Amber tinted eyes momentarily widened in response to Sudeley’s breathy admission, the so-called ‘plundering’ of his health rooting despair into her marrow and evoking a comprehensive concern within the marchioness, that was soon rectified by the chatter that tumbled from his mouth but a moment later. Still, Catherine trailed her fingertips up the length of his arm, lithe digits curling around the muscle of his bicep, ensuring that he was mostly whole–––before relocating her hand to the rich fabrics of his doublet, hovering upon the erratic cadence of a heart that hammered in unison with the plucking of ivories upon a harpsichord. Where Nicholas’ musky fragrance had once been intoxicating, it now heralded the infirmity that shall ensue such intoxication; it was a malady Catherine was willing to chase so long as the soul that beat beneath the heat of her palm was imprinted by the grapheme of her name. “The way I shall scold you, when you bemoan a migraine on the morrow on account of your excessive drinking…”
Warmth pervaded through her corset-encased bodice as his hands, emboldened by her sigh of content to wander, enveloped her waist and his mouth sought sanctuary in the crook of her neck, despite the hawkish eyes of court being bestowed upon them. Catherine hadn’t the heart to deny him her comfort ––– she was well-versed in the art of thwarting a man’s advances, but there was an element of helplessness in Nicholas that was undeniable to her, perhaps for fear of it reflecting within her own person. He unearthed and incited her most primal senses of protection with the flash of his doe-like hues, the creasing of his lips at the corner, but she feared the repercussions of his public display as ardently as her ancestors feared the plague and so it was with a heavy heart that she laid her hands flat against his shoulders and roughly shoved him away. “I am not going anywhere. But you are going to bed. Take my hand, Nicholas. I will not sing you nursery rhymes but I will ensure with my own eyes that you are safely directed to your chambers.”
The rip of their embrace--from her warmth, her smell--irritated Nicholas. There was something about Catherine Parr, something in the sun embedded in her eyes, in the glow of her cheeks, the sweet scent of cinnamon that clung to her neck, that reminded the young Baron of home. Not the horrid, teeth-gritting memories, like those ending with Edward’s boot lammed squarely against his behind, nor the yanking of hair, the scolding of mother, the cold of a night spent alone. His face against her skin was reminiscent of good times, like the rarity of his brother’s smile--genuine, something lost with age. A story before bedtime. A foolish game played with sticks and stones among the trees of their childhood home, breath hoarse, clouds of fog and merriment about their heads. When there were no wars, or duty, or politics. How life did twist and manipulate the most pleasant of thoughts into what kept him up at night.
“You plan to leave me, then? Drop me into my bed like a orphaned child and abandon me to your own merrymaking?” Her took her hand, anyways, squeezing her lithe fingers between his, and allowed her to lead him wherever she saw fit. It was rather ridiculous, in Nicholas’ eyes, to uphold the laws that the court (his brother) choked them with. Surely there was nary a loose ear that didn’t know about their to-be union, didn’t know that the Seymour brother--the foolish, young Seymour brother--had fallen hopelessly, endlessly, madly in love with the unattainable.
His boots crunched against ice that slicked against cobblestone, pace steadying as his lady led him into a star-lined, velvet night. The boisterous laughter and clinking of glasses was but a distant sound, “Catherine, you and the poet--Wyatt. I meant to ask you, but haven’t the chance. You get along well, with him?”
