a new rule

They have so few nights together. Clandestine meetings in empty hallways. Trysts. He goes out of his way to sit across from you at state dinners. His boots knock against your toes. His eyes trace your face and there is the tinkle and spark of cutlery on plates and someone asks him to relay his tales of all the battles he’s won. He’s unstoppable. A legend. His skin shimmers like sun-drenched sand and there’s the tiniest flecks of gold in the dark hair that is pulled away from his handsome face. He grins at you among the flicker of candlelight and stone and you feel it in your stomach. Knotted. Weighted. It hurts.

He’s fucking the Duke’s ward and it is probably the only disloyal thing Duncan has ever done against Leto.

He can’t stay away just as you can’t look at anyone else.

***

“Do you think he’ll marry me off?” you ask him while he’s still inside you. Your breath is hitched and your stomach is in your throat. His strokes are long and slow and inexorable. He can fuck you like this for hours - patient and deliberate as if he is savoring each part of you. Duncan is so big - everywhere - that sometimes you think he’ll keep going until he hits your heart. It stings and it’s perfect.

He stills - his body going rigid. His brow furrows and his expression twists into incredulous. The shadows of Caladan’s moon slip over your bed and force Duncan’s features into sharp relief. “What?”

His tone is blunt and almost angry, which is exactly what you wanted.

“Leto,” you murmur as you dig your knees into his waist - as you clench around him - making him twitch and slide further into you. “He might marry me off to strengthen the alliance.”

His jaw ticks. His nostrils flare. Something ugly and coarse sounds from his chest. He plants his knees and hitches one of your legs over his shoulder. “Duncan…” you start - suddenly thinking that maybe that had been in poor taste. But the apology is crushed and forgotten when he draws his hips back and then slams forward.

“Do you think I would let him?” he grunts as he fucks you into your mattress. You can’t anchor yourself. You scramble to hold onto your headboard - fist your sheets. There’s no use so you grab at his broad shoulders - his back - scrape your nails down his spine. He is unforgiving - the very flash of who Idaho is burns through him as he thrusts into you again and again. No respite. No gentleness. His hands catch in your hair and he presses you deeper into the bed - pinning you in place - biting your lower lip and sucking at your neck - your tongue - whispering things to you that make you shudder: I would never let another man touch you - I would kill them - You’re mine - this is mine - why do you like to taunt me like this - do you enjoy it - do you want to drive me insane enough to fuck you until you can’t speak - walk - my love - tell me

You break apart - squeezing him impossibly tight as he bites into the sweat-slick flesh where your neck meets your shoulder. He follows you not long after - hips stuttering between your spread thighs. You’re stretched around him and everything is wet. His pace loses all of its easy grace as he grinds to the hilt, filling you with hot lashes of seed. When he eases out, you can feel it on your cunt - warm and sticky. You’re empty. You miss the heft of him inside you. Duncan sits back to stare at what’s he’s done - his lips quirking smugly before he uses two of his thick fingers and plugs it back into your sex - marking you - branding you -

It's too erotic and intimate at once.

No words are shared between you aside from both of your strained breathing. You can hear the trickle of water from the fountain beyond your window. The wind pulses through leaves and grass. Dawn is intruding. The pink-purple threat of it drips over the line of his shoulders. There is the scent of incoming rain. The brine of the sea riding the air and you wonder when he will leave again. Not soon. Please not soon.

“You’re a demon,” he finally declares - scrubbing a hand over his face as if he is just waking up - as if he had momentarily lost himself.

You reach down - pressing between your legs where everything is sore and achy and feverish and his eyes follow - his gaze heavy and hungry and darkening with each swipe of your fingers.

“I suppose you’re right,” Your lips curl. “No one else can do what you do.”

He groans. “You’re terrible.”

After a beat, he reaches for your ankle and tugs it over his thigh. He needs something to do. He’s never just still - just willing to float and relax. It’s symbolic of your relationship. He goes and goes and you wait for him. Frozen in time. His thumb digs into the bones of your foot as he circles the soft flesh. He could break it easily if he wanted. He could break you and you’d still wait for him.

“I am, but your humble servant.”

He laughs and it’s bright in the dim blue light of your bedroom. It bounces and rolls off the marble and stone. It echoes inside the clutch of your ribs. It’s so gorgeous that it nearly makes you cry. “You and I both know that you’re no one’s servant.”

“I’m Leto’s.”

“You’re not. He’s far too soft on you.”

“I am,” you hiss as your head falls back into your pillow. Your stomach rolls and there’s a sharp soreness between your legs that you want Duncan to remedy by touch. “He’s going to turn me into a breeding sow or something equally dehumanizing.”

You feel Duncan’s caress pause on your ankle. The humor in the room vanishes with a cold suck. You glance at him and there’s an unreadable expression on his face. The shadows don’t give him all away, but you’re certain you see his jaw flex and his lips peel back to bare his white teeth. A flicker of disgust - regret. “That won’t happen.”

“You can’t stop it.”

For House Atreides - marriage is about alliances. It is about burrowing their family lines throughout the various pathways of the galaxy. You are not Leto’s by blood, but you have been raised as his own and that still counts. He didn’t even marry Lady Jessica.

It's not about love.

Duncan studies your foot in his hands - his calloused fingers slipping over your skin. “Don’t say that.”

The temperature of this interaction has gone dark. You hadn’t meant for that to happen. You were simply stressed - panicked and flustered that you would lose him. Every time that you have Duncan - every time that he comes to your bed - you fear the day that he won’t.

You need to change course and so you sit up and crawl over to him. You wrap your arms around his muscular shoulders and press your mouth to his throat. Your touch dances over his battle scars - the knots of flesh and tissue from blades and projectiles and whatever hideous things he’s fought throughout his life.

“I’m sorry,” you say and he lifts his hand to clutch your wrist. He seals it against his chest and sighs. You kiss his cheek before carefully turning his face to yours. He is so close. He is right here. “Duncan?” you exhale over his mouth.

“Hmm?”

“Would you still want me if I was Harkonnen?”

His eyes widen in surprise and you grin - pleased that you’ve shocked him. He tries to suppress a chuckle, shaking his head.

“Would be a little challenging.”

You are already forbidden.

“That’s not an answer,” you point out as you chew your lip. “What if I had no arms?”

He groans - squeezing your wrist harshly in reproach. He grumbles about how difficult you are as he pushes you backward. He sinks his tongue inside you to shut you up.

***

You hate the thought of Arrakis. You want to revolt. You’ll dry up there with the harsh sun, the smoke trees, the palms, and saguaro. Paul told you about the sandworms - enormous and horrific. They’ll swallow you all. They’ll swallow Duncan.

Idaho is always gone - accepting whatever stupid mission Leto has forced him to accomplish in order to prepare for your arrival. Of course, you learn that he adapts and befriends because that is simply who he is. His loyalty shines strongly enough that even the Fremen find him impossible to resist.

“He works you too hard.”

“It’s my duty. I know it’s difficult for you to understand since you are the most stubborn woman alive.”

The both of you fight until it burns out - quiet arguments hidden in deserted passageways of the castle.

I don’t want to go. It feels strange. The Harkonnens have poisoned it.

There’s nothing you can do. You can’t just stay on Caladan.

You storm off to your room and he inevitably follows.

***

It is miserable. Unbearable. The dust bites at your skin and coats you in a thin film that you cannot seem to wash away. The Harkonnens left their stink on the fortress and it unnerves you.

It doesn’t help that Paul had confided in you about his dreams of late.

When Duncan arrives at Arrakeen, he tells you and the others how close it was - how he had tasted death. He’s laughing. He finds it funny. You can’t control yourself - don’t have the strength to hide your horrified expression. He pauses in his tale - his brow creasing.

“What?” He reaches for you and you jerk away from him. “What is it?”

It’s all very public. Paul sees. Gurney sees. Your face crumples and tears spring from your eyes and you run from him.

You are not like Paul. You don’t know or see things before they happen. But you feel it. You can sense something vibrating in this fortress. It rumbles under your feet. You cannot get a full breath in. Your heartbeat is too fast.

Something is wrong.

You run and run and of course he catches you - his hands in your dress as he hauls you to him. He lifts you as he would a doll before he buries you into the wall with the length of his body.

“Stop” you beg - shoving at him. It’s like knocking your fists against a stone door. “Stop. I can’t do this.”

You think that if he takes you again, you’ll actually go mad. He is screaming death - it permeates his clothes and skin. You don’t want to lose him. He’s been yours for years. He’s only been yours. He is the one thing that you have.

He grabs your chin and forces you to look at him. He is so beautiful that it hurts. You’re going to lose him. His eyes bleed umber - his long hair is pulled back - his beard cut along his jaw. There’s a bit of sand on his chin. “What are you doing?”

“If you die,” you whimper. “I’ll never- I won’t survive it.”

He searches your face - bewildered. Finally, he sighs with the same sort of tone Leto would use on you as a girl. A petulant child. You should understand this. He’s a warrior. He is always touching death. He is always seconds away - an inch or mile.

He palms your cheek before gripping the hinge of your jaw and crushing his mouth to yours. His tongue slides between your lips. You can feel how hard he is against your stomach. He is thick with muscle and hot-blood and he’s been in the desert for weeks. He only wants you - the comfort of you - the familiarity of their bond.

He pulls back just enough to speak - his breath on your breath. His heart thumps strongly against your palm and you long to capture the beat of it. You could collect it and save it for him and use it if he fell. “If I die, you won’t. I forbid it.”

“You won’t be here to stop me.”

His gaze narrows. “No.”

You open your mouth again -

and choke on your words -

His hand has found its way between your legs - his thumb circling the peak of your sex underneath all your wispy fabric. He pushes his fingers into you - curling and scissoring as he deliberately drives you to a quick climax.

I want to save you.

You’re not Paul. You have no gifts beyond the face that seduced the great Duncan Idaho.

He leans forward - mouth brushing over yours.

“Is it because of what your brother said?”

Her baby brother. No blood between them. Sometimes you call Leto father because he is in all the ways he’s tried.

Duncan had been young when he had first seen you.

You were soft and sweet in that garden outside the Duke’s room. I never forgot. I always tried to make excuses to speak to him so I could catch a glimpse. You were so shy.

His fingers are gone and there is the blunt heavy pressure of his cock sinking into you - breaching slowly with all the warrior-patience Duncan possesses. He’s carrying you - anchoring you to the wall. You wrap your legs around his waist. Open up for me. You stroke the wrinkles around his eyes - his brow. Laughter lines. He was always laughing.

“Tell me,” he pleads in a way that sparks like an order. His cock is sheathed to the hilt - shallowly dipping in and out. His fingers on his other hand continue to trace the shape of your cunt. He knows your body too well. There will never be anyone else for you.

“Paul saw it,” you whisper - grief curling around your insides. “Paul sees everything. He knows.”

“He doesn’t,” Duncan snaps. His thumb digs into your jaw - his expression pained and somewhat frantic as you crumble in his arms. He wants you to believe him. “I’m not leaving you.”

“You can’t promise me that.”

“I can try.”

***

Leto had tried to match you with a suitor once. A son from House Corrino. Their grip on power had been waning steadily - leaking out.

There’d been a party - a dance. Jessica had made sure the palace was lit up. The very ceiling of the great room had been hung with tiny lights and blue draping to mimic the very image of the galaxy. The starks winking and trembling with the swell of the music.

Duncan had seethed in the corner. The man famous for his charm and his carefree spirit was consumed with such a rage that everyone noticed. Gurney had to speak with him. You danced and spun and laughed while he sulked. You’d been at that age where you only wanted to needle Duncan in order to make him possess you.

By the end of the night, he had finally caught hold of your wrist and dragged you down the hall. He shoved you into his quiet bare room and then thoroughly fucked you until you could say nothing but his name.

“Do you remember that man? Luther?”

“Don’t remind me.”

“You’re very sensitive.”

“Only when it comes to you.”

You had loved the taste of his anger and his jealousy. It had been a time where he didn’t know if you were his and you had played upon that knowledge. He couldn’t claim you as he does presently.

Now - you both don’t care enough to be anyone else’s.

Now, you despise Leto’s strategies after realizing what you could lose. Leto’s machinations were only entertaining when it wasn’t you on the board.

***

“Should I ask him for your hand, then?”

You’re lying on his chest - your ear firmly glued to the press of his heart. The heavy and relaxed thump thump thump like music. You sit up to stare at him. He’s naked - warm and at ease with his hair spilling over your pillow. It’s a rare state for him.

When you say nothing, he cocks his head slightly. He’s so enormous that he takes up most of your bed. The corner of his mouth twitches as he regards you with a mellow amusement.

“Do you think he’d say yes?” you finally reply.

He closes his eyes and shrugs. “No.”

Would it matter? Couldn’t we just refuse him?

“Perhaps - I will just never marry,” You trace your name across his olive skin. He shudders before snatching your hand and placing it against his mouth. He doesn’t kiss it, but caresses it with his lips. You inhale sharply - suddenly dizzy with him.

“Perhaps - we can wed in secret,” he hums - his lashes dark and long against his cheek. His lids still firmly shut and you wonder if he's gone somewhere in his head. “I’ll simply kill any other suitors he puts in front of you.”

“That would go well.”

He opens one eye to peek at you. “I’ll do it quietly. He’ll never know it was me.”

“Yes, he will,” you protest. “You’re his greatest soldier.”

“Then I’ll make it sloppy.”

You laugh and it tumbles out of your throat - bouncing against his firm chest. He flashes a grin and you finally understand that that had been his intention all along. He wants you to be happy. You hadn’t smiled here - in this wasteland. Not until now.

He slips his knuckles over your cheek. His expression is docile and pleased and you don't grasp how he can be so reverent and gentle when he has killed hundreds of men. You’ve heard the stories. You’ve seen him train.

You watch each other in silence - unknowingly memorizing the other's face. The silence itself is rare. Usually, you’re always lashing out and he is always keeping the balance - protecting you and soothing you until your nerves dim.

I love you. I love you. I love you.

You should tell him that.

You hear a noise outside, but Duncan doesn’t seem to notice. There’s a thump and then a buzz of commotion before it fades to nothing. Perhaps, someone fell.

You bite your lip - strangely nervous. He sinks the tip of his thumb into the soft flesh to stop you. The unsaid don’t in his pointed stare. A wave of uncertainty churns in your belly. You lean into his hand.

“He saw your death, Duncan.”

You think Val is a little resentful - a little bitter at Thor leaving you. She’d become quite protective and she’d been there when Thor was deep in his self-hatred while you frantically tried to pick up the pieces.

“Who was there to take care of you, hmm?”

“He was grieving, Val.”

“So were you.”

“He felt like he failed - he needed - he needed me to just be supportive.”

“And then he just ran off!”

You sigh - pressing the back of your hand to your brow. She had a point. You didn’t want to admit it, but she did. You had bathed him and pressed your mouth to his chest and stroked his hair and it hadn’t been enough.

You had spent many nights running out to the edge of Tønsberg and crying. You had spilled your guts to the sea - shrieking like a witch - drinking down the black-blue sky as the waves pummeled the chipped rocks and it had been Val who had seen to you and grasped you around the shoulders and walked you back to Thor’s hut.

“Let it out,” she urged. “And then be done with it.”

It was the only time you had seen her be soft - be empathetic and sweet and as soon as she spoke it - her expression shot back to her warrior roots. Cold. Deadly. Practical.

“Will you greet him with open legs then?” she teases. “When he comes back?”

She’s clearing the air - making a joke. Sex is the thing the two of you could giggle over like a couple of school girls. A relief after years of pain and sadness and this town breathing like a mausoleum rather than a home.

You grin - the swell of heat in your core. “Thor might not excel at emotional maturity, but he’s fucking perfect as a lover.”

Val laughs. “Let’s go get drunk. I want details.”

***

You don’t expect him. It’s early on a weekday morning. You’re too hungover to crawl out of bed. Your mouth thick as cotton - your head pounding as your ears ring. Sour bile crawling up your throat as Val stirs next to you.

She’d been brewing her own alcohol, irritated that the drinks on Midgard weren’t strong enough. You glance down at your body. Still clothed. Not like you and Val hadn’t fucked around before - she was a Valkyrie and she was ridiculously talented in bed. Both of you branded in Asgardian strength as she ate you out while your knees near crushed her skull.

“That’s it, gorgeous girl,” she purred as she pumped three of her calloused fingers into your gaping cunt. You bucked into her chin - dragging the heels of your feet along her warrior-skin. You were hooked on Val’s primal taste for a rough screw.

It happened on occasion. A full moon. A night you were particularly desperate for touch. It wasn’t like Val was short on lovers, but she seemed to like the taste of you and Asgardians had different views on sex. You didn’t live a thousand plus years - promising yourself to a single person.

Thor hadn’t asked for your fidelity. He hadn’t told you that you were his for keeps or forever and he had run away from you…

There’s a sharp knock at your door. You sit up on your elbows - the sheets twisting around your legs. You’d sweat into the mattress. You smelled like a distillery.

Another knock.

Fucking hell.

You growl as you try and get out of bed. Val simply rolls onto her side - releasing a loud snore. Dead to the world. The morning twines pale pink along her buttery brown limbs - her dark hair ruffled as her brow wrinkles in sleep. Maybe a dream? Maybe not? She had yet to banish her memories of Hela and the battle that took her sisters. Her lover. Still - in the rosy light - looks quite innocent and young though she’d kill you for saying it.

You stumble to the door and yank it open and then feel as if you’d been doused in frigid water.

Thor is standing before you. The sun glinting off the crown of his golden head. His lips break apart into a blinding smile and when he reaches for you, you take a step back.

He frowns. “Is-are you alright?”

You shake your head - trying to clear the fog of your gaze. Your fucking hangover has twisted your vision to too many colors. Your eyes trace his body and you realize that he’s changed. The weight gone. His arms are enormous - his stomach flat and his skin ruddy and dark as if he’d been baking on a beach. He drags his palm over his beard in an act you recognize as insecurity.

He’s nervous.

“Sorry,” you stammer. “Sorry - I’m just - just surprised.”

He frowns. “I should have told you.”

He should have. He should have.

It was always you waiting on him - waiting for him to show up and that was on you too for allowing it. Here he was - back - and you had wished for it - longed for him terribly, but something sinks bitterly in your gut.

His absence had allowed you to really see how painful it had been.

You chew on your lower lip. Your mind whirling and then snagging on different memories and sensations and the last cycle of years and how you cried so often - cried until you were a husk and it was physically impossible to produce more tears.

It’s coming up like vomit - like acid - as it crawls up your esophagus and then you let it out.

“Why didn’t you console me?” you finally ask. “I-I was drowning here - with you - trying so hard to take care of you and not upset you and I felt…fuck I felt…” The words die on your tongue. You deflate, regretting your outburst - your confession. It feels weak - dry crumpled paper that could drift away with the wind.

And maybe he would leave again - run away because you were too much trouble just he has sped off as soon as the battle ended to find himself.

But Thor’s reaction is another story.

Thor looks as if you have slapped him across the face. His lips part and he makes a soft noise of protest or maybe disgust.

“I know,” he replies - he opens his arms - fingers spread in submission - apology. “I’ve spent - spent the last few months thinking about you and how’d I’d left things. I treated you so poorly, my love. The one person I had still with me and I treated you to anger. You tried to take care of me and I just - I just refused to listen.” His lips quirk before he offers a humorless laugh. “I knew that you would run to the shore to cry - I knew how sad and hurt you were and I felt - it’s not an excuse - but I felt like I would only make things worse. I felt like I was cursed and if I kept you, it would ruin you.”

Your eyes narrow. “You still fucked me.”

He blinks - unsure how to handle the bluntness of your words. “I did,” he agrees as he shifts on his feet. “I did, but it - I adored you - adore you - and I don’t know - I wanted you so much I could barely breathe. I was selfish. I took you for granted. I was - fuck I was a bastard and a coward and…” Thor grimaces - seemingly aware that his excuses sound pathetic to his own ears.

You huff, leaning flush against the door frame. His face is naked - his lids heavy as his jaw ticks. He exhales loudly - releasing everything at once. His blue eyes are glassy and pink. He looks like he might cry.

You feel better. Not great, but at least you’d told him and he seemed to understand.

“Would you like to come in?”

***

“Are we moving too fast?” you ask against his parted mouth. Thor’s huge hands tighten around your thighs as he drags you forcefully against his hard cock. You’re practically riding him - grinding your clothed cunt into his crotch.

Thor is still in his armor and you in your linen sleep shorts and thin tank top.

“Mmm no,” he hums as he squeezes the plush cheeks of your ass - spreading them open and curling his fingers into the fat. He kisses your jaw - beard rasping over your chin. “Reunion sex, I think?”

He had made it two steps inside before you were on him. He’d met your lips with matching hunger - clinging to you desperately as he carried you to your room. He had nearly dropped you on Val - you had forgotten - and he had given you a rather amused smile. “I take it that’s why you smell like the inside of a wine barrel.”

You glared before gripping his braid and yanking it hard enough to arch his throat. You had lunged like a wild cat - nipping at the taut muscle beneath his jaw that was now bared to you. He growled - digging his fingers into your thighs as he nosed at your cheek. “Where can I fuck you?” he growled. “Unless - you’d like me to take you on top of our friend?”

“She absolutely would not,” Val muttered before flipping over onto her other side and dragging her pillow against her face. “Go to the living room.”

Here you were - the morning striding warm and gold across the hardwood - flowing through the multiple windows. The lands outside green and rocky and anyone could walk by and see, but who could care because you’re overwhelmed by him and his smell - as if you were made for him and maybe you were because you always came back to him - the years and years - and other lovers and other wars and -

You dip your tongue into his mouth and he sucks it eagerly, hips bucking up between your thighs.

You slide your hands down his shoulders - massaging the swell of his muscles. “God Thor, you’re fucking huge.”

He pulls away - his lips twitching in slight smugness. He pats his tight stomach. “Finally back to myself.”

You cradle his face. “I liked you both ways.”

He snorts and you secure your grip - tilting his chin up. “I did.”

He presses a kiss to your mouth again - soft and yielding. He slips a hand between your legs - through the hole of your sleep shorts - his finger tracing the seam of your slick folds. Your head is still pounding, but the throbbing has begun to recede with each swirl and pinch of your clit. Your walls flexing around nothing - wanting the blunt stretch of his fingers or his cock.

“You’re so wet, sweet one,” he marvels before putting those damp fingers to his lips and sucking them lewdly. He fists your hair and drags you back to his mouth so you can taste yourself - the salt and musk and essence of you.

You rise up on your knees as you try to remove your shorts and it’s terribly awkward and Thor finally snarls before tearing them from you. You’re too mad with lust to care - too sweet for him and wanting and you know that there are things that must be said and discussed and how you will need time for his apology to set and if he really meant it - but you believe him as you believe your heart and the steady beat of it behind your breastbone.

“I thought of you every night,” he rasps - low and ragged against your throat. “ - fucked my own hand and pretended it was that delicious cunt.” He hooks his fingers inside you - rubbing at that patch that makes you spill on him. “I thought of how often I took you - how neither of us could stop until we were joined and how it wasn’t enough - how I could eat you every night of my life or fuck you and it would never be enough.”

You feel the snag of his cock at your entrance. The hard length of it and the tickle of the curls at his groin and how it’s all so wet. He grabs your hips - his fingers smearing your slick on your skin.

“Up,” he demands. “Let me get inside you.”

You do as he says and then the head of him breaches you - parting your hole in such a way that it strikes the breath from your lungs. You lose sense and sink down onto him as both of you groan into the other’s mouth and the joining screams of fate and home and hearth.

He touches at the place where your pussy parts over his length - the obscene stretch. “Feel this my love?” He strokes the area - the puffy outer lips - the peak of your clit. “You were made to take me. No one has ever fit me like you do. My love my love my love...”

It’s all so brutally romantic and he sweeps his thumbs over your cheeks as he lifts his hips off the couch to rut into you. Each rough stroke of his cock marking you and hitting something quite sensational inside your core. You cling to him - lips on his - tasting his gasps and the hot air from his flared nostrils as he snarls like a beast.

He stands up with you still connected to him and he finds another surface - a table maybe. He shoves off the books and the magazines and there’s the crash of a bottle and the pungent stink of Val’s homemade liquor but you don’t care because Thor drags your ass to the edge of the table and begins to fuck you at a superhuman pace. A God’s pace. Each slam of his hips sends you sprawling up the table and there are tiny flecks of glass beneath your arms as you struggle to anchor yourself but it’ll heal - it’s nothing - your skin made for centuries.

He stares at where you’re spread open - flicking his thumb over your clit - the heel of his hand pressing down on your mound. He’s spearing you with his cock - the thrusts sending high-pitched mewls from the center of your throat as Thor growls and praises you in a husky voice - damp with sex: my girl - little one - my pretty thing - you feel so good - i won’t be away from again - i love you

The words fall against you - shuffle together and shoot into the tender flesh of your cunt. You go rigid - your lower muscles bearing down on his pumping shaft and then you spasm - liquid seeping from your sex and dribbling onto the table as Thor stares at you like you’re a star - a comet spiraling white-yellow across the sky that he hadn’t expected.

I love you.

He’d said it and it strikes you again like a still-lit match. It makes your thighs twitch and your knees dig into his waist as he hitches them higher before finally placing them against his shoulder. He’s still fucking you - the loud thwack of the table - his sweat smearing across the backs of your legs. Your cunt aching now - feeling very much like a bruise - as he impales you again and again with all the rest of his immortal stamina.

Thor jerks before he glances down at her milky-white hand resting on his forearm. He snorts - ripping himself away and accidentally knocking his heavy glass off the table.

“You don’t need an empath to know that, Odinson,” Nebula remarks flatly. “We are all fully aware.”

Thor gapes at her.

“It’s true, man,” Peter says - smug as ever - like he’s finally gotten something over him. “You follow her around like a lost puppy.”

Thor glares at him - his jaw creaking as he clenches his teeth. “We have known each other for centuries. She is my closest friend. Your mortal mind could not even fathom a bond as deep as ours.”

“Shit,” Peter exclaims - incredulous. “You’ve been in love with her for centuries and you’re still in the friend zone? That’s fucked up.”

Thor bends the metal edge of the table. “It’s not - it’s not that simple.”

“Why?” Nebula asks - bored (though Nebula always seems bored).

“There’s - she -” Thor frowns before he glances over at you. You’re laughing - your cheek crushed against Drax’s bicep as he embraces you. Jealousy - quick and green - ignites in his gut. “She doesn’t - we just haven’t - I don’t know.”

It’s true. He doesn’t know. He really doesn’t.

“Well,” Peter claps a hand on Thor’s shoulder - knocking beer into his shirt. “As long as you’re aware - that we are all aware. The romantic tension in the Benatar is stifling.”

"Just like when it was you and Gamora," Mantis points out which thankfully shuts Peter right up.

“Everyone knows, but her,” Nebula adds. "I think."

Somehow that pains Thor more than he expects.

“For such old creatures, you’re both quite dumb.”

***

Thor is still awake when you stumble into his room. He’s alone in his bed - staring up at the plain hull - cracking his knuckles as he reflects on the battle today.

Bloody. Close. You slaughtering like you were blind with a lust for it.

He worries about you. Worries too much.

“I thought I put you to bed?” Thor reprimands as you trip over Stormbreaker.

“No,” you slur. “I want to sleep with you.”

You crawl to him and he has to grit his teeth - stop his cock from filling at the sight of you on your hands and knees. He turns on his side and when you reach for him - he lets you - lets you fist your small hands into his sheets and climb onto him. He sits up - scooting himself back so that he’s flush against the headboard.

He cradles your face - thumb smoothing your cheekbone. You tilt your chin - brushing your mouth across his finger.

You’re beautiful and your weight on his lap is damn distracting.

You stroke his nose - petting at his beard. “I want to ride you, Thor,” you tease - voice silky and tender as a secret.

“No,” He grabs your wrist, stopping your trailing hand from grabbing his cock. “You’re drunk, dove.”

You wriggle against him and it’s too much. “Thor let’s just fuck - we always - we always used to...” you trail off into laughter which tilts fully into hiccups. It’s endearing and Thor squeezes the meat of your thigh - desperate to get his head on straight. “Remember back - back home when we used to...used to fuck in your tent...on the battlefield.” You lean forward before sinking your teeth into the cord of muscle in his throat. He swallows a grunt - hips bucking beneath your cunt where he can literally sense how hot and wet you are behind those flimsy shorts. “Fuck - I remember us - sweat and bloody and feral and how you split me open on the ground.”

He bites his lip - of course, he remembered. He’d thrust into his fist at the memory more often than not.

“Loki...Loki always used to get so mad about it because we’d come to dinner...all covered in mud.” You hiccup again. “Miss him-m.”

“Darling,” he murmurs as he grips your hand and places it snug against his chest - right over the thrum of his heart. It has no doubt picked up due to the direction of this conversation, but he knows you’re too gone to notice. “You need to sleep this off - it’s not - not right to take advantage.”

You huff - exhaling through your nose. “Not that drunk.”

“Just - sleep it off - you can sleep here with me...” Your eyes widen, lips quirking upward. “...but only sleep.”

“I don’t remember you being this chivalrous,” you poke him hard above his nipple and it hurts - the shock of your strength - a wink of a reminder that you are more powerful than so many others.

He slides his arms around your waist - yanking you forward so he can wrestle you to his side. You go willingly - muffling a yawn against the back of your hand. He curls himself around you - spooning you in this slim bed - these tired sheets with the taste of war and your shared memories scorching the air like flamed matchsticks.

He noses into your hair - savoring the familiar smell of you - the scent that has kept to you for centuries. He’d know it in the dark - know you in the dark - wherever he was - the ends of the galaxy or right here in this room.

“Sleep,” he orders, but you already have drifted away.

***

“Fuck,” he grinds out as he slams inside you.

Your knees are digging into his waist - your leather skirt rucked up above your belly. There is blood drying across your cheek and in your hair and he cannot get enough. His hips snap between your spread thighs - his cock punching up against something soft and tender located in the heart of your body.

Each rut thrusts you up the ground - sends a high-pitched whine from the ache of your throat.

“Thor,” you moan. “Thor - shit - right there.”

He drops his head to kiss you - his tongue hungry with each grind of his length through the channel of your tight wet sex.

“You almost died today,” he growls - his pace now punishing and possessive and you know that’s exactly what is coloring his touch. You know how desperately he cares for you and how he longs to own you in all the ways that you’ll allow.

“Impossible,” you whisper before biting into his lower lip - his coppery blood blooming around your teeth. “I’d never leave you.”

He snorts and your brow wrinkles - eyes narrowing to slits before you squeeze your knees around his waist and flip him onto his back. His head cracks against the thick dirt - his naked back skidding through mud - and you place your palms on either side of his face.

“I wouldn’t,” you reassure him in a sweeter tone that hardly matches the way you’re riding him. A valkyrie on her horse - the bruises gleaming above your eye - the scrapes and slashes that are beginning to knit together across the map of your skin. There are some days or nights that you will shove your fingers into those raw wounds - keep them from closing around the bend in your knuckles as Thor fucks you - his cock spearing through your tender cunt until you are nothing but boneless and shaking from the pleasure and the pain.

He worries about you sometimes, but he understands. Neither of you is so different.

Even Loki says that.

You grin down at him - a white slash through the dark of your lips. His hands fly to your ass - to the fat that jiggles with each roll of your pelvis. You circle your hips and fuck down onto him - ruin him right there - the thick of his cock splitting your twitching cunt as he plants his feet and meets you stroke for stroke.

He raises your skirts just so he can watch where you’re taking him. Your lovely folds parted and swelling around the shiny rod of his length - glistening with your juice and your pleasure and then he moves his hand - pressing his thumb against your clit and it makes you shudder. He flicks it evenly - swirling and teasing until you tremble and nearly collapse forward. Your walls contracting around him - tightening tightening tightening until you snap and climax on top of him with one last shove of your hips.

“Pretty girl,” he croons. “Look at you - look at you fucking all of me - taking every inch. My perfect warrior. I could - I could watch you forever.”

And it’s true - it’s all so fucking true - the very sight of you sinking down on his cock and riding him to a gallop has made his belly turn over - has made him pulse and thicken and as his pelvis jerks and stutters, he feels himself spit inside you - threads of spend burrowing deep as it spills over and drips from your spasming pussy.

There’s a pause as you both catch your breath - the air suddenly silent after all that wet slapping flesh and obscene squelching and him groaning like an animal in heat. The ground rumbling with your sex since neither of you really knew how to hold back especially when your blood was screaming hot from a battle.

Fandral was probably getting himself off to it right this moment.

“Well,” he snarls - sated and happy as he slaps your ass affectionately. “That was fucking perfect.”

You bite your lip - curling your hair behind your ears as your mouth quirks into a smile. Almost shy.

“What is it?” he asks - reaching for your hand, grasping your wrist so he can tug it toward him for a kiss.

“Nothing,” you reply as you press down into him - both of your laps are soaked in the remnants of your cum and his. Your lashes flutter and all of those nasty cuts begin to smooth out to velvet skin.

“It’s something,” he presses - stroking your hips - your waist and belly. Your cunt still flexing around him - lower muscles gripping him all snug and maybe he could go one more time before the feast.

You start to speak.

“I-I just don’t want this to -”

Something sharp smashes him across the face.

***

Thor grunts - lurching away as another object crashes into his cheekbone.

“Fuck,” he snaps as he blindly tries to cover himself.

“No No No please don’t - don’t hurt him.”

Thor blinks and is suddenly very aware that you’re right next to him and that you are crying and punching out at him. He twists onto his side - his hands around your shoulders. You’re asleep - dreaming - and you struggle against him.

“Hey,” he murmurs. “Wake up, little one. You’re asleep. It’s a dream. It’s just a dream.”

You sob and it shocks him - the sound like a mother's wail bursting from your chest. You don’t usually show this side of yourself. You’re always too tough - too edged in bladed corners to reveal your softness.

That died a long time ago, Thor. Maybe even before Hela.

He says your name - breathes it out again and again until it catches hold. You stop moving and your eyes fly open - your lips parted on another shriek.

You squint in the dark.

“Thor?” You touch his face - frantically caressing his cheek and his jaw until you suddenly pull away as if you’d just realized what you were doing.

“You had a nightmare,” he explains. He’s fully lying on top of you - his body between your spread legs.

“You might have had a dream, too,” you quip - raising an eyebrow.

“What?”

He pulls back - only to realize that he’s hard - very fucking hard and his cock is nudging against the meat of your inner thigh.

He’d had a dream. A memory. One of the times in his tent.

You sit up onto your elbows - your lips breaking apart into a mischievous smile. “Was it of me at least?”

He wrenches himself away, shifting onto his back as he tries to calm himself down. But you stay close, your ankle hooking around his so you can lie on top of him. He fists a hand into your hair out of habit - his palm able to cradle the entire back of your head.

“Don’t,” he warns as you rub against him - your skin warm and soft and so inviting. He is this close to tossing you on the floor and screwing you until dawn.

“Was it of me?” Your tone is curious and weighted all at once.

There’s no point in lying. “Yes,” he replies gruffly. “It was, but I’m sure you already knew that.”

You simper before brushing your mouth over his nipple - tongue hot and damp against the tender flesh. It makes him jerk.

“What was your dream about?”

You immediately stiffen - your nails softly digging into his ribs. That was probably foolish to ask - foolish to press you too hard for information. You didn’t enjoy lowering your walls.

You surprise him, though.

“A nightmare,” you correct. “A memory.”

“About?”

“Thanos,” you answer and Thor’s nerves light up - that name still able to paint him in fear and remind him of his weaknesses. “When - when he tried to kill you - tortured you on the ship...”

Yes - he knows - remembers it in stark detail. Phantom pains in his neck and blood flying out of his mouth as red spittle. You screaming and begging on your knees and he had been so worried - so terrified that the Order would turn their sights on you - that they would read his baser terrors and slaughter you in front of him or worse...

He squeezes you tighter. “It’s over,” he reminds. “It’s done.”

You sigh - your breath warm as it fans across his own mouth. He hasn’t been this close to you in ages. You shove your brow to his and he draws his thumb across the plane of your cheek. You make a small sound - sad and helpless and it kills him - he wants to make you better - he wants to save you - make you stop trying to destroy yourself with each new battle. It’s all the same - always the same. Even these new fights with the Guardians are still shadowed in that desire to wreck oneself against the dangers of it - a wave breaking over rock and shell.

“Don’t think of him,” he continues. “We got out.”

You nod - a shrug of agreement.

More stillness. More quiet aside from the muted hum of the Benatar's engine - space colliding and rocking past them in seconds and inches and millions of leaps.

“I’m not drunk anymore,” you whisper and it makes him chuckle - makes him fill, his cock eagerly twitching against your buttery skin. You always bring it back to sex - as soon as the air between you gets too tense - strangles you too tightly - you change course.

He’d go along with it. He missed you deeply.

“You’d like to celebrate as we used to then? Fuck until neither of us can walk very well?”

He had thought he’d lost you. A thousand times and a thousand ways and he wonders when he will ever get the courage to finally settle it - to tell you of his love and his devotion and how there will be no one else for him. No woman or man who could ever shake him from you.

“I would like to make love,” you counter and it makes him still - makes his eyes sweep your face - searching searching searching - for the truth of it. Your expression bare and young in the electric-blue light of this ship. The place that has carried you both away from the scars of your old life.

He doesn’t recall the last time he had made love.

Though - if he were being honest - every time with you - even the most brutal moments - had been a form of love.

It doesn’t matter, he thinks, as he lightly snakes his hand into your air. Your sharp inhale as your lips part over his mouth and he takes his chance - lunging forward to kiss you like he had wanted to - like he hadn’t allowed himself to hours before.

You breathe into him, the whine of pleasure colliding not far behind as you curl your fingers around his jaw. His chest unfurls with it - the punch of your hot gasp on his exploring tongue.