About Benden
1-21/22-2007 (Issa, Reyce):
They've been poring over the records of Ista Weyr for three days already, but have finally come away with some measure of success for their efforts. There are still copies to be made, however, copies with harper seals for added assurance, and that takes time. So Issa has taken advantage of that by suggesting that they take a night to themselves and camp out on some remote beach. And that's what they've done. They arrived at the spot Issa found out about in the afternoon and set up camp. Reyce, as usual, was in charge of the fire-starting, while Issa set up their bed, a wide hammock she borrowed to make the experience more exotic, and found a nearby tree to store the straps and their luggage with them. Dinner was early, consisting of dried meats, bread and heaps of Istan winter fruits that she's so fond of. And then Issa stripped down, she and Oshisyth leaving Reyce alone on the beach while they traipse away to go and play in the waves, splashing to their heart's content. Which just so happens to be until the light begins to fail. The sun's beginning to dip below the horizon when Issa comes trudging back up through the sand, trailed soon after by her dragon. Her nudity is far away and fleeting, however, for she wraps around herself a thick white towel as she nears, creating something of a short dress that falls to midthigh as she tucks it in. "There are these fish!" she calls out on the edges of earshot, trotting those last few steps that bring her to the fireside. "These little silver ones," she says, demonstrating a space of a few inches with her finger and thumb, "and if you stand really still, they swim right up next to you, tickling your legs. It's so funny."
Left alone to enjoy the dry side of the beach, Reyce retreated to the hammock where the trees it hung from shielded him from the sun. Or such was the intent, but by the time the sun goes down his skin has flushed faintly red and very slick with sweat. Thus he glistens redly when he crouches by the fire, to which he has returned - the meager shade of the hammock useless to him in the settling dusk - by the time Issa gets back from her watery wanderings. He notices her from far away, lifting his eyes to watch her approach, but he doesn't move to get up until she speaks to him. Her enthusiasm prompts the corner of a smile out of him, indulgent rather than sharing in her childlike joy. "Fish aren't smart," he observes, but he doesn't make any allowance for the fire and it crackles over the sound of his voice. Shifting a frown at it, he steps around and approaches Issa, removing the noisemaker from between them.
"I didn't say they were smart," Issa counters archly, "I said they were funny." She steps up to meet him, her face, also touched with red hints of sunburn across her nose, cheeks and forehead, turned smilingly up to him. A moment passes just that way before she snakes a hand out to grab his, crossing to grab at the opposite side. Then she rolls herself into an embrace, placing her back to his front, his arm held under her own as she crosses them over her midsection. Her head settles back into a lean against him, curls still damp pressing against his shirt, while she looks out over the water now that Oshisyth is no longer blocking the view. The sun is sinking out across the water, skewed to their right just slightly, and it makes the split-peaked mountain of a distant island into a dark silhouette against the deepening orange of the sky. She takes in a sigh and her shoulders press back against him until she releases it slowly and silently again. "You can't tell me that's not pretty," she tells him, shifting her head just slightly to find a more comfortable positioning. Oshisyth has since shaken off the majority of the water droplets clinging to her skin-- an action done away from the main camp, as requested-- and returns to their spot, trudging through the sticking sand just behind them.
"I didn't say they weren't funny," Reyce points out, a low murmur into her ear while she arranges his embrace. He lets himself be rearranged willingly, and though her fingertips leave white spots sinking out of his red skin the burn does not go deep enough to make him flinch at the contact. The cedar scent has faded from him over the past few days, leaving him with the pungent saltiness of his sweat made spicy by the soapsand he washed with this morning. He squeezes his arms tightly, as much holding her as tensing his shoulders to suppress the extra waft of odor that he somehow senses from his armpits when she makes his arms lift around her, but his attitude seems relaxed, and he slowly lowers the point of his chin to rest on her head while he watches the sunset with her. "Then I won't," he answers softly, lifting his chin enough to allow her repositioning and then reclaiming his spot with it.
His answer draws out a short-lived chuckle from Issa, its low sound overtaken by another-- Oshisyth whumping down into the sand behind them. The green stretches out on her stomach, opening her muzzle for a wide, toothy yawn before settling her chin into the sand as well. But Issa doesn't have a comment to follow that overshadowed little laugh, returning to relative quiet, broken only by a few sporadic and unexplained faint humming noises, for a minute or two. Her curiosity brings an end to that, however, and she asks, "What did you do while we were in the water?" Gently, the fingertips of one hand run in tiny, simultaneous circles over his skin where they lay on his arm.
Reyce tilts his head, the point of contact slipping from his chin to his cheek as he turns to watch the whumping sand-stirrer that is Oshisyth. The dragon does nothing more interesting than yawn, however, and he gives a soft, settled sigh as his gaze turns back to the horizon. His arms loosen around her when that humming begins, no longer pressing into her stomach, nor does he press for an explanation. "Think I slept," he muses, a low snort following the admission that he only thinks, and isn't sure. "Walked a ways, it got too hot. Didn't get any of my math done." Indeed, the book lies abandoned and half-buried in the sand, a few feet from where he was resting in the hammock.
Issa grows tired of watching the sun set at its snail's pace, and spins around in his embrace, the towel dress somehow remaining in place and relatively snug as she does so. "Sorry," she says, though the apology doesn't much weight, the grin she turns up at him holding only a shred of sheepishness to ground it in sincerity. "I sort of sucked up all your studying time with searching for records, didn't I?" Tucked into this new position, her arms can circle him just as easily as his circle her, and her hands smooth around the curve of his sides to travel across his back; soon they cross paths and meet, one hand holding the other wrist to complete the embrace. "I could go to sleep, leave you to study by the fire, if you want," she offers, something in the drawn out tone, in the slightly lopsided smile implying that she doesn't expect him to take it.
Reyce pulls his shoulders back when she twists to face him, putting distance between their faces when he stares down at her through half-lidded eyes. To compensate for the upper distance, his arms pull her into a swaying step that brings her lower body close to him, pressed tight against his own. "Studying by firelight," he muses. "Just what I wanted." And yet he lets himself be distracted by the more immediate promise of her mouth, leaning forward to close that distance between them as his arms begin to rock her into gentle swaying again. They're loosely draped over her hips, but his hands lock tight to make the circle unbreakable lest she decide to take him at his word.
And take him at his word Issa does, if only feebly; she murmurs a quick and playful, "Good," after their kiss before beginning to back away. She only gets so far as to lean against his locked hands, though, before she relents and crashes back into him with a little ripple of laughter. Her hands don't return to their clasped post against the small of his back, however. Instead, they find his forearms and track a swift caress up to his shoulders, where they exert a downward pressure, weak by intent and her inferior position both. "Sit," she guides further, urging him down though she remains there standing, her motive for such instruction hidden behind the curve of her roguish smile.
Reyce smirks when she falls back against his locked hands, helping her fall back into him with a little tug of his arms. This time he tightens his grip when she moves close, holding her against him with his chin lifted straight up to leave more room for her head. Hearing the intstruction, he tilts a look down at her, reviving his smirk for a moment as his gaze slides down what he can see of her body. "Okay." His hands follow the same trail, sliding down her sides as he lowers himself to a cross-legged seat in front of her.
Issa grins victoriously as he slides down so obediently, one hand draped atop his head, her fingers moving lightly to sift into his curls. But she doesn't leave her towel-shadowed thighs at eye level for long; she dips to sit too, but chooses his lap instead of the sand, arranging herself onto his thigh so she can enjoy him and the view of the sunset both. Toes wriggle deeper into the sand in front of him while her near arm sneaks around behind. Settled finally, she tilts his chin down with just the pad of her thumb, beginning with a soft, "So," only to stop again and place a kiss on the tips of his nose. "You should tell me everything I should to know about Benden. Your siblings." Her thumb flicks down and away again, her forefinger lifted singly instead. Firelit blue eyes slide pointedly to his lips while that finger deals out a pair of taps against the tip of her own nose. Then she looks up to make eye contact again, playfulness curling her smile higher and higher the longer it takes him to catch on.
Reyce helps her get arranged, tugging at the towel so it comes partially undone. He doesn't have time to finish the task before she settles onto him and pins the towel in place, but he leaves a thumb wedged into the wrap of the towel and his fingers splayed out along the cloth. His nose nudges after her when she withdraws from the kiss she placed, but he picks up on the hint quickly enough, or seems to. "I know," he answers, tilting his chin forward to drop a kiss on her cheek, just aside from her nose. A smirk curls his mouth when he draws back again, but the smugness of it is somewhat diluted by the still hovering question of his family. "Know that. Been meaning to, but -" Another kiss misses on the other side of her nose. "Don't know where to start." Third time's the charm: a soft kiss lands straight on the tip of her nose, short-lived in itself although his lips linger right next to her face.
Issa's head gives a tiny shake when that first kiss misses her predetermined target, though her expression remains lightly impish. The gesture is echoed once more as the second one is misplaced too, her eyes thinning into a mock glare. She's beginning to think he's breaking her rules on purpose. But then he gets it right, rewarded with a brighter grin. And a place to start. "Start with Coren," she tells him, leaving her face in that hovering closeness though she makes no move to bridge it, eyes flicking up to find his. "Does he count you as competition, too?" Without another kiss, her face turns aside then, orienting on his opposite hand so that she can capture it in hers, her other hand returning from his back to assist with the venture.
"He - does," Reyce answers, his hand tensing briefly within her hold. It goes loose afterwards, the weight of it simply falling into her hand as he makes no effort to hold it up or keep control. He watches it, though, and his other hand comes free of her towel and drops into his lap, nearly as limp as the first. "Knows about Nabol. All do," he admits, curling the fingers of his free hand inwards. Folding his thumb across his palm, he brings the fingers in the rest of the way. "Most like my father. Favorite. Be his heir, I think, it weren't for Tierna. That's why - Fort."
Issa takes control of that hand as soon as he relinquishes it, manipulating the fingers with such slow preoccupation that it may seem like she isn't listening at all. Until she repeats, with an understanding nod of her head, "Fort." She finishes with his hand before continuing, his middle finger curled down with the rest she's pressed to his palm, leaving him with his forefinger extended just hers was moments ago. Curls flipped away, she looks back up, her sly smile contradicting their serious, political talk. "Is he likely to try something? To make himself look good. Or you look bad." The hand cupping his knuckles gives a sudden, jerked push, urging it into some unspecified motion.
Whatever the intent of that push, it only leaves Reyce confused, his frown switching to the hand she controls. Lips pursed, he lifts his gaze to hers, the question apparent in the faintly wrinkling of his brow. He does not speak it, for he's too busy answering her questions to add his own. "Publically? Doubt it. With you? Yeah, he sees a chance." His eyes drop back to the hand, the pointed index finger twitching slightly as though to greet his returned attention. "How much you remember, when he talked with you at the Gather?"
"Um. A bit," Issa responds immediately. It takes her a moment longer to realize the hand she arranged just so is only going to go to waste without further hinting. So she sets in to provide that hint, grasping his wrist to manipulate it gracelessly upward. "Not much," she reiterates as his finger collides roughly with the edge of his jaw. Her eyes attend the spot it falls, lingering there until she guides it in a falling scrape through his stubble; then they lift to watch for recognition in his gaze, torn away at the last moment as she leans in to place a kiss in the same spot. Her lips drag downward in the same way his finger did, only softer, then she looks back, an eyebrow hitched upward in a silent inquiry. Get it now? Just in case he hasn't, she lifts her own forefinger to give a much neater double tap to the apple of her cheek, pushed up higher by her smile.
Reyce gets it now, indeed. He leans in to plant a kiss on her cheek, the thin squirk of a smile evident in the curl of his lips on her skin. By the time he pulls back, the smile has gone, pulled tight into another pursed thought. "Well, yeah," he mutters, twisting his gaze aside. He lifts his hand to trail the backs of his fingernails along her neck, just stealing a touch before he brings it back to himself and - after a beat's indecision - taps his throat, just below the point of his jaw and not far from where she just kissed him. With the kiss aimed there, he can tilt his head aside and avoid her gaze. "Pissed me off. Every sentence." He swallows, throat bobbing with the motion. "Does that. Ways you wouldn't notice."
Issa leans in with all eagerness when he begins to play along, his finger hardly vacated the spot before her lips replace the contact, one hand balling up a bit of his shirt collar to give her leverage to pull in close. "Why do you let him?" she asks simply, nose nudging into his neck fleetingly before she separates to take her turn. Her next tap falls against the earlobe nearest him without any of the indecision that marked his motion, her gaze focusing on him to catch the entirety of his response.
Reyce's eyes begin to flick back and forth across the darkening sky, looking for an answer there. It doesn't come. He stops himself when he notices she's pulled back and indicated the place for his next kiss, and puts himself into that action instead. Lips parted, and tongue resting in the gap between his teeth, he leans forward. A nip starts him off, his hand curled around her neck to hold her in place while he nibbles and lips at her earlobe. "I hate him," he whispers, punctuating the sentence with the fiercest bite yet and then gentling it, finally, with the kiss she first request.
Issa hums her contentment when the expected kiss turns out to be a nibble instead-- apparently that's allowed within the unspoken rules of this game. A low, soft grunt follows the final kiss, the tone of it speaking an emphatic 'well played' for his efforts. Eventually she squashes her distraction enough to reply, "Then don't give him what he wants," the words whispered similarly into his ear before she'll retreat just far enough to peer up into his eyes, the sides of their noses bumping as she maintains close quarters. "Don't you think it would make him uneasy if suddenly his jabs didn't get a response?" Outside of their little bubble, the fire gives a loud pop that stirs Oshisyth from her dozing and the green slithers closer through the sand, though even then she remains a few yards away.
The hand slips around from her neck, curling back up her cheek to push strands of hair back behind her ear. Despite the distractions of the fire and Oshisyth's crawling, his eyes remained fixed on hers, the hazel growing muddy in the faint evening light. "Not that easy," he answers, and at this distance every breath and brush of his lips registers against her skin. "And not sure I want him uneasy. Want him -" he frowns, fighting with the words - "I talk to him, get pissed off, maybe do something stupid. Think about it, though, after. Want him to remember the stupid thing, though. Counts me as competition, but not good competition. Doesn't keep an eye out." His face withdraws from hers just a fraction, and his finger returns from her ear to touch the bridge of his nose, right between the darkened eyes that still stare at her intently.
"I see," Issa muses thoughtfully, her gaze flicking minutely as she searches those darkened eyes, adding, "Makes him complacent," when her attention adjusts to his hand to track its next move. Surprise for the new location he's chosen settles in with only a few blinks and she returns to meet his eye again before she complies, smile parted slightly while she considers him. Both hands rest against his cheeks for, even though she sits tall as she can, she still has to tilt his head slightly to reach. The touch is gentler than what he gave her, as is the kiss, her eyes slipping closed as her lips press slowly down and then even slower drag away. She rolls her forehead up to his, pale eyes on level with his as they reopen and her smile dawns across her features again. Her hands will sweep down and away first before her forehead leaves, and she asks in the meantime after a quiet throat-clearing, "So what should I be on the look out for, with him?" She lowers out of her stretched position slightly, taking her face further away but also giving him room to see her next fingerfall, a quick sweep against the little hollow above her collarbone.
One of his favorite places. Reyce's finger follows hers to the spot, touching down lightly and then pressing down until his touch creates discomfort in her throat. She won't be able to object, then, when his other hand sweeps under her chin and pushes it up, throwing her head back as much for himself as for her. Both hands move away to rake through her hair as his lips descend, beginning with a light kiss. He keeps her head back still, his own body bent into an arch to maintain the positioning, while he answers. "Charm," he says, "and bad jokes. Like to make himself look harmless, but he's smart. Lot of what he says is pointed. Not always clear what at." The arch in his back unwinds as he pushes forward, sealing his lips over her skin and pulling up a hickey if he can. His hands take turns stroking back her hair.
Issa's as pliant as ever to his manipulations, head rolling back at his insistence, her hands lifted to the back of his neck to press down little encouraging touches that grow more and more distracted as he continues. "Harmless, but not," she mumbles between a heavy swallow and the pleased little 'mmm' that cuts it off. "Got it." She lets the kiss escalate as far as he'll take it-- who's around to see the hickey, after all?-- at his mercy for as long as his lips remain. Once she's given a long enough pause, however, her encouraging hands turn around and deal a faint push. But her face follows his, remaining close enough so that her barely voiced words, recovering from too many delighted sighs, carry easily to his ears. "What about the others?" Though she's surely lost a bit of specificity with all his efforts, she continues on with the questioning and the game both, an inch of distance growing as her eyes wait to latch on to the tapping of his finger.
Reyce lets himself be pushed away when she finally does it, finished with her neck an content with the mark he leaves there. Although his spit gleams over her breastbone and he registers this with a twist of a smile, he makes no effort to wipe her skin clear. His right hand makes another pass through her hair, then retreats along her face. "There's Carlin," he begins, eyes flicking from the path of his finger to her eyes. "Pissy and stuck-up, and dumb. Needs Tierna and Carina to keep him up, and Carina's - you met her." About to cross the distance between them, his finger pauses at the point of her chin and his eyes narrow. It passes quickly. "Pregnant, may not even make it. She does, won't like Garima. Either way, this thing sets them off balance." He tips his head off balance as well, exposing the cord in the side of his neck and running a finger along it. He watches Issa closely.
"Poor Garima, then," she mutters indifferently, though exactly why she is poor or deserving of Issa's idle pity isn't specified. She has far more concern for the area his finger has just traced, her own hand lifted to mimic the motion with knuckles down to prime it for the first of her kisses. There's more tongue than teeth for him, throbbing down softly as she pulls at his exposed skin. There are a few dragging nibbles thrown in as she draws her line down to the base of his neck, her kissing growing heavier, fiercer by degrees as they fall, though with the ground she has to cover none of them linger enough to create the sort of mark that's standing out redly along her own neck. "You're going to tell me more," she informs him as she reaches the end and pauses there, one sandy leg hooked over the other side of his lap to give her leverage for a grand finale of sorts, hands gripping the sides of his waist as her bite transitions into a sucking swirl of her tongue. "But not now," she breaks to whisper, eyes tilting up at that extreme angle to shoot him a mischievous glance. That glance only gets a swift moment to sink in, though, before she's standing, one hand lifting to the towel not to secure it this time, but to untuck it completely. It falls into his lap as she heads off, stalking through the sand without a glance back, a detour taken around the sleeping Oshisyth's muzzle, to the treeline where their hammock hangs.
Reyce's eyes slide closed when her mouth reaches his neck, the hand that indicated it going around to the back of her head to just hold on while she moves, neither guiding nor interfering. A mixture of grunts and swallows fall out of him to reward her kisses (and tongue and teeth), but as she builds up to fiercer pressures he becomes silent and still, but not lax; when she pauses to speak, his hand grips the back of her head, urging more. More comes, and he stretches into it, his eyes opening just a sliver to watch her face and catch that mischievous glance when she stops again. His hands sink into her waist when she starts to move away, as though he might hold her there, but his hold slips as the towel does and he's left holding it. Quick to rise, even a bit awkward in his haste, he props an arm to push himself up and trots after her, catching her before she can reach the trees and grabbing her shoulders to whip her around and pull her into a kiss. "Hammock's no good for it," he says when the kiss breaks, and it only does because he needs to pull of his undershirt. There's a line of pale white there where the sunburns did not reach. As an indication of what /is/ good for it, he throws down the towel she left him with, smoothing it out with his toes while he bends to step out of his shorts. Naked as she is, and within near as little time, he straightens to pull her into his embrace and drag her back over the towel. "Now get down."
They've been poring over the records of Ista Weyr for three days already, but have finally come away with some measure of success for their efforts. There are still copies to be made, however, copies with harper seals for added assurance, and that takes time. So Issa has taken advantage of that by suggesting that they take a night to themselves and camp out on some remote beach. And that's what they've done. They arrived at the spot Issa found out about in the afternoon and set up camp. Reyce, as usual, was in charge of the fire-starting, while Issa set up their bed, a wide hammock she borrowed to make the experience more exotic, and found a nearby tree to store the straps and their luggage with them. Dinner was early, consisting of dried meats, bread and heaps of Istan winter fruits that she's so fond of. And then Issa stripped down, she and Oshisyth leaving Reyce alone on the beach while they traipse away to go and play in the waves, splashing to their heart's content. Which just so happens to be until the light begins to fail. The sun's beginning to dip below the horizon when Issa comes trudging back up through the sand, trailed soon after by her dragon. Her nudity is far away and fleeting, however, for she wraps around herself a thick white towel as she nears, creating something of a short dress that falls to midthigh as she tucks it in. "There are these fish!" she calls out on the edges of earshot, trotting those last few steps that bring her to the fireside. "These little silver ones," she says, demonstrating a space of a few inches with her finger and thumb, "and if you stand really still, they swim right up next to you, tickling your legs. It's so funny."
Left alone to enjoy the dry side of the beach, Reyce retreated to the hammock where the trees it hung from shielded him from the sun. Or such was the intent, but by the time the sun goes down his skin has flushed faintly red and very slick with sweat. Thus he glistens redly when he crouches by the fire, to which he has returned - the meager shade of the hammock useless to him in the settling dusk - by the time Issa gets back from her watery wanderings. He notices her from far away, lifting his eyes to watch her approach, but he doesn't move to get up until she speaks to him. Her enthusiasm prompts the corner of a smile out of him, indulgent rather than sharing in her childlike joy. "Fish aren't smart," he observes, but he doesn't make any allowance for the fire and it crackles over the sound of his voice. Shifting a frown at it, he steps around and approaches Issa, removing the noisemaker from between them.
"I didn't say they were smart," Issa counters archly, "I said they were funny." She steps up to meet him, her face, also touched with red hints of sunburn across her nose, cheeks and forehead, turned smilingly up to him. A moment passes just that way before she snakes a hand out to grab his, crossing to grab at the opposite side. Then she rolls herself into an embrace, placing her back to his front, his arm held under her own as she crosses them over her midsection. Her head settles back into a lean against him, curls still damp pressing against his shirt, while she looks out over the water now that Oshisyth is no longer blocking the view. The sun is sinking out across the water, skewed to their right just slightly, and it makes the split-peaked mountain of a distant island into a dark silhouette against the deepening orange of the sky. She takes in a sigh and her shoulders press back against him until she releases it slowly and silently again. "You can't tell me that's not pretty," she tells him, shifting her head just slightly to find a more comfortable positioning. Oshisyth has since shaken off the majority of the water droplets clinging to her skin-- an action done away from the main camp, as requested-- and returns to their spot, trudging through the sticking sand just behind them.
"I didn't say they weren't funny," Reyce points out, a low murmur into her ear while she arranges his embrace. He lets himself be rearranged willingly, and though her fingertips leave white spots sinking out of his red skin the burn does not go deep enough to make him flinch at the contact. The cedar scent has faded from him over the past few days, leaving him with the pungent saltiness of his sweat made spicy by the soapsand he washed with this morning. He squeezes his arms tightly, as much holding her as tensing his shoulders to suppress the extra waft of odor that he somehow senses from his armpits when she makes his arms lift around her, but his attitude seems relaxed, and he slowly lowers the point of his chin to rest on her head while he watches the sunset with her. "Then I won't," he answers softly, lifting his chin enough to allow her repositioning and then reclaiming his spot with it.
His answer draws out a short-lived chuckle from Issa, its low sound overtaken by another-- Oshisyth whumping down into the sand behind them. The green stretches out on her stomach, opening her muzzle for a wide, toothy yawn before settling her chin into the sand as well. But Issa doesn't have a comment to follow that overshadowed little laugh, returning to relative quiet, broken only by a few sporadic and unexplained faint humming noises, for a minute or two. Her curiosity brings an end to that, however, and she asks, "What did you do while we were in the water?" Gently, the fingertips of one hand run in tiny, simultaneous circles over his skin where they lay on his arm.
Reyce tilts his head, the point of contact slipping from his chin to his cheek as he turns to watch the whumping sand-stirrer that is Oshisyth. The dragon does nothing more interesting than yawn, however, and he gives a soft, settled sigh as his gaze turns back to the horizon. His arms loosen around her when that humming begins, no longer pressing into her stomach, nor does he press for an explanation. "Think I slept," he muses, a low snort following the admission that he only thinks, and isn't sure. "Walked a ways, it got too hot. Didn't get any of my math done." Indeed, the book lies abandoned and half-buried in the sand, a few feet from where he was resting in the hammock.
Issa grows tired of watching the sun set at its snail's pace, and spins around in his embrace, the towel dress somehow remaining in place and relatively snug as she does so. "Sorry," she says, though the apology doesn't much weight, the grin she turns up at him holding only a shred of sheepishness to ground it in sincerity. "I sort of sucked up all your studying time with searching for records, didn't I?" Tucked into this new position, her arms can circle him just as easily as his circle her, and her hands smooth around the curve of his sides to travel across his back; soon they cross paths and meet, one hand holding the other wrist to complete the embrace. "I could go to sleep, leave you to study by the fire, if you want," she offers, something in the drawn out tone, in the slightly lopsided smile implying that she doesn't expect him to take it.
Reyce pulls his shoulders back when she twists to face him, putting distance between their faces when he stares down at her through half-lidded eyes. To compensate for the upper distance, his arms pull her into a swaying step that brings her lower body close to him, pressed tight against his own. "Studying by firelight," he muses. "Just what I wanted." And yet he lets himself be distracted by the more immediate promise of her mouth, leaning forward to close that distance between them as his arms begin to rock her into gentle swaying again. They're loosely draped over her hips, but his hands lock tight to make the circle unbreakable lest she decide to take him at his word.
And take him at his word Issa does, if only feebly; she murmurs a quick and playful, "Good," after their kiss before beginning to back away. She only gets so far as to lean against his locked hands, though, before she relents and crashes back into him with a little ripple of laughter. Her hands don't return to their clasped post against the small of his back, however. Instead, they find his forearms and track a swift caress up to his shoulders, where they exert a downward pressure, weak by intent and her inferior position both. "Sit," she guides further, urging him down though she remains there standing, her motive for such instruction hidden behind the curve of her roguish smile.
Reyce smirks when she falls back against his locked hands, helping her fall back into him with a little tug of his arms. This time he tightens his grip when she moves close, holding her against him with his chin lifted straight up to leave more room for her head. Hearing the intstruction, he tilts a look down at her, reviving his smirk for a moment as his gaze slides down what he can see of her body. "Okay." His hands follow the same trail, sliding down her sides as he lowers himself to a cross-legged seat in front of her.
Issa grins victoriously as he slides down so obediently, one hand draped atop his head, her fingers moving lightly to sift into his curls. But she doesn't leave her towel-shadowed thighs at eye level for long; she dips to sit too, but chooses his lap instead of the sand, arranging herself onto his thigh so she can enjoy him and the view of the sunset both. Toes wriggle deeper into the sand in front of him while her near arm sneaks around behind. Settled finally, she tilts his chin down with just the pad of her thumb, beginning with a soft, "So," only to stop again and place a kiss on the tips of his nose. "You should tell me everything I should to know about Benden. Your siblings." Her thumb flicks down and away again, her forefinger lifted singly instead. Firelit blue eyes slide pointedly to his lips while that finger deals out a pair of taps against the tip of her own nose. Then she looks up to make eye contact again, playfulness curling her smile higher and higher the longer it takes him to catch on.
Reyce helps her get arranged, tugging at the towel so it comes partially undone. He doesn't have time to finish the task before she settles onto him and pins the towel in place, but he leaves a thumb wedged into the wrap of the towel and his fingers splayed out along the cloth. His nose nudges after her when she withdraws from the kiss she placed, but he picks up on the hint quickly enough, or seems to. "I know," he answers, tilting his chin forward to drop a kiss on her cheek, just aside from her nose. A smirk curls his mouth when he draws back again, but the smugness of it is somewhat diluted by the still hovering question of his family. "Know that. Been meaning to, but -" Another kiss misses on the other side of her nose. "Don't know where to start." Third time's the charm: a soft kiss lands straight on the tip of her nose, short-lived in itself although his lips linger right next to her face.
Issa's head gives a tiny shake when that first kiss misses her predetermined target, though her expression remains lightly impish. The gesture is echoed once more as the second one is misplaced too, her eyes thinning into a mock glare. She's beginning to think he's breaking her rules on purpose. But then he gets it right, rewarded with a brighter grin. And a place to start. "Start with Coren," she tells him, leaving her face in that hovering closeness though she makes no move to bridge it, eyes flicking up to find his. "Does he count you as competition, too?" Without another kiss, her face turns aside then, orienting on his opposite hand so that she can capture it in hers, her other hand returning from his back to assist with the venture.
"He - does," Reyce answers, his hand tensing briefly within her hold. It goes loose afterwards, the weight of it simply falling into her hand as he makes no effort to hold it up or keep control. He watches it, though, and his other hand comes free of her towel and drops into his lap, nearly as limp as the first. "Knows about Nabol. All do," he admits, curling the fingers of his free hand inwards. Folding his thumb across his palm, he brings the fingers in the rest of the way. "Most like my father. Favorite. Be his heir, I think, it weren't for Tierna. That's why - Fort."
Issa takes control of that hand as soon as he relinquishes it, manipulating the fingers with such slow preoccupation that it may seem like she isn't listening at all. Until she repeats, with an understanding nod of her head, "Fort." She finishes with his hand before continuing, his middle finger curled down with the rest she's pressed to his palm, leaving him with his forefinger extended just hers was moments ago. Curls flipped away, she looks back up, her sly smile contradicting their serious, political talk. "Is he likely to try something? To make himself look good. Or you look bad." The hand cupping his knuckles gives a sudden, jerked push, urging it into some unspecified motion.
Whatever the intent of that push, it only leaves Reyce confused, his frown switching to the hand she controls. Lips pursed, he lifts his gaze to hers, the question apparent in the faintly wrinkling of his brow. He does not speak it, for he's too busy answering her questions to add his own. "Publically? Doubt it. With you? Yeah, he sees a chance." His eyes drop back to the hand, the pointed index finger twitching slightly as though to greet his returned attention. "How much you remember, when he talked with you at the Gather?"
"Um. A bit," Issa responds immediately. It takes her a moment longer to realize the hand she arranged just so is only going to go to waste without further hinting. So she sets in to provide that hint, grasping his wrist to manipulate it gracelessly upward. "Not much," she reiterates as his finger collides roughly with the edge of his jaw. Her eyes attend the spot it falls, lingering there until she guides it in a falling scrape through his stubble; then they lift to watch for recognition in his gaze, torn away at the last moment as she leans in to place a kiss in the same spot. Her lips drag downward in the same way his finger did, only softer, then she looks back, an eyebrow hitched upward in a silent inquiry. Get it now? Just in case he hasn't, she lifts her own forefinger to give a much neater double tap to the apple of her cheek, pushed up higher by her smile.
Reyce gets it now, indeed. He leans in to plant a kiss on her cheek, the thin squirk of a smile evident in the curl of his lips on her skin. By the time he pulls back, the smile has gone, pulled tight into another pursed thought. "Well, yeah," he mutters, twisting his gaze aside. He lifts his hand to trail the backs of his fingernails along her neck, just stealing a touch before he brings it back to himself and - after a beat's indecision - taps his throat, just below the point of his jaw and not far from where she just kissed him. With the kiss aimed there, he can tilt his head aside and avoid her gaze. "Pissed me off. Every sentence." He swallows, throat bobbing with the motion. "Does that. Ways you wouldn't notice."
Issa leans in with all eagerness when he begins to play along, his finger hardly vacated the spot before her lips replace the contact, one hand balling up a bit of his shirt collar to give her leverage to pull in close. "Why do you let him?" she asks simply, nose nudging into his neck fleetingly before she separates to take her turn. Her next tap falls against the earlobe nearest him without any of the indecision that marked his motion, her gaze focusing on him to catch the entirety of his response.
Reyce's eyes begin to flick back and forth across the darkening sky, looking for an answer there. It doesn't come. He stops himself when he notices she's pulled back and indicated the place for his next kiss, and puts himself into that action instead. Lips parted, and tongue resting in the gap between his teeth, he leans forward. A nip starts him off, his hand curled around her neck to hold her in place while he nibbles and lips at her earlobe. "I hate him," he whispers, punctuating the sentence with the fiercest bite yet and then gentling it, finally, with the kiss she first request.
Issa hums her contentment when the expected kiss turns out to be a nibble instead-- apparently that's allowed within the unspoken rules of this game. A low, soft grunt follows the final kiss, the tone of it speaking an emphatic 'well played' for his efforts. Eventually she squashes her distraction enough to reply, "Then don't give him what he wants," the words whispered similarly into his ear before she'll retreat just far enough to peer up into his eyes, the sides of their noses bumping as she maintains close quarters. "Don't you think it would make him uneasy if suddenly his jabs didn't get a response?" Outside of their little bubble, the fire gives a loud pop that stirs Oshisyth from her dozing and the green slithers closer through the sand, though even then she remains a few yards away.
The hand slips around from her neck, curling back up her cheek to push strands of hair back behind her ear. Despite the distractions of the fire and Oshisyth's crawling, his eyes remained fixed on hers, the hazel growing muddy in the faint evening light. "Not that easy," he answers, and at this distance every breath and brush of his lips registers against her skin. "And not sure I want him uneasy. Want him -" he frowns, fighting with the words - "I talk to him, get pissed off, maybe do something stupid. Think about it, though, after. Want him to remember the stupid thing, though. Counts me as competition, but not good competition. Doesn't keep an eye out." His face withdraws from hers just a fraction, and his finger returns from her ear to touch the bridge of his nose, right between the darkened eyes that still stare at her intently.
"I see," Issa muses thoughtfully, her gaze flicking minutely as she searches those darkened eyes, adding, "Makes him complacent," when her attention adjusts to his hand to track its next move. Surprise for the new location he's chosen settles in with only a few blinks and she returns to meet his eye again before she complies, smile parted slightly while she considers him. Both hands rest against his cheeks for, even though she sits tall as she can, she still has to tilt his head slightly to reach. The touch is gentler than what he gave her, as is the kiss, her eyes slipping closed as her lips press slowly down and then even slower drag away. She rolls her forehead up to his, pale eyes on level with his as they reopen and her smile dawns across her features again. Her hands will sweep down and away first before her forehead leaves, and she asks in the meantime after a quiet throat-clearing, "So what should I be on the look out for, with him?" She lowers out of her stretched position slightly, taking her face further away but also giving him room to see her next fingerfall, a quick sweep against the little hollow above her collarbone.
One of his favorite places. Reyce's finger follows hers to the spot, touching down lightly and then pressing down until his touch creates discomfort in her throat. She won't be able to object, then, when his other hand sweeps under her chin and pushes it up, throwing her head back as much for himself as for her. Both hands move away to rake through her hair as his lips descend, beginning with a light kiss. He keeps her head back still, his own body bent into an arch to maintain the positioning, while he answers. "Charm," he says, "and bad jokes. Like to make himself look harmless, but he's smart. Lot of what he says is pointed. Not always clear what at." The arch in his back unwinds as he pushes forward, sealing his lips over her skin and pulling up a hickey if he can. His hands take turns stroking back her hair.
Issa's as pliant as ever to his manipulations, head rolling back at his insistence, her hands lifted to the back of his neck to press down little encouraging touches that grow more and more distracted as he continues. "Harmless, but not," she mumbles between a heavy swallow and the pleased little 'mmm' that cuts it off. "Got it." She lets the kiss escalate as far as he'll take it-- who's around to see the hickey, after all?-- at his mercy for as long as his lips remain. Once she's given a long enough pause, however, her encouraging hands turn around and deal a faint push. But her face follows his, remaining close enough so that her barely voiced words, recovering from too many delighted sighs, carry easily to his ears. "What about the others?" Though she's surely lost a bit of specificity with all his efforts, she continues on with the questioning and the game both, an inch of distance growing as her eyes wait to latch on to the tapping of his finger.
Reyce lets himself be pushed away when she finally does it, finished with her neck an content with the mark he leaves there. Although his spit gleams over her breastbone and he registers this with a twist of a smile, he makes no effort to wipe her skin clear. His right hand makes another pass through her hair, then retreats along her face. "There's Carlin," he begins, eyes flicking from the path of his finger to her eyes. "Pissy and stuck-up, and dumb. Needs Tierna and Carina to keep him up, and Carina's - you met her." About to cross the distance between them, his finger pauses at the point of her chin and his eyes narrow. It passes quickly. "Pregnant, may not even make it. She does, won't like Garima. Either way, this thing sets them off balance." He tips his head off balance as well, exposing the cord in the side of his neck and running a finger along it. He watches Issa closely.
"Poor Garima, then," she mutters indifferently, though exactly why she is poor or deserving of Issa's idle pity isn't specified. She has far more concern for the area his finger has just traced, her own hand lifted to mimic the motion with knuckles down to prime it for the first of her kisses. There's more tongue than teeth for him, throbbing down softly as she pulls at his exposed skin. There are a few dragging nibbles thrown in as she draws her line down to the base of his neck, her kissing growing heavier, fiercer by degrees as they fall, though with the ground she has to cover none of them linger enough to create the sort of mark that's standing out redly along her own neck. "You're going to tell me more," she informs him as she reaches the end and pauses there, one sandy leg hooked over the other side of his lap to give her leverage for a grand finale of sorts, hands gripping the sides of his waist as her bite transitions into a sucking swirl of her tongue. "But not now," she breaks to whisper, eyes tilting up at that extreme angle to shoot him a mischievous glance. That glance only gets a swift moment to sink in, though, before she's standing, one hand lifting to the towel not to secure it this time, but to untuck it completely. It falls into his lap as she heads off, stalking through the sand without a glance back, a detour taken around the sleeping Oshisyth's muzzle, to the treeline where their hammock hangs.
Reyce's eyes slide closed when her mouth reaches his neck, the hand that indicated it going around to the back of her head to just hold on while she moves, neither guiding nor interfering. A mixture of grunts and swallows fall out of him to reward her kisses (and tongue and teeth), but as she builds up to fiercer pressures he becomes silent and still, but not lax; when she pauses to speak, his hand grips the back of her head, urging more. More comes, and he stretches into it, his eyes opening just a sliver to watch her face and catch that mischievous glance when she stops again. His hands sink into her waist when she starts to move away, as though he might hold her there, but his hold slips as the towel does and he's left holding it. Quick to rise, even a bit awkward in his haste, he props an arm to push himself up and trots after her, catching her before she can reach the trees and grabbing her shoulders to whip her around and pull her into a kiss. "Hammock's no good for it," he says when the kiss breaks, and it only does because he needs to pull of his undershirt. There's a line of pale white there where the sunburns did not reach. As an indication of what /is/ good for it, he throws down the towel she left him with, smoothing it out with his toes while he bends to step out of his shorts. Naked as she is, and within near as little time, he straightens to pull her into his embrace and drag her back over the towel. "Now get down."