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10/10/00
A Dangerous Man: Lawrence After Arabia Rating: NC-17 Summary: The stress of the conference gets overwhelming. Lawrence goes looking for the desert in a marble hotel. Disclaimer: This springboards from Tim Rose Price's script, and makes reference to selected events and remarks in it. No infringement is intended, and no money is involved here. If it were, I wouldn't have to get up at 6:30 tomorrow and go to work. Sex disclaimer: It's not terribly explicit, but it is m/m, and there are enough disturbing implications for me to genuinely want to warn about it. If you're under 18, give it a couple of years before reading this one. If you're timid, seek happy!fic.
Tides of Men
I loved you,
so I drew these tides of men into my hands and wrote my will across the
sky in stars
The night he came out of Deraa, he was almost too cold to move. Cold all over, really, and he ought to be grateful for that, because even he can't imagine how much it would have hurt otherwise. He'd spent seventeen hours in hell, and suddenly he was being carried into a cave out of an English Sunday school Bible. The long rocks of Syria had simply drawn back and given them shelter. Sheepskins inside, smelling like warm animals and old leather. At another time, he would have been dazzled by the beauty of the view. New light on the desert, and it was cold. Feisal was at his shoulder, alternately rocking him and wrapping him in more layers of desert-grown wool, all the time crooning and begging him to stop shaking. And he had tried. It wasn't his place to be so fragile. He was going to have to rise up and lead an army in as few days as possible. When he remembered how to move. When he remembered how to speak. After the sun rose fully, the others went to stand guard outside and left Feisal with him. He learned, later, that they understood what had happened, maybe better than he did, and that none would question him on it. As they would never question those hours he spent keening wordlessly into Feisal's chest. He'd believed, truly, that if he raised his face out of that black wool shelter, that he would be unmade by God or Allah or some unnamed higher power. Sometime in the cold of that day, Feisal kissed him. His lips were hard, windburnt from their weeks in the desert and as dry as you would expect the lips of a desert prince to be. They touched his temple first, and then his forehead. Only after another hour of silence did they brush his lips. In that instant, the other man was curled almost completely around him, blocking out the sun and wind and judgement of the men outside. And not demanding anything. Just acknowledging. Feisal took Lawrence out into the wind once. Dressed him in white silk. Made him pure and holy, worthy to lead the Bedou against the Turks. And he laughed, and in that instant, he was perfectly happy. Lawrence thinks about that now as he pads through these icy French halls. One instant of purity is perhaps the most he is to be allowed, but he clings to it. He misses the desert. He's been back in Europe for almost a year; his sunburn is gone; he looks the part of the English officer. It's only occasionally that he starts to fragment. The moment when Meinertzhagen referred to him as a pleasure boy was a nasty shock, and it's been taking him apart for most of the past day. The Abyssinian opens the door to Lawrence the instant before he raises his hand to knock. Huge and unspeakably graceful, that one. He smiles gently and waves toward the inner room. In the outer chamber, there are a few retainers curled up with their blankets, and it reminds him of the desert, where they all slept where they could. A strange effect in this palace of marble, but it calms him. "Lawrence?" Feisal, at the door of his bedroom. He's in one of his hybird moments -- his expression belongs to the war, and the brittle nights outside Damascus, but he's wrapped in one of the better smoking jackets he's acquired on this particular Parisian jaunt. Warm silk. Cigarettes making an edge of sharp darkness around him. "I --" What, exactly? "I couldn't sleep. I thought you might want company." Feisal examines him for a moment, then, "Of course. Come in. This is your home as much as mine." A small irony in a place so alien to both of them, but he doesn't comment on it. "[Thank you. You can sleep if you wish.]" The words are Arabic, and not addressed to him. The Abyssinian nods and settles himself, extinguishes the light a moment later. "Don't stand there like a thief. Come in and sit down. Take off your tie -- you look like you might choke on it." The room is more European than the space outside. Two wingback chairs by the fire, Louis Quatorze dressing table, the four-poster bed which seems to be ubiquitous, at least for the people who count. Not him, obviously, but it's a necessary mark of respect for the son of the man whose army presently holds Damascus. "Don't look at me like that. I didn't decorate this monstrosity. Are you going to sit down?" Feisal is already kneeling by the fire, and after a moment Lawrence realizes that he's boiling tea over it. The grin his friend gives him when he turns back is decidedly crooked. "I'm trying to imagine you doing that at Oxford," Lawrence says, and sits, finally. After a glance at Feisal's stocking feet, he removes his own shoes and slides down to sit cross-legged on the carpet. Feisal glances at him and nods. They both remember carpets. Crippled men were weaving them on the streets of Damascus when they marched in. "I took it up there. It's in keeping with my image as the wild man of the desert. Also, it gave permission to the others. We could all sit together in the common room and boil tea on the open fire, and they weren't barbarians because it was my idea." Hands him a cup and gestures to the sugar bowl on the hearth. "Why can't you sleep, or is that really what's wrong?" Lawrence is disgusted to find himself shaking again. There've been nights when he wished that he were only shell-shocked. Then, at least, people would stop asking him why he looks so awful. And he wouldn't fragment like this for no reason. Loud noises would reduce him to a sobbing wreck, but at least he'd be able to recognize the source of his breakdown. "I don't know. Yes. I mean, I did try to sleep. Someone made a stupid remark, and it threw me." Raised eyebrows. Coffee eyes under them so deep he could swim even in their shallow edges. "Oh, just about my looks. About looking like a girl. It's rot, of course, and he meant it as a joke. It might not have bothered me if he hadn't been sitting so close by. Only." Only nothing. Only. "It's your curse, I suppose. Every great man is supposed to have one. Arrange not to be born pretty, next time." "Thank you. That's terribly helpful." He's surprised to find that he does feel better, though. The gaslight and the fire have reduced the bedroom to the intimacy of a tent, and they're where they've been before, sitting opposite each other in the first quiet hours of the night. He's been here, too, when Feisal leans forward and kisses him. His lips have changed a little. They're softer, damper, they taste like sugar and sharp tea. They still ask nothing from him, only reassure and give. Feisal's tongue brushes his lips, presses in just a little to examine the surface of his front teeth, then retreats, and the kiss breaks and they're sitting across from each other again, expectant. His decision, then. Feisal's expression is only watchful. But it doesn't reject him when he sets his cup on the hearth tiles and leans forward and touches this man in a way he hasn't touched a half-dozen people in his whole life. Even the kisses he's given his family have always been dry, delicate things dropped on a cheek. This is warmer, wetter, closer to passionate than anything he's attempted before. And Feisal accepts it, rocks back a little to accept Lawrence's sudden weight against his thighs and then steadies, supporting them both and gently rushing the short blond hairs that curve around Lawrence's ears and trace back to the base of his skull. Other kisses, after that. Several on his jaw, and one on each cheekbone, just below the eye socket. On his throat, just above the unreasonable stiffness of the necktie he's forgotten to remove. He used to lie in the dark, and his skin would crawl. And Feisal would come silently through the camp and settle beside him, and to the army it looked like leaders planning strategy, not the prince holding the Englishman together. Clever fingers loosen and remove his tie, unbutton and lift away his collar. Soft lips against the newly exposed hollows of his throat. "You might sleep better among friends tonight. Do you want to stay?" "God, yes." And he laughs. He's sprawled in an undignified line with his feet still back by his tea-cup and all his weight in the prince's lap. He needs to be better than that. Pulls back and straightens. Once he's firmly in balance, drops the softest, driest kiss he can onto Feisal's forehead, just between his eyes. And stands and undresses. At some point, he's aware of Feisal behind him on the bed, already naked. The smoking jacket is folded with geometric precision in one of the unused chairs, and the pajamas lie in a looser heap on top of it. Lawrence is only naked to the waist, and still dealing with that much exposure. He doesn't like to be naked, really, hasn't for well over a year now. He can feel Feisal's eyes probing his skin. He has a half-dozen stories that he uses to explain the scars, the most plausible of which is that he was thrown by a camel into barbed wire. Though it's not absolutely believable, the horror of the image is usually enough to make his questioner flinch and change the subject. Even Feisal hasn't seen the damage in its permanent form. And he's looking now with the tense silence he reserves for battle and other cold moments of rage. Lawrence stands suddenly, and slides off his trousers and underclothes together. His cufflinks, which were in his lap, hit the floor so loudly that for a half-moment he looks around for gunfire. Then flinches and laughs at himself, and turns naked to face his prince, who is not laughing, only looking at him, and so graceful and unashamedly naked that he should be preserved in some piece of art for archeologists to dig up in a millennium and marvel at. "Lie down. You're going to freeze in this chill." Softly, almost a tease, and he's able to respond to it, kneel on the bed and the settle on his side, facing the other body. The hand on his shoulder startles him, though. "Lie flat for a minute?" He flinches, flashes back to things he'd rather not remember. "I don't think I can." "Shh. Trust me. I would never injure you, I promise." The fingers massage his shoulder; he relaxes into the touch and gradually lets himself slide forward onto his belly, raising his arms at the same time to pillow his head. Feisal traces the lattice of scars. He's sitting up, curled in on himself a little in the cold, with one knee tucked up to his chin. Touches lightly, reading the agony that each one represents and the horror that underlies them. Acknowledges, finally, that if Lawrence broke, then perhaps he had good reason. And bends, kisses the long spine, lays his cheek against it. The cold drives him down, though, eventually. He settles on his side with Lawrence pressed against his belly and buries them both under the mass of satin comforter that the French have deemed appropriate for the emissary of a minor war to the conference on a major one. There are places he's hidden. Caves. Conference rooms. The huge open swell of the desert, where he was just another man muffled to the eyes and swaying with the motion of his camel. He's too aware of how close he's been to cracking every time he smiles. But in this darkness, not even Feisal can see him. The lights are dead, and the fire is quieter, sparking only occasionally in the grate. And if he needs to weep a little, finally, for just himself, he can. Long dark fingers are still there, brushing the back of his head. Comforting. He suspects that Feisal is just a little pleased to have Lawrence relying on him, rather than the other way round, but he can't bring himself to begrudge that pleasure. He needs this too badly. Needs it even more when he rolls to his side and Feisal shifts to accommodate him. The long planes of their bodies fit suddenly, like a child's puzzle coming together, and he gasps. He hadn't realized that he was aroused, but the brush of the other man's hip against his groin is a quick, ecstatic, and utterly unexpected pleasure. He leans infinitesimally forward to catch Feisal's lips in the dark. Withdraws the distance of a breath and runs the tip of his tongue over them. Gasps again as clever fingers insinuate themselves between his legs and stroke him, run up his thighs and cradle his scrotum for a moment, stroke over the tiny hole between his buttocks, and he flinches at that, doesn't unclench until Feisal's touch has removed itself to the safer territory between them. He can share in that, at least. It's an uncomplicated touch, even with the danger of their wrists tangling. His hand curls gently around Feisal's erection, and Feisal's around his, and they can kiss and stroke each other, unhurriedly. Always in the other man's touch the imperative to relax, be safe in this chilled darkness, imagine that the hollow room has somehow transformed itself into one of the tents he lived in throughout the desert campaign. His orgasm is a surprise: quick, sharp, almost painfully intense. He stills in Feisal's one-armed embrace and drifts, only comes back to himself when he realizes that the other man is trembling, still on the edge and trying not to frighten him. And he's suddenly angry, both at his own fragility and Feisal's gentle treatment of it. The kiss he presses against the dark mouth is rough, and his hand tightens, works the hard flesh with a touch that he might consider brutal at a different moment. Not fair, but effective. He wraps an arm around Feisal's body, shaking off the embrace he was offered a moment ago, and kisses him, hard, again, to swallow the scream that wells out as he comes. In the aftermath of it, they're both panting, and there's a moment of dangerous anger between them. Rage at being used, at being indulged, before they both manage to release it and ease closer to sleep. He's never been touched so intimately or for so long at one time, except by his captors during those hours, and he wonders if Feisal knows that. Wonders whether the other man would count this as lost virginity. Whether Lawrence should. He hasn't felt really clean since the morning he ventured into Deraa to scout its fortifications. Not even now. But, for the moment, he's peaceful, and he doesn't expect that he'll be able to ask more than that from the universe anytime soon. Into his hair, Feisal whispers, "Come hunting with me tomorrow. Show me something of your country. I'm so sick of council rooms." "It's not my country." "It's not so different.
I remember England. There were wonderful fields. There must be open country
near here somewhere." Another breath ruffling his blond hair. "Come hunting
with me. Please."
"Alright." Feisal smells like
dry spaces, even in this European coldness. Lawrence likes to imagine that
they are still in Damascus. The day they took the city was brilliant, and
wonderfully warm, and when he rode through the gates he wasn't afraid of
anything.
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