There are some dramatic metaphors he could deploy upon seeing either of them again. They have to do with shipwrecks beneath calm waters, the cold currents and churn of restless sea soil. There had been an acknowledging nod at the seeming urgency and then a borderline funerary silence to follow.
There is tea. He picks up the cup nearest, a slightly impolite spidering of his hand over top that ignores the delicate handle. ]
I'd prefer to be, [ he says, digging his voice up out of him as if with a shovel. ]
[Julius doesn't sit, his own agitation subdued but betrayed in the way he can't quite settle.]
For us ... for me, [not to exclude her, but to avoid hiding behind the convenience of a unified front] it's evident that I've been ignoring certain feelings. In part because of promises I've made, [with a glance at Petrana], in part because I was distracted. But I don't think that will do, now. And it seemed to us that it didn't make sense to have a serious conversation about you without you. Without knowing what you thought.
( picking up the thread of his thought, petra says, )
I was not kindly disposed to your declaration of feelings, in the woods, in that dream. But when I knew myself to be dreaming, a thing that felt very much like your dream—
( an island where mages could live quiet, simple lives and raise children who would never be taken to circles, )
I knew it in how polite you were to me. How perfectly correct you were, how there was no fault that I could object to in your conversation or your behaviour toward me, and how dissatisfied I nevertheless found myself with both. Even as a stranger to you here at the beginning, you did not hold me at such remove. I saw you look at Julius the way I have grown accustomed to seeing you look back at me when I look toward you, and I, ( carefully, ) did not dislike it. I only wished to have a place in it.
( she had told him she loved him, in that dream. in front of julius and in concert with him, now, she asserts that she had meant it. )
[ At first, all that he is confused by is why it's necessary that they require his thoughts at all, and that all of this is a slight percentage more of pomp and circumstance than Marcus would have assumed of them. On his part, he'd imagined doing this through letters. He'd imagined himself already having begun apologising for his conduct, for their pain, whatever part of it he's caused. For agreeing that it's best he distance himself, and allow them their space to come back together.
He listens—it is unfair of Julius to have bid him to sit and then not do so himself, by the way, tall as he is—and studies them both, tea cooling in its cup in his hands, before he sets it back down on the table. This isn't a tea conversation.
All that aside, that they likely both consider this conversation as being frank is very funny.
As Petrana speaks last, he watches her carefully, and keeps doing so after she has finished. Marcus' expression is maybe difficult to read in this moment—and in fairness, he's not sure what he's feeling either—but some of that quiet wariness has lifted away. It's probable that he is looking at her like she claims he tends to.
So he looks to Julius. ]
And what would you wish, [ gently, ] standing in her place?
[ Looking at them, being tender. There is no weight to his words, no special attempt to corner a particular answer out of the man. They've had a little practice, now, in discerning one another's tone. Marcus only wants to know. ]
Not everything we dreamed felt true, even within the dream itself. There were things that unsettled, that pushed us toward realizing. But you and I together wasn't among them, for me. It didn't seem anything but natural, that we should be content together. And I don't wish to presume on something neither of us was in a position to consciously choose, but ... if it were possible. All three of us. I think I would like it very much.
[Talking about his own feelings when he's not sure of someone else's is among Julius's least favorite approaches. But in this moment, whatever Marcus wants, Julius feels the other man deserves honesty, even if offering it makes him much more vulnerable than he'd like. Had he been so frank, even with Petrana, early on? They'd allowed attraction and friendship to grow into something deeper so organically that he can't even remember which of them started using the word "love" first. But in this situation, waiting and suggestion won't serve.]
( if he hadn't been certain of the way he was looking at her—at them, then—then the way that it visibly sets some part of petrana at ease might speak for itself. ah; there. a comfort when she had had just long enough this morning to second-guess almost everything she had thought and assumed—
no, there, the way he looks. and julius, prising himself open for his sake. for theirs.
it is not all bad, of a morning. )
We thought we could not discuss the matter further without you, ( she reiterates, ) but we agreed, before you came, what we would wish for. It is somewhat uncharted territory, but I have myself gone on—more than one unanticipated journey.
[ It is humbling, this. It's a little like being trusted with something exceedingly delicate, that you wish to admire and hold but fear of its breaking compels you to stillness, maybe even refusing it. Refusal is not far from the tip of his tongue, really, but never had a chance.
He remembers sitting by Julius and putting his hand out, knowing the other man would take it. It is a trust he's known with Petrana already. ]
I was delayed in responding to your message, [ he says, finally, looking to Petrana ] as I was speaking with a Nevarran skilled in making problems disappear, who'd dreamed of living amongst Venatori, and who presently wouldn't look too kindly on traitors. And so. My mind is—
[ He swallows that sentence, leveling his focus down at the table surface. He has a hand resting there, which he flattens. He's adorned a finger in a silver ring set with a square of obsidian, completely thoughtless in his readying himself for the day. ]
I remember what it felt like to love you, [ he says, finally, looking to Julius. ] And I recall—whatever it became, that at a certain point it was my own. And I've loved you a while, [ is tipped to Petrana, trace humour. It would be an apology, if this were some other conversation, if he'd been able to help it. ]
Coming here, I was intending to apologise for causing you both harm. I wouldn't—whatever I feel, I don't wish to come between you.
It might have been a mess, [Julius allows Marcus, of that.] But I don't think it needs to be. We're already ...
[He breaks of and smiles, absent and brief, as something else occurs to him.]
I am more in the habit of being discreet than otherwise, even after years of not needing to be. And I realize that it can make me easy to misread, at times. But none of us were trained to navigate the world we now inhabit. It occurred to me, when Petrana suggested it, that if we're fashioning something new for ourselves, we may as well build it to suit.
[He pauses, as if he might leave it there. But as he looks at the other two of them, he decides to take a bit more of a chance on being frank than he might.]
If we'd spoken of this before, I might have suspected that you'd take me on as something you didn't mind, for Petrana's sake. I don't know if I could have borne that for long, though I might have tried for her happiness that way. But if you think it wouldn't be that. If it would be all three of us together ... that wouldn't come between anything. It would be something new.
( petrana reaches for julius's hand, for several reasons not limited to the weight of his words and the prevention of any further pacing. she presses a kiss to his knuckles, briefly, saying, )
I would like to build something new with the two of you, if that is something we would all be pleased by. It was something I hadn't considered until I saw you together in that dream, and how content you were—how well-suited.
[ He watches that gesture between them, her kiss to Julius' hand, knowing well that they're private people, that even witnessing subtle tokens of physical affection like that is a step into a shared sort of intimacy. Marcus might imagine that the twinge of feeling that comes with it is something like Petrana had experienced, on the island.
The one identified as not unpleasant.
If, they say. If he wanted them both. If it would be something they'd be pleased to have.
The conversation tips towards him, and there is a pause as Marcus considers what to say. His instinct, oddly, is to remain silent, twisting the obsidian ring on his hand in a rare fidget, as if he is participating in all of this at some strange remove, but this impulse is dismissed. It is not that he has nothing to say so much as doing so while sitting politely over his cooling tea feels—
There's a twinge of a smile, more to himself than anything else. ]
You recall, [ to Petrana ] in the forest. Before I left you to Silver. [ It's all well and good to speak of the island, the blissful union they'd enjoyed, the resolution Petrana made to herself; the darker mirror of it seems like dangerous territory, but not without meaning, here and now, and so. He pushes past the discomfort, determined. ] You spoke of my returning to the Venatori as though there were the option to go with you. Had you asked it of me, I would have. I'd have gone anywhere you wished me to.
[ He goes and takes her other hand in his own. ]
If [ that word ] we are to build something—the three of us—then begin it.
[ And if she hesitates for more than a second over what that might mean, Marcus assists in leaning past the table to kiss her gently. ]
[Julius lets out a breath he hadn't been conscious of holding. It's the realization that until this very moment, he hasn't been sure Marcus would want to try. It's a not insignificant amount of trouble, navigating two people at once, especially two people with years of intimacy already behind them. He can think of many reasons that have nothing to do with attraction or affection why someone might say no. But he'd wanted Marcus to want this, all the same.
He doesn't rush them, giving Petrana's hand a small squeeze in the interim. When they part, he says quietly,]
I had a conversation with Silver in that one. I was shocked you hadn't come back with her, and I had a lot of very logical reasons in the moment but I think it was mostly ... it felt wrong, there. That you weren't with us.
( it's not romantic—or maybe it is, in a strange and roundabout way—the way she says, )
I was angry with you beyond the telling of it, ( quiet and frank. ) I felt so much that I had—that I had made again an old mistake. That I had—how careful I had been, elsewhere, and how clever I had thought myself for that care, and how easily and naturally I have trusted you from the first.
( her thumb follows the line of marcus's knuckles; it is almost the more intimate gesture than to kiss her. )
But the only thing I remember you doing is rescuing me, and standing down when I asked it of you. What am I to think but that Julius is right?
( and that it is wrong for marcus not to be with them. )
[ It's all still a little recent, a little oddly real as far as a memory goes, for Petrana's words not to be a little piercing. The gesture of her hand in his does much to make up for it, as does the intent of her words. He remembers her bloodied knuckle, his paltry attempt to soothe it.
So it's really only a twinge. Marcus can brace against it, before it moves on. ]
It felt wrong to be alone, [ he says, quiet enough that his voice is almost all texture.
And it has felt wrong to be alone in the waking world as well. There has always been some form of companionship, even if not the romantic kind. Circle-mates, soldiers, Sima's gentle breathing where she lay on the other side of a dark room. Whatever aloneness (different, you see, from loneliness) he'd experienced in the Gallows had come about tenfold in the darker of the two dreams.
Marcus looks to Julius, then, and says, ] I don't think it fair to expect it of us, to be exactly as we were in our dream. Those men grew towards something together. I think we shouldn't miss all of that.
[He supposes if it was of course it wouldn't have needed saying, though, so he adds:]
I don't expect ... It isn't as if we're trying to work backward to get to that exact spot again. I don't think we could. For one thing, that was still two of us and not three. We came to it a different way. But even beyond that, I wouldn't want to presume a familiarity before I'd earned it.
[Julius hadn't even presumed friendliness until Petrana had given him a nudge, and it likely says more about Julius than it does about Marcus under the circumstances. He gives her hand one more squeeze before releasing it so he can also sit, finally, on the edge of the made bed. It occurs to him that he may have backtracked too far, so he adds, softer:]
[ That feels incorrect, that Julius should have to earn something in this particular configuration of people. The flicker in Marcus' expression seems to imply something of the other man's response, like his meaning hasn't been conveyed exactly as intended, but it seems a lot to unpack and so instead he says— ]
( in spite of herself and the morning that they've had (the morning after the night before), petrana laughed, quick and melodic. )
Some, yes, ( is a little sly, her hand falling to julius's knee as he's seen fit to sit himself beside her.
she considers the pair of them. vysvolod, dozing on the far end of the bed, evinces no interest in proceedings whatsoever. )
Then, if I may be so bold: how much shall we consider appropriate to begin? ( it is half proposition, half a fairly clear effort to contain the impulse to suggest immediately that they have this quite large room with two beds pushed together, he might well simply move all his things today- )
I wish to be quite familiar, ( compromises neatly on both points. )
Some. [He echoes them both with a small smile. Julius smiles so often that it would be easy to think it came naturally to him, but the one he uses now, privately, has a different quality. Less practiced. A little warmer.]
I would like very much if you stayed awhile, assuming your plans for the day allow. Even if it's just to have your company. [He glances at Petrana, then back to Marcus.] It was an odd night and I expect we'll all of us be required elsewhere soon enough, but I think at a minimum we could take an hour or two.
[It's not not a proposition, for all he feels it is only fair Marcus set their pace. If Julius is a bit more cautious than Petrana, the invitation is still warmly meant, for however Marcus might want to spend that hour or two.]
The urge to maintain delicate handling is there, the same urge that prevents him from stating without prompting the things he would also like. There is the question of what he deserves up against what they are willing to give, and it all still feels off-kilter. He is off-kilter. He thinks of the case of cigarettes in his pocket but doesn't go for one.
After a beat of observing them both, Marcus reaches down to undo the buckles and laces at his boot. ]
It was an odd night, [ he echoes, as he does this. ] There'll be questions, and talk of what the answers ought to be, who should say them, how they should be said.
[ The boots are nudged aside, and he stands, hands going to the edges of his frockcoat. ]
Solutions may come eventually, but not before more problems are made. [ The coat is left over the back of his chair, and he turns away from them both, moving for the door. There's a key in the lock that he doesn't recall Julius turning, so he turns it, the tiny mechanisms within tumbling heavily into place. ]
I would like very much to avoid it all for an hour or two.
( today is likely to be strange for everyone; it's entirely possible that a morning's absence will be far from noteworthy, amongst the rest. she considers his coat, mentally preparing future arguments as to the benefits of not dressing in robes—e.g. that what marcus just did was quite attractive, and wouldn't julius like to be able to be half so dramatic as the two of them—and when she straightens from the bed it's to step out of the lightweight indoor slippers she's wearing and,
prudently,
to encourage vysvolod off the end of the bed. it is, as noted, not one bed originally but two, tightly pressed together and made up as one with far more space than they've ever really needed—at least, until this morning.
she touches julius's arm, lightly, and then frames his face with her fingertips: ) Isn't this much more productive than we were? ( wryly. )
[He laughs, warm and quiet, and takes the opportunity to kiss her before he removes his own shoes. To Marcus, he says,] We were at real risk of tying ourselves in knots discussing the situation without you. This is a marked improvement.
[He has every confidence that the two of them would have managed without Marcus, if he'd said he preferred not to try it. It would hurt, but they'd have survived it. That said, he finds himself sharply glad they don't have to as he watches Marcus across the distance between the now-locked door and the bed.]
Won't you come join us?
[While the tone is light, the look that accompanies it is sharply attentive.]
[ The pin holding his necktie is removed, the clean white fabric undone, unwound, tossed onto whatever surface is passed by as he approaches. Talk of knots and their tangling properties almost bids a smile out of him, you know, as a person with a particular strategy when it comes to such quandaries.
This is all new, even down to the notion of having two other human bodies to consider, let alone all they have signified to him in the past year, in the past twelve hours. ]
To discuss the situation? [ is his reply to Julius, and he resists the urge to look at Petrana as he moves in close to where the other man is seated on the edge of the bed, giving him no time at all before his hands come up to gently take his face, to lean down to kiss him, as if finishing the up until this moment broken circle of intimacy—
—if more thoroughly than the tender exchanges prior. ]
( it is different to what she saw in the dream, and not only because it is more thorough. intimately close, as well, and a thing that she finds herself not outside of except for the complexities of trying to fit together three people instead of two. there is an impulse that she's had for some time and in this moment it seems appropriate to follow it—
another knot. the one holding neatly back his hair, it comes free with her nimble fingers, and all so absent-minded she ties it loose around her own wrist before threading her fingers into now-freed hair.
her own is pinned up, neat, off her neck. her dress is simple, but more by her standards than anyone else's, and she's made no start on undressing herself beyond her shoes. when they do part, she considers the tableau, which is not unpleasant, and the prospect of what's to follow it. )
I can think of several ways, ( eventually, ) that we might pass these hours.
( logistically speaking. granted, there was never a third party in her marriagebed—nevertheless, it's extremely likely that petrana's sexual history is the most creatively adventurous of the three of them. she has some ideas. )
Perhaps we ought to establish where we are most comfortable beginning. I know that Julius has been with men—
( there is an implied question, and yes, this still counts as frank discourse where she's concerned. )
[Marcus kissing him is arresting in reality in way that it wasn't in the dream, whether because it was a dream or simply because it wasn't a novel experience for his dream-self. This is something entirely new. Julius leans into it, in no hurry to cut the moment short.
When they finally do part, Marcus's hands still framing Julius's face, it takes him a moment to fully register Petrana's comment. When he gets there, the comment draws a bit of warmth to his smile for its sensible practicality. He could confirm, elaborate ... but instead he waits, the hand that went to Marcus's arm during the kiss lingering there. He leaves room for Marcus's response, giving every indication of being very interested.]
[ Practicalities are good, for Marcus is not thinking in those terms. The terms he is thinking in is that he wishes to touch them both at the same time, to collect up these little intimacies—scalp still tingling from the brush of Petrana's fingers, Julius' hand set on his arm—as though they could all wake up a second time and find reality once again reset.
(Or as though he will leave this room, and must then reconcile with what is in need of repair, what's been broken beyond it—)
But a frank discourse, such as it is, is not unwelcome. ]
I have as well, [ he says. In breaking from the kiss, he has a knee against the ground so as best to be in range of them both. Where Petrana's hand has drawn away, his trailed his after it, fingers impressed along the inner of her wrist, the loop of ribbon now there. It takes him a second to understadn she is talking of particulars, and adds— ] In either respect.
( she draws his hand to her, and kisses his palm, lightly, bright-eyed. pleased. one could hardly imagine her to have been the same woman pacing this same room an hour beforehand, vexed beyond measure and biting off words she was mostly sure she would regret if she did not. now she is the warm sun, anticipating satisfaction. )
Don't think me presumptuous, then— ( or do, feel free to, she is, ) —or in undue haste, but as we have established you will not come between us as a wedge, might I propose having you between us in a more literal sense?
( she is partial to the idea of having marcus rowntree. on bare feet, she goes to her desk; the bottom drawer and its false back that had presumably at one stage held the secrets of office and these days julius at least knows to mainly contain a few things she's acquired discreetly for their use, the most relevant of which being a jar of oil he might correctly presume is what she's decided to fetch. )
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There are some dramatic metaphors he could deploy upon seeing either of them again. They have to do with shipwrecks beneath calm waters, the cold currents and churn of restless sea soil. There had been an acknowledging nod at the seeming urgency and then a borderline funerary silence to follow.
There is tea. He picks up the cup nearest, a slightly impolite spidering of his hand over top that ignores the delicate handle. ]
I'd prefer to be, [ he says, digging his voice up out of him as if with a shovel. ]
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[Julius doesn't sit, his own agitation subdued but betrayed in the way he can't quite settle.]
For us ... for me, [not to exclude her, but to avoid hiding behind the convenience of a unified front] it's evident that I've been ignoring certain feelings. In part because of promises I've made, [with a glance at Petrana], in part because I was distracted. But I don't think that will do, now. And it seemed to us that it didn't make sense to have a serious conversation about you without you. Without knowing what you thought.
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I was not kindly disposed to your declaration of feelings, in the woods, in that dream. But when I knew myself to be dreaming, a thing that felt very much like your dream—
( an island where mages could live quiet, simple lives and raise children who would never be taken to circles, )
I knew it in how polite you were to me. How perfectly correct you were, how there was no fault that I could object to in your conversation or your behaviour toward me, and how dissatisfied I nevertheless found myself with both. Even as a stranger to you here at the beginning, you did not hold me at such remove. I saw you look at Julius the way I have grown accustomed to seeing you look back at me when I look toward you, and I, ( carefully, ) did not dislike it. I only wished to have a place in it.
( she had told him she loved him, in that dream. in front of julius and in concert with him, now, she asserts that she had meant it. )
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He listens—it is unfair of Julius to have bid him to sit and then not do so himself, by the way, tall as he is—and studies them both, tea cooling in its cup in his hands, before he sets it back down on the table. This isn't a tea conversation.
All that aside, that they likely both consider this conversation as being frank is very funny.
As Petrana speaks last, he watches her carefully, and keeps doing so after she has finished. Marcus' expression is maybe difficult to read in this moment—and in fairness, he's not sure what he's feeling either—but some of that quiet wariness has lifted away. It's probable that he is looking at her like she claims he tends to.
So he looks to Julius. ]
And what would you wish, [ gently, ] standing in her place?
[ Looking at them, being tender. There is no weight to his words, no special attempt to corner a particular answer out of the man. They've had a little practice, now, in discerning one another's tone. Marcus only wants to know. ]
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[Talking about his own feelings when he's not sure of someone else's is among Julius's least favorite approaches. But in this moment, whatever Marcus wants, Julius feels the other man deserves honesty, even if offering it makes him much more vulnerable than he'd like. Had he been so frank, even with Petrana, early on? They'd allowed attraction and friendship to grow into something deeper so organically that he can't even remember which of them started using the word "love" first. But in this situation, waiting and suggestion won't serve.]
no subject
no, there, the way he looks. and julius, prising himself open for his sake. for theirs.
it is not all bad, of a morning. )
We thought we could not discuss the matter further without you, ( she reiterates, ) but we agreed, before you came, what we would wish for. It is somewhat uncharted territory, but I have myself gone on—more than one unanticipated journey.
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He remembers sitting by Julius and putting his hand out, knowing the other man would take it. It is a trust he's known with Petrana already. ]
I was delayed in responding to your message, [ he says, finally, looking to Petrana ] as I was speaking with a Nevarran skilled in making problems disappear, who'd dreamed of living amongst Venatori, and who presently wouldn't look too kindly on traitors. And so. My mind is—
[ He swallows that sentence, leveling his focus down at the table surface. He has a hand resting there, which he flattens. He's adorned a finger in a silver ring set with a square of obsidian, completely thoughtless in his readying himself for the day. ]
I remember what it felt like to love you, [ he says, finally, looking to Julius. ] And I recall—whatever it became, that at a certain point it was my own. And I've loved you a while, [ is tipped to Petrana, trace humour. It would be an apology, if this were some other conversation, if he'd been able to help it. ]
Coming here, I was intending to apologise for causing you both harm. I wouldn't—whatever I feel, I don't wish to come between you.
no subject
[He breaks of and smiles, absent and brief, as something else occurs to him.]
I am more in the habit of being discreet than otherwise, even after years of not needing to be. And I realize that it can make me easy to misread, at times. But none of us were trained to navigate the world we now inhabit. It occurred to me, when Petrana suggested it, that if we're fashioning something new for ourselves, we may as well build it to suit.
[He pauses, as if he might leave it there. But as he looks at the other two of them, he decides to take a bit more of a chance on being frank than he might.]
If we'd spoken of this before, I might have suspected that you'd take me on as something you didn't mind, for Petrana's sake. I don't know if I could have borne that for long, though I might have tried for her happiness that way. But if you think it wouldn't be that. If it would be all three of us together ... that wouldn't come between anything. It would be something new.
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I would like to build something new with the two of you, if that is something we would all be pleased by. It was something I hadn't considered until I saw you together in that dream, and how content you were—how well-suited.
( her smile is small, but assured. )
A great deal else happened that, of course, is—
This, I could not leave unaddressed.
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The one identified as not unpleasant.
If, they say. If he wanted them both. If it would be something they'd be pleased to have.
The conversation tips towards him, and there is a pause as Marcus considers what to say. His instinct, oddly, is to remain silent, twisting the obsidian ring on his hand in a rare fidget, as if he is participating in all of this at some strange remove, but this impulse is dismissed. It is not that he has nothing to say so much as doing so while sitting politely over his cooling tea feels—
There's a twinge of a smile, more to himself than anything else. ]
You recall, [ to Petrana ] in the forest. Before I left you to Silver. [ It's all well and good to speak of the island, the blissful union they'd enjoyed, the resolution Petrana made to herself; the darker mirror of it seems like dangerous territory, but not without meaning, here and now, and so. He pushes past the discomfort, determined. ] You spoke of my returning to the Venatori as though there were the option to go with you. Had you asked it of me, I would have. I'd have gone anywhere you wished me to.
[ He goes and takes her other hand in his own. ]
If [ that word ] we are to build something—the three of us—then begin it.
[ And if she hesitates for more than a second over what that might mean, Marcus assists in leaning past the table to kiss her gently. ]
no subject
He doesn't rush them, giving Petrana's hand a small squeeze in the interim. When they part, he says quietly,]
I had a conversation with Silver in that one. I was shocked you hadn't come back with her, and I had a lot of very logical reasons in the moment but I think it was mostly ... it felt wrong, there. That you weren't with us.
[And now this. Here.]
no subject
I was angry with you beyond the telling of it, ( quiet and frank. ) I felt so much that I had—that I had made again an old mistake. That I had—how careful I had been, elsewhere, and how clever I had thought myself for that care, and how easily and naturally I have trusted you from the first.
( her thumb follows the line of marcus's knuckles; it is almost the more intimate gesture than to kiss her. )
But the only thing I remember you doing is rescuing me, and standing down when I asked it of you. What am I to think but that Julius is right?
( and that it is wrong for marcus not to be with them. )
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So it's really only a twinge. Marcus can brace against it, before it moves on. ]
It felt wrong to be alone, [ he says, quiet enough that his voice is almost all texture.
And it has felt wrong to be alone in the waking world as well. There has always been some form of companionship, even if not the romantic kind. Circle-mates, soldiers, Sima's gentle breathing where she lay on the other side of a dark room. Whatever aloneness (different, you see, from loneliness) he'd experienced in the Gallows had come about tenfold in the darker of the two dreams.
Marcus looks to Julius, then, and says, ] I don't think it fair to expect it of us, to be exactly as we were in our dream. Those men grew towards something together. I think we shouldn't miss all of that.
no subject
[He supposes if it was of course it wouldn't have needed saying, though, so he adds:]
I don't expect ... It isn't as if we're trying to work backward to get to that exact spot again. I don't think we could. For one thing, that was still two of us and not three. We came to it a different way. But even beyond that, I wouldn't want to presume a familiarity before I'd earned it.
[Julius hadn't even presumed friendliness until Petrana had given him a nudge, and it likely says more about Julius than it does about Marcus under the circumstances. He gives her hand one more squeeze before releasing it so he can also sit, finally, on the edge of the made bed. It occurs to him that he may have backtracked too far, so he adds, softer:]
I do look forward to earning it, if I can.
no subject
I would like to presume some familiarity.
[ —iykwim. ]
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Some, yes, ( is a little sly, her hand falling to julius's knee as he's seen fit to sit himself beside her.
she considers the pair of them. vysvolod, dozing on the far end of the bed, evinces no interest in proceedings whatsoever. )
Then, if I may be so bold: how much shall we consider appropriate to begin? ( it is half proposition, half a fairly clear effort to contain the impulse to suggest immediately that they have this quite large room with two beds pushed together, he might well simply move all his things today- )
I wish to be quite familiar, ( compromises neatly on both points. )
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I would like very much if you stayed awhile, assuming your plans for the day allow. Even if it's just to have your company. [He glances at Petrana, then back to Marcus.] It was an odd night and I expect we'll all of us be required elsewhere soon enough, but I think at a minimum we could take an hour or two.
[It's not not a proposition, for all he feels it is only fair Marcus set their pace. If Julius is a bit more cautious than Petrana, the invitation is still warmly meant, for however Marcus might want to spend that hour or two.]
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The urge to maintain delicate handling is there, the same urge that prevents him from stating without prompting the things he would also like. There is the question of what he deserves up against what they are willing to give, and it all still feels off-kilter. He is off-kilter. He thinks of the case of cigarettes in his pocket but doesn't go for one.
After a beat of observing them both, Marcus reaches down to undo the buckles and laces at his boot. ]
It was an odd night, [ he echoes, as he does this. ] There'll be questions, and talk of what the answers ought to be, who should say them, how they should be said.
[ The boots are nudged aside, and he stands, hands going to the edges of his frockcoat. ]
Solutions may come eventually, but not before more problems are made. [ The coat is left over the back of his chair, and he turns away from them both, moving for the door. There's a key in the lock that he doesn't recall Julius turning, so he turns it, the tiny mechanisms within tumbling heavily into place. ]
I would like very much to avoid it all for an hour or two.
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( today is likely to be strange for everyone; it's entirely possible that a morning's absence will be far from noteworthy, amongst the rest. she considers his coat, mentally preparing future arguments as to the benefits of not dressing in robes—e.g. that what marcus just did was quite attractive, and wouldn't julius like to be able to be half so dramatic as the two of them—and when she straightens from the bed it's to step out of the lightweight indoor slippers she's wearing and,
prudently,
to encourage vysvolod off the end of the bed. it is, as noted, not one bed originally but two, tightly pressed together and made up as one with far more space than they've ever really needed—at least, until this morning.
she touches julius's arm, lightly, and then frames his face with her fingertips: ) Isn't this much more productive than we were? ( wryly. )
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[He has every confidence that the two of them would have managed without Marcus, if he'd said he preferred not to try it. It would hurt, but they'd have survived it. That said, he finds himself sharply glad they don't have to as he watches Marcus across the distance between the now-locked door and the bed.]
Won't you come join us?
[While the tone is light, the look that accompanies it is sharply attentive.]
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This is all new, even down to the notion of having two other human bodies to consider, let alone all they have signified to him in the past year, in the past twelve hours. ]
To discuss the situation? [ is his reply to Julius, and he resists the urge to look at Petrana as he moves in close to where the other man is seated on the edge of the bed, giving him no time at all before his hands come up to gently take his face, to lean down to kiss him, as if finishing the up until this moment broken circle of intimacy—
—if more thoroughly than the tender exchanges prior. ]
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another knot. the one holding neatly back his hair, it comes free with her nimble fingers, and all so absent-minded she ties it loose around her own wrist before threading her fingers into now-freed hair.
her own is pinned up, neat, off her neck. her dress is simple, but more by her standards than anyone else's, and she's made no start on undressing herself beyond her shoes. when they do part, she considers the tableau, which is not unpleasant, and the prospect of what's to follow it. )
I can think of several ways, ( eventually, ) that we might pass these hours.
( logistically speaking. granted, there was never a third party in her marriagebed—nevertheless, it's extremely likely that petrana's sexual history is the most creatively adventurous of the three of them. she has some ideas. )
Perhaps we ought to establish where we are most comfortable beginning. I know that Julius has been with men—
( there is an implied question, and yes, this still counts as frank discourse where she's concerned. )
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When they finally do part, Marcus's hands still framing Julius's face, it takes him a moment to fully register Petrana's comment. When he gets there, the comment draws a bit of warmth to his smile for its sensible practicality. He could confirm, elaborate ... but instead he waits, the hand that went to Marcus's arm during the kiss lingering there. He leaves room for Marcus's response, giving every indication of being very interested.]
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(Or as though he will leave this room, and must then reconcile with what is in need of repair, what's been broken beyond it—)
But a frank discourse, such as it is, is not unwelcome. ]
I have as well, [ he says. In breaking from the kiss, he has a knee against the ground so as best to be in range of them both. Where Petrana's hand has drawn away, his trailed his after it, fingers impressed along the inner of her wrist, the loop of ribbon now there. It takes him a second to understadn she is talking of particulars, and adds— ] In either respect.
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Don't think me presumptuous, then— ( or do, feel free to, she is, ) —or in undue haste, but as we have established you will not come between us as a wedge, might I propose having you between us in a more literal sense?
( she is partial to the idea of having marcus rowntree. on bare feet, she goes to her desk; the bottom drawer and its false back that had presumably at one stage held the secrets of office and these days julius at least knows to mainly contain a few things she's acquired discreetly for their use, the most relevant of which being a jar of oil he might correctly presume is what she's decided to fetch. )
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should probably mark nsfw at least once;
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