"I am a Pilgrim on this Journey" -Legend of the Seeker Fic - Richard/Kahlan (NC-17)
Disclaimer: Legend of the Seeker belongs to Terry Goodkind and all the grand high mucky mucks of ABC. No copyright infringement is intended, and no money was made from this. Any similarity to any story not my own (and this one is similar to others of my own *grin*) is a coincidence. And all of this amounts to: just playing around here, please don't sue. *wry grin*
Title: I am a Pilgrim on this Journey ~whither thou goest~
Genre: Kahlan/Richard PWP; Richard POV
Rating: NC-17, rated for sexual content
Timeline: After the end of the series; so spoilers for Tears
Author's Notes: This is a reworking of my story of the same name written for my legendland big bang and retold through Richard's POV. And before you say it, yes, yes I did indeed just go there. *wry grin* Just go with the flow though, okay? *grin*
I am a Pilgrim on this Journey
~whither thou goest~
Love is not the dying moan of a distant violin,
it's the triumphant twang of a bed-spring
- S.J. Perelman
Gently, I pushed the smooth ivory sheet away from Kahlan's hip, baring it, and the full length of her left leg to the cool spring light filtering in through the white silk draped window.
Richard...” she protested with a small laugh, tugging lightly on the sheet, trying to pull it back over herself.
“Mmmm...?”
I brushed the sheet back away and softly kissed her on the inside of her knee.
“Richard...”
I felt myself smile a bit helplessly and trailed lingering fingers up her leg before tenderly kissing another spot on her hip.
“King's Port...” I murmured softly against the warmth of her skin.
Kahlan laughed lightly.
“Richard, what are you doing?”
My answer was to simply smile once more, letting my lips curve slowly against the hollow of her hip. I pushed away more of the sheet and then, again, let my hand drift upward. I trailed my fingertips up until I reached the soft swell of her breast. I tickled my fingers there a moment before brushing my lips against a dusky freckle.
“Southhaven...” I whispered.
Kahlan shivered.
“Richard...” she sighed softly.
I smiled and traced my fingertips up around her breast, making certain to take my time.
“Richard... what are you doing?” Kahlan asked me again.
I kissed a small, sweet spot above her heartbeat, letting my tongue flick against the dusky freckle there.
“Hartland...” I whispered, undeniably pleased to feel Kahlan shiver when my breath brushed over her dampened skin. I slowly drew the sheet downward.
“Richard...”
I placed a kiss in the warm hollow of her throat, my lips lingering against the rapid pulse of her heartbeat as I tasted and savored it like wine. For a moment, I lost myself in the sheer wonder and joy of the fact that I was making it race like that; that her heartbeat was mine to roll over my tongue like a decadent sweet.
“Nicobarese...” I murmured finally, unable to keep my eyes from tilting up and giving her a mischievous glance.
“Nicobarese?”
“This one's Nicobarese,” I confirmed and Kahlan laughed lightly. “And here...” I whispered, half leaning over her to nuzzle her neck tenderly. “This one here... this freckle would be Aydindril...” I murmured, teasing a pleasured shiver from her.
Kahlan sighed softly, her warm laughter making it a rich velvet sound.
“Where else...” she asked, the laughter still lingering in her voice. “Where else could you go, Seeker?”
“Well...” I drawled, carefully moving to brace myself above her. I tripped my fingertips lower, smiling before I traced her nipple playfully and slipped down to place a light kiss on a dusky freckle that graced the soft skin there.
“Perhaps Galea...”
Kahlan gasped.
“I think perhaps Galea... right here...” I murmured, taking her nipple in my mouth and teasing it into a taut peak.
She moaned breathlessly as I captured the pebbled sweetness of her with my teeth, letting the tip of my tongue circle her captured nipple.
“Or even...” I breathed over Kahlan's damp skin before gently releasing her and sliding further down her body. I finally pushed the tangled sheet free to fall to the floor. “Even Renwold,” I said softly, kissing another freckle on her right hip. “But of course...” I drawled, titling my eyes up. “There is one place that I would really like to visit...”
“Oh?” Kahlan half-asked, half sighed.
“Very much,” I replied with another teasing breath as I let my fingers drift to a spot low on her belly. I danced the tips of them against her warm skin.
“Very much,” I repeated, playing with her.
I slid my fingertips lower, and lower still, until the Kahlan gasped and arched up into my touch. “I think I would like...” I drawled, sliding down to kiss a freckle on her belly. “To visit...”
I kissed another freckle just a bit lower.
“The Wilds,” I murmured, kissing yet another perfect freckle. “Do you think I should?” I asked her lightly.
“Oh yes,” Kahlan half-gasped, half laughed. “Yes I do...”
“As you wish,” I whispered back with a smile. “Anything you wish...”
I tipped my gaze upward and held myself still, lost in the sensation of needing to hear her breathe above me... needing... just needing her... wanting her... And as I lay there, needing her like I needed my own breath, I felt that very breath fall into synch with hers, naturally, and without any hesitation.
“Richard?”
“I love you, Kahlan.”
“My Richard,” she murmured before reaching down to brush her fingers through my hair. “Oh, my Richard.”
I leaned into her caress a moment before lowering my lips into her curling softness. Kahlan gasped and arched like a wave into my touch.
“Oh, my Richard...”
I drank her in like bittersweet ambrosia, intoxicated by the very taste of her as I reached my hands up to cup her hips.
“Richard...” she sighed, and the sound of my name on her lips was as rich as the taste of her on my own. “Richard...”
I murmured endearments against her skin and into the dizzying warmth of her, knowing that Kahlan could feel the shape of them, even if she couldn't hear each one clearly. I whispered love to the deep places of her body and soul while she shook, shivered, and tangled her fingers almost painfully into my hair.
“Richard...” Kahlan moaned blissfully as she abruptly dropped her hands to grip the sheet beneath her graceful body. She twisted her fingers tightly in the ivory fabric and formed a perfect arch as she pressed herself into my caress. And then suddenly, she was shuddering and I felt the deep ocean tide of her power pull at my own soul. In liquid demand, it sought to drown me.
“Yes...” I whispered softly, feeling Kahlan's power wash over me like a wave, nearly overwhelming in its intensity. I gave myself willingly over to her, and it, feeling the unalloyed pleasure of doing so, and emerged gasping when it did not wash me away. Nothing could be any greater than the love and devotion I already felt for the woman beneath me. I smiled and kissed my way back up her body until I reached Kahlan's honeyed lips.
We kissed breathlessly until I moved to lay next her, letting my hand drift along a lazy path up and down the smooth valley between her breasts, content in the heavy moment. Kahlan laughed a little giddily and grasped my hand in her own. She studied the calloused length of it a moment before kissing a small part between my thumb and forefinger.
“Hartland...” she said with a small grin, laughing again as I raised a questioning eyebrow. “Hartland,” she repeated, kissing my hand once more before shifting until she hovered above me like some deliriously wonderful dream. She kissed my hand yet again.
“You aren't the only one that can read a map you know, Seeker,” she explained with a playful smile.
I felt myself returning her smile with a grin of my own even as Kahlan slid her hand down my chest and a little to the side. Gently, she ran her fingertips over a small scar she found there.
“Brennidon,” she whispered softly before slipping down my body and placing a small kiss on the warm skin that her fingertips had traced. “And this one,” she murmured, tracing another small scar just to the left of my nipple, her fingernail grazing the peaked flesh lightly and causing me to gasp in with a rough sound. “This one would be Drendril,” she said with another playful smile before deliberately circling my nipple with her tongue without ever touching it.
I couldn't help but groan and I felt her breath as she laughed, pleased at my aching response.
“Kahlan...” I half-begged, half-growled.
She gave me an innocent look, impossibly blue eyes tilted up to look at me from under dark lashes.
“Kahlan...”
“And this one,” she whispered, sliding purposefully up my body and ignoring my protest. “Would be the forest of the Nightwisps,” she continued, lingering at the hollow of my throat. Again, she laughed very softly when my protests became a low moan.
“And Ayndindril...”
Kahlan nuzzled the curve of my shoulder, tracing the small white scar there with the tip of her tongue.
“I think you may know how to read a map better than I do,” I admitted in a low voice.
“You think so?” Kahlan asked lightly, her voice like music in my ear.
I nodded wordlessly as she slid her fingers down my shivering skin and taut muscles until she reached long thin scar hidden along my side, one I had received during my time in the Valley of Perdition.
“Well,” she murmured before trailing kisses down the path that her fingertips had just followed. “It is a very well-drawn... map...”
Kahlan replaced her fingertips with the warmth of her mouth and my eyes fell shut a moment, savoring the sensation.
“And I haven't exactly reached my final destination yet,” she demurred with a small laugh that sounded as if she were blushing.
I opened my eyes and tilted them down in her direction to see that she was indeed blushing. I grinned and she blushed a bit more.
“Well then,” I prompted lightly. “Where to next, Mother Confessor?”
A glowing flush spread suddenly over her skin, but still she trailed a tantalizingly light caress to the hollow of my hip and tenderly traced the scar that ran close to my hip bone.
“The Valley of the First Generation?” Kahlan asked, raising a teasing eyebrow. She replaced the caress of her fingers with one from her mouth and I tried not to surge upwards, instead pressing myself as tightly to the bed as I could. I couldn't help the moan that she pulled from me though, and I felt it thrum from my chest and up through my throat in a low curl of sound.
“The cave...” she murmured, before drawing herself back of the length of my body to whisper in my ear. “By the firelight... where we kissed...”
Kahlan echoed her words then, kissing me with a soft and deep passion, until we finally both emerged from the moment breathless as any swimmers that ever dared the ocean waves.
“I remember,” I murmured back in a ragged whisper. “I remember the cave... but I think you've forgotten to note someplace on this map of yours,” I teased as we lay there in eager stillness.
I couldn't hold back the suggestive smile that tugged at my lips when I rocked my hips against her.
“What about the Pillars of Creation?” I asked shamelessly.
Kahlan blushed, and it lent her skin a warm glow as I kissed her heated forehead playfully, tasting the sweet saltiness of her skin.
“Richard...”
“Kahlan...” I echoed before rocking my hips once more and feeling a joyous laugh well up in me. It rushed through my body and spilled from my lips, leaving me euphoric and nearly dizzy with the sensation. I rocked my hips once more just to feel her move with me and against me.
“Richard...” Kahlan half-laughed, half-gasped before biting her bottom lip and shifting to finally straddle my hips.
“I've not forgotten,” she whispered slowly, drawing me into her with a liquid sort of grace.
I gasped, moaned, and for a moment, closed my eyes as my head fell back. There was suddenly no gravity and I fell helplessly upwards into her.
“Kahlan...”
It was a heavy weightlessness that embraced me, and I reached out my hands to steady myself, splaying them wide on Kahlan's fluidly moving hips.
“I've not forgotten,” she repeated almost breathlessly.
I slowly opened my eyes to see her moving above me, haloed in the golden light of dawn. And it was a sight more glorious than all the radiance of heaven, or fires of creation.
“Kahlan,” I whispered reverently, irretrievably and perfectly lost in the grace of her.
She smiled and reached for me; drew me up. Face to face, she rested her forehead on mine, stilling for a moment as we breathed each other in.
“I do know how to read a map,” she reminded me playfully, smiling.
I smiled in return and gently began to move within her, sliding my hands tenderly up her spine. With absolute trust, she fell back, letting me catch her as she formed a perfect arch before me.
“You've always been my guide,” I replied quietly before leaning forward to capture one of her dusky nipples between my lips, sucking gently until she moaned and shivered against me. After a few moments, I released it and breathed, “My northern star.”
“Richard...”
I shifted my devotions to her other breast as we moved together like two waves surging toward some distant beach.
“The only true north for my heart,” I whispered, drawing her back up to me and settling my hands once more on her canting hips. I met her darkened eyes; watched the power gathering there, unafraid. “In any storm...” I continued, still moving within her, feeling our heartbeats match the rhythm of our entwined bodies. “In the darkest night... the deepest forest...”
I watched the storm of her power gather for me, and saw only Kahlan. When it came for me, when she came for me, all I saw was how much I loved the woman in my arms. All I saw was Kahlan...
“Kahlan...”
I fell into her love with perfect trust, knowing, without a doubt, that it was a place I could spend the rest of my life... that I would spend the rest of my life.
“Richard...” she sighed, resting her head gently on my shoulder as we held each other. “Richard... I love you...”
“I could never ask for more from love... and life... than you,” I whispered in return as we sank back into the tangled ivory sheets of our bed. I brushed the curling strands of her hair back from her face, meeting impossibly blue eyes that made me think of the Stone of Tears, or ocean waves and perfect blue skies.
She smiled.
“Is that so, Seeker?” Kahlan asked with an almost shaky voice, still trembling a little in my arms.
“Since the first moment I saw you,” I replied sincerely, knowing, from the deepest parts of my soul, it to be the truth.
Kahlan's fingertips traced small circles and paths over my chest.
“I am a pilgrim on this journey,” she whispered. “Take my hand and walk with me.”
I reached for her hand and she looked at me with some surprise before she met my smile with one of her own. I entwined my fingers with hers as they lay on my chest.
“I am a pilgrim on this journey, take my life, I give it, thee,” she continued to recite in an almost sing-song sort of voice, low and intimate. “I am a pilgrim on this journey, take my soul, it belongs with thine.”
“I am a pilgrim on this journey,” I said softly, picking up the old song, my voice falling into the familiar lilt my father's voice had always had when he sang it to my mother. “Take my heart, it is thine...”
I kissed Kahlan's warm hand, still wrapped in my own.
“We are pilgrims, you and I... so come take this journey with me...”
“I will, Richard,” she whispered, kissing me softly. “Where ever the journey takes us,” Kahlan vowed.
“Together.. from this life to the next, Kahlan...” I swore in return as I noticed her slight shiver. I shifted, reaching down to the floor a moment and retrieving the abandoned ivory sheet. I tucked it around us as Kahlan settled herself against me. “That is, if we can ever manage to leave this big, white bed of yours,” I couldn't help but tease.
She blushed as I chuckled softly.
“Richard...”
FIN
Title: I am a Pilgrim on this Journey ~whither thou goest~
Genre: Kahlan/Richard PWP; Richard POV
Rating: NC-17, rated for sexual content
Timeline: After the end of the series; so spoilers for Tears
Author's Notes: This is a reworking of my story of the same name written for my legendland big bang and retold through Richard's POV. And before you say it, yes, yes I did indeed just go there. *wry grin* Just go with the flow though, okay? *grin*
I am a Pilgrim on this Journey
~whither thou goest~
Love is not the dying moan of a distant violin,
it's the triumphant twang of a bed-spring
- S.J. Perelman
Gently, I pushed the smooth ivory sheet away from Kahlan's hip, baring it, and the full length of her left leg to the cool spring light filtering in through the white silk draped window.
Richard...” she protested with a small laugh, tugging lightly on the sheet, trying to pull it back over herself.
“Mmmm...?”
I brushed the sheet back away and softly kissed her on the inside of her knee.
“Richard...”
I felt myself smile a bit helplessly and trailed lingering fingers up her leg before tenderly kissing another spot on her hip.
“King's Port...” I murmured softly against the warmth of her skin.
Kahlan laughed lightly.
“Richard, what are you doing?”
My answer was to simply smile once more, letting my lips curve slowly against the hollow of her hip. I pushed away more of the sheet and then, again, let my hand drift upward. I trailed my fingertips up until I reached the soft swell of her breast. I tickled my fingers there a moment before brushing my lips against a dusky freckle.
“Southhaven...” I whispered.
Kahlan shivered.
“Richard...” she sighed softly.
I smiled and traced my fingertips up around her breast, making certain to take my time.
“Richard... what are you doing?” Kahlan asked me again.
I kissed a small, sweet spot above her heartbeat, letting my tongue flick against the dusky freckle there.
“Hartland...” I whispered, undeniably pleased to feel Kahlan shiver when my breath brushed over her dampened skin. I slowly drew the sheet downward.
“Richard...”
I placed a kiss in the warm hollow of her throat, my lips lingering against the rapid pulse of her heartbeat as I tasted and savored it like wine. For a moment, I lost myself in the sheer wonder and joy of the fact that I was making it race like that; that her heartbeat was mine to roll over my tongue like a decadent sweet.
“Nicobarese...” I murmured finally, unable to keep my eyes from tilting up and giving her a mischievous glance.
“Nicobarese?”
“This one's Nicobarese,” I confirmed and Kahlan laughed lightly. “And here...” I whispered, half leaning over her to nuzzle her neck tenderly. “This one here... this freckle would be Aydindril...” I murmured, teasing a pleasured shiver from her.
Kahlan sighed softly, her warm laughter making it a rich velvet sound.
“Where else...” she asked, the laughter still lingering in her voice. “Where else could you go, Seeker?”
“Well...” I drawled, carefully moving to brace myself above her. I tripped my fingertips lower, smiling before I traced her nipple playfully and slipped down to place a light kiss on a dusky freckle that graced the soft skin there.
“Perhaps Galea...”
Kahlan gasped.
“I think perhaps Galea... right here...” I murmured, taking her nipple in my mouth and teasing it into a taut peak.
She moaned breathlessly as I captured the pebbled sweetness of her with my teeth, letting the tip of my tongue circle her captured nipple.
“Or even...” I breathed over Kahlan's damp skin before gently releasing her and sliding further down her body. I finally pushed the tangled sheet free to fall to the floor. “Even Renwold,” I said softly, kissing another freckle on her right hip. “But of course...” I drawled, titling my eyes up. “There is one place that I would really like to visit...”
“Oh?” Kahlan half-asked, half sighed.
“Very much,” I replied with another teasing breath as I let my fingers drift to a spot low on her belly. I danced the tips of them against her warm skin.
“Very much,” I repeated, playing with her.
I slid my fingertips lower, and lower still, until the Kahlan gasped and arched up into my touch. “I think I would like...” I drawled, sliding down to kiss a freckle on her belly. “To visit...”
I kissed another freckle just a bit lower.
“The Wilds,” I murmured, kissing yet another perfect freckle. “Do you think I should?” I asked her lightly.
“Oh yes,” Kahlan half-gasped, half laughed. “Yes I do...”
“As you wish,” I whispered back with a smile. “Anything you wish...”
I tipped my gaze upward and held myself still, lost in the sensation of needing to hear her breathe above me... needing... just needing her... wanting her... And as I lay there, needing her like I needed my own breath, I felt that very breath fall into synch with hers, naturally, and without any hesitation.
“Richard?”
“I love you, Kahlan.”
“My Richard,” she murmured before reaching down to brush her fingers through my hair. “Oh, my Richard.”
I leaned into her caress a moment before lowering my lips into her curling softness. Kahlan gasped and arched like a wave into my touch.
“Oh, my Richard...”
I drank her in like bittersweet ambrosia, intoxicated by the very taste of her as I reached my hands up to cup her hips.
“Richard...” she sighed, and the sound of my name on her lips was as rich as the taste of her on my own. “Richard...”
I murmured endearments against her skin and into the dizzying warmth of her, knowing that Kahlan could feel the shape of them, even if she couldn't hear each one clearly. I whispered love to the deep places of her body and soul while she shook, shivered, and tangled her fingers almost painfully into my hair.
“Richard...” Kahlan moaned blissfully as she abruptly dropped her hands to grip the sheet beneath her graceful body. She twisted her fingers tightly in the ivory fabric and formed a perfect arch as she pressed herself into my caress. And then suddenly, she was shuddering and I felt the deep ocean tide of her power pull at my own soul. In liquid demand, it sought to drown me.
“Yes...” I whispered softly, feeling Kahlan's power wash over me like a wave, nearly overwhelming in its intensity. I gave myself willingly over to her, and it, feeling the unalloyed pleasure of doing so, and emerged gasping when it did not wash me away. Nothing could be any greater than the love and devotion I already felt for the woman beneath me. I smiled and kissed my way back up her body until I reached Kahlan's honeyed lips.
We kissed breathlessly until I moved to lay next her, letting my hand drift along a lazy path up and down the smooth valley between her breasts, content in the heavy moment. Kahlan laughed a little giddily and grasped my hand in her own. She studied the calloused length of it a moment before kissing a small part between my thumb and forefinger.
“Hartland...” she said with a small grin, laughing again as I raised a questioning eyebrow. “Hartland,” she repeated, kissing my hand once more before shifting until she hovered above me like some deliriously wonderful dream. She kissed my hand yet again.
“You aren't the only one that can read a map you know, Seeker,” she explained with a playful smile.
I felt myself returning her smile with a grin of my own even as Kahlan slid her hand down my chest and a little to the side. Gently, she ran her fingertips over a small scar she found there.
“Brennidon,” she whispered softly before slipping down my body and placing a small kiss on the warm skin that her fingertips had traced. “And this one,” she murmured, tracing another small scar just to the left of my nipple, her fingernail grazing the peaked flesh lightly and causing me to gasp in with a rough sound. “This one would be Drendril,” she said with another playful smile before deliberately circling my nipple with her tongue without ever touching it.
I couldn't help but groan and I felt her breath as she laughed, pleased at my aching response.
“Kahlan...” I half-begged, half-growled.
She gave me an innocent look, impossibly blue eyes tilted up to look at me from under dark lashes.
“Kahlan...”
“And this one,” she whispered, sliding purposefully up my body and ignoring my protest. “Would be the forest of the Nightwisps,” she continued, lingering at the hollow of my throat. Again, she laughed very softly when my protests became a low moan.
“And Ayndindril...”
Kahlan nuzzled the curve of my shoulder, tracing the small white scar there with the tip of her tongue.
“I think you may know how to read a map better than I do,” I admitted in a low voice.
“You think so?” Kahlan asked lightly, her voice like music in my ear.
I nodded wordlessly as she slid her fingers down my shivering skin and taut muscles until she reached long thin scar hidden along my side, one I had received during my time in the Valley of Perdition.
“Well,” she murmured before trailing kisses down the path that her fingertips had just followed. “It is a very well-drawn... map...”
Kahlan replaced her fingertips with the warmth of her mouth and my eyes fell shut a moment, savoring the sensation.
“And I haven't exactly reached my final destination yet,” she demurred with a small laugh that sounded as if she were blushing.
I opened my eyes and tilted them down in her direction to see that she was indeed blushing. I grinned and she blushed a bit more.
“Well then,” I prompted lightly. “Where to next, Mother Confessor?”
A glowing flush spread suddenly over her skin, but still she trailed a tantalizingly light caress to the hollow of my hip and tenderly traced the scar that ran close to my hip bone.
“The Valley of the First Generation?” Kahlan asked, raising a teasing eyebrow. She replaced the caress of her fingers with one from her mouth and I tried not to surge upwards, instead pressing myself as tightly to the bed as I could. I couldn't help the moan that she pulled from me though, and I felt it thrum from my chest and up through my throat in a low curl of sound.
“The cave...” she murmured, before drawing herself back of the length of my body to whisper in my ear. “By the firelight... where we kissed...”
Kahlan echoed her words then, kissing me with a soft and deep passion, until we finally both emerged from the moment breathless as any swimmers that ever dared the ocean waves.
“I remember,” I murmured back in a ragged whisper. “I remember the cave... but I think you've forgotten to note someplace on this map of yours,” I teased as we lay there in eager stillness.
I couldn't hold back the suggestive smile that tugged at my lips when I rocked my hips against her.
“What about the Pillars of Creation?” I asked shamelessly.
Kahlan blushed, and it lent her skin a warm glow as I kissed her heated forehead playfully, tasting the sweet saltiness of her skin.
“Richard...”
“Kahlan...” I echoed before rocking my hips once more and feeling a joyous laugh well up in me. It rushed through my body and spilled from my lips, leaving me euphoric and nearly dizzy with the sensation. I rocked my hips once more just to feel her move with me and against me.
“Richard...” Kahlan half-laughed, half-gasped before biting her bottom lip and shifting to finally straddle my hips.
“I've not forgotten,” she whispered slowly, drawing me into her with a liquid sort of grace.
I gasped, moaned, and for a moment, closed my eyes as my head fell back. There was suddenly no gravity and I fell helplessly upwards into her.
“Kahlan...”
It was a heavy weightlessness that embraced me, and I reached out my hands to steady myself, splaying them wide on Kahlan's fluidly moving hips.
“I've not forgotten,” she repeated almost breathlessly.
I slowly opened my eyes to see her moving above me, haloed in the golden light of dawn. And it was a sight more glorious than all the radiance of heaven, or fires of creation.
“Kahlan,” I whispered reverently, irretrievably and perfectly lost in the grace of her.
She smiled and reached for me; drew me up. Face to face, she rested her forehead on mine, stilling for a moment as we breathed each other in.
“I do know how to read a map,” she reminded me playfully, smiling.
I smiled in return and gently began to move within her, sliding my hands tenderly up her spine. With absolute trust, she fell back, letting me catch her as she formed a perfect arch before me.
“You've always been my guide,” I replied quietly before leaning forward to capture one of her dusky nipples between my lips, sucking gently until she moaned and shivered against me. After a few moments, I released it and breathed, “My northern star.”
“Richard...”
I shifted my devotions to her other breast as we moved together like two waves surging toward some distant beach.
“The only true north for my heart,” I whispered, drawing her back up to me and settling my hands once more on her canting hips. I met her darkened eyes; watched the power gathering there, unafraid. “In any storm...” I continued, still moving within her, feeling our heartbeats match the rhythm of our entwined bodies. “In the darkest night... the deepest forest...”
I watched the storm of her power gather for me, and saw only Kahlan. When it came for me, when she came for me, all I saw was how much I loved the woman in my arms. All I saw was Kahlan...
“Kahlan...”
I fell into her love with perfect trust, knowing, without a doubt, that it was a place I could spend the rest of my life... that I would spend the rest of my life.
“Richard...” she sighed, resting her head gently on my shoulder as we held each other. “Richard... I love you...”
“I could never ask for more from love... and life... than you,” I whispered in return as we sank back into the tangled ivory sheets of our bed. I brushed the curling strands of her hair back from her face, meeting impossibly blue eyes that made me think of the Stone of Tears, or ocean waves and perfect blue skies.
She smiled.
“Is that so, Seeker?” Kahlan asked with an almost shaky voice, still trembling a little in my arms.
“Since the first moment I saw you,” I replied sincerely, knowing, from the deepest parts of my soul, it to be the truth.
Kahlan's fingertips traced small circles and paths over my chest.
“I am a pilgrim on this journey,” she whispered. “Take my hand and walk with me.”
I reached for her hand and she looked at me with some surprise before she met my smile with one of her own. I entwined my fingers with hers as they lay on my chest.
“I am a pilgrim on this journey, take my life, I give it, thee,” she continued to recite in an almost sing-song sort of voice, low and intimate. “I am a pilgrim on this journey, take my soul, it belongs with thine.”
“I am a pilgrim on this journey,” I said softly, picking up the old song, my voice falling into the familiar lilt my father's voice had always had when he sang it to my mother. “Take my heart, it is thine...”
I kissed Kahlan's warm hand, still wrapped in my own.
“We are pilgrims, you and I... so come take this journey with me...”
“I will, Richard,” she whispered, kissing me softly. “Where ever the journey takes us,” Kahlan vowed.
“Together.. from this life to the next, Kahlan...” I swore in return as I noticed her slight shiver. I shifted, reaching down to the floor a moment and retrieving the abandoned ivory sheet. I tucked it around us as Kahlan settled herself against me. “That is, if we can ever manage to leave this big, white bed of yours,” I couldn't help but tease.
She blushed as I chuckled softly.
“Richard...”
FIN