A/N: "Here" is a companion piece to Tobiume's Bloom.

For C, who is my girl with really deep thoughts

betrothal: two prose poems

Here

She's small when she's underneath him, fragile like a porcelain doll, not tall and imposing as she is when she stands shadowing him in the courtyard (or in the throne room when they linger side by side), enraging him, making him wish he could cut her down several heads, not dead, but remedied to my taste, he thinks and curls his tongue out to sample where her moon-white stomach meets her waist. Because, here, here in bed she's perfect and she moans and wails and screams, her fists balled in his hair as he sinks his teeth into her smooth shoulders making blood streams that pool in the curves of her, lightly suckles her nipples and revels in her writhing beneath him. Am I good, my lady? he asks with a crack of the crop to her back, am I good, and then he feels raw and exposed like a child, never doing quite right, never man enough, not making anyone proud, you're not making anyone proud. Father's been in the ground a month but his voice is still loud and when she looks up, dolly eyes wide, he is afraid sometimes she can see right inside so he digs into her skin with that long, hard piece of him, the piece that can coax either cries of pain or his name from her rosy lips in a lusty sigh, cooing Joffrey, Joff. And he's not certain which he likes best, to kick or caress, but he prides himself upon the fact that he's trained her to respond to his touch, his once wild wolf is tame and he is her Master. He stuffs it inside her as her sapphire eyes roll back and he grips her by the hips, his jaw slack as he pierces through her, not wasting any time, seconds later shooting hot white rivers inside and sighing with accomplishment, cradling her in his spindly, thin arms. Because here, here, in the bed, he is doing good, whether she agrees or not.

Swirl

this, he thinks, his hand moving from her plump breast (pert nipple flexed forward like a sweet bud begging for light) to the flower folded wet between her smooth thighs, this is the woman I will marry, this is my queen. Her head is bent back and for a moment she looks like that whore, that what was her name I had tied to my bed so I could hunt her like a rare tiger, (her mouth open and her eyes fluttering shut before he used his very last arrow on her very most important organ, dead whores can speak no treason) then he is brought back into the moment when his lady lets out a moan of pleasure, not a sputtering moan of crimson exposing all her sinful words, but he gives a lofty sigh still and plummets his fingers forward, making her cry out and laugh, a lilting and beautiful sound. He likes that she sees his truths, holds him with her head shielded by his chest and she pays him pretty compliments, tossing out words like handsome, strong, intellectual and hero, and he holds his thin chin up, his face aglow, he knows these things by heart because (years ago) his mother would hold him and she told him so. But kings do not need mothers, and he does not need Cersei anymore, she's about as useful to him as that crumpled whore (bloody chest swelling and a groan of death leaving her hanging body as the arrow made its mark). Margaery, though, Margaery understands. She knows where to place her teeth and her hands, and she's a mirror Joffrey can see himself looking into, forever. Her body is impeccable and she lets him use it, he holds her hand, grabs and twists her tits and drinks warm kisses from the corners of her lips and he wants this to be enough, he really does. Yet as he sticks in four fingers and solemnly swirls, he remembers the soft cries and the whimpers of his redheaded Stark girl. He really does not want to pluck out the petals from his Tyrell rose, but tender touches tend to grow tedious, this much Joffrey knows.