athelstanthescribe | (no subject)

Ragnar looks at him, fully aware that nobody else loves him this selflessly and absolutely, or ever has.

For once, he's at loss for words.

Athelstan reaches up to touch his face.

"What is it?"

"I'm a bad man, and don't deserve you," Ragnar says.

"You're not a bad man." It's instant, and it's firm. "A bad man wouldn't care if he hurts others or tramples them as he goes."

"I trampled enough," Ragnar says. "Including all your fellow monks."

Pause.

"And for all that, you have only love for me -- and such shining love!"

"Did you, personally, kill even one of my brothers?" Athelstan asks softly. "You wanted the gold, not the blood, and for that I forgave you long ago."

"No," Ragnar says. "But I brought the men who killed them. And the gold -- the gold is here."

He looks at the stones and earth they've covered it with.

"You didn't know we were a peaceful community when you landed. How could you, never having seen such a thing before?"

He doesn't spare a glance for the place where the gold lies.

"But I love you," Ragnar says, "and I can never show it enough."

"I know it", Athelstan assures him, and his face is full of love and serenity, "every time you touch me. Come back to the cabin, we have a little time yet."

"Yes," Ragnar says. "Who minds if we return for the mid-day meal or dinner?"

He kisses Athelstan again, then lets go and picks up that pathetic little bundle of bones in his leather jerkin.

"We'll bring them back our catch, and they'll be pleased to see it for dinner."

He whistles to Fiachra, who stands up to follow, bringing the remains of his rabbit along.

"I can think of some good use we can put those hours to," Ragnar grins. "In addition to washing off the grime of digging."

"So can I." He glances innocently back over his shoulder. "Why do you think I suggested it?"

"Because nobody knows how long it'll take until we can sail to Ribe, and touch again," Ragnar grins. "So that'll make a few less hours you'll have to go without my hands touching your flesh, my teeth on your throat, and my prick within you."

Sometimes, he likes to say it out loud. It makes the fact more real, less set apart.

"Yes", Athelstan says, almost inaudibly on a breath. "And today, I want to take our time."

"We have time to wash the dirt off, and for me to touch you everywhere as we do it, in the sunlight," Ragnar says.

"And then something more. We could swim in the brook together."

"But only afterwards," Ragnar says. "The cold will scare our pricks away and make them retreat!"

"Yes, afterwards." He smiles, slantedly wicked. "To clean ourselves up again."

It's fun when Athelstan gets like this! He far too earnest and responsible most of the time.

"I'll do my best to get you really sticky," Ragnar promises.

Ragnar brings it out in him.

"And I want to tell - and show - you how you deserve how much I love you."

He knows a certain Biblical passage by heart that best explains his feelings.

That promise gets Ragnar to hurry along even more, confident that Athelstan can keep up.

Athelstan can keep up most of the time, whatever it is they're doing!

He can easily keep up with running, even with Ragnar's longer legs, and he does.

Soon, the cabin comes back into sight.

Their bags are still sitting by the door, and Fiachra, who is of course faster than either of them, is sitting next to them finishing his rabbit.