Yessë
I watch him blink, every inch of him perfect in the unearthly blue-white light,
and I know his mind. He does not understand and I do not
expect him to. At least he does not yet. But soon, he will. Soon.
"Hit me, Boromir".
He frowns, looks up at me as I stand before the place where he is
sitting, before his gaze quickly drops to the grass beneath our feet,
fingers toying with the mail showing beneath his sleeves. And then he
glances up at me, as though he cannot decide if I actually mean for
him to do this. I do. I almost long for it. From him.
"You... you mean for me to... do this?" he stammers, daring at last to
lift his face and look me in the eye. I nod, I smile. "But... why?"
"You ask too many questions", I say. "Stand up". He does not
move. "Stand up, man. Stand up". I seize his wrists, pull him roughly
to his feet and the look on his face is enough to stir my soul; he
does not understand, though he is trying. "Now, hit me".
The feeble excuse for a slap that follows is not even enough to
sting. I quirk an eyebrow at him, and I know he knows that means `you
can do better'. So, reluctantly, he tries again. And this time it
does sting. But that is all.
"I did not ask you to slap me, Boromir", I say. "I asked you to hit
me. Make a fist and hit me. Hit me. Hard. What are you afraid of?
I'm asking you to do it. I want you to do it. What is it that you
are waiting for?"
I shove him, not hard, but hard enough to make him stumble. He frowns
at me and I do it again; this time the tree trunk where he was
sitting blocks him as he tries to regain his footing and he trips,
forced to sit. I step closer, standing between his thighs, looking
down at him. I twist a hand in his hair, yank back his head, force
his gaze to mine as he sits there. He's frowning again.
I bend close to his ear, beard rasping against his cheek and he tries
to turn away but I do not allow it. "Hit me, Boromir", I whisper. And
I stand back, hold out my arms to my sides. "Come on, hit me. You
know you want to do it. You hate me. I'm heir to the throne of
Gondor. Perhaps I will ride to the White City and claim what is mine;
then where will you stand? Or perhaps I will stand by and watch as
Sauron takes your city. You hate me because you do not know what I
will do. Do I anger you, Boromir? Don't you want to hurt me, wipe
this smile from my face? What sort of a man are you? Come on!"
He launches himself at me, and I do not even try to avoid it as his
fist connects sharply, jarringly with my jaw, sending tingling
shivers through me. I am knocked to my knees; I spit out a mouthful
of blood and look up at him over my shoulder, swiping my sleeve over
my bloody lip as my heart races madly in my chest. He just gapes at
me for a second then he is on his knees beside me, holding my head in
his hands, babbling some kind of apology. For a moment I let him,
enjoying the touch of his palms against my cheeks, my neck, his thumb
against the split in my lip, but then I push him away and smile as he
falls back against the grass, frowning up at me.
"Is that all you have?" I ask, smirking down at him. I step over,
slap him hard across the cheek, hard enough to redden his face and
sting my hand. "You can do better".
Growling low in his throat, he tackles me to the ground. I land
awkwardly below him, pain jarring through my shoulder, but, teeth
bared, I shove him, hard, and he tumbles to my side. In a second I am
over him, straddling his hips, and I hit him, flesh sliding smoothly
over hard bone beneath my fist. And he smiles up at me with bloody
lips. Before his fist strikes my jaw and I am knocked to the flat of
my back, winded.
He drags me to my feet, forces his knee up into my stomach, colliding
with my aching ribs. And even as I gasp for breath I lunge at him,
blood pumping wildly in my veins as I strike him hard against his
chest and then his shoulder; I watch as he falls away from me, to his
knees, and I wrap my forearm around his neck, under his chin, pulling
back as hard as I dare. He clutches at it, claws at my skin; suddenly
the back of his head smashes back against the top of mine and he
turns quickly, traps my hands above my head, plants a knee blunt and
heavy against my sternum.
I struggle against him, watching as he leans over me, hair dampened
with sweat and blood, face smeared bloody red though whether that is
all his blood I cannot be sure. And he smiles at me, teeth a bloody
pink beneath swollen lips. He knows I could escape if I wished. But
he knows I will not.
He leans down above me, hair hanging around his face and brushing
against my cheeks, eyes hovering just inches above my own. He leans
down a little further, the knee he has against my chest digging down,
pressing all his weight against me painfully and I can hardly move
enough to draw breath. He stoops down further, takes my bottom lip
between his teeth, runs the tip of his tongue over the split. And I
swear I'm purring, writhing beneath him as he kisses me now, taking
the knee from my chest, settling himself over my hips instead. He
kisses me, hot and hard and perfect.
I missed the taste of his blood. It has been too long since the last
time I cut him, ran my tongue over his warm, soft muscles, tasted the
coppery tang of blood and knew he was at my mercy completely. I do
not understand why he would make himself so vulnerable for me, and
yet he has. In Rivendell, the night we met, I first saw what could be
between us. On the long journey past the Misty Mountains he came to
me, asked me to do it again; I took a dagger, I cut him, bled him,
tasted him... it was as if he needed, yearned for me to do it. And
Moria, at night, as the others slept, I swept the leather from his
chest and drew my knife down over it as the fire shone in his eyes.
He asked me to do it. And I did it. For him.
I sweep my tongue over his lips, taste his blood and mine. He
releases my hands and they go to his shoulder, his cheek, pull him
down further toward me. Here I am, lying here on the grassy ground in
the woods of Lothlórien. And this time I am the one doing all of the
asking. Here and now, here I am asking him to do something for me.
For one night I wish not to carry this weight, this looming
birthright, this name. Elrond understood, always. He would look at me
and know what it was that I needed, and he would give it to me. But
then, Arwen... she complicated things between us. She embodies my duty,
stands for everything I would forget. I love her though the love of
her means that I must be king, that her father will not come near me...
Boromir. Son of the Steward of Gondor. He would not have me claim the
throne. He would not care if I remained a Ranger and never claimed my
birthright. I think if I did not he may take me with him, back to his
city, to Minas Tirith, keep me with him because of how I understand
him. And sometimes, lying awake in the night, keeping watch, I think
I may want that, to be his and not my own, to belong to him and not
to fate. I know that in this moment I do. And I think that I will
want it at least as long as this quest may last.
I unclasp his jacket, slide it back over his shoulders. His fingers
work at my shirt—he moves back, sitting over my thighs, pulling me
up with him so that he may discard the shirt and run his hands over
my tender, bruised chest. Somehow he has managed to shrug off his
shirt and his mail, and he is sitting there in front of me with just
his bracers on his arms. I reach out, lay my hand upon the tough
leather, tuck my fingertips under the buckles, feel the soft skin of
his wrist; he wraps his other arm about my shoulders and sweeps me up
in another bloody kiss.
In the morning I know I will bear bruises. But that does not matter.
Or perhaps that was the reason for all this. He has marked me, shown
his passion for me physically in a way I can display for all to see.
I will bear the bruises that he gave to me, as he bears my cuts. A
passion shared, it seems. And we will do this again. I will feel his
hands upon me, hurting yet not harming me, claiming me, marking me as
his own.
"What I said... about the White City..." I begin as he lays me down in
the soft grass, as his hands move to my belt. I need for him to know,
it was not true, just a trick, a cheap trick, necessary but wrong of
me. "I..." He stops my mouth, placing his fingers softly over my
swollen lips.
"You meant not what you said", he says, running his fingers sadly
over the jewel about my neck, the jewel that feels now more weight
than mere decoration. I nod, try to smile. "I know. Thank you,
Aragorn". Now his fingers leave the Evenstar—they let go and twine
in my hair, pull me into another kiss.
So now I know. What we have is far from over, because now he
understands. We are far from the end and the anticipation of what is
to come... it shivers through me as I look up into his clear eyes. This
is far from over. This is only the beginning.
by Lizzie
it me".
