disgraced - pt one
Knight!Bucky Barnes x Princess!fem!Reader (SFW) - Reader’s POV - Fantasy AU
pt two - pt three - pt four - masterlist - AO3
Synopsis: After returning wounded and disgraced from a failed ambush, Bucky has to work his way back from the brink of losing his knighthood. But in doing so, he’s avoiding you, he’s isolating himself, and he’s shedding his blood to make everything right. And right when you think he’ll finally connect with you again, things get…complicated.
Warnings: Reader’s POV, fluff, angst, flirting, longing & yearning, sexual tension, inexperienced & virgin reader (purity culture), mentions of violence/fights/battles, arguing, confused feelings, semi-graphic descriptions of wounds (not quite gore but they are not shallow wounds), an established friendship between bucky and the reader, bucky’s punishment includes physical harm to himself by training to the point of bleeding (& his mental health is far from great)
Word Count: 6.3k
A/N: This is kind of an experimental piece that came to me on a whim. Let me know how we're feeling this one! :) I'm thinking of continuing it while swapping POV between chapters (with Bucky's internal monologue taking focus in a continuation). Also I have a fever while writing and editing this, so for any errors missed...I am so very sorry. (Also NSFW in future parts!)
The battle had been a failure. Bucky's wounds were half-healed; he'd barely finished bathing when he was brought to kneel before your mother and father in front of their thrones. Other knights awaited the same fate, lined up behind him, surrounded by those unstruck and safely kept back in the castle. The disconnect was visual, yet it didn't seem to reach. Doesn't matter that they weren't conscripted for the attempted ambush–Bucky and his team had failed horrendously in their eyes, so they were to be judged.
And as the leader of the infantry....
Bucky didn't beg–he'd never been talkative enough to ever be one to beg. The rigorous path to knighthood hadn't been an easy one for him already, and yet every risk, every sacrifice, every little win all led up to that moment. Disgraced. Sentenced to such public scrutiny and the task of working until his hands bled and he'd proven himself worthy of his knighthood again.
He was not allowed a moment of peace until he could prove he deserved it.
And not once did he look at you during such a harsh undressing.
He wouldn’t. He’d never. He stewed in his thoughts, his failures, in all that was his very bubble. Drawing himself in, wrapping himself in chains, cuffing and muzzling himself until he couldn’t move more than a few inches. Inches he had to work back bit by bit. Fixing what he’d broken even if someone else’s bad call had led to the failure. Even if he’d done every last possible option to fix before the mistakes broke.
You watched from windows, from your family's carriage, from balconies and benches as he worked. Trained horses, cleaned their stables, forced to redo the beginner lessons with new knights. Forced until his hands were bleeding on his sword, and he was hunched on the ground wheezing, clothing sticking to his skin, his hand on his shoulder while shuddering.
He'd taken a blazing hit during the ambush. A net of barbed wiring had closed tight around his left arm, and fire had been dropped over the group. The visceral pain had his fist opening and his sword falling. Many were lost in the fire that went behind him. He had to make a call–die or simply suffer worse. But at least then he lived. Or so you supposed that's how it went. That's the story told, and there he knelt in the open field for practice, gritting his teeth in the moonlight, hours of training gone from person to person to person until he was tasked with training with targets. And he held his upper arm where it met his shoulder, clawing through his shirt, and the moonlight caught the blood.
It was scarred to hell and back.
Yet, no matter the pain, he didn’t fall. It only took a moment–a few, really–and then he was hauling himself back up and staggering toward the next target. His hair stuck to his forehead, sweat dripped, and blood…. His left arm was smeared with it and down on his fingertips…that wasn’t sweat dripping from them.
He raised his sword and swung at the target, yelling as it collided.
He still didn’t speak to you.
Thirty days passed. His arm was scarred but it no longer required any bandages or healing. They hadn’t docked his food, so he hadn’t lost his strength. But he was forced into the same regiment. Other knights had been given release. Weaker ones, younger ones. Yet Bucky had to continue. A leader who’d fucked up, but it was getting to the point where limits were being reached. Crossed. There was more than anger at himself in Bucky’s eyes. The blue was harsher. The masked contempt wasn’t entirely masked.
But your mother and father heard no reason.
Such an error couldn’t be tolerated. They’d lost fifty men because of that failure. Bucky had to learn. He had to do better. He had to fix it.
But a man couldn’t raise the dead. No matter how much of his blood dripped into the earth, it wasn’t going to bring back the charred knights buried below.
Day forty, the dam finally broke. Not a word spoken to you, not even a glance your way once. And then you had to go into town alone while your parents were so busy with their royal duties and such. It was a personal trip–you wished to see the new jewelry in the shops and the new fabrics in the tailor's. No knight cared for such a task. No maid was free to be your chaperone. So, who was the task dumped on?
“At least it’s a physical break?” you breathed.
Both crammed into the back of the carriage that felt suddenly smaller. Seated across from each other, Bucky finally looked at you. Tired. Worn. Angry. And when the door shut, the carried lurched, and you spoke, his brows, his eyes, his shoulders softened. Just a smidgen.
“It is,” he answered softly. His voice sounded so broken. So worn. So tired.
Your heart pounded beneath his gaze. It’d been intense before he’d left–the little looks stolen in the throne room, when he was out in the yard training new knights and he’d catch you on your balcony, when he was a guard during dinners and meetings. Those little looks were always an instant summer inside and a star in the daylight sky. A connection you’d shared in small words when you could have them. He’d been serving since you were both teenagers–you’d seen each other through the ups and the downs and until he was a true knight. A sincere knight. An honorable knight.
Well, honorable enough. He was the only one who broke the tradition and rule of closeness and touch. Never anything catchable. A touch to your back when you needed to hurry or when he was guiding you toward your carriage. Fingers curled around your elbow to pull you aside when others were rushing past. Nudging you with his elbow to get your attention before he’d fix your earrings or your necklace or even the tops of your gloves. Never more than that.
And he always broke that tradition with a smile you'd seen so many times before. Given to others you'd catch him with out in the gardens as you overlooked them. A charm you'd seen only in other royals trying to flirt and entice. A grin that was a piece of art and a spark in his eyes that rivaled the diamonds and gems you played with in your bracelets and rings and necklaces. A smile he'd honed since you'd met him, and one that made your heart lurch and skip and burn every time it found you. Every time you saw him give it to another, you were so far away.
That smile wasn’t even a hint upon his lips for the last forty days.
Not a single smile was.
"Should I ask if you are alright, or should we avoid such a topic entirely?"
Best to face it instantly. To avoid it would make for worse tension. And based on the look he gave you through his lashes, it was telling. A longing of pain you couldn’t comprehend–you knew too little when he and the knights were your shield. Your sheets were the softest in the kingdom, food was always on your plates, a bath was ready every night with rich soaps and sweet lotions, desserts and tea waited at every whim. Your dress cost more than what he would be given as pay for a week.
"You won't accept any answer I give," he said softly, and his gaze fixed on the curtain-covered window. He looked upon it as if he was looking out the bared glass–somewhere else, lost, tired. "There's nothing to talk about anyway. My task is to see you to town safely. Let me focus on that."
Good lord–the sudden shift to seriousness. The sharpness in his eye. His hands closed into fists, and the gloves he wore were not standard. No others wore them unless their hands were hurt. His sleeves were too long for the hot air and his clothes were too tight. His hair was pulled back at least, and there was a small scar–a new scar–on his jaw. It went down along his neck, faded but new. Jagged. Rough.
“We are just going into town, Buck. Nothing’s going to happen.”
“I know,” he whispered. “It’s why they sent me. Can’t screw it up if nothing’s there.”
An insult in the reprieve from the others. He wasn’t wrong. It was a deliberate attempt to torment him beyond the mundane of going with the princess to get what she desired in excess. And it showed in new anger, new irritation, new defeat. His jaw hardened as he continued to look at the curtained window, mouth in a fine line, hands tight on his lap.
But….
You flattened down your dress. The layers were incessant in the heat. Going about the castle in casual gowns was fine, but the image you had to present to the people required layers of thick fabric and harsh structure that made breathing difficult. Not normally. But within the carriage that Bucky made smaller by merely existing within it was…proving to be difficult. Your knees nearly touched, and you were breathing in the same warm air.
"At least they trust you to accompany me without a chaperone," you tried. Such a scandal would be produced with anyone else, but for all his flirtations, they were never over the line, and they never breached the royal bubble. He may have taken others to wherever he wished, but you? The line was always thick, steady, and sure. "Is that not a compliment?"
“Adjacent.”
The carriage jerked forward. The road was particularly bumpy that afternoon.
"It is less of a compliment and more of a fact that I would never disgrace you, and you'd never disobey." A stinging hit your chest. Off-center. A sharp pinch of a sensation that traveled down with your next breath. Disobey? Your dress wrinkled under your fists. “I’m tasked with accompanying you to shop, Your Highness. That’s the task of a friend or a servant or….” His jaw went tight again. His words were truthful but not without their hurt. “They have tasked me with climbing a ladder and I have not yet gone up a rung. I stand on the ground with mud past my ankles.”
His hands twitched.
That far-off look remained. And the anger. A deep, visceral anger. Frustration bleeding in every breath. He finally moved the curtain and in came the sun; the castle grew smaller as the market grew closer.
You sat in silence for the duration of the ride.
Disobey?
He was hurt. No doubt about that–he was hurt, he was frustrated, and he was taking it out in impolite ways. He was never careful with filtering his bluntness, but he was never so callous about it. While he tended to save his charming words for those he spent the hours of the night with, it still…hurt. You’d never disobey? Was that how he saw you after so many years?
He walked a step behind you and no more and no less as you wandered the market. You stopped at nothing in particular, the people around you smiling and waving, and yet you managed only the bare minimum back. The jewelry was pretty, but you didn’t stop to go into the shops. The tailor’s doors were wide open, but you merely stopped and looked in the window, blinking at your pensive reflection. Fresh baked goods carried through the streets with mouthwatering delight, yet hunger never struck.
The minutes ticked by slowly. The sun was quite hot and the rays were quite bright. It was hard. Hot. Stuffy. The dress was too thick. The jewelry was too heavy. Everything was too bright and vibrant and packed. Too many people waved and talked and welcomed you. Asked for you. Tried to hand you things you couldn’t take–you hadn’t enough hands or bags or pockets.
There was just this closing darkness within your vision around the singular word. Disobey. And that stinging, that pinching–it burned all the way down into your stomach. That’s what Bucky thought of you–you were…that. A frivolous princess. He'd brought you a wildflower one night plucked from the castle garden after you'd been rejected by a potential suitor. He sat with you when you had tea and all others had been too busy to join even for a moment. You'd watched the sunrise and sunset when you were together, taking those small moments to see the sky change color, the temperature change, and the world welcoming a new day. Darkness. Light. He'd helped you to your room when you were too sick to stand, and you snuck him fine bandages and soups and teas and all pastries when he was still in training.
He was being cruel for the sake of his own frustration, but it still–
Warmth through thick cloth closed around your elbow. Familiar yet forgotten. He may have been ignoring you for forty long days, but he'd been away twice that for the ambush. Bad news had reached the castle before he'd returned, but the somber tone and the fierce frustration had been stronger than you'd anticipated upon his arrival. At least he'd look at you, you'd thought. At least you could be there to lend an ear. But no.
He'd shut you out, and now he was taking his irritation out on you, except he was touching you. Pulling you. He tugged you across the brick road back more than a step, more than you'd anticipated. It came late. The movement, the sound. His hand closed around your elbow entirely as the ground went uneven beneath your heels, and all the years of wearing them hadn't helped as your heel caught the edge of a crooked brick.
Your shoulder hit him first. Oof came out on a breath, and your weight shifted into him. Trying to get your feet was a struggle, and both of his hands went to you. Your elbows. Steadying, studying; your shoulder stayed against his chest–hard and unwavering–before you faced him fully. Close. Much too close, and then there came the hooves slamming against the brick behind you. Horses wild at the end of a carriage barreling too quickly down the street. People parting for it, people shouting, knights nearby rushing after to help contain it.
But it raced behind you, nearly clipping you, and Bucky pulled you closer. Chest to chest.
The wind whipped past you as the carriage did.
Just over where you’d once been standing.
Ah.
Was that your heart? Yes. You felt it through your glove. A soft touch just beneath where your necklace sat. Pummeling. Your pulse was within your head as if your heart had moved, but no. It was beneath your fingers, pounding away within your heaving chest.
You other sat on the chestplate Bucky wore. At the top. Clutching where the metal became a collar, your gloves snagging on the edge, and his body heat pushed through. His hands slid along your elbows until you felt his gloves breach where yours didn’t cover. Had his hands been bare, it might’ve been worth a lashing or two. Such bare contact in a public space while the space between you was no bigger than a breath….
Heat flushed your cheeks.
Heat flushed all of you rather unceremoniously.
“Are you okay?” was his first question. Far away.
You stared at the center of his chest. To look up and meet his gaze was impossible. You were too close and touching far too intimately. This…. Yet you could not step back. The dust would settle. People would turn from the chaos any moment and see. They’d see a knight protecting his princess, but that was not what you felt in your belly, in your chest, in your head. Beneath your dress was too much heat. Sweat trickled down along your spine without managing to catch on anything beneath, and it sent a shiver with it.
If you imagined hard enough–and it did not take too much effort in that immediate moment–you could almost see that drop as his finger. Beneath every layer peeled back by his deft fingers only to touch what he’d bared, and–
“(Y/N), what the hell were you doing? It was coming right toward you,” were his next words.
The improper address of just your name snapped your attention up. It'd been so long since he'd broken the code, but right then, it wasn't out of a fun slyness to mess around. It wasn't playful. Sure, concern was plastered all over him, but there was no erasing that irritation.
And that was enough.
Your chest may have heaved and your heart might've yet to slow down, but you pushed back. His fingers snagged on the ends of your gloves but did not pull them down further than a wrinkle. Still, you turned your back to him and adjusted them, taking a cursory glance at the road before just…leaving.
“I am capable on my own. I will have local knights tend to my safety and see me back. You can return to the castle, Sir Barnes,” you said with every step onto the road.
Knights were already nearby. Knights were already tuning in with piqued interest. Too piqued, and that doubled the cruelty. You knew it. It was not meant as a sleight on his honor or abilities, but his sleight to you.
He was one step behind you, and, in fairness, he attempted something. His fingers hooked around your skirt where the other knights would not see. Where no one would see anything but a knight trying to get your attention as you walked too quickly with your eyes forward. A stubbornness that could warrant that physical action.
“(Y/N),” was all he got out. The tug on your dress went across your stomach and pulled on all the layers. Down to the very ones pushing divots into your skin and pinching your chest. Though, that may not have been from the dress.
"That is not a suggestion, Sir Barnes," you snapped. It was hard to define it as anything else. You just…snapped. Cruelly. And you looked over your shoulder and finally met his gaze. It burned with that irritation that you now matched. And it just…stoked a flame you should've doused. He had not been so cruel to you, and yet you still said the words you knew you should not have. "Or are you still incapable of following orders correctly?"
It was not immediate. Whether it was intentional or not, you weren’t entirely sure. But the hurt showed. It was masked, but not enough. That fierce irritation was the exterior, but the depth that found his gaze was shattering. The guilt that slammed into you choked out your next breath and sealed you to the ground. His brows twitched into the slightest furrow and his mouth hardened into the finest of lines. His hand only twitched before it dropped from you.
He said nothing.
He didn’t need to say anything. The look he held reserved for your unfair, just mean words was enough. Tears burned your eyes as he just turned. In silence, he left. His shoulders hung heavy as he vanished in the crowd.
Two knights took his place in an instant.
“Don’t let his brashness ruin your afternoon, Your Highness,” one mused. “He’s still finding his footing. Hard to come back from such a catastrophic fuck up.”
A loud clang made you jump.
“Forgive his crudeness, Your Highness,” the other said. “The streets allow for such whispered words, but–”
“It’s fine.” You swallowed hard. You did not take your eyes off where you’d last seen Bucky. Yet despite the hurt you knew he felt and your own strangling your words, you didn’t follow him. You turned the way you’d initially intended to go and began to walk. “I wish to finish my errands. May we continue?”
Without hesitation, the knights fell into place two steps behind you.
You took enough time going from shop to shop, cart to cart, person to person in a daze that would cover Bucky taking the carriage back. Though, the odds were that he wouldn’t. He was technically allowed to, but in the current circumstance, it would be a massive sleight upon what little character he had left. If he had any at all.
Still.
Maybe it was the daze. Maybe it was the hurt. Maybe it was needing to distract yourself. You just walked. Shopped. Actually shopped. It felt hollow picking up jewelry and fabric swatches. You stood outside a cart filled with all the flowers you could imagine and hardly had any motivation to make one, yet you plucked up a rather monochrome collection of ivory and purple. They were wrapped separately in thick brown paper, but you'd put them together once you returned home. The knights carried them despite your disinterest in them doing so; but they were offering, and it would be rude to turn them down.
Your carriage was waiting for you as you’d left it. You needn’t ask if Bucky had used it–you already knew the answer. Neither knight rode inside the carriage with you. They hadn’t the chaperone or innate trust to do so. Guess Bucky wasn’t so far off. They trusted you not to disobey, but the other knights? Trust and honor only went so far when the evening sky was overhead. And it was a courtesy to ride outside when their king and queen did not know they were accompanying you now.
Bucky would face consequences for you dismissing him.
And still, he'd left. He could've said something. He could've pointed that out to you in your forgotten state, fueled by adrenaline. But he hadn't. Hadn't wanted to? Or maybe he thought he didn't need to. Your words had been hurtful enough, but if he thought you were sending him away knowing what awaited him back at the castle….
You pressed your head back against the seat and sighed.
Damn it.
It was not his fault. None of it was. It was pointless and cruel and stupid. You hardly waited for the carriage to roll to a stop. What was your parents’ schedule for the evening? There were guests–a Duke, a Duchess, and their son–they were tending to for the day with meetings to talk of trades and taxes. Then they were to stay for a personal dinner, leaving you on your own, and that would be uninterrupted unless it was an emergency. So it was possible. It was entirely possible that if Bucky did not turn himself in, he would not have to go before your parents again for any disgrace. Odds were he wouldn’t be foolish enough to enter the castle at the front. There were side entrances with guards that would give him hell, but they would not rat him out.
He may be disgraced, but the knights still had a brotherhood.
One you were breaching as you left your bags to be tended to by others and rushed toward the barracks. There were many around the castle nestled away in the trees. Bucky’s had always been the same. At the back, past the garden, near a lake you’d often spend hours sitting by to enjoy the sun, the garden in the distance, or to read.
You knew the path like the back of your hand.
And you took it with quick steps, nearly running–no princess would sprint–until branches threatened to snag at your dress and–
A blur stopped you. Halfway to the barracks, near the training field, you staggered to a stop. The sun was starting to set already. The knights were changing shifts. And the rhythmic whacking was familiar. Too familiar.
Damn it.
Panting, sweaty, and feeling every beat of your heart down to the tips of your toes, you moved. Trudged across the grass, around a corner of trees, past the edge of the garden where flowers bloomed in full, and found him. His shirt clung to his back. The sheath of his sword was on the ground. And three targets had already taken the brunt of his…whatever he was feeling.
Knights passed by you, but you did not care to fetch a chaperone. If you could go to town with Bucky, you could see to him in an open field where open curtains gave way to you.
And perhaps you should’ve maintained some semblance of courtesy, but you couldn’t find it in yourself to be so strict. You watched only a moment. Closer than you’d ever been to him training before. Taking in the thick muscle he’d gained over the years and the rippling strength that shot through as he grunted, striking the target with a loud crack. The momentum sent him back a step. Sent the hair growing longer than you'd ever seen it right into his eyes. And he turned with it, and you took the opening.
“Bucky,” you said softly.
You timed it with his movements, just as he pushed his hair back and he tilted his chin up. Found you. He found you in that instant, eyes locking onto you as he staggered. Straightened. Still hurt. So obviously still hurt. And so angry. So frustrated. He slumped back, his jaw clenching while his throat bobbed with a hard swallow.
“What?” His fingers tightened around the handle of his sword. He glanced over at the castle only briefly before finding you again. Sharply. “What did I do now?”
“How self-pitying,” you breathed. They were not said with any sharpness, but the words were also not meant to be kind. Prior to this, he’d never been one to wallow. Circumstances were different, he was more than justified. But there was a limit. Just as you had crossed it earlier. “I came to apologize, Buck. I spoke cruelly, and I did not mean what I said. I am sorry.”
His chest heaved. The material was not tight before, but it was now. With how the sweat made it cling to him, it…. You looked at it without bringing your eyes back to his. How it wrapped around him as if he wore nothing at all was a look of hidden intimacy. You could see too much without it being bared, and it was as hard to look at as it was to look away.
He was more muscle than you'd remembered him being. You had to shake the image of him from when you were younger. Somewhere along the way, that image would take precedence. Like a mask over the man who could woo just about anyone with that damned charming smile.
“There’s always truth even in hurt,” he said, and suddenly his back was to you. A loud, deep grunt came as he swung the blade again, and it lodged deep in the chest of the target. “Don’t apologize. You meant it. Just took you that long to say it.” He left his sword there and turned, stepping over his sheath and moving to a small bench set up just a ways away. A canteen sat with a towel beside it. “You should be in the castle. It’s one thing for me to accompany you into town. If you’re caught out here alone, they’ll crucify the both of us.”
Your hands twitched. That was it then? You’d burned the bridge permanently? It was one thing if he was genuinely hurt, but this was the same as earlier. He was walling you off with this as an excuse, and he was insulting you in the process. Again.
No.
You scoffed. No.
The grass stayed bent as you followed his steps. He did one glance toward you as you did so and then an immediate second one when you continued toward him. Didn’t stop him from taking a deep drink of water. Didn’t stall you either.
"This castle belongs to my parents and, therefore, is mine to roam. I am free to be in this field if I desire it. You do not get to tell me where I should be.”
He wiped the back of his hand over his mouth, and the side-eye he gave you was a glimpse into the past. It was almost familiar. Almost.
“Really? That’s the game you want to play?”
"Who is to say it's a game? I wish to be here, so I will be here. You do not tell me what to do. My parents do not tell me what to do. I desire to be here, I want to be here, so I will be right here."
He closed the lid of the canteen and dropped it without care. It was a loud clamor on the bench as he faced you fully. In tandem, his brows came together, his eyes narrowed, and he stood close. Much closer than was necessary, but you'd chosen that. You came right up beside him, arms nearly touching. And you didn't flinch away as he faced you.
“Yeah, really?” He threw a hand in the direction of the castle. “So all the schedules your servants make, all the guiding out of your room, all the same shit every day down to the minute–that’s your choice? You do that cause you enjoy it?”
Oh. Your stomach tightened. Your next word turned into a hard swallow.
“Who is to say I don’t enjoy it?”
The wave turned into a point. At the back patio just outside the ballroom. And your heart skipped already knowing what he was going to say.
“You enjoyed sitting there for hours crying over some asshole lord who chose a duchess over you after your parents pushed you toward him?” His voice rose and the edge in it was rough. Coarse. Hard. His eyes flared. “He was an asshole, (Y/N). And it was agony not being able to do shit except just sit there with you, but I guess if you liked it so much, I’ll leave you to do it alone next time.”
There was a lot to pick from there, a lot that rushed through you as you started to shake. That night had been a hell of its own making. You'd danced with the lord five times with the impression he'd ask for more of you that evening. Not a proposal, but the next step toward one. You'd spent weeks getting to know each other beyond when you'd met as young children. And then he pulled the rug out from under you after making a huge show of romantic smiles, gifts, and slight touches throughout the night. He'd gotten your hopes up that maybe you'd finally do what was expected of you, and then nothing. Gone.
Your parents had been left fuming. And you retreated to that patio not even knowing Bucky had been in tow. He sat with you until there wasn’t anything else to say or any tears to shed. He looked really nice in that moonlight in his formal armor, his beard trimmed, and meeting every look you shared with a small smile.
That was two years ago.
Your next breath hitched as you glared at him. You snagged and caught on the last two words. Hard not to.
“How generous of you to be so honest in thinking there will be a next time.” You flattened out your dress and glanced down, fixing how your bracelet started to twist. Next time. How wonderful it was that he thought your next suitor wouldn’t want you. “Should I prepare myself for disappointment now? Do you know something I do not about my next suitor or is my beauty much more lacking than I have realized?”
Your own words stung. You heard them as you started to turn. The tears were not just…they were of adrenaline pumping through your veins and heightened emotions and overwhelming exhaustion and just–
Warmth again. On your elbow.
Bucky didn't pull you, but he stepped forward. Closer. His hand slid up to your upper arm, and the air changed. It grew thicker as you stared blearily at the bench.
“That is not what I meant, and you know that,” he whispered. His thumb, even gloved, burned against your bare skin. It…he…. It traced a curve back and forth so gently. Soothing. It was soothing. And yet you went still as goosebumps rose across you from head to toe. His breath tickled your cheek. “(Y/N), you know that is not what I mean. There is not a person in the kingdom that holds a candle to your beauty.”
Ah.
Heat blossomed across your cheeks and your ears and down your collarbone and…and lower. Head to toe, it swallowed. It bloomed. It was a tightening in your stomach and a twitch in your thighs.
Slowly. Slowly, you tilted your chin. Slowly, you looked at him. His chest moved as yours did–quick, deep, steady. Locking onto each other like that, the air felt too thick. Too hot. His grip didn't tighten, but it didn't move either. He still stroked and soothed. His brows furrowed and his jaw tightened and his gaze….
Yours dropped first.
But you saw his move as yours did.
His mouth parted before it closed tight.
His throat bobbed.
“You need to go back to the castle,” he breathed.
“I came to make sure you did not tell my parents of my dismissing you,” you stated quickly. Breathily. Bucky. You couldn’t look away from his mouth. Couldn’t breathe without getting anything of him. “I do not want you punished for my action.”
“I didn’t. They were busy.” His hand skated up higher. Beneath your sleeve. How badly you wanted him to take his glove off. How badly you wanted to know if his hands were as rough and warm as you remembered. “But I need to.”
"Don't." You reached up and found his wrist, but you did not push him away. Instead, you just…squeezed. Still, you did not look from his mouth. "Let me handle it. Please. I sent you away out of my own frustration, you did nothing." Your breathing was getting faster no matter how you tried to handle it. Failure was written all over you in thick divots. "Thank you for saving me earlier. Truly. I am sorry for what I said."
His jaw clenched hard, and you finally found his eyes again. They weren't on yours, but they weren't elsewhere from you. Just as yours had been, his were down. Same spot. And the rush of whatever it was that hit you was catastrophic. Your knees wanted to buckle, so you locked them. You began to shake, so you shifted your weight on your feet to hide it. And the goosebumps were vanishing under that light touch, but…there was no getting out of that.
His eyes flicked up, and his hand….
His other raised and brushed across your cheek. Right over the apple and down…his fingers barely brushed your jaw. A tear. It was wet in the wake of his touch, it was a tear, and you did what could only be described as melted.
“James,” you whispered.
And his fingers…. Your eyes fell shut. They brushed over what was bare on your chest. It wasn't much, but where his finger landed was intimate. A scandal in itself. And they were of a light, horrendously wonderful touch until he found your necklace. He'd always fixed it near the top, around your neck, but he adjusted the pearl pendant with slow, careful movements. Ones he managed even as your breaths stayed far, far too deep.
Was your heart going to explode? It certainly felt like something was anew. Something hot and strange. Something burning. Boiling. Dripping.
"You're forgiven," he whispered just beside your ear, and it sent new goosebumps all across you. "But you really need to go before someone catches us. They find us like this, and I won't be allowed to take you to town alone again, (Y/N)."
His fingers brushed across your neck until they met beneath your chin. Holy…. He tilted your chin until you were looking toward him. Until you were leaning in. Close. Close. Closer. His mouth parted and looked so beautiful. So soft. So rough with his beard. So–
His thumb brushed over the corner of your mouth.
All was alight inside of you.
And all it took was a look. Your eyes found each other in some shared connection that wasn't comprehensible right then, but it was there. And when your eyes met, you knew. You had to go. Something was there, something that made you want to crumple to the ground, that made you feel that same gnawing sensation on the flip side of whenever you saw Bucky in this exact position with others. It was raw and dangerous, and you had to go.
His hands fell exactly as you took a step back. Then another. Then another, until your hands were behind you and you were leaning against the closest tree.
You both swallowed at the same time.
Go. Knights moved around you. Someone called Bucky's name. Your parents would be having dinner, and your absence, even for your single dinner, would be noticed. So you just nodded slowly and found your footing. Bucky's eyes glinted bright and hot as you bit your lip, step after backward step moving you away.
And without sharing more than one last look, you turned.
Something new was in your belly, or, at the very least, something sparked. An ember–old or new, you couldn’t face it–burned through you. And you rushed back to your bedroom to fan yourself incessantly.
It seared into you in an unbearable way, and yet you could only fan yourself as you watched Bucky strike the target harder, faster, continuously from your bedroom window.
And no matter how hard you tried, the heat wouldn’t die.
Not even a snowstorm could cool you.
