million_star

Title: Ivory
Author:

millionstar
Pairing: Merlin/Arthur, AU
Rating: NC17 to be safe, I suppose.
Here There Be: Marking of skin, introspection, language, smut... kind of? Fluff.
Characters: Merlin, Arthur
Summary: A photo of Colin filming Legend, with his back to the camera, has been stuck in my mind for weeks now. His shoulders (look at those things), the braces, it's just been the best kind of fic fodder. I felt like Arthur would feel the same way upon seeing Merlin dressed this way, and this was the result.
Disclaimer: I don't own this version of Merlin and Arthur, the BBC does. No profit is being made, and this is fiction.
Beta/Support: As always,

dolce_piccante - thank you to

matturemuser for the encouragement as well. Love you both loads. <3
Author's Note: If you choose to read, thank you, and I hope you enjoy.

When you’ve been with a partner for as long as I have been with mine, it basically goes without saying that you know their body rather intimately. I’ve traversed every inch of his frame. I’ve tasted every inch of it. My eyes have committed nearly all of it - from every beauty mark to every pore - to memory, because I am so enthralled with him that the urge to do so comes naturally.

I’ve seen him in the suit many times before. Hell, I’ve peeled it from his body numerous times, reducing it to a mere pile of crumpled fabric on our bedroom floor. His clothing, you see, was singularly responsible for igniting something inside me that I couldn't, and didn't want to, shake.

I had caught a glimpse of him earlier, on our friend Gwen’s wedding day, talking with the bride in the moments before he led her down the aisle, the two of them smiling and laughing. His back had been to me at the time and for reasons I don’t quite understand myself, I was overcome with a wave of affection for him, for this man who owns me completely. His jacket in his hands, my eyes eagerly drank in the broadness of his shoulders, the sight of his back, and the braces he was wearing.

The affection, though, I have to admit, was laced with a liberal dose of lust. The sight of his frame, decidedly male, and just as decidedly mine, in that moment, set my blood aflame. The sight of him in the braces gave me the image of him as a very precious gift that needed to be unwrapped slowly, reverently. I didn’t even mind that I would have to sit through a wedding ceremony and the reception that followed before I could indulge myself. To burn for him for the rest of the day would be the highest of honors; to do so made me feel alive in a way nothing else could.

My heart was thundering when I finally got the chance to envelop him from behind several hours later. He leaned back into my embrace, pressing his cheek to my own. I could feel him smile against me, and it prompted me to kiss his cheekbone softly. When he turned to me and slipped the braces down his arms to hang loosely at his sides, my breath hitched audibly. Unable to stop myself, I parted his shirt, two buttons flying across the room so I could finally taste his bare shoulder.

I could only give myself over to him when he cupped my face in his hands and brought his mouth to my own. My hands carded through his hair, thick and dark, and as our kisses grew in intensity, he suddenly pulled back, licking the corner of my mouth before whispering against it.

“Take me to bed. I want it slow.”

It felt like a challenge and a benediction at the same time.

I did my best to make it last for him. On all fours before me, he writhed and shivered while I slid into him, one hand gripping the headboard of our bed, the other moving lazily, yet somehow gracefully, between his legs. I held his hips tightly while I fucked him, my hands releasing him only to smooth the skin of his lower back now and then until we were both sated.

He lay next to me, on his stomach, as we both came down. I propped myself up on one arm and traced along his backbone with my fingertips. A purr escaped his lips as my hand drifted down to cup the curve of his arse; his legs shifted. I dragged my hand back up his body, stopping to caress both of his shoulder blades softly. He never questioned my actions that night, that wasn't his way; he simply allowed me to indulge myself however I saw fit.

The thought of using his bare back as a canvas began to dominate my thoughts.

“Let me mark you," I asked softly, tracing triangles on his bare back, "here."

His head turned to face my own, one eyebrow raised, as he nodded his assent. "I can't deny you anything," he admitted quietly.

The kohl pencil was a deep, dark ebony, and I was delighted when it adhered to his skin smoothly. I had taken up writing in my spare time recently. The words didn’t always come to me easily, or quickly - but on that night, they did. Looking back, I chalk it up to sheer inspiration in the form of my lover lying in front of me so openly. Verse flowed like waves, across his shoulder blades. It spilled beneath the curling hair at the nape of his ivory neck, and down, across his spine. With a delicate reverence, I pressed kisses to each section of the bare expanse I’d been presented with before I proceeded to mark it.

Through the duration, he would sigh, caught between sleep and the waking world in his post-orgasmic haze. The sound was so alluring that at one point, I leaned down to steal a kiss in an attempt to capture it for myself. Once or twice, he twitched slightly, as though the pencil were tickling him. I admired my handiwork and smiled to myself.

I asked him later if he was curious at all to know what words his body was temporarily in ownership of. Hugging his pillow, his eyelashes stark against the white pillowcase, he smiled softly, never opening his eyes as he shook his head.

"We all need our secrets."