Knowledge, Late in the Day.

TITLE: Knowledge, late in the day. 1/1.
AUTHOR: Belinda, Doom's Eyebrow (eyebrowofdoom@yahoo.com)
URL: http://www.dombillijah.com/~eyebrowofdoom
FANDOM: Hornblower
PAIRING: Horatio/Pellew
RATING: NC-17 for explicit m/m sex
SPOILERS: HH3
SUMMARY: "No, no," the Admiral said. "I have come to see how you are getting on."
NOTES: A gfor for Mary Crawford, as part of the Yuletide obscure fandoms secret Santa project (http://www.intimations.org/yuletide/).
FEEDBACK: Yes, please.
DISCLAIMER: These characters belong to C S Forrester and A&E, and no profit is made, nor disrespect intended, by their use here.


The banner of stars had unfurled above the dark gables of the street when Horatio returned that night from his evening stroll, to find a figure standing at ease in the military style before Mrs Mason's door. Horatio had thought on Admiral Pellew so much, this last day since their encounter at the club, that it was for a moment not strange at all that the figure should be the Admiral. He had marvelled at the rush of youthful sentiment that had come over him at seeing the Admiral again: that old, anxious pleasure he had felt as a young midshipman when circumstance bade him submit at any length to his captain's regard. So, in that moment, it were as if Horatio had conjured the Admiral there upon the cobbles. And it was no strangeness that at the strike of Horatio's heel, the Admiral should look up and release the pose, and it should be apparent that the Admiral had been waiting for him.

"Mr Hornblower," the Admiral said. The shadows of his face in the gloom broadened to suggest the familiar smile.

"Admiral Pellew." Horatio brought himself up short. "Does the navy...?" For it was at some naval happenstance that his mind grasped.

"No, no," the Admiral said. "I have come to see how you are getting on. Won't you show me in?"

"Yes," Horatio said, "yes, of course." And he stepped forward to the door.

It was now, fumbling in the darkness of the narrow doorway with his key, the Admiral close behind, that Horatio began to be what one might call *taken aback*.

And now it was full strange, when the Admiral had followed him inside. The Admiral was boxed in at the foot of the narrow stairs, too large and fine and decorative a doll for so meagre a dollhouse, and Horatio was forced by the closeness of the place to stand nearer than respect might dictate. He dreaded to seek flint for the lamps in the parlour, lest Mrs Mason awake in drunkenness and come below.

But the Admiral said, at a discreet volume, "Come now, let us not wake the house. Show me up."

With relief, Horatio took up the candle at the foot of the stairs. During the ascent, he said quietly, "I shall seek out Mr Bush. He may not yet have retired."

"Ah, no," the Admiral said. "I would not disturb Mr Bush."

Upon the thin rug on the upstairs landing, Horatio's step slowed. But the Admiral peered into the hall and said, "Come along, Mr Hornblower."

The runner in the hall was so weathered, it barely muffled their heels, and with each step, it became more clear that Horatio really was going to entertain the Admiral in his room. And then he was opening the door and directing the Admiral within.

A shyness, a fright overcame him at the exposure of his wretched lodgings thus. To let the Admiral behold, at such intimate quarters, the depths to which Horatio had sunk was insufferable. There was a kind of nakedness to the candlewick so threadbare, the walls so close and mean, the open lid of his old midshipman's trunk and its scanty contents. Already, while Horatio settled the candle on the mantel, in a few steps his guest had traversed the lateral extent of the floor.

"My dear young man," the Admiral said. "The peace is not treating you well." There was nothing but warmth in his voice.

Horatio found he had to retreat to the window. "Not at all, Sir," he said. "I am quite content here."

There was no mistaking the approach of the Admiral's tread across the bare boards. "You are agitated," the Admiral said. The voice came from very close behind him.

At length, Horatio found there was a hand on his shoulder. "You mustn't be agitated," the Admiral said.

Against the sharpest revolt of the sensibility that had driven him to the window, Horatio allowed himself to be turned around. Before he could speak, the Admiral raised his hand to Horatio's face, and stroked his palm across Horatio's cheek, his thumb across Horatio's lips.

Horatio thought perhaps that he had never been touched so, that not even a nursemaid had lingered thus. There now nowhere to flee, for already the windowsill pressed hard up behind him. The Admiral's thumb traversed the circumference of his lips again, and slowly again. Horatio stared at the candle dance on the mantel, at the shadows sway in the corner of the ceiling; then at last it seemed he must look at the Admiral himself, and he found in the Admiral's gaze so perfect and frank a seriousness that he could not look away again. And when the Admiral cupped instead the back of his head, and pushed, Horatio could not but tilt it forward with helpless obedience, could not but submit to the Admiral's pressing his lips to his.

Then it seemed he must submit to more and more: to be pulled close, breast to breast, to open his mouth for the Admiral's tongue. And after long moments of that, in which his own tongue joined the fray, he found that his coat was pushed to the floor, his shirt loosened and dragged up, his bare skin stroked and tickled, his nipples tweaked and pinched. His agitation had both softened and deepened, and there seemed naught to do but to push the Admiral's coat to the floor in turn, to arch into the pinching fingers, to tilt his mouth for another kiss, and another.

Then the Admiral tugged him forth, and around, and lifted the shirt over his head, and tumbled him onto the bed. Here now was a frank revelation, brought forth by the closeness of their hips, and with it, Horatio's understanding of their enterprise together ripened to fullness. Fright had departed from him, and he was able to put it to himself calmly that the Admiral wanted to bugger him, and by all accounts he was going to submit, though he knew not how such a thing was accomplished. Indeed he found he could ask himself without distress whether this was not what he had always wanted from his captain, and have the accusation in the question sound but faint.

Catamite - he tried the word out on himself - it meant an abject thing, like a woman. But he did not feel like a woman, or like an abject thing, more some impossibly, terribly real version of himself, as the Admiral slipped his breeches and his stockings down. And how the Admiral knew him then, seized such knowledge of him as was greater even than his own: for the tenderness of the skin of his inner thigh, the delicate sensation provoked by the cupping and lifting of his sacs, these were unknown to Horatio. Even the firm and rhythmic grip of this strange hand was a new country. And to look full upon his conqueror's face as the conquest was assayed - what luminous bravery there was in this, to submit to be utterly known in this way, and to meet the gaze of the knower unflinching!

At last the lines of the Admiral's face creased deeply, and he rose and staggered a step from the bed to unclothe himself fully. Returning, he threw himself down upon Horatio, kissing him and introducing a leg intimately between Horatio's thighs. He proceeded to rock, full of cunning intent. With the Admiral's own swollen member pressed against him, Horatio found that he cried out now, as he had not done before.

And then, with a cry of his own, the Admiral was up, and manhandling him onto his front, upon his knees. "Darling, darling, please let me," the Admiral gasped, his voice hoarse and affected as Horatio had never heard it. It was so shocking that Horatio could not have resisted had he wanted to His mind capered around *darling* like a cur about a bone - he could scarce give thought to the matter that was to be let.

The long slide of a caressing hand, from the intimate, ticklish back of his neck to the very base of his spine, this brought him back to himself. And then Horatio's stomach contracted at the spreading and fondling of his buttocks, and the shock of cool air in the terribly private cleft between them. But far more was to come - he found his entrance was astonishingly sensitive to the touch of a finger, and to a wet, circular massage in turn, and he pressed his face into the pillow in mortification. The first intrusion made him burn, and arch in panic, though the Admiral hushed him, and he became more accustomed to the sensation with each new assay.

Still the great, implacable bluntness of the thing itself gave him fright. "Shh, darling! Slowly," the Admiral said. And Horatio heard him lick his fingers once more. At last it did begin to slide within, and Horatio marvelled at what depth and breadth of space his body could surrender, with shrill complaint all the way.

When his hips had come flush with Horatio's, the Admiral rested against his back, reaching beneath for his member and stroking it for a time, hard and intent, unlingering.

"Now then," the Admiral said softly, and began to move. The edge was off the discomfort, and in a moment, the Admiral sighed, and sped a little faster, and then Horatio began to feel he understood this, to push back, to feel as though he could sigh himself.

And when he did sigh, the Admiral reached beneath him and took him in hand once more, and the pleasure of both had become one pleasure, spreading deep into his vitals. Now the Admiral made fierce, wordless comment upon each sheathing of himself in Horatio's body. The hunger to spit himself faster on this great spear became intolerable to Horatio. A flush shot across his skin, and he begged, "Harder."

Harder the Admiral did take him, till the impact of their bodies became brutish, and it was all Horatio could do to press his face into the pillow, and brace his arched back, and finally, helplessly, spill his seed upon the candlewick. Shortly the Admiral spent himself in turn, with a cry, and lay close against Horatio's back, arms tight around him.

A carriage rattled past outside, as they lay together. And it was over now, and they had done this thing: they had unclothed each other, and laid down, and kissed as a man and a woman will do, and Horatio had rolled over and the Admiral had done it, and indeed, Horatio had begged for more; and this act could not be undone, this knowledge not be unlearned. And neither, now, could he unlearn of this space he had in his body in which another man might sheathe himself: he would carry the knowledge of it around with him, indeed feel as though he newly carried the thing itself around, like a freshly grown limb.

Gently the Admiral uncoupled thend Hnd Horatio lay for a time on his front.

Then he turned over, back to face the Admiral, and he thought he had never seen the dear face look so severe, as the Admiral bent to kiss him, carefully now, unhurried.

Horatio shifted to lie across the Admiral's chest, and made, unwilling, a small noise of complaint at the twinge his body gave him.

"I have not punished you too much, I hope," the Admiral said.

"If punishment is to deter, it was a poor one," Horatio answered, quiet into his neck. Some shame, it seemed, had returned to him, for heat rose in his face.

They lay quiet. Then the Admiral's voice came soft, warm across Horatio's scalp. "I could not stand you ever to hate me."

"It is you who should hate me," Horatio said. "I found my courage late in the day."

Horatio raised his face, and they kissed again. The Admiral held Horatio's jaw and looked at him, and presently, Horatio looked back.


-end-