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indelible (i'll catch you when you fall)

the long-awaited wizard prom fic is here! settle in, it's a long one <3

Pairing: Gale Dekarios / Poppy Lyons

Rating: Explicit, NSFW

Tags: Pre-canon, Canon-divergence, Fluff, Flirting, Hurt/Comfort, Drinking, References to past self-harm, Depression, semi-public sex, The Blackstaff Ball, Meddling Mothers, Tara is the best wingwoman, The Alamo

22.2k words, oneshot

AO3 Link (acct required)

beta-read by the lovely, incomparable @spooky-lil-bee. this fic wouldn't be where it is without her help.

divider by @saradika

“It’s quite rude, you know, to accept when you already said you’d go with someone else. Especially when you did the asking in the first place.”

“I know, I know, I’m so sorry,” Marietta coos. “But I still have feelings for him, you know? And he apologized and I’m sure he means it this time.”

Doubt it.

Gale sighs. “Don’t worry about it.”

Pulling his bag higher up on his shoulder, Gale leaves the classroom and heads for the nearest staircase to head home.

A bright spring day welcomes him as he steps out into the courtyard, the past tenday of Mirtul warming up the city and calling the Waterdhavian citizens out onto the streets. Staff mill about the wide-open doors to the ballroom, measuring pillars and holding up swatches of fabric. The Blackstaff Ball is two days away and now he’s without a date.

His hand’s always been a popular one at the ball, but never popular enough to be asked as someone’s date before. Besides, Marietta and her boyfriend are infamously on and off again. She’s pretty enough, but when she’s not passing notes with her friends her contributions to class are middling at best…Gale’s not even sure if she wants to be a wizard. While he had been looking forward to being her date to the ball, he wasn’t necessarily interested in anything longer-term after the fact.

A group of underclassmen race past him in the dormitory, taking on the end of semester with carefree zeal. He unlocks his door and begins packing up the last of his things in his bag of holding; now that exams are over he can finally stay at home for the summer. Gale had been looking forward to the giddy anticipation of the ball for the next two days but instead he is now trying to ignore the disappointment festering in his stomach.

His mother always offers to send the carriage to bring him home but it’s such a lovely day and he’d much rather be outside. It’s a short walk into the Sea Ward where his childhood home resides, a villa with a sprawling garden that wraps around the whole house, all aspects of which are carefully curated by his mother. Gale walks around back through one of the garden gates to find his mother where he expects her at this time of day: sitting outside on the patio drinking a cup of tea and completing the latest Waterdhavian Gazette’s crossword.

“Good afternoon, my darling. ‘Never forget this tragic playwright–’ six letters.”

Gale ponders for a moment before settling on the answer. “Alamos, mother.”

“Ah, yes thank you, that’s perfect,” she chirps. Setting down her quill and the paper, she levels her gaze at her son as he sits in his usual chair opposite her, his bag landing on the patio tile a little too heavily. “Something the matter?” she asks. Nothing gets past her…ever, really.

“Marietta is going to the ball with someone else,” he exasperates.

“Now, that doesn’t make sense, she asked you to go with her!”

“She and her boyfriend got back together again, it seems,” punctuating his words with a shrug.

“Sit up, my dear.” Gale corrects his posture with minimal huff. “How incredibly inconsiderate of her, and downright churlish if I do say so myself. Two days' notice! Unheard of. Who raised that girl?”

“Nothing to be done about it now,” he mutters. He reaches for the teapot to pour himself a cup of a Calimport blend his mother has been favoring lately, adding in cream and a heaping of sugar.

A footman appears a few minutes later with a letter on a silver platter. Morena thanks him and her face alights as she looks more closely at the envelope. Cracking the wax seal open, she flips open the contents and scans the letter. “Oh, delightful! Gale, Poppy is done with her coursework and she and Adrianne will be arriving tomorrow! A whole two tendays earlier than usual, isn’t this splendid?”

Gale lights up at the news, his eagerness at seeing one of his oldest friends begins dashing away at the disappointment that had been making its home inside him. “That’s wonderful!”

Morena sweeps away from her chair, taking her cup, the letter, and the paper with her. “I have to alert the staff, we can’t have their rooms unprepared for them, can we? I’m so happy to see you home, my love.”

Shortly after his mother disappears, Gale picks up his bag and weaves through the staff in the kitchen before ascending the back stairs. They’re technically only for the staff but Gale doesn’t care about that one bit. He strolls through the upstairs hallways sipping on his tea before coming upon his bedroom. The door is cracked open and after pushing it open finds his quarry: Tara sprawled out on his bed and snoring quietly.

He places his bag gently down on his desk chair before tip-toeing over to the bed, laughing to himself. Tara insists like a proper lady that she absolutely does not snore, even though the evidence right in front of him begs to differ. Leaning onto the bed, he reaches a hand forward to sit in front of her snout and he waits. It’s after a few twitches of her nose that the rest of Tara begins to awaken, yellow eyes blinking open and ears twitching like a predator’s are wont to do to keep an eye on the place.

“Tara…,” he croons, gently scratching Tara behind her left ear just the way she likes.

She grunts and stretches as sleep falls away, pointing her sharp eyes at him. “Good afternoon, Mr. Dekarios, I hope your day went well?”

“Yes,” he beams. “Mother just got word, Poppy and her mother are arriving tomorrow!”

“Good heavens, that’s early! It will be wonderful to see our good friends again. Now, how was your last day of exams?”

Gale stands, brushing some rogue tressym fur off his front. “Nothing of import,” he answers, making his way over to his desk and emptying his bag of holding of the last of his things from the dormitory.

Tomorrow can’t come fast enough.

—

Poppy and her mother materialize onto the Waterdeep transportation circle late the following morning, steadying themselves after the displacement.

“I don’t like that—what was his name, Lorroakan?” Adrianne comments as they right themselves. “I didn’t like that look in his eye. I assumed Ramazith would have better filters for who he brings on but maybe he sees something in the young man that we don’t.”

Poppy recalls the hungry and dark look in Lorroakan’s eyes whenever he scanned her body like some sort of thing to possess and shudders. “I think maybe Ramazith is getting old and can’t see that prick for what he is.” He also wouldn’t stop staring at my tits.

They stroll out of the transport room into the customs area, handing the officer their papers once they’re at the front of the line. Quickly enough, they’re outside and find the Dekarios carriage waiting for them. The footmen help load their luggage and they climb into the cab before setting off towards the Sea Ward. Poppy stares out the window, eyes not taking in the scenery around her. Her fingers tap on her legs mimicking the fretting for one of the songs she had played for her College of New Olamn audition months ago.

Adrianne’s warm hand settles on Poppy’s knee, stopping her brain in its tracks but her fingers keep moving, the muscle memory for this song well-worn in by now.

“Sunshine, don’t let the anxiety rule you. We’ll find out soon enough.”

“You said you had them divert the letter?”

“I did.” Her mother squeezes her hand. “Whatever they say, it does not reflect your talent or capability. I believe in you. Gale, Morena, and Tara believe in you. Whatever happens, you know they will also have your back.”

She knows her mother is right. There have been plenty of successful bards who eschewed college to instead go out into the world on their own…but New Olamn has been a dream for ages now. Waterdeep has been her second home for years and she and Gale always talked of what their lives will be like once they’re old enough to not fully rely on their mothers. The key change she chose for the fifth verse of The Knights of Dragon Down was probably too excessive… What if they didn’t like her monologue? Did they notice how one of her swords slipped near the end of her demonstration? Her drums were perfection but her lute performance could have been tighter—

“Poppy, breathe. Remember the exercises Mother Helena taught you.”

Poppy’s hands clench around nothing as she resists the urge to scratch at her arms. She takes a deep, shaky breath and looks out the window to truly see the city.

Five things I can see…she starts, willing her body to pull itself together before they arrive.

—

Gale takes a deep breath and speaks the incantation once more. He moves his hands just so to try and manipulate the Sleet Storm spell into a new shape but he feels the energy falter in his grasp. Suddenly, he hears bustling around the front of the house. Curious, he breaks the spell and shakes out his hands—he hasn’t quite figured out how to keep the ice from crystallizing on his palms—and walks toward the gate that leads around front.

The driveway is abustle with staff unloading the family carriage. Gale cranes his head in his search for one particular dark head of hair. He spots Adrianne with her nearly identical brown locks like the blackest cup of coffee almost immediately and he falters a moment before Poppy appears from around the back of the carriage. She speaks a few words with the footman there who hands her her lute in its case from the rear boot.

They exchange letters almost every tenday throughout the months they’re not together, but they’re not compensation for real company, or for more immediate conversation. Maybe he should finally get around to making those sending stones…

Stepping out of the rocking carriage and onto solid ground doesn’t do as much to help her stomach and mood as Poppy would like. She still feels strained from the carriage ride, having to utilize her breathing techniques the entire time to not much success. The Dekarios’s servants swarm the carriage, only making her feel even more overstimulated, and so she stalks around to the rear boot to start digging out her belongings herself.

A footman unstraps her lute in its case and hands it to her, and it’s in that moment that she catches movement out of the corner of her eye. Gale approaches from the back garden, his hair has grown out just past his ears and his sleeves are rolled up exposing his tanned forearms as if he’s been working on his spellcasting. Seeing her best friend for the first time this year allows her to begin to push the worries of her college acceptance results to the back of her mind.

“Pulled your nose out of a book to greet us? I’m honored!” she calls to him, cocking a hip to one side. Maybe if she forces the joy, maybe it’ll overcome everything else. Her fingers flex where they’re wrapped around the case strap, continuing to fret that song she’s been worrying about the whole carriage ride. Gods, she would love to just sit down at the Dekarios’s piano right now…

His heart skips a beat—for the past eight years Poppy has been the best part of every summer, even last summer when she wasn’t feeling her best and kept herself in bed most days. Having her even just in the same house instead of over 500 miles away is always a vast improvement upon his life. And having her joke and smile as a greeting? She had mentioned in her letters she started feeling more like herself but seeing it just makes his whole day and he can’t suppress the grin that cracks his face in half.

“The day I am unable to tear myself away from whatever I’m doing to see you will be a terrible day indeed, and you have my permission to thoroughly wallop me if that were to ever occur—which it won’t.”

“What a bold thing to come out of the mouth of a future archmage who will most certainly have more important things to do than socialize,” she banters as she approaches.

“My lady, you wound me,” he replies as he wraps her in his arms, placing his icy hands on her back.

“Mystra’s tits, Gale! Warn a girl next time!” Poppy exclaims, pushing him away playfully.

“It’s just some ice, no harm done,” he replies cheekily. “Nothing a student of New Olamn can’t handle, am I right?”

She’s so exhausted and still so frayed, it takes her longer than usual to school her face into something that’s not the strain that immediately flashes there.

“Surely you’ve been accepted,” he continues. “They’d be daft not to–”

“I haven’t heard from them yet,” Poppy replies tightly, avoiding his gaze.

Gale doesn’t think he’s ever truly read discomfort on Poppy’s face, but now her whole body reads it. In her body language, in her tone. He’s not sure what to make of it. He crouches down a bit to catch her gaze and he smiles, trying to coax one out of her.

“I mean it! You’re a shoe-in,” he insists. So earnest. Poppy wishes she could be as positive as Gale but she knows better than to get her hopes up–it makes the inevitable disappointment that much more bearable.

She forces a small, close-lipped smile. Her mouth might not mean it but her eyes do soften enough. His earnestness is so powerful, enough to melt away her icy edges. But not completely.

“Thank you,” she whispers; genuine, but her heart aches with worry all the same. “I’m going to bring my things inside, I’ll come find you shortly.”

Gale wipes the melted ice on his pants as he watches her go. Even when she isn’t feeling her best, she is enough to wash his every worry away, enough to make him forget why he was so dejected the day before.

Neither of them notice how Morena pulls Adrianne aside furtively, leaning in close to whisper in her ear as they make their way into the house between staff unpacking the carriage and carrying things inside.

Gale is in the back garden once more working on the spell when he starts hearing the piano from inside. He pulls his watch out of his pocket and realizes that quite a bit of time has passed since Poppy and Adrianne arrived.

Gathering up his things, he makes his way inside to find Poppy in the parlor playing away.

The piano is a gorgeous thing that Poppy wishes she had access to year-round. She practices on the piano at Chromatic Scale as often as she can manage, but that old and slightly out of tune upright can’t compare to the immediate access of a baby grand piano. The song has been stuck in her head all day, and given all her pent-up energy, it feels good to let it out like this. She doesn’t notice Gale until he sits next to her on the bench, quietly listening and watching.

Gale loses himself as he watches her play, her expert hands dart across the ivory keys, playing a song she knows deep in her bones. He’s practiced at piano and can hold his own when performing a song but the ease with which her fingers dance across the keys is utterly captivating. His eyes steal a glance at her face and she appears completely relaxed, humming to herself as she works through the piece. Some movement out in the hallway catches his eye and looking up, catches his mother with a knowing glint in her eye as she observes them. Gale tosses her a questioning look and suddenly he’s frozen there, paralyzed. Poppy’s sparkling laugh fills the space and she moves into his view since he can’t even move his eyes, smirking at him.

“Careful, Gale. If you keep making faces like that one day it’ll get stuck that way.”

With a wave of her hand, she drops the Hold Person she cast on him. She used the song she was playing as her verbal and somatic components without me noticing, remarkable!

She snickers at the awe-struck look on Gale’s face.

“You’ve been practicing!” he exclaims. “That was incredible. You need to show me again.”

Poppy doesn’t get a chance to as at that moment the housekeeper appears, summoning them all to the dining room for lunch.

As Poppy passes Morena on her way to the washroom, she catches a wry look in the woman’s eye that troubles her. Morena only gets that look whenever she’s plotting something and with all of them about to sit down for lunch, she braces herself as she washes her hands for whatever she has in store.

If Gale knows anything, his body language gives nothing away as she sits down for their meal, scribbling away in a notebook. It’s once their food is served and the staff retreats and Poppy is about to take her first bite of mackerel when Morena speaks up.

“So, Gale, I’ve been putting a lot of thought into what you told me yesterday and Adrianne and I have decided that you should bring Poppy with you to the ball.”

Poppy’s fork freezes in front of her mouth as a disbelieving look possesses her face. The fish falls off her fork as she narrows her eyes at the two older women in front of her, looking utterly pleased with themselves.

“It’ll be just so wonderful!” she continues. “After that wretched girl jilted you so boorishly, wouldn’t it be just the thing for the two of you to go together? Poppy, we’ll take you shopping once we finish up here, obviously. The ball is tomorrow, and we’ll ensure that the Temple of Beauty does you up so beautifully…”

“Tomorrow?” Poppy says incredulously.

Adrianne reaches an arm over to her friend to stop her. “Gale, sweetheart, we thought it would cheer you up. And Sunshine,” she says, looking at Poppy. “You’ve always said how you’d love to go to the ball, but we were never up early enough. We thought you’d both enjoy it. Morena has made a few calls to make the preparations a breeze.”

It’s an insane idea. Find her a dress and get her ready when the ball is tomorrow ? What the hells is Morena thinking? And why does this need to have been some sort of scheming plan crafted by their mothers? Poppy squints at her mom, not surprised that she’s going along with Morena’s plan but instead a tad hurt that she would go behind her back about anything. They share everything with each other and she doesn’t appreciate having this thrust upon her. Besides, finding a formal gown? In an afternoon? Impossible. Just the idea of dress shopping even with plenty of time before them makes her skin crawl.

Beside her, Gale sits frozen in his seat. It’s embarrassing how often his mother does this, bowling over him and making decisions for him. He loves her, truly, but this is…not the worst idea actually. Poppy’s never been up early enough to even consider asking her to the ball, and the idea of spending an already wonderful night with his favorite person on Toril excites him.

“This plan is absurd—” Poppy snaps and Gale looks over at her with concern.

“Do you not want to...?” Gale’s voice trails off, his grip feeling weak around the pencil in his hand.

Poppy turns in her seat to face him. “I don’t want to impose! And these two,” she says gesturing to their mothers, “feel the need to—”

“Nonsense,” Morena interrupts. “I’ve gone through a lot of trouble to ensure the two of you have a lovely night out together. Everything has been arranged. Poppy, we have an appointment at Meiroth’s in an hour and an all-day session tomorrow for you at the Temple. Just an afternoon to find you a frock is plenty of time. Oh, this is such a splendid idea, I cannot wait to see the two of you just sparkling.”

Poppy bristles, Morena’s choice of words and tone not going unnoticed. Her mother had assured her before they left that she’d finally be able to rest after finishing her schoolwork, not diving into one of Morena’s elaborate plans.

Gale and Poppy share a glance they’ve shared many times that says, “We don’t cross Morena when she gets like this,” before turning to their meals in front of them. Poppy turns into herself. An echo of one of Mother Helena’s reminders peeps up but is easily squashed down.

The rest of lunch is the two of them listening to Morena prattle on about dress colors and hairstyles for Poppy, with Adrianne piping up with a suggestion here or there. Poppy listens, nodding and assenting where appropriate, whereas Gale stays silent for the rest of the meal.

He occasionally steals glances at Poppy to try and get a gauge on how she’s feeling. While she never looks up from her plate, her furrowed brow only burrows the pit deeper into his stomach.

He finishes first and excuses himself, finally allowing his face to fall into the expression he’s been holding back–one of unease. Poppy’s obviously put-out by Morena (and Adrianne’s) meddling, but it doesn’t even seem like she wants to go, which hurts. Gale has never seen her with her hair and makeup done or wearing a formal gown, she’d be beautiful, she’d—he catches himself, acknowledging his flushed face in one of the mirrors in the hall.

This isn’t a date, they’re going as friends. That’s the plan.

Then why does it make him feel so sad?

—

This fucking godsdamned day.

She never truly settled down after that carriage ride. Playing the piano had been an attempt to channel her restless energy elsewhere, and while teasing Gale always puts her in a better mood, neither were enough to snuff out her anxieties.

And then their mothers decided to meddle.

Dress shopping was, in a word, grueling. Morena insisted that Poppy try on every available off the rack frock at Meiroth’s including some truly hideous options that thankfully were immediately taken out of the running once both mothers saw it on her.

Poppy doesn’t mind being the center of attention, she is a musician after all, but the poking and prodding and her body being on display in such a manner eviscerated her already tattered nerves. It took all of her energy to not snark at Morena the whole time they were there. She was ready to beg her mother to take her home when the last dress she tried on ended up being a winner, notable enough for Poppy to herself to acknowledge that it was lovely, but only for a moment. By that point, the sun had set, she was starving, and her skin felt like it could crawl away from her if given the opportunity.

She loves Morena. She well and truly loves her like a second mother, but gods every little comment about how everything needed to be just right for her precious baby boy set Poppy’s teeth on edge. This whole afternoon has made her feel more like a mannequin and less like a human and if she doesn’t get to hide in her room the moment she’s back at the Dekarios residence, she will not be responsible for what happens afterwards.

Dinner is laid out for them when they get home late with Gale nowhere to be seen. Poppy snatches a plate of food from the table and stalks upstairs without a word to their mothers, slamming the door to her bedroom behind her.

Despite her hunger, the food sits heavy in her stomach and once she’s finished she leaves the plate outside the door and crawls into bed fully clothed, pressing a pillow over her head to block out the rest of the world.

—

The ladies are out all day and past dinner, Gale eating his meal in the garden with only Tara for company. He’s not used to an empty house. His mother goes out without him occasionally, sure, but it just feels different. Or maybe he’s just willing it to feel that way. At some point he transitions to his balcony, a book in his lap that he tries to read but to no avail.

Hours later he hears the women return. Gale can hear their mothers chatting away from afar before heavy stomps racing up the stairs smother their voices. The stomps only cease once he hears Poppy’s door open and slam shut, silence echoing throughout the house. A while later, there’s a knock at his door and the sound of his mother letting herself in.

“Gale, my dear. Poppy is wearing these colors, if you could transfigure your robes to match.” His mother brandishes two scraps of fabric pinned together and she’s outright giddy.

“I take it the trip was a success?”

“Oh!” his mother swoons. “She looks ethereal, darling. Just wait till you see her tomorrow.” Just as quickly as she swept into his room, she floats away, closing the door behind her.

Gale fingers the pieces of fabric in his hands. Marietta wanted them both to wear red in a shade that wasn’t quite complementary to Gale but he followed along nevertheless. The scraps he holds are both of a deep blue, one solid-colored swatch of silk while the other is more sheer with some lovely swirling floral embroidery and beading. He has not a clue what her dress could possibly look like but knows that this will look divine on Poppy.

Tara hops onto his desk to take a look at the fabrics for herself. “My my, what a lovely selection!”

It’s no trouble at all to adjust his robes, turning the reds to blues and even transfiguring the pattern of the brocade to look closer to the scrap of embroidery. He keeps the gold trim—gold has always been his color.

“Mr. Dekarios, you’ve been sulking all afternoon, I thought you’d be excited about these new developments!” Tara chides.

Gale sighs, “You didn’t see her Tara—she was so upset at lunch. And hearing her slam her door shut? She abhors the idea. I’d rather go without her if it means that she won’t have a bad time at my side.”

“I say,” Tara harrumphs and leaps off the desk towards the open balcony door. “I’ve had enough of this. I’ll leave you to your brooding and pining over Miss Lyons if you’re so determined to avoid any sort of self-reflection.”

“I—pining? Tara, what are you—,” Gale stutters as Tara flies away, probably to go hunt or keep his mother company.

Pining? He doesn’t pine over Poppy! She’s his best friend! He feels everything one normally does about their best friend. He loves spending time with her, to the point where he wishes she lived in Waterdeep so he could see her more often. He feels the most like himself around her with the way she doesn’t shut him down when he rambles like his classmates do. It’s as if she knows him almost as well as Tara does. Gale would do anything for her. And of course he feels admiration over her entire being: her wit, talent, determination, and not to mention her beauty are all worth that, the last one being a fact and not just something only he sees.

His mind once again wanders to the image of them dressed up, him in his newly blue robes and Poppy wrapped in some concoction made of the swatches he caresses in his fingers absentmindedly. He feels his face flush at the idea that his classmates will see her on his arm. That they’ll be able to dance, his hand on her waist and Gale at the center of her attention. He recalls how her piercing eyes flashed at him as they bantered in the driveway, how her pants clung to her thighs as she sat at the piano…

Gale freezes at the thought and he shakes his head as if to be rid of it. That’s not proper, he shouldn’t be thinking of her like that—unwillingly, his brain recalls an image from two summers ago, when a long heatwave broke with a glorious rainstorm and Poppy ran out into the deluge fully clothed and it made her clothes cling to every inch of her—

He attempts his earlier failed casting of Sleet Storm until the frost coats his hands again and presses them to his face. Gods, control yourself, he thinks. He’s not some silly Blackstaff freshman who ogles every girl that walks by! He’s 19 for godssakes! He’s a grown man and can handle himself around a beautiful woman. A beautiful, charming, incredible…

Gale refreshes the spell and claps his hands on his face again before stalking over to his overstuffed bookshelves to look for a new distraction.

A few hours and barely half a page read later, Gale still hasn’t settled down. Once these unwelcome thoughts of Poppy started they were hard to keep away. He recalls how during one of their first summers she came back with puberty in full effect and her chest much larger than he had last seen it, he remembered his mother’s etiquette lessons and was fastidious in never staring at her like that. But sometimes, he realizes now, he can’t keep his eyes off of her. And that’s not merely an appreciation of objective beauty but rather something else.

Maybe Tara was a little bit right. More than a little bit right, even.

Deciding that it’s probably best to just get ready for bed, he pulls off his clothes and starts putting on his pajamas. It’s as he’s half-dressed and reaching for his shirt that a voice materializes from out of nowhere.

“Did you move the corkscrew?”

Gale starts, his heart jumping into his throat at the voice. He turns around to find Poppy in the balcony doorway with a wine bottle in hand and another on the ground by her feet, searching around the potted plant in the corner. She’s not looking his way but he covers his naked chest with his bundled shirt nevertheless.

“Elminster’s beard! A knock would be most appreciated in the future!” He says as he fumbles to pull his shirt over his head.

Poppy glances over at him at his words and sees him dressing but doesn’t otherwise care, the one task she’s focusing on eclipsing all other thoughts or observations. Finding the corkscrew between two fronds of the leafy plant she had been digging through, she sets to uncorking one of the bottles she pilfered from the Dekarios wine cellar.

Gale isn’t otherwise surprised by Poppy’s presence; they frequently spend nights on his balcony during the summer, talking the hours away. She usually climbs down with one of his Feather Falls at the ready for safety’s sake but he sees in her demeanor that something is not quite right. The way she angrily twists at the cork and yanks it roughly out of the neck to only then take deep quaffs from the bottle solidifies that for him.

He approaches cautiously, out of care for her current mood but also the past few hours have him looking at her differently now. The red wine she picked stains her lips and there’s a drop of pinkish red clinging there that’s distracting him when she blurts out, “I fucking hate today.”

Tears burn the back of her eyes but she glares at the bottle as she hands it to Gale, willing the waterworks to stay away.

She picked something expensive tonight, Gale thinks as he drinks deeply, willing the rich red wine to slow his busy mind.

“Anything I can help with?” he asks, Poppy still standing at him glaring at nothing.

“Sure,” she replies. A lilt of sarcasm pulls at her words as she wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. “Maybe you know a spell that can reverse time, so that I didn’t have to spend hours being manhandled and cinched every which way like I’m some sort of fucking doll while our mothers got drunk off champagne at Meiroth’s! Or maybe, we can fast forward in time so I can just get my rejection from New Olamn and get all this fucking over with!” Tears begin to betray her now and prick at the corners of her eyes.

Gale takes a deep breath and considers the words he wants to use to comfort her, but she continues in what starts as a steady stream of words that quickly turn into a tumbling torrent. “All I wanted to do once we got here was rest, but no! I feel so twitchy from waiting for the godsdamned acceptance letter. I almost had a breakdown in the fucking carriage ride here about my audition! I don’t know what I’ll do if I don’t get in, this has been my dream for years!”

Her last few words crack embarrassingly and the tears fall freely now, Poppy finally succumbing to it all.

Putting the bottle down on the ledge, Gale pulls her in for a hug, pressing his face into her hair.

Poppy’s hands claw at his back until a bunch of fabric is in each hand, anchoring herself to him. Despite his namesake, Gale is grounding. It’s just her and her mother in The Gate, which is perfectly fine most days, but nothing can compare to Gale’s company. One of his hands cradles her head while the other hooks around her back and between him and the wine it’s more than enough to help her start calming down, to breathe deeply, and for her nerves to properly start washing away.

The tension leaves her shoulders, her arms, her hands, until she feels limp and malleable in Gale’s arms…not to mention a little wet and bedraggled. She pulls away from the hug but Gale keeps her close, his warm, large hands cupping her face so that she can’t escape the patented Gale Dekarios Glimmer of Determination in his big, round eyes.

“You are Poppy Lyons,” he says decisively. “If New Olamn denies you, they would be the biggest fools on Toril. I know for a fact that even if that did happen—which it won’t!—You would make a killing as a bard in Waterdeep.”

“If I don’t get in, I can’t just leave my mother in The Gate—”

“But you will get in, there’s no need to worry about that!”

“Gale, you’ve gotten everything you’ve ever dreamed of before you’ve even asked for it. I put my blood, sweat, and tears into that audition and it still wasn’t perfect.”

“Well, I know that’s not possible,” Gale dismisses.

“Gale, you weren’t even there.”

“No, but I know it was perfect because you’re perfect.”

Gale is always so earnest but there’s something in how he says this that makes Poppy falter. His hands move down from her face to rest on her shoulders and his touch now feels as though it’s branding her, sending ripples of heat deep within her. His thumbs massage her shoulders but his eyes never leave hers, locking her in this spot.

“You’re the most remarkable person I know,” he continues quietly but no less determined. “I have never encountered anyone who cares as much as you do. I still remember the second summer you came here, with a pile of empty notebooks and freshly sharpened quills, questions about magic brimming at the tip of your tongue to ask me even though I am no bard. Your dedication I’m certain will inspire your contemporaries and beyond. I know that within the next few years if not sooner, bards all over will be singing your songs and regaling patrons of The Yawning Portal and beyond of you and your adventures. I—” he pauses, realizing he has likely said too much and would say so much more than he should. Damn the wine. Damn her for rattling the foundations of everything he thought was true until this afternoon.

They’re so close, he suddenly realizes, and before his body can react embarrassingly he releases her shoulders, trying to appear casual as he reaches for the wine bottle.

“You what?” Poppy asks.

He glances at her over the bottle as he drinks deeply, buying himself some time. What is that look on her face? Gale doesn’t know what to make of her furrowed brow. Better to get farther from all of this.

“Just that I’ll get to say I told you so when you do get in,” he teases.

Poppy thankfully laughs at that and snatches the bottle from his hand, grabbing the other off the floor shortly after. “Oh, I bet you’d like that wouldn’t you?” she says as she flops onto the bench.

–

Time passes differently once the sun has gone down and wine has been consumed. One bottle of wine sits empty on the table while the other is half-empty, sitting resolutely beside its companion. Gale’s teasing comment was what they both needed to break through whatever that was and combined with the wine it felt as though almost nothing was amiss. Almost.

She’s touching him. Some indeterminate amount of time ago, she decided that laying down would be more comfortable than sitting and since this bench isn’t particularly long, her feet and calves have been resting on Gale’s lap. For a shorter but equally indeterminate amount of time, he’s been touching her, too. Just her legs on his lap, just playing with the fabric of her soft pants. But it’s still been enough to keep him on edge; that pleasant high that comes when you’re so close to someone who makes your heart race, as if you are walking along a precipice.

He can’t help it. She just looks so godsdamned comfortable, laying there next to him, finally free of her worries, at least temporarily. For the first time in many years, Gale allows himself to look at her. The curve of her neck is exposed with how her hair is piled on top of her head. She had changed out of her traveling clothes before she jumped down to his balcony; the slightly stretched collar of this shirt exposes her collarbone and the fabric otherwise stretches tight across her chest in a way that makes him want to ogle. He recalls the press of her breasts against his chest when they hugged earlier—

His face heats as he realizes what he’s doing and shakes his head, willing the thoughts to leave his brain. There’s still that niggling in the back of his head that this is just temporary, that she’s going to be down upon the morrow with the ball right in front of them. Her giggling visage just a short distance away tugs at him—he’s had to work hard to pay attention to what she’s been saying given that the idea of wrapping her in his arms once more refuses to leave the front of his mind.

Poppy does feel much better. Granted, the wine is doing much of the legwork, but Gale is no slouch in that department, either. Everything feels better with him—lighter, more possible. He looks at everything and anything as if a new challenge to conquer and it’s infectious. What is the point of worrying when Gale Dekarios has put his whole head and heart into believing in you? That, and the way he smiles at her that makes her stomach do somersaults. That is new and decidedly not unwelcome.

He’s grown so much these past few years, hasn’t he? Poppy thinks to herself. Physically and emotionally, he has become not just the boy she grew up with building sandcastles at their yearly trip to the beach but a man, even. There’s this ease with which he carries himself that she is so envious of, herself being so self-aware of everything and anything her body is doing at any given moment that it’s hard to relax. Except here. Except around him.

Last summer, she could barely get out of bed. And most of those days, Gale was right next to her. He would do his summer work, read to her, or more often than not, just talk about anything and everything, which she didn’t mind. Poppy could listen to Gale talk all day. She never asked him to do that, he did it of his own accord. No judgment, no prying questions, just him.

And she gets just that this evening. It’s so easy to get him talking; just a single question about his freezing hands from earlier starts a long explanation of the intricacies of the Sleet Storm spell and indicative reflexives. Despite what would normally be a fascinating conversation to Poppy, she is not able to stay focused. Sure, the whole bottle of wine she’s consumed has to do with part of it, but Gale’s hair is just as powerful as the wine. She can’t stop staring at it; how it curls around his ears, how it hangs in front of and around his eyes, how it moves when he runs his hands through it. It looks unbelievably soft and she desperately wants to touch it.

The words tumble out of her mouth before she can stop them. “This looks good,” she says, gesturing to his hair. “I can’t believe your mum is letting you keep it this long.”

Gale blushes and looks almost nervous as he runs a hand through his hair once more, disheveling it further and causing a few strands to fall in front of his face. “She looks for any opportunity to tell me I need to chop it off.”

“Well, you shouldn’t. It looks great.” Where is her self-control? Gone with the wine, she supposes.

If Gale weren’t already drunk surely these compliments would have made him so. A million words and responses tumble through his mind and before he can come up with the semblance of an answer, a voice startles him out of his thoughts.

“Yoohoo!”

Tara’s voice calls out from the darkness, the tressym silent on her wings as she flutters down onto the table on Gale’s side.

“Tara!” Poppy calls, happy to see Gale’s familiar again. “We haven’t said a proper hello today, have we?”

“It is such a pleasure to see you again, Miss Lyons. Hearing the dulcet notes of that old piano echo through the halls of this home are much more pleasing to the ear than whatever explosions Mr. Dekarios decides to summon in the back garden.”

Ignoring Gale’s scoff, Tara furls her tail around his head before carefully stepping onto the back of the bench and carefully tip-toeing her way towards Poppy.

Tara, with the ease of, well, a tressym, steps down onto the small patch of bench between Poppy’s side and the back cushions before flopping herself down into her arms. Poppy giggles at Tara’s overt affection, rare from the tressym, but always welcome.

“Aww, thank you, Tara. You’re so sweet.” Tara’s purrs rumble through her body as Poppy begins to scratch away at that one spot behind her ears Tara loves so much.

Tara sniffs, “I say, did you two get into the wine cellar again?”

“Don’t ask questions you already know the answer to, Tara. It's unbecoming of you,” Poppy mumbles into Tara’s fur, lost in the softness and the purrs.

Gale, on the other hand, is quite jealous at the scene in front of him. Oh, how he’d love to have her hands play with his hair, to be pressed up against her like that…

“It pleases me to see that you two are finally enjoying yourselves. You should have seen him earlier, Miss Lyons. Mr. Dekarios was wallowing so deeply I thought he was going to drown in his own feelings!”

Poppy’s eyes open at that, round and soft and full of concern at Tara’s words. “Why were you wallowing? Is something wrong?” she asks.

Gale flushes, “N-nothing you need to worry about….” Dammit, Tara.

Maybe it’s the tressym in her arms purring away, maybe it’s the wine she’s been drinking, but she swears she feels her body warm considerably when Gale blushes again at Tara’s words. His eyes somehow go even bigger and he looks away, the picture of bashfulness. Now that does something to her stomach and the rest of her that’s much harder to ignore. He’s never had any reason to be even a little nervous around her, what’s going on?

“Hey Tara, my mother picked up some beholder jerky on the way home from Meiroth’s today. I’m sure they’d love to deal you into a game of three dragon ante again for it....”

Tara’s ears perk up at that. “You don’t say…Well, it seems I must be off, then!”

She stretches luxuriously, her tail swishing against Poppy’s chin as she does so before taking the few steps needed to butt her head against Gale’s.

“Don’t stay up too late, you two. You have a big day tomorrow!” Tara soars off to drain their mothers’ coin purses and beholder jerky stores and Gale and Poppy are once again alone.

“You didn’t answer my question,” Poppy says once Tara is well out of earshot. “You know you can talk to me about anything.”

Gale starts and turns back to face her only to find those piercing grey eyes of hers trying to see right through him. She’s sitting up now, her legs removed from his lap and crossed under her. Gods, and so much closer to him as well, he can almost count all of her eyelashes.

Gods, he doesn’t want to talk about this. Bringing up the ball again is risky even if his intentions are good. But she’s so insistent and Gale can’t deny her…

“I know you’re not looking forward to going to the ball with me,” he says slowly, reaching for the half-empty wine bottle on the table to take a swig. “But maybe it can take your mind off things? The ball really is a grand time.”

She feels so cold now that Tara’s gone from her arms and his words ring discordant in her head. Hells, she hasn’t even considered Gale in all of this, has she? She just assumed he was as put off by their mothers’ conniving as she was. Poppy hasn’t even let herself think about the ball and what that would entail. To go to the Blackstaff Ball, the event Gale has always gushed about whenever she visits, with her favorite person in all of Toril…

“Gods, I didn’t even…,” her voice trails off. No words feel right at this moment.

The words spill from his tongue too easily and it makes his heart sink, his desire to placate at the moment much too strong. “I don’t want you to force yourself to go especially if you don’t think you’ll have a good time—”

“I know I’ll have a great time because I’ll be there with you,” she interrupts.

He freezes at that, the conviction in her words clear as day on her face. Is she even closer now? He squeezes the neck of the bottle in his hand.

“I mean, as long as you’ll still have me,” she continues. “I’ve been a complete and utter ass.”

Gale takes her hand while he drinks from the bottle. “You,” he says with a gasp after his drink, “are the farthest thing from that. You’ve been under immense pressure and my mother is…”

“Inevitable.”

Gale quirks a wry smile and points at her with the bottle in hand. “Right you are.”

She giggles, of all things, and the relief Gale feels at hearing that sound makes him feel buoyant.

“It will be fun, won’t it? With all the dancing and sumptuous feasts,” she says, borrowing one of Gale’s favorite words. She holds out one of her hands and he passes her the bottle. But instead of pulling away, Poppy grabs hold of his hand as she raises the bottle to her lips with the other.

It’s all so overwhelming, her hand in his and the way her throat bobs as she finishes off the bottle of wine. Nevermind the thought that she actually seems excited about this, now. He had resigned himself to her disappointment but to see her coming around to the idea—

“All of those dance lessons our mothers put us in are going to finally pay off,” Poppy slurs, well and truly drunk now. “Your hand is ‘s—so popular’ according to your mother, I’m going to have to fight off a million suitors wanting to dance with you, won’t I?” She’s even closer now with one of her legs slung over his lap again. Poppy continues to play with his hand in her lap, both of her hands now preoccupied, the empty bottle set aside on the tile of the balcony.

“No,” Gale says resolutely. She looks up at him at that, eyes wide and hazy. “Your name will be written next to every dance on my card, if I have any say in the matter.”

“Scandalous,” Poppy banters, a rogue lock of hair falling in front of her eyes as she shakes her head. “What will everyone think?”

“I don’t particularly care what they all think. Your opinion is all that matters to me,” Gale replies, reaching a hand up.

It startles her, when his fingers touch her face just so as they brush her loose hair behind her ear. Poppy is so drunk and time is so wibbly-wobbly, she thinks it’s the wine making her think that his hand lingers there just behind her ear. It’s probably also the wine that’s making her think that he’s looking at her differently, looking at her in a way that makes her face burn and her heart race. And so she tucks her head into his shoulder while both of her hands continue to toy with his fingers.

He smells like sandalwood and ozone; that sizzling arcane scent that follows him as a caster, magic just clinging to him like sweat. Poppy breathes deeply, taking him in.

“I didn’t know you held my opinion so highly,” she huffs, starting to wish she wasn’t as drunk as she currently is.

Gale’s hand comes down to rest on her knee, the one that’s slung over his lap. He can move it higher, she realizes. She’d very much like that, in fact.

Gods, his heart is pounding. It would be so easy to lean down and kiss her, to pull her into his lap.

“Can I ask you something?” Gales whispers, before he can think better of it.

She doesn’t need to imagine her heart racing at that question, at its potential. “Always.”

He hesitates now, in way too deep. He wants to kiss her so badly it feels as though he will explode if he doesn’t. But…

“Please don’t climb down here without me,” he says instead. “You know I’ll always catch you if you fall.” A pit starts to form in his stomach that the wine eats away at and he curses his cowardice.

Poppy can’t help but smile into his shoulder and Gale feels it, smiling wide and unbidden himself, thankful that he didn’t just completely ruin the moment.

“I promise.”

—

Poppy is awakened the morning of the ball by her mother with a fresh cup of coffee in hand and Morena tittering just outside the door. Adrianne knows better than anyone that Poppy can’t go without her coffee and Poppy is otherwise thankful for the shield against the storm that is Morena Dekarios on a day such as this. Besides, her head is pounding from all the wine she drank with Gale last night and—

Fuck, last night.

She was flirting. He was flirting, there’s no doubt about that. Was it just the wine? Was it just to make her feel better? Poppy doesn’t get a chance to see him and gather any more intel as she is sent off to the Temple of Sune bright and early to begin the hours-long prep Morena booked for her. Upon arrival, Morena apparently sprung for the all-inclusive option which enables Poppy to order a hangover cure without even pulling out her coin purse.

Once hangover-free and settled into a hot bath full of sweet-smelling things, she lets everything wash over her. She feels excited. Giddy, even. She recalls how she kept finding Gale looking at her differently last night on the balcony and she can’t help but grin and kick her feet. Any thoughts of New Olamn and her acceptance results are far from her mind.

Gale is similarly buoyant; even his mother asking him to cut his hair before he sets off for the Temple of Sune in the early afternoon can’t dampen his mood. He keeps an eye out for Poppy at the temple but doesn’t see her, which only makes his anticipation for seeing her later build exponentially. When it’s time for his haircut he accepts the hot towel shave but only tells the hairdresser to trim his ends and nothing more; something his mother will certainly complain about, but he doesn’t care. Poppy likes it long, so he’s keeping it this way.

Getting ready with her mother is a fun affair; Adrianne laces up the dress (delivered as of this afternoon) and cinches Poppy in securely, ensuring that the elegant makeup done by the Temple doesn’t smudge on anything. Morena comes in only once to drop off some jewelry for Poppy to borrow, which turns out to be Morena’s entire jewelry box. Poppy carefully picks through it, in awe of the options but also what it means for Morena to give all of this over to her to pick from.

Once home and dressed, the nerves start to settle in. Gale Dekarios does not get nervous. Or didn’t, until today, or was it yesterday? He’s more than a little vain and can’t help but fret about whether or not Poppy will like how he looks in his dress robes. The room suddenly feeling too warm, he steps out onto the balcony for some fresh air. He takes a deep breath and is inundated with the scent of the flowers from his mother’s garden. She deserves flowers, he thinks and Dimension Doors himself right into the garden to peruse his options.

Minutes later, he climbs the stairs in the main hall with a bundle of blush pink peonies in hand. The fresh air did him some good, but it’s time to leave soon and he’d like to give her the flowers out of view of his mother. Ascending to the third floor, he knocks on her door and sweats.

Adrianne opens the door and her eyes soften as her gaze settles on him. “Oh look at you,” she coos. She cups his face in her hands as she takes him in. “So handsome. Are you sure you’re the same little boy who summoned a magma mephit in the bathroom just a few summers ago?”

“Lies and slander,” he replies cheekily.

“You brought me flowers?”

Adrianne steps back and Gale is suddenly assaulted by the vision standing behind her.

She looks like starlight, he thinks.

Beads and crystals glitter along the length of her midnight blue dress. Though the dress is high-collared, the top of the bodice dips slightly between her breasts exposing her collarbone. It’s clear the dress is designed to draw the eye to the exposed skin there and Gale has to work to keep his eyes from settling there. This proves especially difficult when he realizes that even her skin is shimmering from…magic? Some sort of lotion? Attempting to look elsewhere, his eyes instead catch one of her bare legs stepping through the slit in her dress that goes partway up her thigh and he feels his mouth go dry.

As she approaches, his eyes land on her face and his heart just about stops. He’s not sure exactly what the Temple of Beauty did to her hair, but it’s shinier and pulled back with curls bundled at her nape. A few pieces artfully bounce around her face and Gale has the sudden urge to brush them out of the way, to touch her. As she gets even closer to him he starts feeling very hot under his collar—is he blushing? He tries to train his face into something more neutral but he’s not quite sure he’s succeeding.

How is he supposed to survive the night with her on his arm?

Poppy wasn’t sure what to expect of Gale in his dress robes but she certainly wasn’t expecting broad shoulders and his round puppy-dog eyes looking at her like she hung the moon. With her favorite flowers in hand, of all things; it’s sweet enough to make her teeth ache and her heart to boot.

In her heels, she stands eye-to-eye with him and is thus pinned under his gaze. She fiddles with the rings on her fingers, not sure what to do with her hands. The recollection of the fact that he was just dumped a few days previously rings in her ears and the thought baffles her; how could anyone turn down this glowing, sweet boy before her?

“Sunshine, let me find a vase for these.” Gale lets Adrianne take the blooms, not really paying attention as she disappears into Poppy’s ensuite bathroom.

They both stand there, holding their breath.

“Hi,” she whispers, smiling.

Somehow Gale’s eyes grow even wider and an adorable blush crawls across his face as he smiles back.

“Hello,” he replies, his breath hitching a little. “You look...breathtaking.”

Poppy waits for Gale to continue, but he doesn’t. She’s truly made the ever-verbose Gale Dekarios speechless, something she once thought impossible without magic.

One of his hands comes up and brushes his hair back. He had clearly done something to style it but this one motion has undone how artfully it had sat just a moment prior.

She tsks. “No, put your hands down. Let me.”

Poppy’s hands brush against Gale’s temples and he freezes at her touch, his eyes growing even wider. Gale is bombarded by her perfume with her wrists so close to his face now. It’s something that tickles his nose in a welcome way—peppery and slightly sweet. He finds himself leaning into her hand but rights his posture immediately, letting her do her work.

Has she always bitten her tongue like that when she focuses? he wonders. Poppy’s hands course through his hair to style it accordingly and he wishes she would press harder—scratch, tug, even. Her fingers are deft—he’s witnessed her pluck complicated songs on her lute or dance across the keys of the piano in the parlor countless times and now he’s wondering how they would feel dancing across his skin. This close, he sees how her eyelashes are darkened and how shades of glittering blue, black, and silver make her gray eyes glow like the moon. The shimmer on the tops of her cheekbones is iridescent, almost like the light cast by a prism hung in a window. Her lips are painted the color of blackcurrant jam and look just as delectable. Poppy, simply, looks like a work of art. His fingers twitch as he restrains himself from touching her, the urge so strong with her so close. He has to remind himself to breathe, which only sends more of that intoxicating perfume into his lungs. Gale can’t decide if he wants to consume her or be consumed by her. Both, preferably.

This close to Gale, Poppy can see every striation of brown in his irises and how long his lashes are. His hair is soft beneath her hands as she styles it. The stiffening of his posture does not pass her by, but his eyes are so distracting...

One of her rings catches on a lock of hair that causes her to pull a bit harder than she intended and Gale puffs out a quiet groan at the sensation.

“Oh! Sorry,” she frets. “I hope you didn’t hurt you.”

You could have pulled harder and I would have begged for more, he thinks. “No, no you didn’t. Don’t worry about it. Promise,” he reassures.

Adrianne returns with the flowers in a vase, placing them carefully on the mantle. “Let’s hurry along, you two. Morena is surely pacing downstairs and the carriage is waiting.”

When they reach the stairs, Poppy moves to pick up her skirts but Gale slides in, proffering his arm for her. She takes it with a small smile and Gale wants to pull that smile out of her again and again and again.

Dual gasps cut up the stairs as they descend arm in arm. Morena is dabbing her eyes with a handkerchief with Tara perched on her shoulder. “Oh, aren’t you two just the picture—we’ll need to schedule a time for you to sit down and have a portrait done, oh my goodness.”

They hug Morena and Tara makes a point to bump both of their heads with her own, purring her approval.

Gale and Poppy climb into the carriage with minimal kerfuffle from their mothers, Adrianne wrangling Morena to not fuss over them even more than she already has.

The carriage bumbles along to Blackstaff, Poppy and Gale sitting silently, not sharing a word. Occasionally they steal glances at each other and catch the other looking, which makes them both blush.

At one point the carriage hits a pothole and Poppy grabs Gale’s hand to keep herself from going flying. Neither makes a move to let go. If anything, Gale ends up absentmindedly toying with one of the looser rings on her fingers. It’s his mother’s, he realizes.

His lingering hand doesn’t escape Poppy’s notice and she doesn’t care; she loves it, actually. The worry of the past few days is completely gone and is replaced with this effervescent bubbling under her skin. This is what this should have felt like the whole time.

“We’re going to have fun tonight, aren’t we?” he asks, squeezing her hand gently and breaking their silence.

She squeezes his hand back. “Oh, definitely,” she grins. “We’re going to have a blast.”

The way his eyes dart down to her mouth do not go unnoticed, and neither does the way her leg presses against his from where they sit in the trundling carriage.

—

“Oh my gods you saw them at Three Pearls? I was on vacation with my family in Neverwinter at the time and the one time they come to Waterdeep, I’m out of town. I am unbelievably jealous. Did they perform Cecelia?”

“They did!”

Poppy and Gale’s classmate Nell have been chatting nonstop like this ever since they realized they were both fans of the traveling bard duo Shymon and Scarbunkel. Both women talk animatedly with their hands between bites of food while Nell’s boyfriend on her other side chats with the rest of the table. The classmates they’ve found themselves as tablemates are fine, he supposes. Nell is intelligent and one of the least scathing of his peers, but their classes don’t overlap much. Zanthas to Gale’s left isn’t particularly smart but neither does he outright antagonise Gale which is a small win, if you’d call it that.

“And you brought Dekarios with you? He didn’t chatter your ear off during every song?”

Poppy bristles a little at the slight at Gale but holds her tongue otherwise. After last night, she has only been barely sipping her wine but takes a larger sip now to give herself time to gather a nicer response.

“Forgive me, Nell, for wanting to bring my best friend with me. Gale thoroughly enjoyed himself that night. He’s had years of me performing those songs in front of him, he knows all of them almost as well as I do.”

“Just please don’t ask me to sing any of them,” Gale interjects. “I wouldn’t dare sully the air with my singing voice when Poppy is right here.”

“You sing?” Nell asks.

“Oh, she can do much more than sing,” Gale answers immediately. “In fact, her acceptance to New Olamn should be arriving any day now.”

Poppy cringes inwardly at the mention of the school. “Gale…”

“They’ll know soon enough anyway; you’ll have a recurring gig at The Yawning Portal by summer’s end, I guarantee it.”

Poppy eyes Gale’s wine glass, which is still half-full, just like her own. None of this can be blamed on the wine like it could have last night.

Gale sees her hesitancy and decides to double-down. There’s just something about making her blush that makes his already impressive ego grow even larger. “How many times do I have to remind you that I would never dare to disparage your immense talents? Especially because by doing so I’d be made a liar as there is nothing to disparage.”

“Oh, then please continue singing my praises; I’m sure that’s what everyone wants to listen to right now,” Poppy replies dully, taking another sip of her wine to hide her blush.

But her prayers never really get answered, do they?

“Gladly! Let’s see, you can sing, play the piano, drums, lute, lyre, and violin….” Gale rattles off while raising a finger for each instrument mentioned.

“Oh, is that all?” Poppy replies feeling her cheeks redden further, unsure how to handle this Gale who so willingly sings her praises.

Six fingers still extended, Gale looks thoughtfully into the middle-distance before replying cheekily, “You know, your flute could use some work.”

“Well, everyone,” Poppy addresses the table. “It’s been a fine evening, but I really must be going—”

“Now, now,” Gale chides, grinning from ear to ear as he grabs hold of her hand. “We haven’t even danced yet and I promised you that we’d dance every single one.”

Standing there, Gale’s hand in hers, a shiver runs through her. As she readjusts her skirts to sit back down, she catches the eye of a girl a few tables over shooting her the dirtiest look Poppy has ever been on the receiving end of. It’s not the first time; Poppy noticed the sneer from the girl in a red dress from the moment they first sat down. If Gale has noticed, he hasn’t said anything. Granted, Poppy is also aware of how Gale hasn’t taken his eyes off of her throughout their meal. She keeps a subtle eye on the strange girl throughout dessert, the glare never wavering.

Gale’s hand tingles from the aftermath of holding her hand once more. His mind wanders to her hand in his as they exited the carriage, her hand on his arm as he led them into the ballroom, even her hand on his back for one too short moment as they found their seats. The bare leg exposed by the slit in her dress mocks him from mere inches away. His knee knocks against it but gods what he would give to reach down and touch.

“Gale,” Poppy hisses in a whisper only heard by him.

His eyes dart up from where they had been locked on what she is assuming was her bare leg and smirks at him when he catches her eye. It’s so easy to let a smirk curl her lips and the effect on Gale is immediate, eyes darting down to the movement and lingering there even after once her mouth has relaxed.

“Who is that girl in red staring daggers into my back two tables away?”

Poppy jerks her head slightly in the direction she’s referring to and as casually as he can manage given that not looking at her seems like the worst kind of torture at the moment. He scans the room in the direction that she indicated and immediately finds Marietta staring daggers in their direction. Her boyfriend sits next to her in matching red, speaking with a girl he doesn’t recognize in a fluffy pink dress.

Turning back to Poppy he takes her hand in his once more, almost instinctually, and replies hesitantly, “That’s Marietta.”

Recognition rings a bell in Poppy’s mind as she recalls Morena disparaging the girl during the trip to Meiroth’s.

“I thought she dumped you, why is she glaring at me?”

“Your guess is as good as mine. She was all apologies when we last spoke and I was perfectly civil; I see no reason for her to be treating you this way. I can go and tell her off if you’d like?”

Poppy’s lips quirk a small smile. “No, don’t worry about it. I’ve been through worse.”

“Worse?” Gale worries. “Who needs to be on the other end of my Lightning Bolt?”

His voice has turned from worry to heated in but a moment and it warms Poppy in turn in places beyond her cheeks. She likes protective Gale, she thinks. Very much. Suddenly, it occurs to her that Marietta might be jealous. It’s not beyond the realm of possibility; Gale is handsome and from what Poppy has heard, Marietta seems to not have the best judgment otherwise.

Egged on by the racing of her heart and the tingling under her skin, Poppy leans forward and kisses his cheek, staining his skin with the dark purple of her lipstick.

Gale tenderly touches the spot she kissed to see that his finger comes away with some of her lipstick. “What did I do to deserve such a gift?”

“Just being you,” she replies simply. Affection for him makes her heart feel full to bursting.They could all rot for all she cares, she just needs Gale. She grins as she guides Gale’s hand to rest on the top of her knee and her hand on top of his. The reddening of the tips of his ears and his widening eyes do not go unnoticed as she digs into the dessert that has been placed in front of her. As she returns to her meal, Nell shoots her a silent but knowing look over the lip of her wine glass that Poppy doesn’t deign to respond to.

Gale doesn’t taste the food as his hand on her bare knee, half-obscured by the drape of the white tablecloth, takes up all of his brain’s processing capacity as the rest of his tablemates chatter on.

Once the dessert dishes are cleared away and guests begin milling about, Gale guides Poppy by her hand to the open glass doors to one of the balconies off the ballroom that look out over the city. From this angle, they can see the coast from where it appears from behind Mount Waterdeep and even the Sea Ward. The mountain and setting sun together cast a shadow. He sees her shiver from the breeze of the cooling day and, feeling quite bold, wraps his arms around her and rests his chin on her shoulder. From here, her perfume is the strongest and he takes a deep breath, trying to commit this scent to memory.

“Soon you’ll be up there,” he gestures to the high slope of Mount Waterdeep, about halfway between The Sahuagin Humbled and The Lady Dreaming, to the location of New Olamn. “And I’ll be right down here, so close yet so far. Be sure not to forget me when you ascend to those heavens.”

“Not this again,” Poppy scoffs, but her smile betrays her. Being wrapped in his arms feels so completely perfect.

Gale’s breath is hot against her cheek as he replies, “I will continue to remind you of your greatness until you believe it yourself, and well beyond that in case you dare to forget.”

Fuck, she wants to kiss him so badly. “Flatterer.”

Gale’s skin alights with her response. Are her cheeks pink from the comment? Or from the chill in the air? “Are you accusing me of being insincere? Because I promise you, I am the farthest thing from that,” he murmurs into her skin, brushing her cheek with his lips.

Hells, she feels so off-kilter. She’d do anything to feel more control here. “I think I like you when you’re more arrogant. Where is that infamous wizard arrogance, anyway?”

“It’s right here, waiting for you to kiss me.”

Never one to back down from a challenge, especially something she desperately wants to do, Poppy turns in his embrace and pulls his face into hers, stealing his breath with a kiss.

Gale’s hands flex around her waist as they clutch her, mind going completely blank. All there is in this moment is Poppy. Any past fumblings in dark corners of the Blackstaff library or his dormitory are immediately eradicated from his memory. Her cold hands are ice against his face but brace him there, warmth exploding throughout his body from every point their bodies come in contact.

A quiet groan rumbles through Gale’s chest and it takes all of Poppy’s willpower to not drag him away to some dark corner. It feels…perfect; his arms around her, her lips against his, her hands tentatively weaving into his hair. All of it. All of him.

A sharp wolf whistle from the ballroom breaks them both out of their reverie, a group of junior apprentices stalking by and whooping. Gale starts at the noise, knocking them both into the balustrade.

Poppy’s hands grab at his sides. “Don’t fall,” she gasps as he steadies. His lips are stained dark with her lipstick and the sight makes her feel as though something right has fallen into place.

“I think I already have.”

Poppy huffs, ignoring how that one comment makes her stomach do somersaults, and so she kisses him instead because she definitely didn’t get enough of him the first time. She presses herself against him, making them flush against one another. Gale’s hands begin to wander, rubbing up and down her back and shoulders. He hums the quietest whine when she starts to pull away and the pleased groan it transforms into when she kisses him again is addictive.

Spoiled, she thinks affectionately. Possessively. There is just something in how expressive Gale is in his want that thrills her to no end.

Finally pulling all the way away, Poppy hums a melodic Prestidigitation against his lips and the lipstick disappears, leaving his face clean.

“Gods, you have to teach me how to do that,” Gale groans, heart pounding and head foggy with lust and adoration.

“You don’t need me to teach you how to cast Prestidigitation. Last time I checked, you were able to cast that right out of the womb.”

“Yes, but I want you to teach me. I love watching you cast, each time is more astounding than the next.”

“So you’re saying you want some private lessons?” Poppy replies with a smirk. His hands have settled on her hips after their travels and they twitch toward her backside at her words.

“There are many things I’d love for you to show me in private,” Gale says, every voice heated and weighted with his true meaning. “And as much as I’d love to see many of them at this very moment, unfortunately this balcony is a little too open for my tastes.”

“Not an exhibitionist, Gale? Hmph. I thought you were a show-off.”

Gale stands and straightens himself before holding his arm out for Poppy. “You on my arm tonight, dancing with me tonight, is more than enough to show everyone that you’re mine. Anything else that happens between us, well….” he pauses, one of his hands reaching up to rub away a smudge of lipstick smearing away from the edge of her lip. “I’d rather have you completely to myself if it’s all the same. Let’s head back inside, the dancing should be starting soon.”

The dancing does indeed seem to be starting soon—musicians have taken to the stage and are tuning their instruments, the warbling of soon- notes wafting through the open ballroom.

Despite not wanting to leave Gale’s side, nature calls and Poppy would love a few minutes to collect herself before she’ll be swept up in Gale’s arms once more.

“Nell, can you show me where the lavatories are?”

“Oh! I have to go, too. Let me show you.” Nell stands and leads Poppy out of the ballroom and down the hall.

Gale watches Poppy as she goes, unable to tear his eyes from Poppy’s rear end as it sways and shimmers until she’s out of sight.

Zanthas also apparently can’t tear his eyes away, and once the women are gone, he turns to Gale and asks, “Where did you find her?”

A million poetic words jump to mind about Poppy, but at this moment, his brain is only able to form one simple response.

“She’s always been here, I suppose.” His heart thuds at the idea that what he didn’t know he needed has been by his side this entire time.

Nell leads Poppy down a hall and just before they enter the women’s lavatories, Poppy notices Marietta’s curly-haired date excitedly following the girl in a fluffy pink dress through a nondescript door. Interesting.

The Blackstaff lavatories are just as impressive as one would expect and Poppy takes her time in the grand space. She checks her makeup in the mirror as she washes her hands but notices a familiar sneer dressed in red behind her in the reflection.

“Can I help you?” Poppy asks as she turns the water off.

Marietta reaches out and pokes Poppy’s arm, much to her shock. “Gods, you are real. Did he summon you or something?”

Poppy recoils at her touch, “Excuse me?”

Marietta rolls her eyes. “I only asked him to go to the ball with me to make my boyfriend jealous, but the fact that he found you in such a short amount of time? What, did his mother pay you to go with him?” She gasps, “Did he pay you?”

Vicious words simmer on her tongue, waiting to be unleashed but Poppy bites them down, not wishing to start a fight. “He’s my best friend,” she replies tightly. “And it—”

Marietta barks out a sharp, cruel, laugh. “You? His best friend? Dekarios doesn’t have friends. He must have paid you extra to say that about him. How pathetic!”

Poppy is only tangentially aware of Nell approaching the sink to wash her own hands, obviously listening to their conversation. But Marietta has managed to render Poppy mostly speechless. She is a guest here; she cannot start anything but this horrible girl in front of her is making it difficult.

Marietta takes Poppy’s terse silence as permission to continue. “He’s cute enough, but I can’t imagine actually being intimate with him.” She then pretends to gag whilst rolling her eyes. “He’d probably spend the whole time talking about Mordenkainen’s theories of the multiverse. Dekarios loves the sound of his own voice more than he does anyone else. Does he ever stop talking enough to kiss you? Or does he think that his mere presence is enough of a gift for you?”

It takes almost all of Poppy’s self control to keep herself from slapping Marietta across the face. Unfortunately, that is not enough to keep her mouth shut. The weave is so potent here and with the notes she can hear flitting down the hall from the musicians tuning their instruments it’s so easy for her vicious words to hold power as she spits at Marietta, “Advice coming from someone who has to play tricks to keep her boyfriend around when minutes ago I saw him sneak into the closet down the hall with another girl? Better to keep things together at home before you go shitting in someone else’s house.”

The shorter girl’s pupils turn to pinpricks as the words his and she sways as the words stab true.

Poppy sweeps out of the lavatory, trying to slow her breathing so as to not scream into the halls as she so desperately wants to.

Nell catches up to Poppy, still steaming. “I’ve never seen anyone make Marietta shut up like that before. That was incredible! I can see why Gale likes you.”

It’s one thing to feel it yourself and it’s another for it to be said out loud by a third party. Poppy feels her cheeks heat at Nell’s words as they re-enter the ballroom together. Just the vision of Gale across the hall, animatedly talking about something with Zanthas makes her heart swell. Somehow in the middle of his conversation he notices her and beams, his smile blazing like the sun and warm enough to burn away the rest of the tension in her body.

Before Poppy can even get near the table, Gale stands, taking his leave with Zanthas and tries his best to not outright sprint over to her. As stimulating as it was to discuss a particular intricacy of Mordenkainen’s theories of the multiverse with him, he is not embarrassed to admit that he had anxiously been keeping an eye out for Poppy. His whole body has been feeling like it’s crackling ever since they kissed on the balcony. Gale is thankful his layers of robes easily hide his half-hard cock, refusing to flag after their embrace. It took every ounce of self-control to keep himself from lewdly groping her as his hands so itched to do. And even now, as he walks quickly over to her, he finds himself meditating on one simple command, “Keep it together, Dekarios.”

The musicians are finally done tuning their instruments and seem to be getting ready to start. Guests stand and take hands or rush to other tables to find dancing partners. Gale knows her answer already, but when he reaches her and holds out his hand in question, it still utterly thrills him that she takes his hand to follow him to the dancefloor.

She has so quickly become…everything. He doesn’t think a single thought that has crossed his mind in the past twenty-four hours has not been of Poppy. And so when he takes her up in his arms to start the first dance, a whirling, energetic song that has the two of them spinning round and round the floor, Gale can’t help but feel as though he is drowning in her.

Being held by Gale like this, being led around the dancefloor is a rush that Poppy loves like no other. It’s almost enough to make her forget about what had happened in the lavatory just moments before.

Almost…if it weren’t for—

Right as the song ends and Gale and Poppy come to a stop, chests heaving at the exertion and all flushed cheeks and brightened eyes, a sob cuts through the din as Marietta runs into the hall and towards the main doors, covering her face. Not far behind is her boyfriend in the matching red, covered in lipstick much pinker than the dark color Marietta is wearing.

Poppy tries not to overtly stare as she runs out of the ballroom main doors. But that doesn’t stop Gale and the rest of the hall for that matter from staring at the pair as they leave. A few giggles and hushed murmurs fill the hall once they’re gone save from Poppy who shares a look with Nell just a few feet away in the arms of her boyfriend.

“Did something happen in the lavatories?” Gale asks Poppy.

Poppy bites her lip under his gaze before answering slowly, “I may have pointed out that her boyfriend and another girl were having some time alone in a closet…”

“You did more than that, I’d say,” Nell whispers over to them. “She was being a bitch and you defended him! Gale, you should have seen her, she was your bard in shining armor.”

The music starts up again, something more sweeping than the last and Gale and Poppy are off with eyes locked on one another.

“Defended me, did you?” He manages before he twirls her around, making her dress glitter and swish.

“She deserved it,” Poppy replies decisively, her voice breathless in a way that distracts Gale to no end, making him wonder how he can make her breathless is a much more pleasurable way.

There is this tension coiling between them that Poppy cannot ignore. Gale leads her around the dancefloor but she wants nothing more than to pounce on him and have her way with him. Marietta’s outlandish and blatantly incorrect insults did nothing to make her like Gale less. If anything, it has only highlighted every little thing about him that she adores.

Something about Marietta’s exit and this new information seems to change something in Gale. His moves are no less graceful but there is something in how he looks at her now that makes Poppy feel too warm in the layers of silk and gauze that adorn her body. Before she is even conscious of it, the song comes to an end, and they both stand there panting.

A trill from the harpist cuts through the ballroom, a descending arpeggio that pulls in the rest of the instruments, introducing a slower song to dance to. Gale pulls her in, his eyes never leaving hers as they begin to sway. His pounding heartbeat echoes in his ears and it has nothing to do with the exertion. His whole world has been turned upside down since his mother had this not-so-harebrained idea to have them go to the ball together. Or rather, maybe he’s been living upside down this whole time and he’s finally right side up.

Poppy doesn’t know how it happens, but they’re closer than they were before, their chests brushing against each other every so often. Feeling brave, she leans her head forward just so, wanting to be even closer to him. He closes the distance between them even more and rests his forehead against hers, his breath hot against her face. They close their eyes and it’s as if the rest of the world falls away.

There’s this energy, like the anticipation of a kiss, that thrums between them. Poppy glows under his touch, his closeness. There’s no worry, there’s no nervousness. Only acceptance and excitement. Their relationship is forever changed and she couldn’t possibly be happier.

It’s as if there is a thread between them pulling and pulling and Gale hesitates. All he has to do is lean in, but even though a moment ago it was as if they were alone, suddenly the noise of the ballroom comes rushing back into his ears, the presence of so many and the potential for eyes on them making him sweat.

The tip of Poppy’s nose brushes against his and he shudders. Eyes like platinum flash in front of him and he’s hers. Simple. Her hand on his shoulder brushes up his collar to hold his cheek and pulls and gods there are so many people—

Gale pulls away. “I want to—so, so badly. But not here, not in front of everyone...”

“Gale, it's just a kiss…,” Poppy soothes, brushing her thumb along his cheekbone.

“But if I start kissing you, I won’t be able to stop,” he murmurs, body thrumming.

Poppy’s eyes widen at his words. “Someplace private it is, then,” she replies, stepping even closer to him. Poppy is fully pressed up against him now and Gale feels as though his heart will burst out of his chest and into her own with how hard it’s beating.

Gale takes a bracing breath, trying to steady his racing heart. Focus. A place to go. Nearby and away from chaperones and other guests. His eyes dart down to her lips and just as quickly as he did that he trains his eyes elsewhere. FOCUS. There’s plenty of classrooms nearby, guaranteed to be monitored for this very reason. But there is this particularly long and meandering hallway on the other side of the ballroom...

Of course she doesn’t miss how his eyes glanced at her lips, or how his hand on her waist almost imperceptibly tightened afterwards, or how his eyes alight once he’s clearly settled on an idea—

Gale leans forward to whisper into her ear, “It would be suspicious for both of us to leave at once, so let me give you some directions...”

It takes all of Poppy’s brain power to commit Gale’s directions to memory, his hot breath tickling the shell of her ear determined to possess all of her attention.

“...you will go first and I’ll follow a minute or two behind you. Do you have all that?”

Poppy nods in understanding. Gale steps away and her body cries out at the separation. But she takes a deep breath and casually walks towards the door he indicated, letting her hips sway a little more than usual just for him.

She strides through the hallways and up a set of stairs with purpose, recalling Gale’s instructions as best she can given the circumstances under which they were bestowed upon her. Just as he predicted, no professors or chaperones roam these halls. The last turn brings her to a small hallway with a large window at the end overlooking the city.

Waterdeep could have no actual splendors within it but it would be worthy of the epithet nevertheless if it still looked like this; the glow of the moon and stars shining down upon the city roofs and the streetlamps and candles in windows making the city sparkle. It’s enough to temper her racing heart just enough.

Two minutes feels like a decade to Gale, as he returns to the table and takes a sip of his wine. He tries not to let his mind wander but even restricting his thoughts does nothing to the tightening he’s feeling in his trousers beneath his robes. The sight of her swaying hips as she walked away was almost enough to make him run after her, but he holds firm.

Once the two minutes are up, it’s a struggle to not look excited or suspicious or both. The anticipation nearly kills him as he follows the path he directed to her, hoping she found it alright. He gets his answer in the form of Poppy right where he directed her, back to him as she looks over the city.

There are no lights in this hallway, the window providing the only illumination but Poppy practically glows from where she stands. This wandering star, this celestial body beckons him, her allure something he had succumbed to years ago but only in the past day has he realized how indelible she truly is.

Poppy hears steps behind her and in the reflection of the glass can tell it’s Gale but something makes him stop. She waits a few moments and when he doesn’t move, she turns and finds him standing a few yards away, gazing at her.

“Sorry, I was just enjoying the view.”

“As was I,” he replies, his eyes unwavering from her and full of longing.

The force with which her eyes roll could have towed a ship to shore but it doesn’t stop Gale from finally approaching her. If anything, he finds it funny if the quiet chuckles she hears are anything to be believed.

Poppy turns and leans back against the wall next to the window as he approaches. His patience wanes with every step and by the time he’s only a few feet away Gale practically pounces on her. Capturing her face in both his hands, he kisses her fiercely. These are not the gentle first kisses back out on the balcony, but uninhibited and hungry.

Now that they’re properly alone, there is no more hesitating. Poppy has known Gale long enough that you do not stand up against the storm, you get swept up in it instead and let it take you wherever it wants. And tonight, they want the same thing.

When she licks into his mouth for the first time Gale’s legs almost give out. He’s been wanting this all night and now that he has it, it’s almost overwhelming. Every crush of their lips and swipe of their tongues is accompanied by the low moans of desire. One of Gale’s hands rakes down her front and around her back to grope her backside, pawing away at the soft flesh wrapped in silk and beads.

Poppy has decided that she loves Gale’s hair, and every little noise she can pull out of him when she plays with it. Every scratch and tug of her fingers summons broken whines from her wizard’s throat and she cannot get enough of them. His hands scorch her, leaving her skin buzzing in their wake with how he caresses her.

This must be a dream, truly. Gale does his best to not crush her against the wall but clearly that is something Poppy wants with how she uses her arms wrapped around his shoulder as leverage to press their bodies together anyway. He must be dreaming, he must—a groan rips through him as one of Poppy’s hands tugs harder on his hair. No, most certainly not dreaming.

Gale’s lips travel down her jaw to just below her ear, licking and sucking on the sensitive spot and making her see stars.

His hand on her cheek skates down her neck to cup one of her breasts through the stiff fabric of the bodice of her dress and the sharp gasp she cries at his touch makes him achingly hard.

“Gods...Poppy...” he groans between kisses. “You have no idea what you do to me...”

“Why don’t you use your words, then?”

“I think I’d rather let my actions speak for me this time.” Gale grips both of her hips and presses them together and her eyes grow wide when she feels his erection press against her abdomen. Slotting his mouth against hers once more, he immediately deepens the kiss, summoning a moan from deep within her.

Gale kisses her so thoroughly it makes her knees weak and so she clings to his robes for stability, trying desperately to stay afloat. Every growl and moan that falls from his lips goes right to her core.

Carnal desire threatens to overtake him, fraying his respectability. He suppresses the urge to just rut into her against this wall. She deserves better—a bed, privacy, her attention completely on him instead of also the risk of getting caught. Gods, this was all his idea, who does he think he is?

Gale’s leg notches between her own and she bends her leg exposed from the slit on her dress, hooking her knee against his thigh. He takes the hint and pulls that leg higher, holding it up against his hip.

One arm holds up her leg against his hip with that hand gripping her lush backside. His other hand slides down between them past the slit in her skirt to her smalls where her heat greets him expectantly. He takes two fingers and rubs circles around and on her clit through the soaked cloth and she gasps, her whine a delicious vintage on his tongue.

Poppy holds on for dear life as he pleasures her, her leg held obscenely high over his hip to give his hand full access to her arousal. She wants their clothes off to be as close to him as possible. She’s addicted to the groan that tumbles out of his mouth whenever she tugs on his hair. They’re at this perfect angle where if he freed himself and just slid her smalls to the side they could—

Gale removes his hand and she gasps a pained whine at the lack of friction, but with a motion of his hand suddenly there’s a breeze down there and his hand has returned to touch her directly. She breaks their kiss and pants, “Did you just vanish my fucking smalls?”

“They were in the way,” he replies simply, voice husky. His lips continue to explore her jaw and neck. She’s soaked under his touch, his fingers gliding through her lips effortlessly. His hand on her ass pulls just a bit to open her for him and he uses the opportunity to slide a finger into her, making her squeak at the insertion. He barely needs to move as Poppy’s bucking onto his hand gasping, “yes, yes, yes,” into his ear.

Each sound of hers is like a verbal component to a spell, the roll of her hips the somatic and all of it together thoroughly ruins him. She’s going to be an incredible bard with how she’s so effectively charmed him. Gale would do anything for her, be anything for her. He tells himself he wouldn’t take her right here and now but if she asked…begged, even…

He slides a second finger into her core and she arches her back, suppressing the cry she wants to unleash into the hall.

“Gods, I need to taste you, I need you to make me yours,” he babbles into her ear, breath tickling her skin. “You’re so perfect like this, gorgeous—sublime, even.”

“F-fuck, Gale,” she groans, clinging onto his shoulders for dear life. Every brush of her clit against his hand sends sparks throughout her body. She feels as though she could be lit aflame at any moment and she’d thank him for it.

Gale nibbles and kisses down her neck but is immediately stopped by the stiff, embroidered mantle covering her neck and shoulders wishing for more. More skin, more her. His entire world has become his best friend in and around his hands and there’s no place else he’d rather be.

He curls his fingers just so and it makes Poppy cry, “Yes, fuck,” in his ear. His whole hand works her now and is completely soaked, kneading her clit with the heel of his palm and fingers finding that perfect spot within her. Gale opens his eyes to find Poppy’s are half-lidded in ecstasy, lipstick smudged and cheeks flushed. Ethereal.

“Come for me, Poppy. Come for me,” he pleads.

Her eyes flash open at his words, her body singing for him. Every touch, every sound, every word threatens to be the one to push her over the edge. His intense gaze traps her like a leash, tethering her to him even more than they already are, already have been.

He can’t be looking at her like this, he can’t, he can’t. Those massive godsdamned eyes have ensnared her, locking her into this moment with him. They hold such tenderness and care that simultaneously breaks her heart and holds it together so that it could never ever shatter.

This whole time he’s been gripping her ass as if he were afraid it would disappear and it’s when the pleasure starts to brush the line with pain combined with a trembling press of his palm to her clit that she comes, crying out his name as she falls apart in his arms.

He’s a goner, truly. Nothing compares to her, nothing at all. She is recontextualizing everything he once thought beautiful. Everything will be compared to her, now. Her scent, her sounds, how she makes him feel, every bit of her. One could almost call it obsession, with how his heart latches onto her as if it had never felt love before.

Poppy’s hands stutter against him, looking for a place to hold. Gale releases her leg but moves to hold her by her waist so as to not let her fall. He raises his hand to his mouth and licks it clean, savoring it. Just her taste riles him up even more, the desire to kneel before her and hoist her legs over his shoulders—the thought makes him moan around his fingers...

“Fucking hells, Gale.”

His eyes flutter open after doing one of the hottest things she’s ever seen, pupils all blown out and dazed. He’s completely gone and utterly captivating.

“You’re made of magic, I’m certain,” he asserts, peppering kisses across her face.

She shakes her head, trying to clear the post-orgasm fog. “I’m no sorcerer...”

“Then how would you explain how my acute arcane senses are tingling?” he says between every kiss along her jaw.

“I think that’s just your dick,” she huffs, grinning and palming his erection through his robes.

Gale shudders at the contact, hips rolling out of his control and groaning into her neck. His hands aren’t his own, tugging at her dress as if to remove it.

Poppy’s other hand stops him, her voice breathless but stern, “You will not be ripping this dress off of me or vanishing it to only gods know where.”

He didn’t vanish her smalls, they’re just in his pocket. But her dress can’t fit there, he has to admit, which is difficult to accept when she keeps stroking him through his clothes like she is.

“I feel as though my whole body will be set ablaze,” he shudders.

“You should go to a cleric to get that checked ou—”

“I think I heard something this way,” a distant voice echoes down the hall.

They hurriedly right themselves, adjusting clothes and hair as necessary until Gale notices that Poppy’s lipstick is quite smudged. Casting Prestidigitation to make her lipstick and its mess disappear, Poppy does the same to him without question and he’s thankful for it. Gale turns them both around so they’re looking out the window and he begins pointing out notable landmarks as if that’s what they’ve been doing the whole time.

“See? And over there past The Hawk Man is the Honorable Knight! The Lady Dreaming is behind us but surely tomorrow I can take you there—”

The footsteps get louder until they’re clearly in the hallway with Gale and Poppy when one nasally voice pipes up.

“Excuse me! You cannot be here. Please return to the ballroom at o–ah. Mister Dekarios.” They turn around and see two dour-looking professors at the other end of the hall.

“Pardon us, Professor Venris! I was just showing her the view and this is just the best window for it, don’t you agree?” Gale says affably.

Both professors grumble something unintelligible while Professor Venris summons them forward which Gale and Poppy follow dutifully hand in hand. They are led down the maze of hallways and stairs that Gale had originally directed Poppy and are deposited back into the ballroom where the dancing continues. Once the professors are out of earshot, Poppy whispers to Gale, “Nice and private, hmmm?”

Gale can’t help but grin when he responds. “It was! But I can’t help that someone was quite loud—”

Poppy swats him playfully at that response but doesn’t otherwise snap back, a novelty. He spies that she’s blushing which makes him hold onto her hand even tighter.

The table is empty except for Nell and her boyfriend chatting and sipping on champagne. The redhead eyes the two of them when they sit down but Poppy ignores her and retrieves a few things from her purse to reapply her lipstick. Nell snickers from her seat and Poppy eyes her at that.

“You two aren’t subtle, you know that?”

Poppy blots her lips and sets everything back into her purse as she cheerfully replies, “I don’t think I know what you’re talking about.” She turns to Gale to find him staring at her, smitten and warm.

“Careful Gale, if you keep making faces like that, one day it’ll get stuck that way,” she teases.

One of his hands takes hers again and replies, “But what if I want it to?”

Poppy ignores the oh my gods she hears Nell gasp from her right and kisses Gale’s cheek again to return her claiming mark to his face.

I think this may very well be the best day of my life, Gale thinks to himself. The dousing of his obvious arousal has done nothing to dampen his desire or the rest of his feelings for that matter. He meant it when he told Poppy that he feels as though he will be set ablaze…or maybe he already has? He burns for her most ardently and he can’t imagine a world where she isn’t by his side.

—

The last few hours of the ball are a whirlwind. Gale can’t keep his hands off Poppy and the only way to acceptably do that is to dance. Everything feels lighter now, with her in his arms, dancing with him.

Poppy doesn’t want this night to end. It almost baffles her, to think about how they haven’t done this sooner. Being so close to Gale, openly affectionate, and romantic of all things feels completely natural, like it was the next logical step in their friendship. He’s still her best friend but also more and every time his hand rests a little too low on her back she wishes she could find that coat closet Marietta’s boyfriend snuck into and have her way with her wizard.

But Gale is persistent at keeping her on the dance floor, and so they dance until the band finishes for the night and many of the guests have left, all of their table mates included. She is sweating and her feet are sore, but feels utterly exhilarated, like she can do anything. And with the way Gale has been looking at her all night, she knows exactly what she wants.

Gale Dekarios is many impressive things, but despite all of them he is still a young man with some…needs. Private Sanctum is a wonderful spell, but oftentimes he doesn’t want to take the ten minutes to cast it, especially for it to then last 24 hours. He may have, a few years ago, developed a variation of the spell that takes but a few seconds to cast and lasts an hour. He may have, as he told the footmen to take the long way home, cast said modified spell on the carriage before he and Poppy climbed inside.

Within moments, the carriage is off. He has intentions, plans even, on how to maximize their time on the way home. But all of them are dashed when Poppy slings a leg over his lap with her dress rucked up over her hips. Her lips are upon him becoming his life breath. All of tonight has spent like hours-long foreplay and he can’t fool himself anymore—he needs her now. It’s taken all of his concentration to keep his body from getting carried away, but now, in the semi-privacy of the carriage, that concentration breaks.

He’s hard in moments, rolling his hips in time with every grind she gyrates on his lap. Gale can feel her heat through his layers and can’t wait to feel all of her around him. The bumpy cobblestone roads only make it more fun for Gale to kiss her, the bumps and jolts moving his lips to new spots to suck and tease that make her tremble beneath his touch.

Poppy tugs at his robes, pushing them aside to access the laces to his trousers. Her hands fumble in the toddling carriage but Gale holds onto her by her hips to keep her from falling ass-over-teakettle. She sighs when he’s freed and Gale groans a deep groan that makes his eyes flutter when her hand wraps around his length. She can’t remember the last time she was this excited about sex, this excited to be with a specific person; it’s completely exhilarating.

The jostling of the carriage has shifted where her bodice sits on her torso, shifting the neckline lower than is proper. Between another jolt of the carriage and Gale deftly unclasping the collar around her neck, she’s practically spilling out of the dress.

Gale ogles her cleavage, now easily within reach. There’s nothing to hold him back. Keeping one arm wrapped around her waist, Gale’s mouth sucks and nibbles on the tender skin. He had wanted their first time to be more private, in his bed preferably, with all of her clothes off. But beggars can’t be choosers and the only thing distinguishing Gale from a beggar tonight is the fact that he has yet to get on his knees.

Poppy doesn’t seem to care about this, as much as Gale wants to bury his face between her thighs. Besides, they’re on a time limit and nothing seems hotter right now than this goddess of a woman riding him into oblivion in this carriage.

She seems to think the same thing, even though Gale’s mouth on her breasts makes her a trembling mess. He’s managed to tug the bodice down just enough to pop a nipple into his mouth. Poppy whines and swears in his lap, little gasping “fucks” pouring out of her lips. Her hand releases his cock and instead scrabbles on his chest for something to hold onto as she submits to his ministrations. She presses herself closer and lowers her hips, running her lips over his hard length. They both groan deeply at the contact as Poppy starts grinding on him, chasing her pleasure.

Her babbling swears turn to gibberish as this goes on, Gale’s mind almost completely submitted to the sensations. But he can’t come yet, he won’t come quickly like some virgin schoolboy. Bidding her breasts farewell with a wet kiss, both hands move to her waist to lift her up. Poppy helps, planting one hand on his shoulder for leverage while using the other to line him up.

It’s when he’s notched at her opening and nothing more that the carriage rumbles over a rut, jolting both of them and sheathing Poppy halfway down his cock in one go.

“Ah, fuck!” she cries out, trembling in his arms.

Gale’s eyes roll back into his head at the sudden pressure of her around him but recovers quickly at her exclamation. “Poppy—are you okay? Are you alright?” He moves to lift her off of him but she resists, covering one of his hands with her own.

She focuses on her breathing, adjusting to the stretch. In answer, she begins lifting herself up and down along his length, slowly acclimating herself to him. The ache quickly turns pleasurable and her measured breaths turn into moans and with it Gale’s worry melts off his face.

He slips his hands under her skirt to hold her directly, cradling her ass as she works him. She’s unbelievably tight and Gale is trying his hardest to not come right this very moment; it’s difficult when she’s hot velvet around him, so soft and pliant under his hands.

Gale can’t tear his eyes away from where they’re connected, watching himself disappear inside her with each measured move of her strong thighs. “You’re astonishing,” he breathes, gazing up at her in awe.

It’s not the first time he’s complimented her tonight, but in the privacy of the carriage and in this moment of bearing herself to him, Poppy feels especially vulnerable and can’t help but blush at his words. He’s looking at her like she’s some sort of goddess and the full force of his gaze is as powerful, if not more powerful, than any spell. Overwhelmed, she looks away but one of his hands comes up to hold her by her cheek to turn her gaze back to his.

“Stay with me,” he says, mouth puckered in a heart-breaking pout and eyes beseeching.

Poppy nods, unable to form coherent words at the moment, and wraps one arm around his shoulders, keeping the other hand pressed against his chest. This brings her face closer to his, close enough for their foreheads to touch. His breath tickles her face and every roll of her hips sends waves of pleasure up her spine.

Eventually, she bottoms out and holds herself there, relishing in the fullness. Gale gazes at her with a rapt expression on his face before surprising her with a kiss, all tongue and wanting. It’s as she’s kissing him that she starts moving again, rolling her hips in small, quick snaps.

They moan into each other’s mouths, losing themselves in each other but not losing the other. Neither has felt closer to the other than before this moment, before tonight, even.

Another pothole and thus another jolt of the carriage thrusts Poppy onto him harder causing Gale to stutter his own “fffuck—”

“A curse? From the dashing Gale of Waterdeep? What a treat,” she teases breathlessly, clenching her walls around him to elicit a shuddering “hells” from his mouth.

He responds only by sliding his hand on her face around to grip the back of her neck and tightening an arm around her waist before thrusting up hard with planted feet, transforming her smirk into a gasping “O” of pleasure. Catching her off guard, he uses the opportunity to turn the tables fully on her, Poppy shaking on top of him in a gorgeous moaning mess as he fucks her.

She feels as though her body has become one giant nerve, hyper-sensitive to everything him. Every one of his thrusts hits her in that perfect spot that renders her speechless. He’s just as noisy as she is, which is such a fucking turn-on, many of her previous male partners quiet as mice for only gods know why. Poppy tries her best to meet him with every thrust but she’s so overwhelmed by the pleasure coursing through her body that it’s difficult to control anything at the moment.

Gale wants her to come—no, needs her to come. He removes the hand from her neck to instead move between them to pleasure the bundle of nerves at her center. Knowing how she likes it after their rendezvous in the hallway earlier, he quickly sets her on the path to ecstasy.

Poppy’s certain Gale’s hands are magic at this point with how quickly he’s learned how to maximize her pleasure. Every meeting of their hips shoots bolts of electricity back through her body. A whine tears through her throat as he cranes forward to kiss and suck at her neck, every touch of his dragging her closer to her end.

He feels it before he hears it, how her hips and walls stutter around him as she approaches her climax. Gale maintains his pace, willing for her to fall over the edge before him.

“Fuck, fuck, FUCK—”

Her pleasure is everything. Seeing her at the precipice apparates him there as just the thought of her coming undone is enough to bring him to the edge. “Poppy, I’m going to come—”

Poppy’s desperate eyes lock with his as her body explodes with sensation, pleasure surging through her entire body as she comes.

It’s all the answer Gale needs, her climax milking his cock as he comes inside her. Poppy’s hips stutter against his as she comes down from her high.

She’s captivated by his expression, how his lower lip wobbles as he gasps her name and how his heavy-lidded eyes don’t waver from her own.

“You’re so pretty when you come,” she murmurs, and Gale feels his face burning, startled at the compliment and also how sincere and wrecked she sounds when she says it. Her eyes are locked on his and he feels simultaneously lost at sea and perfectly on track; he would let her lead him anywhere.

“That’s quite a compliment,” he stutters, admiring her flushed face and heaving breasts, makeup smudged to high hells. She’s so utterly gorgeous like this, perfectly debauched. Perhaps he’s been bewitched, like she’s some sort of succubus or divine being. He doesn’t want to let go yet, so with a prestidigitation the mess is cleaned and she collapses onto him, her head resting on his shoulder as his cock softens inside her. She can have all of me, he thinks. Every last bit of me.

Glancing out the window as he catches his breath, Gale sees the carriage just now entering the Sea Ward.

“Come on, love,” he whispers, tapping her gently on her back. “We’re almost home.”

Love? She thinks. Of course she loves him, he’s her best friend. Does he…?

Raising herself up, Poppy catches his lips in a sweet kiss. She can’t yet put into words how she feels about this, about everything that’s happened tonight, so she hopes this kiss conveys at least a fraction of how he has made her glow and feel so utterly seen. Slumping onto the seat next to him, she rights her dress and snaps her collar back into place.

Poppy watches his long fingers as they run through his hair to make it look less disheveled and admires him—the line of his jaw and the flexing of his fingers. There’s also all the purply-pink lipstick smeared all over his face that reminds her of what her own face must look like.

She finds her purse where it has fallen onto the floor and digs out a small mirror to take in the damage. Gale casts prestidigitation on himself to clean off her lipstick, but her situation is not so salvageable. Lipstick covers the entire lower half of her face and her collarbone and the tops of her breasts. Her eye makeup is melting down her face and her hair is more than mussed. It’s more than a prestidigitation followed by some touch-ups that can save on such short-notice, so she resorts to casting Disguise Self to make it look as though her makeup is fine and only on her face, if a little faded and patchy after a long night out.

Gale tucks himself away, adjusting his robes and smoothing out any wrinkles as he watches her cast. He’ll never tire of her magic, how he’s never seen her cast a spell the same way twice. That tune rings through his head, the one they had danced to so closely earlier. The fact that she remembers it too and wanted to put it to such a use warms his already blazing heart.

The carriage pulls onto his street and Gale places a hand on her thigh, grabbing her attention. Her sharp gaze pierces right through him, all-knowing and more. “Do I look presentable?” he asks.

He watches as her eyes scan him and he notes how they linger almost imperceptibly on his hands, eyes, and shoulders. “Perfectly presentable,” she says. “And myself?”

“Exquisite,” he murmurs, once again pulled in by the delectable color of her lips, even if this time it is an illusion. The kiss is short but not lacking in passion and Gale dreads pulling away, but now they’re pulling up to the house and they’re out of time.

His eyes rove over her form one last time. He’s never felt so hungry; she has completely wrung her out but he thinks–or rather, knows—that he could never tire of her.

“What’s that look in your eyes?” she asks archly, the footmen hopping down from their posts and jostling the carriage.

“If I don’t devour you in the next twenty-four hours, we’re going to have a problem,” he vows. Her cheeks heat at his words and then the door is open, waiting for them to exit their private sanctum.

Once inside, they hear that they’ve stayed out late enough where their mothers long having gone to bed, thank the gods. Ascending the stairs inside hand in hand, Gale has never felt happier or more whole. Her hand in his feels so utterly right and the entirety of the summer laid before them makes his mind race with ideas and possibilities. There’s a quiet beach in a cove just north of here he stumbled across late last summer that he didn’t get a chance to show Poppy last year—maybe a day trip when the days get warmer is in order. The image of Poppy in swimming clothes or even skinny-dipping with water sluicing off of her naked body sets his need ablaze once more.

Gale walks her to the stairs that lead to the third floor and, out of view of the floors below, he pulls her in by her waist for a kiss. His words from earlier ring in her head and as much as she hates to leave him now, she has an idea that she wants to act upon.

Cupping his cheeks, she kisses his lips and then the tip of his nose, gazing at him with adoration. “Goodnight, Gale.”

“Goodnight, Poppy,” he breathes, looking utterly besotted and it makes her heart swell. Her hand grazing down his shoulder to his fingertips as she heads up the stairs, she finally looks away so she can see where she steps. It’s not until she’s about to turn the corner that she looks back down to see Gale watching her leave, but his eyes are not on her face.

“Eyes up here, Dekarios,” she hisses down the stairs with mirth.

Gale’s eyes flit up to her face from where they had been trained on her backside as she climbed the stairs and he grins a sheepish and yet completely self-satisfied grin at being caught. Poppy blows him a kiss before disappearing around the corner and he feels so, so cold without her.

Once upstairs and in her room, Poppy closes the door behind her and lets the events of the day settle within her. It’s crazy how everything can change in a day, but this is not a moment to be dwelling on things. Summoning a mage hand to help her unlace her dress, she slips out of the gown and rushes to the washroom to scrub off the makeup and to undo her hair—but she’s not going to bed quite yet.

Downstairs, Gale slowly makes his way to his room, reliving all of the events of the evening. He undresses carefully, setting the clothes aside as he recalls his mother’s comments about the two of them sitting down for a portrait.

With a flap of her wings, Tara flits into his room from the open balcony door.

“Mr. Dekarios! I am so pleased to see you are home safe. I trust that you two had a grand time tonight?”

Gale can’t help the grin that spreads across his face as he recalls the events of the evening once more. “We certainly did, Tara.”

As Gale finishes changing into his pajamas behind his changing screen he regales Tara with the more appropriate events of the evening. While emptying his pockets, he finds Poppy’s smalls and grins to himself, stuffing them into his pajamas pocket to hide from Tara. The tressym’s big yellow eyes gleam at him as he wraps up his story, now fully dressed. He may have made maybe a few too many comments about how Poppy sparkled in the candlelight or the amount of times he held her hand…

“Mmmm,” she hums. “It sounds like your mother will be very pleased when she hears about the details of your evening.”

Gale opens the balcony door, stepping out into the cool spring night. “I don’t think mother needs to hear all the details, Tara.”

“Mr. Dekarios, what do you think you are doing? It is late!”

“A gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell,” he answers as he casts Dimension Door, teleporting himself onto Poppy’s balcony above.

There’s a screech when he lands, Gale crashing into Poppy on the middle of her balcony. He grabs ahold of her to stabilize himself but also to stop her arms from flailing.

“Shhh, shhhh, it’s all right, it’s me,” he soothes. Lit by the bright light of the moon in a clear sky, he notices that she’s washed off her makeup, undone her hair, and has donned her nightshirt...

“Poppy, where are your pants?”

Still breathing heavily, she responds, “Didn’t think that’s something you would put up a fuss about.”

“Care for these back?” he says cheekily, holding her smalls out in his hand while the other roves down her back to grope her bare ass.

She splutters at his words. “What, you don’t want to keep them?” Barbing him, readying herself for his response.

“If you ever decide to gift them to me, I will eagerly accept. Excuse me for attempting to be a gentleman...” He murmurs, leaving lingering kisses down her cheek. “But what are you doing out on the balcony so late at night? Dressed in such a state?” he continues, trailing kisses down her neck.

“I could ask the same of you with how you Dimension-Doored onto my balcony without warning,” Poppy gasps, Gale’s mouth all-too effective.

With his tongue on her pulse-point, he can feel her pulse race, still coming down from the shock. Without looking, he guides Poppy back into her room through the open balcony door, kicking it shut behind him.

Gale maneuvers her towards her bed until the backs of her knees hit the edge of the mattress. Before she can fall back, he tugs her shirt over her head and tosses it behind him, leaving her completely bare before him.

Everything about her is soft; soft curves, soft skin and he can’t get enough of her. Her skin still shimmers in places–-her arms, her collarbone, the tops of her lush breasts…his hands don’t know where to rest as he pushes her onto the bed, exploring every inch of her as he crawls on top of her.

As amazing as this is, Poppy needs skin, she needs his clothes off. After a few seconds of persistent tugging on his shirt, Gale finally gets the picture and stands, pulling the shirt over his head in one fluid motion.

She feels a little silly with how he so effortlessly knocks her off balance. His chest hair trails down his front past the top of his pajama pants slung low on his hips and gods, she’s never been more turned on in her life. Just as quickly, his pants are off and—fuck, she might be drooling.

Instead of climbing back on top of her, Gale surprises her by grabbing her ankles and tugging until her ass is almost hanging off the bed. His large hands grip her thighs and spread her wide as he kisses and bites up the sensitive skin towards her center.

Poppy sits up on her elbows to watch him, brain heady with all that he’s done to her. She had been hoping to get him on the back foot, to make him lose his mind. But instead he’s turned the tables so that she’s the one falling apart while he’s in control.

Gale nuzzles her arousal, head swimming with her scent, her trembling, all of her. Finding her on her balcony ready to surprise him? Gods, he might just be in love with her.

Releasing one of her thighs, he guides one of her hands to the crown of his head and closes it until she has a tight grip on his hair. Poppy’s eyes go wide at the sight; at how Gale’s pupils have almost eclipsed his caramel irises.

“Don’t let go,” he pleads, almost sounding like a growl, before diving in to finally taste her.

—

Poppy awakens to the muffled sound of Morena waking up Gale in his room below hers, thankful that she doesn’t have to deal with Morena finding her dear boy missing from his bed. She had exhibited more self control than she believed she possessed by shooing Gale out of bed in the wee hours of the morning, her wizard all longing looks and tousled hair. There is no way in the nine hells she would have allowed Morena to find her son in here this morning. She rolls over and tugs one of her pillows to her chest, wishing it was Gale instead of cold silk.

Gale stumbles out of bed as his mother exits. He finds his dressing gown but gets his arm stuck in the sleeve as he attempts to pull it on—so very tired after not getting enough sleep. His exhausted mind slowly recalls all of last night's events and he decides that it is all quite worth it. Slowly walking towards the door, he passes by his full-length mirror where he catches the sight of a hickey on his collarbone, exposed by how he’s stretched his shirt in his half-arsed attempt at tying his dressing gown. Righting himself quickly as to not be interrogated by his mother this morning, he makes his way downstairs enticed by the smell of breakfast.

Once downstairs he finds his mother and Adrianne already at the dining room table, digging into their breakfasts and chatting. They both light up at Gale’s appearance but continue on in a hush.

Poppy finally reveals herself and joins them at the dining room table looking delightfully rumpled with her hair sitting large and wild around her face. Like every morning, she still appears half asleep, but reaches for the carafe of coffee with purpose, filling her mug to the brim to drink it black, unlike how Gale prepares his with a mound of sugar and milk. She doesn’t look at him, which he doesn’t have time to worry about as he feels the side of her stockinged foot press against the side of his and he hides his smile at the contact in a too-big bite of pancakes.

She settles in with her mug in hand, nursing it. Poppy is grateful for it, giving her time to build her defenses against the onslaught of questions they will receive about last night. They didn’t have the time last night in the carriage home to discuss how they’d handle their mothers. Poppy isn’t a fool, she knows Morena desperately wants them to get together, but she’ll be damned if they let on that they had more than a little “fun” last night. Morena doesn’t need to know that Poppy fucked her precious son silly or vice versa.

It’s actually as she sees Morena open her mouth to speak and Poppy braces herself by taking a large bite of toast that her savior comes in the form of one of the Dekarios footmen declaring to the room, “Mail delivery for Miss Poppy Lyons.”

Gale’s head whips around to look at Poppy and sees that she’s fully awake now, her eyes wide at the footman’s announcement. He can count on one hand the amount of times Poppy has received mail while staying with them and so this is a true oddity, until he remembers why this announcement makes Poppy nervous.

She swallows her toast heavily and moves to stand, her hands shaking slightly. Gale almost moves to hold her hand reassuringly but restrains himself, just watching her approach the footman and the silver platter he carries.

Poppy picks up the nondescript wax-sealed, cream-colored envelope in her hands and takes a deep breath, before cracking the wax and opening the missive before she can talk herself out of it. She turns towards the others in the room but can’t look up right now, it’s as though her vision has tunneled on the paper in her hands.

The room is silent beyond the rustling of paper and Gale holds his breath, waiting for Poppy to speak as she unfolds the letter in her hands. She unfolds the pages and then her voice cracks out, “Congratulations!” before breaking down into happy tears.

Gale is up in an instant, rushing towards her and wrapping her in his arms in excitement. Her feet are off the floor in his exuberance and she can’t help the laugh that she huffs at his reaction. Months of hard work and waiting and stress have paid off and she can’t believe she’s going to New Olamn—and Gale’s lips are on hers.

He just…got caught up in the moment. His happiness for her burst out of his chest and his body reacted accordingly. Pride does not even begin to describe what he feels. Her joy is his joy, it’s that simple. The unrelenting itch to even just hold hands with her all morning may have had some underlying influence…but no matter. Her lips are soft, she tastes like coffee, and the arm that she slings around his neck to hold him there is just the most welcome thing.

The awareness of where he is returns to him when she breaks the kiss. He can feel more than he can see both of their mothers’ eyes upon them, having just seen him kiss Poppy. To avoid any immediate confrontation about that, he just pulls Poppy closer and buries his face in her hair.

Poppy’s hand holding the acceptance letter is trapped between them and she’s reeling from the news and Gale and she lets him hold her upright. Her eyes dart across the room and her mother is standing on the other side of the table to give her and Gale space but her face is brimming with happiness. Adrianne’s hand clutches Morena's, who is crying into a lace handkerchief and babbling about how happy she is at all of it.

“I’m sorry,” Gale whispers into her ear. “I got carried away.”

“Don’t be. It looks like I’m staying,” before resting her forehead against his and closing her eyes to let the excitement wash over her.

~~~

@dr-demi-bee @lanafofana @spooky-lil-bee @feedthepheasants @crimson-and-lavender @pouroverpaloma @marlowethebard @seastar-bunny @caughtnyact

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