it, for the rising wave of light that engulfs you, in the presence of the song, is unlike anything you have felt before. Swell upon golden swell fills you, raises you and buries you in ecstasy. With each trembling spasm the song diminishes and your world is brought slowly to the present. A coursing contraction and you are two bodies again, both locked in climax. Another and you feel him slip wet and rigid against you. Another and you notice the moss is now warm on your back. With each rippling throe your world builds back to reality till he looks down at you, his curls wet from perspiration and his eyes still wild with passion. His quick, fiercely joyous smile draws one like it from you and he arches into you with one more playful and bawdy thrust of his hips. You choke on your laughter but your answering tightening on him elicits a satisfying gasp of pleasure. He is not so much the master here as he should like to think.

"Are you contented, my love?" he asks, meaning more than the fulfillment you have received.

"I am assured," you answer reaching your arms around him to rest in the smooth curve of his back. "And when my doubts arise, I will strive to remember this day.” The warm glow of your lovemaking bathes his face in light and looking up at it your wounded heart sings with profound joy. As much as you love your sisters, he is the one you came to this isle for – he is your purpose and will ever be. He is the one you should look to for comfort and inspiration for he is the only one who can truly know his heart; all other reflections pale beside him. You treasure the reality of the warm body that still rests above and within you. You may seek comfort in your sisters when his hand is too far away to reach, but it is to him that you are bound, and will ever be.

He has gazed down at you, smiling, as your thoughts have coalesced and after that interlude, gives the tip of your nose a charming kiss.

"Then I will have to make the memories of this day stronger and more persistent than your doubts,” he grins. “It has started well, but we have many hours till dark, and even then I may have things to show you that will lend magic to the night."

"Then take me whither you are bound, my beloved... For I will be yours forever."

END