A/N: I posted two chapters today so if you clicked right here, you'll want to go back to five!

Also: Lemons as promised!

Disclaimer: Sofia is 18, Cedric is 34, I don't own either of them, or anyone else mentioned. I'm just inking Sofia cause we all know she's got a naughty side in there somewhere!

.o~O*O~o.

It was only a few hours before dawn when the coach landed in front of the castle.

To Cedric's surprise he could see Baileywick standing at the bottom of the steps holding a lantern.

When the coach came to a stop he opened the door and extended his arm to hand Sofia down.

If she was still upset about this morning he couldn't tell. She seemed too worn out to give Baileywick much attention and simply thanked him quietly before starting up the steps.

Cedric followed her out, but before he could catch up to her, Baileywick blocked his path.

"I need to speak with you." The Steward's tone was unreadable.

Sofia turned just a few steps from the top and looked at him with worried eyes.

"Go on up Dearest. I'll be along in a few minutes." Cedric told her, trying to keep his voice level.

She didn't need any more drama today. Truthfully he didn't either, but if one of them had to take it on cuff he would gladly be the one.

Once Sofia was out of sight, Cedric eyed Baileywick with disdain.

"Say whatever you have to say then get out of my way, it's been a long day."

They'd never been very polite to one another, but after this morning the older man should simply be grateful he didn't have a Sorcerer out for revenge.

"I wanted to say… that is…I apologize." Baileywick looked away then as if apologizing and looking Cedric in the eye while he did it was just too humiliating. "I shouldn't have barged in on you this morning and I shouldn't have implied that…I shouldn't have implied what I did."

"Implied what you did? I assume you're referring to the part where you accused me of raping my wife?"

Baileywick's head shot up at that and there was an unmistakable look of anger there.

"She isn't your wife yet." He spit.

"Words are wind Baileywick. Saying a few of them in front of a crowd and getting a new piece of jewelry changes nothing between her and me. She'll mean as much to me on that day as she does on this one, as she always has."

"Then you admit it." Baileywick looked as incredulous as he was angry.

"Merlin's mushroom's what are you on about now?"

"That you've had designs on Sofia since she was a child!

What were you doing with her up there all those years while everyone thought you're magic lessons where so innocent? How did you manipulate her into believing she loves you?

Other people might think you're nothing more than peevish and anti-social, but I've always seen you for what you are. You're a scheming snake with a soul as black as soot, only out for himself. You don't love Sofia. You want her to achieve some end of yours, and when you have it you'll throw her away broken.

How she can't see what you are, how she can let you…touch her like that, I have no idea. But then she's always seen only what she wants to in others."

"This is quite an apology Baileywick. You may want brush up on the form though before you go making one to anybody else."

"I don't hear a denial!" Baileywick looked triumphant at that, as though he'd caught Cedric out.

Cedric didn't have the heart to tell the Steward he was about eight years too late with his accusations of ulterior motives.

The way Baileywick was going, finding out he missed his chance to have Cedric beheaded by so wide a margin might cause a fatal heart attack.

That would be fine with Cedric, but it would probably make Sofia sad. More than likely sad enough to cry. And when she cried, which she'd already done far too much today, he felt like someone was twisting a knife into him. He was utterly indifferent to the suffering of any other living being, save her. Her pain was a thing he simply could not bear.

So he'd have to let Baileywick live.

"If I did deny it would you believe me?

If I told you how deeply and honorably I love her, how much I need her, how far I would go to make her happy, would it change your opinion of me in the slightest?"

Baileywick's only answer was a look of contempt.

"I thought not. Why don't we just finish this non-apology and if the King asks, since I assume it's him who put you up to this, I'll say you were humble and contrite. Now move aside."

With that Cedric's left shoulder smashed into Baileywick's right as he pushed passed the Steward.

"Don't think I won't be watching for the moment when you turn on her!" Baileywick called after him.

Cedric knew he should just keep walking, but he found himself turning to look down at the other man.

For someone who others seemed to think was a sniveling, shrinking coward, he certainly seemed to have developed a habit of poking already enraged bears with sharp sticks.

"I really don't care what you do Baileywick as long as you NEVER enter my tower without explicit permission again. Do we understand each other?"

The Steward made a grudging grunt of assent.

"And just so we're perfectly clear, whatever your opinion of me, if you ever again insinuate I used Sofia's affection for me to abuse a child or that I've forced myself on her, I'll kill you, and I won't do it quickly.

You're wrong about my feelings for her, but you're more right than you know about the blackness of my soul."

With that he turned and finished making his way up the stairs, without a backward glance.

By the time Cedric reached the door of his workshop he felt a hundred years old.

He wondered, if he kept using magic to stop the physical signs of aging, was this how he would feel all the time in a few decades; constantly care worn and weary even as the mirror told him he continued to look twenty-five?

Opening the door, he found the only thing that could make him forget about his exchange on the palace steps….

Sofia, sitting on his worktable in something black and sheer and sleeveless and so sinful, it made him wonder who was the corrupted one in their relationship.

"I was getting worried." She told him as walked towards her.

"Baileywick just wanted to apologize." A half-truth was better than ruining what was left of the night.

Despite some sticky moments, the day had been a triumph for her. Cedric wanted it to end happily so, as time took the sting out of the nastier aspects, she'd come to remember this as a unique, stressful, but essentially momentous day filled with beauty and victory… and him.

As he closed the final distance between them he took one of Sofia's tiny, bare feet in his hand and began sliding his fingers over her skin. Over her ankle, higher to her leg, and higher still, taking up the hem of her diaphanous, exquisite… he didn't know what to call it really….

Clothing covered. But this, this exposed everything yet made it seem tantalizingly out of reach at the same time.

Having pushed the hem of her 'dress' to her knees, he took the final step that would leave him standing cradled between her thighs.

She was temptation come to life.

He couldn't wait to touch and taste all of her.

But there was one last thing he wanted to do tonight before he lost himself in her arms.

Something Cedric had been looking forward to for longer than he was willing to admit. Something that had left him hard and wanting every time he thought about it for months, maybe even years.

"Have you decided on a spell?"

Sofia looked up at him then, pinning him with eyes that had gone midnight blue.

"I'm have."

She pulled gently at his tie, letting the yellow silk slip to the floor, forgotten the moment it was out of her way. Next she pulled the belt to his robe and slipped the heavy velvet off his shoulders. His vest and shirt followed and soon he was standing in front of her naked to the waist as she caressed the script tattooed on his arms.

"You told me that each of the spells had special significance to the wearer. But you've never told me what yours mean to you.

This one for instance," she traced the three lines of words on his left bicep. "The Veritas Unveilius Incantation, the spell to divine truth from falsehood. It's certainly useful. And it's very beautiful, lyrical. When you say it, it sounds as if the words have music to them, just beyond your ability to hear. But why choose it?"

Cedric took a steadying breath. Even the light touch of her fingers on his skin was making it hard to stay focused.

"This was the last spell I had done. I got it on the same trip to Friesenburg where I found your ring.

By then you had worked your magic on me, making me believe I was better, stronger, more gifted than people gave me credit for. Then I gave myself credit for sometimes.

This spell reveals a hidden truth, a secret reality disguised underneath a façade.

I choose it because you made me believe there was a better me beneath the face I showed to the world.

I'm not always sure that's true. But when I feel most tempted to do something I know wouldn't make you proud, I feel the words pulse under my skin and it pulls me back."

Cedric thought of his conversation with Baileywick on the steps.

He hadn't just been tempted, he wanted more than anything to murder the arrogant bastard right then and there. But he hadn't… for her. Because how could ever do something so evil and then hear her tell him there was goodness in him? He'd burn to ashes with the shame of betraying her belief in him like that.

He counted on Baileywick believing he was capable of anything, but the truth was the hateful prick was safe from him. Losing Sofia's love, her adoration, her trust in him wasn't worth the transient pleasure of watching the life ebb out of the castle Steward.

"Oh Cedric." There were tears at the corners of her eyes again, but her smile was so radiant he thought he was standing in a pool of sunlight. "There is good in you. So much good! How can you doubt it?"

She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him down into a kiss that stole his breath and left him feeling weak in the knees. He needed her so badly he was nearly ready to throw carefully laid plans to the wind.

But then her lips and her arms left him and he shivered, cold where her skin had abandoned his.

She turned to the things she'd gathered on his desk and flipped open an ancient spell book, a crumbling tomb he'd had for years, turning to a page near the back.

"Illuminate Nacht," he read the title of the spell, "To bring light to the dark."

He looked back at her to find a yearning expression in her eyes as she whispered the spell into the semi-gloom of the chamber.

"When black you find the night,

Without hope or help your plight,

Fear not the shadows for lack of sight,

Illuminate Nos, Illuminate Nacht,

From darkness be delivered by this light.

This way I'll always wear us on my skin. And I'll always remember, in times of trial, to look to the people… the person who sees only best in me."

Cedric grabbed her right arm and pulled her flush against him.

His mouth descended on her, crushing her lips beneath his, tracing her jaw with his tongue, nipping down the column of her throat. He nuzzled the roundness of her shoulder and then brought soft kisses down her arm, till he reached her bicep.

He looked up at her then, their eyes locking as he reached to the other things she'd laid out.

Taking the mystical ink, he dipped his wand into it and brought it to her arm.

With painstaking, perfect strokes he painted the words in four circles around her small arm.

When he was done he spoke the words that would bind it to her skin and the ink shimmered and shivered for a moment before sinking beneath the surface.

When it was done the tattoo stood out dark and black against her pale skin, completely healed.

"It's perfect." She breathed touching the words with reverence.

"I have one more thing for you."

Cedric walked from the shelter of her legs to a chest he kept at the foot of stairs to the balcony. Unlocking it he pulled out a large box and turned to find her standing next to him.

Taking her hand he led her down to their bedroom.

He sat her in the large armchair before the fire and cast the spell that would set the logs there ablaze.

Kneeling in front of her, he motioned for her to open her present.

Sofia smiled like it was Wasallia night and began attacking the purple bow that adorned the box.

When she finally had it open, she pulled out the soft tissue only to give a quizzical look when her hands met soft velvet cloth.

Lifting the cloth away she gasped, but no sound came out.

Instead Cedric watched her hands begin to tremble as she pulled her now revealed present out.

"As you were studying for your judgment, I kept thinking what I could give you, to show you how proud of you I was, how amazing a Sorceress I already knew you were. My mind kept going back to that day you took me with you to Mystic Meadows, so your good deed could be helping me get my family wand.

Do you remember how you convinced my father to let me try out the wand in hopes I would impress him?

She nodded, looking overcome, but found enough of her voice to finish the story for him.

"You told him you'd conjure him the most magnificent Sorcerer's hat anyone had ever had. And he said he always liked a good hat.

Later when we were riding home I asked you why you never wore one and you said you looked silly in them, but that most Sorcerers wore them as a sign of their status."

"I didn't conjure this one. It's very old and very rare. Actually I can't take full credit either.

If it hadn't been for your sister and her magnificent pushiness, I might not have convinced its previous owner to relinquish it. But in the end my bribery and Amber's audacity prevailed upon him.

Once, a thousand years ago, it belonged to a powerful Sorcerer Queen who lived on the steps of what's now Rudistan, Empress Zoya-Marina. She used her gifts to drive invaders from her kingdom and bring peace and stability to the land. She was beloved by all.

When I found out it still existed, I knew it needed to belong to you."

"I have no words," Sofia told him, holding it up. "It's exquisite."

Cedric took it from her hands and gently placed it on her head.

"Now it is." He said, kneeling back to look on her.

Hat was an insufficient word for the large tear-drop shaped headdress. It was more a crown, made out of an unknown filigreed black metal, which seemed to swim as though there was liquid inside it, inlaid with rubies and black diamonds.

She stood then holding out her arms to him and Cedric was overcome…

A slave at the feet of his queen.

Instead of standing as she seemed to want him to, he bent lower, kissing the top of her foot.

Following the path his fingers had taken earlier, he kissed his way around her ankle, up her leg, nipping at her knee as he lifted the transparent material of her gown.

Without hesitation Sofia lifted her leg and helped him rest it over his shoulder, a shiver passing through her as his hands cupped her bottom. The anticipation for what was to come nearly making her scream.

Cedric took his time, kissing the silky skin of her inner thighs, teasing her in the most evil way.

Finally he looked up at her with hungry eyes and let his tongue slip between her folds.

Time slipped and slided as it always did, and when he savored the memory in the morning he would see everything in a series of flashing images accompanied by the sounds of her gasps and his cries.

He remembered the tightness of Sofia's grip on his hair as she fell over the edge he'd brought her to with his fingers and tongue. Her legs giving way as her body shook with the power of her release.

She'd collapsed to her knees and he'd caught her in his arms.

Cedric saw her laid out on the rug before the fire, the diaphanous gown bunched under her arms. Her nipples shimmering in the fire light wet from his mouth, her breath coming in heaving pants as she watched him remove the rest of his clothing.

He remembered the way he'd laid himself completely on top her, covering every inch of her.

The way Sofia had welcomed his weight on her, hands grabbing at his back, legs rubbing along his sides.

He shuddered at the memory of their combined cries as he'd ground his achingly hard length against her folds. Felt again her legs becoming a vice around his hips, as she tried to urge him to change the angle, so he would slip into her wet, heat.

"Say your mine," he'd demanded in a harsh whisper as he took some of his weight on his elbow. Sliding his hand underneath her head, his fingers tangled tight into the hair at the base of her neck.

Cedric remembered how she'd trembled, aroused even more by his demand.

Her eyes had gone impossibly darker, something like a sob escaping her lips, as her hands moved up his body to cup his face.

She'd kissed him hard, her eyes locked on his, her tongue invading his mouth, possessing him as he needed to hear he possessed her.

Pulling away from her mouth, he buried his head in her neck, kissing and biting softly at the vulnerable spot below her ear.

"Say it," he all but growled as he brought his other hand to her hip. Holding her down, he made the slight shift that allowed him to enter.

With one blind thrust he slid into her all the way to the hilt, and her head fell back, a scream coming out of her mouth.

He started to move, still holding her down beneath him, and heard it.

At first it was a whisper, but then it built until she was shouting out as though the words were the only thing between her and disaster.

"I'm yours. I'm yours. I'm yours."

Over and over again as he pulled out and flipped her over.

"I'm yours. I'm yours. I'm yours."

As he laid over her once more, entering her from behind.

The sight of his hands gripping hers flashed before Cedric's eyes. He watched himself bring them over her head as he pushed her into the plush of the rug.

"Mine," he'd whispered back, his face buried in the back of her neck.

He saw them coming together, the fire lighting one side of their bodies as they shuddered and shook and screamed through their release.

And then he saw nothing, heard nothing, as blackness took him….

When Cedric came back to himself, they were lying on their sides, Sofia's back to his front, one his arms across her chest, one of his legs thrown over her hips. She was staring into the fire, her hands gripping his arm.

He saw tears shimmering unshed at the corners of her eyes and he had a moment of sick dread.

He didn't know what had come over him. He'd been near barbaric with her.

"Dearest," He started, feeling unsure his endearment would be welcome. "What's wrong? Have I hurt you?"

Sofia turned her head, and looked at him incredulously.

"You're crying." He said, feeling the knife start to twist at his insides.

She smiled then, even as the tears began sliding down her cheeks.

"I'm happy," she whispered. "So happy I'm scared."

Cedric's arms instinctively tightened around her and he felt her hands squeeze back.

"I know you love to think I'm blindingly optimistic and not a little naïve. But I know nothing comes without a price in this world.

My mother and father loved each other so much. The price for that was my father's life. No one can be as happy as they were, as happy as you've made me, and not have fate come to collect.

Sofia shifted in his arms then so she was facing him, their bodies pressed together.

"I would pay almost anything, to have what we have. But I'm scared one day the price will be you!

Cedric, I've always been yours, from the first moment. Now that you're mine too….I can't lose you."

He silenced her then with a long kiss.

He wanted to tell her the same fear lived in him, that one day her life would pay the price for the happiness they'd found. But he knew it wouldn't help right now if he did.

Instead he broke their kiss to take her face in one of his hands, sure that her eyes were on his so she would see the truth of what he was about to say.

"Sofia, I will split this world in two and cast everyone on it into the void before I let usbe parted.

Do. Not. Mistake. Me.

I've never said a thing just to appease you and I won't start now. If someone were ever to try to take you from me, I would come like the dark of Hell in the night, and nothing standing between us will still live when I'm done.

I swear to you when I do die, centuries from now, it will be in your arms."

She'd fallen asleep a short time later, reassured by his words, probably only half believing them.

Cedric took the crown from her head and placed it on the small table by the arm chair. Then picked her up, carrying her to the bed.

It was dawn by then, but he closed the curtains till only a small chink of light peaked into the room, just enough for him to see her face.

Pulling Sofia's sleeping body into his arms, feeling her unconsciously wrap herself around him, Cedric vowed again he would never let anything part them.

She wasn't the only one who could no longer imagine a life that didn't include the other.

"Like the dark of Hell in the night."