Blaine had promised to teach his husband how to make love to him, but like many of the things Kurt really wanted in life, he ended up learning for himself.

It came about with no lengthy conversation beforehand, no explicit asking for permission, no thought other than Kurt kissing his husband, gazing deep into his eyes, and saying, “I want you, my lord.”

Blaine smiled at his young husband. Without explanation, he knew in what way Kurt referred. Kurt had been too nervous to mention it after their initial discussion of it, but there it was, a twinkle in Kurt’s eyes hinting at his meaning. This was not an offer of his body for his husband’s worship. This was him wanting to give Blaine the same pleasure that Blaine so often gave him.

Blaine took a step close to his husband and replied in an inviting whisper, “Then you may have me, Count.”

Kurt’s heart thumped so powerfully in his chest that he felt the whole of Earth swirl beneath his feet, both out of excitement and a touch of fear.

Kurt had little idea what he had gotten himself into with those words. His hands shook with nerves, and his mouth went dry in a way that no amount of water could quench. He did have, to a degree, a sensual knowledge of his husband, a basic understanding of the earl’s body. He knew which touches would make him moan, where to kiss to make him surrender. But in order to do what he was asking, what Blaine was offering, Kurt would have to go beyond what he already knew. It was one thing to straddle his husband and kiss down his neck as Blaine claimed him from underneath.

It would be another to hold Blaine down and make love to him in a more dominant fashion.

Kurt felt anxious, but he was also excited, and grateful that Blaine would allow him this opportunity.

There was nothing Blaine Anderson would not do for his beloved husband. Had Kurt asked for his wealth, Blaine would give him every cent of it. If Kurt wanted his lands, Blaine would give them to him, down to the last tree. Had Kurt demanded the removal of his other leg, Blaine would have done so gladly.

Still, Kurt was hesitant. As much as he wanted this, he did not wish to seem young and foolish. But Blaine could never think his husband foolish, and he enjoyed Kurt being young. He appreciated Kurt’s guilelessness. It was something Kurt had managed to hold on to, even with all that they had been through fighting against him, trying to force him to become cynical and world-weary.

Kurt was, in so many ways, still the boy that Blaine had first fallen in love with. The boy that Blaine had dreamt of for so long.

It was that boy that Blaine wanted to have him.

Blaine escorted his husband to their chambers and poured him a glass of brandy – not enough to inebriate him. Only a sip to loosen his nerves. Kurt did not usually partake in spirits. Blaine watched in amusement as Kurt threw back the whole swallow, sputtering and coughing when the liquid burned his throat.

“Oh…oh, God…” he managed between hacks. “That’s just…my lord…”

“I think that that is enough of that,” Blaine remarked, relieving Kurt of his glass before he could drop it to the floor. “Now, why don’t you undress for me?”

“I thought I was to be the one in charge, my lord,” Kurt asked, a pout on his rosy lips. But still he removed his clothes quickly; his mouth, his throat, his head, and, swiftly, the remainder of his body suddenly over-warm from the drink.

“Tis not about who is in charge, my love,” Blaine said. “But once you have removed your own clothes, then you can undress me. And besides” – Blaine leaned against the bed, folding his arms across his chest – “I do so enjoy watching you undress.”

“And why is that, my lord?” Kurt asked, needing this conversation to keep him going. He feared that he might lose his nerve beneath his husband’s darkening gaze. He would give in and let his husband have him instead.

And as much as he would enjoy it, he wanted this a bit more.

“Because, you are so elegant, my love…so graceful…”

Kurt tripped stepping out of his pants when his husband said this. He righted himself quickly, but it was all Blaine could do not to chuckle more than a little.

“Even when you are tipsy.”

“You’re one to talk,” Kurt grunted. “I have seen you so drunk you could not even manage the stairs to your room.”

“Regrettably, that is true,” Blaine said solemnly, “and for that, I apologize.”

Kurt smiled as he finished rolling down his stockings. “You are forgiven, my lord.”

“That is very gracious of you.”

When Kurt had himself entirely unclothed and his garments neatly set aside, he turned his attention to his husband.

“Maybe I should have you strip for me,” Kurt commented, sliding the coat from Blaine’s shoulders and down his arms, laying it carefully on the settee, “so that I may rest against the bed and watch you.”

“Ah, but undressing me is your duty, my love.”

“How do you wager?” Kurt asked, catching Blaine’s lips in a kiss before he could answer.

“Mmm…” Blaine hummed, reluctantly letting go so Kurt could pull his shirt over his head, “because it is late” - Blaine moved as needed to aid his husband’s efforts, but only slightly, quite enjoying playing the role of ‘doll’ - “it is cold. And I am infirm and getting old.”

“Horseshit,” Kurt exclaimed without thinking. He tossed his hands - still clutching his husband’s shirt - over his mouth. “My lord,” Kurt mumbled as Blaine began to laugh out loud, unable to hold it in any longer. “Oh, my lord. I am sorry. I usually don’t…I never…”

“It seems that that brandy has loosened your lips too well.” Blaine said, taking the shirt from Kurt’s hands and tossing it away with less care than his husband would have (which Blaine felt at liberty to do since it was a readymade shirt and not one of his husband’s designs. Those Blaine treated like gold).

“I believe you are right.” Kurt stripped off Blaine’s trousers, then started on the leather straps that attached his leg. In this, Blaine tried to take over, but Kurt slapped his husband’s hand hard enough to sting. And Blaine, surprised at first, found that he liked it. He liked this assertive, take charge side of Kurt. He was a man who respected Blaine, but did not kowtow to him. He loved Blaine, longed to please him, but did not jump simply because Blaine wanted it. But most of all, Blaine appreciated the fact that his false leg, that had soured the way Blaine saw himself for so long, meant little to Kurt. It did not frighten Kurt, and he did not find it ugly the way Blaine knew other lovers had.

And Kurt did not pity Blaine for it. It saddened Kurt, brought him great regret, but he felt not one iota of pity.

Kurt released Blaine from his prosthetic and hurried to put it away while Blaine pushed himself up on to the bed. Blaine relaxed against the pillows and watched his husband – his pale skin flushed pink from the alcohol, but not at all self-conscious as he strode to the end of the bed frame, to the casket where Blaine kept it. Kurt bent over at the waist and unintentionally presented himself to his husband. Blaine sat up and sucked in a breath at this vision of man that belonged to him and him alone; whose trim and masculine figure Blaine had been the only human ever to relish – his strong legs and back, his sublime hole, and his endowments on glorious display. Blaine reached for himself, needing a sensation of tightness around his cock to match that exquisite image.

Kurt stood and turned to see his husband holding himself, eyes glued to his body, and that pinkish flush on his skin turned a luminous, ruby red.

“My lord,” Kurt said, climbing up on the bed, “could you not wait for me?”

“I have no intention of tending to myself when I have a handsome young thing to do it for me,” Blaine said. “Only…”

“Only…?” Kurt asked, hovering over Blaine’s body, skin grazing skin, eyes on his mouth.

“Only” - Blaine sighed against Kurt’s cheek - “you have no idea what you do to me.” Blaine lunged up to capture Kurt’s lips, which Kurt kept a breath away, prompting his husband to earn his kiss by telling him more. “Your confident posture when you walk, the light in your smile, the color of your eyes…everything about you is miraculous.”

Kurt shyly lowered his eyes. He knew his husband wouldn’t lie by overstating his feelings. Blaine, on the whole, was rather to-the-point with his praise, which he did not give out lightly. But being called ‘miraculous’ was too much for Kurt to hear without evaporating from pure joy.

Blaine cupped a hand beneath Kurt’s chin and lifted his gaze.

“I thought we had an understanding,” Blaine admonished gently, “that you would never deprive me of your face.”

“I’m sorry, my lord,” Kurt said, “but when you say such wonderful things as that, it makes it difficult for me to remember.”

“What do I have to do to remind you?” Blaine brushed his lips along Kurt’s, tempting him into a kiss.

“Maybe you can start by telling me what it is you enjoy, my lord? So that I may make you feel good.”

“Ah, but the fun is in discovering that for yourself, husband,” Blaine replied, quite at his leisure to allow Kurt to explore his body for himself.

“As you wish, my lord.” Kurt laid down beside him. He kissed Blaine once, his fingertips stroking Blaine’s cheek with feather-light touches. Then he put a hand to Blaine’s shoulder, turning him on to his side.

“Do you need me faced away from you so quickly?” Blaine asked, his heart racing at the tender way his husband manipulated his body.

“Shhh, my love,” Kurt whispered, placing a line of delicate kisses down the nape of Blaine’s neck. “I shall start where I want to start, and this is what I choose.” In truth, Kurt had done so partly because he didn’t wish his husband to see him flustered. It was safe for Kurt to ply his courage this way, where his husband could not see, than to do so face-to-face and risk faltering under his scrutiny.

Kurt’s fingers danced down Blaine’s back, tracing the lines of his muscles in much the same way Blaine did to Kurt, but where Blaine’s fingers were stout and strong, Kurt’s were long and lithe. Where Blaine’s were fairly sure of their path, Kurt’s sometimes stuttered along the way. But he did not give up, going back over the same spots, experimenting with speed, pressure, stopping on occasion to massage, to lick and to kiss.

For all of Blaine’s willingness to submit to Kurt’s innocent ministrations, his attempt to learn Blaine’s body the way Blaine had learned his, Blaine almost could not contain himself. There was a bittersweet beauty to Kurt’s hands and how they caressed Blaine’s skin. The softness of Kurt’s hands were unparalleled by anything Blaine could think of – rose petals, rabbit fur, velvet.

Kurt had the touch of an angel; one who knew nothing about sin.

“I feel your fingers tremble, my love,” Blaine said in an equally unsteady voice. “Is there something wrong?”

“No, my lord,” Kurt said. “It’s just that…I long to be inside you.”

“Then do so,” Blaine replied simply, masking the fact that he himself could no longer wait. He needed Kurt so badly, he felt about ready to tear out of his skin.

“But, I do not wish for this to be over so quickly.”

“This isn’t the only time we’ll have to be together, love,” Blaine promised, arching into Kurt’s touch. “Go as fast or as slow as you want.”

Kurt looked thoughtfully at Blaine’s back. “Are you certain?”

“You are in control, are you not? You set the pace.” He reached back for Kurt’s hand, and Kurt gave it. “I will enjoy whatever you share with me,” Blaine assured him, kissing across his knuckles to seal those words.

“All right, my darling.” Kurt left Blaine’s body and reached behind to his nightstand for his ampule of olive oil. He opened it and spread the oil over his fingers. As Blaine waited for the return of his husband’s warmth and his touch, his mind wandered through thoughts of the life they had shared so far, specifically to the many times they had made love. More recently, during Kurt’s recovery, when they had to start over from scratch and re-learn what it meant to make love to one another again.

It took a while before Blaine could convince Kurt to undress completely in front of him. When they bathed together, slept together, or made love, Kurt required a shirt to cover the scar that Matthew’s wicked knife had left in his back. Blaine had thought, for a while, that vanity caused Kurt to remain clothed; that he feared Blaine would see him as imperfect and damaged.

Much the same way that Blaine felt Kurt would perceive him if he ever caught sight of Blaine’s leg.

But it was for a much more heart wrenching reason that Kurt refused to expose his body.

It was for Blaine’s sake, but not out of fear that Blaine would think him unhandsome. It was because Kurt knew that Blaine blamed himself for what happened to him – how Kurt had almost died at the hands of a man Blaine had hired to work in his household, never knowing that he was, in fact, Blaine’s half-brother, set on revenge. Kurt did not wish for his husband, who often enjoyed making love to Kurt from behind, to have to look upon that scar and despise himself during a time when they should simply be free to revel in one another.

And that was how Blaine knew that Kurt was the man meant for him all along…because Blaine would have. He would have looked at that scar on his husband’s shoulder and hated himself to the depths of his soul for his weakness and for his infirmity. Knowing this, he looked upon it with new eyes and only saw the strength of his husband – the fiery man who slid down a rocky hillside, fought a blade bare handed, and leapt into the unknown depths of a powerful river to save the life of their adopted daughter – the daughter of Blaine’s brother, Cooper, and the only known Anderson heir.

Kurt always told Blaine how much he owed him for coming back into his life and loving him. But Blaine owed Kurt more. He, and the entire Anderson family, owed Kurt everything. And Blaine promised himself that he would give it, with every beat of his heart and every bone in his body.

Blaine felt Kurt’s fingers, slick with oil, slide down his spine, and even though the oil warmed with the heat of Kurt’s hand, it sent a shiver along Blaine’s skin. His touch was so gentle, Blaine absorbed it into his skin, into his body, and it surrounded his heart with its tenderness.

“Oh, Kurt,” Blaine moaned around a heavy swallow, but it was a moan that spoke of sorrow as well as eros. “Oh, my love…”

“Am I…doing something wrong?” Kurt asked, pulling his hand away. Blaine reached behind and brought it back.

“Oh, no, my love,” Blaine said. “You are perfect. Simply perfect. You are everything I could ever want. You are…divine.”

Blaine did not wish to upset his husband by admitting that Kurt’s tentative touches brought Blaine back to his first time – a time that was awkward and clumsy and, in some ways, unspeakably painful. Oh how he had wished that that first time could have been with Kurt. He hated the manner in which he gave his virtue away – three sheets to the wind, and with a barmaid who couldn’t care less about him aside from the fact that, in his naïveté, he had paid her too much. She stared at the ceiling while he mounted her, and moaned so loudly and obscenely fake that other men waiting outside her door for their turn laughed at him when he left. The only reason he climaxed at all was because he had managed to fool himself that the soft, pale skin beneath his fingertips, and the blue eyes that glanced at him from time to time to see if he was done, belonged to Kurt. But later on, when the full realization of how well he had fooled himself hit him, he wept.

But had he been with Kurt, had they been together, being deflowered would have been a much sweeter affair, full of talking and kisses, shy laughter and words of love.

Unlike the despicable way Blaine deflowered his own husband.

He wouldn’t have gotten drunk first.

He wouldn’t have taken him from behind.

He wouldn’t have left immediately after.

Could he replace one memory of heartache, and one of humiliation, with this one? With Kurt’s soft touches and his sweet voice?

Blaine prayed it would.

“My love,” Kurt whispered when slipping his fingers past the crack of Blaine’s ass caused him to stiffen, “you are so gorgeous, so amazingly handsome and strong. And I am so lucky to have you for my own.”

“And I you,” Blaine replied past the lump building in his throat.

Kurt’s first touch to Blaine’s hole brought a gasp and a moan so unguarded, it sent a thrill racing through Kurt limbs, nearly making them weak. But that sound made Kurt bold, and it made him curious. He slid a single finger in slowly – his index finger and only to the first knuckle, working it past the tight ring of Blaine’s muscle with extreme patience while he kissed across Blaine’s shoulders.

Blaine prepared to be entered by thinking of ways to relax, but he really didn’t need to. Kurt did that for him. He was so much more soothing with his movements than Blaine had been with him their first time, probably ever so much more than Blaine still was. Kurt laid himself out behind his husband, no longer keeping them parted by a respectable distance. He loved watching his finger disappear into his husband’s body, but he needed the feeling of Blaine against him more.

Kurt’s one finger plunging inside Blaine sent pulses through Blaine’s muscles, unwinding every knot and loosening every hitch. He rolled on to his stomach and Kurt followed, covering his husband’s body with his own as he finally dared a second finger and began to scissor him open.

“Oh, Kurt…” Blaine moaned, his body becoming restless, his need to have his husband strong. “Please, Kurt…I can’t…I…”

Blaine felt Kurt breathe against his shoulders, shuddering at his begging, perhaps. Or at the constant undulation of his hips in search of friction. These were the same things that stirred Blaine deep inside when he fingered Kurt, and he wondered if they affected his husband the same way.

Blaine placed his palms flat on the mattress and pushed up, wobbling as he tried to find his balance. He wished to be on his hands and knees when his husband took him, not lying, face down, like a hole in the mattress, but he could not maintain that position for too long with only the one leg to support him.

“Shhh, my love,” Kurt said, putting a hand on Blaine’s back to still him as he removed his fingers and reached for more oil, this time for his cock. “Lie down, and let me take care of you.”

Blaine wanted to object. He wanted to explain. But Kurt’s was such a genuine entreaty, that Blaine chose to do as his husband wanted. After all, he had promised Kurt this. He had given him leave, he had granted him freedom.

He needed to hold to that.

Blaine felt Kurt line his cock to his entrance, and held his breath as he waited for Kurt to breach. It was not a response that he could help. Blaine was bracing for pain, for he believed there would be quite a lot of it. There had been for Kurt when Blaine first had sex with him. Blaine remembered shushing him over and over. He remembered massaging Kurt’s back in an attempt to soothe him.

He remembered Kurt’s virgin body clenching around his cock.

Blaine had felt that with other men and women he’d slept with, but he chose not to remember those – to ever remember them again. They were inconsequential. They did not exist. They crept up every so often to remind Blaine of what a cad he had been, but Kurt was always there with him to kiss those thoughts away.

Kurt pushed in completely, and Blaine remembered how to breathe again.

“Oh, God, my lord,” Kurt uttered with broken words in one long, pleasure-filled grunt, and the knowledge escaped Blaine once more. “You are so…”

“So…?” Blaine asked, fascinated by everything his husband felt about this moment, wanting to know anything he was moved to say.

“I…don’t want to be vulgar,” Kurt said, sounding bashful. He pushed in just a hair farther, and Blaine immediately felt his blood boil.

“Go ahead, my love,” Blaine moaned, thinking For the love of God! Whatever that is you are doing, keep doing it! “Be vulgar. I will not judge you for it.”

“You are so…tight.” Kurt pulled out slowly and pushed in again. “Yes,” he said, as if agreeing with himself on that point. “Yes, tight. That’s it. That’s it exactly, my lord. Marvelously tight…”

Kurt’s voice ebbed away as he began to move a bit faster, and Blaine became so relaxed, he thought he might dissolve into a puddle on the sheets. Having Kurt inside him was an inexplicable luxury. He had wanted this, but was also wary of it. He thought it might be uncomfortable, to say the least, as Kurt was larger when aroused than Blaine had ever given him credit for, even in his fantasies. But Kurt was considerate. He touched Blaine with a deliberateness, following those touches where he could with kisses. He kissed and touched, touched and kissed, as if he would never get enough. Blaine could feel the love in Kurt through his lips and his fingertips. There was not a single touch wasted; not a one that did not translate some message of love or want or longing. It dawned on Blaine that Kurt treated him the way he himself liked to be treated.

Cherished and adored.

Again, Blaine’s heart broke, for this was the way Blaine should have made love to his husband on their wedding night. He should have pushed pride and bitterness aside, and came to him the way he had dreamt of it.

As a lover to his prince.

And that realization made Blaine want to cry out in despair.

But here they were, husbands and lovers, and friends most of all, so Blaine endeavored to forget all of that and feel only joy in his husband’s embrace.

“Oh, Kurt,” Blaine whimpered, the emotion within him swelling to drown out the angst coloring his tone. “Oh, my love.”

“Oh, Blaine,” Kurt returned, knowing none of Blaine’s anguish, not comprehending the catch in his breathing, or the break in his voice. “Oh, my darling Blaine. My God, you feel incredible.” He took Blaine’s hands in his, weaving their fingers together and pinning them to the mattress beside Blaine’s head.

“Oh, God in heaven,” Blaine moaned, pushing back against Kurt’s hold but only to feel his strength, confirm what he’d always suspected – that Kurt, if he wanted, could hold Blaine down with little effort, and have him at his mercy.

And that turned Blaine on immensely.

“Oh, Kurt…just…just stay like that…”

“For how long, my darling?” Kurt asked with a giggle. “Because I’m not too sure how much longer I can last.”

“Forever,” Blaine groaned. “Until the end of time. I don’t care, just…don’t ever stop, Kurt. Don’t ever stop…”

“I’ll try,” Kurt said, slowing down a trifle, hoping to make it last for his husband though his own body had been begging for release the second he entered Blaine’s body.

It had begun to storm outside. Thunder echoed in the sky, the chill night heavy with a rain that turned to sleet the second it hit the air. It pounded the windows, bringing with it a threat of cold that neither Kurt nor Blaine could feel. They were a single entity, a twin flame that burned hot where they touched. The only sound Kurt could hear was his husband moaning. It filled his ears and blocked out everything else.

“I love you, Kurt,” Blaine said. “God, I love you…”

“I love you, too,” Kurt mumbled, letting go of Blaine’s hands and grabbing hold of the headboard for leverage so he could snap his hips harder. Blaine struggled to rise to his knee. He couldn’t stay like that long, but he could long enough to make it easier for Kurt to go deeper. Just a few times would be all he needed.

“Blaine!” Kurt exclaimed in concern. “What are you…?”

“Don’t worry, my love. Just…keep going.”

“But Blaine…”

“Don’t slow down…”

“Blaine…”

“And don’t stop…”

“But, Blaine…my darling…I do not think that…G-god! Oh God!” Kurt grabbed Blaine’s hips as Blaine had hoped and pounded harder, this angle easier to move with longer thrusts than before, especially when Blaine lowered his shoulders and head to the pillow. He felt Kurt shudder almost instantly. Kurt reached a hand around to grab his husband’s cock and stroke it as best he could as tremors began to rock his body. He tried to keep up, tried to maintain that pace that Blaine had let him set, but there was a talent to doing these three things at once – staying upright, moving his hips, and stroking his husband – that Kurt had yet to master. He managed to do passably well, and when he began to falter, his husband helped by bucking back.

“That’s it, my love,” Blaine said, his teeth chattering from the climax he couldn’t hold on to any longer. “Almost there…I’m…almost there…keep going, my love…”

“I…” Kurt was about to say he couldn’t. He was about to admit that he had reached the limits of his energy. But when he felt Blaine’s hips go still, saw his back curl, felt his cock pulse in his hand, Kurt knew he could let go. “Oh, Blaine,” Kurt muttered as he came inside his lover’s body for the first time in his life. As much as he loved when his husband took control, showed himself for the dominant man that he was, this was an experience Kurt could definitely see himself getting used to. “Oh, Blaine,” he continued in a voice that choked off with every stunted thrust of his hips. “You gracious…glorious…gift of a human being.” Blaine fell to the bed with his husband on top of him, thankful to have his weight to keep him grounded. He wanted to bask in the praise of his beautiful husband, but along with his orgasm came a sudden and unexpected conflict of emotions. He needed to get them sorted before he could speak a word to Kurt.

“Thank you, my lord,” Kurt panted against his shoulder. “Thank you so much for that. For letting me…” Kurt shook his head, at a loss for even the simplest of words to express his feelings. A giddy hiccup came out when he attempted another thank you, so he simply melted into his husband’s back. He felt he couldn’t be closer to Blaine than he was at that very moment, and yet he ached to be closer. But when Kurt received nothing but silence in response, he began to worry. “Are you…are you alright, my lord?” Kurt pulled out of his husband quickly to be sure. “Was that…acceptable?” he asked, frowning that he could not find a more apropos word.

Blaine collected himself sufficiently to look back over his shoulder and meet his husband’s eyes. He smiled his roguishly crooked smile, and Kurt sighed with relief.

It killed Blaine that it worked.

He did not want to deceive his husband into believing he was alright when, for the moment, he wasn’t. But being made love to that way by his Kurt, finally, after all of this time, was something he refused to spoil, so he focused on that instead.

“That was exceptional,” Blaine said, and Kurt positively glowed. “You, my love, are a god.” Blaine turned his body to face him, hissing a bit when he rolled on to his behind, and Kurt’s look of elation fell.

“My lord, are you hurt? Did I…did I not open you up enough?” Kurt asked.

“You did, my love,” Blaine said, settling on his side with another slight hiss of pain. “It’s not that. It’s just…I am a little sore. I have not done it that way…ever…”

“What? Why not?” Kurt asked, mildly confused.

Blaine smiled kindly. “My love, I am an earl. People don’t much care what I do, but how I do it is of great import to some. It would seem like a weakness to allow someone to do that to me.”

Kurt’s face turned white, the relaxing murmur of his orgasm completely erased by those words.

“But…” Kurt sputtered, deeply hurt by this insinuation that what applied to his husband’s character did not apply to Kurt’s; that Kurt was somehow lesser than Blaine, and could be denoted as such, humiliatingly so, by the manner in which they made love, “but what about…”

“My love” – Blaine took Kurt’s hands in his and held them – “you are not weak by any means. And if anyone had ever been stupid enough to believe you so, I feel that their minds have been quite changed, don’t you?”

“I would like to believe so,” Kurt pouted, but less offended after receiving his husband’s praise.

“Well, I know so, so you should listen to me, Count Anderson,” Blaine said, kissing his husband’s fingers.

“Yes, Lord Anderson,” Kurt said in a sulking manner.

Blaine felt his husband beside him, sinking into the mattress of their bed with a despondent sigh. He couldn’t have that. He couldn’t have his husband feeling lackluster and disheartened after such magical lovemaking. That the ridiculous conventions of society should have any say in the way in which they conducted their private lives was absolutely preposterous. Blaine knew of no one in the world braver than his husband, kinder than his husband.

More worthy of accolades and devotion than his husband, and he was inclined to shower him with some.

“Before we go to sleep, my love, there is something that I do need to ask.” Blaine grabbed hold of Kurt’s arms and wrapped them around his naked body. He needed to be forever trapped by them, ensconced in their warmth, caged by their strength.

“What is that, my darling?” Kurt asked with another deep sigh, pulling the covers around their bodies as the cold from outside crept in.

“Where, my love, did you learn to do that so well?”

Blaine could feel Kurt’s manner change. He wrapped his arms tighter around Blaine’s waist and torso, moving a few inches to be closer to him.

“Hmm…” Kurt smiled, pressing it to Blaine’s skin and thus branding it to his shoulder, so that he might feel it for all time. “I am fortunate to have an exceptional teacher.”