Page 17 of Rumpelstilzchen

Rumple studied the boy. It bothered him that his Heart was still wearing the same clothes as he was yesterday. The cider brandy had dried alongside the sticky pink of strawberry juice, and the unmistakable evidence of their intense first night together was clearly visible on his crotch.

Unsettled, Rumple looked around until he found what he needed. In the recess to the right of the chamber bay stood an old washbasin, an empty pewter jug, and a shrivelled-up bar of soap. Impatient now that he had a kernel of a plan, he commanded shadow tendrils to place the small tub on the floor and flicked his wrist to fill the jug with warm water.

The whole while he told himself that this was not a kindness; he simply liked beautiful things Clean and beautiful things.

Begrudgingly, Rumple took several steps back and waited for the boy, who had since propped himself up on his elbows, to follow. When no further action was forthcoming, Rumple arched an eyebrow in silent question.

“I don’t know what you w-want from me.” The boy’s voice shook a little when he spoke, and it betrayed his insecurity.

As he had the night before, Rumple held out his gloved hand, palm side up, in invitation. Rich chestnut eyes flickered between Rumple’s face and his outstretched hand, and then over his shoulder to the window behind him.

Was he worried about being seen? Or about being seen with Rumple? That thought didn’t sit well with him at all. In fact, it felt like a belt had tightened around him, but when the boy sat upright on the bed, he caught the slightest twitch of movement from his crotch.

Had he imagined it? But no, the boy flushed crimson and looked down at his lap where he surreptitiously rested his hands, and Rumple couldn’t tear his gaze away. His presence had had the same effect on the beguiling human last night. What an unexpected, and ambrosial, side effect of having found his Heart.

Rumple stalked closer and traced a gloved hand across the boy’s jaw. A hot wave of anticipation twisted in his gut and his body hummed.

The boy closed his eyes but failed to suppress both the shudder that overtook him and the way his head pressed ever so slightly into Rumple’s palm. Was the rapid rise and fall of his chest fear, or was the boy struggling against the same tide of desire?

If it were fear, then he had already failed his Heart. Rumple dragged the back of his leather-clad knuckles lower, down the thick artery that pulsed in his neck, along the fair skin of his collarbone, and over the sensitive skin on the inside of his arm until he reached his wrist, where he gripped him firmly.

If it were lust, then he needed to be certain it was given freely. With a single tug, he pulled the boy to crowd against him, his slender chest pressed to Rumple’s more muscled one. Heat radiated from the boy’s body. His breaths came fast and shallow, and he held still as if any movement at all might shatter him.

Rumple leaned in close, his lips ghosting over the shell of the boy’s ear when he spoke. “Last night, you knelt for me.”

The crimson flush, which had been restricted to the boy’s cheeks, spread down his neck and he spluttered in shock. Rumple ran his other gloved hand roughly down the boy’s side and gripped his hip tightly. Possessively.

“Have you fantasised about doing it again?” Rumple had thought of little else since he had left his cell shortly before sunrise.

“N-no,” the boy protested.

His gaze flickered under Rumple’s heated scrutiny, and the patter of his pulse was fast under Rumple’s fingertips. “You’re lying.”

The boy flinched at the accusation and bit his lip, leaving it red and raw.

But the possibility that he might be telling the truth, that maybe the boy hadn’t thought about what had transpired between them on repeat whilst he had edged himself to fever pitch, angered Rumple.

He released the boy from his hold and stepped back brusquely, his shadows thickening in his rage as they oozed up the walls like molasses. Slowly, they overcame the sturdy but battered vanity unit that stood beneath the looking glass… They swallowed the iron grill in the hearth where the previous occupant had left the ashes for someone else to clean out… They soaked the already-stained material that partially covered the windows… And they plunged the interior of the farmhouse into darkness. A darkness under Rumple’s control.

Roughly, he pulled the hem of the boy’s soiled shirt loose from his breeches, giving him only seconds to figure out Rumple’s intention and raise his arms before it was yanked clear over his head. Rumple could easily count the ribs on the bared torso—a stark reminder of his Heart’s mortality. It gave Rumple pause.

Yet where he hesitated, the boy didn’t. With wide-eyed wonder, he stretched up on his tiptoes, and gained enough height to swipe his fingertips through the shadows that hung from the rafters above his head. The boy’s breathy gasp travelled unimpeded to the cavity of Rumple’s chest, and a rush of sexual pleasure coursed through his veins, softening them.

Shyly, the boy glanced at Rumple. His fingers lowered as if he were unsure of their welcome, but before he found the words to encourage him to do it again, the boy smiled. A beatific metamorphosis that lit up his whole face. It pinkened the cheeks that framed his enlarged eyes, which seemed to Rumple to sparkle with delight despite the full dark that enveloped them both. This dynamic between them was exhilarating.

He watched the boy like an owl might observe the activity of an entire field with a single blink; with an omnipotent fervour. When those work-hardened hands dipped into his shadows once more, and the boy laughed—a genuine and delighted sound—it made Rumple forget why he had been so angry in the first instance.

Rumple’s shadows, that not long ago had flayed a man alive, showed no signs of treating the boy in the same manner. They became less viscous and easily coated his hands in darkness, the black a stark contrast to the pale and freckled skin that adorned his exposed and angular shoulders. Rumple couldn’t look away.

There was that something again.

Having only ever coveted fear as a symbol of his power, Rumple was rendered speechless by the simple sound of laughter. He’d heard laughter before, of course, but as he stood motionless while his shadows played with the boy, he realised nobody had ever laughed with him. They’d cried, begged, and pleaded. They’d vomited, bled, and died. But no one had ever found joy in his presence. Until now.

And somewhere deep down inside, Rumple realised he was the one who was afraid.

Unnerved by the direction of his own thoughts, Rumple took three abrupt steps back toward the only window in the chamber bay.

There’d been no hint—no suggestion whatsoever from anything he’d ever read or learned—that discovering his Heart would affect him this way. And that must be what this was.