My heart is pierced by cupid; I disdain all glittering gold

[simplestgift]

Who: tothelibrary and noprevaricating.
What: Stretching Dawn's legs after her mallynap.
When: July 11, early morning, before it gets hot.
Where: The forest path, not far from town.
Summary: Archie wants to make sure Dawn has lots of sensory experiences after being kept in a cell for a few weeks. And by "sensory experiences," we mean "intentions here are totally chaste please Buffy do not kill me."
Rating: It's flipping Dawn and Archie. Inevitably it will end up so disgustingly sweet your teeth will rot just from reading this form.


Archie wants Dawn to see the morning the way he sees it.

She was bleary-eyed and sleepy when he came by her apartment to pick her up, holding a bouquet of brightly-colored daisies, but it's the perfect time of day for this. Right now, the sun is barely up, not quite hot enough to burn off the mist but bright enough to turn it to gold, and to edge the leaves of the forest in gold, and cause the dew to glimmer. The air is damp but a perfect temperature, with the promise of heat later in the day. It's nothing like morning on a ship, with voices slowly building up and the seventh bell ringing and that last moment of warmth before swinging out to begin a new day. Still, it doesn't have to be--he loves everything about morning, wherever it takes place. This one is a bit more like mornings on his family's estate in Lanarkshire, misty and green and gold before the sky turned blue and the sunlight turned silver. All bright, all fresh, shedding the shadows of night for long shadows of its own, deepening the woods and making the leaves shimmer.

He carries a bag with breakfast in it, along with a rolled-up blanket they can spread out in the woods somewhere to keep off the dew.

Comments

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

Being a morning person has never been among Dawn's skills. Translating ancient texts, yes. Exorcisms, yes. Buying too many shoes, very yes. But being up and alert and moving around before ten thirty or so? No.

But Archie is the one asking her, so she agrees with a minimum amount of grumbling, leaves a note on the fridge and heads out. She's quiet for the first bit of the walk, yawning every so often and just trusting Archie to lead the way. But between movement and fresh air she starts to perk up, and with one last yawn she slides an arm around Archie's waist, shaking her head.

"Okay, I have to admit it. I'm still not a morning person but you were completely and totally right, this is beautiful."

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He draws her closer with his arm around her shoulders, fingers lightly running up and down her arm. "Told you, didn't I? If you can imagine more moss, it isn't entirely unlike my father's estate."

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

"I'll never argue with you again, up until I do." Dawn nods solemnly, resting her head on Archie's shoulder for a moment, just breathing. "I know I sound like a cheesy vacation ad, but compared to growing up in LA the air here is kind of amazing smelling. And it's not perpetually soaked like Scotland." A bit of an exaggeration, but she's a beach girl.

"I'm moss-imagining to the fullest." A wistful sigh. "It is really pretty out here."

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"Did you live in the highlands? I hear they're very wet indeed."

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

"Just me, Buffy, Willow, Xander, Giles, and a whole bunch of annoying teenage girls with no respect for personal space." Beat. "And rain. The rain was another tenant."

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"That does explain it. It doesn't rain so constantly in the lowlands." They're running out of perfect weather. He stops and picks a grassy area to spread the blanket on.

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

"We should have picked a different giant castle. I'm filing a complaint with the castle department." Dawn helps spread out the blanket-- read: fusses with the corners-- and then once it's settled, sits down on one side of it. "Should I be helping? I feel like I should be helping."

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"There isn't very much to help with." He pulls out fresh fruits, cheeses, and a loaf of cinnamon bread. Setting these out on paper plates, he also pulls out a thermos of homemade hot chocolate an pours them both cups. Hot chocolate, to him, needs cinnamon and a little cayenne pepper and things like that, but he's certainly made it for her before. It's something he's made sure he can make well, since it tastes like home.

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

"So I can be lazy and watch you do stuff? Because I can do that, too." And true to her word Dawn leans back, propping herself up on her elbows and looking around them and then back at Archie, not bothering to try and hide the tiny, happy smile building. "You're kind of curve-breaking amazing, just fyi." Beat. "For your information, I mean."

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A surprised, somewhat embarrassed little smile at that. Archie is not the best at taking compliments, but gives her a little bow of the head in surrender. "And I still have a long way to go before I catch up with you."

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

It's okay, Dawn will shove the compliments down his throat. "Uh-uh, no turning this around on me. Take the compliment or there will be consequences, Mr. Kennedy." Beat. "We haf vays of making you talk." For a language genius, her Russian accent is truly awful.

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Not being able to remember all the words she said about how amazing he is, he instead chooses a different path.

"And I have ways of silencing you." He leans in to kiss her in the morning light, its rays clouded by mist.

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

Part of Dawn always expects kissing Archie to get less amazing. According to the massive number of rom-coms the baby slayers watch, after a certain amount of time love gets boring and then you have to contemplate a fling with a shirtless Ashton Kutcher before realizing that you already have everything you want, and then kissing is exciting again. Coldplay usually features in somewhere. But every single time is still amazing, makes her heart go faster and butterflies take up residence somewhere around her midsection.

"...I was talking? Because I think I forgot what words are." It's a joke, but her voice is a little too breathless to completely be written off.

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Mission accomplished. Proud of himself, Archie picks a knife out of the bag and cuts her a slice of cinnamon bread. "No fussing over me today, my joy. This morning belongs to you."

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

"I can fuss if I want to fuss. This is a free... kidnapped pastoral land of weirdness, I know my fussing rights." She turns a little pink, but after taking slice of bread smiles winsomely. "Of course, if you wanted to stop the fussing I think you figured out what works."

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"And this?" Popping a strawberry into her mouth.

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

"That works too." The words are thick through a mouth of strawberry. "Wow, those are good. But, just so you know, that was an open invitation for more kissing."

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Yes, but now her lips are all sweet from the strawberry. He leans in for a taste.

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

Strawberry kisses are possibly better than the normal ones. There should be testing done. Extensive testing.

"It's so nice out here." Impulsively Dawn kisses the corner of Archie's mouth, then leans back to look up at the sky. "Especially after the whole enforced inside time thing. The Malnosso should really look into adding windows to their creepy science experiment rooms."

She tosses it off like a joke, but that's the first mention she's made of her captivity being upsetting at all.

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A pang as she mentions it. He brushes back her hair and kisses her forehead comfortingly, then moves to wrap his arms around her, holding her to his chest, saying nothing. He'll let her speak, if she wants to. If she would rather not, he will not make her.

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

"I don't-- I'm okay, though, you know?" The first hint of anxiety creeps into her voice, there, and Dawn sighs. "Really, it's not like I'm freaking out. I just-- after Glory, the whole kidnapping and experiment thing is not a favorite."

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"What did Glory do?" It's a gentle question.

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

"She wanted to go home. Back to whatever gross hell dimension she was from, anyway." Dawn worries at the hem of her shirt, tugging and rearranging and just trying to keep her hands occupied. "Key blood was the only way to do it. So, you know. I got kidnapped. Again."

If she approaches it like it's not still terrifying, maybe it won't be terrifying.

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His fingers tangle in her hair. Thinking about someone cutting up his Dawn makes him queasy. So he holds her, pretending he can take the blows for her as long as he is close enough.

[tothelibrary.livejournal.com]

Dawn just lays there for a while, letting Archie hold her. Then, staring hard at the sky until her eyes water, she swallows hard. "Don't tell Buffy because she'll get weid, but I might be a little more freaked by the whole snatching thing than I told her. There was this thing back home, called the Initiative? They liked to capture non-humans and like, experiment on them. They did it to Spike. Anyway, after I found out what I was, I used to have nightmares they had like... done a Key-test and figured it out, and they took me." She breaks off, inhaling a little too fast and then trying to relax. "I'm okay and everything, it's just-- you know. Old scary stuff doesn't get that much less scary, sometimes."