The Arcana Oneshots

In The Alleyway - Julian Devorak

s h i t you thought I wasn't gonna post a smut on the most glorious of birthdays?

"Ahh-h! Oooh, oh, fuck, Julian—"

His words were mumbled so close to the skin of her thigh that in her private cloud of heady pleasure she could barely make out their meaning:

"You taste... exquisite."

"Mmm, oh—what was that?"

He ducks his head out from under her skirts, and even in the dim light of the alley, she can make out the shape of the cheeky grin he flashes her.

"Better than anything Bartholomew is pouring."

She croaks a laugh, a weak sound, soon lost to the throaty moan that rides on its heels, long and low, when he buries his head beneath her skirts and returns to his teasing.

She's... not really sure how they got here, if she's being honest. She's never been an exhibitionist, as far as she knows, though with the way it's making her feel—all electric and coiled and strung, Julian kneeling between her legs in the back alley behind the Rowdy Raven—she would not be surprised to find out that, maybe, in the part of her life she can't remember, she had been.

It helped that she was a little drunk. That's how it had started: drinks in the tavern. And then—what? Julian had leaned across the table towards her, whispered something in that rolling timber he used when he was being flirtatious. And by now she'd known him long enough, well enough, that when she saw the telltale arc of his eyebrow that signaled more clearly than anything a turn towards the suggestive, she'd played along.

Too well.

Or, just well enough—perfectly, even, depending on your perspective.

Gods, he was talkative, suave; but she hasn't guessed how talented he'd be when he put that tongue to other, more indecent uses.

Another swipe of it along her lips and she felt her legs quiver; she feared they'd go out beneath her and she'd collapse, right into the same shallow puddle Julian was currently kneeling in, murky back-alley water pooling around his knees.

(Bless those tall, water-proof boots—)

His hands ran along her legs, clutched the clenching muscles of her calves, hummed in satisfaction against her. So plainly proud of himself, for reducing her to a trembling mess, pulse thundering, so hard and so loud in her chest she could swear Julian heard it ,too.

But then he pulled away, excavated himself once more from the heap of her skirts. When her eyes found him his hair was comically mussed, but it took nothing away from the devilish grin he favored her with, lips glistening with the evidence of his work.

"Wish I could keep you like this, 'Red. So coiled and close to undone...delicious."

Slowly he trailed his hands from her calves to the height of her thighs, squeezing them for emphasis. "Working just enough to keep you on edge, but never over it—right on the brink until you're so mad for it you can hardly beg—"

She let out a breathy whine. Gods, she wanted that too, wanted him to wreck her, ravish her like he'd promised back in the library, keep her on edge until dawn blushed the sky rosy...

But here, in this alley, in full view for anyone who might pass by, was neither the time nor the place.

"Please," she rasped, lowering her hands to tangle in his hair, pull at it, needy and eager.

Julian laughed.

"Ahh, but how could I be so cruel? How could I possibly refuse so polite a request from such an enchanting woman?" He leaned close to her, and she could feel the tip of his nose burying into the curl of hair between her legs as he pressed his lips to her clit in a kiss that was absurdly, maddeningly chaste.