Shadewood you are at war, even in your dreams

Nero understands, in a singular, vulnerable moment as she thrusts her muzzle towards him, the cool press of her nose against umbra fur and heated flesh just how close to death he was. The fur at the nape of his neck bristles but he remains stalwart. Unflinching as she sniffs wildly at him, as if they are lovers long since kept apart only just returned to one another’s arms. It is not necessarily trust that holds Nero still, that bides back his instinct to take his teeth to her flesh in consequence. It is because he believes (perhaps in a very narcissistic way) that so very easily their situation can change from the wayward emperor and infernal nymph to irrevocably becomes Hades and Persephone; though admittedly not all versions of that story are horrible and dark. Some will claim that she willingly went with him, willingly ate the pomegranate seeds that sealed her fate so that she could be with him on the belief that his affections for her did not go unrequited. Like all mythos it merely depended upon whom told the story and their interpretations of the myths.

She drinks in her fill of his scent and, most intriguing to the Macedonian she settles back upon her haunches and prostrates herself with a lift of her chin, exposing the soft and delectable flesh of her neck. To trust a roman, now that is a brave trust, he thinks. He takes his own step closer, accepting the invitation she graciously extends to him though his movements are slower, easily more sensual than her gripping need. He begins his exploration at her jaw, following the length of it and working down, over the junction where her jaw meets her throat and then to her neck, all the while drinking in her scent — a trade for a trade. As she now had his scent he, too, would have her’s committed to memory.