Examine Your State

Katherine felt the tension through her husband's tightening grip before he slowly exhaled. "It is possible, however, let me remind you again about the risk of testing - "

"But we need to test it anyway", Katherine interjected before he could start a sermon about responsibility for their child. "You may hope otherwise but I did not forget that your veins were already dark when you left me. I doubt healing you can wait much longer."

"It can wait for nine months at least."

"But it will be inconvenient, right?" When Nathaniel remained silent, Katherine continued: "We need you at your full strength, not like the first time we met. These are dangerous times. How will you protect us if your condition deteriorates? Not that I need protection, but our child is a different matter!"

To leave her pride intact, Nathaniel barely resisted a smile. Skadi forbid that his wife ever needed protection! Somehow he found her insistence more adorable than anything else. Nevertheless, he had a different opinion. "I lived with that power for several years before I ended up the way you saw me. The spreading is so slow that only my movement will get a bit, well, rigid. But not to the point that I become useless, so you don't need to worry about it and just focus on our child."

"Reeeeaaally?" Katherine's eyes narrowed as she scrutinized him. "I don't believe you. I can see you uttering the same words even on your deathbed. If there is nothing to worry about, then open your shirt and let me see. Your personal doctor will examine your state - and don't you think you can play it down!"

"Examine my state, huh?" A sexy smirk crept onto Nathaniel's face as he leaned back. "Very well then, Mrs. Doctor. I shall give you full access. Take these."

He handed her his gloves before his long, slender fingers went to open the silver clasp of his cape. The black fabric fell on the mattress almost without a sound.

Katherine gulped. That undertone was not what she had intended but she knew better than to complain. Her eyes were transfixed on his neck and the smooth skin that was exposed as his fingers worked on the buttons of his dress shirt. The first, the second, the third...

"The gloves," Nathaniel murmured. "Put them on."

She followed his command willingly, fumbling with the leather while her eyes were drunken with the sight of her husband. Oh, how she had missed the pearly white expanse of his skin, the pronounced adam's apple, the curves of his collar bones teasingly revealed when the fabric slid aside. Her lips parted with the urge to kiss every centimeter of this art piece...

"Don't." His voice was a low rumble with rough edges. The tilt of her body, like a moth drawn to a flame, must have betrayed her intentions, and his fingers halted on the fifth button. Yet, after weeks of missing each other, he did not tell her 'no'. "We have played the game of 'no touching' once... more or less successful. Maybe a different set of rules will work."

The hitch in her breath was a sign that he caught her interest, as was her gaze when she looked up. It was eager, almost dazed. Inhaling her rosy scent, he lowered his voice to a whisper. "For example: ask permission before each touch. At all times, do not use magic. And when you touch me... you and our baby need to be protected."

Lightly like a leaf, his hand came to rest on top of Katherine's belly. This little touch sufficed to take her breath away since only her blouse hindered him from feeling the place where their baby grew. There was not even a bump yet but the gesture felt special in a way that was difficult to comprehend or explain. Almost as if he could secure the invisible baby in his broad palm and protect it. Her eyes moistened as she placed her hand above. "Will you really allow me to? I could understand it if you think it's too risky... at least I'd try to hold back..."

Gentleness softened his features, and his thumb caressed her belly. "If you follow the rules, it should be okay... after all, a good husband should fulfill the urges of his wife as long as it is possible. Even more so, if said wife carries his child."

Giggles vibrated in her stomach. "Does that mean you're hen-pecked now? Where does your commanding tone from before fit in then, huh? I get the feeling, you sly fox just want to make up for snapping at me. Isn't that so?"

He had the decency to look a bit guilty. "Maybe. But I'm also a realist. Both of us were eager to reunite, so I imagine the intimacy would... kind of find a gap to break through one way or another." The wry smile curving one side of his mouth made her want to press her lips against it, lick it like chocolate. Surely, it would taste just as delicious. "I assumed it to be safer to release the pressure slowly instead. My self-control may be good, but it is far from perfect, at least if it concerns you."

With his last words and the heavy-lidded gaze slowly wandering up from her belly, it grew again. The tension. It prickled in each caress of his strong fingers, in the breath that mingled between their faces, even in her breasts when he swept his eyes over them and up to her face. Another stroke of his thumb, and she pressed her legs together.

"Can I touch you?", she asked, already rising her hand.

"Where?" His red eyes sank into hers, lingering, almost hypnotic in their intensity. "Tell me where. Concretely."

"Your... chest." Despite the heat that burned in Katherine, she tried to remain calm and rational. "You did well in averting my attention, but..." her fingers gently brushed the shirt from his shoulders. "... I still want to see how far it has spread."

With Nathaniel's defeated sigh, another layer of fabric fell and completely exposed his upper body. He leaned back to give her the full view. While most of his skin was a healthy white color, black patterns riddled his left arm and shoulder, even down to his waist. Katherine sharply inhaled, her fingers reaching out to follow the markings. It was true that they did not spread much further in the time they were apart, however, "... they are much denser."

Almost a third of the skin in the affected places was black from poison. Anger brewing in her, Katherine looked up at her husband. "Is it a coincidence that you almost only use your right hand right now? Can you even move the other?"

"I can." To prove it, he clenched his hand into a fist and opened it again, then lifted his arm a bit as if to shrug. "You need not worry too much."

"And you need to be clear that it is my obligation to worry even if it was just a tiny scratch, which it is not." With furrowed brows her gloved fingers followed the markings, leaving goosebumps in their trail. Her bearing turned almost professional again if it wasn't for the hardened tips of her breast that strained against the inside of her blouse. "Turn around. I want to see your back."

Nathaniel complied willingly, despite his dejected expression. When she hummed softly while she tried to assess the damage, he suddenly spoke up. "Do they disgust you? The markings of the poison?"