Work Text
“Can’t you just
shoot it
?”
Lance’s face scrunches up in that way when he thinks someone is being an idiot. “‘Shoot it’? It’s a five-thousand-year-old cat monster. Person. Er… cat woman.”
“Yes, and? You’ve got a big gun,” Leo gestures at the- admittedly- very large gun cradled in Lance’s arms. (Leo objected to the gun at first, in case the site was damaged by bullets. But then Lance said, “Andean mummies,” and Darcy added, “Norwegian fish-men,” and he’d been convinced.)
“I can’t just open fire!” Lance flaps his elbows at the beautifully-carved and -painted walls. He doesn’t normally care about the “artsy shite;” that’s Darcy’s job. The murals probably hold some kind of key to the item Coulson had retrieved from that cult last month. They shouldn’t be destroyed; even the smallest loss of detail could be catastrophic. (Lance used to object to prioritizing artefacts over combat until he broke the nose off a statue during a fight, releasing a millennium-old spirit that possessed Mack for three days. Nobody is in a hurry to have Mack swinging broadswords anytime soon.)
Darcy leans back against the bas-relief wall and rummages in her pack. They’d be at this for a while longer.
She turns to the sphinx and says, “Jerky? It’s teriyaki flavor.”
Brown and sandy gold in the warm light of the temple courtyard, she shakes her coat and dips a paw into the offered snack pouch. The sphinx’s sharp, white teeth close over the morsel and her eyebrows rise.
“This is good.” Her voice is a rolling burr, beautifully accented in a way that makes Darcy think of Thor’s people.
“Ste- uh, one of my friends makes it. He’s really into preserving meat.” Darcy looks down into the baggie and reflects that Steve is
really
into preserving meat.
The sphinx settles onto her haunches next to Darcy, and plucks another piece of beef from her outstretched hand.
The air in the courtyard carries the faintest breeze from the shaded parts of the temple. Darcy thinks she can smell water from somewhere; there are caves under the temple, she knows. That’s where they’re trying to go. They’ll need to get going soon, even if her guys could bicker ten hours straight. Speaking of which...
“You’re the genius. Can’t you figure out the answer?”
“I’m a scientist, not a
philosopher
,” Leo spits. They know how he feels about philosophy.
Lance draws up to his full height, forcing Leo to angle his glare upward. He’s about to say something
real
nasty and probably twig Leo’s brain into coming up with the solution. Or Lance is gonna get smacked. If they make it out of this assignment alive and un-maimed, the make-up sex is gonna be
epic
.
“They’re quite bad at this, you know?” The sphinx shifts onto her side and sets her chin on one heavily-clawed paw. Her yellow eyes, half-lidded with amusement, shift to Darcy, who huffs.
“I wish their brains were as big as their dicks. Then we’d be getting somewhere.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Sharp snow, ice against skin. Air gusting underneath armor, frost in hair. Equipment, lost. Handlers, gone. Nothing but white and wind before his eyes. The soldier was malfunctioning, outside his parameters for use. The cold was too much even for him.
Falling into the snow was not soft. Drifts scratched over him in the gale. Ice and white darkness.
I don’t want to die.
---
“And what will you give me, in exchange for your life,
Soldat
?”
The old woman ran the rough pad of her finger down his temple, under his lank, wet hair. Her nail skittered over the mask, dragging across what would be his cheek. The sound made the hair at his nape stand up, but he didn’t shift from the hand-hewn chair. His legs stretched before him; his muscles were numb from the blizzard and he hadn’t recovered enough to bend his knees. There was fire sparking under his skin now, but that discomfort would fade like everything else.
The soldier said nothing.
Her hut was warm and dim; it was nothing like the facilities where the soldier was kept. An iron pot steamed over the fire. The soldier’s nose was filled with the smell of cooked meat; his stomach was empty, but that was nothing to him.
The old woman watched him with eyes black like an owl’s, sharp like a hawk’s, hungry like a wolf’s.
The soldier had roused before, immobile over the shoulder of this crone as the wind pulled at them both. She had dragged his half-frozen body inside without effort. In the facility, it took two large men to lift him, more if he struggled. The soldier had learned not to struggle. The strength of the old woman wasn’t alarming.
He couldn’t feel alarm; he felt nothing.
He felt no curiosity at the herbs and smoke-stained bones in the rafters. He felt no shame at being retrieved from the storm by someone who wasn’t in his chain of command. He felt no fear at the crone’s sharp, brown teeth.
He felt nothing.
“What a curious one you are,” she huffed. She straightened up, and for a moment she looked ten feet tall, and then she was a bent old woman again, her kerchief colorful and much-mended. She adjusted her shawls- unwrapping and re-wrapping her bony form. The soldier watched her because he was trained to watch movement.
Her lined face drew down into a scowl. The wind sent a gust down her chimney; the fire guttered and the air was full of smoke and the smell of blood.
The soldier blinked and the old woman was close, too close, her breath reeking of mass graves. Her fleshless hand pressed into the center of his chest; her nails dug into the leather of his jacket. It was too thin for a storm like this, despite his resistance to inclement weather. The soldier went where ordered, in whatever gear they put on him.
Her nails pierced his jacket, pierced his skin. The soldier felt his heart kick once. The pain didn’t signify.
The old woman pressed her fingernails deeper, and the soldier didn’t move.
“Perhaps I shall take your heart. It is exceptionally strong, like you,” she sneered, “and too tough to eat.” She laughed, a dry, hacking thing, and showed him her teeth again.
The soldier’s blood welled under her nails, beading and trickling down his chill skin. His blood was hot. He didn’t answer, and he didn’t fight back.
“Your heart in return for your life, then.”
She pressed forward, tearing into him without moving an inch. The old woman’s eyes were black and deep and full of rage and smoke, and the soldier looked into them and felt nothing.
---
Steve won’t say anything, but Bucky knows he’s poor company. The doctors in Wakanda had fixed his head, and built him a new arm, better than before. He’s as fixed as he’ll ever be.
The world is harsh and dull now. Bucky had tried to explain how the days melted and blurred even as his internal clock tracks exactly how much time passes. Steve doesn’t understand; there is always a purpose with Steve, a vibrancy. Nothing else is as clear as when he’s around Steve.
The world is grey.
Then again, it’s winter in New York; even the snow is grey.
Bucky had agreed to visit Avengers’ Tower on the caveat that Howard’s son wasn't there. There’s some kind of clean energy conference in South Africa, so Stark is conveniently away. So is Natalia, on some mission or other. Bucky is grateful she's made herself scarce; he knows she isn't ready for him to apologize, and he knows it's the first thing he'll do.
In fact, the only official Avenger in residence is the alien, Thor. Steve says he’s here to visit Dr. Foster, one of Stark’s collection of geniuses.
Thor wants to meet “Steven’s blood brother” and introduce the women who'd provided a touchstone during his first return to Midgard.
Bucky doesn't mind. Steve says Foster and Lewis are sharp as tacks; they’d saved the Nine Realms once, whatever those are. Thor is winding up to tell him, but Jane Foster and her assistant emerge from the elevator, and Bucky is gobsmacked.
Dr. Foster is a smudge of distraction, her mind focused on something besides meeting Steve’s old brother-in-arms. Her assistant, though- Darcy Lewis-
She’s beautiful. God, it’s like he hasn’t seen color in decades, and she’s bursting with it. Her clothes are vibrant and rich, but it’s
her
: the glossy brown of her hair, the upturned red of her lips, the sweet and rounded skin, the soft blue of her eyes.
He freezes beside Steve, his heartbeat kicking into a gallop. She is looking right at him. A moment’s surprise flows into a growing grin, the color of her eyes sharpening. Had he just thought they were soft? They are cutting and amused and the color of smoke in winter.
Bucky amazes himself by feeling fear, of this small, unarmed woman, all curves and oversized clothing. He feels something.
He feels more than something as he watches her measured approach. The unexaggerated sway of her hips and the gap in her delighted grin are getting him to feel all
sorts
of things. Mostly that these jeans are tighter the longer he looks.
“Hi there!” she chirps, but her eyes are whirlpools, freeing something in his memories that even the Wakandans couldn't unbury.
Bucky doesn't spare a moment for the confusion he feels. He wants to engage this woman, and find out why he looks at her and thinks of snow.
He finds his smile an easy answer to hers, even if he has to ask, “Have we met?”
She laughs, and for a moment she looks ten feet tall.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
With a groan, Darcy collapsed onto Steve, chest-to-chest, and sipped at his panting breaths. Her hands stroked over his jaw, his shoulders, down his arms. He was breathing so heavily Darcy was being shifted up and down like a buoy.
She straightened her legs, dislodging him, but covering him more completely with the warmth of her body. She liked to soak up his heat, she said. In this form, she always felt a little cold, so used to containing fire within her.
Steve didn’t mind one bit; he liked having a soft, sated woman spread over him. In this form, he could lift her with one hand, but her lax weight settled the creeping sense of being adrift. Darcy was an anchor in reality despite the laws of physics twining around her like beloved pets.
Fire and a wingspan that could stretch between bases aside, Darcy was a modern woman. She might be twice his age, but she was abreast of all the technology and twists of language; Darcy often gave Stark a run for his money.
She was gorgeous, dangerous and powerful, clever, playful, and direct. Steve wasn’t sure how he’d gotten so lucky.
Without meaning to, he blurted, “Why me?”
Darcy set her chin on his sternum, let him feel the point digging down. She didn’t hesitate: “You’re smart, strong, and funny. Why not you?”
“There are smarter people around you all day. Stronger people. Funnier, too. Clint made you snort milk out of your nose two days ago.”
Her lips curled up. “But they’re not all those things. They’re not you.”
Steve couldn’t explain what he wanted to say. Darcy could have
anyone
. She could call on magics older than human civilization and find all kinds of lovers
anywhere
. In any dimension, on any planet, in any culture. For some reason, she liked Steve. A boy from Brooklyn; the man out of time.
He brought his hands back to her skin, sliding up her thighs, over her sides, and across her back in a slow embrace. Darcy arched into the touch, but watched him through slitted eyes. He had to ask another way. “What was the- the moment you decided on me?”
Color rose into her cheeks, and her eyes went from pleased slits to an embarrassed glance. She tucked her hands under his back, where the air hadn’t cooled the sweat on his skin. “The first time I saw you.”
Steve searched his memory for a moment; she must have seen him before he saw her. The first time he'd seen her, she'd thrown a desk at a hostile in the middle of a lab invasion and then tased another one creeping up as he stood gobsmacked. “When?”
“You were coming out of a training session with Thor. I was coming to ask him- and you were... you were-”
Steve held back a smile. Knowing how strenuous sparring with Thor often was, he guessed, “Sweaty?”
Darcy tucked her face into his neck and her voice was a breath on his skin, “You were shiny.”
“
Shiny?”
Steve laughed. He’d never been described that way when dripping with sweat. Darcy nipped his collarbone in retaliation.
“
Yes.
We don’t start hoarding until a… specific age. The old ones usually prefer gold and gems- those are traditional. I may be young, but we’re all still attracted to certain things. ”
“Shiny things?” Darcy nodded, dipping her head to taste the skin she'd marked. “And I was shiny.”
“Well, then I actually
met
you. Shiny was just my first impression.” She sat up just a little so she could look him over with a leer. “It’s a good impression.”
She wriggled on top of him, pressing closer and canting her hips in a way that made Steve's hands flex on her hips. He pulled her snug against him, and she sat up, giving him quite the view.
Her gaze trailed over him and her hands followed. The look in her eyes was a familiar one.
Steve couldn't help the shit-disturbing smile that grew on his face. “I’m going to take a wild guess that seeing me shiny is why you insist on riding me.”
Sinking down, she nibbled up his neck to his ear, where she spent a moment making him shiver. Darcy worked a slow path to whisper: “It’s not just that. Dragons also like to be on top of their hoards.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
The lights overhead are unreliable, their flickers throwing shadows before and behind the women. The air has the smell of old ships: mouldering wet wood and tar. Hospitals should not smell like this.
“I don’t know why I let you convince me to hunt monsters instead of finishing college. I only had-”
“Six credits left,” Jane echoes, not bothering to glance over her shoulder at Darcy. Her device gives a steady glow in counterpoint to the fluorescents.
They edge through one loud-hinged door and onto the roof. This building is old, and the roof is nothing but graveled tar and ventilation ducts.
Jane’s machine is giving her directions of a sort- they’re playing hot and cold with something that gives off the proper paranormal energies. The energies and the machine both have very complicated names.
Both women stay silent, creeping forward with tension in their shoulders. Darcy’s taser is in her hands, held away from Jane, just in case of sudden trigger happiness.
The rising scream is sudden and steady, pulsing through them like a full-body toothache. They flinch and hunch up against the physicality of the sound; they are so close they can practically
see
the sound waves.
Darcy’s ears are less delicate than Jane’s, after years of blasting her iPod at top volume. She can briefly withstand the scream. “Oh my god, will you
shut up
?”
The silence is abrupt and shocked. Jane makes out the human shape in the indirect, yellow light of the city. It could be wrapped in its own wings, or a long cloak, and once Darcy’s night vision catches up, neither woman is particularly interested in finding out.
“You do know this is a hospital, right?” Darcy snaps.
The man-shape seems to be looking at them now.
“It’s full of people. Like, newborns, and sports therapy people, and people with
very delicate hearts that don’t react well to screaming.
” Jane doesn’t even try to get Darcy to tone it down; they’d passed someone in ED with a crippling migraine who had had to be restrained by three nurses during the last scream.
The voice of the figure is strange, “I wail the approach of death.”
“Has it occurred to you,” Jane says in a measured tone, “that many people already die in hospitals? The wailing is sort of redundant. Unless it’s giving a warning so someone can avoid death. Is it?”
It pauses.
“I thought not. Do you maybe know who you’re wailing for? That would be pretty useful.”
The pause is longer, and Jane sighs.
“So- jump in if I get it wrong- you’re hanging out here, screaming intermittently because an unknown person in an unknown radius of you will die in an unspecified amount of time.”
The silence seems somewhat embarrassed now.
Darcy interjects, “Dude, you’ve been scaring the bejeesus out of the nurses.”
“You should probably, definitely stop screaming from the hospital roof,” Jane says, reasonably. “Find a nice moor or something.”
“Yeah, make like Jane Eyre and get lost.”
The hiss rises in pitch and volume until both Jane and Darcy are forced to retreat back into the creepy hallway.
As Jane switches her hide-and-seek device for one of her homemade weapons, Darcy checks the charge on her souped-up taser. It’s illegal in twelve states, and she wouldn’t have it any other way.
Jane hands over a pair of earplugs. They were engineered by some asshole who ogles Darcy in the most insultingly perfunctory manner. She prefers her ogling to be awed or at least appreciative.
Darcy stuffs her ears with the plugs because she is
not
being deafened in the name of paranormal investigation.
“You told me it wouldn’t come to fighting a monster, Jane.”
Jane gives her a glare that says what Darcy has to read from her lips:
Well, if you hadn’t antagonized the harbinger of death, we wouldn’t have to.
“It’s like you don’t know me at all, Jane.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Her hair is a cloud around them, silken and glossy like the shell of a chestnut. Nothing outside the veil of her hair is important. Not the press of her soft curves, or the scent of warm grass, or the way the roots of the oak cradle them.
The only thing that matters is the shape of her cheek, the sweetness of her breath, the coruscating warmth of her sky blue eyes. They are alone here, in this place; his companions left a distance behind, dozing in the summer heat.
Peter, though- Peter had wandered into the wood, wanting shade, wanting respite. Adventure can wait for one afternoon.
Adventure can wait as long as his lady desires.
She traces the many-pointed star over his breast; the silver thread couched in intricate loops catches on her fingers. That he is the illegitimate scion of a great house is of little matter to her, and he loves her for it. The shimmer of his badge, proudly borne, fascinates her.
“Ah, my handsome Star Lord, will you go with me?”
“I will go where you will, lady.” Peter draws the back of his fingers over her neck. He loves how his lady’s eyes half-close with pleasure. He wants to bury his face into her hair and breathe in her perfume; he cannot place the scent.
She tips her face above his, lips so close to his he can taste the sweet air of her breath.
“Will you tell me your name, darling?”
Peter laughs; his lady always knows just how to amuse him. As though she does not already hold his name in her heart, as he does hers. He will play any game she wishes, though. Anything for his lady. “Tell me yours first, lady?”
“I am known as Darcy,” her smile is sudden and brighter than the sun in the shadows of her hanging locks. “It means “dark one’ in the old tongue.”
“I’m Peter.” He hesitates, thinking perhaps to give her his father’s name, but no. He esteems his father’s family and place in the world, but he does not have that name to attach to his deeds; he has his own. “Peter Quill.”
“Peter Quill,” she rolls his name in her mouth and he shivers. “A strong name. A name with softness. A stone and a feather. I like it.” She kisses him, the softest touch deepening into a victorious devouring. She tastes of summer and he loses himself in the sweetness.
He hears, at a distance, his companions calling for him. Has the afternoon waned? What is the hour? They have promises to keep.
He sits up, and she comes with him, her skirts shifting over her legs and his. One cool, soft hand traces his brow and cups his cheek.
“What is the matter, my Star Lord?”
He looks down at her, the delicate translucence of her skin, her berry-red mouth, her fine clothes. A lady would never be without her entourage, but he’s heard no one until now. The westing sun turns the shade of the oak molten. The waning heat of the day is leaving the air sweet and rich.
His companions’ cries are ever more distant and ever more panicked.
Peter jumps to his feet, and his lady rises to hers. She barely comes to his shoulder, but she stands like a queen. She places a hand on his arm and he looks at her again. In the late light, her eyes are bluer than real, the gems at her throat glow and spark, her smile is sweet and amused.
“Your companions will miss you, Peter Quill. They will tell many tales of your feats.”
He trips away from her reach, over roots and knobs of grass and his own feet. “Where have they gone?”
“Nowhere. It is you who have gone, my love.”
The air is heavy with his panic and the scent of warm earth and greenery, like his lady’s breaths. The woods are deep and still and beautiful, like his lady’s eyes. The light is golden and palpable and unchanging, like his lady’s heart.
A soft, cool hand finds his cheek, offering only a shadow of comfort.
“Oh, Peter Quill,” she murmurs with no little enjoyment, “you should not have been so free with your name.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
“Can we keep it?”
Darcy set down her tablet and gave Pietro her full attention. He only looked like he was half-joking. “No.”
The droop of his shoulders was immediate. Darcy would really rather not deal with a disappointed superhero; he tended to be
extra
underfoot when he was down. In and out of her presence in a flash, sure, but he was around more. Racking her brain for a solution, Darcy first tried reason: “It’s only going to get bigger. We don’t have the facilities. We don’t have the know-how. Do you want the Lovecraftian version of Free Willy on your hands, Piet?”
He trailed his fingers in the tank- the squid-looking thing was too big for a kiddie pool no matter what Scott had suggested- and let its tentacles twine around his hand. “It’s just a baby.”
“Yeah, and babies grow up. It
is
a cute little krakitten,” Darcy allowed. She’d promised herself she wouldn’t get attached to it. Darcy picked her tablet back up and looked at the readouts for the tank. Oxygen levels and salinity were still in the ideal range. “Wanda says you’re down here a lot. How come?”
Pietro was silent, tugging his fingers rhythmically against the grip of the wee beast. It bobbed under the surface, one eye aimed his way; soft blue-white spots ran up its mantle. A pinky-orange arm lifted a rubber dog toy out of the water and proffered it. Pietro took it and sent it skipping across the surface of the tank. The tiny monster shot after it, its limbs encircling the toy before it hit the bottom of the tank.
Darcy had an order in for more toys, even though half the Avengers had brought something down for the wee beastie. Only Clint had made the mistake of trying to play tug of war with a 2 meter cephalopod.
The baby kraken brought the toy back to Pietro’s side of the tank, but offered it up to Darcy.
After Darcy threw it, Pietro said, “At first I came because I was bored.” Darcy did
not
snort; Pietro was frequently bored. “Then I came because you said the
lignj
če
might be bored, too.”
“You… listened to my presentation about enrichment?” Darcy looked away from the tank and the blue-spotted rosy peach kraken; those were its happy colors. She was surprised to find Pietro watching her.
“Of course,” Pietro scoffed, a smile growing on his face. “I always listen to your reports.”
“What? Really?” Darcy didn’t know why she felt flustered. That was a lie; she knew.
His smile turned into a grin. “Yes, Darcy. They are short and sweet, like you.”
Darcy knew her face was bright red, even if she found an answering grin forming.
The rubber toy sailed out of the tank and beaned Pietro with perfect aim. The assault was followed by a jet of water that drenched him.
“
Stvoření
č!
What was that for!”
The kraken circled its tank at speed, flashing victorious bright orange and deep purple spots.
Darcy tried covering her laugh with the tablet and completely failed. “I think it was defending me- red is the distress color for cephalopods.”
Pietro shook his hair out at speed, spraying droplets everywhere. He tossed the toy back into the tank, and the baby monster went after it. Darcy watched Pietro sidle up to her, smelling of saltwater and grinning like a fool. “What’s the enjoyment color of a cephalopod?”
Darcy gestured weakly to the squidlet- it was slowly tearing the rubber toy into pieces, streaked gold and mauve and dark blue.
Pietro was close, and Darcy found herself leaning towards him despite the smell. “If you’re done here,
kr
ásná
, perhaps we can find a quiet place I can discover
your
enjoyment colors.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
“This is ridiculous,” Darcy hissed to her bodyguard-cum-attendant-cum-advisor. They were waiting for her father, the king, to swan in and formally bring court into session. “Formal” was the order of the day- they had a royal delegation to welcome. “Everyone is freaking out about the crown prince being a centaur, of all the knock-brained notions.”
Natasha did not crack a smile. That was part of why she was the perfect shadow for the princess. “They are a nation of centaurs.”
Darcy scoffed. “And we're a nation of goblins.”
The duchess of the northern province gave the princess an elegant glare from under her butterfly wing diadem. The fiery-red aigrette in her hair bobbed with disapproval. In true princessly fashion, Darcy tipped up her chin as though she hadn’t noticed the duchess while still catching the light in her tiara. And if she used a bit of magic to make the sparkles a little blinding, well, the duchess could disapprove of that, too, while she blinked the spots out of her vision.
Under her breath, Darcy said, “Anyway, the royal family hasn’t been quadrupedal in centuries. If they were,” her tone turned pedantic, “there’d be a few more questions of anatomical compatibility than have been heretofore presented.”
It was only Natasha’s decades of training that saved her from snorting in royal court. Darcy’s impression of her granddam was uncanny. The queen mother was only a few yards away; it would not do to for an underling to get caught laughing with her younger granddaughter in the middle of the upper nobility.
Just as Natasha and Darcy got control of their faces, the royal procession started. Darcy was excused because she’d twisted her ankle during magical defense training; she could hardly be blamed if the city militia she was training was full of buffoons tripping over their own- and her- feet. It was mere coincidence that she wanted to avoid the kind of train her sister was wearing.
The crown princess was attired in a crystal blue gown, soft and flowing, with a tasteful explosion of gems around the neck and over one shoulder. Her river grey cloak was fastened over the other, and had two handmaidens carrying the trailing edge.
Their mother had
six
ladies hauling her train. They were all in the deepest green-black, as glossy as a raven’s wing. The queen was arrayed in the black of forgotten places, so dark that even though Natasha had been present with Darcy at the gown’s fitting, it was impossible to see the nap of the velvet. The queen’s cloak- long enough for six women to carry- was the fur of some black creature the queen had killed herself, or so hearsay would have it. The queen’s throne was a mirror of her husband’s, and she sank onto it with dangerous grace.
Natasha never failed to thrill at the fire of the queen’s green-gold gaze as it swept over them all. Darcy didn’t quail, but she was the queen’s daughter through and through.
The king’s entrance was the grandest of all: one moment the throne beside the queen was empty, the next she had her hand extended and the king’s hand was in it. Darcy’s father was decked head-to-toe in a dusty white, from his tall boots to his gloves to the feathered mantle of office. He scintillated with gems and the wild aura of his magic.
Court was in session.
The royal prince had arrived in style to negotiate a treaty. A treaty HRH Darceline Sarah Yvaine had been notified would likely include her hand in marriage. Darcy was practical; unless the prince was a complete bastard, she was willing to do what it took to ensure her country’s safety. If he turned out to be a bastard, well, Natasha did know a few rather unpleasant places in the kingdom he could be sent. Some of those places were exceptionally stinky.
At the far end of the court hall, the prince was announced. Natasha watched Darcy suppress her desire to crane for an early glimpse. Princesses did not
gawk
.
The boots of the prince and his retinue rang among the soft susurrus of the court. Natasha, standing behind her lady-cum-charge-cum-friend, watched the finery and poise approach the thrones. The prince was a fighting man; it was clear in his stride, his bearing, and the network of scars across his hands Natasha could see even from where she stood. His own father must be sure of his diplomats to send an envoy whose first instinct was to wade into danger or create it.
“Ohhh,
now
I get it,” Darcy breathed.
Natasha bent close. It wouldn’t do to have anyone overhear Darcy’s comments on the black-haired prince or his entourage. “Princess?”
Darcy flicked her hand discreetly at the man, encompassing the power in his limbs, the arrogant confidence of his demeanor, the weather-worn condition of his looks. Natasha turned her smile inward at Darcy’s predictable taste.
“He may not be a centaur, but I want to ride him.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Darcy rolled off Bucky, breath heaving in her chest, and collapsed onto Clint’s bed. She was running with sweat and dripping with… well.
“Holy shit, Bucky. How long’ve you been storing up all that jizz?” Clint marveled, his face level with Darcy’s crotch. His calloused fingers swiped through the mess on Darcy’s thighs, drawing little shapes. Darcy hoped they weren’t some kind of sigil; that was what had gotten them into this mess.
Bucky, eyes slitted in the dim room, growled, “
More.
” His dick was hard against his belly, still glossy with their come.
“Already?” Darcy squeaked. Her heart hadn’t stopped racing yet.
Clint patted her thigh. “Don’t worry, Darce. I got this.”
He shuffled between Bucky’s thighs, running his hands up the tender inner skin. Clint knew what Bucky liked, and could only hope that whatever was influencing him didn’t skew his tastes too much. Clint gripped the base of Bucky’s dick with rough pressure and sucked the rest into his mouth.
Bucky moaned and thrust his hips.
Clint didn’t bother pulling any of his special tricks, just set to work. He kept his eyes on Bucky’s face as he twisted his wrist on the upstroke. He was watching Clint work, the unnatural black of his eyes hooded by Bucky’s familiar half-wrecked look. Every unseen stroke of Clint’s tongue elicited a soft, throaty moan.
“That is one of the most workmanlike blowjobs I have ever seen in my life,” Darcy taunted. She reclined next to them, and only smiled when Clint glared at her.
He drew his mouth off with a wet pop, never stopping his hand. “Think you can do better?”
Darcy’s lips, rosy and kiss-plush, turned up even more. She curved into Bucky’s side, trapping his metal arm between their bodies. Without preamble, she reached up and twisted Bucky’s nipple.
The first jet of come hit the underside of Clint’s jaw with an audible
plap
. Clint adjusted his wrist so the next spurt fell across Bucky’s chest, and the next, and the next, and the
next
.
“
Damn
,” Clint breathed, wiping the come from his throat. Bucky usually gave a little warning, but Clint wasn’t exactly put out. He sucked the residue from his fingers and considered their next moves.
Darcy pressed her lips to Bucky’s slack mouth. He barely responded, letting her stroke her tongue against his. Darcy moved down the bed to give Clint the same treatment while Bucky panted, lax.
Darcy swirled a purple-painted fingertip through the copious mess on Bucky’s belly. “Is it weird I think this is kinda hot?”
Clint suppressed a sarcastic remark. Anyone with two brain cells to rub together right now (sorry Bucky) could tell Darcy thought this was more than
kinda
hot. She had a history of hogging all the creampies.
She drew her fingertips over Clint’s dick, red and straining, but he pulled back. “Gotta pace myself, Darce. Unlike our super-soldier, I’m not gonna get a fifth wind.”
Her eyebrows rose over twinkling eyes. “Were you gonna get a
fourth wind
?”
Clint stuck his tongue out, but before he could come back at her, Bucky rumbled, “
More
.”
Darcy and Clint both looked down at Bucky’s dick- throbbing against his abdomen, and as hard as the first time his eyes opened to blackness.
“I think I’m gonna miss this,” Darcy mused. She tickled Bucky’s balls and made him twitch.
Clint frowned. “I won’t. He’s bad enough when he’s
not
possessed by an insatiable sex demon.”
Bucky reached down with his metal hand and cupped the back of Clint’s head, drawing his face down.
That
move was pure Bucky.
Before Clint could get his mouth on his second-favorite dick, Darcy was there, sucking Bucky down while shooting him a wink.
Narrowing his eyes, Clint reached over Darcy’s hip where she was pressed to Bucky’s flank and gave her ass a swat. Darcy sucked in a sharp breath and almost choked on Bucky. Clint reached a little lower and sank two fingers into Darcy’s sopping wet pussy. He thrust them inside her until she moaned with her mouth full, pulling a groan from Bucky.
Satisfied, he swiped his thumb over her clit and took his hand back. Darcy’s little, needy growl had Bucky’s hips flexing upward. Clint smirked.
He didn’t waste time, stroking the tight muscle of Bucky’s asshole with well-lubed fingers. Clint knew his man, and sure enough, the muscle relaxed and Bucky’s hips flexed down onto Clint’s fingers. Teasing was for when Bucky was in his right mind. Now, Clint pushed one slicked finger into him and pushed deep.
Bucky’s full-body shiver didn’t dislodge Darcy, but her hand did sneak between her thighs. She took his dick to the back of her throat and hummed. Bucky’s hand dropped into Darcy’s hair, silver fingers threading through sweat-damp locks.
Clint drew his finger back just far enough to fit the tip of the second against Bucky’s rim. Again, Bucky angled his hips down and took Clint’s fingers with a pleased moan.
Clint bit his cheek against a groan. Bucky was tight around him and Clint was beginning to regret ignoring his own dick. He didn’t dare touch himself right now; he was too close to the edge. Better to wait and make the most of his first wind.
He took a few shallow thrusts to make sure Bucky was loose and ready. Darcy threw Clint a thumbs up, her lips and chin wet with saliva. Bucky’s hand guided her pace, slow and steady, but the way his breath caught in his throat, Clint knew a move that would finish him.
Not that Clint hadn’t had plenty of practice at this- before and with Bucky- but he prided himself on his excellent aim
in all things
.
Using his near-perfect aim, Clint found that sweet spot inside his guy and gave it a little poke. Bucky’s wavery yip was all the confirmation Clint needed to jiggle his fingers against Bucky’s prostate like Clint was a determined Jehovah’s Witness at an atheist’s doorbell.
Darcy’s happy slurping turned into a surprised chirp as Bucky’s back bowed up and his hand dropped her head further onto his dick. Clint watched from less than a foot away as Darcy fought to swallow everything Bucky was giving her.
The hand between Darcy’s thighs stilled and she shuddered with Bucky’s dick still twitching in her mouth. Pulling away with a gasp, Darcy swallowed to clear her throat, but couldn’t resist dragging the head of his dick across her lips. Clint tapped his fingers one more time, and a last stripe of come fell across her lips and cheek.
Darcy looked like she might object to an unexpected facial, so Clint surged forward and planted his mouth on hers. Their kiss was slippery with come and spit, and it tasted of bitter and salt, and Clint felt his dick throb.
Bucky lay against Clint’s ancient, mismatched pillowcases, shivering with aftershocks until Clint slipped his fingers out of his ass. Bucky’s eerie eyes closed, and Clint decided to test the accuracy of his aim, but with his dick next time.
Darcy tucked her legs under her, leaning back from the sweaty, radiant heat of Bucky’s body. Her voice was husky and wry when she wondered, “When did Dr. Strange say this was gonna wear off?”
“He didn’t. Either Strange breaks the… the curse or whatever it is, or we fuck it out of him.” Clint looked at Bucky’s dick, filling as he watched. “Or die trying.”
Darcy sighed, eyes on Bucky’s thickening dick as well. “There are worse ways to go.”
Bucky reared up from his prone position, and dragged them both up the bed, and under his body as he turned.
“
More.
”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
The tide is awash today; the sea is thinner than blood and hotter than love. The water is cold, and she wishes she could return to it.
Instead, she watches the village men take their boats out for the catch. She hopes her husband drowns, but knows he won’t. A selkie wife is a good wife, and her pelt will protect a man from drowning.
From his house on the hill, she can taste the clean salt, and breathe the wind, and wonder about the ship’s sails at the horizon.
Darcy is a proper wife; his house is always as fresh as a wedding house, his clothes are always mended good as new, his meals are filling no matter what he gives her to cook with. His bed is always as warm as her flesh.
She is a good wife, but for giving him children. Darcy knows the secrets of remaining childless, even if she won’t be able to continue them and still be a good wife for much longer.
There is not much time in her day for looking out to the sea, but Darcy does. There is a ship, chasing before a storm. The cove of the village is a safe harbor, she knows. Safe harbor for men, anyway.
He told them she came from a village down the coast, like theirs. His mother loves her, she says, for her cooking and cleverness. The village women like her well, they say, for her kindness and steady heart. Her husband loves her, he says, for her eyes and her silky skin.
She would rather swim in the indifferent sea than be loved on the shore.
The boats return with the catch and the ship, bigger than any vessel she has seen since she was a pup. They bring the storm’s vanguard with them, and Darcy collects her linens from the line before they get wet again. She would rather stand in the rain and think of drowning.
Her husband brings a man with him, and tells her to prepare dinner for one more; the man will be bedding down with them for the night. The ship has a skeleton crew for the storm, he says. Darcy is a good wife and has no difficulty stretching their supper to accommodate another hungry man.
Ale with their supper is not enough, the spirits come out in short order; her husband is eager for news of the world, and wants to whet their guest’s tongue. Darcy is eager for the sea.
The man smells of the sea, but also tar and woodworm, and calls himself Sam. He is the captain's first mate, and Darcy nods, though one sailor is much the same as another.
She finds that she smiles while he regales her husband with tales of the cities he has visited, the lands. She laughs at the antics of the members of his crew, his captain, and Darcy has surprised herself with it. Unsettled, she retires to bed.
She doesn’t sleep, her body heat seeping into the bedclothes while her husband and the sailor laugh and drink. She listens, smiles curving her mouth over and over until her cheeks hurt. It is a good kind of hurt, and one she welcomes.
Sam asks her husband about the fur he has about his shoulders, and the good hurt turns back into an old ache.
Her husband is boasting drunk, and Darcy wishes she had fallen asleep hours ago. The storm is fierce outside, but not strong enough to drown out his words.
Come upon a beautiful maid sunning herself on the rocks, he says, and she must be a selkie, a seal-woman. Somewhere nearby she has lain her pelt to dry, and if you take it, she will be your bride. If you wear it yourself, you cannot drown.
Does your seal-wife swim in the sea? Does she still use her own pelt?
No, no, she may not have her skin back, or else she will return to the sea and never come back to you. Her pelt must be locked in this chest and the key hidden here to keep her by your side. She is the perfect wife.
Sam says nothing in answer, but she hears the bottle against two glasses, and knows they drink.
Darcy falls asleep, or else she must weep, but a good wife doesn’t cry herself to sleep.
The storm has been brief, but strong. The morning air is still and clean, the dawn light cool on her upturned face. The hillside is starting to bloom, and Darcy thinks she might collect a handful of wildflowers for her husband’s table.
Her husband is sleeping off his drink- two bottles were on the table when she rose to feed the chickens- and her pelt is in his iron-banded chest at the hearth-side. He does not wear the key to the chest; she knows that well. He knows her that well, for Darcy would surely try to throttle him with the cord to get it, again.
The sailor is at the door when she rounds the house from seeing to the chickens. She has two eggs in her hand, and very nearly makes a joke about breakfast. The ship is leaving again, he says, and he is grateful for her hospitality.
Darcy smiles again, laughs but doesn’t say it was her husband’s hospitality, and a good wife honors her husband’s guests.
She knows the tide will be going out soon, taking the ship and the fishing boats with it, and leaving her behind.
“Where I hail from,” Sam says, catching her eyes with his dark ones, “a good guest brings a gift or does a service.”
Sam takes the eggs from her hand and sets an iron key in her palm. It’s weighty and smaller than she remembered. She had forgotten how touching this key feels like being dragged in an undertow: crushing breathless and tossing her senses. She hardly knows where she is, the brine of the sea so close in her lungs she almost feels at though she’s gasping water.
Her empty hand flies out to brace her wobbling legs, and her palm finds the sailor’s chest. He is firm under her hand, real like love and hot like blood. Darcy finds herself steadying. Her heartbeat is the crashing of waves in her ears, but she finds herself smiling at the sailor, who is smiling back.
“Hospitality must be answered,” he says.
The ship has a bell, which is heard all the way up the hill. Sam glances down into the cove, then back at her husband’s house, and turns away with a smile that Darcy thinks might have some mischief in it. His tread away from her is light, and he is soon lost in the curve of the path and the brightening sky.
Darcy turns back to the house. The key is in her hand, and weighty like the sea- uncaring and comforting.
She has been a good wife, yes, but that is not enough; she is a good woman, and must now be good to herself.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Don’t freak out
.
That was the text they received from Darcy that afternoon. They’d turned their phones back on, and that had been waiting for them.
Steve could admit that, by the time he and Bucky disembarked from their mission, he
was
freaking out. But only a little.
Ok, he was freaking out a lot.
Bucky's answering text,
Freak out about what?
had gone unanswered. She didn’t answer their calls, either.
They were dirty and in uniform, but Steve and Bucky both took the steps to their brownstone three at a time. Who gave a shit what the strangers on the street thought. The block was being locked down as Bucky closed his hand around the biometric knob on their door. The lock clicked open as though nothing was amiss.
Bucky had his sidearm drawn, and stepped sideways into their foyer exactly as he’d cleared the AIM base with Steve and SHIELD a few hours before. Their synchronous movements led them further into their home, the tension they’d carried to their door subsumed by the loose readiness they’d learned from years of combat.
Neither man called out to Darcy; they couldn’t risk giving away their position.
Sunlight streamed into their living room, falling across the sofa and coffee table. Darcy’s favorite mug was there-
I Say Thee Coffee!
- three-quarters full and no longer steaming. She never let her coffee go cold. Steve's heart felt like a rock in his chest.
Bucky cleared the room, saying nothing. There was no one behind the sofa or in the tiny coat closet that Darcy had insisted was charming. No hiding assailants, and no Darcy.
They cleared the Darcy-dubbed “library” that she mainly used as an office. Her papers were scattered across the desk, printouts pinned to the enormous cork board and strewn onto the floor. The room was a disaster zone. As usual. Darcy liked to spread out until she could see the bigger picture and gradually reorganize everything how she wanted. They'd have a hard time telling if there'd been an altercation in here.
The door to the basement was locked when Steve tested it. The keypad hadn't been used since he and Bucky had left for the mission. So Darcy wasn’t in the panic room down there. Which didn't mean anything good if Darcy hadn't been able to reach it in time.
A creak upstairs had both men freezing. Bucky's gun was up and aimed, and Steve had his shield up, defending their flank.
“Is that my fellas? I hear the world got saved again, or at least Arizona.”
Bucky had dropped his aim as soon as they heard her on the stairs. By the time she'd finished talking, his sidearm was away and he was rushing up the stairs to meet her.
“Darcy!” His arms were around her and his face pressed into her loose, unbrushed hair.
Steve didn't relax on seeing her the way Bucky had. “Darcy, is everything alright?”
“Uh, yes? I’m fine; why?” She peered down at Steve through the banister, and he cursed himself for not discussing signs and countersigns with her when they bought this place. “What's going on?”
Bucky took his face out from under her ear, and looked at her- one step above and perfectly eye-level. “Your text, doll.”
Her whole demeanor shifted from confused to guilty. She lifted a hand and waved it towards Steve in a classic “don't shoot” gesture. “Oh. Uh, ok. Don’t freak out.” She shut her mouth, nipping her lower lip between her teeth.
“
Darcy
,” Steve barked.
She pulled out of Bucky’s arms, but took his hand as she slipped past him down the stairs. She edged around Steve but brushed past the shield without a care. “Ok, so, Bilquis, right?”
Bucky rolled his eyes at Steve. Only Darcy could take a two-ton, scaly, horned monster that made Asgardians nervous and casually turn her into a house pet. It didn't hurt that due to some magic of Loki’s, outside their home, the massive beast looked like an innocuous, enormous bull mastiff.
“Yeah, doll, Bilquis. Eats enough to feed the Bronx Zoo? She’s a little hard for us to have missed,” Bucky snarked. Darcy hip-checked him and kept going.
“So you know how Thor left Bilquis with me?”
“Just until he finds a suitable habitat on Earth, or another realm,” Steve hedged. Darcy treated Bilquis like a lapdog, but even Steve could admit he liked going for runs with her. Bilquis was still a wild animal, though, and definitely wasn’t suited to living in a city for very long. At least, not without starting to
hunt
.
“Right,” Darcy nodded. “Ok, well if you promise not to freak out, come into the kitchen.”
Bucky snagged a strap of Steve’s uniform as Darcy dragged him past, and they trailed her into their kitchen. It was a mess, as usual when Darcy was home alone for more than a couple of days. Dishes were piled beside the sink, fruit was scattered along the island, and the blender looked like it had lost out against Darcy’s insistence that anything could make a smoothie.
In the former breakfast nook, Bilquis lolled in her bed. It was a double bed mattress with a duvet tucked over it. There was not a dog bed in existence large enough for a “dog” the size of a hippopotamus.
Darcy let Bucky’s hand drop and approached the fanged monstrosity. The myopic, scaled head lifted and Darcy was snuffled in greeting, Bilquis’ carrion breath rustling her hair. Steve set his shield on the island counter; the clink of it against the surface had Bilquis heaving herself to her feet, ears flicking in delight.
“Missed us, huh, girl?” Bucky said, scratching between her antlers. Bilquis’ wriggle when Bucky’s fingers found the right spot nearly knocked Steve off his feet.
“Remember your promise…”
Bucky and Steve looked up from the happy unstoppable creature and Steve, at least, felt his jaw drop.
Darcy, back-lit by the diffuse shade on this side of the house, was hefting a round shape dappled grey-green like river algae and mud. It was an overall pebbly texture, like Bilquis’ underbelly, and when Darcy hefted it again, it
peeped
.
“Bilquis had babies!”
Bilquis turned back to Darcy, knocking both men back into the kitchen island and onto the floor. Her tail flicked a pineapple off the counter, and Steve caught it before it beaned Bucky.
Darcy had the baby bilgesnipe cradled in her arms, tickling its belly with her fingertips. It was kicking its middle feet and letting out tiny, high-pitched grunts.
Its mother nosed at it, and let out a reverberant grunt of her own. Bilquis returned to her bed, delicately trampling the surface until she was satisfied, and settled, curling around more mud-and-algae lumps.
Steve shut his mouth, but found he had too many questions to keep it that way. “How many did she have?”
“Three.”
Steve couldn’t see past Bilquis into her nest, but Darcy was her favorite, so he had no doubt his gal had the right of it. “When’d this happen?”
Bucky was using some of his stealth to lean over Bilquis’ bulk and peek into the bedding at the other baby snipes. One of Bilquis’ ears was angled toward Bucky, listening, but the other was flicking with satisfaction.
“Uh, well, I texted you when the first one came out, so… yesterday night?” Darcy shrugged, and the little monster in her arms rolled over and craned its head up to sniff at Darcy’s chin. She swayed under the shifting weight and grinned at her armful (and tilted her face up and away to avoid a leathery tongue to the mouth). “Bilquis and I have been a little busy, sorry. I take it I missed a call or two?”
So she hadn’t missed that they’d been stalking through their own house like a building with unknown hostiles. Steve felt a grimace forming on his face- the mix of fear for Darcy, the regret they may have scared her, the pending conversation about her safety was blending into a sour knot in his throat.
Bucky came and hauled Steve to his feet, then prodded him to bracket Darcy and the wee beastie in her arms. “We might have been a little worried at the radio silence, doll.”
Steve sighed and relaxed his weight against Bucky. “More than a little worried, if I’m honest.”
“You’re always honest,” Darcy murmured. She shifted onto her toes and leaned up to press a kiss to Steve’s cheek. “Sorry.” She twisted to do the same to Bucky. “Sorry.”
“I’m sorry if we startled you when we came in, Darce.” Steve didn’t ever want to scare their gal, and he knew Bucky felt the same.
Darcy snorted. “You know Bilquis would
eat
any intruders, right?” The baby bilgesnipe in her arms peeped again, and she laughed. “And so would Thorsten, wouldn’t you, baby?”
Steve smiled. “I bet Thor was delighted you named one after him.”
She tipped her head in the way she did when she realized she'd forgotten something important. “Well…”
“You have called Thor, right?”
Darcy’s smile was a rueful flash. She leaned toward Steve and deposited the hefty Thorsten into his arms. Steve’s neck and chin were licked in a most excited fashion- and, oh, yes, the tongue to the face. Thorsten was adorable, but so slobbery.
Bucky grinned and slung an arm around her waist. “Think he ought to know there are now four bilgesnipes in New York?”
“I'll call him. It's a good thing he has a cell phone now, really.” She was already pulling up his number in her phone, muttering under her breath, “Never thought I'd be glad Loki convinced Thor to do something.”
Steve and Bucky could hear the phone ring through the tiny speaker, and the tinny boom of Thor’s voice over the line, “
Darcy! To what do I owe the honor of your call?
”
She glanced at Bilquis in her nest, and Thorsten gumming at Steve’s chin, and said, “Don’t freak out…”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
“Lucky Lewis, right?”
“Huh?” Darcy turns away from adjusting Pern’s belly band. One of the yellow-coated eyrie handlers shifts a few yards away, making last-minute checks to a dragon’s harness and kit, while the riding wingman checks its other side. The handler is slight and quick at his task, and when he turns to look at her again, he’s younger than she expected. One of the trainees, then.
“Lucky Lewis, who flew 40 kilometers into military airspace then dragon-jumped to avoid radar, just to steal back a requisitioned iPod? That's you, right?”
Darcy wants to tuck her hair behind her ears, but it’s already braided back. “Uh, yeah. I didn't think anyone out here knew about that."
Her criminal trespass might have been ballsy enough to get her recruited to Romanoff’s stealth program, but she hadn't thought it wouldn’t end up public knowledge.
“
Everyone
out here knows about that.” He doesn’t see Darcy roll her eyes. Of
course
the Air Cavalry would have heard of her antics the second the inquiry was over.
“I was still in school; I read about you in Dragons & Flight magazine. Just the nickname, of course. My gran said you had to be so lucky to make up for the stupidity.” He seems to realize what he’s said and flushes pink.
Darcy laughs. “Pern is all the luck I need.”
Pern chirrups at her name and flicks her occipital spines, eager to get into the air. They're going to be running maneuvers; Pern and Darcy need more practice doing breaks and aerial pickups. Pern
loves
dumping her rider mid-air; Darcy, though, is the only one she'll catch up again.
The heavy downdraft of a dragon executing a precipitous break whips Darcy's unzipped coat open and catches her attention. The airfield is busy, as usual, but wingmen usually land their dragons further away from unfamiliar animals. Pern doesn't seem to bothered by the green drake, but then again she mostly just dislikes people.
Darcy has seen this dragon before, though for a second, she doesn't know from where.
The rider leaps down, whips off his helmet with a laugh- his sweaty hair falls like a goddamn cinema hero- and it's flying ace
Bucky Barnes
and his Francesca, a huge American Drake, sleek and fast and full of fire. Not far behind, America's favorite son, Steve Rogers, lands with Saoirse, Francesca’s clutch-mate. (Rogers and Saoirse are the darlings of dragon flight, even better known to the public than the rakish Barnes and charming Francesca. News articles and Air Cavalry advertisements feature Captain Rogers and his dragon on a regular basis.) Saoirse’s famous blue coloring is a counterpoint to Francesca's vibrant green.
Judging from their harness and the day’s field schedule, they’ve been practicing their moves. Darcy doesn’t doubt they’ve been honing their already flawless coordination; she’s seen the duo execute strike maneuvers with enviable precision. She’s never seen either wingmen or dragons this close, though. A rookie in the stealth squad does not run in the same circles as the poster boys of American dragonflight.
With a pat to Francesca’s neck, Barnes strides across the open field, towards the flight office. He twists to call something to Rogers, and when he turns back, he’s laughing. His smile is fucking radiant. Darcy is dumbstruck, feeling her blood rush into her cheeks. She knew she had a bit of a dragon rider kink, but this is just ridiculous. She’s
seen
Barnes in Air Cavalry
propaganda
films and never had this reaction. But standing there with her helmet at her hip, flight coat not even zipped yet, Darcy is struck with a case of lust at first sight.
Pern rustles her wings behind Darcy, drawing Barnes’ eye. The fresh smile that curves his lips is sin itself. He's giving her a once-over so blatant she can see it from fifty paces, and he's only getting closer.
The wingman near Darcy peeks over his dragon’s neck to ask the eyrie handler, “Is that Wing Commander Rumlow? I thought he was stationed in California.”
Decorated war hero and unparalleled badass Brock Rumlow? Darcy has got see the guy who had his dragon shot out from under him and still completed the mission. The guy who led the most decorated wing of the Air Cavalry to new levels of infamy. The guy green recruits wet themselves over being assigned to the
same base
.
He’s in his service uniform, hat and all. Normally, a man in uniform doesn’t do it for Darcy, but Rumlow has a contained swagger she can’t look away from. Black hair and that jaw- those don’t hurt, either. He’s heading out onto the field, insignia shining, and Darcy doesn’t miss how his hand flexes like he’s holding a dragon’s lead. Damn, what she wouldn’t give to see that man astride a dragon.
“Big wigs are having some kind of powwow,” another eyrie handler says, coming up alongside Pern. Darcy’s dragon twists her head to hiss at him. No one is going to be checking her harness but Darcy, whenever she peels her eyes off Sex Walking.
Then the man strides past their knot of dragons and riders and techs, into full view of the air field, and Darcy glances at Barnes in time to see his smile change to one of surprised delight.
Barnes picks up his pace, jogging and then running. He’s like a moving advertisement for the Air Cavalry, tall and broad-shouldered in his flight suit, with wind-reddened cheeks and a determined trajectory. (Behind him, Steve has the leads of both dragons, shaking his head with a grin.) Barnes is smiling wide as anything, and Darcy feels a pinch of disappointment? envy? when Barnes’ momentum crashes him into Rumlow's arms. Rumlow’s hand in Barnes’ hair crushes their mouths together.
Oh
no
. They're so hot. Darcy doesn’t even consider looking away.
Barnes is gripping the back of Rumlow’s command jacket with both hands. The Commander’s other hand is at his hip, tugging him closer. They can’t seem to get close enough, tilting their heads to deepen their kiss. Darcy is gonna be taking the image of the two fighters wound around each other to bed tonight, that’s for sure.
Barnes pulls back, looking at his man, then dips forward to say something in his ear. Barnes is just that little bit taller than the Commander that the stoop of his shoulders to reach the proper height makes Darcy ache to stand tall between those two towering wingmen.
They both turn in Darcy’s direction, Barnes’ and Rumlow’s eyes marking her with the precision of winged predators.
Rumlow’s gaze takes her in the way Barnes’ had, and Darcy shivers from the wind through her coat.
Rumlow says something, and both men grin.
She is so fucked.
If she's lucky.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
She made him out of whatever she could get her hands on. Most of it, she stole. Marble, and porcelain and bone and a little carmine from the pigment shop with the skinny, pugnacious artist behind the counter.
Even so, she didn't have enough and one of his arms had to be salvaged from the remains of a H.Y.D.R.A. automaton. Erik had lectured her about the dangers of sneaking into a H.Y.D.R.A. scrapyard, after the fact. Jane had just shaken her head and gone back to welding one of her machines.
Darcy wasn’t to be dissuaded. It didn’t matter to her if H.Y.D.R.A. came after her for theft, as long as he was completed before they did.
She used the carmine to paint a star on his metal arm. What little was left over she dusted onto his stone-white lips.
The spell work was trickier; he had to have the words for life, and speech, and strength, but he also needed the words for not-slave, and intellect, and protection. Words of that magnitude were a struggle to apply to the ritual scroll, no matter the skill of the writer. Darcy had only been young when H.Y.D.R.A. came, barely an acolyte. The temple scholars were all killed; she was the only one with any of the knowledge to build him, and what she knew wasn’t nearly enough.
She traded two meal rations for just enough ultramarine to get a wash of color onto his irises. She bartered her last chisel for the quicksilver to whet his tongue. She exchanged her happiest childhood memory to learn how to write the words properly.
Jane had gifted her the space to build and the cover of being a genius’ assistant when the more suspicious members of the resistance paid visits.
Even so, “What is he even going to do, Darce?
If
this works.”
“He’ll help.” She bit her lip. If it worked, “He’ll help us rout H.Y.D.R.A. out of our city. Help the resistance destroy H.Y.D.R.A. once and for all.”
Jane was nodding, picking at the wires of the weapons she used to send parts of the enemy who-knew-where, while the other parts stayed behind. They’d both been in the resistance since the start, for far too long.
“He’ll be perfect.”
“He’s a bit mismatched, though,” Jane pointed out.
“That doesn’t matter. He’ll have a purpose, and he’ll be perfect for it. And what’s more, he’ll be alive, and free to choose.”
“He could ignore his purpose, then,” Erik reminded from over the stew pot, in the middle of cooking their rations with the spices he traded for moonshine.
“He could,” Darcy agreed. “But if he doesn’t ignore his purpose, he has been built to carry it out.” She looked up at the figure, placid and, yes, mismatched on the marble base she’d stolen from the ruins of some majestic institution H.Y.D.R.A. had razed. “I don’t think he
will
ignore his purpose. Some of the words- the words feel right. I’m not worried.”
“I think you’re a little in love with this guy, Darce,” Jane teased.
Darcy ducked her head and laughed. “I suppose I am, a bit. If everything works, he’s hope for a better day. A day where pain doesn’t bring order, but compassion.”
“And it doesn’t exactly hurt that you made him anatomically correct.” Jane added with a sly expression, “
Impressively
correct.”
Erik guffawed over their dinner while Darcy blushed and stammered.
The day dawned when she’d prepared as much as she could, and no more opportune time would come.
Darcy placed the prepared scrolls inside him, said a prayer, and stepped back. She had built what none of the temple masters had been able in hundreds of years: a golem. A man of clay with words enough to be alive.
Jane and Erik were peering at her creation as though he'd lurch to life like some kind of fairytale monster.
Darcy stood there, waiting, fretting. She knew the words were
right
, but she wasn't sure they were
enough
.
She wasn't sure of the exact moment, but his eyelids flickered, and where there had been porcelain and pigment was now a living eye, storm blue, in a living face. A marble-white hand lifted, and the eyes focused on the flex of the fingers. The metal hand rose up and got the same treatment.
His hair was dark. She hadn’t even given a thought to it, couldn’t recall what she’d used to make it, but here he was, lifting a real hand to it and brushing it away from his brow.
She stared at all his little movements, stunned. He was
breathing
.
He was beautiful. He was perfect.
He was
alive
.
Darcy must have made some kind of movement because his eyes are on her, curious and blank. She's pinned under his gaze, felt the heat creep up her face and down her body.
His hand swept through his hair again, and Darcy could swear she hadn't sculpted it so long. She can't quite remember, and she doesn't care. She wouldn't change a thing.
His lips turned up, the skin around his eyes crinkling a little, and he's still looking right at her. “Hey there, gorgeous.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
“Doctor, your visitors have arrived,” Mudok quavered, somewhere behind her.
Janerin couldn’t be bothered to look up from packaging her device. The visitors would just have to wait until she fitted it into its casing for travel. This trip to the surface was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and this device was
important
.
The nervous throat clearing of her head assistant wasn’t worth noting. The man sounded like a clamshell hitting rock. “What
is
it, Mudok?” She reached for the inventory; she had work to do.
A pale-skinned hand pinned the list to her work surface. The unmistakable, shell brown of her most illustrious visitor... Janerin turned wide, brown eyes to the man who had approved her excursion, and dropped into a bow.
“My king! How unexpected.”
Namor arched a fine, black brow, the insouciant smirk he’d worn all through her presentation firm on his face. The council had only approved her request because the king thought her ideas worth investigating.
“I have come to see you off; you are my royal astronomer, after all.”
“You honor me, your majesty.” Janerin couldn't think why he'd visit her work space instead of summoning her. She might be one of the brightest minds of Atlantis, but she didn't pretend to understand the eccentricities of their king. “As I said in my address to the council, the stars and the pathways between them will be easier to study outside the distortion of water-”
“Yes, yes,” he waved her off. His gaze was drawn to the telescope protruding into Janerin’s laboratory space. Dark eyes turned back and pinned Janerin. “Beware the land-dwellers; they are savage, and can never find out what technologies we have. Your guard and help-meet on the surface will be Darssia; she has traveled to the surface before, and is equipped to protect you. I have been assured your disguises will be indistinguishable from the natives, but take care to reveal nothing of us to the land-dwellers.”
“Thank you, sire.” Janerin bowed again, glancing at the curvaceous Atlantean standing behind their king. The woman threw her a wink.
Namor watched the exchange with an indulgent smirk, and turned to leave. “I wish you safe travels.”
Janerin and Darssia bowed to their king, and he was gone.
--
“Darcy, have you seen the calibrator?”
Darssia rolled over in the lumpy, poky RV bed and glowered up at the genius. “I need about three liters of water before I even consider telling you where I hid it.”
Janerin jammed her fists on her hips. “But I need it for-”
“No, Jane. Water first, coffee second,
then
calibrator.”
Janerin leaned over Darssia in bed, slipping her hand under the sheet. She smiled as Darssia gasped and spread her legs. “I think I have a workaround you'll approve.”
--
Their van had hardly come to a stop before Janerin and Darssia rocketed out of it. Had they killed a man? Injured him? Land-dwellers were so fragile, and liable to get into the worst situations- like stumbling through a storm into the path of the only vehicle for miles.
“Do me a favor, and don’t be dead,” Janerin pleaded under her breath. She needed to finish her work and return to Atlantis without alerting the humans to anything unusual happening in the desert, and more importantly, she needed not to have anyone’s blood on her hands.
He wasn’t dead. He was… mostly alright, if a little insane. And threatening.
Darssia had warned Janerin that she always carried a weapon, but hoped she’d never have to use it.
The man in the storm staggered towards Janerin, his arm raised. “You. What realm is this? Alfheim? Nornheim?”
Janerin was frozen; she’d read of those places in the texts written by previous Atlantean astronomers. How did this mad land-dweller know of them?
Darssia raised her weapon. “Uh, New Mexico?”
He growled, voice rising to a bellow, only to be cut off with convulsive abruptness when Darssia shot him with enough electricity to dissuade a giant squid.
--
The alien didn't seem to have a problem walking around half-dressed, unlike the land-dwellers they’d met so far. On the contrary, he seemed perfectly at ease in his leagues and leagues of golden, sand-colored skin on display. Darssia wouldn't object to watching the muscles bunch under that skin, or feeling how they might shift under her hands, or even-
“Oh
no
, Jane,” Darssia moaned under her breath.
Janerin didn't glance up from her computer. “What?”
“I want to lick him. Like,
everywhere
.”
“You know we can’t get involved with land-dwellers,” Janerin admonished. Wrestling with the interface between Atlantean technology and primitive land-dweller devices was not half as interesting as watching Thor pass a t-shirt over his head. She would freely admit that she'd like to suck a constellation of marks into that soft spot below his navel.
He turned away, adjusting the lay of the shirt. The muscles of his back were smooth and perfectly symmetrical under the dark fabric.
“But he isn’t a land-dweller,” Darssia mused. “He’s from space.”
Janerin raked her gaze over their guest. He was looking out the showroom windows at the desert beyond Puente Antiguo, bulging arms crossed over his chest. Janerin was coming to appreciate that Darssia’s instinct to lick things she liked was as reliable as any gut feeling.
“You make an excellent point.”