Happy Halloween, strawberrykait
Trick or Treat!
Title: Meet by Moonlight
LiveJournal username: ldymusyc
Prompt: #5 - Moon
Rating: R
Word Count: 1000
He asked me to come. It had rained that night, left the air full of mist that coated the thick wool of my cloak with sparkling silver droplets and dappled my hair like stars in the black expanse of a midnight sky. I knew from the moment I saw his owl, eyes shining like copper coins, standing on the stone balustrade of the terrace outside my bedroom window that I would go to him. I knew that I shouldn't, and I knew that I would. His letter held one word, only one, and I traced the lines of his script with the tip of my nail. Please, he'd written, the word sweeping across the parchment, and my heart stumbled.
I arrived in the cold hours before dawn, found my way to the boundary, old memories guiding my feet across wet grass and moist earth. I put my toes against the flat stone embedded in the dirt and crouched to touch the land. I closed my eyes and whispered the passcode he'd given me years ago. We made each other so many promises then, promises broken and mended until they were a mosaic of sighs. This was the only promise never broken, the one made with our fingers linked and our foreheads touching. When he needed me, when I needed him, we would always, always be there.
I spoke, and the magic opened for me, the boundary parting in a ripple like a pebble dropped into a lake. I stepped through, fingers chilled and shaking beneath the rain-speckled folds of my cloak. Ten paces forward, turn east, ten paces forward, turn east, and there he stood beneath the heavy boughs of an oak. Moonlight gleamed off his hair. He raised one hand in greeting and the light glinted off his ring, the symbol of his family, of his duties to his line. The symbol that had separated us at last. We made our choices, he and I, the only choices we could. Still, my heart trembled when I saw his lips move as he mouthed my name, and I flew into his arms with a cry.
His hands smoothed across my back, warm and rough on the thin shirt beneath my cloak. His shirt. I'd kept it, stolen it from him the night he kissed the tears from the corners of my eyes and tried to set me free with a farewell. I didn't tell him then - could never tell him - that I hadn't been freed from him that night. I wasn't free from him now, and it was obvious as he bowed his head to mine that he had never freed himself from me. His fingers shook against my cheeks as he caressed my face.
I looked at him as if I hadn't seen him in a century, drank him in like he was water and blood and life all at once. The shine of his eyes told me that he was doing the same, that we stood there with no more than a breath separating us and we memorized each other all over again.
"Hermione," he whispered, his voice low and trembling. I smoothed one finger across his lips and shushed him. I rose up on my toes and pressed my mouth to his, silencing him. Now was not the time for words, not when there was so much else between us. Sorrow and joy and love and regrets all mixed together in a spell that could never be broken.
I twined my arms around his neck and drew him down, drew him with me to the chilled ground. I spread my cloak over the cold grass and rolled back on it, my arms stretching up for him. Draco closed his eyes and ran his tongue across his lower lip, then he lay beside me. He touched my throat, he stroked the arch of my ribs, and he lowered his head to mine. In the gleaming light of the moon, he shone like an angel, blond hair, silver eyes, marble skin.
We kissed like the first time, slow and hesitant, our mouths closed, our movements tentative. We kissed like the last time, furious and hard, tongues pressing and hands roaming. The air around us heated with our heavy breaths as our bodies slid together, and the ground beneath us warmed as we joined. The wide boughs of the oak and the narrow beams of the moon were our only witnesses as we renewed our private vows. Nothing else existed for us, nothing and no one.
The cries of owls hunting in the distance and the howling wind across the stars formed a harmony with our desperate, passionate moans and whispers. I clung to his waist, holding him tight as I fell from the brink of ecstasy. He shoved his arms beneath my shoulders and clutched me against him as he stiffened in release. Spent and exhausted, we lay together in a tangle of limbs.
I moved and he tightened his grasp, pulling me to his chest, pressing his lips to mine. "Don't," he murmured, his voice taut and shaking. "Please. Please don't leave. Not yet. I need you." He shuddered and bent to place a kiss over my heart. "I love you."
I stroked his fringe away from his forehead and met his eyes. My vision shimmered with tears and my heart clenched in my chest. I would have to leave eventually, but not then. Not just then. I had sworn myself to him years before, and he had sworn himself to me. I kissed him and held him, promising to stay until the sun rose. Until the moon was gone, I was his. His for one more night in body, and his for all of eternity in soul.
I curled against him, the cloak and the moonlight forming a blanket over us, and he wrapped me in his arms. He stroked my hair as I laid my head on his heart. "Draco," I whispered. "I love you. Forever."