Curiosity's Paradox

*Curiosity's Paradox Part 1*

A man's back, as a beast's, was made to bear, and Eomer, freed by his lieutenant's consent and lost in new sensations, had not worried about Tael's overmuch when he had flogged him. Likewise the guilt that had assailed him thereafter was less for what he had done than for having felt the need to do it.

A man's belly is another matter. He might have flailed his own mercilessly, but as Eomer swung the whip towards Tael's abdomen now he thought about the vital organs snug beneath, about the sensitive nipples above and the cock below even more so. He was not relieved of the desire to see, to feel, almost to taste leather slicing against skin, but indulging it became less an expulsion of power than a playing upon the delicate thread of tension stretched between two sets of dark eyes watching each other intently, between the flick of Eomer's wrist and the sounds that issued from Tael's throat. A lick of the thongs here, at this point on the firm body, with this much force, might make the younger man grunt… there, like so, a stinging slap would make him gasp, or pant, or give a drawn-out moan that made Eomer's cock twitch. A pulse, a rhythm, a dance, a flowering of red lines upon the flesh that rose and fell with the flow of Tael's breath.

But finally a blow landed that made the lieutenant's outstretched body buck involuntarily, and the cry that flew from his mouth before his will could strangle it made Eomer abruptly drop the whip to his side.

"That was too much," he breathed. "I am sorry."

Though his brow was beaded with sweat Tael's gaze was as clear and cool as ever.

"In time you will learn, my lord, that it is the one beneath the lash who determines what is too much and what is not."

Eomer's eyes widened as though Tael had landed a blow of his own.

"Curse you," the marshal snarled quietly, turning away. "I wish to learn nothing further."

He dropped heavily down upon his sleeping pallet.

"Unless…"

His voice trailed away, and his right hand, abandoning the whip, came up to press at his temples and creased brow.

Tael calmly unbent cramped fingers from around the centre-pole of the tent and slowly massaged blood back into them.

"Unless," he ventured softly to finish his lord's thought, "it be to understand how you have found yourself at this pass in the first place."

Eomer's movements stilled and there was a long moment of silence.

"You should leave now, Tael."

Tael saw no reason not to keep pushing the luck that had served him well so far through this encounter.

"I would rather try to help you, my lord."

The marshal gave him no acquiescence but neither did he repeat his command.

Tael took the few steps to Eomer and sat beside him on the pallet.

"It seems to me you think you have stumbled into some strange new world of shadow and threat, my lord. In truth you have simply discovered that the boundaries of your own world are a little more expansive than you had realised."

Eomer's broad body remained motionless and Tael pressed on.

"What lies between two people is always expressed as much in force as in gentleness. Do we not hold each other down and love each other until the intensity of pleasure becomes a pain that we fight through to find yet greater pleasure? Do we not wake sore and aching from what we have wreaked upon one other in the night, our skin marked with bites and bruises we may hide from the world yet show to each other with a smile? These things are evidence of the strength of our desire and our need for one other. We are not outraged or sickened by them, but proud: proud to be loved and wanted so."

Eomer was looking at him now.

"What you and I have shared, my lord, is an extension of that. An intensification, a rarification. And but a mere beginning of what I can show you, if you so desire."

Eomer stared, and his words stumbled from him, croaking.

"But you… you had no part in how this began… I took up the whip… I started this myself…"

Tael smile at the other man's look of confusion was shot through with sympathy. He took up Eomer's broad hand and, finding no resistance, placed it over his lord's cock, still insistently pressing against the inside of his breeches.

"Was it not by your own efforts that you were first brought to completion? I have little doubt of it. So why must you make a mystery where there is none? Many pleasures we discover and enjoy alone take on a deeper resonance when shared with another soul."

Eomer bit his lip as Tael slipped his hand from Eomer’s spread one and slowly worked his cock through the leather, thumb stroking bare skin beneath the loosened ties. Tael ached to undo them completely and take his lord in his mouth, but knew he must be patient. Instead he rose, noting with satisfaction the small sigh of loss that escaped Eomer as his hand left him, and moved lightly over to the marshal's riding gear. Without seeking permission he calmly searched through it until he had found the small leather pack each Rider carried with liniments and salves for both man and mount, a rudimentary first aid kit to treat the everyday scrapes and strains of their warrior life. He returned to the pallet with it and withdrew a small pot of healing herbs crushed and mixed with a soothing cream.

With his free hand Tael lightly caressed the whip lying between them.

"You have experienced a little of the force that comes with this expression of the self within. Now I would show you a little of its gentleness, if you will allow. Let me tend you, my lord."

Eomer saw only sincerity in his lieutenant's face.

The marshal took a considering breath in and out, then slowly lay back upon the furs that covered the pallet, keeping himself propped upon his elbows so that he might keep watch. Tael went to work on him with supple, capable fingers. With each fresh application of ointment upon his skin Eomer felt the initial sting of it doing its work, then a stage of numbness, then a warmth that would have relaxed him had he been treating himself. Tael was moving methodically from belly to shoulders. Although his touch upon the lower body carried unavoidable intimations of the sexual, with Eomer's cock aware and aching to be touched, the later contact as he travelled over chest and shoulders was somehow even more intimate, his eyes, his face, his essence ever closer to Eomer's.

Eomer had not failed to notice the younger man's interest in him ere this night. Despite Tael's complete discretion, the marshal knew the signs of a subordinate's affection by now, and a few intercepted glances that had lingered too long before a shy turning away had been all it took to alert him. Eomer was very careful about any involvement with his men. It seemed to him that life protecting Rohan's borders was harsh enough without having to navigate the pitfalls of emotional attachment in circumstances where any of them could be dead on the morrow. When he needed a lover he preferred to take one from amongst the older and more battle-hardened soldiers of his eored, who gave and received pleasure pragmatically, without expectation. Certainly he had never indulged himself with any of the greener Riders who yearned towards him with the eager lust and capacity for hero-worship of the young, happy for them rather when their attention was claimed by another.

So the fact that he was here with Tael now, throwing all his carefully imposed rules to the wind, was somewhat extraordinary. But then, for him at least, so was the scarlet tapestry throbbing upon both their skins.

Tael was done now, the last mark upon Eomer's shoulder anointed and soothed, and his head was level with his marshal's. He looked squarely into the face he found so beautiful: the wide, noble brow with its centre crease etched by Eomer's occasionally ferocious frowns, dark eyes large and deep enough to drown in, sculpted cheek and jaw, a short turned-up nose that lent him boyishness when he did chance to smile, and full lips that in his waking life Tael had to try hard not to think about kissing. But having had the privilege of tasting them the once he was certainly thinking about it now.

The young man the marshal saw was equally pleasing to his eye and always had been, although he had never had been given cause to study him as closely or as freshly as he did this night. Tael's bone structure was more delicate that Eomer's but not his demeanour, his clear brown eyes and wide mobile mouth lending strength to his youth. Eomer noticed Tael's nostrils quivering slightly, like a horse that has reached a familiar stable.

"You smell so good to me, my lord," said Tael softly. "It is strange, is it not, how the scents of some of people attract us more than others, even if our eyes are equally drawn?"

" Tael..." Eomer wanted to confide that he liked Tael's scent too, but somehow to say it seemed a declaration of so much more than simply that, and the words died in his throat.

Tael sensed his marshal's hesitation and for a brief moment his eyes clouded. Then he blinked and they were clear again. He retrieved the salve and held it in his palm, looking at Eomer.

It was a question and a challenge and somewhere beneath both of these a plea, and Eomer welcomed the opportunity to wipe away the hurt his failure to speak had caused. He took the salve.

"Turn around, Tael. Give me your back."

When his hands touched Tael's reddened skin he expected to feel disgusted with himself afresh but strangely he did not. He had wanted to mark Tael, and Tael had wanted to be marked. The care he took now to anoint the abused yet somehow glorying flesh beneath his fingers felt in direct proportion to the force with which he had inflicted the blows, as though the answering half of a ritual.

There is force here. There is gentleness here.

Eomer felt miraculously cleansed and whole. When his work had been completed from Tael's shoulders to the base of his spine it was all the marshal could do not to lay himself against his lieutenant and rest there in gratitude. Instead he wrapped a broad hand in the boy's hair and massaged the base of his skull briefly, hearing him give a soft groan in response.

"Your front now, Tael," Eomer commanded.

" Mmnn…" Tael rubbed his head back against Eomer's fingers like a cat being scratched.

"Must I ask you again?" Eomer smiled.

"You did not ask me, my lord," murmured Tael, still moving luxuriously.

"Ha, true enough. Well then, pedantic one, will you give me your front?"

"My lord…"

I will give you anything you desire.

Tael managed to keep back the response he longed to give, and instead rearranged himself on the pallet to present himself as requested.

When Eomer had plied the whip upon Tael the second time, it had been less of a desperate plunge into surrender, more an exploration and even the beginnings of a game. As a counterpart now, Eomer's reverence started to take on an edge of play. He still faithfully tended the welts and cuts upon his lieutenant, but he allowed his fingertips to roam as they served, tracing over the strong collarbones and muscled chest, teasing nipples into pebbled hardness, circling a thumb gently in Tael's belly-button, softly scratching the thatch of fur that covered his pelvis. Everything he did was slow and languorous, designed to fan the flame already glowing between them.

He seduces where I am already seduced, thought Tael, trying to keep his breathing under control, fighting not to writhe like a wanton beneath his lord's strong hand. But he could only cry out when Eomer lowered his golden head and took the tip of Tael's engorged arousal in his mouth.

Yes… oh, my beautiful lord… yes…

One wide hand came to rest on his balls, stroking gently, and the marshal's tongue lapped magnificently around the crown of his cock.

Oh, my lord… please…

As though the thought gave birth to the deed, Eomer's mouth sank down upon him. Tael groaned and gave up all pretense at control, hips rising to thrust his cock eagerly into that tight wet embrace. Eomer laughed throatily around Tael's shaft and brought his other arm over his belly to hold him down as his tongue snaked over sensitised flesh. The hand that had caressed Tael's balls now grasped his cock tightly at the base and starting to move in rhythm with Eomer's mouth. The lieutenant abandoned himself to the pleasure he had craved so long and never dared to think he might experience. Tongue, mouth, fingers, heat, slick moisture, suction, all these combined to rob Tael of thought, save for marvelling that it was Eomer, his marshal Eomer, lavishing this attention upon his body.

Yes… oh, yes… oh… oh, yes…

No.

Somewhere inside himself Tael shouted in anguish as his will imposed itself implacably upon his ecstasy.

But why? My lord wants me.

Does he now? Do you think just because you are in the marshal's quarters this act somehow means more than any casual cock-sucking behind the kitchen tent after a hard day's riding?

Of course it does. We have shared something. We are kindred.

You fool, he has paid you no special notice ere now. More likely he does you penance for the marks he has carved into your flesh. Pays you for services rendered and thus assuages his guilt at what he sees as dark and wrong.

He does not think thus... I have helped him…. he moves towards understanding…

You know nothing of what he thinks or understands. Let alone what he may want of you beyond this night. Or rather may not.

Then I will ask him.

Fool.

Tael grabbed a handful of the marshal's blond hair and tugged gently.

"Stop, my lord. Please…"

It took a few more moments of aching pleasure for Eomer to realise what Tael was demanding. He let the still-rampant shaft slip from his mouth and looked up at his lieutenant, a ghost of his habitual frown threatening his brow, and panting slightly from his exertions.

"What is wrong, Tael?"

Tael stared wide-eyed at the beautiful, stern face. Tonight he had nursed Eomer through fear and self-doubt, but he was a leader of men and he was strong, so strong. Tael felt his will and his desire fuse into a pride that demanded that the marshal should only be shown strength in return.

There would be no quavering words, no begging for answers or favours. He would not ask what Eomer wanted. He would tell him what he, Tael, wanted. And there would be all, or there would be nothing.

"You do no wrong, my lord."

"Then what?"

Tael took a breath and eyed his marshal steadily.

"I want to be inside you."

Eomer raised a gently amused eyebrow at such boldness.

"You were inside my mouth but a moment ago."

Ay, as I have been in countless tormenting dreams, Tael thought, and the reality surpasses them all. But it is not enough.

"I want more."

The slightest hint of doubt crept into Eomer's eyes beneath their warmth as his wide hands stroked the lieutenant's thighs, fingers curling into short coarse hairs that thickened around his genitals.

"Are my talents not sufficient to your needs?"

Tael shivered.

"You know they are, my lord, and more. I would gladly yield my manhood to your mouth at any other moment but this. But my manhood is not everything that I am. And with everything that I am, I want more."

His eyes held Eomer's with the same cool decisiveness he had shown throughout their evening's encounter; his voice was soft, fervent, aching, a lover's voice.

There is force here, thought Eomer absently. There is gentleness here. And I have absolutely no idea what might befall me should I choose to dive beneath waters that contain these two extremes.

With the fingers of one hand tracing over Tael's heavy sac, Eomer slid the other down the boy's shaft and rubbed his thumb over the liquid gathering at its tip. He licked the thumb; he lapped slowly once more over the satiny head of Tael's cock, holding him briefly in his mouth. Then in one fluid lift of his powerful shoulders he raised himself up to sitting.

"I can promise you nothing, Tael."

"I need no promise, my lord."

The two men eyed each other for a long moment, then Eomer reached for the leather pouch Tael had brought from his belongings. He drew out a small glass phial of oil and silently proffered it.

Tael took the phial with a steady hand and a shaky breath he tried to quell.

And Eomer rose from the pallet and began to unlace his breeches.

*****

*Curiosity's Paradox - Part 2*

For a few moments, mesmerised, Tael watched Eomer's strong fingers pulling the leather ties from the deerskin hide drawn around his hips. Then he knelt up on the furs before the marshal and gently pushed the wide hand away so he might continue the task himself, shivering as his knuckles brushed the hot, silky skin beneath.

Tael could not help the sigh that escaped him when Eomer's thick cock was finally revealed in all its veined and heavy majesty. It reared hard and curved and proud before him, commanding the attention he was all too willing to give. He took its length reverently in his hand and pressed his face between Eomer's thighs, nuzzling the ample sac the cock rested upon, lapping experimentally with his tongue and breathing in the delightfully musky scent. He felt Eomer's hands rest lightly in his hair, and, grasping the marshal's firm buttocks, he started to give the shaft long, slow, worshipful licks from base to tip, then worked his tongue into the slit and harvested the dew gathered there. Oh, the taste of his lord. Eomer.

He wasn't anywhere near tired of his explorations when it was Eomer's turn to lift his mouth away.

"You will undo ere you have me, lad," he rumbled softly. "Is that what you want?"

Tael's eyes shone. "There is nothing I do not want of you, my lord."

He took hold of the band of Eomer's breeches, pulling them over his strong thighs and down to the ground. When Eomer had stepped out of them Tael took hold of one firmly muscled forearm and tugged him onto the furs. The marshal lay back upon his elbows as he had before and watched his lieutenant prepare.

Tael pulled the stopper from the phial and poured golden oil into his cupped palm. He let it pool and warm there for a moment before running his other palm over it, coating each liberally, and grasped his cock. Eomer felt air snag in his throat as Tael worked his oiled hands over the hard shaft until it too was slicked.

"My lord."

Eomer slowly drew his legs up and Tael moved between them, pouring more of the oil over outstretched fingers and sliding them between Eomer's buttocks. The marshal gave a grunt when Tael found the ring of muscle he sought and began to massage it open. Tael bit his lip and watched his marshal's face as he breached him, long-lashed eyelids fluttering over dark eyes and the line of his jaw standing out more prominently as his breathing began to change. Once two fingers had gained entrance to the tight passage, Tael poured a last few drops of oil upon them to work them in further. Eomer's soft moans brought a smile to the boy's lips as he added a third finger and slowly rotated his wrist, his other hand steady and soothing on Eomer's belly. The two men locked gazes, Eomer's hips began to move, and he bore down upon the fingers inside him. Tael's belly lurched. All his imaginings combined could not have readied him for the beauty that was his marshal abandoning himself to the pleasure he offered.

"My lord?" he murmured, a question this time.

"I am ready, Tael."

Briefly there flared across the lieutenant's fancy the image of teasing the older man, an unbearable stop-start dance of fingers moving inside him and a firm palm working and then stilling upon his cock until Eomer begged and cried to be filled and satisfied. Tael prayed he might have that opportunity, but he knew tonight had not been given to him for such lovers' games.

Eomer drew his knees up towards his shoulders and Tael moved in close so that there might only be the barest second lost as he replaced his fingers with his oiled shaft. It was his turn to groan as his swollen, sensitive head touched Eomer's braced, expectant flesh for the first time. So many nights, so many dreams. All real now. All his. He took a breath and pushed, trying not to whimper as his tip was engulfed by tight heat.

Eomer breathed deeply, willing himself to relax and surrender against the stretch and burn and sting of his lieutenant filling him. During Tael's slow, inexorable invasion he neither asked the marshal how he fared nor withdrew to any degree to give him relief, but the smile he gave him was reassuring - indeed, all but radiant - and he seemed uncannily attuned to his task, as though timing his slide exactly to Eomer's ability to take him in.

"There," whispered Tael, when finally he finally had sunk himself to the hilt. A statement of possession. A caress.

Tael felt his balls pressed tight and seed-heavy against his marshal, and it made him quiver to think that soon he would be spilling himself inside him, let alone that he had ever been given permission to do so. But he wanted to savour this moment which might never come again. He held himself still, gazing intently upon Eomer's wild, handsome face, revelling in the warmth and breadth, the sheer bulk, of the body beneath his and the exquisite grip of the inner muscles encasing his cock. Tael's nostrils flared. Leather, salve, sweat. Eomer. Raw, heated perfection.

Eomer, every nerve ending screaming for what his lieutenant was poised to give, could only bear stasis for so long and no longer.

"Move, Tael," he breathed.

Tael blinked. He had slid into a state where he almost felt he could have stayed, rapt and unmoving, inside his marshal until sunrise. But on hearing Eomer give his order, voice husky and aching with need, his reverie melted instantly, leaving only desire, heavy and squirming in his belly like a serpent about to uncoil.

"I hear and obey, my lord."

Tael leaned forward, supporting his weight on his hands. Slowly he pulled nearly all the way out of Eomer's tight, oiled channel, and, equally slowly, ground himself back in. And out. A sigh from his lord. Back in. A moan. And out. Unbearable friction. Back in. Delicious heat.

Eomer's lower body rocked and found a rhythm to meet him thrust for thrust. Tael tried hard to keep his pace measured, wanting to take care, wanting to tantalise, wanting to keep the control he prized, but as his hips powered his aching cock deep into his adored marshal the slicked velvet heat tightly throbbing and pulsing around him unleashed a ravening need that could not be brought to heel. Beyond the reach of his will, what he had wanted to be artful pleasuring rapidly transformed into a fierce and merciless assault but it was no matter, for Eomer met it, matched it and challenged it to become more savage still with every surge of his strong body around Tael's. There were no kisses, no endearments, no words at all. Tael longed to breathe Eomer's name but he dared not, while Eomer had no idea how to address his familiar subordinate now made the most intimate of strangers. Instead, two sets of brown eyes locked as the Rohirrim heaved and strove against each other, gasps that slowly mounted to growls the medium to communicate their pleasure, their wonder.

Eomer felt Tael's relentless pounding driving him to the point that was the beginning of his fall over the edge and roughly pulled his lieutenant fully down upon him. Both men hissed as their whip-scored bellies slid over each other, Eomer caught between the smarting of Tael's salty sweat in his wounds and the delight of his weight rubbing along his swollen shaft. The feel of his lord's cock upon his flesh brought Tael, all but mind-blown by the tightness of Eomer's arse clenching around him, back to his senses enough to snake a hand between their undulating bodies and grasp Eomer tightly. Focused now, he gritted his teeth and began to work him mercilessly, determined that the marshal should have his climax first. Tael had borne the arousal of two assaults of the whip, of Eomer's mouth around him and now his glorious heat and was aching to come and come hard but he vowed to hold on.

Eomer, straining for his final fulfillment, lifted his legs the last bit higher around Tael, and ah, there it was, the perfect angle where Tael's cock squarely hit the tiny nub inside him, sending white lightning bolts across his vision and ecstasy arcing like wildfire through his body. For moments of eternity the whole world was simply the cock in his arse, the hand on his shaft and his tight balls poised between them ready to explode, then with a howl of completion he was shooting hot seed between their pressed bellies. Tael's cry of triumph that he had not been bested by his own need fell into feral moans as Eomer's climax bucked his hips wildly beneath him and set tight rings of muscle squeezing Tael's cock in such ferocious spasms the younger man could only give up his own orgasm in answer, filling Eomer's arse with semen that made his last uncontrollable thrusts so deliciously hot and wet he thought he might pass out from the bliss of it. A last shuddering pulse of his spent manhood later, Tael collapsed upon his lord, body quivering with aftershocks that threatened never to die away to stillness.

For an age there was only sated heaviness between the two men. Then there was an awareness of warmth and breath and sweat and tangled limbs. Then there was Eomer and Tael cradled dazedly in each other's arms. And at last there was the two of them remembering who and where they were, looking at each other while Tael slowly pulled out of Eomer's body. He shivered at the soft groan the marshal gave as arse released cock, then he lay down beside him.

Eomer reached out a hand and touched his lieutenant's face.

"You wanted more…"

Tael's face was grave.

"And I received it."

Eomer's eyebrow arched again.

"I think it was I who received it."

The ghost of a smile playing about the marshal's lips allowed Tael to smile softly in return.

"Satisfactorily I hope, my lord."

"What do you think?"

Tael considered.

"Sufficient to you needs, perhaps?"

Eomer gave a proper smile this time, the one that to Tael always erased the marshal's familiar frowns as though they had never been.

"And more, perhaps."

After which they both fell silent. Because that gentle joking upon words exchanged earlier in the evening proved they already had a history, a frame of reference shared by two lovers, and they did not know what that meant for the morrow.

"I would kiss you, my lord," Tael ventured.

Eomer gave him a look from beneath heavy eyelids that, spent as it was, made Tael's cock stir.

"And quite possibly I wished to be kissed. I think you should find out."

Tael reached out and tangled a hand in the marshal's mussed wheaten mane, then leaned in and brushed Eomer's full lips with his own. Soft teasing kisses gave way to tongues meeting, became mouths opening and exploring and finally taking each other with passion and hunger. As moments passed a part of Tael tensed, waiting for the marshal to be the one to pull away first, but when he had not before Tael himself had to draw breath he was emboldened.

Eomer lay back with a sigh when it seemed Tael's kisses were not to be confined to his mouth. He closed his eyes the better to enjoy the warm, tickling sensation of lips travelling over his jaw, his neck, his shoulders. He laughed softly when Tael pressed his nose and mouth deep into one of his armpits - if Tael liked his scent he was certainly going to have his fill of it there - then hissed when his lieutenant skated back over his chest and gently fastened his teeth upon one sensitive nipple while he pinched the other between his fingertips. Finally he groaned when he felt Tael's warm, wet tongue upon him and realised the younger man was lapping up the traces of the semen Eomer himself had spilled upon his belly.

Eomer wound a hand in Tael's hair and lifted his head.

" Tael, you need not."

Tael looked at him innocently.

"Wounds must be kept clean, my lord."

"I hardly think my own seed will harm me."

His lieutenant gave him a rather feline grin.

"Better to be safe than sorry, don't you think?"

"Surely you will taste the healing salve." Eomer wasn't sure why he was arguing when the thought of what Tael wanted to do was rapidly making him hard again. "It is none too pleasant."

Tael dipped down and gave another, experimental, lick. He smiled back up at the marshal.

"We must have sweated it off. I can only taste you."

He looked enquiringly at Eomer, who gave a shrug and a smile in return.

"Ay then, I can see you are not to be gainsaid."

He surrendered to the sensation of Tael's tongue trailing upon him, his lashed belly quivering from both its softness and from the air cooling the moisture it left there, and his manhood bobbing back into life as though it too might relish some attention.

"Will you turn over for me now, my lord?" Tael murmured.

Eomer complied, wondering just how far Tael's playful adherence to cleanliness was going to be taken, considering the boy's seed was still slicking his arse, but he found it was rather his back that seemed to interest Tael now. The lieutenant ran his hands slowly over its planes, from broad shoulders to the tapering at his waist, to the base of his spine just above the flare of his buttocks. Fingers gently worked corded muscle, and palms smoothed the flesh that had just been kneaded before passing on. Then Tael pressed against him and again Eomer felt the soft warm tongue upon him, this time drawing a line across his shoulder blades.

"There is a mark here I did not see before," murmured the lieutenant.

"Ay," Eomer confirmed wryly, "I set it there ere I discovered the joy of whipping my belly to a pulp."

Tael gave a quiet chuckle against the marshal's neck, then drew back tangled blond tresses so he could kiss the skin beneath. Next Eomer heard a rustle in the furs and felt Tael drop something softly upon his shoulder and start to draw it gently over his flesh.

The whip.

"My beautiful lord," Tael said reverently, "if some other night you might allow, I would score another work of art into this existing one, and make it doubly beautiful in my eyes. I have little doubt you would enjoy the process."

He felt his marshal quiver beneath touch of the leather thongs. Eomer's voice was low.

"Why do you not offer to do it now?"

The whip caressed him, the hand stroked him, and then lips dropped softly to his skin and their words gently vibrated against his warm flesh.

"You have had enough for tonight, I judge. Perhaps for awhile even. And I do not wish to rush something I consider sacred."

Strength and gentleness, mused Eomer.

Tael must have set down the whip, because now both hands stroked the marshal again. Soothed him. Worked a gentle lullaby right into him. Eomer felt his eyelids getting heavy and his awareness starting to haze.

" Tael… I'm…"

"Sleep, my lord," murmured the lieutenant, "you deserve your rest. I consider you have fought a battle of a sort tonight, after all."

Eomer gave a soft snort.

"And been soundly fucked… after all…"

Even as Eomer fell towards oblivion he could hear the smile in Tael's voice.

"Yes, that too."

Although Eomer was indeed exhausted in a way, it was only the short sleep after passion that claimed him. Perhaps a bare quarter of an hour had passed before he woke with a dry mouth in need of a draught of water before sleeping again. He lazily reached out an arm toward the drinking flask he kept by his pallet to find he was covered by a blanket and Tael was over by the centre-pole of the tent drawing on his breeches.

Eomer snapped out of sleepiness into full awareness.

" Tael, you do not have to leave. I'm sorry I fell asleep ere I could ask you to stay."

Tael's face was impassive. The minutes that had crowded around him while Eomer slept had been all he needed to decide he did not care to wake hopefully beside his marshal and perhaps find there was no hope to be had. If this night was to be their only one he would far rather learn of it by a cool glance given amid the jostling safety of their comrades, not here, naked in both body and spirit, upon the furs where he had known such supreme pleasure and the beginnings of intimacy.

"It is no matter, my lord."

For all he might keep his emotional distance Eomer did not disdain the comfort that sharing sleep against another warm body brought to any man far from his hearth and home. Even the most casual of Eomer's lovers was welcome to spend the night if they cared to. And this lover was far from casual.

"I would like it if you did."

The look Tael gave him was wary, and prickly with pride. "You said you could make no promise."

Eomer did not prevaricate.

"And I cannot. But that does not mean I cannot ask you to stay. Any more than making the request means you are obliged to accept."

Tael looked slowly around the confines of the tent then back to Eomer.

"Who is it bids me stay?"

The marshal gave his familiar frown.

" Tael, what do you mean?"

"What I say. Who is it bids me stay? The Third Marshal of the Riddermark, the leader of my eored with power to command me?"

Eomer was taken aback.

"Nay, Tael. There is no rank between us inside this tent. Have you not proved that ten times over already?"

Tael was still retrieving his tunic and boots.

" Tael." The low voice brushed past him, indeed commanding nothing but arresting him all the same. He straightened, and looked his lord in the face.

" Tael, I am Eomer, and I ask you to stay."

Tael's lips parted as though he might speak but he did not.

Eomer reached out a wide hand to him. "Please come here, Tael."

Tael looked down into dark beseeching eyes. He knew what it would cost his lord in pride if he walked away. He had no way of knowing what it might cost either of them if he did not.

Tael took the few steps to the sleeping furs, no decision made.

Eomer reached up and gently pulled Tael's tunic and boots from his arms and set them on the floor. He moved over on the furs.

"There. A place is warm for you."

"All your places are warm, my lord," said Tael softly.

He needed more, and Eomer knew it.

" Tael, we are equals. It matters not that I have been in your thoughts more than you have been in mine ere now. You must trust that I will not take advantage of that."

He looked over his shoulder and located the discarded whip. He picked it up and set it on the furs beside him.

"As I trust you will not take advantage that I am but a student where you are master."

Tael let out a breath. The dark-stained leather was a talisman, a sign. He had said he would not mark Eomer again now. And the hard ride their company must make on the morrow to relieve the beleaguered garrison further south upon the Entwash would leave no time for anything but a hasty breakfast and a saddling of their mounts.

But the whip told him there would be another night. Another night with his beautiful lord whom he loved even if they never touched again. Another night to explore and experience the superb body he was just beginning to know. To teach it further pleasures of control and surrender. To mark it as his own. And to surrender and be marked in return.

If nothing else, at least another night.

It was a prospect he could not forgo.

Tael dropped slowly to his knees beside the furs. He leant in and tasted Eomer's waiting lips, sighing as he felt a wide hand in his hair pulling him closer. Then he drew back the blanket to slide in beside his lord.

"I'd prefer you without your trousers, Tael," he heard the marshal drawl.

Tael looked up to find Eomer's eyes dancing with amusement.

"They might chafe my delicate skin."

A slow, answering grin spread across Tael's face.

"My lord, I did not know until this night so much levity co-existed with the gruffness and honesty all your men revere." He laid a hand upon Eomer's left breast, feeling the steady heartbeat beneath. "You are a somewhat of a paradox."

"A paradox?" said Eomer, with a soft smile. "It's strange, I have been thinking the same of you."

Tael looked at Eomer, and the marshal saw his lips both frame the word 'why' and still it ere it was uttered.

"It is good to be challenged."

It was the cool side of Tael, but Eomer was no longer daunted, for he knew the warmth.

"Indeed it is, for thus we grow. But in between challenges, rest." He placed a hand on Tael's breeches. "' Tis only prudent."

Tael nodded. "And sometimes pleasant."

"Ay." Eomer pulled at the ties beneath his fingers. "Must I do this myself?"

Tael placed his hand over Eomer's. "I will help.

Eomer looked at him. "You have helped much already."

The dark eyes were sincere, and the low voice held a caress that sent a ripple through Tael's belly.

A few short moments later the offending breeches were rumpled in a heap beside the pallet and Tael was curled within Eomer's sturdy arms. Their separate breaths gradually falling into a shared rhythm, marshal and lieutenant drifted towards sleep, two strong Rohirrim cradling each other in gentleness.