Deepwood Weald you waiting at ho[m]e for me saying what time do you call this?

The shore disappeared from view as Lotte was dragged abruptly under, floating weightlessly in an endless chasm of pleasure. Speech was beyond her; even the beloved syllables of Arturo’s name fell away. Indeed, if not for the taut grip of his jaws around her scruff, she felt she could have turned to liquid and evaporated into the very atmosphere. She spoke to him with the rhythm of her arching back and flexing hips, with the quickening rasp of her breath that caused her muzzle to part and her tongue to loll — and she sang for him, an ancient and undulating song composed of silvery whines and whimpers and low, guttural moans that scraped the bottom of her vocal register. And when at last he eased from her and their entwined souls retreated to the confines of their separate bodies, Lotte turned to him appealingly with a starry look in her argent eyes. Stay with me, begged the thump of her tail and the coquettish tilt of her head, for even in the wake of their shared passion she had not shed this new and yet intimidating vulnerability. She didn’t trust her voice yet, and merely whimpered softly to him, trying to wriggle nearer with an insistent hum of need.

[table width=85%][tr][td]

When the couple reached the apex of their love making Arturo took a few steps back to give her some space unsure if she enjoyed after sex cuddles or not, each breath he took deep and even of the weald around them, and of her scent mingled with his own. When she turned to him, her moonbeam gaze appealing and asking him to stay with her he responded by closing the distance with the intent to rub his muzzle against her’s, placing a loving kiss upon the corner of her mouth. Of course I’ll stay, he intended for his actions to say, unable to call upon his vast vocabulary to form coherent words. Not while the passion they shared still lingered, freshly imprinted in his mind and to the muscles of his body. When his nightingale whimpered and wiggled nearer he let her (like he was going to deny her closeness, haha), drawing her into an (wolfish) embrace. “Well my nightingale,” The gangster drew in his accented, smoky timbre, offering her a slow, lazy devilish sort of grin. “Was it as you thought it would be? Or not at all as you thought it would be?” It was not for his pride that he asked. He had wanted her first time to be perfect (or as close to it as it could get, at the very least) and though she did not seem scared off by the sacrosanct act of passion but he wanted to be sure, just in case.

[/td][/tr][/table]

True to her nature, Lotte considered Arturo’s question seriously, nestling flush against his tall, lean frame while her heartbeat slowed to a normal rate and the strange, cloying feeling of vulnerability ebbed away. She needed his nearness desperately and busied herself with trying to press herself as close to him as she possibly could without shoving him clear out of the weald. “It was,” she said in a low, husky purr, “not at all as I thought it would be.” Lest he think she was disappointed, she hummed low in her throat, a thoughtful murmur, and explained herself: “I am not used to willingly relinquishing control — not to my body and certainly not to any other wolf. It was hard to let go.” A smile played about her lips as she turned to preen lovingly at his fur. “I thought I needed you — before — ” she said a bit clumsily, “but after — I need you just as much, rakas. Maybe more.” Absurdly, her throat grew thick and tight with emotion as she softly whined: “I want to come home with you. Not after winter — now.”

Turning her mind forcibly from the bleak season and the empty den that awaited her in Donnelaith, Lotte honed in on the present, drawing a deep and cleansing breath. She could sing her loneliness later — now was a time for joy. “It was the most wonderful thing,” she breathed rapturously, argent eyes aglow with love and sorrow and deep-seated contentment. “When can we do it again?” She slanted a wickedly mischievous glance up at the Fearghal. It never occurred to her to wonder about other conquests or lovers; although she would willingly — and eagerly! — fight off any females who approached now with the intention of wooing and winning the masked coywolf, his past wasn’t something she cared to pick over or scrutinize. She wanted his now — she wanted his someday. “You have created a monster, Arturo Fearghal,” she promised him boldly. “I will not be satisfied until I have mastered every way to please you.”

[table width=85%][tr][td]

Arturo was genuinely interested in her response, wanted to hear that she enjoyed it as he had though he also knew that the first time came as bit of a shock. For him, so very long ago, it had. There was little that shocked (or embarrassed for that matter) Arturo Fearghal these days. “As I need you,” He admitted, allowing himself the vulnerability of his confession; but it was true and as he believed their relationship was one of equality it only seemed fair that he allow her inside the walls that protected him. Admitting that he needed her on more levels than just the physical wasn’t easy for him but with Lotte he did not fear speaking it, neither did he fear she couldn’t handle the burden. He craved her companionship, her opinions, her love in a way he had never craved anything before. It was this that was new to Arturo and though he some pessimistic part of him told him to be cautious he paid it no heed. Lotte had plenty of opportunities to strike him down, literally and figuratively. He inhaled deeply at the words that followed on her whine, feeling his heart clench at the knowledge that they would have to part with one another. Not forever, but it might as well have been for he knew the days and weeks and months would pass like a slow ache beneath a bruise. “I want you to come home with me, and I want it now,” He murmured, his lips seeking her ear to nibble lightly at it. “and while I am accustomed to getting what I want —” a devilish grin followed that statement. “— you should see Donnelaith through the winter.” That was harder to say than he thought it would be.

Arturo laughed heartedly when Lotte asked when they could do it again and told him that he created a monster. “As often as you like,” The gangster promised her, answering her mischief with a glint of it in his own eyes. “It’s not just about my pleasure, you know.” He reminded her with a playful click of his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

[/td][/tr][/table]

Feel free to powerplay Lotte scampering away after he answers! She will want to be caught. ♥

The smoke-and-shadow songbird was still highly sensitized to Arturo’s touch, and the chaste nibble to the curve of her ear ignited a current of heat that danced down her spine and curled restlessly in her gut. It didn’t help that his smoky timbre, richly accented and devastatingly devilish, was even more attractive to Lotte now that she’d heard him gasp her name in the throes of their shared passion. She shuddered once at the memory, turning to nip warmly at the juncture of his throat and shoulder, and accused him playfully, “You are doing it again, rakas!” Gathering her long, supple limbs beneath her, she rose to her paws and snaked her body hard against his like an overexuberant feline, greedily taking pleasure from his nearness.

Oh! He is too much — dangerous, dangerous man.

“Play with me,” she begged abruptly in a throaty murmur, desperately needing an outlet for the spice of arousal that had already begun to drum headily through her veins. “Kaapata ja Kysyä — in your tongue, Catch and Ask.” It was a game she’d just now made up, but she liked the alliteration and decided on the spot that if anyone asked, she’d simply pretend it was a traditional game from the Enok Tundra.

“I chase you and catch you,” she said, laying out the ground rules, “and then I ask a question.” A wicked glint sparkled in her moonbright eyes as she saucily flicked her coal-colored tail at her suitor, preening her ashen ruff with the air of a femme fatale fastidiously checking her nail polish. She glanced at him over her shoulder, teasing, “Then you try to catch me, and if you do, you ask.” Inspired, she stretched her limbs, shaking out her fur with a sunny smile. “Information for information, Turo — I am very Teaghlaigh, yes?” Without waiting for his answer, the soot-stockinged rogue paced forward like a stalking cat, butting her muzzle lovingly against the underside of his and stretching forward in a continuation of that motion to rub her cheek against his. When her lips were close enough that her very breath ruffled the fur of his ear, “Caught you,” she said. “Now, Ceannasach, tell me this — where would a man like Arturo Fearghal be found if a nightingale were to go looking?” He knew to find her in the weald, but she wondered whether he had any secret haunts inside or outside Teaghlaigh.

[table width=85%][tr][td]

Arturo drew in a soft breath when she (playfully) accused him, her warm nip to the juncture of his throat and shoulder leaving a tingle of nerves in it’s wake. The gangster’s chuckle was warm, a soft, buoyant, utterly affectionate rumble that lingered in the strong column of his throat as she rubbed her body against his in a cat-like manner. He did not mind her quirky touches. In no secret manner, the gangster reveled in them. Cherished them. Cherished her. He watched her with smoldering fiery eyes lifting himself to his feet when she invited — though begged was the more appropriate word here — him to play with her and unable to deny Lotte anything that she wanted of him he obliged her. “Sounds easy enough.” Arturo agreed with a quirky lift of his lips into something that was partially coy, partially devilish. “Very Teaghlaigh indeed.” The smoky timbre of Arturo’s deep, accented voice was a near purr as he answered her question. Information for information.

Two seconds into the game and with a butt of her head at his chin and rub of her cheek against his own she’d already caught him — not that Arturo was going to claim that he minded (because he didn’t). “A nightingale could find her gangster in the Gyrfalcon Keep, if she wishes to go looking for him.” The gangster responded as she had worked the question: as if they were not speaking of themselves but of two different entities entirely. He favored the shortcut through the Keep to carry him to Donnelaith faster when he sought to visit her, had sought it out for Chusi’s use as well since she enjoyed visiting though she knew and he didn’t fancy her taking the long way across the River (but truly his intentions when he’d discovered it were as selfish as they were selfless). “but the Nightingale may sing for [I]Ceannasach in his borders, too, if she feels particularly bold.”[/I] He would not chase her from his lands and with his expressed permission to freely roam his lands she was granted a right that he would (very likely) never give to any other. But Lotte wasn’t anyone else. She was Lotte.

Swiftly she scampered away from him, fleet of foot as she was. He felt the absence of her heat as the chill seeped into to rush away her lingering warmth. He was after her just as quick and when he caught her it was his turn to circle her tightly, making sure that he touched her the entire time, whether it was the brush of his hip or shoulder, or muzzle. “I caught you,” He purled against her jaw, drawing his tongue there, following the grain of her fur. “If Ceannasach is impatient, and he very much so is, how soon could he see his nightingale again?”

[/td][/tr][/table]

“Whenever you wish,” Lotte breathed, failing at her own game in her zeal to be near him. “Call for me at Donnelaith and I will call for you at Teaghlaigh and we will make nuisances of ourselves that every wolf knows we are — courting.” She wasn’t sure that was the correct usage of the term, but she didn’t care either way. “Turo,” she murmured throatily, “I think our winter will be very warm indeed.” Nobody could have told her that she was both very, very right and very, very wrong.

Resuming the game, the gangster and his nightingale chased one another through the weald, tearing up the ferns that blanketed the earth with their eager feet; by the time they returned to their respective homes, the sky was full of stars.