#mmmmmmmm yeah

oh man yeah i am also frequently rotating that scene around in my head like a rotisserie chicken—especially now that i’ve actually written out some bergenia and there’s a more tangible basis to build off of from that preceding dynamic. she just has to be on all the time with beron. always preempting. always catering. always doing the pleasing. he’s so fickle towards her because he can be, and she has to be ahead of it to keep him as benevolent towards her as possible.

cue tamlin, who is a high lord like beron, with iphigenia, who assumes this high lord will expect her to please him like beron did, in a situation with sexual underpinnings: shimmering water, scantily clad bodies. her own body has become an inherently sexual thing to her, one that is foremost meant to please no matter the cost to her. she can’t imagine a high lord looking at her differently than that, which chafes her—because tamlin has become different than that. it’s a terrible dissonance as she undresses and feels his eyes on her, off her, on her, off her. she wants him; she wants him to want her; she doesn’t want it to be like it was with beron but she has absolutely no frame of reference for how else it could be.

after a while of swimming probably for tamlin’s gratification—with tamlin keeping himself either to the shallows or the shore—she gathers up the courage to approach. i’m picturing sunlight gleaming off of her, naked and sparkling, her hair long and dark with the water in it. he finally has nowhere to look but fully at her, and he’s hungry. she can see it in his eyes; she can feel it on the air, a current on the breeze so strong it makes her own mouth water. but she isn’t supposed to give into that. she’s supposed to do what he wants of her. so she straddles him, and she arches her back just right, presses down onto his lap where it will please him best, touches him coquettishly—the side of the neck, the shoulders, the chest. her absolute favorite part of his body. but whoops! this isn’t about her.

they kiss a long while, but she’s too focused on him to get into it. she’s arranging herself on him to entice him and spark pleasure through him. he’s hard; she can feel him prominently between her thighs. but he isn’t … enjoying it? that hunger she can taste on her tongue feels stymied—dissatisfied. and a dissatisfied high lord is a very bad thing. so she gets agitated, and because she gets agitated, he gets less and less into it. probably tries to disengage once or twice, but she latches onto him even harder every time, her heart leaping in her chest. because she likes him, and she doesn’t want to see how he would be cruel to her—so she has to please him so that she’s never made to mislike him. the illusion of a kind lover, a kind high lord, a kind friend can be maintained.

she pushes him back into the grass, starts kissing down his chest, his abdomen. unlaces his trousers. takes him into her mouth. he’s hard! he’s obviously attracted to her. but she knows all the tells of a pleased, powerful male, and he’s just not into it. at this point, tamlin’s like. alright, i’m taking matters into my own hands here because she’s not picking up what i’m putting down. (because why would she ever assume what he wanted of her was for her to genuinely enjoy herself?) he flips her over, and this time he’s kissing her. he’s going down on her. for her! he’s attuning to her body’s needs! i genuinely thinks she comes so fast just from how pent up she’s been with beron using her for his own pleasure/the shock of how it’s supposed to feel. she gets like self conscious and panicked—but tamlin is right back on it, and now his desire finally feels sated.

Chat I made a Pepis

langdon caul was a man of color

OOOOOH TRUE!

My guess is he’ll wear something more official, like the outfit he wore at the street parade, maybe less armored, but yes, that!