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katsukisblackteddy · 3 years

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You Have My Heart...

Word Count: 2.14 k Pronouns: feminine (she/her) Pairings: K. Bakugou x reader Warnings: gore, dark fic ahead, violence, cursing, death

Thanks Marie ( @dailydoseofscenarios) for letting me be part of the server event! I had a lot of fun writing this, and as you can tell, I took the prompt kinda literally...anyways....I hope you like it! Don’t forget to check out all of the other fics in this event under the server event hashtag!

The ash blonde sat in the oversized red leather arm chair that faced the large window overlooking her garden. He let out a soft sigh, readjusting his position to get more comfortable as he leaned his chin in the palm of his hand.

“What am I supposed to get her, that she doesn’t already have?” He questioned aloud, his crimson eyes shifting to the side as the large dog beside the chair let out a sigh himself moving into a laying down position, as if to say, I don’t know why you’re asking me.

“You aren’t very helpful, Khan.” Katsuki muttered, as his eyes focused back on the window, a ghost of a smile pulling at his lips at the sight of his beloved wife in the garden below. Khan let out a whine in protest, as a close lipped smile grew on his owner’s face a moment later. “I’ll ask Shitty Hair.” Katsuki stood to his full height, the large black dog standing as well, prepared to follow him.

The ash blonde and his loyal dog walked down the long expanses of hallway, ornately decorated with golden accents, on the way to his private quarters. “Good day, Master Bakugou. Please give my best to the Mistress.” A few servants said as he passed them in the hallway, simply nodding in acknowledgement before he closed the heavy wooden doors to his study.

“Khan get me the ink.” Bakugou stated without looking up from where he was writing, the quill held firmly in his left hand, an almost empty ink well beside the letter he was in the process of writing to his best friend. “Good boy.” He threw the dog a treat as a reward before going back to writing, Khan settling at Bakugou’s feet once more in content silence.

“Dear Shitty Hair, Help me or else. What do I get Big Hair for Valentine’s Day? Come over and help me now. I won’t help you next time with Raccoon Eyes if you don’t help me. Signed, K. Bakugou.” The explosive man read aloud, nodding once before shoving it roughly into an envelope. He scribbled the information down before sealing the expensive stationary with golden wax, pressing the Bakugou Family Crest into the warm wax to leave an imprint.

“You!” Bakugou’s loud voice startled the butler walking past him in the hallway, the man blinking up at his employer nervously.

“Master Bakugou?”

“I don’t care how you get this to Kirishima, just do it. And get it there by this afternoon.” Bakugou told him before walking away. He didn’t have to tell anyone anything twice, and he liked that.

A number of hours later, one of the servants announced that Kirishima had arrived, while Mina went to the garden to spend time with (y/n).

“So is there a reason a winded man servant showed up at my door some time ago? You aren’t a father yet...are you?”

The ash blonde scoffed, quickly dismissing the idea with a roll of his eyes. “Fuck no.”

“Well, you aren’t getting any younger...”

“Well, I’m not getting any older either...”

“Don’t counter my point with another point.” Kirishima argued back as Bakugou rolled his eyes and flipped the redhead off with a small smirk.

“Whatever.” Bakugou stated as they both sat down in a chair. “I can’t think of anything to get (y/n) for Valentine’s Day.”

“It’s your anniversary, too right?” Bakugou nodded. “How many years?”

“183.” Bakugou said after a moment in thought. Kirishima stayed quiet as he thought.

“Do you remember how we all met each other?”

“You mean on our wedding night?” The blonde snorted as Kirishima rolled his eyes.

“Well, I guess...but you remember the first time you saw her right?”

“Well yeah, but she was just an extra then...I didn’t even know she was the woman I was going to marry.”

“What did you do? You weren’t an asshole to her, were you?” Bakugou simply glared at Kirishima. “Damn, you were.” Kirishima frowned.

“That’s a lie, Shitty Hair!”

“Whatever, just give her something super unconventional. Mina loves those types of gifts.”

“Like what?”

“Well, you remember those super exclusive auction seats that we scored a few decades back?”

“Which ones? The Body is Art ones?”

“Yeah...well, I contacted Pierre and he lined up this whole private show and he let me harvest the different pieces...anyways, Mina loved it....We ended up keeping a few things.” Kirishima shrugged.

“How did you contact Pierre? Didn’t he say he hated technology?”

“That just what he tells everyone. He owed me a favor from a while ago. Anyways, the man loves you, I’m sure he’d do it for you in a heartbeat.”

“Whatever.” Katsuki shrugged dismissing the idea, but he would definitely look into it later. “Are you staying for dinner or not?”

“Are you asking?”

“Answer the question, Shitty Hair.”

“Sure!” Kirishima smiled widely, showing off his sharp teeth before the pair of friends decided to join their partners outside in the garden.

“Hey Mina?” (Y/n) questioned, looking over at the pink skinned girl who had her back against a tree. Mina’s eyes focused on her, a kind smile on her face.

“I’ve been thinking of what to get Katsuki for Valentine’s Day...and I want your opinion on it...” (y/n) trailed off, growing slightly nervous that Mina would think the gift was weird or stupid.

“If you wanted to model lingerie for me, you could’ve just said that...though Bakugou wouldn’t care if you were in a sack or lace...have you seen the way he looks at you? How do you not have gremlins...I mean children yet?”

“Mina! Get your head out of the gutter! I’m not modeling lingerie for you...right now at least...and we’re too young for children...”

“You’re 200 years old, but keep lying to yourself.” Mina teased as (y/n) rolled her eyes at one of her best friends, her face still slightly hot from what Mina had said earlier.

“What’s the surprise then? If it isn’t you in new lingerie or a child?”

“So...I thought it would be fun to recreate the night we first met?”

“But you literally just said you weren’t giving him lingerie.”

“Mina! The actual first night we met! Not our wedding day!” (Y/n) laughed, throwing her hands up in mock exasperation.

“Oh...the hunt? Ohhhh, the hunt.” Mina’s smile grew wider the longer she thought about it.

“That’s perfect! But the lingerie thing would’ve been nice too.”

“Mina! If you wanna see me in lingerie, then you should’ve just said that.” (Y/n) giggled before further explaining her plans for Valentine’s Day.

It was the only plan she could think of for the man she had loved for almost all of her life...a man that seemed to have everything he could ever want.

ON VALENTINE’S DAY...

“I don’t understand why you couldn’t have just hired more people to help.” Mina complained while straightening a string of lights.

“It’s more fun, and besides, all of the girls are back together!” (y/n) commented, gesturing towards all of the girls that were gathered around the room, each hanging different decorations.

“How long has it been since we’ve all been in the same place?” Ururaka questioned with a wistful sigh.

“At least 30 years.” Momo chimed in. “We really do need to see each other more.”

“Then we should have more balls, like we used to.”

“This isn’t a ball, Tsu.” Mina pointed out. “It’s the hunt. You know, like we used to have way back when.”

“Wait a second...where are we getting the prey from?”

“Aren’t you vegetarian?”

“No, Iida and I gave that up like 5 years ago.” Midoriya laughed. “Iida just likes sustainably sourced and organic.”

“Oh come on, you haven’t ever just gone to a night club to pick up a few?” Mina teased as the girls, Midoriya, and Denki laughed.

“No, that’s so 1960s, Mina.”

“No, that’s date night.” Mina corrects as (y/n)’s face heats up slightly as she laughs.

“We’ve done it a few times...not recently though, we’ve been pretty busy...one of our neighbors called the cops because she thought she saw us doing something suspicious.”

“What were you doing?”

“Well we may have been hiding a body, but that’s besides the point. That old lady should’ve minded her own business. It’d be a shame if she were to suddenly...go missing.” (Y/n) mumbled with a roll of her eyes as they all laughed.

“Alright, everyone go change! We’ll be starting in three hours!” Jirou announced, ushering everyone to different parts of the large castle to change into their special outfits.

It only took everyone an hour and a half to two hours to get ready, the last hour was spent doing finishing touches and everyone calling their partners to come as a surprise.

“Oi Shitty Girl! What’s the problem? You aren’t hurt are you?” The aggressive blonde questioned quickly, his red eyes gliding over (y/n)’s body as if checking she was ok for himself.

“Then what’s the problem?” He questioned, raising an eyebrow at her as she placed a blindfold over his eyes. “Shitty Girl, what are you doing?”

“Be patient, Katsuki. You’ll like the surprise.” (y/n) said in a teasing voice as she led him into the large ballroom. The sun had just sat and the night sky was dark and littered with stars that could be seen from the windows.

“What’s all of this?” Katsuki questioned, finally removing the black blindfold as he scanned the room, surprised to see all of his friends equally surprised from where they stood with their partners.

“Surprise! I thought it would be fun to recreate the party that happened the first time we met each other. Happy Valentine’s Day!”

“We’re going on a hunt?” Denki questioned excitedly, practically bouncing up and down as Jirou just smiled lightly at his antics.

“Duh.” Jirou mumbled from beside him with a quick roll of her eyes as everyone made their way outside.

“Ok here’s the rules...and it’s the Valentine’s Day edition! So there’s 20, whichever couple can get the most hearts wins.” Midoriya announced with a large smile on his face. “(y/n) release them, and we’ll give them a minute long head start.”

(y/n) walked over to the where the 20 individuals were lined up single file, metal cuffs around their wrists and longer ones around their ankles. Each one wore a black leather collar with a number from 1 to 20 on it. “You evil bitch! Let me go!”

“Where are your manners, Thomas? You were so good up until now...I wouldn’t want to have to make an example out of you.” (y/n)’s voice was kind and soft, but the look in her eyes was anything but that.

“Why are you doing this?” Thomas questioned, his blonde hair falling into his light eyes as she stared in fear at the group around him before meeting (y/n)’s eyes once more.

“It’s fun, Thomas.” (y/n) told him, patting him on the head before releasing everyone’s cuffs. “Go ahead...you’re free now.” (y/n) urged as they all just stood there with blank stares. They continued to stand there, looking at each other. “I said go!” (y/n) repeated, her eyes practically glowing in the light of the full moon. The soft light shining against the sharp points of her canine teeth.

The group of 20 broke off into a sprint, disappearing into the tree line as Iida looked down at his watch. “Is it time yet?” Denki questioned, obviously ready to begin.

“Almost.” Iida replied shortly, a smile growing on his own face as the seconds counted down to zero. “Now!”

Everyone ran after that, disappearing into blurs with the speed they were moving. (y/n) ran with a long spear, the silver tip shining in the moonlight as she jumped forward, releasing the spear into the unsuspecting number 13.

13 fell to the ground after looking down at the sharp spear poking through his chest. No sound leaving his lips since it had all happened too quickly. “One down!” (y/n) called out, seeing the recognizable flash of blonde that belonged to her husband.

Katsuki came to a stop beside her, his hands stained red along with his lips. He smiled at her. “Two, actually.” He told her, showing her the heart in one of his hands. “Happy Valentine’s Day...I’ve already given you my heart figuratively, so now I’m giving it to you physically.”

“Aw, that was cute.” (y/n) laughed before accepting the gesture. “You can have mine too.” She added after her laughter died down, picking up the bloody organ from number 13 before holding it out to Bakugou.

Tags:

#the colosseum: sweet but psycho valentine's day #the colosseum server event #bnha x reader #vampire!bakugou #vampire!bakugo #dark bnha fic #bloody valentine #bakugou x reader #mha x reader #please don't interact if you are uncomfortable with slight gore #bakugo katuski #bakugou katsuki #twisted #katsukisblackteddy #this is my first attempt at a fairly dark topic #valentine's day

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witchqueenofthemoon · 5 years

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BODY AND SOUL Part 27 (Duncan Shepherd/Mackenzie Stone Millory AU)

BODY AND SOUL MASTERPOST

Author’s Note: I always knew the cabin stuff was gonna be pretty long; this is ostensibly Part 1 of 3 that involve the cabin and the narrative surrounding it, a major part of my fic. Please refer to this in particular, which was a major influence on the mythology I’ve built around this particular place--especially the black oak circle--and its connection with Duckenzie’s destiny. I’m so excited for all of you who have reached this part of their journey with them; while I’m using these chapters as an excuse to write LOTS of sex and doting for them (which I fucking live for), they’re also really important to the arc of the wider narrative I’ve been weaving from the beginning; the crux of what pulled this fic out of the relatively small story I had originally planned into something huge and cosmically beautiful--a project that has changed my life, a project I will finish, or die in the attempt thereof. The cabin’s kitchen looks like this. Duncan’s herb grinder is this one, for y’all stoners like me who care about shit like that. Sweet alyssum looks like this (here’s some in pink and white). The mental picture of Duncan with those little flowers in his hair is such a beautiful one to me. A reminder that Kenzie’s bikini looks like this, the rust-colored slip dress looks like this. In order to really understand a major aspect of my story, I feel it’s important to read a little about the concept of the Divine Feminine, a major tenant of witchcraft--I’m a solitary practitioner, and though my Kenzie is not overtly Pagan, she is Pagan-minded regarding how she conducts her life; coming to understand her powers will bring her closer to owning her witch identity for real. The Divine Feminine in my story is certainly not limited to Kenzie, either, and it’s very important that everyone who cares about Duckenzie understands that; Duncan learning to nurture, understand and respect his own feminine divinity, within and outside of his relationship with Kenzie, is a huge aspect of this story. Kenzie kneeling in the flowers was definitely inspired by these shots of Mallory in APOCALYPSE. The spiral of the flowers is not coincidental--the spiral is a very old symbol, symbolizing the cyclical nature of the universe and everything in it, so keep that in mind. If you haven’t noticed, roses are an important part of the imagery of my story--the working title for this fic was DARK RED ROSES once upon a time for like half a second, and Duncan calls her the Queen of Roses in his thoughts because they will forever be associated with her in his mind--it was that rosy balcony where he first saw her, and like the clearing surrounded by black oaks, the balcony was a Thin Place. I’ve been working hard on 28, so that delayed me editing this part--the good news is I’ll probably be done with 28 by the end of the day tomorrow. Here are some super cute pics I found of Billie where she really looks like Kenzie. As ever, your likes, reblogs, comments, asks and edits mean the world to me.

Duncan’s mouth was open on the fiercely soft skin above Kenzie’s breasts, drifting against the Tiffany moon, his hands urgently searching for the tie that held her sun-colored top over them, his mind adrift in her with an overwhelming strength that was making him gasp--the bed was so silken-soft, the light so sweet and golden in the daylight, and the energy in the room seemed suddenly hazy with the weight of their thoughts; Kenzie’s were rapid, heightened, pressing him with mutual relief, kindling up a desire in him that inflamed.

“Oh my fucking goddess, baby--fucking fuck me.”

Queen of Roses. Not just the Princess. The Queen. The highest and most beautiful. The height of all my desires and every pleasure of my heart.

“Oh, I fucking will, Miss Stone,” he spoke into her skin, against her neck, into her ear. “I heard you, baby. We have nowhere to be. This is the only place in the world, and there’s only you and me, and I’m gonna make you fucking scream, I’m gonna make you feel so fucking good, Kenzie, moonbeam--” Kenzie writhed under his touch, a nervous, ecstatic laugh drifting out of her.

He found the tie at her waist as his mouth fell onto hers again--oh thank Fate, fuck--his fingers demandingly pulling it apart, drawing the soft fabric away from her, eager beyond all feeling to touch her. Since this morning, her little mouth so adoring around him, his senses for her had been urging him on to a desirous undoing for her--Mackenzie. Kenzie. Baby. My fucking baby. As wonderful as it is to taste you, as exquisite as it is to have your mouth on me, beloved, it’s fucking you, fucking you as we gasp against each other that brings us closest, so irrevocably close, kindles that feeling in me of not knowing where I start when I’m inside you, not feeling the divide of our bodies anymore, never wanting to come away, feeling truly as though wherever we were once separated, we’re tied together again, whole. So before we do anything else today, I’m going to fuck you. Right now. Fuck me, beloved, and let’s get lost in each other, my Persephone, my Ariadne bathed in stars, my Titania of the flowering forest.

Kenzie was lifting up as he gripped her in the space under her shoulder blades, her eyes heavy-lidded as she listened to his thoughts; he easily held her slight weight, keeping his grasp wildly tender. She pushed the top from her arms, and Duncan was lowering her back to the bed (oh fuck it’s so fucking soft, I could lay here with you all day, for days and days), her golden hair scattering around her in a wide halo, his fingers clutched tight around the roundness of her breasts now--he’d slipped them under the softness of her little black bikini top, and Kenzie’s slender chest was heaving, her breathing labored with the immediacy of his touch as he kneaded his palms into her supple skin. He could feel the tiny fluttering vibration of her heart under his thumbs, and it was making his cock jump against the front of the jersey shorts, urging him to make her moan. Speak, angel. Tell me of your need in this sacred space that exists only for us right now.

Kenzie’s little fingers (so delicate, so sweet and small, I love your hands, Kenzie baby) were drifting up to his open collar, undoing the buttons below with gentle speed, their smoothness sending a burst of shivering warmth down his spine, into the space between his legs where his cock was beginning to strain as he knelt over her, his body dipped down on her. Her mouth was so wet and tasted so sweet, her little tongue quivering against his, the tiny longing sounds she made under his lips, and he fought the faintness she was causing; it was gathering like wild, stray flowers, into a bloom in his mind. Fuck, I want you so much, I feel like I’m going to actually pass out, baby.

“I could just die,” she was whispering. “The way I can feel you right now, the way you touch me, baby, the sweetness of your thoughts, how beautiful you are--Duncan, baby, how you kiss me--”

“Remember that first night, Kenzie,” he was murmuring into her mouth, his fingers drifting down the jut of her hip bones, into the denim shorts, down the prickly slightness of the shorn hair around the lips of her sex, letting his fingers hover there. “Remember when you first let me kiss you, angel of heaven? Your little velvet dress, the crystal at your throat, those shoes that left red welts on your beautiful little ankles--remember how you told me you’d come home with me? God, I thought I was going to die right then.” Duncan was drifting the hand up from her sex now--I’m gonna tease you a little, angel baby. We have all the time in the world. I’m gonna make you so fucking wet. Drifting it to the button of her shorts, pulling the zipper down with an ease that brought a wet glow into her jade-hazel eyes, her little mouth open as she listened to him speak, releasing tiny gasps, her thoughts swirling and chaotic with want for him. The soft black of the bikini bottoms peeked from where he’d opened the zipper, and Duncan brought the flat of one palm against the mound of her there, the softness between her legs, using his other hand to pull slowly at the shorts. Kenzie wiggled a little from where he held her down, and the shorts eased off her thighs after a moment. She kicked her Vans off and they tumbled to the floor--then Duncan was dipping back to yank the shorts away, discarding them to the floor as well, kicking his own shoes off, lost in admiration of her body in the bikini. Kenzie’s little hands had managed to undo every button of his shirt now, and he ripped it away, impatiently, mouth still shivering into hers--then he lifted up, pressing his hand harshly between her legs again, heart aching at the whimper that fell out of her, and then Duncan smiled.

“For you, Kenzie, I surrendered my soul in an instant. I may not have really understood that in the moment--but I do now. I would do anything for you.” And this he spoke into her jaw, lips drifting along its delicate curve. “Anything. You--an angel. In my bed, and now that bed is ours, and right now this one is too, isn’t it, baby? This is our bed.”

“Yes,” Kenzie whispered, and the pleading in her voice made him bite his lip, close his eyes, force his need back with an insistent hand. “Yes, fuck, Duncan, yes, hmmmh,” and she was kneading against him, moving her hips so she pressed into his hand cupped around her, “Gimme your big cock in this beautiful bed, fuck me, Dunny baby--”

He moved his fingers down now, to the crook where her thighs began on either side of her cunt, and pressed outward, then up, so her knees were pressing into her belly, the underside of her thighs clutched in his tight grip, the lips of her visibly folding into the slight fabric covering her sex. Kenzie moaned again, her eyes closing at the demand of his movements; now I have you right where I want you, Princess Kenzie, and I’m gonna make you want my cock with terrible, aching need before I give it to you, before I fuck you hard. I know you want me to--I can feel the golden coil of your desire, telling me what you need.

“Who’s your Prince, baby?” Duncan dipped his hips down so his crotch rode up against hers, against the strain of her cunt still wrapped tightly in the dark fabric, lifted his body up so they were flush against each other there, the hardness of his erection pressing into the outline of her, then back down, causing an aching friction that sent sharp needles of want through him--he felt Kenzie shudder deeply, her thighs shivering violently under where his hands gripped them harshly, felt her cunt spasm along his length, and her head dipped up, her hands finding his jaw, flitting over the stubble on his cheeks, her little mouth open, beginning to abandon all sense of her composure.

“Uhmmm, you are, Dunny, only you, you’re my angel Prince--I want you to fuck me till I’m raw--”

“Not until you tell me whose baby you are. Tell me who you belong to, baby.”

“Unh, you. I belong to you.”

“Say it again.” He let go of her thighs now, pushing himself against her again, as harshly as he could, riding his cock against the fabric that contained them, his hands clutching her little wrists and forcing her arms up over her head, straining them against the silken strands of her golden hair fanning out around her head--like your halo. I will bring you sweetest ecstasy, my goddess, I will worship you most faithfully for all my life, I ache to be your most supplicant admirer, truly, you must know that I do, you must know that I would die for you, I would die and love to die if it was what you wanted--

“I belong to you, Duncan. I’m yours forever. Fucking please--” Her voice needled up into a piteous cry that made him feel as though his mind were about to come undone, unhinge from itself and float away into the ether of oblivion. His mouth tasted at her, cutting her words off, swallowing her cry, his fists pressing her wrists down into the impossibly soft bed, pressing so hard he worried for a moment that he’d leave bruises on her skin, but could feel her thought--leave them, I want bruises from you, beloved, I want to see your devotions on my skin--and the sweet softness of her mouth was promising him that she meant it, her tongue laving out along his bottom lip, her hips bucking up to press her cunt against the fabric that covered his straining cock. He let go of one of her wrists, keeping his fist around the other, his gold Cartier bracelet digging into her, the diamonds on hers leaving tiny welts on his arm--and forced the hand that was now free into the waistband of the black fabric at her sex, rough, demanding, running his thumb into her cunt, now soaking wet for him, bringing it back to her clit and pressing there, unrelenting. Kenzie keened up against him, and her breasts were pressing into the top of his chest for a moment and he shivered to feel her sweet warmth, to smell the sweetness that lingered around her face, and then he was letting go of her other wrist, knowing what she wanted to do--she slid the shorts from his hips so they pooled around his knees, and keeping his hand at her clit as though it were tethered there, he slid out of them; the remainder of their clothing was pushed over the bed so it fell to the floor, discarded.

They were in the very center of the huge bed now, and to Duncan it felt as if they were floating in the middle of some impossibly smooth cloud. He paused for just a moment, Kenzie’s lithe body spread out under him, the irresistible curve of her hips attracting the grip of his hands with a magnetic pull, her face aglow with iridescent arousal and happiness, her fingers dipping in a little fist under her chin, her eyes fixated on his face.

“Kenzie, sweetest, loveliest, beloved--” he dipped his mouth to her ear, unable to stop himself, wanting to give her the roughness he could feel she desired, but lost in his own rosy thoughts, his own deep need to worship her endlessly. “You are so beautiful it fucking staggers me.” She was giggling against the tickle of his breath, and Duncan was overwhelmed so utterly with his love for her he had to steady himself, had to slow his mind, drift away from it, for fear that he’d die right there, die of the immensity of it. Then, he slid his arms under her, against the terrible softness of the bed, and lifted her onto his lap, lifted her so for a moment her golden hair tossed against his cheeks, so her mouth was hovering above his, so her breasts were pressing into his chest, sliding against him with such a yielding ache, the back of her thighs pressing into the top of his, the hard length of his erection pressing between the lips of her, into her clit, and he moaned against her throat as she cried out near his ear, and then he was lifting her up and forcing her down onto his cock, clutching her under one breast and at her hip, holding her steady as he rode up into her, humming into her skin as she began to buck onto him, grinding down so he was buried in her, entirely.

Duncan’s thumb came down and pressed against her clit again, and he spoke into her ear.

“Remember when you rode me like this, that first night? Your hair and your necklace glittered in the low light, and your mouth was open, just as it is now--and I knew you would belong to me, from the way you gave yourself to me, oh Kenzie, I knew you were mine--” he was gasping now, gasping for breath, gasping to feel her, to see her with her head thrown back now, eyes to the ceiling, her mind a swirling maelstrom of gold, lost in his words, loving them utterly as he knew she was. Keep talking, baby, keep saying such beautiful things. Tell me everything and fuck me.

Duncan was pounding his hips up into her with so much force, his cock burying itself in her with such abandon, he worried he’d rend her in two, her breasts and arms shivering terribly against him, her eyes full of ecstatic, oblivious brightness. He paused for a moment, the entirety of him inside her, the wetness between her legs sliding down his thighs in dripping trails.

“I love you, I love your golden hair, your lips, your throat and your eyes--I worship you, unnnh, Kenzie, Mackenzie, you are the goddess of my heart, unggg, you are the most divine of all beings--” Duncan suddenly lifted her up so he slid out of her, and she gasped in surprise, and he was flipping her over forcefully, pushing her down on all fours on the vast silken bed, hand gripping the back of her neck downwards, her little palms coming out to hold herself up, and her ass slid up towards him. Duncan brought his fingers up to tangle into her hair, then gripped it harshly, pulling her head back--then he buried himself into her cunt, seeing the veins on his cock straining with hardness before he did, and now he was riding into her from behind with a wildness that bordered on a Bacchanalian trance--they were facing the painting of Cupid and Psyche now, and his mind prickled with the combined tenderness of it, his tenderness for her against the hedonistic lust he felt for her, inside her this way.

“Unnnng, fuck my little cunt, baby, fuck me--” Kenzie murmured, her fingers clutching the luxuriant gold-and-white spread, pressing her ass back to receive him, and he slid back so all of his length retreated from her, then he forced himself back inside her, entirely, so his balls smacked up into the lips of her vulva, and jerked her head back further so he could see her eyes rolling up into her head, the open drift of her mouth as she lost herself inside the feeling of him, feel the twist of her head under the forceful pull of his hand.

“God, I love your little cunt so much, I’m gonna fuck you so hard while we’re here, I’m gonna make your little cunt so fucking pink and sore, baby--” he was keening into her, burying himself in her, pressing his whole body against her; Duncan pressed her head down now into the bed so her cheek dipped to the side, her little breaths gasping against the silken sheet, and he lifted her hips higher so he could see the raw, rosy darkness that was spreading through the space between her legs, the color of his attentions, see the redness at the pucker of her ass where he knew he’d fucked her so well last night, fucked her so hard, pressed his come inside her with the plug afterwards and kept his need inside her. “We’re gonna fuck so much you won’t be able to walk, baby, we’re gonna fuck so hard you won’t be able to move--”

“Uhhhghh, Dunny--” He could feel how close she was hovering to her orgasm, and he immediately stopped, now, stopped and pulled out of her, though he still pressed her neck into the bed, holding her steady, and Kenzie dissolved into a shivering moan of frustrated need that set his heart on fire--”Mhhhhh, Dunny, please--please--mmph, put it back, gimme your cock, spank me--”

“That’s it, angel, I knew that’s what you wanted, I felt it--tell me again. Say it again, baby.”

“Spank me. Fucking spank me.”

“Yes, Princess Kenzie.”

Keeping the hand steady at her neck, holding her rigidly prostrate, Duncan brought his open palm down, immediate and harsh, on Kenzie’s right ass cheek. The snap reverberated across the wide room, and Kenzie let out a little scream that rang in his ears, making him smile immediately, making his cock smack against the space between her legs, straining. He watched her cunt spasm, felt her shudder under his hand.

“Mmmphhyes,” Kenzie cried, and then, demandingly, “do it again, again, right now, do it again.”

Duncan smacked her left cheek now, first with the palm of his hand, then the flat of it, as hard as he could--Kenzie keened forwards from the force of it, a gasp rattling out of her, the sound of her choking on the spittle that had been sucked back into her throat. “Uhhhhhyes,” she moaned. “Again.”

Duncan could see the rising red welts he had caused--already he knew he’d left a mark that would linger on the left side, but he felt utterly beholden to her demand now, lost in his lust. Hearing his hidden hesitancy, Kenzie spoke again, her voice (the sweetest of all sounds to me) drifting up to him from where he pressed her. “Do it, Duncan. Leave marks. I want it, baby. I want you to leave your mark on me. Do as I say.”

Duncan felt his skin flush, felt himself quake under the power in her words, knew that as much as she wanted him to do it, his desire to give her the pleasure she demanded was even stronger--I would do fucking anything for you, Mackenzie Stone. I can’t speak of the things I would do in the face of my love for you. I am utterly yours for all time. There is nothing for me without you. Whatever you ask of me, know I would do it. No holy terror I would not face. No fearful, dreadful task I would not undertake. No darkness I wouldn’t swallow. I fear nothing if it is in your name.

So he brought his hand up once more, and then down with as much force as he could onto the right side of her ass again--Kenzie keened forward once more, gasping out a cry that was stifled in her surprise, and she sucked air in sharply as he smacked her again on the left, and then he buried his cock into her cunt again, unable to stand the coolness of the bare air against him anymore, unable to bear the sight of her dripping sex, convulsing and empty, and he pulled her head up from the sheet and flushed her against him, his arms trapping her little body as he knelt into her, mouth at her jaw, fingers rubbing harshly at her swollen clit--her hands gripped up around his arms, her faced turned up to Cupid and Psyche there, and he heard her whisper “that’s us, baby, that’s us, fucking divine,” and she was coming now, her tiny shape shivering with such intense force in his grip, her voice screaming out so utterly that he immediately felt his own release, suddenly, unexpectedly, coaxed out of him with her impossible sweetness, her utter abandon, and she was turning her head as they came together, their open-mouthed kiss the melding of their souls, their minds melding together, high in some other, more ethereal place for that moment, in the place where they had wings imperceptible to human eyes, where they had eyes made of galaxies, hair of sunlight, clothing woven in impossible geometry. It’s you who are divine, Mackenzie Stone. I’m merely blessed to be in your light. Her golden softness against him in the daylight was, for a moment, so like a dream, he wondered if they’d fallen into an impossibly vivid fantasy, a place that was untethered from all reality.

But no--you’re no dream, my love. You are the realest, the truest, most irrefutable of all things.

------

For a little while they had laid quietly, clutching each other, still lost in the center of the golden-cream bed, its smoothness still kindling his senses to a strange high; Duncan pressed soft, imploring kisses along her cheeks, at her eyelids, the bridge of her nose. For a little while Kenzie seemed to drift in a wordless oblivion of post-coitus, her eyes fluttering, her throat spasming with tiny movements as she swallowed, her arms shivering almost imperceptibly under his hands as her mouth dipped open, her hands drifting at his jaw, falling back and forth over the stubble. I love this, he could hear her thinking, over and over in an endless circling. I love this, I love the feeling of you here, I love the soft-prickly touch of you, I love you, I love the curve of your jaw here, I love you, I love touching you here, love you…

His hands fell down to her ass, feeling there tenderly--he coul sense the wincing shiver in her as he did, and ached to know she felt pain he had caused, even if she had asked for it--”ugh, Kenzie, are you okay?” He dipped his head up to look at the marks he’d left--he could see the dark red outline of his palms on both cheeks, and knew there were would be bruises on her tomorrow.

“Baby, it’s okay. I loved it. I wanted it. It--it fucking feels so good. I like it when you’re rough like that with me. I asked you to do it, okay? It was perfect.” And she was pulling his face down to her mouth and kissing him and sending long waves of reassuring, lovely gold into him, where they cascaded down from the top of his head into his body, and Duncan was staggered again by the power he knew she had inside her. I’m blessed to be near you at all. I can’t even fathom it.

Kenzie leaned back from him, eyes gazing at him insistently. “Baby, go get some of that weed, okay? I wanna smoke a little. Then we’ll bring the picnic basket down to the lake.”

“Ugh, yes, baby. Yes.” Duncan slid out of her arms, finding his underwear and the jersey shorts where he’d thrown them to the floor, pulling them on, glancing over to her in the middle of the bed as he did; her hair was still fanning out around her, her expression quiet and deeply content, her little mouth dipping open, her eyes falling up and down over his form. He leaned back over her, dipping his head down over her hip, pressing his lips into her left ass cheek where the redness was swelling, hand coming under it to cup it softly. She moaned softly, hand falling in his hair--then he leaned away and went to the open doorway, glancing into her face over his shoulder. “I’ll be right back, baby, wait till you try this stuff, it’s so good, the high is so gradual and steady, it practically feels like an edible.”

Kenzie smiled at him, dreamily, and Duncan had to turn away, feeling lost, consumed for a moment inside his longing for her, her golden hair, the roundness of her breasts, the space between her legs. No matter how much I’m with you, no matter how often we fuck, it never feels like enough. I want you again. And again. And again.

Duncan was drifting inside these thoughts, distracted deep within them, when he realized with a shock that he was outside; the warmth of the afternoon was on his skin, the gentle wind off the lake drifting into his curls and and down his naked torso--wait, how did I get outside so quickly? Did I really walk through the house and down the stairs and out the door without noticing?

Wait.

Duncan tried to backtrack to the bedroom for a moment; tried to rewind the last few moments, retrace his steps. But he couldn’t visualize walking through the house--he couldn’t feel the wood under his feet or see the shape of the chandelier on the landing, couldn’t feel himself descending the stairs. Oh, fuck. I think I did it again, he thought. I think I moved again--without moving. He went to the G-Class, parked quietly on the gravel. Duncan stepped gingerly over it with bare feet, noticing his legs were shaking a little--he opened the trunk and pulled his Prada suitcase towards him, unzipping it and pulling his Armani sandals out, slipping them onto his feet, then set about the work of moving the other Yeti cooler and the picnic basket inside, as well as both suitcases and Kenzie’s tote bag with the books, the fireside cooking kit, and the picnic blanket and piles of lovely quilts Kenzie had ordered. Once everything was inside the house, Duncan brought both of the coolers into the rustically-styled kitchen; it had long windows overlooking the woods on the eastern side of the house, and an island in the middle made of a long slab of oak, rustic tree trunks fitted closely together to make up the base, and latticed stools with oak legs, cool-silver appliances mixed in with the wood embellishments of the counter tops. Duncan hauled both coolers onto the island tabletop, then the picnic basket beside it. The Yetis should keep everything cold for another hour or so, he knew. We’ll pack the picnic basket for the lake in a little while. For now, I need to test this theory again.

He noticed his hands were stinging a little still; stinging from his harsh slaps against Kenzie’s skin. He brought his thumbs against his palm, drifting his fingers over it, down his wrist to the gold bracelet, twisting it around absently. It wasn’t as though he’d never touched anyone else in a harsh sexual way; there were many lost nights with random partners where he remembered flashes of wanton lust, remembered his nights with Evan where he was always the dominant. But Kenzie, he thought. The idea of hurting her in any way is nightmarish to me. I understand that it gives her pleasure, but I can’t help but feel unnerved. Inside this love, I always feel untethered, absolutely unhinged with attachment towards her, and helplessly shy; helpless to behold her. To love someone this much in a world so uncertain is terrifying, and even moreso to love someone as beautiful--inside and outwardly--as she is. And to feel passion from inside it is so intense, it’s as if I’m constantly on fire. Whatever she asks for, I would die to give it to her. I know this. Utterly. It frightens me, and yet I feel so unafraid when we’re together. How strange and wondrous this love is. And it feels as though--these things happening to us are only happening because of this love. I don’t know why, or what it means. But I do feel like our love has opened some kind of door. A pathway, maybe, is a better word. The path is becoming more clear every day. The path to our destinies. And our destinies are irrevocably intertwined. Our destiny is to be together no matter what--to be together inside this greater thing that’s coming.

Duncan went back to the front doorway, where he’d left their suitcases. He gripped the handle of each in either hand. Okay. Let’s try this again. Duncan tried to visualize the bedroom, closing his eyes; the golden-creamy coverlet, the soft gauzey curtains, the gold laurels, Cupid and Psyche on the wall--and Kenzie, her hair fanning out around her like beams of sunlight, her serene expression with her eyes lifted up to him under the halo of her eyelashes, her little mouth smiling, her white breasts and dark rosy nipples, her little hands clutched along her ribs, and her wonderful, beautiful hips and thighs, the gorgeous curve of them, pressed together, hiding her sex in their dip. Mackenzie Louise. Angel of my heart. Light of my shadow.

“Duncan, fuck.”

Duncan opened his eyes--oh, shit. It worked. He was back in the bedroom, the weight of the suitcase handles still in his fingers; Kenzie had opened the window while he was away, and wind drifted cooly against the curtains. Kenzie had put her bikini back on, and she had been laying on her belly on the coverlet, her feet lifted up behind her, knees crooked, chin against her hand; she’d been facing the Swynnerton painting, no doubt gazing at it with the same sort of serene expression she usually reserved for The Youth of Bacchus; but her eyes were on him now, full of astonished confusion, her head crooked back in alarm.

Kenzie sat up, shaking her head in amazement, crossing her legs.

“You just did it twice, baby. I thought maybe the first time I imagined it, I was still coming down from my orgasm and thought I was just sort of fucked up--but that time I saw it. You popped back in here like Samantha in Bewitched. Wow, baby.”

“Kenz, see if you can do it again. See if you can move something--wait.” Duncan crouched and laid his suitcase flat, unzipping it and taking out his gold weed pipe. He laid it flat on his palm and held it up to her, looking into her eyes--they were glowing with flecks of gold, her excitement rising behind them.

“Okay. Try now. See if you can move it.”

Kenzie’s eyes squinted for a moment, biting her lip with concentration; Duncan felt the adoration of his love wash over him, watching her in her little black bikini, her tawny hair gathered over shoulder now, her hand reaching out towards him, her palm upwards, fingers curled just a little. Then Duncan glanced down at his hand--the pipe was gone from it. His eyes shot back up to Kenzie, who was grinning at him in triumph, the pipe now grasped between her thumb and index finger. “Ah ha!” she laughed, tossing her hair. “I did it again!”

“Baby, do you feel--” Duncan was going into his suitcase again, pulling out the bag of weed, a black herb grinder, and a black BIC lighter, sliding up onto the bed with her, kissing her, “--do you feel like whatever this stuff is, these things we can do--fuck it, this magic, is stronger here? That whatever it is is more potent out here? I feel like my body is charged with an electrical current, I feel like my nerves are singing--”

“Yes. Yes. That time it took almost nothing from me--it was as easy as breathing. I just thought about it for a second, and it came to me. I don’t feel dizzy or out of breath like I did before. I think I could do something a lot larger and it wouldn’t bother me at all. That’s how it feels.”

Duncan was grinding some of the blue-strain out and packing the bowl of the pipe, and his nerves still had that potent, shimmering edge--he felt high already since reappearing in the bedroom, high on the strange power of the impossible thing he had done, and the things Kenzie could do, the mystery of them.

“I was thinking, you know that feeling we were talking about--you said it seemed like we opened a door when we met, and I think the door was more like a pathway, like we opened a path, and now we’re on the path, and it’s one we only could have found after we found each other. And now we’re on it. It’s the right path. And the powers--fuck, Kenzie, the magic--they’re part of that path.” He held the bowl out to her and she took it, gently brushing his fingers, staring up at him. My sweet sweet Kenzie. To be alone with you this way. I can’t find words.

“I think so too, Duncan. I think we found the path. Oh, baby. It’s so beautiful, isn’t it?”

He could see the hint of tears glistening around her eyes, then she lowered her gaze to light the bowl and breathed in, deeply, letting out a little cough at the first embers in her throat--she dipped down to his mouth, lifting her lips onto his, hand cradling his cheek, then blew the smoke between them, into him, down into his throat, into his lungs, the weed at once inebriating and potent, settling into both of them in the span of moments, bringing a new glow to the room, a spiritous opalescence. Together we’ve manifested real magick, she thought, and he heard her, warm inside her mind and in the grip of the weed, reaching out for her hand, pulling his long fingers achingly down her skin. She passed the pipe to him, which was still lit, and he breathed in from it, deeply. Together we have brought something to life. With this love we’ve woken up something very old and very powerful. I feel it, Duncan. I know it.

“It’s--so, so beautiful,” he replied. “Beyond anything I ever imagined was possible before I found you. You are so beautiful, Kenzie. It’s like I can see the universe inside you.”

“When I write my book, I’m going to steal all the lovely things you say to me,” Kenzie smiled. “I’’m going to pretend like I came up with them.”

“They’re all for you anyway; they belong to you. Everything is for you--every part of me.” Duncan set the pipe down on the softness of the bed, hand drifting down her smooth thigh to her knee. To give myself to you, to give you my love--there is nothing that has ever made me so happy in all the world, Mackenzie Stone.

“I know, baby. I know. I love you. All of me is for you, too.”

“To hear that, my heart just--fucking sings, Kenz. To be loved by you is just…” Duncan trailed off, looking away from her, full of the feeling of shyness again. To be inside her gaze shook him to the center of his soul. It’s like looking into the window of time, seeing that there is something beyond that, something so radiantly lovely, it defies all description. The thing beyond time is love. And I see that now. Because I feel it.

Kenzie was dipping her face down to him as she had before, pressing her mouth up against his--the taste of her bitter with the weed, sweet with the scent of her perfume and her hair and her skin, then she leaned away and gripped his hands, pulling him off the bed with her. He stood over her little frame, marveling over the crown of her head only reaching to the top of his chest, longing to pull her against him, but she was dipping down to her suitcase now, pulling out one of the dresses she’d packed, a strappy rust-colored mini dress, pulling it over her head, sitting abruptly on the rug around the bed (it was covered in gold fleur de lis) to slip her Vans back onto her little feet.

“The lake, baby, the lake,” she said over her shoulder, disappearing into the bathroom, emerging moment later with two fluffy white towels which she pressed into his arms. “I wanna see the lake, come on.”

Kenzie twined her fingers around his, and in the haze of her touch and the weed and the magic he knew was with them (I know it, I know it is, I’ve seen it, I feel it) now, Duncan knew he was right. We are on the path now. “Take me, baby. I’m yours.”

--------

Together they’d put away all the groceries they’d brought in the woodsy kitchen; Duncan couldn’t stop himself from continually pressing kisses into her hair and along her forehead as Kenzie lined the fruits and vegetables and the carton of eggs, the jars of olives and tiny pickles carefully on the empty shelves; opening the drawers, her hair dipping into her eyes, to slide the lunch-meats and turkey bacon into them. He packed the picnic basket with honeycrisp apples, the tortilla chips and pico, two ripe avocados, and made them each a turkey sandwich on the sprouted bread with fresh lettuce, the artisan provolone and slices of a ripe tomato; then he slipped two bottles of the wine inside, one red, one white, and lined the others carefully at the bottom of the fridge and the reds on the kitchen’s island. Kenzie was watching him with that glittering affection in her eyes, the one that always stopped his heart, made him shy--who was I before I met you? He wondered. I feel like my life has finally begun. Finally, I’m awake, and everything before you was a dream. The weed had made him feel deeply contented, and he could feel a similar dreamlike state of solicitude from her.

“There’s so much I want to show you here,” he said, gripping the handles of the basket. He was still shirtless, and only in the jersey shorts and sandals--fuck it, Duncan, he told himself. There’s no one to care. “Just wait until you see the sky tonight, baby. And I think I can find that clearing again, the one I told you about before--where I went alone that night. With the goldenrods and orchids. Though they might not be blooming now, I don’t know.”

Kenzie was anxiously pulling him out the sliding door to the side of the kitchen; through it was a small side-deck, and then a stony path that led around the house to the path next to the gazebo and the swing that hung from the oak tree--then even further down to the lake, its surface dappled with glitter in the afternoon sun, and the dockside, the canoe bobbing from it on a length of rope. Kenzie stopped them for a moment to admire the gazebo, then glanced over at the swing, her expression elated; I love all of this so much, he heard her, and pulled her against him for a moment, burying his nose into her hair, breathing in. I love you so much.

She pulled back from him, her eyes gold-flecked, then she smiled, mischievous--Kenzie turned and sprinted away from him down the path, her hair streaming out behind her, the little dress fluttering up to flash the dip of her ass in the black bikini. Kenzie made it to the dock, the Vans slapping noisily on the wood, and paused to slip them off and pull the dress over her head, discarding it in a heap--as Duncan came up behind her she ran back a few paces on the dock, then scurried off the edge, cannon-balling into the water, splashing him with a jet of cold spray. He grinned, setting the picnic basket down, shaking the droplets of water from his hair. After a moment, Kenzie reappeared, blinking water from her eyes, pushing her wet hair out of her face, bobbing to the surface. He could see the minute kicking of her feet under the water as she leaned back, face tilting up to the wildly blue sky, the tiny wisps of cloud scudding over the sun, which had moved from the center overhead to begin its slow descent into mid-afternoon.

“I think heaven looks like this,” she said, her eyes drifting closed as she floated there, the surface of the water’s clear reflection making it seem as though she bobbed in the sky itself. In the distance there were hills that stretched for miles due west, and Duncan knew the sun would set over them that evening--he thought of Karer See, with its pink and purple hills--knew after that the sky would burst into a brilliant cascade of stars, the likes of which were never visible in the city, the likes of which weren’t visible anywhere but here, really, as far as he had ever seen--I can’t wait to gaze at the universe with you, he thought, crouching to sit along the side of the dock, dipping his legs down into the water, bringing out the bottle of red wine and opening it as he watched her, the blue weed floating up and down through him, flaring in his mind and his blood like flowers blooming.

“Heaven looks like you, Miss Stone.”

She squinted at him, sticking her tongue out, dipping down to swim over to him, reaching up to where he held a wine glass down to her, his other hand falling against her wet hair. Kenzie sipped at it, then set it gently on the dock, dipping down into the water so her mouth was hidden under it. She kept her nose hovering just above the surface, her eyes sparkling with a green-blue reflection from the sky, dancing at him. He felt a jerk at his foot as she playfully yanked on it under the water.

“Hey! A little fish grabbed me!”

Kenzie laughed at that, ecstatic. She yanked again, and Duncan had to grab onto the side of the dock to keep from being pulled into the water this time.

“Cut that out, Mrs. Shepherd.”

“Mrs. Shepherd,” Kenzie balked, laughing. “That’s your mother.”

“But it’ll be you, too. Soon. Mackenzie Louise Shepherd, Chairwoman of the Board of Directors, Shepherd Unlimited LLC.”

“Oh, soon, huh? What makes you so sure I’ll say yes to you, Mr. Shepherd?”

“I know you will. You told me you will.”

“What if I change my mind,” she said, teasingly, reaching for her wine glass again.

“You won’t.”

“Oh really?”

“You love me.”

Kenzie grinned. “Nah, I just love your big dick and your credit cards.”

Duncan shook his head, and the weed crashed against him again, this time in a stronger wave. He stared at her; he felt bold, untethered by reason, and intoxicated with her.

“Nope. You’re totally in love with me. You’d do anything for me. I heard you tell Annette. You gave yourself away. You’re going to marry me.”

Kenzie’s smile fell away; oh god, what was it? What did I say? he thought. But then he saw the emotion in her eyes, saw that it had been there all along, that her facetiousness had been a paltry attempt to hide it. The weed seemed to be clashing against her thoughts in him, muddling them; but now he felt them in a surge. I did, didn’t I? I did tell her. I forgot about that--so much has happened since then. And I meant every word. I would do anything for you. I am going to marry you. And I love you so much it fucking hurts like a wound. It’s like the most bittersweet chocolate, a wine so rich it burns on the tongue, this heady weed we smoked, drifting in our veins now. My love for you is like that inside me all the time--and your love for me, so strong it’s like a storm that surrounds me, sweetest rain against me.

“Kenzie, baby. Come here. Eat something.”

The heat had deepened; it had to be in the 80’s now, Duncan guessed, remembering his phone was off and discarded in one of the pockets of his suitcase now, and he breathed a sigh of relief as Kenzie set her wine glass down again on the edge of the dock, reaching for his hand. He pulled her easily up to him, into his lap--cradling his head into her neck for a moment, not caring when her wetness seeped into him. Then Kenzie extracted herself from his arms, leaning over the basket to use a cloth napkin to dry the lake water from her hands, grabbing one of the towels to wrap around her shoulders, then reaching for one of the turkey sandwiches Duncan had made for them--he’d wrapped them in cloth napkins too, tying each with a neat double-knot, and Kenzie sat beside him, crossing her legs, wincing a little, to untie it.

“My ass is sore from double-duty,” and then she snorted; they both burst into a peal of laughter. Kenzie reached into the basket and handed him the other wrapped sandwich, their laughter bleeding out into stoned giggles--and together they sat on the dock, eating with insistence. Duncan was starving; sex and weed will do that, he thought, and Kenzie was nodding, reaching for tortilla chips from the basket’s interior, her little teeth crunching into them, her eyes drifting up to the sky again, full of lovely wonder that pierced his heart. Duncan finished his sandwich and cut one of the avocados in half, using a spoon to dip its green flesh into his mouth, watching her coyly. Her wet hair was dripping onto the dock’s wood surface, leaving a damp ring around her, and he fought the urge to reach out and grasp her little breast in the tiny bikini top. He watched it shiver with moisture; watched the dip of her clavicle, the moon still glittering at her throat. She brought a hand up to brush her wet hair from her cheek again, the diamonds on her wrist flashing.

“I just wanna buy you more diamonds,” he murmured between bites. “Hundreds more. One for every star in the sky.”

“Just get me flowers, baby. I love the flowers best.”

“We’re taking the path through the woods behind the house after this, I’ll show you where most of the wildflowers grow--we can gather as many as you want to bring back with us.”

“Oh, Dunny, I’d really love that. I wanna cover the whole wall at home with them.”

“A wall of flowers for Persephone, trapped in the Underworld.”

“Duncan. No. It’s not the Underworld. It won’t be--not anymore. Not after what we do.”

Duncan hesitated; my heart is so light with you. I believe it. He remembered her tear-stained face last night, the pulsing glow of her sadness when he found her in the powder room, the memory of Bill Shepherd’s cruel resentment in her eyes.

“I’m so sorry about my uncle, Kenzie. I’m so sorry I wasn’t there. I’m so sorry that he doesn’t understand--I’m sorry he touched you, that he said those things. It won’t happen again.”

“Duncan. It’s not your fault.” Her hand grasped his much larger one, disappearing into it. “Death is frightening. People are afraid to die. It’s makes them do things they wouldn’t do otherwise. He’s afraid. I already forgave him. I can’t possibly hold a grudge against a man who’s about to die.”

“And Annette?”

“Annette...I think when we get back, we’ll all feel different, you know? I think things will be different.”

“I hope so. I wish I could push all my resentment away. I want to--to try to forgive her.”

“You’re human, baby. You’re allowed to be upset, unsure. It’s okay.”

“Kenzie. How are you so wonderful. So perfect.”

Kenzie shook her head, scattering water across the dock, her eyes (the forest, the sun) burning at him. “I’m not perfect, Duncan. Fuck.”

“You are perfect. You’re perfect to me. For me.”

“You’re fucking perfect,okay? Your fucking stupid perfect hair. Your jawline--I dunno--it could cut steel or something. Your beautiful hands and your lips and your eyes like the sky. And the beautiful way you think about me. It takes my breath away.”

“Kenzie. You are the brightest person I’ve ever met. It’s like you’re made of sunlight. Of starlight. It shines out of every part of you. I could see you in the darkest place. You’d shine out like a beacon. The way people react to you...they can see it too. I think you...you have royal blood. I mean--you come from...something greater. Greater than me. Greater than anyone.”

“I don’t understand that. Why people react to me that way, especially lately. I thought maybe it’s just because of your family and, I dunno--you. Millions of Instagram followers.” Kenzie smirked at him.

Duncan shook his head.

“I think it has to do with us being together. They can see something--I don’t know what to call it. Something extraordinary. They don’t know what it is, but they can feel it. It has something to do with the magic, maybe. Like an invisible current of energy. Claire said something to me that night she came over, after you fell asleep--she said we’re intense, like a bright light a moth flies into. I think people see us like that, for whatever reason--especially you--like a bright light that they want a part of. Some people are like Lindy and Gabby, they’re sincere--it inspires them, they see how much we love each other, I think. And some people respond like that guy Georgio--lust. They just want a bite of it. And other people still--Marissa, or my uncle. They want to destroy it. Snuff it out. They long for it, and can’t accept that it doesn’t belong to them, and never could; that they can’t possess it.”

Kenzie was eating one of the apples now, munching on it with an earnest cuteness that made Duncan long for the bed upstairs again; I’m gonna throw you down in the flowers and kiss every inch of your skin soon, Mackenzie Stone.

“I think that’s why I want to be kind to them so much,” she said softly. “Lindy and Gabby, I mean. They’re so sincere.”

She paused, her mouth on the apple’s smooth skin, and he wanted to reach out and brush his fingers along her lips there. Eve eats the Apple of Knowledge in Eden. And then she Knows--she knows everything. I feel like we’re about to know, too. Everything.

Duncan nodded. “I know that, baby. You don’t have to explain that.”

“Claire has always been that way to me. So sincere. I feel love from her so genuinely, so selflessly. Now I think--I think Claire could always see it. The thing we are becoming.”

“I think so too. I think Samuel could see it too. And Pilar. And so many other people around us our whole lives. We’re noticing it now, but...I think it was always there.”

They both fell silent. Kenzie’s fingers tightened on his palm for a moment, drifted down to the bracelet, sliding over it softly. The thread. The tether. It was always there too, wasn’t it? The one between us. The magic was always there, and so were we. Us. Together.

Then she dipped her head down and took another ravenous bite from the apple, crunching it happily, her face falling into an expression of blissful happiness, the sun in her hair. She slid her hand out of his, balancing the apple on her knee, and twisted her hair out onto the deck. Water pattered in an arc that glittered in a beam of light, reflecting off the water and her diamond bracelet, blinding him for a moment. Scatter your gold over me. Then she reached for the little dress she’d discarded in a heap, pulled it over her head, and stood up, reeling her arm back and tossing the apple’s core into the water. Duncan drifted his fingers up her leg, looking into her eyes.

“Show me the woods, fair Oberon.”

The day was growing muggy now, the heat at its zenith--Duncan knew after this time, this halo’d span of hours, the sun would begin to set and the day would cool into an evening that would linger in both of them for the rest of their lives; whatever we see and feel tonight, Kenzie, will always be with us. His skin felt hot, potent, the weed crashing up again in his mind, like a rising tide. He could feel the sweat at his temples, at the back of his neck, feel the ghost of her hand that had just left his. Kenzie’s hair had already begun to dry, its waves tossing over her shoulder as she slipped her Vans back on and skipped away from him down the dock, beckoning to him impatiently.

“Come on, Dunny.” Her eyes were luminous; their gold seemed to reflect the sky, tossing green and bronze in their depth with swirling intensity. I want you again. I want you under the eaves of the shade. Come to me.

Duncan launched himself up from the dock, from his trance in the sunlight. The spell she was weaving (as you always do, my love) was pushing him toward her--he started to jog towards her but Kenzie flitted away (my little firefly), her little feet in the tennis shoes flying out behind her in the grass, cutting across the path and behind the gazebo. As Duncan ran after her the sun dappled through the trees, giving the afternoon a glittering sheen, the affectation of a sepia memory. Because as this moment fades into the next, it really is a memory now, he thought, his heart aching as he chased her, the sound of her excited giggling drifting back to him as she flew down the path which had faded from stone to pounded dirt, and through the pines and oaks that grew abundantly together at the forest opening. I ache for every moment with you that fades from reality and exists only within us forever after. I’d extend every single one of them into eternity if I could. I could never have enough moments with you. Each one is precious gold--I don’t have space in my hands enough to hold them all, and that will always leave me yearning for you, Kenzie. My moonbeam, radiant with hallowed light.

He made it to the space where the trees parted to the path, panting heavily, pausing to press his palms against his knees, dipping down to suck air into his lungs--his hair fell down over his forehead, sweat dripping at the side of his cheek. The heat had begun to feel almost tantric, enveloping him, the weed veering into the space behind his eyes, through the crown of his head, down the back of his neck, through his arms, swirling down his throat and into the warm center of him. Where are you, angel. I’m going to find you. He suddenly ached for her with a terrible craving that made him want to groan aloud. What is this day, the summer wind, the sky, the water, the wood, without you. Where are you.

He jerked his head back up, hands drifting over his shirtless torso, over the sweat that was pooling in the dip of his throat, and peered through the trees. The clearing he knew was inside wasn’t visible from this distance, and Kenzie had disappeared around the dip in the path a few paces ahead. Duncan stepped under the canopy of trees; in the forest now, he thought, and shivered a little despite the heat. He forced himself to walk rather than run; Kenzie wouldn’t have gone far, he knew. She’s expecting me to follow. And once she sees the clearing--her heart won’t let her go on. I know her; as I’ve always known her. He turned around a cluster of Virginia pines at the dip in the path, eyes falling on the stream he knew was here, one that had run here for at least a hundred years. An arching, handmade bridge spanned across it--it had once been a dark wine-red, but was now fading into the russet of the forest, the paint chipping away. Duncan listened carefully; the telltale sound of Kenzie’s giggling echoed ahead, the distant slap of the bottom of her shoes. Then, it stopped, and he heard her gasp of delight--she had reached the clearing, that oasis he had found on a night his heart had ached with loneliness for her.

Duncan stepped over the bridge, glancing down at the clearness of the stream, his heart pounding wildly, his head dizzy. He knew the clearing was nearly upon him, through the denseness of the strange cluster of black oaks ahead. He remembered them because they grew oddly close together, as though they were guarding something; as though they were the gatekeepers for a world beyond, one that was different than this one, tinged with mystery. Their leaves grew heavy, dipping low, shielding the space where the path led through them. Duncan lifted his hand to push them aside, lowering his head between the eaves of them, feeling their many-pronged leaves brushing through his hair; as he cleared them, he lifted his eyes, and his breath caught again, but not from running. Fuck me, he thought. I thought I’d remembered how lovely it is, but I didn’t, not really. And there are more flowers now; so many more. It’s as if they all bloomed for her. They knew she was coming.

Kenzie was kneeling in the center of the round clearing--overhead the trees created a canopy of shade that only let slivers of sunlight down onto her, but these seemed to create a circlet of gold around her head--her halo, he thought, immediately overcome with her loveliness. All around her there were wildflowers; little lavender asters with golden centers, clusters of drooping red fuchsias, and the goldenrods he remembered. There were what seemed like a million tiny white, purple and pink alyssum flowers covering the carpet of the forest floor, too--they seemed to have grown in a circular pattern that cascaded from the outward edge of the clearing in swirls that dipped all the way to the center where she sat, her feet tucked under her little dress, her face leaning down to press her nose into the clusters in front of her, her hands delicately trailing down their stems and petals. Duncan felt dizzy again--this wave burst over him with more power than the first, and he reached out a hand to clutch the nearby trunk of the black oak beside him. The trunk was warm--strangely warm, almost--and its roughness was soothing. It seemed to tether him to reality when nothing else wanted to, not the flowers or the sunlight in her hair, not her little face turned down so angelically, not her little sighs of longing and joy, nor the way the clearing seemed to drift around her, its anchor, its center--the flowers seemed to have gathered around her with purpose, though such a thing could not be.

“Kenzie, baby,” he heard his voice call to her softly, untethered from himself; and when she looked up at the sound of his voice, Duncan felt his breath gasp again. Her eyes were glimmering gold once more; gold like they had been in the complete darkness of their bed that night, in the throes of their passion in the shadows, otherworldly and ethereal; though they were not as intensely strange as the ones he’d seen in his dream of her, they reminded him of those eyes, those galaxies she had inside her, and Duncan felt the weight of a universe pressing down on him inside the moment, inside that clearing. He went to her, hearing her speaking to him from inside the halo of where she was sitting; come to me, come to me, Duncan, come here my love.

Yes, angel. Yes, Queen of Roses.

She reached up to him, and Duncan lowered himself into her arms; the clearing was cool, strangely so, drying the sweat from his skin, and there was no breeze here, more strangely still; the trees must grow so closely the wind can’t penetrate them, Duncan thought; but that didn’t seem quite true. He could see the dips of the trees beyond through the circle here; knew that any breeze of earth would easily be able to drift through into the space. But there was only stillness, stillness in her arms. Duncan let his hands drift up into her hair, tangling in the waves, now soft and dry. The scent of the flowers was rising up to him, the dizziness he’d felt at the edge of the clearing dissipating; a deep need for her replaced it, a painfully clear desire to give himself to her in this quiet, secluded place, this place that seemed to be brimming with finespun power. Kenzie’s eyes were coaxing him to a euphoric state of abandon, and the laughter she’d sent out behind her moments ago had metamorphosed to a look of absolute trust on her small features, in the hugeness of her eyes; all her trust, and all the holy sweetness of her power over him reflected therein.

“This place is sacred, Duncan,” she whispered, and the hairs at the back of his neck rose at her words; at the fragility of the tips of her fingers on the bareness of his ribs. “This place feels like it’s part of another world.”

“Maybe it is,” he whispered back, lowering his face to her cheek, brushing his lips down the skin there, tiny kisses that pressed in measured holiness until they reached her mouth, opening to him, the scent of the flowers drifting up into his senses again as her face turned against him, her hair falling through his fingers. Kenzie was sliding into his lap, her legs parting to press the space between them flush to him, their mouths still crushed together, deeper, the small movement of her under him shivering out; he clutched at her as she rose to lean over him, her hair falling into his eyes, against his curls, chestnut-gold in russet-copper. Her hands were on his jaw again, her favorite spot, her hands belong there, lifting him into her, tasting him as though he were the sweet nectar of some wild fruit, and Duncan gave himself over to her, to the need he felt falling onto him from every fiber of her. Her power here, in this place, in this bed of flowers; it was absolute, and he knew it, could sense it. Like the Mirror, like this place--I belong to her. My world turns to her whims, her tiniest pleasures; my life is hers, my toil, every breath from my lungs a prayer to her wonders.

“I’m yours,” he whispered up into her mouth. “Kenzie, you must know how much, oh, god--how I belong to you--”

“I do know, beloved,” and her smile against him made him shiver; the Kenzie in this moment had an overwhelming flood of golden power rushing out of her into him, and he felt weak with it; weak and desirous, overcome with her. “Now, lay back, sweet Prince. Your angel needs your attention.”

Duncan let her push him, the weight of her fingers so slight and yet so entire, into the coolness of the long grass under them. His head crushed into the clusters of tiny alyssum that carpeted the clearing; for a moment, he saw himself through her eyes, dizzyingly, and knew it seemed to her that he wore a crown of flowers for her, oh love, Lord Hades, I know how you’ve dreamt of flowers in my hair, but to see them in yours too, is a delight to my eyes. In this I know you truly are mine; with these flowers I kiss you, I give you my gold.

Kenzie stood; Duncan went to lift up to her, but she shook her head with the tiniest movement, and he knew not to move; he watched her from the alcove of flowers leaning over him, watched her pull the dress over her head, untie the bikini and slide it from her thighs, her shoes discarded to a drifting patch of grasses. She was sweetly naked now; her nakedness so beautiful to him in this place, this (sacred) clearing where once he knew he’d longed for her, and where, now, miraculously, he longed for the reality of her before him, knew she held him in her sway here, knew the gold of her was brimming with power not of the world they knew; that here it was greater, somehow, it was closer to the Kenzie he had seen in the achingly beautiful dream, knew, without knowing how he knew, that she was closer to that Kenzie now than she was to the one who existed outside this circle. She lowered herself onto him, straddling him at the waist, and he shuddered to feel the lips of her sex press down onto the sensitive space below his ribs. She leaned down over him, hair tossing into the alyssum beside his face, her knowing grin shaking his heart into adamant supplication; I need you Kenzie, I need you, need you, bless me, let me give all of myself to you, I beg you--

“You need me, do you, sweet Prince? You, he of great riches and great beauty, lord of many houses, overseer of shadows, soon to be king of many lands--”

“All of these are nothing in your eyes, Goddess of the Golden Bower, High Princess of the Garden of All Delights, Angel of the Hidden Sphere wherein is held the knowledge of all things, supremely exalted in heaven--” for a moment, someone else seemed to speak through Duncan’s lips; he understood his words but not from whence they came, knew their shape, but could not comprehend their meaning--and then--these are her names, he knew. These names belong to my Kenzie, they are her names that I forgot.

Kenzie dipped away from him, and his nerves thrilled as she pressed her hand harshly against his mouth, stopping his words; he watched her expression contort in a way he couldn’t quite decipher; he could feel the rise of her lust, and feel that she could not bear the words he spoke; that somehow they were too much, too great, or too raw a wound for her to allow. Some other self, she thought, the one I was before, the one my mind can’t seem to see, the one my heart can’t comprehend. Her finger went between his lips, pressing hard into his tongue, demanding. No more words, beloved, I can’t stand the beauty of them, I’m--I’m not ready. Not yet.

“Fuck me, Duncan. Right now. I need you.”

“Kenzie, up,” he murmured, and demandingly he pressed his palms against the redness he’d left along her ass cheeks, loving the mingled gasp of pleasure and pain that fell out of her, could feel it wiping her mind clean of her uncertainty; Kenzie’s hands fell above his head into the sweet grass as her cunt bruised against his mouth and his tongue pressed, immediate, into her swollen clit, urging it to sodden preparation. Her voice sobbed up into the trees that covered the clearing, and Duncan thrilled to know no one could hear them; this belongs only to us, no one else can have any of it, and his hands drifted up her back, pressing her onto his face. Her wordless cries almost sounded like a song to him; an otherworldly, ethereal one, fitting for a place such as this, this circle that seemed like the portal to another world, surrounded by the black oaks. He pushed his tongue further into her, dipping it down to the opening of her sex, up to her clit, down the side of either lip of her, making her thighs shake against the sides of his jaw, and he kept his eyes open, open to look at the intensity of her beauty; there it is again, her halo, he knew as her head dipped back and her throat moved, shivered for him, her hair falling back in a waterfall against his fingers, and this time it’s not the sunlight, it’s not the dappled light in the clearing, it’s real, it really is her halo, and it’s like nothing in this world, this mundane world made of rules that bind us to the earth, but another world where we had wings unfathomable to human eyes, where we had clothing woven from a thread that doesn’t exist here. Her halo is the essence of her divinity. My Kenzie is truly a goddess. I can feel that here. In this place, I can see that. Here, I worship her in the truth of her golden light. And he knew.

Oh my fucking god, Kenzie. You are Holy. You’re fucking holy; you really are an angel, or something like an angel--there was a time, somewhere, somehow, where you were something else, a being made of light, higher than humankind. I saw it that first night, when I loved you so immediately; I saw it the first time we fucked in the low light of that dark bed and I longed to be by your side forever from that day, when the thought of you leaving me was like a knife in my heart. This is just the beginning--just the tip of the knowing. More is coming.

“Baby, let me fuck you,” Kenzie’s voice was half whisper, half a cry that rattled at the edges of his mind and she lifted her sex away from him, making him gasp to lose her--she was sliding down his skin, the feeling of her smooth as silk and hot as low fire, to the waistband of his jersey shorts--she snapped it back demandingly, her fingers closing around the base of his cock, sliding down further, further, her mouth dipping onto him for just a moment, scattering wetness along his length, then she lowered herself onto him, so quickly and sleekly he cried out, overcome with her--Kenzie lowered her palm against his cheek and her fingers dug into his skin, down against the incline of the top of his throat, and she was pushing into him, forcing her hand into him, and she murmured “give your hard cock to me, Duncan--” and then she was keening her hips down onto him, riding him with so much force that he felt white spasms of light, like the crackling edges of a bonfire, around the edges of his vision.

“Fuck me, give yourself to me, let me fuck you, give yourself, give to me, dearest love, fairest of all men, and mine alone, chosen one--” Kenzie’s head fell back again, her words drifting into the stillness of the clearing, the coolness, the solitude that was blessed and golden, the holy sweetness of this place that, in this moment, was theirs and theirs alone. Her nipples were achingly hard in the soft, shaded light; Duncan’s hands came up to them as she rode against him, biting harshly into his lip to keep himself from rushing over the edge already; his thighs were prickling with the softness of her swollen ass pressing down onto him, and she was so wet--so exquisitely tight against him--

This place seemed to heighten everything in his body; his sight seemed sharper, bringing every detail of her small features into clarity, the impossible depth in her eyes, the shivering length of her eyelashes, her little lips and their tiny, gathered dew, the little round dip at her nose, the scattered blush at her cheeks, the strands of her hair plastered to her neck in her passionate abandon. The sensation of her in his hands and along his cock was nearly unbearable; he fought the urge to scream, to burst into tears, and the scent of her held a sweetness that seemed, like the air, the aura of this place, not of the earth. The scent of a moonbeam, of moonlight scattered on some place that is paradise--the Garden of All Delights, is that what I called it? Is that what I said to her a moment ago, inside this place, halfway between a dream and reality?

Duncan gripped under Kenzie’s arms and forced her down, crushing his mouth against hers; the heat of her naked body was so exquisite, the warmth of her cunt so divine, he wished she could absorb him inside her somehow, cradle him in the cocoon of her light.

“That’s it, baby,” she whispered, and she gasped, “give yourself to me, just like that, ride up into me, like that, fuck me in these sweet flowers, in this sacred place--because we’re fucking holy, baby, when we’re together, it’s fucking holy, isn’t it--it’s sacred--”

“God, yes, I can feel it, it’s like a--unnnh, it’s like you’re made of sunlight, and you’re sucking me inside you--it’s so fucking lovely, Kenzie, baby--I can’t fucking stand it--”

“Fuck, baby, this place--what is it--” Kenzie was gasping, and to Duncan it felt as though her body were lifting him up into her, not just their skin pressing together here, in the dark green grass bursting with wildflowers, but their souls, twining in a meditation that seemed to exceed the boundaries of what he thought possible; like her wings are there again.

“I don’t know, baby, I don’t know, but fuck--unngh--you feel so good--”

Her hand came down again, against his mouth, her index and middle fingers pressing inside his teeth, her hips rhythmic now, back and forth along his length, his fingers coming up to dip into her clit and soothe the deep wetness there, pressing the lips of her to the sides. He could feel it now; the vibrating air, the space of this sacred circle, feel that it wasn’t just their own imagining; for a moment it was as though the circle of black oaks became unstuck, and the spirals of the flowers growing in their twisting pattern turned to a hidden beltway of galaxy, and they had ascended to that other place, the place of in their dreams, made of the sunrise colors that were moving beyond any language he had ever heard, the colors of time and things beyond time.

And then--then they were crashing back to earth, the circle tethered once more, locking back into its place, and Kenzie was falling against him, and he felt his orgasm rushing up into her intense heat, closed his eyes in his overwhelmed idolatry of her--I am the cup that runs over with the abundance of your grace--and they were coming together, crying into each other’s mouths, her little fingers on his face, flitting over his eyelids and along this stubble and against his forehead, beating softly like butterfly wings as she shuddered down onto him and he held her as tightly as he could, crushing her into him, wishing they could be together like this always, that the moment of their inevitable parting would simply never come.

------

Kenzie was laying against him now, in the crook under his arm (her spot, the place she was torn away from me); her hair was scattered back, his hand toying with its soft strands, absent-mindedly. They lay in the center of the clearing, the flowers still crushing around his head, the soft afternoon light scattering through the black oaks onto the long green grass that grew so strangely verdant here. Duncan had noticed, with a strange sort of calm, that the trees outside the circle would drift now and again in the wind; but that the leaves of these trees, the ones that created the circle, did not.

“I almost never want to leave this place,” he murmured to her. Kenzie’s eyes were closed, her cheek on the corner of his chest, her breath small and calm; she’d slipped her bikini bottoms back on, as Duncan had pulled the waistband of his shorts back over his softening cock, but she was still topless, the softness of her breasts pressing against him. “There’s something about it that’s so peaceful. Like the rest of the world can’t get in. Like only we can.”

“Baby,” and Kenzie was turning her head up to him. “What were those names you called me before? They were so beautiful. What did they mean?”

“Kenz, I--” Duncan drifted a hand over his eyes. “I don’t know, honestly. I’m not sure what I was saying. It’s something about--something about this place. It put the thought of them inside me. Like I was remembering something I’d forgotten. Like when you relearn words in a language you haven’t heard for a long time.”

Kenzie didn’t say anything more, just brought her fingers up to his stubbled chin. She seemed to be thinking, but as he knew she could if she willed it, she seemed to have closed her thoughts away from him again. He ached to hear her; he pulled her in closer to him, so her leg dipped over his thigh in their flowery bed. The light was lowering; he wondered what time it was, how long they’d laid here in the quietness. He lifted a hand up and picked a pink alyssum from where a cluster dipped down over them, bringing it around a wave of her golden hair and weaving it through, then did the same with a white flower, and a purple one--eventually there were a dozen flowers he’d braided into her, and Kenzie was smiling at him quietly, not moving, head crooked under her arm, eyes sleepy but watchful.

“I like you with flowers in your hair too, baby,” she murmured. “For our wedding you should wear a crown of flowers, too.”

“Thought you hadn’t decided if you were going to say yes to me or not,” he whispered, hoisting himself up to look down at her now. Goddess of the Golden Bower. That had been one of them.

“I mean our theoretical wedding.”

He grinned at that, then drifted back into seriousness. There are things I realize now, Kenzie. It’s like I can’t speak them out loud though, not yet. Is that what you’re closing away from me? The things you know about me, too? Did you hear me when we fucked? Did you hear that I know you’re holy? That you really are some kind of angel--that you were, once?

Kenzie made no indication that she heard these thoughts from him, either--she was drifting up from her sleepy position, the flowers he’d woven into her hair shivering around her shoulders. She reached her hands up into the air, legs tucked under her, and stretched, yawning, cat-like. Duncan immediately reached for her, pulling her against him, overcome with her again, lost for words, fumbling to speak. Kenzie seemed to sense his emotion, and pressed her lips in an earnest kiss into his neck, whispering “oh Duncan, how I love you,” and he knew there was nothing he needed to say, then--that everything between them was known, and he could enfold himself safely into her, and the outside world was impossibly far away in the understanding of her love.

They lingered that way for a little while, Duncan’s hand in her hair, the tiny remnants of the scent of roses and vetiver on her skin mixed in with the alyssum and the sun-dried earthiness of her hair now, then Kenzie pulled away from him and stood, gathering her other clothes and her shoes, reaching out her hand. He pulled himself up to her, his body immediately towering over her tiny one, and she pulled the bikini top around her waist, turning to him and brushing her hair aside; Duncan laced it back together, kissing her neck.

“We left the picnic basket on the dock, I guess we should go get it,” Kenzie said, glancing up into the black oaks one more time; Duncan followed her eyes to where the round patch of sky above was deepening into a darker blue, the hints of oncoming sunset beginning to bleed around the edges of the trees. Soon the stars will be out, baby. You’ll see.

“We should gather some of these flowers first,” he said, pulling the dress gently out of her hands and gathering it so she could dip her head into its neckline. Duncan straightened the hem around her thighs as she pulled her arms through it, then turned to pick some, but Kenzie stopped him, grasping his fingers.

“No, baby, let’s do it tomorrow. Let’s come here tomorrow morning, when the sun is rising--and gather them in the sunrise. Can we do that? I want to be--I want to gather them that way. In the sunlight.”

Duncan nodded. “Of course, baby. Whatever you want. That sounds lovely.”

She was pulling him out of the flowers now; out of the halo of oaks, back into the forest. As they left the shrouded enclosure of the huge trees, growing so closely together in their strange way, Duncan breathed out a long sigh--the air seemed to suck back into him, the wind immediately raising the hairs on his arms. It was as though they’d walked through a door back into the outside world from the shadowed interior of a house, its floors made of long grasses and wildflowers.

“That’s so--” Kenzie hesitated, pausing, faltering. “That place, Duncan.”

“You said it yourself, Kenzie, and you were right. It’s sacred. It was the first place I felt you, even when we were so far away from each other once. It was the first time I knew you were out there somewhere--that I missed you.”

She nodded, eyes bright, hand tight inside his. “It’s thin there, isn’t it?”

Duncan knew what she meant; he felt it, deep within his bones, the certainty of it. Yes, my love. It’s thin there; and the barrier between this world and whatever else there is--whatever is outside it--is barely there in that place. We felt another world bumping up against us there; our past. Our future. And other things. Things too great to even describe.

“Yes, Kenzie. I think so. I think you’re right.”

Kenzie nodded a little again, then, clutching his hand tightly, she led him down the path to the bridge; he could hear the eerie cry of a loon far off in the distance somewhere--probably on the lake--and he shivered, threading his fingers against hers, contented to be led by her. Led anywhere. Led into hell if you willed it. Led into an abyss if that was your wish. But no. I know you’ll lead me into heaven. I know it, and it amazes my soul.

Soon they were out of the woods. A cool gust of wind drifted toward them from the lake, smelling of earthy rot, grass baked in sunlight, and the oncoming dew of the evening, and as Duncan lifted his eyes to its serene surface, he was moved anew by its beauty in the oncoming sunset--the sky had begun to turn shades of pink and apricot, and they reflected on the lake’s face with a passionate kiss.

“Wow, Duncan. It looks like…” Kenzie trailed off, squeezing his hand. Her eyes misted, glancing earthward to hide her emotion; but he knew--for I see into your thoughts, beloved, and therefore, into your soul--what she was trying to say. It looks like that other place. The one with colors we can’t describe. I know, baby. I know. She looked up to him, went up on her toes, gripping into his bare shoulders to kiss him. Holy. He felt her shiver a little as another gust of wind fell over them, the flowers he’d twined into her hair falling against her cheek.

“Go get a sweater, baby, it got chilly. I’ll get the picnic basket.”

“Can we make a fire? The weather tonight is perfect. Then we can lay under the stars all night, until the sun rises.” She was grinning against him, her little chin pressing into his skin, her eyes inside his, eyelashes so long, her softness like the rose petals that had been in her hair last night--like the petals she’d slipped inside his wallet, a memory. I want to remember every minute I’ll ever have with you, I wish I could, I wish I could memorize every tiny part of everything.

He pressed his hand down from her head. “Of course we can. I can’t wait to show you the spot--the place where you can see everything. Every star in the sky. And tonight’s so clear--baby, it’s like everything is coming together. I feel so--it’s like they did this for us--”

“The Fates.”

“Yes. Kenzie--I love you.”

“And I love you. To the moon and back.”

Duncan’s heart clenched, knowing that was what she said to Madeline; knowing it was sacred, special, held close, shared between two women, tied to the feminine parts of her, secret and achingly personal. Knowing that saying it to him was a wildly intimate permission from her; knowing that the thing that had passed between them in the holy embrace of their passion under the black oaks was a piece of something vast and yet, somehow, coming together, like a thousand intricate threads of a tapestry that encompassed a universe. He felt as though he’d passed some sort of deeply difficult test; one of utter trust, one innately tied to her femininity.

To share ourselves with each other means to open our hearts to each other utterly; not just our hopes, but our secret fears, our quiet anxieties, our uncertainty, and all our vulnerabilities. In the woods, under those trees, flowers in my hair, I touched something divine in a way I hadn’t before. You felt it, too, didn’t you, my Kenzie?

Her eyes heard him, and recognized him, russet, green and gold. Yes, Duncan. Yes, my exalted love.

Kenzie turned away from him, lightning-quick--he watched her run down the path and disappear around the gazebo; a minute later he saw a warm light spill from its opening as she flicked on the lantern there, then he watched her little shape flitting out and up to the deck, hair swaying, her shoes slapping up the path, the sliding door opening then slamming behind her. The swing drifted, creaking in the breeze--the loon called out again, from somewhere far away on the lake, the canoe slapping against the dockside. Duncan shivered in the sudden solitude, walking down to the dock to gather the basket up, gazing out on the color reflected on the surface of the lake once more, lost in thoughts of otherworldly vistas, of ethereal, angelic clouds. He turned back to the house, lost inside his thoughts of the wood, the strange names he’d called her in his passion, the new knowledge, the certainty of her divinity--one he still couldn’t find words to describe to her. Maybe under the stars I’ll find them. Maybe with the universe looking down on us, I can speak what I know in my heart to her.

Maybe then I can tell her what I know now: that she really is an angel. Or she was. Or she will be.

That she truly is divine.

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