Nonetheless, he retained enough of his wits to recall his plan.
With great effort, he unwove his fingers from where they had tangled in Shrike’s locks.His palm raised toward the sun behind Shrike’s back.He twirled his wrist in a beckoning gesture that had become almost instinctive.He’d practiced for weeks figuring out how to make the blackthorn surrounding the briar retract just its thorns.
And now it was only the smoothest vines that crept forth to do his bidding.
Mere tendrils at first, then thicker and thicker followed, until finally withes emerged as broad as his thumb.They encircled Shrike’s arms and wove together against his back.
Shrike gasped into Wren’s mouth.His eagerness grew alongside the vines—if the readied sword below his belt, braced against Wren’s own, were anything to judge by.
Wren, against his immediate wishes but in accordance with his overarching goal, broke off the kiss and opened his eyes.His enquiring glance was answered by an enthusiastic nod and a gleam in Shrike’s dark gaze.
And with that, Shrike was swept up into the vines as swiftly and securely as a Nereid caught in a fishing net.
The idea had sprung into Wren’s mind as he’d reflected on the Green Man aspect of the Oak King.Traditionally, a foliate head had greenery erupting from its mouth, eyes, and ears.Which (to Wren’s mind, at least) begged the question: if there was more than a head, where else would the greenery entangle?
At present, the greenery had woven itself into a hammock beneath Shrike’s back and twined his forearms together over his head in a lackadaisical fashion.They hung slack in such a way that suggested he could break their hold with a Gallic roll of his shoulders.
Wren had asked the vines to do the former.However, he did not recall telling the vines to do the latter, which made him uneasy.
Then Shrike threw his legs over Wren’s shoulders and crossed them at the ankles.Slithering sounds behind him told Wren the vines had come forth to bind Shrike’s ankles as well.
Wren hadn’t told them to do that either, but judging by the fae grin on Shrike’s handsome lips, he thought he knew who to blame.And knowing the magic’s source, now he could lay any concerns on that head to rest and focus upon the task at hand.
Namely, claiming his crown.
Some fumbling ensued.First in scrambling to retrieve the vial of oil from where he’d forgotten it in his waistcoat pocket, then in adjusting the vines to manoeuvre Shrike into position at the correct height.Throughout, Shrike remained far more patient than Wren felt he deserved.
At last his sword was oiled and poised to return to its most welcome sheath.
Within the harness they had together constructed it was Shrike who set their pace by bracing his limbs’ might against the vines.Wren had but to cleave to him.He gave silent thanks that Shrike’s fae form proved far more supple than his own mortal flesh and could contort with ease, folding very nearly in half so Wren might bestow another ravenous kiss upon his lips; a ceaseless kiss save for the gasps and sighs they dropt into each other’s mouths until Wren could hardly tell which breath belonged to whom.
He knew not where to attribute his singing blood.Perhaps it was merely the heightened senses of the season or his anticipation of the rite.Perhaps it was the thrill of his and Shrike’s nakedness joining in the open air, blending their bodies to match their hearts until their pulses beat in the same rhythm.Perhaps it was the magic he’d never thought possible in the mortal realm now thrumming through his veins as he wielded his mastery over their shared domain.Or perhaps it was the simple pleasure of his Shrike: with his gasps shuddering through his broad ribs and rippling down over his belly; his arms bulging as they strained against their bonds—bonds which Shrike had called forth himself and which only remained entangled in his limbs because he wanted them; his thighs clenching against Wren’s chest and his heels digging furrows between Wren’s shoulder-blades to draw him in further and faster into his hot tight sheath; his Shrike so handsome and so strong and so utterly blissful in his surrender.
With all this before him, it was a wonder Wren could hold off even so long as he had.
Until, trembling, he could withstand no longer.
“Do you yield?”Wren whispered.
Shrike’s curiously sharp eye-teeth flashed in a wicked grin.In ragged gasps he replied, “Command me, my king.I am at your mercy.”
Wren seized Shrike by his left antler to turn his head and kiss beneath his ear.Shrike’s breathless laugh vibrated through his throat against his lips.
The second growing-in had proved less painful than the first, just as Everilda had promised, and now Shrike boasted a splendid pair of prongs that he had graciously permitted Wren to make good use of in the intervening months.It seemed almost a pity for him to lose them now.Yet the ritual demanded sacrifice.
And to that end, Wren raised his lips just far enough to murmur in his beloved’s ear.“Spend, Shrike.”
Shrike’s breath cut off with a sharp gasp.His back arched against the vines.His spend burst forth in plumes that scattered across his broad chest like an efflorescence of Queen Anne’s lace over the meadow.
Wren’s own spend overcame him a heartbeat afterward.He poured his seed into Shrike’s furrow and clung to him like ivy.
He returned to himself with Shrike’s lips upon his own in gentle entreaty.This preoccupied him for several moments further.Gradually he became aware that the embrace surrounding him was not solely comprised of his beloved’s limbs but now included myriad stout vines and that the curious weightless sensation he enjoyed was not merely the wake of their shared ecstasy but also a sort of hammock that either he or Shrike or perhaps Blackthorn itself had seen fit to grow around them both.Once he realised this he felt more than content not to question it further and instead basked in the summer sunshine filtering down through the greenery, letting his own head fall into its natural nest of Shrike’s collar.His mind meandered down pleasant if not entirely rational pathways.
“It seems odd,” he heard himself murmur distantly.
“What does?”Shrike replied in the low, familiar tone that Wren had oft heard in the twilight moments that heralded sleep.
“To claim a kingship by thrusting a sword into its sheath, rather than drawing it from the stone in the Arthurian fashion.”
