"You cannot keep coming here, Gunther. People will talk."

He doesn't say anything, just continues divesting himself of his sodden clothing.

"Gunther?" she tries again, but he ignores her query and instead hands her his cloak. The fabric is soaked and freezing, and it crunches slightly under her grip. The storm has been raging for hours and at some point the rain must have turned to sleet during his walk. It drips onto the worn planks of her floor, forming a small puddle.

She stares at it for a moment, transfixed as a bit of slush falls with a wet plop.

How bad must it have been? How painful - how violent - for him to make the long trek in the dead of night, in the midst of such inclement weather?

Was he hurt again?

The thought snaps her out of her stupor, and shames her a little. They are partners, friends, and she cares for him deeply - why was that not her first thought, her first concern, her first sarding question when she woke to his subtle knock?

Jane gives her head a little shake and blinks hard one, two, three times. A vain attempt to clear the sticky webs of sleep which still cling to the corners of her exhausted brain.

She glances up from the puddle to see him looking at her strangely. His lips are pressed into a thin line and his expression is hard to read in the dying light of the fire. It's clear he isn't going to reply to her statement, which is frustrating but not at all unexpected. He is stubborn and distant as always, pushing her away even as he is asking for help.

Dear lord, he is such an ass.

He stares at her for a moment before resuming his task. He's retrieved her bedroll from her pack, and is trying - and failing - to untie the leather straps which keep it closed with clumsy, frozen fingers.

She sighs and tightens the grip on the blanket she'd thrown about her shoulders before letting him in. He'd been here just last night and she hadn't expected - but then did she ever actually expect? - him to come again so soon, and when preparing for bed she hadn't put on anything more substantial than an old shirt. It falls to her knees but is well worn; the fabric threadbare and comfortable.

Moving carefully to avoid the puddle of slush, she steps over to the pegs near the mantelpiece and hangs the dripping cloak so it will dry before morning. She pauses for a moment, pretending to brush a bit of ice from the shoulder - it will dry faster if she does - but it's a ruse, and a poor one. Really she is just stalling, gathering her thoughts and her courage before turning around to press him further.

After a moment's consideration she leans down and retrieves another small log from her bucket, shoving it into the fireplace. She watches as the fire flares up again, renewed, warming the room which had chilled considerably upon his arrival.

Behind her she hears him grunt, a sound which is followed by a soft thump. It is the sound of him gracelessly dropping to the floor and removing his boot. Jane turns around and picks it up, placing it on the hearth - if she doesn't he'll leave it where it lands to be tripped over, instead of putting it by the fire to dry out - and she sees he is struggling to remove the other. His face is twisted in pain and his hands are trembling, but he's attacking the boot as though it has lobbed some devilish, personal insult.

In the renewed firelight she can see his eye is swollen and there is a dark, purpling bruise forming around it.

He is hurt.

She despairs to see him thus and is almost consumed by a burning, searing flash of rage on his behalf. Her heart starts to pound and her vision narrows to a black tunnel - but she forces it back, bids her heart calm, measures her breath, relaxes her expression.

It is something she has had far too much practice with as of late, and the thought almost makes her angry again.

But she forces it down, managing, just barely, to appear calm when his eyes meet hers. Gunther would not understand her reaction - would take her righteous anger as pity - an assumption which would surely chase him out into the storm faster than her mother, should the woman suddenly appear.

He curses under his breath and Jane drops down beside him, covering his hands with her own. "Let me." He starts to argue, to protest that he doesn't need her coddling, to sod off, but she stops him before he can get started. "You are being too loud."

It's a lie, he's hardly made a sound during the time he's been here, but she doesn't think he knows that - as frustrated as he is with his inability to move around in his pain. He lets go of his boot and leans back on his palms, changing his position so he can pull his leg while she grips his boot. They make short work of it, and he tucks his legs under him as she leans over to place it next to its mate, sitting back on her haunches to study him.

There is a new bruise forming on his face - joining the garish mark that had graced his cheek and jaw just yesterday evening. The flesh around his left eye is swelling and turning red - it is going to be ugly as it settles - the two bruising combining into one rainbowed injury as gravity pulls the blood down.

His whole face will be a mess.

Jane scooches towards him and brings her hands up to brush his hair away from where it is sticking to his purpling face. She leans forward, her blanket falling off her shoulders as she reaches out, and finds what she expected. The skin has split from the force of the contusion, and even in the unreliable light she can see the faint outlines of where Gunther's family crest has been stamped into the high bones of his cheek.

It breaks her heart to see him so hurt, almost branded, by the violence of his familial obligation.

She pulls the rest of his wet hair away - it is getting too long and will need to be cut soon - and uses her fingers to comb it back, scraping her nails along his scalp and neck as they catch in the tangles there. Jane uses one hand to cup his jaw - it's late and she can feel the rough texture of a full-day's beard in her palm - and turns his head to better examine the wound.

She prods the cut with her fingers - it is worse than she'd originally suspected, though it has long since stopped bleeding freely - and she is not sure the swelling and secondary bruising will be enough to cover the evidence of his father's drunken fury.

His eyes are closed and there is a pained, almost tortured crease between his brows. She wants to smooth it away, take away the pain and the humiliation and the hurt, and the thought makes her throat tighten with something she refuses to identify.

"This will need tending," she whispers, and he shivers as she runs her fingers over the mark again. Behind her the wind howls and rattles the shutters, and a draft blows in from under her door. It's biting and strong enough to disturb some of the rushes scattered about her room.

Bloody hell.

She'd completely forgotten he was still wet from his journey.

Jane drops her hand to the collar of his shirt and plucks at it where it too, has plastered itself to his skin. He is soaked and freezing, and has been suffering in silence throughout out her examination. Isn't that always his way, when the hurt is real?

"Take this off before you freeze to death." She releases the shirt and stands over him, waiting for him to comply. "I will hang it near the fire."

Gunther opens his eyes and starts to say something, but instead relents, pulling his shirt off with stiff and awkward movements - cursing under his breath. It gets caught and she helps him yank it over his head - and then sees the problem. There are masses of bruises, some green and yellow with age, some newly fresh and purpling to match ones on his face. They are from blows to his ribs and kidneys - and based on their placement, he hadn't even tried to fight back.

He'd just tucked his head into his arms and let them land, over and over.

Her vision blurs and she struggles to breathe normally. How dare he? How DARE HE?!

Her tunnel vision is back and the anger, the rage is almost all-consuming. The blood is pumping, pounding through her veins in a quick succession of hot and cold.

She drops her blanket and his shirt so she can have both hands to examine his ribs more closely, and she is on him, poking and prodding, hissing her anger with each and every breath.

He tries to back up, to bat her hands away from his damaged side, and even makes a weak attempt to stay her hand by grabbing her wrist - but he lets go when he sees the furious look on her face. Gunther looks like he wants to run, to flee - but to where? He has nowhere to go. He cannot go home, and he has far too much pride to go to the barracks.

If he didn't - if he hadn't been crippled by his stupid and unnecessary pride - he wouldn't come here to hide in her hearth and sleep at her feet, night after night.

He wouldn't have to endure the beatings, at all.

But he is here now, and this is her domain. She is master and ruler here, and he knew that when he sought refuge. He can suffer her ministrations - her embarrassing coddling or her mewling mothering or whatever snide words he wants to use to deflect the fact that she cares - or he can get the hell out and suffer on his own.

The anger is burning throughout her, incandescent and directionless, and Jane knows this isn't his fault, and she most certainly does not want him to go. No, she wants him to stay, more than anything else in the world.

She wants him to stay. Not because she wants to nurse him, or care for him, or take away the pain, or keep him safe from his father's abuse - or at least not only because of those things. No, she wants him to stay because she loves him, is in love with him, and has been for far longer than she is willing to admit.

It doesn't matter - and like her rage, she pushes her feelings of love aside and continues her assessment.

Feelings, she can ignore - triage she can not.

Gunther is shaking, jerking in discomfort beneath her prodding fingers. She can't see his face, her body is blocking the light from the fire's glow, hiding his expression in contrast and shadow, but she can hear the sharp intake of breath as she runs her hands along the tender planes of his torso.

Finally she pulls back, unhappy but satisfied. "I do not think they need to be wrapped, but you cannot sleep on the floor. Get into the bed." She stands and moves to the fireplace, needing some distance, some space and time to rein in her scattered emotions. She spends a few minutes needlessly picking through the myriad jars on her mantle, pretending to search for a salve to treat the cut on his face.

When he doesn't move, she turns and gives him her sternest look. "Now, Gunther."

"I cannot," he croaks out. It's the first time he's spoken since he arrived - since he'd stepped over her threshold, wet, bedraggled, broken. "I cannot. It would not be…" his words trail off.

Jane whirls around, wondering what ridiculous reason he could possibly have for naysaying her, and takes in his flushed face. No, not flushed. He's blushing - crimson red from the roots of his hair down to the light smattering of hair on his chest, and his breath is hitching, his eyes skating all over her body.

She's about to yell at him, to scream and ask just what the hell his problem is - she's told him to do something and he had better do it - when she realizes she's left her blanket on the floor and she is standing - backlit by the fire behind her - in nothing but a threadbare, see-through shirt.

She might as well be completely naked, presenting herself in such a manner.

Jane rolls her eyes and makes a disgusted little sound. It's not as if she's the first naked female he's seen.

She supposes she should pretend to be embarrassed, mumble falsely demure apologies and cower, mortified, under the covers of her bed - but she is not embarrassed and does neither.

She is furious, and getting angrier with each passing second. She is livid at his father for hurting him, angry at Gunther for coming here, furious at him for trusting her when she has never done anything to deserve such faith, and positively seething at herself for letting him in. And now, now the stubborn ass - having come here to impose on her hospitality, to impinge on her privacy, to force these unwanted feelings on her - is ignoring her instructions.

"Get in the bed, Gunther." Her voice is flat, inflectionless. "I will sleep on the floor."

"No." He swallows thickly, unable to look away. "I will not."

She moves closer until she is towering over him, and he cringes away. She is dimly aware that the fire is still behind her and yes, her shirt is still see-through, but she is far beyond caring. She has weapons of her own - and she's not at all hesitant to use them. "You will or else you will not be able to sit up tomorrow, let alone report for duty. Get in the bed, Gunther."

He closes his eyes against the sight of her - the coward - and tucking his chin into his chest, shakes his head. "No," he repeats, "it is cold and there is a draft and I will not."

Is there anyone, anywhere, more maddening than Gunther Breech?

Jane resists the urge to smack him across the face - he'd had enough of that this evening, thank you very much - and works to calm her tone. "All the more reason you should not be on the floor. Now, Gunther."

Without looking up, he shakes his head again, stubborn as always.

"Sarding hell. If the thought of me sleeping on my own floor bothers you so much, then we shall both sleep in the bed."

He looks up sharply, his eyes blown wide.

Well that certainly got his attention.

"NO, Jane."

She isn't sure if she should laugh at his prudishness, or throw him out for being obstinate. Instead she does neither - and grits her teeth to growl in frustration. Jane takes a deep breath, and for the third - fourth? - time that evening tries to push down the flood of emotion that threatens to swamp her.

It's exhausting, this jolting back and forth between extremes.

"Fine," she grinds out, tired. Exasperated. She wants to cry. "I cannot argue with you any more. But this is the last time you come here - this is the last time I will take credit for your injuries. From now on, you will need to find somewhere else to sleep - and find someone else who does not - " her voice breaks a little, "- care."

She tosses the little jar of salve at him - or at least means to - but it's less of a toss and more of a throw, and it hits him square in the chest, causing him to flinch in surprise and pain. "Put that on your face yourself, jackass."

Jane gives his outstretched leg a deliberate kick - it hurts her bare foot, but it is perversely satisfying - before stepping over his legs and crawling into bed. It's childish and the last thing he needs, but she is angry, livid, and she cannot reconcile her rage with the her desire to comfort him.

The sheets have lost the warmth and she's left her blanket on the floor, but she'll be damned if she gets out to retrieve it - or worse - ask him to pass it back up to her. If the floor is as cold and drafty as he says, he'll need it.

Curling on her side, away from him, she pulls the thin sheet over herself, and after a moment's thought, sits up to grab the crocheted blanket she keeps at the end of her bed. It's thin and won't provide much warmth, but right now she's burning with hurt and anger and it is better than nothing.

And then, as sudden as it came on, the ire drains out of her, and the tears are back. Her chest tightens and she can feel that first hiccuping sob threaten but she'll be damned if she cries in front of him. It's not just habit borne from a childhood of combative animosity - she's hurt and angry for him - and she has no room, no space, no privacy to process all this because he is right there, spending his night in pain, on the hard, unforgiving floor because he is too stubborn to accept what little comfort she can give him.

Sure, he'll accept her shelter, but not her warmth, or her love.

And then she is crying, unable to suppress the tears or the sobs as they rack her body. She bunches up her small throw and presses it to her face, biting down on the rough wool in an attempt to stifle her cries. It goes on forever, and the pain rips through her and she feels guilty because she knows it can't hurt one tenth as badly as the actual pain he feels from his injuries, but she can't stop it and cries anyway.

She is so absorbed with her grief she doesn't hear him stand, or his foot falls as he approaches the bed, and she is surprised as the weight of the blanket settles about her. She burrows under it, crying harder now, if such a thing is even possible.

"Juh- Jane." he stutters. This is new terrain for him, for both of them, and he has no idea how to approach this hidden - weak, she thinks - aspect of her personality. "Jane." he tries again. The bed dips with his weight and she feels his hand on her shoulder.

"I am sorry, Jane." he tugs at her shoulder, wanting her to turn over and face him. "Jane, please."

She's not a coward, but right now she feels cowardly, and jerks her shoulder out of his grasp.

He has the audacity to chuckle. It's low and breathy, and it makes her want to kick him again. "Now who is being a jackass?" He tugs at her again, and she relents, turning over to curl into the broad expanse of his chest. He wraps his arms around her, and she is grateful that he is blocking the light from the fire, because she is not sure she could handle seeing the ugly bruises which cover his body so close.

"I am sorr-" he repeats but she cuts him off.

"What on earth could you possibly be sorry for Gunther?" The words are muffled, with her face pressed into his chest and neck as they are. "How is any of this your fault?"

"It is not. But I am sorry I made you cry."

It doesn't stop the tears, makes her bark out a wet and hitching sob, but eventually they slow and she nods. After a while - an embarrassingly long while - she's composed enough - brave enough - to ask, "Why do you come here?

"Because I -" he swallows, unable to go on. He clears his throat and says, "because I know you will let me in, and will not ...tell."

Bullshite.

"There must be a hundred other places that are closer, easier, and less risky." She pulls back slightly, swipes a hand across her reddened eyes before pushing it between his arm and his body, wanting that heat. "Why do you come here?"

"Because I-" he stops again, and she wants to scream. "Do not make me say it, Jane."

"Why not?"

He ducks his head, possibly in an attempt to avoid her gaze. "Because it will change everything."

"Would that be so bad?" she whispers.

"Jane, I -" but stops.

"Have you ever stopped to consider why I let you in?"

He opens his mouth to argue, or protest, or say something completely asinine, "I-"

But she stops him by pressing her lips to his.

It's awkward and clumsy, and she's stiff with her own insecurities, but after a moment of surprise he is kissing her back.

She is completely unprepared, despite her own forwardness. Jane thinks that after all the years they'd spent together, all the long hours of practice, and sparring, and marches - she would know all there was to know about his mouth, his lips. She'd certainly seen them smirk, frown, sneer, taunt, insult - and on rare occasion, smile.

But she'd never imagined, never dreamed, how soft, how plaint, how seductively intoxicating they could be. He leans into her, deepening their kiss and traces the seam of her mouth with his tongue. She opens to him and runs her hand up the cords of his neck - it makes him tremble, and she swallows his groan. The sound fills her with warmth - a heavy heat that spills out from her middle, languorous, slow. It spreads to every corner of her trembling body; creeps up her spine and into her hair, rolls over the pulse in her wrists, fills the empty spaces between her toes.

They kiss and kiss. They forget about everything; his father's violence, the impropriety of their actions, the storm that rages outside. There is only them, only this, and it is enough.

When they finally pull apart - Gunther tucks her head under his chin and pants hot breaths into the wildness of her hair - Jane cannot remember a time before she had kissed him.

After a long while, he says her name, just, "Jane," and nothing more. His voice is broken, cracked, and heavy with lust.

She tightens her arms around him, though taking care to avoid the most bruised- up areas. His hands, she realizes, through the warm haze that's overtaken her, are moving restlessly against her - one of them tracing her collarbone, right at the neckline of her old, soft shirt; the other drawing little patterns on her hip through fabric so thin it might as well not be there at all.

That one, in particular, is sending sparks through her that cause her to shift against him and make a muffled, inarticulate sound into his shoulder. His breath hitches in response, but then he pulls back a little.

Jane feels a mild flare of panic at even this minimal loss of contact - quite a turn of events from when she'd tried to shake his hand off her shoulder just moments ago, but that had been before they'd kissed and it feels as if a lifetime has passed since then - and so she moves with him, nestling back into his heat, closing the scant distance he'd managed to establish.

"Jane," he says again, and now his voice sounds nearly tortured, "stop. We cannot… we have to… this is not… you… I… we should not -"

A part of her wants to laugh at him, in spite of his injuries and the storm and all the really horrible circumstances that have led them to this moment. Another part is on edge, and quite ready to launch into some sort of lecture, should he suggest something so dull-witted as sleeping on the floor. But Jane does neither because she has never, not once ever in her life, heard him sound this utterly, utterly... flummoxed.

Gunther - Gunther - who has a rejoinder for everything - is …speechless.

And she understands.

She's practically tongue-tied too, given what just happened. Still -

"Why should we not?" she asks, her face still flush with his shoulder, lips moving against his skin. She feels him shiver in response, although whether to the words or to the sensation they provoke, she doesn't know. "Gunther?" she presses, when he offers no other answer beyond that.

Still nothing. His whole body is drawn taut against her. She sighs, then drags her mouth an inch or so to the side, and kisses the juncture where his shoulder meets his throat. She wonders what he tastes like, there, so she lets her tongue dart out and touch his skin.

Gunther swallows convulsively, makes a pained little sound, and again grinds out the word, "Stop."

His reaction makes her want to do it again. So she does.

"I will stop," she says, her own voice unsteady with the force of her emotions, her desire, "when you tell me why I should stop."

"Be… cause… if we do this… shite… Jane…"

"If we do this, what? Gunther, what?" She draws back, now, but only so she can look at him. She hadn't wanted to, before, when he'd lain down beside her, hadn't wanted to have to see the damage to his face, as if by avoiding the sight of it she could somehow negate it, undo it.

But she needs to see him now. Discolored skin, swollen eye and all. She needs to watch him answer her.

Except he isn't answering her. He isn't even meeting her gaze. His eyes are slammed shut and he's shaking now, she can feel it all down the length of his body, and he looks as if he's at war with himself. Absolute war.

"Oh, for God's -" Jane actually huffs. Impossible man. Why does he make everything ten times harder than it needs to be? She wants to kick him again. Or kiss him. Possibly both. "Fine, Gunther Breech. I will go first. I let you in because I love you."

His eyes fly open and what she sees in them - the depth of feeling behind that grey gaze - it would have knocked her flat if she hadn't already been lying down. It's there, and it's real, and it's the perfect answer to her statement, her declaration - except he's still fighting against it. She can see that too.

"You should not," he chokes out.

"Why NOT?" she practically screams. He winces, and she thinks she should feel bad, but she does not.

He shakes his head and groans. "You… you are…"

"What!? Gunther, what am I!?"

He closes his eyes again, and that is all.

In mounting frustration, she gives him a little shake. He winces again and that hurts her, it half-kills her to be causing him more pain than he's already in, but sarding hell -

"Your partner," she nearly snarls. "Yes or no!?"

"Yes." His voice cracks on the word.

"Your friend. Yes?"

"Yes." Barely audible. He sounds as if he's had the wind knocked out of him. Christ, is he breathing?

"Someone -" she stops and swallows thickly, suddenly terrified, because if he answers this one wrong, it will break her. Oh, lord, it will break her. But she forces herself to plunge on, although her voice is constricted now. "Gunther… someone you love. Y-" She chokes off, unable quite to finish.

And he goes very still. For a very long time.

Long enough for Jane to give a profoundly hurt little gasp and start to wrench away - though she has no idea where she is going to go, he is in her bed for heaven's sake - and that is what finally, finally galvanizes him into action.

All of a sudden he is crushing her to him, so hard she can't properly draw breath, so hard it hurts a little, and if it's hurting her, what must it be doing to him?

He buries his face in her hair and gasps, "Yes. Yes. Damnit, Jane, yes."

The relief is so intense, so acutely severe, she thinks her heart may have actually stopped beating - and then she's flooded, swamped once again by her fickle, changeable emotions - but this time with anxious, fragile joy.

"But," he continues, and oh by every saint in Christendom, why must he always have a but!? "- We cannot do this - I have nothing to offer you. I am a Breech. I am the worthless son of an abusive father. A man whose reputation is very much deserved. We cannot do this - we cannot be together - you deserve so much better."

When she doesn't say anything - she can't, not without making a complete fool out of herself - a skill she seems to have perfected this evening - Gunther tries again.

"Jane -" he nuzzles her hair, "Please say something. Please understand."

Oh, she understands.

She gives a little scoff - he's still wrapped around her so tightly she can barely breathe. "Gunther -" she wiggles in his grip, "let go -" Jane bats at his arms when he doesn't immediately release her, then presses on his shoulder - probably a little too hard - until she is able to untangle herself.

He lies back, that pained crease between his brows has returned, and he looks suspiciously like he is working himself up to rolling over and off the bed. But he's not fast enough - the bruises on his side slow him down - and Jane takes advantage of his sluggish escape. She sits up and throws one leg over his hip, pinning him down with her weight.

His breath hisses between his teeth and he jerks under her touch. Jane tries to suppress the little half smile that quirks the corner of her mouth; she knows she hasn't hurt him - she is, after all, only wearing her threadbare shirt.

"Gunther - I know we have been partners for a long time now, but I never, not until this moment, suspected you actually had dung for brains." She lets one hand trace teasing patterns up his side, shoulder, neck. "I do not see your father, I do not see your name, I see you, Gunther Breech." Jane leans forward and brushes her lips against his. "I see you."

He groans under her touch, trembling. After a moment's hesitation - it's longer than any of the breathless, pained, embarrassing moments Jane has already endured this evening - perhaps it is the longest moment in their shared history - Gunther loses the war with himself - or maybe he wins it - and pulls her down, kissing her back.

A/N: So this is obviously a fanfiction of BW's fanfiction - I hope I did it justice :)

A special thanks to Kyra for helping me whenever I got stuck, and to Batbladders and Biscuitweevil for putting together Janther week!