The Demon King had the castle’s mage place an enchantment upon the windows of the castle—with the exception of Zeldris’, Meliodas’, Estarossa’s, and the King himself—so that the Vampires were free to roam around. Zeldris had a strong urge to go to Gelda and help her get settled in and show her around the castle as well the next day, but he knew it was a ridiculous idea and that others were taking care of this. And when he really thought hard on why he would want to do such a thing, removing all the silly excuses he could make up, it came down to the simple fact of wanting to see her again.
A tad bit lighter at the realization, he decided to give in to the rash idea, only the remnants of his forming plan from the night before pushed him in a better direction.
Zeldris had ended up stealing two horses.
He knew nothing about the creatures and never needed to. Why would he, when he could move faster than the average being could sense and sprout wings whenever he wished? Finding an old farm in Britannia had been easy though. And there had been plenty of them milling about to choose from. The only problem was that they kept galloping away from him with high pitched whinnies each time he attempted to assess them.
They knew of his nature.
That had made the task more tedious than anything when he'd finally decided on two with fur a dark brown that shined black in the moonlight. Finding the creatures and then tying them to a tree in the field he wished to take Gelda took most of the afternoon, most of which he also knew Gelda was settling into the castle and unfortunately confined indoors.
While waiting for the night to claim the sky and the guards patrol to shift away from the window he knew Gelda's to be, Zeldris let his mind wander to the Princess that seemed to peek his interest like no other has. He'd gone out and stolen horses, useless creatures and a waste of his time all because she'd been so disheartened and he wanted to change that. Why would he want to do that? Why does her happiness seem to play a huge role in his life, just like that? He rubs his hand over his face while leant against a secluded alcove near her window on the first floor. It's unbelievable how the shine in her eyes and that small smile of hers can make him feel so good for even managing to bring them to her beautiful visage.
Now both hands go to cover his face as a flush spreads there at the thought.
But something shakes nervously inside him as his hands fall from his face and he stares at his palms looking for answers. “Will she like this surprise? Or will she think I'm crazy for stealing horses for her?” His palms clench against the tremor inside of him. “Fuck, I don't even know how to ride the damn things.” His head falls back so that the dark spread of sky is displayed above, him dusted with shimmering stars. The guards are a good distance away, not even headed there for some time. It's about time he collects her.
Stepping out of the alcove, Zeldris goes to the first window on the right of it and peers in tentatively. The cloak of the mages magic upon the windows wanes in the night, but grows stronger with the day, so he can see the spread of a quaint yet elegant room with one Princess perched on the edge of her bed. Upon laying eyes on her, his mouth goes dry and his fingers clench against the windowpane.
She's not doing anything special and yet she's magnificent in his mind. Her hair is out of its plait, running over her shoulder like a silken river as she brushes it slowly. She's barefoot with her dainty feet crossed at her ankles. The dress that clings to her is simple in design and a rich forest green. He stares at her intently, wanting to see her like this more often even though he knows it's a fickle hope. He can't help that she takes his breath away and fills his chest with a growing warmth.
Eventually he looks down and swallows, noticing the clamminess to his palms on the pane of her window. He's not supposed to be ogling her, but getting her attention. Focus regained he looks up once more only to see Gelda staring at him with a blush bridging across her button nose. Losing a breath Zeldris lifts a hand and awkwardly waves it at her while mentally berating himself for appearing like a pervert looking through her window.
Gelda rises quickly after tossing her brush to her bed and hurries to her window where he steps back to allow her to open it. For a moment the wind sweeps through and brushes her tresses behind her in an elegant wave leaving her to chord her fingers through her bangs placing them behind her ear. His eyes soften on her in a daze at her natural beauty. "What are you doing here, Zeldris?" She blinks curious eyes at him.
He looks down at where his hand are subtly trembling before meeting her expectant gaze. “I did say I'd be able to help you with your problem, didn't I?”
Her brows furrow for a moment, then a dawn of understanding gleams in her eyes. “Did you—?”
He smirks. “Get ready to go horseback riding, Gelda.”
~.~.~
It'd only taken her a few moments to plait her hair and throw on a pair of dark flat shoes. Then she'd climbed out of the window with his aid and clutched his arm as they snuck off the castle grounds. There were a few close calls where they had to hide and duck out of sight and Gelda's giggles made the whole thing a game more than anything. His pulse never stopped racing at their closeness and her excitement and she even pulled a few chuckles from him when they slipped out of the castle walls effectively winning their game.
Once in Britannia, the field where he left the horses isn't too far from where the portal deposits them, so it's only a matter of time before Gelda spots them and lets out a delightful gasp. Her hold on his arm relinquishes and with quick feet she's off to greet the grazing animals.
He greatly misses her pleasant heat and alluring smell, but seeing her pet the beasts’ snouts and noticing how well they take to her easily replaces that feeling of loss with content.
He decides to keep a nice distance so the horses don't grow anxious while she's so near them. Gelda with her hand running through the mane of one in particular, turns to Zeldris with a lovely smile that glows in her eyes. “They're so wonderful, Zeldris. I can't even begin to thank you for bringing me here.”
Her tone the happiest he's heard brings heat to his ears. “You, um, haven't even ridden one yet,” he offers gently.
“You're right,” she laugh sweet as honey and a feeling turns low in his stomach. “Can I ride this one, then?”
Bringing his eyes to her, he hides his confusion and nods sheepishly.
Something darkens her eyes, a knowing kind of look that deepens her smile. “Thank you, Zeldris,” she says overly sweet. Before he can figure out the hidden meaning to her look, because he knows there is one, she's untying the creature and climbing atop it with ease. Then with the urging of her heels and a flick of her reins she and the horse take off.
And he's left to stare at the remaining one with a grimace.
The closer he gets to it the more it tries to distance itself with distressed noises that begins to irritate him. He's not going to hurt the damn thing. It should realize that if he'd wanted to by now it would've been made clear. Nevertheless, Zeldris somehow gets it untied and leaps onto it with less finesse than Gelda had as it keeps moving about anxiously. But he winds up seated with the reins in his grip ultimately.
That's a success, right?
The horse is an uncomfortable presence under him as it shifts nervously on its hooves on the flat terrain. Zeldris' grip on its reins is steady and all for show as he awkwardly sits on the creature well over his height. A fall from this thing wouldn't hurt, too badly, he decides when the horse makes a nervous blowing noise and takes a few reckless trots forward for the hundredth time. He doesn't blame it for wanting to get as far away from him as possible.
That is if he weren't trying to make Gelda feel better by riding these things.
And from what he can see of her as she takes control of her horse with such ease, the two seeming to flow together naturally through the night even after having just met, well, she seems lighter than air. Free, unbound.
A warmth begins to swirl inside of him, stirring hotter the longer he keeps his eyes on her galloping around the field. 'I've never really felt this way before. It's so foreign. I don't even know what to do with myself, but...' His grip on the reins tightens, an unspoken command, and the horse jerks beneath him before breaking into a full on sprint.
In he takes a breath to finally relax his stiff limbs from the fall and his eyes fall shut wiping away all visual. The sound of his horse's gallops begin to fade and overlap with another's approaching, and his relaxed posture stiffens painfully. 'Damn, of course she'd see me make a fool of myself...'
“Zeldris! Oh, Zeldris are you alright!?” She shouts, her voice stained with concern and he doesn't have it in him to look at her from his place thrown like a weak ragdoll to the ground.
But feet hit the dirt and before he even knows what's happening, his torso is lifted into her lap and caring fingers are weaving into the back of his hair, soothing against his scalp. His eyes fall open to see her face over his right over his. A few locks of her pale hair have fallen free to softly sway in the wind, and he resists the urge to brush the pads of his fingers over the curve of her cheek bone to see if her skin is as soft as he imagines it to be, then to curve them around her ear as he stares, transfixed. Her gaze is fixed and deeply worried as her fingers rub gently through his hair. And suddenly he's overcome with a blaze of emotion that sinks in him and takes root. Zeldris struggles not to brush her hair behind her ear with a furious blush and a shift of his gaze.
“Are you alright? She probably just got spooked by something and took off.” Gelda attempts to explain with a sheepish little grin.
“I'm fine…” He assures slowly as he takes her words in. He can almost hear the chortles of Estarossa and the quiet contempt from Meliodas as he pulls himself from out of her worried hold, feeling undeserving of it. He'd been riding the female horse the entire time?
Zeldris muffles a moan of despair into his hands. As if things couldn't get any worse...
A piercing whistle sails past his ears drawing a wide eyed gaze from him when he sees Gelda pulling two fingers from her mouth—one from each hand—having been the one responsible. She blinks at him feeling his gaze and opens her mouth, closes it, then chooses her words almost carefully. “I'm sure she'll come back, if that's what you're worried about. I know I must seem weird to you now. Most Princesses don't spend their time—”
“I don't think that at all,” he has to interrupt and in a rush too because she has to know that that's the furthest thing in his mind every time his thoughts turn to her. “I think you're different. Good different!” He corrects when her expression starts to go sour. “I like it…” He mutters towards the ground feeling the thunderous pumps in his chest start to cause a nervous tremble in his hands. He wishes he had the courage to say I like you, but it's much too soon. She just saw him get thrown off a female as she rode a stallion with expertise. She'd go running for the hills.
A grip on his sleeve brings his head up enough to see her lips turned up just enough in gratefulness. “Thank you, Zeldris.” But then something darkens the blue of her eyes just as her lips shift into a teasing smirk. His mouth goes dry just watching the shift. “You know, if you weren't experienced with horses you didn't have to do this.”
He only shakes his head a little dazed instead, still staring at the light flush in her cheeks, the flare of her gaze, and his favorite pair of lips... “I did. I needed to make you smile.” The words shot past his lips against his will leaving the air uncertain between them.
Gelda rushes to clear things up when she gifts him with a soft hug. He's too shocked to figure out how to return it before it's gone, but he takes full pleasure in the way her hands grip his shoulders and the low, flustered tone she takes when she stares down at his chest instead of meeting his eyes. “You're very sweet, Zeldris. Thank you.”
That feeling of heat and warmth that had taken root and given him no control over the new feelings dancing without care within him is one he just doesn't want to lose.
~.~.~
After she’d ridden until the wee hours of morning, it was decided that they return to the Demon Realm. Sneaking Gelda back into her room was an easy task after she’d convinced him to return the horses with a grateful smile that had lit up her whole face at the time. She’d gazed at him from out of her window, dress rumpled with grass stains here and there, but still looking absolutely stunning if anyone were to ask him. She’d made to assure him with a sugary kind of feel which had made his nerves buzz, they were zipping through his veins so quickly, “You don’t need to steal anymore horses for my sake. These memories will be enough to lift me for quite some time.”
And he believed her.
Now he’s shut off in his chamber a floor from her room, buried under covers with plans for sleep. The accomplishment of helping Gelda rise from the tangles of restraint she’s being kept in, even just a little, rolls right through him like a light relaxing wave. He breaths slowly, pressing his face into his pillows more, knowing he has to be up and ready at dawn sharp to meet with Meliodas. But the image of Gelda persists in his mind for a time and Zeldris simply feels warm, like when wrapped in the arms of someone who’d never give up on you. And content, like all the tension in his muscles have been released and he can just lay there dreaming of the fair haired Princess without worry. He feels soft fingers dusting at the nape of his neck then tracing down the bumps up his spine, enticingly slow as well…
His mind lazily prods him with a question. ‘A hand…?’
Both his hands are curled beneath his pillow under his head and even if they weren’t it’d be impossible for him to reach behind himself in such a way. Shock which gives way to logic which can’t explain away the sensation leaves him wide open to the full feel of someone’s very soft, very delicate palm now splaying out across his shoulder blade. The demon sucks in a curse as he twists in bed at the same time flaring out his powers to sense the person who somehow slipped into his room. The person’s hand isn’t bothered by his shift in position. In fact, it moves with him, sliding along his ribs and smoothing along his stomach in a way the muscles there twitch as he inhales sharply.
Just as he goes to capture the person’s wrist, already thinking of a thousand and one ways to end their existence for sneaking upon on him in such a way, something draws him up short. Just as he focuses his thin glare in their direction, many things seem to happen at once. Blood rushes so fast to his skull he’s almost positive he’ll pass out before all of it, every single drop, decides to flood south to where he’s afraid the erection he gains just might spring free of his loose sleep pants. His hand settles shakily around her wrist where the places where they touch practically numb from the charge of his desire for her running so high. And it’s weird, he thinks, how such a simple look can leave him so boneless, so fidgety, so starving for breath as heat gathers in his lungs.
His mind may be out of commision, run through with his suddenly acute need, but his eyes most certainly have not lost their ability to feed his insides with fuel to his blaze. It’s the Princess he ogles like a gaping fish out of water. But never would he have thought to let his mind dip her image in a salacious glaze the way it is now. She wears nothing, not a stitch, to cover her smooth white skin except a thin encircling of pure darkness around her breasts and another strip that weaves around her hips and in between her thighs. It’s hardly enough to keep his eyes from flicking from the thick spread of eyelashes that shadow the molten darkening her blue eyes down the many soft curves of her figure he wants so desperately to put his hands on even if he doesn’t have the slightest clue of what he’d do.
Gelda watches him with a tiny knowing smile as wisps of blond hair fall in front of her smoldering eyes, around her ears, and along her the length of her lovely throat where he suddenly wishes to trail his tongue slowly and leave breath stealing kisses. He swallows and looks away only to notice just how she’s positioned over him with an internal groan. Her knees are spread on either side of his, sunk into the bed and it’s instantly that much harder not to notice the swell of her hips that curve into her plump thighs nor can he keep his focus off of her her belly and just how smooth it might be against his hands.
His very persistent problem gives a few good twitches in time with his speeding pulse and without looking he can tell from the brush of cool air against him, some quick readjusting will be needed—as useless as that may be. And he goes to sit up, pushing from under her and that’s when Gelda moves. She slides forward to sit on his thighs with a sultry purr that draws his eyes to the full rose tint of her heart shaped lips. A thought goes to his mind that maybe he should be asking what the hell is going on? But the teasing feel of her clad without anything pressed against his thighs scrubs it right away and a white hot blank kind of feel takes its place when her hand goes from his chest to his very exposed , very needy erection in a searing grasp.
He’s sure he chokes then a strained kind of groan comes when instead of pulling his pants up, she shoves them down and behind her to where they’re bunched at his knees. And despite the darkness being there, he can feel everything. The softness of her, the sticky wet heat gathering where she’s most hot, even a tiny pulse that beats as fast as his. And his length cradled and stroked, and pumped in her grasp begins throb and pulse in a messy kind of way as the heated storm in his chest threatens to collapse inside of him sending him spiraling towards a place he’s not yet reached.
Not a word has left his lips since her appearance. Not what are you doing here? Not how did you get here? Not even when did you learn how to control darkness? He should question this entire encounter. But something keeps him silent. It could be the way she’s looking at him, her eyes clouded in their own storm of longing. It could be the way her cheeks are flowered in a deep rose as her lips part to breathe almost soundless pleas of pleasure more seductive than anything he’s seen while she grinds a wet path along his thigh. It could also be the rough sounds he’s making as well from the constant tightening inside of him just her tight little hand provides him.
What they’re doing is dangerous, if caught. What they’re doing is thrilling regardless. And it’s an insane idea to want to run his hands up her stomach and cup her breasts as he kisses a path up her shoulder. It’d be crazy to pull her close and press where they’re most hot together until they both quake and melt and lose their minds all at once. He knows it’d be nuts if he just lifted a hand and—
Gelda abruptly lets go of her hold on him and instead pushes herself flush against his front so that her nipples, hard and strained are unmistakable against his chest, the heat of her thighs are warm and tantalizing around his hips, and his erection is trapped between his stomach and her slick cleft. He’s certain he won’t ever be able to breathe again as she pulls his trembling arms around her while her mouth goes to his neck in a shuddering sigh. And like a snap his hands, one at the small of her back and easing lower over the mouthwatering curve of her rear while the other sits just under her shoulder blades, clutches her to him. Then Zeldris begins to roll his hips against her suddenly needing this more than anything in his life.
Heat pricks the tops of his ears at the way her sounds start to sound urgent and stick more and more in her throat as if to force them out would lead to a full blown wail. He doesn’t know whether to feel pride at this or to allow the heady feeling stuffing his skull and building like a pressure ready to erupt at the base of his groin to rein free.
Gelda decides for him when she scrapes her tiny fangs along his neck and breathes out a single question. “Will you let me taste you?”
He comes undone as his vision fades behind his eyelids, his release overwhelming in full bodied waves as it lands in thick ropes along his stomach and chest. He’d let her drink him dry for a feeling like this. It’s draining and filling all at once as he muffles his gratifying sounds and rolls his hips to a fading thrum. And when the blaze of sensations finally ends, all he can do is sigh in satisfaction and blink his open to see the very faint rays of sunlight crawling across his pillow.
The loose languid feel ground deep into his muscles retracts in an instant the second he realizes that she’s not there. She’s a floor beneath him where he left her. It wasn’t real. Damn it, it was a dream. A sticky, embarrassing one at that as he begins to feel the mess cooling beneath him. For a moment he searches frantically through his mind for something similar like this that might have happened, but nothing comes to mind.
He’d thought he was over stuff like this and just happened to be lucky to have skipped right over the awkward patch of wet dreams Estarossa insisted on telling him of in that teasing tone of his. When it came to his years of puberty, he’d gone through years being scrawny and pathetic looking before filling out into a stature similar to his eldest brother’s. He hadn’t gained hair on his chest and his voice had stopped cracking and found a home at a low tenor. And there was obviously a spiked new interest in curvy beautiful women. He’d get a bit excited from time to time but that was easily brushed aside for more important things like his studies being a Prince of the realm required and the power and firm discipline he had to attain. That is until his eyes landed on her. Now he doesn’t seem to understand how to balance on the fine line he’s paved of his life anymore.
His befuddled thoughts flee the moment he senses something foreboding heading his way. It’s like a deep, heavy dread that takes root in his bones and stings along his spine painfully. And for the life of him he can’t figure out why it feels like death is marching towards his door.
The sunlight grows stronger on his pillow and Zeldris’ insides freeze over in terror.
The malevolence gathers behind his chamber door before said door is thrust open with such force it cracks against his wall. And Zeldris can only turn with wide eyes to stare at Meliodas, his throat too dry to form a curse at his own misfortune.
He’s late.
He’s never late.
A Meliodas stares him down with a frigid glower knowing this too.
They stare at each for several beats, Zeldris chilled enough to not want anything to do with dreams for a long while, and Meliodas calculating and searching. Meliodas breaks their gaze in favor of glancing around in seek of what kept the younger, when his nose twitches. “Why does it smell like frustrated sex in here?” his eyes zero in on Zeldris cringing upon his bed. His expression turns dry as blond eyebrows lower in a straight line. “Oh. I thought you were through that phase.”
Now Zeldris feels downright humiliated as he begins to splutter. “I am. T-this just hasn’t happened before.”
A slight raise to Meliodas’ eyebrow that disappears under his bangs and Zeldris wonders why he even opened his mouth to begin with. “You’re either younger than I remember, or vanilla in your exploits.” He holds up a hand before Zeldris can protest and dig a hole deeper for himself and continues, “Get cleaned and meet me outside in half an hour no more.” Then he about faces and departs from the room.
Briefly Zeldris buries his head under his pillows and begs the question of why the sun raised that day.
