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„What am I to you?”
Fyodor’s hands still on your body. Your question feels as out of place as does the frilly, crisp white dress on your frame, ribbons tied into a tight corset on your back and proving it a little harder to breathe. Lithe fingers secure the sheer white stockings high up on your thighs, the elastic - although smooth and delicate - digging into the plush meat much like Fyodor’s fingertips before he lets go of you, looking up at your face.
Confusion doesn’t fit Fyodor - someone at this level of enlightenment, erudition and intelligence. That’s why it’s perhaps the first time you watch his brows furrow in real time, the expression as strange as it is endearing.
“What kind of question is that?” he counters, smoothly, his features relaxing in a blink. He smiles instead, then, smoothing a hand up the side of your leg. “Am I not making myself clear enough, milaya?”
It’s exhausting to think lately, and the august breeze is so suffocating, you think, creeping under the pleats of your skirt and threatening to ride the material up. But it wouldn’t be anything he hasn’t seen yet, or taken for himself before - shamelessly and ludicrously, for he has already claimed it as his own a long time ago, and what could you really have done to stop the man infamously called evil given flesh?
You feel naked under his gaze anyway.
“I don’t know,” You admit, sunken, and trail your eyes down to where Fyodor gently picks your foot off the ground and positions it on his knee. You let him, for again, what else can you do? “There’s a lot I don’t understand about you, sometimes.”
Fyodor wraps his fingers around your ankle but stops his actions, putting the deep burgundy, heeled bar shoe back down. He contemplates something before pulling you in with one swift movement, making you stumble and shriek, arm flying out to grab on the balcony railing.
Much steadier than your flustered form, Fyodor presses his forehead to your knee with a sigh. You watch, astounded, as he begins pressing kisses down your calf, on your ankle, and eventually, lifts your foot to his mouth where he almost tenderly kisses the instep and each of your toes.
You feel your breath scratch at your throat as he cradles your foot to his chest and speaks, diamonds in his eyes and devotion on his tongue.
“Believe me, golubushka, I would have told you all about it if I could. Is it words you want from me?” Fyodor asks, but you can’t bring yourself to reply. Your hand shakes on the railing, moved by the scene playing out right at your feet, and at the gentleness with which fyodor handles you. You inhale sharply, heart in your throat.
“Expressing myself in words sickens me, milaya, but don’t I love you?” He presses your sole against his chest where a heart thrums, full of this love he speaks of, “What is it that you need to believe me?”
Your cheeks grow hot and temples pulse with an incoming headache as you run your fingers through Fyodor’s hair, sparse gray glimmering in the sunlight much like the magenta of his sharp eyes, hopeful and desperate.
“Fyodor,” you speak, embarrassed. “Get up, please."
“Answer my question, please?”
Not missing a beat, Fyodor deems you speechless. You swallow thickly and shake your head, the wildflowers stuck behind your ear moving in the wind. “I’m sorry. I’m just… all in my head lately.”
It’s not quite convincing, you realize, for Fyodor’s expression hardens, unsatisfied with the lackluster reply not touching on his question at all. You urge him up on his feet, for once far more comfortable with his height towering over you, but it’s not easy getting used to a conjurer kneeling at your feet like you’re a deity deserving of adoration.
“I can see that,” Fyodor says, all knowing as always. Your eyes flutter when he leans in to press his lips to the bridge of your nose, his hands moving to cradle your face. “Moya lyubov, trust me, I know. And for that reason alone, leave the thinking to me, yes? You stay here and wait for me to come home and kiss you, show you how deep this desire of mine runs…”
Fyodor trails kisses across your cheekbone, nudging away the flower crown neatly sitting on top of your head.
“I will,” you promise, resting your cheek on his chest, careful not to wipe off the blush he swept across your cheeks earlier.
The reply couldn’t be anything different; for when his mouth lingers by your ear, it’s where the wound still heals and skin stays tender, reminiscent of the ways he went to imprint this love of his in your very presence.