the day after the night before
Nov. 20th, 2014 10:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
smackenzieThey curl up together in the light of the rising sun, both of them still half-drunk and completely, utterly satisfied. Brother Peire can't form a coherent thought, and even if he could he doesn't have the energy to articulate it. He only wants to sleep, and to dream about his body and Rainaut's and all the pleasures they can take from and offer to each other.
When he wakes again, the sun is full on his face, hot and painfully bright. He feels sticky and sweaty. His head is throbbing, his eyes are hot and dry, his mouth dry as well and his tongue thick and slow. He thinks he might be sick.
He tries to remember what he did last night, and the sense memory of Rainaut buried inside him, stretched out on top of him, weighing him down and breathing hot desire into his mouth makes something warm and yearning stir deep inside him. But the urge has left him. He wants to wash. He wants to lie down somewhere cool and dark and go back to sleep.
He really, really wants to be sick.
He untangles himself from Rainaut's arms and legs and sits up, but even that little motion is too much and he has to roll away onto his hands and knees to vomit on the grass. Everything he ate and drank last night – mostly drank, and how many cups did he swallow? Why did Rainaut bring a bottle out here with them? Why did he go back for another one? - comes back up until he's spitting bile, his stomach empty but still heaving. He can feel the sweat prickling along his hairline and down his spine. He's so embarrassed.
"Peire," Rainaut mumbles, apparently awake as well. "Are you – how are you?"
Ashamed, Brother Peire thinks. In desperate need of a purifying bath.
He hopes, irrationally, that God couldn't see him last night after all, nearly insensible from the mead and the wine and the heady, contagious desire of something so close to a pagan fertility festival that it may as well have been.
"You were sick."
"Yes." Brother Peire wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. "I drank too much. I can't believe how much."
"That's part of the point." There's a rustling, probably Rainaut sitting up, and then a warm, sweaty hand slowly rubbing Brother Peire's hot, sweaty back. "I did too. I don't think it stayed with me quite as badly, though."
Brother Peire sits back on his heels. He feels fractionally better, but his head is still pounding and now his eyes hurt and he feels disgusting and unfit for polite company.
"You sound fine," Brother Peire says, not meaning for it to come out as accusingly as it does. Rainaut just chuckles.
"Many more years of practice. Come. Put your clothes on and we'll go back. We both need water and a bath and a good few hours of sleep." A hand appears in Brother Peire's field of vision and he lets Rainaut haul him to his feet.
They find their clothes and get dressed. Rainaut takes the empty bottle – just one, and Brother Peire wonders what happened to the first one – and puts his other hand on the back of Brother Peire's neck and pulls him close so their foreheads are touching.
"Peace be upon you, my brother," he says softly. "I feel blessed that you shared your first Midsummer with me."
"What else was I going to do?" Brother Peire asks. "I wanted to."
"I could tell." He steps back, grins, and takes Brother Peire's hand.
They walk slowly back to the monastery and past the tables and benches still sitting out from last night. They pull up water from the fountain in the middle of the cloister yard, wash their faces and rinse out their mouths, and Rainaut pulls off his shirt to splash water on his shoulders and arms and chest.
"Bath now or later?" he asks. He doesn't look well – pale and tired and no doubt a little sick from all that he drank – but his voice is the same as it always is, if a little hoarse.
"Later. I need to lie down." Brother Peire still feels a little unsteady. The cold fountain water is refreshing but right now he really, really wants to be off his feet, on his side on the mattress, where he can close his eyes and breathe in and out and not worry about his legs deciding they don't want to hold him up after all. "We missed the dawn service. And the midnight service."
"What do you think we were doing out in the grass?"
Things I can't talk about in public, Brother Peire thinks.
"That was our prayer," Rainaut continues. "Or at least it was mine." He cups Brother Peire's face and Brother Peire hopes that no one is going to appear out of nowhere and see them. The cloister is unusually quiet for the late morning. He wonders how many people are still out in the fields or the grass, and how many have come back to sleep or bathe or eat or whatever it is they do after their wild Midsummer activities. "Midsummer is the night to throw off all your restraints and lose yourself in food and drink and dance and other people. It's the night for orgies, for excess. God wants us to lose our minds. There's no shame in being ill the next day." His thumb strokes Brother Peire's cheek in a comforting and distracting way.
"Then I honored your God well."
"I remember." Rainaut grins. "I'd kiss you but I imagine my mouth tastes like something sour and dead. Let's go lie down, and later we'll bathe and maybe eat. There's going to be a dusk service but it's expecting that not everyone will go, but we should be at the midnight service. The dusk service technically signals the end of Midsummer, but if we don't make it, it's not a problem."
"I don't think I can eat." His stomach mounts a weak protest at the thought.
"I'm not sure I can either. But there will be a cold buffet in the refectory, for the children at least."
Brother Peire takes another long drink from the bucket in the fountain, and they go back to the cell. The shutter is closed and the room is cool and dark, just what he wants. He and Rainaut peel off their clothes and lie down, Brother Peire's back to Rainaut's chest, their fingers twined together.
"Did you find peace?" Rainaut asks.
"When?"
"Last night. Very early this morning."
Brother Peire doesn't even have to think about it. "I did. If you can call, uh, did I, was I very loud?"
"I didn't notice."
"No one could hear us, could they?" He's a little surprised he didn't think of this last night, but maybe he did and he just doesn't remember. And he had a lot of other things to occupy him then.
"I doubt it. Did you hear anyone else?"
"Just you. And me."
Rainaut presses his lips to the back of Brother Peire's shoulder. "You made as much noise as you needed to, friar. As did I. God heard us and looked down on us with favor. Couldn't you feel it, that divine gaze? It would have felt like light."
"I felt like I was, like there were candles just under my skin, thousands of them lighting me up. I thought it was God, my God, looking down at me and hearing me cry your name. I felt Him. I thought I did. Not like, not like I could feel you, but like I would feel Him during prayer sometimes, in the Gray Friars' chapel, surrounded by my brothers, all of us singing His praise. It was like He looked down from Heaven and saw me."
For once the memory of standing in the chapel with his brother friars doesn't cause him any pain. It's a good memory, a warm memory, but it's just that, a memory. A part of the life he doesn't have any more, belonging to the man he used to be. The man he isn't any more.
It's an odd feeling, but not a bad one.
He closes his eyes.
"You were blessed, friar," Rainaut murmurs. "By your God or mine, it doesn't matter. But that was the touch of a divine hand. And that's the other point of Midsummer – to show yourself worthy of receiving God's favor."
"Did you?"
"Did I feel God's hand on my head? God's gaze on my skin? Of course I did. You couldn't hear me?" How he grins against Brother Peire's shoulder. "I saw God in you, my brother. In our coupling, and the sounds of your pleasure, and the look on your face, and the way you took me inside you, and the way you let me take you. I tasted God in your mouth and felt God on your skin."
"Please stop," Brother Peire says helplessly, feeling his cock twitch at the memories that Rainaut's words conjure up for him.
"I just want you to know what it meant to me, what we did. It was physical and spiritual, holy and profane both. It's important that you know. This too is part of the ritual, this expression after the fact of what the participants felt and saw, what it meant for them, what their pleasure showed them."
"I don't know what it meant to me. I felt God's attention turned on me, my God's attention, and I felt you, and, and, I don't know, maybe your God smiled on me as well. It did feel sacred. And pagan. And new. And I, I would do it again, next year. With, with you."
"Well, of course with me. This is the last time I'm going to talk about it. What men and women do in the fields on Midsummer is between them and their partners. It's not for other people to hear about."
"I won't tell anyone."
"I know you won't."
"People know, though, don't they. Amada knows. She, she wished me blessings with you. I won't have to say anything – they'll look at us and know."
"But you'll see her and know the same of her. Don't think about it too much. Midsummer isn't for thinking too hard. Go to sleep until your head feels better." His free hand brushes through Brother Peire's hair, a little awkwardly because of the way they're lying. "Peace lay upon you last night, my brother. May you keep it with you."
No, Brother Peire thinks, a little shocked at his profane thoughts, ou lay upon me.
But Rainaut did bring him peace, in a manner of speaking. The peace after ecstasy, and the peace of familiarity and affection and love.
"May you keep your peace with you too," he says. Rainaut doesn't say anything in return, and Brother Peire lets himself fall asleep.
The next time he wakes he feels better, more rested, less ill. He feels calm. He doesn't think he should, considering all his actions last night and very early this morning are enough to consign him to Hell for eternity, but he's reached some kind of peace in himself, some kind of acceptance that he'll never be a Gray Friar again and that he can't keep all the laws of his Order, but neither can he wholeheartedly follow all of the tenets of the heretics' beliefs. He still feels as if he's betraying God in some way, but he still loves God and still wants to serve Him – is still trying to serve Him in his own way – and isn't prepared to accept that God doesn't still want his service.
Maybe he can be both friar and heretic, or at least a friar who can adopt some of the practices of the heretic community that took him in. He certainly threw himself into their Midsummer celebrations.
As if thinking about that is some kind of signal, Rainaut stirs behind Brother Peire and mumbles something into his neck.
"Are you awake?" Brother Peire asks.
"No," Rainaut answers. His arm tightens across Brother Peire's chest. "But I think I'm hungry. And we should bathe. Did I mention the bath signals the end of one's participation in Midsummer? You wash yourself clean of dirt and sweat to show that your self and your spiritual practice are pure. I know, I know, we were just lying naked in the grass, taking our pleasure in each other's hands and mouths and hard, heavy - "
"Don't."
Rainaut chuckles. "Such delicate sensibilities you still have. Our coupling has nothing to do with spiritual or bodily purity. You wash to show that your heart is sincere and that you come before God with a clean soul."
Which is something Brother Peire understands. He can even look into his soul and reassure himself that it really is pure and that he's still sincere in his faith.
words: 2150
total words: 42,496
When he wakes again, the sun is full on his face, hot and painfully bright. He feels sticky and sweaty. His head is throbbing, his eyes are hot and dry, his mouth dry as well and his tongue thick and slow. He thinks he might be sick.
He tries to remember what he did last night, and the sense memory of Rainaut buried inside him, stretched out on top of him, weighing him down and breathing hot desire into his mouth makes something warm and yearning stir deep inside him. But the urge has left him. He wants to wash. He wants to lie down somewhere cool and dark and go back to sleep.
He really, really wants to be sick.
He untangles himself from Rainaut's arms and legs and sits up, but even that little motion is too much and he has to roll away onto his hands and knees to vomit on the grass. Everything he ate and drank last night – mostly drank, and how many cups did he swallow? Why did Rainaut bring a bottle out here with them? Why did he go back for another one? - comes back up until he's spitting bile, his stomach empty but still heaving. He can feel the sweat prickling along his hairline and down his spine. He's so embarrassed.
"Peire," Rainaut mumbles, apparently awake as well. "Are you – how are you?"
Ashamed, Brother Peire thinks. In desperate need of a purifying bath.
He hopes, irrationally, that God couldn't see him last night after all, nearly insensible from the mead and the wine and the heady, contagious desire of something so close to a pagan fertility festival that it may as well have been.
"You were sick."
"Yes." Brother Peire wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. "I drank too much. I can't believe how much."
"That's part of the point." There's a rustling, probably Rainaut sitting up, and then a warm, sweaty hand slowly rubbing Brother Peire's hot, sweaty back. "I did too. I don't think it stayed with me quite as badly, though."
Brother Peire sits back on his heels. He feels fractionally better, but his head is still pounding and now his eyes hurt and he feels disgusting and unfit for polite company.
"You sound fine," Brother Peire says, not meaning for it to come out as accusingly as it does. Rainaut just chuckles.
"Many more years of practice. Come. Put your clothes on and we'll go back. We both need water and a bath and a good few hours of sleep." A hand appears in Brother Peire's field of vision and he lets Rainaut haul him to his feet.
They find their clothes and get dressed. Rainaut takes the empty bottle – just one, and Brother Peire wonders what happened to the first one – and puts his other hand on the back of Brother Peire's neck and pulls him close so their foreheads are touching.
"Peace be upon you, my brother," he says softly. "I feel blessed that you shared your first Midsummer with me."
"What else was I going to do?" Brother Peire asks. "I wanted to."
"I could tell." He steps back, grins, and takes Brother Peire's hand.
They walk slowly back to the monastery and past the tables and benches still sitting out from last night. They pull up water from the fountain in the middle of the cloister yard, wash their faces and rinse out their mouths, and Rainaut pulls off his shirt to splash water on his shoulders and arms and chest.
"Bath now or later?" he asks. He doesn't look well – pale and tired and no doubt a little sick from all that he drank – but his voice is the same as it always is, if a little hoarse.
"Later. I need to lie down." Brother Peire still feels a little unsteady. The cold fountain water is refreshing but right now he really, really wants to be off his feet, on his side on the mattress, where he can close his eyes and breathe in and out and not worry about his legs deciding they don't want to hold him up after all. "We missed the dawn service. And the midnight service."
"What do you think we were doing out in the grass?"
Things I can't talk about in public, Brother Peire thinks.
"That was our prayer," Rainaut continues. "Or at least it was mine." He cups Brother Peire's face and Brother Peire hopes that no one is going to appear out of nowhere and see them. The cloister is unusually quiet for the late morning. He wonders how many people are still out in the fields or the grass, and how many have come back to sleep or bathe or eat or whatever it is they do after their wild Midsummer activities. "Midsummer is the night to throw off all your restraints and lose yourself in food and drink and dance and other people. It's the night for orgies, for excess. God wants us to lose our minds. There's no shame in being ill the next day." His thumb strokes Brother Peire's cheek in a comforting and distracting way.
"Then I honored your God well."
"I remember." Rainaut grins. "I'd kiss you but I imagine my mouth tastes like something sour and dead. Let's go lie down, and later we'll bathe and maybe eat. There's going to be a dusk service but it's expecting that not everyone will go, but we should be at the midnight service. The dusk service technically signals the end of Midsummer, but if we don't make it, it's not a problem."
"I don't think I can eat." His stomach mounts a weak protest at the thought.
"I'm not sure I can either. But there will be a cold buffet in the refectory, for the children at least."
Brother Peire takes another long drink from the bucket in the fountain, and they go back to the cell. The shutter is closed and the room is cool and dark, just what he wants. He and Rainaut peel off their clothes and lie down, Brother Peire's back to Rainaut's chest, their fingers twined together.
"Did you find peace?" Rainaut asks.
"When?"
"Last night. Very early this morning."
Brother Peire doesn't even have to think about it. "I did. If you can call, uh, did I, was I very loud?"
"I didn't notice."
"No one could hear us, could they?" He's a little surprised he didn't think of this last night, but maybe he did and he just doesn't remember. And he had a lot of other things to occupy him then.
"I doubt it. Did you hear anyone else?"
"Just you. And me."
Rainaut presses his lips to the back of Brother Peire's shoulder. "You made as much noise as you needed to, friar. As did I. God heard us and looked down on us with favor. Couldn't you feel it, that divine gaze? It would have felt like light."
"I felt like I was, like there were candles just under my skin, thousands of them lighting me up. I thought it was God, my God, looking down at me and hearing me cry your name. I felt Him. I thought I did. Not like, not like I could feel you, but like I would feel Him during prayer sometimes, in the Gray Friars' chapel, surrounded by my brothers, all of us singing His praise. It was like He looked down from Heaven and saw me."
For once the memory of standing in the chapel with his brother friars doesn't cause him any pain. It's a good memory, a warm memory, but it's just that, a memory. A part of the life he doesn't have any more, belonging to the man he used to be. The man he isn't any more.
It's an odd feeling, but not a bad one.
He closes his eyes.
"You were blessed, friar," Rainaut murmurs. "By your God or mine, it doesn't matter. But that was the touch of a divine hand. And that's the other point of Midsummer – to show yourself worthy of receiving God's favor."
"Did you?"
"Did I feel God's hand on my head? God's gaze on my skin? Of course I did. You couldn't hear me?" How he grins against Brother Peire's shoulder. "I saw God in you, my brother. In our coupling, and the sounds of your pleasure, and the look on your face, and the way you took me inside you, and the way you let me take you. I tasted God in your mouth and felt God on your skin."
"Please stop," Brother Peire says helplessly, feeling his cock twitch at the memories that Rainaut's words conjure up for him.
"I just want you to know what it meant to me, what we did. It was physical and spiritual, holy and profane both. It's important that you know. This too is part of the ritual, this expression after the fact of what the participants felt and saw, what it meant for them, what their pleasure showed them."
"I don't know what it meant to me. I felt God's attention turned on me, my God's attention, and I felt you, and, and, I don't know, maybe your God smiled on me as well. It did feel sacred. And pagan. And new. And I, I would do it again, next year. With, with you."
"Well, of course with me. This is the last time I'm going to talk about it. What men and women do in the fields on Midsummer is between them and their partners. It's not for other people to hear about."
"I won't tell anyone."
"I know you won't."
"People know, though, don't they. Amada knows. She, she wished me blessings with you. I won't have to say anything – they'll look at us and know."
"But you'll see her and know the same of her. Don't think about it too much. Midsummer isn't for thinking too hard. Go to sleep until your head feels better." His free hand brushes through Brother Peire's hair, a little awkwardly because of the way they're lying. "Peace lay upon you last night, my brother. May you keep it with you."
No, Brother Peire thinks, a little shocked at his profane thoughts, ou lay upon me.
But Rainaut did bring him peace, in a manner of speaking. The peace after ecstasy, and the peace of familiarity and affection and love.
"May you keep your peace with you too," he says. Rainaut doesn't say anything in return, and Brother Peire lets himself fall asleep.
The next time he wakes he feels better, more rested, less ill. He feels calm. He doesn't think he should, considering all his actions last night and very early this morning are enough to consign him to Hell for eternity, but he's reached some kind of peace in himself, some kind of acceptance that he'll never be a Gray Friar again and that he can't keep all the laws of his Order, but neither can he wholeheartedly follow all of the tenets of the heretics' beliefs. He still feels as if he's betraying God in some way, but he still loves God and still wants to serve Him – is still trying to serve Him in his own way – and isn't prepared to accept that God doesn't still want his service.
Maybe he can be both friar and heretic, or at least a friar who can adopt some of the practices of the heretic community that took him in. He certainly threw himself into their Midsummer celebrations.
As if thinking about that is some kind of signal, Rainaut stirs behind Brother Peire and mumbles something into his neck.
"Are you awake?" Brother Peire asks.
"No," Rainaut answers. His arm tightens across Brother Peire's chest. "But I think I'm hungry. And we should bathe. Did I mention the bath signals the end of one's participation in Midsummer? You wash yourself clean of dirt and sweat to show that your self and your spiritual practice are pure. I know, I know, we were just lying naked in the grass, taking our pleasure in each other's hands and mouths and hard, heavy - "
"Don't."
Rainaut chuckles. "Such delicate sensibilities you still have. Our coupling has nothing to do with spiritual or bodily purity. You wash to show that your heart is sincere and that you come before God with a clean soul."
Which is something Brother Peire understands. He can even look into his soul and reassure himself that it really is pure and that he's still sincere in his faith.
words: 2150
total words: 42,496
