II. Stratford Upon Avon, Late Summer
[Version 1.1]

Crawford had traveled to three towns that week on 
Anstruther's orders: starting from St. Austell in Cornwall, 
he'd journeyed to Rye, London, and then Stratford-Upon-Avon, 
his primary duties being to investigate the reports his boss 
had received regarding children with special talents.  He was 
to try to convince the parents of each child to give their 
little darlings up to him for education at the institute.  
Whether they said yes or no, he was to kill them.  

Simple, effective, and all too familiar.  

But Crawford hadn't even bothered with the formality of 
asking them.  He'd merely stated his reasons for being 
there, then shot them.  He really hadn't wanted to go any 
further than London, and had taken his displeasure out on 
the parents of Anstruther's new wards.  He had even seduced 
the first boy the night he and his associates from the 
institute had come to call for him, a sweet faced 17 year 
old virgin with a dark, messy mop of hair and hazel eyes.  
He'd told him he'd seen him in a vision, and had loved him 
since, and the little fool believed him!  

Drawing his cigarette case from the inside of his tuxedo 
jacket, Crawford smirked at the memory.  He'd spent the brunt 
of the evening negotiating a deal over dinner with a 
businessman from Nice on Anstruther's behalf--Estet business.  
He'd gotten him to agree to Anstruther's terms, gotten his 
signature on paper, and now, he was standing along the path 
the locals termed the Riverwalk.  The air was filled with 
the wet susurration of the rippling waves meeting the bank, 
the croaking of frogs and the chirrup of crickets.  Light 
from a quarter moon kissed the water.  Crawford tugged his 
white bow tie loose and opened his collar, and sighed most 
wearily as he tilted a look at the twinkling sky.  

"I think," he said softly, "I need a vacation."  

No one answered him, though he sensed someone was standing 
on the walk further down, someone very familiar.  Someone 
he'd seen earlier in a vision.  Crawford lowered his head, 
peering off into the tree-limned shadows to his right with 
a hungry, wolfish grin.  

"If you are there, then come out.  The night is young yet, 
and we have much to do."

***

"What, did you think I'd be right where you left me?"

The shadows along the left of the left of the path parted 
like cobalt and black gossamer curtains.  No one else 
strolling under the winking lunar eye was looking just then, 
as one lonely glow worm drew out of the darkness.  Schuldich 
had let it crawl up along the lock of hair which ran along 
his left cheek, and there it had left one pocket of earthly 
starlight on his skin.

He padded up beside Crawford then, neither really looking the 
other's way, as if they had simply run into one another 
without ever having met before in the world; that it was only 
chance they both stood there, gazing at the sky through a tear 
in the oak branches overhead.  Except that Brad's eyes weren't 
really tracing the firmament.  

/Heh, well, too bad for him.  It almost looks like someone's 
painting of the sky from here./

"I left Saffie with the cleaning lady.  Don't worry, the old 
bitch should still be alive when we get back."

/Damn... I'd be in front of the canvas for hours just whisking 
away at those few clouds by the horizon./  But he couldn't see 
himself there for now, and besides, there were far more 
captivating little judgments at hand but...

Since the shields around his lover hadn't faltered, hadn't so 
much as rang when the precognitive caught onto his footsteps, 
Schuldich failed to notice his sight had trickled away from 
whatever it beheld, and ran down the lines of his white trench 
coat instead, all the way to his ratty, silver boots, and back 
up again.  But when their eyes met, he didn't turn away, didn't 
look surprised.  Just grinned.

"Oui, le nuit est jeune, I wonder what we should do with her 
until she gets old?"

***

"Ohhh..." said Crawford, leering.  "I have a few ideas."  And 
he groped Schuldich's thigh through the trench which covered 
it, eliciting a throaty little chuckle from the redhead.  He 
grinned, nodding to that part of the path which sank into 
dense, bordering woods.  No one ventured there past nine, 
harkening perhaps to some deep -seated fear of the wild, dark 
solitude which the forest signified.  A place where demons 
might wreak havoc upon the unsuspecting populace.  

What better spot to seduce the Devil himself?  

Hands in pockets, loafers tapping along the stone walkway, 
Crawford led him on, past nodding willows and sheltering oaks.  
Of course, he was looking for something in particular, 
something he'd only seen in another vision, and it wasn't too 
long before he'd found it:  A boat, a red one with a wide, 
slightly flat bottom; the planks one sat upon were spaced far 
apart, far enough for two tall men to rest in without much 
difficulty.  

Not that they were going to rest, exactly.  

Smirking, Crawford turned to Schuldich, and found him staring 
at him as if he'd gone mad.  His expression was so odd that he 
laughed out loud, seizing him around the waist and pulling him 
close, purposely pressing his growing erection against him.  
Another grin melted over the redhead's face, and he slid his 
arms around his neck.  

It was enough to drive him mad, holding him--Just looking at 
him was enough.  But Crawford wasn't in the mood to ponder the 
ever-strengthening appeal the other held for him; he wanted 
too much to act upon it instead.  

"Come on, Aubrey," he whispered feverishly, smoothing his hair 
back from his neck and lightly biting him there.  "Let's go 
sailing."

***

The curious look Schuldich had worn a moment before returned 
to him then, and his hands rippled away from Brad's neck, 
leaving only his lover's arms to hold them together any longer.  
The glow worm in his hair had changed bodies though, and was 
perched now on the shimmery circlet of the precognitive's 
watch, where it made the glass twinkle, seem more alive 
than itself there, in the slick dimness that swept up 
around the misty water.

Misty... he hadn't known water ever grew misty in the 
summertime.  Then again, this was England now, and it didn't 
exactly feel like summer the way he remembered summer.  He 
did know one thing though, "Ch' I tol' you not to call me that."

But he had, Crawford, been letting that name slip from his 
lips now and then ever since he had read it off his Estet 
application.  Estet.  Applications.  It didn't make sense, 
and neither did the west wind, soft soul look in Brad's eyes 
when he said that name.  One would think he'd look like men 
did when they sang out after the footfalls of slippered things 
that silent roamed evenings.  But he didn't.

And Schuldich shrugged in the following mezzo forte that the 
crickets had played into, and slid out of his embrace into 
the rushes along the water no one had bothered to clip.  

Even by moonlight and the unadulterated fireworks of 
far-flung stars, he still had a reflection, or somewhat of 
one, amid the tiny eddies at the shore.  The water was like 
black currant wine under the glossy afterimage he left wobbling 
in and out of sight above them.  He could almost make out the 
smudge of the bite mark that was pinking on his neck.  
Almost.  And he was looking at himself there for what seemed 
like ages.

Brad just didn't come, didn't disturb him.  Almost acted like 
he didn't know he was there at all

At least, not until the redhead at gathered himself up, his 
trench wound tight in his hands as he drew back, and then took 
the graceful start of a leap, and the finish of one at least, 
alighting in the boat with only the slightest thump-thump of 
his shoes settling on the planks.  The middle of it all seemed 
to be missing though, as if he somehow had gone without 
hanging himself in the air. 

/Can too teleport, you old bastard.../

Simpering at the old master of the art who wasn't there to 
see him, Schuldich reached into his pocket and came up with 
the little green pen knife he kept to tend to the odd 
intractable bottle of wine and likewise uncooperative double 
agent.  The rope barely made a sound as it was cut, but it 
gave way just the same.  His lover though started to say 
something, a million things at once, and where he couldn't hear 
his thoughts, he got to guess what they were.  With or without 
them, he took up one of the oars and shoved himself out into 
the middle of the river.

"Yes, it's a fine night to go sailing.  I wouldn't want to 
miss it."

From the shore, Brad cursed and cursed...

***

Of course, Crawford was quite beside himself as he watched the 
object of his desire drift away from the rush-lined bank.  
/The bastard!  I invite him out for a lazy roll in the bottom of 
a sailworthy boat, and he does this!/  He wanted to shout 
profanties at the top of his lungs; almost did.  

But every lapping inch that separated them caused another sort 
of impulse to rise and strengthen.  Before Crawford's reason 
could take hold, he'd whipped off his tuxedo jacket, his tie, 
his shoes, and splashed unceremoniously into the mossy water. 
Schuldich's laugh rose above the soft, wet licks his arms made 
as they scooped the rippling surface.  Not for the first time 
was he grateful to Anstruther for encouraging his late-blooming 
love of swimming.  

He met the side of the boat suddenly, raking his nails down 
the slippery bow.  Silhouetted against the spangled sky, Schuldich 
smirked down at him, but made no move to assist him into the 
craft.  Not that Crawford expected him to.  

"You brat," he purred, shoving his sodden hair out of his 
eyes, before planting both hands firmly onto the side.  "I hope 
the boat rocks so much you tumble out."
 
With that, he hoisted himself up, managing to get himself waist 
high over the wildly shaking craft, and nearly falling back in.  
He hurried to flip a leg over the side, and wound up rolling 
onto his back with a hard, loud smack! into the bottom of the 
boat, legs and arms akimbo, and a worrying ache rumbling 
through his bones.  

So much for graceful entrances.  

"Damn," Crawford hissed, as Schuldich laughed and laughed.  

***

"Brat?" the telepath finally managed to get past his joyfully 
sputtering lips.  "Brat? Is that the best you can do, my sopping 
little rabbit?"

Brad of course, thought about as much of being called a rabbit 
as Schuldich thought of being called Aubrey, and in keeping 
with his understated personality, proceeded to give a stuttering 
humph, though he made no move otherwise to pick 
himself up from the bottom of the boat.

And shortly found himself in a situation where he quite possibly 
wouldn't find another such opportunity for some time.

His red-haired lover couldn't really say why he'd ever called 
him his rabbit, his bunny- not out loud where the words would 
crush the little, glowing icon into gleaming powder of someone 
else's dream.  That was all he had for weapons with the silver, 
skylight ice of Bradley's shields always and forever between the 
temples where their thoughts lived.

But he did find what he KNEW was one of his favorite places 
in all the world, just waiting for him to sit in it.

And before the precognitive had a chance for his predictions 
of the next moment to click into place, he had tipped himself 
away from the plank where he had been resting, and drew himself 
up between Bradley's spread legs- on his knees now, but far from 
curled over.  His white trench flew behind him like smoking edges 
of a ghost just about to alight where the earth should be, and 
themoon turned his hair a dark, slick bronze as he crouched there, 
none of him coming even close to the sopping body he took such 
delight in then- humming and licking his lips.

Quite suddenly, he stopped, and palmed the front of Crawford's 
pants, enticing him a little at least even where the cool water 
had melted his erection away to almost nothing.

"You washed my glow worm off when you dove in."

***

"If you hadn't taken off with the boat, your glow worm might 
be alive right now," said Crawford mildly. "So...It appears that 
you are an accomplice in its murder. Ahh..." Tentatively (because 
his back felt a bit touchy after his tumble into the boat), he 
wriggled under Schuldich's hand. "Just a tiny bit harder, if you 
please. Oh, yessss," he drawled. "Just like *that*." 

He let his eyes drift shut, and focused upon the wet lapping of 
the water against the hull, the warmth of Schuldich's caresses. 
The redhead's efforts were having a strong effect upon Crawford; 
slowly, his flagging erection began to stir and waken. Apparently, 
Schuldich felt it too, for when Crawford opened his eyes again, 
he found his lover regarding him intently. As if his next move
would be to pounce. Brad half-wished he would. 

But then...there was a lot to be said for playing. 

"Ah, I adore men who are good with their hands," purred Crawford.

***

"Hand," Schuldich corrected with a toss of his hair.  "This is 
only one of mine.  This however..." the palm he had left flopping 
against the rim of the boat, just out of reach of the waves, drew 
itself in then, and settled itself against on of Crawford's warm 
thighs, stroking upwards along his trousers, drawing just along 
the seam along their center, finally trailing together with all of 
the telepath's fingers as he cupped his lover's sac, squeezed him, 
made him gasp, and then ever so lightly stroked his way up his 
shaft, coming to rest his thumbs against the quivering tip of it.  
"...is both of them."  Drawing them aside for only a moment, 
he blew on the dampness still settled in the folds of Brad's 
clothing.   

"You're shaking," this observed as if rather he was looking 
down on a foolish kitten come in from a sudden shower.  "But 
you don't exactly feel... cold.  Something tells me you're not 
frightened either."

"So..."

With a sigh and a pop of his shoulders, Schuldich drew away 
once again, tugging on Crawford's shirt tail only long enough 
to get him to lean forwards from the bottom of their little 
ship, just so far he could keep his eyes in the scintillating 
moonlight where it shone through the trails of the mourning glow 
worms all around them.  The oars in his hands again, he willed the 
boat close enough to shore to catch himself another one from the 
leaves bush of tight-lipped flowers dragging into the river.  

"What's the matter? Is there a spook hovering over me? The Lady 
of the Lake up and moved? Immature sea serpents biting the stern?"
His teases though fell into a low whistle as he leaned over the 
edge of the craft towards the dark nacre shine of the water and his 
new toy wound itself around his wrist, and began to crawl after 
it's own tail.

"Nah... seems like all the ghosts here would be the sort who like to 
come up behind people in the middle of the night and say things like, 
I don't know... 

Shall I compare thee to night in the city?   
Thou art more exquisite; more mercurial:   
Rough lights do trouble the streets when night descends,   
And evening's lease hath all too short an hour:   
Sometimes too quick the passing headlights find,           
They can no longer catch the images of glistening whores;   
And every fair from fair sometime declines,   
By chance, or the sound of sirens washing away all voices.   
But thy desirous whispers shall not fade,   
Nor lose possession of that lust thou ow'st,    
Nor shall law brag thou wander'st in his shade,   
When in eternal lines to time thou come to bed;   
  So long as I fuck you, or you fuck me   
  So long lives THAT, it will give life to thee.

***

"Oh," breathed Crawford in the silence which descended upon 
the end of Schuldich's recitation, "how very appropriate. The bard 
might be turning over in his overgrown grave, but I am thoroughly 
amused. Not to mention delighted." 

"And quite...quite aroused." With the barest wince of pain, 
Crawford shifted his legs so he could rise upon his knees, and, 
bracing himself along one sturdy rail of their boat, maneuvered 
his way to his lover. 

"The Lady in the Lake gave up on England long ago. As for the 
ghosts congregating around you...they'll just have to take their 
turn.  Tonight, you're mine." He planted his hands firmly on the 
water-slick seat around Schuldich's hips and leaned in very 
close--near enough to feel the warm, wine wafting of his 
lover's breath on his lips. 

"And so, if I stare at all, it's only because I find you so 
desirable. Would that I could compose some sonnet in your 
honor...I would certainly do it."

***

Schuldich's left hand came up along the collar of his coat, 
only to trickle down it once again until it lit on the edge of 
the pale blue silk shirt he wore, and which seemed to grown 
transparent against his skin as the glow-worm tested it with its 
tiny feet, bobbing in and out as it made its way to his buttons.  
As it crept over the first of the silver circlets, he pressed it 
open, and let the center of his chest peer out.  "Is that so? 
Because I haven't minded you staring in a year now but... still, 
sonnets?"

Slipping the tip of one finger into his mouth, he sucked it 
until the skin about his lips grew pale for a moment, and then 
flushed with returning blood as he let the pop open.

"That's new... even for you, you perv."

Spoken though with a smile and a brush of one of his toes 
against Crawford's stiffness.  Rather than let his lover 
retreat at the remark though, he tangled his hands in his wet 
hair, brushing the few strands that had lopped over his eyes 
away, and he did it by sight, for the shadow threads were 
plain against the fairness of his skin, even while the moon 
had retreated behind a web of branches for the time being.

"If it's been a year, I'm allowed to call you a perv, nicht 
wahr? So happy anniversary, my rabbit."

He closed the small breath of space between them then, and 
warmed the lips the river had chilled with his own.

***  

And when he had retreated, Crawford murmured, "Funny, I 
always thought the first was paper, not pet names." He 
leaned in for another warm touch of Schuldich's lips. "Oh, 
well...I suppose you've earned the right to hang such 
sobriquets upon me. Especially when you of all people know 
just how well that word fits me." 

Crawford pressed another kiss to his lover's maddening lips, 
and then to his cheek, an arm sliding around him. 

"You know what the pity is?" he asked, stroking the side of 
his neck. "I can't find just one word that suits you. So many 
do." He flicked his tongue under Schuldich's jaw, and the 
redhead tilted his head back, baring his throat and drawing 
attention to his smooth chest. Crawford drank in the expanse 
of moon-bronzed flesh before him. 

"Seducer. Madman. You don't have an agenda, as I do; you only 
want to enjoy yourself. You've shown me how to enjoy myself." 

Crawford lunged forward to bite his neck hard enough to leave a 
bruise. The fingers wrapped in his hair clenched painfully, then 
loosened, rubbing little circles along his scalp. 

"Like a devil," he breathed, hunching lower to paint the exposed 
'V' of his chest with kisses, despite his back's protests. 
"Shall I call you that..." 

Crawford rose up and quickly kissed him. "...Aubrey?"

***

"Funny, you don't *act* like you want to be tossed in the river 
again," Schuldich remarked now that he had once more caught his 
lover by the hair, and pulled him up just enough to look him in 
the milky moon blue of his eyes.  Crawford gave him a woeful 
little grin, but just the same, made no move to go slipping out 
of the puddle his wet clothing had made, or away from the 
fingers that tugged on him so hard, and kept him away from the 
dark little bud of the nipple his wandering kisses had managed 
to bear.

He just watched, and the telepath just held him still, and 
traced the glimmer of his just barely parted mouth as he 
breathed.

Caught in the boughs of a willow who had dipped her hair in 
the mumbling water of the river, he shook his head at last, 
twice, for the first time he had looked to be stirring the 
branches away from his spilled hair.  "No.  I'm Schuldich, 
and as much as I may be mad and seductive, I don't like 
any of those."

His arms crossed over his chest, and Brad fell a little when 
he let him go.  Their eyes had parted in the darkness, but 
whatever his found on the far shore failed to make itself clear.  
Indeed, his gaze followed nothing and no one over the gurgles 
and the arcane little prayers of the cattails.

Out of nothing and no one, he let go of his voice and tried his
mind instead, even if the shields around Crawford's would keep 
him out anyway, ::Not that you got to pick YOUR name in MY mind, 
or that you'll listen, whatever I say.::

But neither of them did anything about it straightaway, and 
rather, still looking away, Schuldich embraced Crawford's chest 
with his hands, and rippled his fingers over his skin as he 
breathed.   

***

Crawford hadn't taken his eyes off Schuldich during the whole 
of his punishment--and that was what his sudden retreat was, he 
knew.  He'd been subjected to enough of those abrupt cessations 
of affection during the past year to be unaffected by them any 
longer, not that Schuldich realized it.  The green-gold tickle 
his mental probing left behind in his head never served to coax 
Crawford into letting his lover into his mind outside of sex; 
it wouldn't now.  

"All right," he said. "You want to be called Schuldich, I'll 
call you that...in public.  I reserve the right to call you 
Aubrey when we're alone."  

Schuldich's hands tensed upon his chest, and Crawford grabbed him 
around the waist, pulling him forward a little.  "Yes, Aubrey," 
he drawled, smirking.  "You do blow hot and cold.  Keeps me on 
my toes.  I can't say that I mind it."  

Crawford nuzzled his ear, kissed it.  Kissed his cheek and the 
corner of his mouth, but Schuldich didn't respond other than by 
unfastening two more buttons of his shirt, and burying his hands 
under the soaked, snowy cotton.  

"Come on, Schuldich, and kiss me properly."  

***

"I will," Schuldich affirmed, one of his eyebrows raising itself 
just the same as he swung his hair over his shoulder, "When 
I feel like it."

Which he didn't seem to, not that moment, or any one close 
to it.  He did though, over his lover's sigh, part the last of 
his buttons.  With a bit of a smirk still playing over him, he 
bent, and took the soft skin there against his lips, his 
tongue.  

"Not yet," said for Brad's discontented moan.

He crossed his legs then behind Crawford's back, but slowly, 
as footsteps fall in unfamiliar time, so the bondage was not 
obvious at first, and came certainly enough to thrill, not 
startle.

"Or even now.  It's just what I do, nothing personal."

Not far from that, nibbles at his throat long passed, 
Schuldich's shirt also seemed to leave him, and fell into a 
heap with his coat all the way at the far end of their craft.  
His boots chased it, scared the now forsaken glow worm, and 
his belt, leaving the edges of his fly to open around his 
lacey, blue panties, for he'd managed to get it undone 
without Crawford noticing, somehow or other, while they played.

And it was Crawford's little grimace at the sight of his 
undergarments he finally kissed again, coaxing his tongue 
all the way into his own mouth, and sucking softly upon it.

***

With the melding of their mouths, his lover's choice of 
underwear suddenly became unimportant. Crawford caressed the 
backs of his arms, his shoulders; cupped his shoulder blades 
as another would breasts. They fell together, and he felt 
Schuldich's inquisitive fingers trail along under his shirt 
over his skin. 

/Oh. Right. I'm still dressed./ 

He pulled away abruptly, only to move in for another such 
caress of his mouth, working his shirt open and sliding it 
off. Crawford cradled him as before once he was free of the 
garment, but Schuldich averted his face from him, breaking 
contact at last. Crawford entertained himself by peppering 
open-mouthed kisses along his throat and bare shoulder. He 
lay his head there, and eyed once more the lacy, feminine 
underwear Schuldich had chose to wear. 

"Of all things," he said, stroking the backs of his fingers 
along Schuldich's lower abdomen, delighting in the tensing 
the muscles there every time he touched him, "to wear *those*." 

Schuldich said nothing, but rippled his fingers along Crawford's 
spine. He knew he was smirking without even looking at him. He 
didn't care. 

"I just don't know..." Crawford folded back his fly, and 
wriggled his fingers inside his pants, slowly working them off 
his lover's body (with his help). Crawford tossed them behind 
him, out of his way; his hands sought the skimpy panties he wore. 
He petted the shadowy rise of his erection, kissing him ardently 
as he did so. 

And then one hand stole inside, and embraced him there. 

"Oddly enough, I think I could get used to seeing lingerie 
on you."

***

"Ohhhhhh! Glad to hear it.  I did just buy two sets- stockings 
and all!"

Crawford sighed, either because he'd been turned into a victim 
by his lover's latest fit of impulsively, or because he knew he 
was as helpless in the company of such things.  Schuldich only 
snickered at him through his little gasps- he was being uncommonly 
gentle with him, torn it seemed between bringing him to climax 
with a flight of tenderness and drawing it out as long as he could 
by feigning shyness.

Not that the telepath could say be minded when it started to feel 
like the latter.  They hadn't gotten to play- just play -since 
they'd left New York and that was months ago by now...

He went on then, as if he hadn't started to flicker inside with 
a slow honey lust known only to those who find themselves 
unmistakably alone in bed. "I got a white set and a blue one, 
since I don't think I look all that good in black.  Makes me 
look pale."

Much the same could be said of the midnight sky overhead, 
with her one gloaming bauble shining down on they two.

"Unless it's bondage gear, of course.  But that's a whole 
other..."

In the end, he chose not to fight the mouth that smothered out 
his words, or the little tug on his stiffness which was no part 
of play or touch, but a wordless question.  Bracing himself with 
his hands on either side of their boat, he slipped down from the 
bench where he had gathered himself when he first alighted in the 
craft, and knelt rather on the floor with Brad.  

Their knees touched in the shadows.  Then their waists, their 
nipples and the hands twined around each other's shafts.  
Schuldich took his own away a moment, and undid his lover's 
trousers and his boxers; cupped his bare ass with his hands, and 
bumped his erection up against his own.

***

Crawford broke the kiss, but only for a moment did he pause 
there, cheek to cheek with Schuldich, the other's warm, heavy 
breath wafting against his ear.  Ever so slightly did their 
bodies undulate against each other, just enough for their 
erections to rub together.  His hands wandered down the 
hollow of Schuldich's lower back to stroke the velvety curves 
of his ass, dipping now and then in the shadowy cleft which 
separated them.  He would quietly draw breath, and clutch at 
him a bit harder; rub against him just a bit more intensely.  

Crawford nuzzled his way back to Schuldich's mouth, and they 
melted together in another time-stopping kiss.  

"You know," he whispered between shallow meetings of their 
lips, "of all the things you've ever worn to seduce me, 
nothing--NOTHING--compares to this."  He ran his hands up 
Schuldich's back to cup his moon-shimmered shoulders.  "You are 
most beautiful when you're naked."  

He kissed him deeply.  "I'll never get tired of looking at you."  

***

His mouth still half-pressed to Crawford's, Schuldich laughed, 
and the tongue which crept over his own failed to silence him.  
The boat shivered under him, and so did Crawford, for the wind 
had lit upon them, and the heat of their caresses aside, and all 
the summer too, it was still just a little colder than their
 bedroom and their satin sheets.

"Of course, it's what all the master seducers wear these days." 
He chuckled then.  "As if I would argue with such a refreshing 
trend, especially one that kills modestynicks."

At which Brad, in spite of the way his lover swayed into him 
just then, knitted his brows in puzzlement.  

Schuldich shrugged with a little flick to the bare, white 
chest against his cheek- barely a brush of breath in flesh, 
but it still sent the figure once resting in his arms tumbling 
over to the floor of the boat, where he lay supine in a nest 
of their mingled clothing.

"You know, those women who won't even kiss their boyfriends '
cause modesty is a lost art and all."

Without even a pause to pop his shoulder, he cast all memory 
of such creatures to the moonlit winds, and stretched himself 
over Crawford's body like a cat upon an elegant velvet couch it 
knows quite well it is never to sit upon.  Their legs wound 
together, cradling each other in all the right curves, muscle 
against muscle- a effortless and mindless little dance of their 
skin, but one few couples could do without stumbling.

"Some things go out of fashion for a reason."

***

"Let's hear it for change, then," parried Crawford.  

The pain in his back quieted down to a dull ache, and Crawford, 
sighing deeply, fully embraced the naked man who now covered 
him.  Kisses, caresses passed between them with abandon, until 
they were both quite breathless.  Crawford gave a whispery 
little chuckle, and lunged forward to leave a love bite on 
the side of Schuldich's neck.  

"Those women who won't even kiss--they don't know what 
they're missing."  

They kissed again.  Something amongst the bed of clothes upon 
which they lay tore, the sound barely registering with Crawford.  
He was far too busy rubbing his palm up and down along 
Schuldich's erection.  

"No, they don't know what they're missing at all."  

***

"Let alone what else there is to miss!"

Schuldich was almost singing, though half breathless with his 
lover's petting: Crawford could only be teasing him, but his 
palms were still warm with intent despite the dew-drenched 
darkness enfolding them.  The boat swayed with him a moment as 
he tried to fall like he was so wont to do on their bed at home, 
but he caught himself, and neither of them got to know the water 
any better.

Smirking then, and rubbing up against the digits that had wound 
around him, he found one more thing to say on the matter: "They 
all end up straight though.  And let's face it: no guy and girl 
ever had it this good."

Not, he thought, that he didn't go himself for the occasional 
pussy cat, but that was neither here nor there nor above the 
spiral breaths of clouds that lingered yet above them both.  
Shaking his head, he rose from a tight and drippy kiss to 
crouch just above is lover's chest.  Brad still held him in 
his hands, though now he rocked back on his heels a little.  
There was only shadow deep between is legs- the rest remained 
strung between their imaginations.    

"But you've been waiting all day for me to say that.  It's your 
cue, right? Just when you couldn't want it any more."

It didn't matter in the end that he was completely dry- the 
willingness of his body sufficed- the heat of it all opening 
him up, inside and out.  No, he wasn't teasing either, all 
appearances aside, and he took his lover in him to the hilt, 
and wound his muscles tight around him- let him feel him 
tremble inside for a moment as his tip sank against the rim 
of his sweet spot.  

***

Crawford reached up to catch him by the waist, but Schuldich 
caught his hands, and forced them back to the chilly wooden 
planks upon which they lay.  Their fingers laced close 
together, Schuldich stretched out over him, and they kissed, 
a slick dance of tongues and nibbling teeth.  Crawford kept 
his hips as still as he could whilst his lover worked his cock, 
though his tension shone in the stuttering rise and fall of his 
chest, the way he squeezed the slender hands pressed against 
his own.  

"I like it like this," he whispered, "when you do me.  I can 
feel the give and take of your insides, all tight and 
straining against me.  It's..."  

He caught his bottom lip with his teeth, and his lids fell 
over his eyes.  Schuldich sank his teeth into the side of his 
neck, and he groaned.  

It was like nothing he'd ever experienced before.  Every 
single time he had him.  

Crawford shook off one of Schuldich's hands, and buried his 
own in the redhead's thick mane, dragging him down for another 
deep kiss.  

***

A kiss which Schuldich was more than willing to return. Not 
only once, but tree... four... five refracted, little caresses 
of his wandering mouth, until he broke away from his lover's 
lips just long enough to add, "...good for me too."

::If you'd let me in your head, you could feel how much. Just 
like before, back in Chicago, remember?:: It came quick, his 
latest little offer- didn't seem as if it had simple coalesced 
from his thoughts, but burst over sky only to recede before more 
sense than essence caught what he had meant. He smirked.

Not one to be outdone, his lover unabashedly slapped him right 
back- just enough to leave a momentary bloom of pink. Their 
sudden movements worried the boat and Crawford's stiffness rolled 
inside him with the pitch of the water where he had provoked 
it. Then again- one swoop of the ripples playing off the other, 
and dissolving at last so this time, he surged against him where 
the river rose, though neither had really born down on the other.

Schuldich flittered inside, even when the surge beneath them 
had swept back towards what lights there were in the woods. He 
did his best to convince Brad he wouldn't get the satisfaction 
of hearing him moan for something so trifling as that little 
trickle of pleasure, not that he wore in life any special wish 
for silence, or ever kept to it in bed.

But he did cry out, and Brad spasmed against his hips at the 
sound.

***

But then, sometimes, just the tensing of Schuldich's body, his 
yelps of pleasure were enough to push Crawford over the edge. 
Brad clamped his hands around the redhead's hips, holding him 
steady as he filled him with his juices. His own orgasm burst 
like the fourth of July in his head, and he was only dimly aware of 
the squirming, clinging mass that was his lover. 

When the ecstasy of it had subsided, and a sense of calm had 
replaced it, Crawford realized his body was free of his lover's 
weight, and the air was cool, and gently tickled his naked 
flesh. Schuldich was sprawled opposite him, a hand holding 
his dangling locks from his face, their legs still entwined. 
Crawford allowed himself a moment's admiration of his lean 
form, before he eased himself up on one elbow, and groped for 
his trousers. A fresh pack of smokes lay within, still encased 
in its protective plastic, as was his spare silver lighter, one 
engraved with his initials, an 18th birthday gift from 
Anstruther. He had thought ahead enough to slip the gleaming 
cylinder into a small sheet of plastic wrap before coming to 
the river. 

Schuldich, when he saw it, laughed. 

"Shut up," he said without a trace of animosity. Crawford 
tore the plastic and foil away from the top, and slid one of 
the uncrushed cigarettes between his lips; unwrapped the lighter 
and lit up. He then slid his precious accoutrements across the 
planks to Schuldich, and lay back down with a weary grunt. Above 
him, the night sky sparkled through the web of willow limbs. 

And then, one fell, flaring bright through a tired wisp of smoke 
before it disappeared behind the trees on the far bank. Crawford 
sighed in contentment. 

The Bard, he thought as his toes nuzzled Schuldich's inner thigh, 
would undoubtedly be pleased.

***

As out of character as it might have been for him, Schuldich 
too gave every sign he too admired the evening where it floated 
all around them in the silver-shot darkness.  Though he was in 
silence otherwise washing the cum from his belly with his 
fingertips, licking them clean with a relish quite silent except 
for the occasional smacking of his lips.  Some of his lover's 
seed had splashed on his thighs, and he drank that up too, 
forgoing his fingertips though.  He simply propped his knee 
in the crook of one arm, and bent to lap his skin clean. 

It took him a moment to notice the offering made to him, but 
he did just then, wound up in his own arms as he was.  He also, 
accepted it with open lips; let the tip of the cigarette on 
Brad's and splendored rather in it's smoke than the streaks 
of salt he still wore.

"Well," he remarked at last, and his words were so distant, so 
fraught with the tendrils of the evening, he could only have 
been speaking on what had troubled his mind not long before.  
"I don't know about you, but I'd say boats sure beat 
airplane bathrooms."

***

Crawford tapped his ashes over the edge of the boat, and eased 
himself up into a sitting position.  "And why would that be?" 
he asked with a trace of amusement.  "Because people can 
actually watch you have sex, instead of just hearing your 
cries and moans?"  

***

When he laughed, the smoke still clasped in his throat 
billowed out around in him puffy, bitter-sweet clouds.  
"Yeah! I mean, that and there's no old perfume from 
the last old lady who went to 'freshen up'.  That..."

The bruises on his lips here pursed into a little grin, he 
slunk over the boards the boat and into the circlet of his 
lover's legs.

"...and I mean, hey, there's a LITTLE more room at least.  
Not that you didn't still get some all over you too."

Rather than finger tips alone, his whole palm washed close 
to the few tiny splatters of semen still clinging to Crawford's 
stomach, lingering just above his skin rather than skating 
back to his lips.

"I'll wash it off with my tongue if you do one little thing 
for me."

Brad's intrigued expression evaporated into a hint of a 
scowl.  He knew very well what the request was.

"Just for ten seconds.  It's an anniversary present."

***

Crawford took a deep drag on his cigarette, and let it out in 
a slow breath.  "Just this once...Okay.  But if you pull any of 
your telepathic tricks on me, you'll be making your way back to 
Cornwall on your own."  

Warily keeping an eye on him, Crawford tipped the ash from his 
cigarette again, and slid it between his lips, settling himself 
as comfortably as he could against one of the boat's plank seats.  
The barrier that held his thoughts in privacy melted into a deep 
red haze, and thinned away, leaving him as wide open 
to Schuldich as he could ever possibly be.  

"All right," he mumbled around the tip of his smoke.  

/What is it?/  

***

/For me. I said it was an anniversary present, right? I didn't 
say who for!/

Schuldich licked his lover and felt nothing from him but a 
warmth spreading where his tongue had been, licked his lips, 
and beneath the fading blotches of a passing bow, he vanished 
but for what of the Alice's cat friend lingered on his face. 
Just like that, he spoke, flickering in and out of existence 
with the wet bobbing of his lips.

"It's a game."

/Because, Brad... a year? A year is too long for anything 
except being alive./

/It's too bad the sex tonight didn't last until dawn. But 
then again, it never does. It COULD but.../

All the while his smile never faltered. Making an exist was 
just what he had deemed it.  One toy, among a whole sky of 
starry baubles. And what an exit!

::Keep your eyes open.::

But of the stars- they all grew pale before him. His 
cigarette sailed into the water and scarcely did the flame 
of it sing when it died, but his mind... even as far away 
as his thoughts began to draw, as much as the outer barriers 
of Schuldich began to bleak apart like the last thread of 
smoke trailing from his mouth, it never really left him. A 
hundred birds, a thousand birds on strings took off from him 
and all the while the wind did not stir.

From then every fragment, every hint, every whisper and word 
unsaid in lust and passion and pure crush came back to him. 
He couldn't feel them himself, for himself had dissipated 
among them. He was them, and he wasn't them... but 
Crawford? He left Crawford savor everyone in a dark rainbow 
cascade before he began to play.

"You get one chance."

He could no more give them form then than he could string the 
moon on a necklace, but he let each one mimic the flame they 
had been born from.  Around Schuldich and his lover then... 
danced one hundred, one thousand, ten thousand colored fireflies 
for his memories flew after them. Like fire pixies they were in 
the illusion between they two, ethereal and brilliant, but 
casting no light outside of themselves as they sailed above 
the water.

"Pick which one is me, and I'll fix it so you'll be able to feel 
me in Istanbul if I'm in Rethwellen. And vice versa. 'course your 
shields'll still work..."

/And when you fail.../

***

Crawford gave him the barest nod of assent, and sat back to 
study the tiny rainbow fairy lights that winked and swam 
around them. He could feel Schuldich's presence in his 
mind--unintrusive, oddly enough; a mild glow at the 
edge of his consciousness that bore something of him, as 
elusive as a childhood memory. 

/All right,/ he thought back at his lover, and the glow 
brightened just a touch. The lights swirled even faster, as 
quick as the insects they resembled, all save for...one. 
Crawford nearly missed it in the whirl, a blue-green one that 
hovered just at the surface of the water. It swayed along the 
bank, far from the rest of the glowing mass. Crawford savored 
his last breath of smoke from the cigarette between his fingers, 
then slowly ground it out on the boat's rim. 

"It's that one," he said, pointing at that lone light. "That's 
you."

***

/You could just tell him he's wrong and be done with it./

But it was already too late.  A look close to horror had 
already passed over his face, the shock of it still lingering, 
and his lover couldn't have missed it, even in the trembling 
gleam of the midnight moon.

"What?"

He didn't know why he'd spoken that later.  Only that he had, 
and perhaps in meaning "why" when the word hadn't come out 
quite right.

So Brad told him again, and as he did so all the other thoughts 
around him began to leave the aura of the boat, taking off into 
the woods and the cyan-cast heavens, back to their owners, 
sailing away until nothing remained of them but the single 
blue-green winged flame now hovering between them on the planks.

A handful of moments passed, and suddenly it burst into a 
brilliant cherry red, burning thusly in the breeze of its 
owner's mind.

"So... hiding it behind my back didn't work.  You can't tell me 
you still want your prize after that.  What kind of a lover am 
I if I do shit like this?"

/But... you don't seem... angry at all./

He wondered if anyone else heard his heart stop.

***

"You're the kind of lover...I want," said Crawford, looking 
much like his blurted admission had surprised him even more 
than it surely had Schuldich.  "And yes, I expect you to give 
me my prize," he added, mentally shaking himself back into 
his usual cool.  "I won it fairly."  

/And how rare it is, Schuldich, that I do anything fairly./ 
Smirking devilishly, Crawford, with the awkward movements of 
an arthritic beast, maneuvered himself onto his knees before 
Schuldich.  

"How do you form that link you promised me?"  

***

"Well..." Schuldich voice had faded damp and fair, as if what 
he said bore no meaning to him, or had come quite unexpected 
soft out of a raucous dream.  He kept it though crystal steady 
over the waving sound of their boat skimming the 
river's surface.

"When I reach for you, you reach for me."

The streak of light he held winked out like a candle under 
breath and Schuldich's eyes, still clear, went blind as ancient 
penitents'.  He plunged into his lover's mind, and floated 
there an instant, feeling nothing but the icy surface refrozen 
all around what he had broken.  He kissed nothing not apparent 
to him, drew nothing to the sense of himself there.  He simply 
drifted an instant, turned, and spun away, back to the 
rents in the frost now that his lover's shields had fallen.

Wavering there as if the vapors of his mind could stand on tiptoe, 
he offered, and no word, no sense, no streak of color could have 
made it plain just what.

***

Crawford had shut his eyes against Schuldich's invasion, and 
still his lids lay closed. His lover was still there, he could 
feel his presence lurking just along the ridge past where his 
shields would rise. It was there that Crawford focused his mind, 
and there he surged forward to reach for him, not wanting to 
think about what he was about to do. 

They met with an explosion, as vivid and dizzying like sunlight 
flickering through wind-tossed branches, and spun together, 
green and yellow now that twisted and dimmed and melded into 
one, becoming nothing. The glow that was Schuldich was gone, but 
in its place lay a tunnel of sorts, through which traveled 
echoes of his thoughts. He knew that all he had to do was to 
call to him down that link, and the glow that was him would 
fill his head. 

When he opened his eyes, and the darkness had at last become 
dotted with winks of moonlight and muted shadow, he found they 
were holding each other in their arms. 

"...Damn."

***

Schuldich didn't open his eyes at once, for they had drifted 
closed somewhere between one breath of light and the next, not 
that they would have done him any good to see so lost in his 
lover's thoughts as he had been.  The grin which stained 
his lips had faded to a pale reflection of itself, and his 
breath slowed.  Brad had to give him a shake before he did 
more than sigh softly for him.  

Only then did he awaken to find he had lurched into his half-open 
arms.  To himself he chucked, but couldn't quite make himself 
sit up...

"Nothin' to it.  Course if we want to test it, you've gotta 
get rid of me for awhile.  How's that for irony?"

Crawford gave him no answer, audible or mental, though the 
passage between them blazed open for an instant as if he had 
considered it.  Nothing came besides the faint intent... and 
some little sister sense of it.

He wasn't going to answer him that way, not now at least, but 
neither was he about to let him skitter towards those oh 
welcome shadows, even to play with his present.

"Well..." he said in one of his best nonchalant rationalizations, 
obvious as it might have been to more than himself.  "I don't 
feel like getting up anyway."

***

"That's good," said Crawford, "because we can test the link any 
time we want. There's no rush." 

He leaned in until their lips were just centimeters from meeting, 
and added in a whisper, "Besides, it's still our anniversary, and 
I'm not through with you yet." 

Crawford let his hands slip over Schuldich's back, pressing him 
closer, and he sealed the scant distance between them with a 
fervent kiss.

***

And Schuldich, in spite of himself, kissed him back; so hard his 
lover nearly fled from him, and knowing in that the real irony, 
he laughed against his skin, having caught him by the hair.

"Oh? Aren't you? Because that's something I always like to 
hear from you, y'know."

He didn't, that much darted across his vision before their 
lips once more met.

/He doesn't even know how far from always he was tonight.../

Even in the tangle of their bodies, he shrugged, and from 
there fell to the planks of the boat.  The river welled up 
around them and a few drops splashed in his hair before the 
familiar hands on him could chase them away.

/Stupid prig./

"Hey, would you put your..."

His mouth thrilled a little around the fingers that had slipped 
inside him, and he purred.  Just purred, content as he could be.  
The stars could have left them, and the darkness.  The moon, the 
gloaming water.  Every firefly real or not that ever lived.  All of 
Avon.  Content now in some quiet way, he cared not.  Even if quiet 
could not have been further from himself.

/Aw well.  It's not like another year of great sex is gonna hurt 
anything.../

*****