ArrangedMarriage!AU
From yet another awesome prompt on the TDKR meme.
consummation
"You're mine now," Robin said, astride him still. He breathed, Bane's seed held warm inside his form. "This belongs to me." His chest was sweaty. He was beautiful in Bane's eyes, all of him shining in the firelight. The base, tight hold of his body on Bane's softening member was a part of it, physical and real, but it was his eyes that arrested Bane. The heat there made Bane feel possessed, and, perhaps for the first time in his life, protected. It was an unusual feeling, and in that moment it was utterly necessary.
Bane put his hand on Robin's torso, watching his fingers span his skin and muscle. He felt the heat of him, the vitality of his heart, beating strong.
His Robin, so alive.
Bane was not a man of words, not for this. Bane was in awe, but he knew not how to tell his lover, his husband, how the simple touch of Bane's hand and its crooked finger against Robin's body could fell him from a height. Bane wasn't sure he'd stopped falling, with his Robin looking at him with his dark eyes from above, his lithe form so young and strong, and Bane's own large, scarred, the signs of the life he'd lived there for Robin to see.
Yet his Robin loved him, Bane knew not how, but he could see it. He only had to look, and be humbled.
"My Robin," he said, breath short and raspy in his chest, a tightness there. "Robin," he said again, quieter, on a breath. Bane drew his hand down, didn't have to go far, and he took Robin in hand, held him, the crook of his broken finger hidden as the rest curled around his perfect lover. "Make me yours."
kohl
On the day before their wedding night--secret, as anything could have been, concealed and hidden from even those closest to them, something for the two alone--Robin had laughed when Barsad had asked which of them should wear kohl, putting his hands on his lover’s face, feeling the pleasant scratch of Barsad’s ever-present beard.
The light caught on it in the night, with the torchieres of Robin’s innermost chamber burning hot and bright. He’d touched Barsad like this thousands of times before, and yet, here with them kneeling on his bed and facing each other, his dark-rimmed eyes more hauntingly beautiful than anything Robin had ever seen...
He wanted to say so many things, small things but deep things at once, like I love you and you’re my everything, things Barsad knew, things that Barsad would say like it came so easily to him, like loving Robin was as breathing. Robin knew this, and Barsad knew this--their connection lay within their souls, and words weren’t needed, but on this night, Robin didn’t have words and he wanted to say them.
Barsad had put his hands on Robin’s shoulders, stared into the darker colors of his lover’s eyes, shining with the fires in them. His pale Robin was beautiful, strong as ever, the kohl emphasizing the vitality and passion that never ceased to humble and amaze Barsad in turn, that he should be graced with love from one such as this.
Barsad had felt the child, smuggling the pale silk robes from areas of the estate to which he was allowed but had no reason to be, his Robin giggling like a boy when Barsad had shown him his spoils. Robin did not laugh when Barsad, shy for perhaps the first time in his adult life, had met him in his bedchamber wearing the robes in traditional folds. Barsad had not worn clothing in the customs of his home country since he’d been a boy, and had been carried on the winds that had taken him to Gotham’s kingdom and into Robin’s orbit.
Now his Robin gazed at him like he was meeting him at the first, and welcoming him home, to where he belonged, all at once. In an instant Barsad’s self-consciousness faded, not only because of Robin’s own appearance--Robin’s eyes held everything for him, and it wrapped about his heart like something soft and secure, as his Robin would say, something right.
The prince’s consort had no business marrying said prince, and the memory was one of Barsad’s most cherished as it represented a truth between the two of them that would never be broken. Even now, with his Robin in the arms of another, belonging to another and, Barsad trusted in time, loving another, Barsad ached. He accepted, and he went about his pain quietly as was his wont.
It did not hurt any less, knowing that his Robin and the Lord Regent Bane were joined in body and in custom, in the law of both Bane’s land and Robin’s. Gotham had not truly been home to Barsad--home was where his Robin was, and if that was now this darker place, with its severe beauty, at his Robin’s side but no longer in his heart, so be it.
Barsad knew Robin could come to love the Lord Regent, because love was Robin’s way. If another was worthy of it, they would receive that love and understand the gift they had been given without reserve. Bane was an honest man to a fault, and Barsad had looked into his eyes and felt him worthy, had felt something he’d not thought he’d need to hide--pain, even resentment, pushed down to the farthest reaches. Barsad was skilled at simply being. What was necessary was something he could be.
It still pained him, and always would, somewhere much lower than the place where he still held his Robin, tightly held in the inmost chambers of his heart, as he would ever be.
thalaathah
[forthcoming]
consummation
"You're mine now," Robin said, astride him still. He breathed, Bane's seed held warm inside his form. "This belongs to me." His chest was sweaty. He was beautiful in Bane's eyes, all of him shining in the firelight. The base, tight hold of his body on Bane's softening member was a part of it, physical and real, but it was his eyes that arrested Bane. The heat there made Bane feel possessed, and, perhaps for the first time in his life, protected. It was an unusual feeling, and in that moment it was utterly necessary.
Bane put his hand on Robin's torso, watching his fingers span his skin and muscle. He felt the heat of him, the vitality of his heart, beating strong.
His Robin, so alive.
Bane was not a man of words, not for this. Bane was in awe, but he knew not how to tell his lover, his husband, how the simple touch of Bane's hand and its crooked finger against Robin's body could fell him from a height. Bane wasn't sure he'd stopped falling, with his Robin looking at him with his dark eyes from above, his lithe form so young and strong, and Bane's own large, scarred, the signs of the life he'd lived there for Robin to see.
Yet his Robin loved him, Bane knew not how, but he could see it. He only had to look, and be humbled.
"My Robin," he said, breath short and raspy in his chest, a tightness there. "Robin," he said again, quieter, on a breath. Bane drew his hand down, didn't have to go far, and he took Robin in hand, held him, the crook of his broken finger hidden as the rest curled around his perfect lover. "Make me yours."
kohl
On the day before their wedding night--secret, as anything could have been, concealed and hidden from even those closest to them, something for the two alone--Robin had laughed when Barsad had asked which of them should wear kohl, putting his hands on his lover’s face, feeling the pleasant scratch of Barsad’s ever-present beard.
The light caught on it in the night, with the torchieres of Robin’s innermost chamber burning hot and bright. He’d touched Barsad like this thousands of times before, and yet, here with them kneeling on his bed and facing each other, his dark-rimmed eyes more hauntingly beautiful than anything Robin had ever seen...
He wanted to say so many things, small things but deep things at once, like I love you and you’re my everything, things Barsad knew, things that Barsad would say like it came so easily to him, like loving Robin was as breathing. Robin knew this, and Barsad knew this--their connection lay within their souls, and words weren’t needed, but on this night, Robin didn’t have words and he wanted to say them.
Barsad had put his hands on Robin’s shoulders, stared into the darker colors of his lover’s eyes, shining with the fires in them. His pale Robin was beautiful, strong as ever, the kohl emphasizing the vitality and passion that never ceased to humble and amaze Barsad in turn, that he should be graced with love from one such as this.
Barsad had felt the child, smuggling the pale silk robes from areas of the estate to which he was allowed but had no reason to be, his Robin giggling like a boy when Barsad had shown him his spoils. Robin did not laugh when Barsad, shy for perhaps the first time in his adult life, had met him in his bedchamber wearing the robes in traditional folds. Barsad had not worn clothing in the customs of his home country since he’d been a boy, and had been carried on the winds that had taken him to Gotham’s kingdom and into Robin’s orbit.
Now his Robin gazed at him like he was meeting him at the first, and welcoming him home, to where he belonged, all at once. In an instant Barsad’s self-consciousness faded, not only because of Robin’s own appearance--Robin’s eyes held everything for him, and it wrapped about his heart like something soft and secure, as his Robin would say, something right.
The prince’s consort had no business marrying said prince, and the memory was one of Barsad’s most cherished as it represented a truth between the two of them that would never be broken. Even now, with his Robin in the arms of another, belonging to another and, Barsad trusted in time, loving another, Barsad ached. He accepted, and he went about his pain quietly as was his wont.
It did not hurt any less, knowing that his Robin and the Lord Regent Bane were joined in body and in custom, in the law of both Bane’s land and Robin’s. Gotham had not truly been home to Barsad--home was where his Robin was, and if that was now this darker place, with its severe beauty, at his Robin’s side but no longer in his heart, so be it.
Barsad knew Robin could come to love the Lord Regent, because love was Robin’s way. If another was worthy of it, they would receive that love and understand the gift they had been given without reserve. Bane was an honest man to a fault, and Barsad had looked into his eyes and felt him worthy, had felt something he’d not thought he’d need to hide--pain, even resentment, pushed down to the farthest reaches. Barsad was skilled at simply being. What was necessary was something he could be.
It still pained him, and always would, somewhere much lower than the place where he still held his Robin, tightly held in the inmost chambers of his heart, as he would ever be.
thalaathah
[forthcoming]