(Not searching desperately, of course. Even in the heat of all his foolish machismo, he had not thought that she was in danger. )
He stood at the base of the tree and looked up, and any reproof he might have thought to offer died on his lips. Rose looked down at him without an expression on her milk crisp face but her arm swept out from her lap and her fist relaxed, releasing a dark sphere that Dart caught in a purely reflexive move.
"What is it?" he asked her. The forest around them was strangely quiet.
Her red mouth quirked in a rare smile. "It's...food. I'm surprised to see it growing here; it's native to a land beyond the sea. The name..." Her eyes moved beyond his to focus on some hazy relic of her past. "The name doesn't translate well. But, regardless. Food."
Dart stared at the wrinkled object dubiously. It was dark maroon in shade and its skin was loose and vaguely rough. 'Appetizing' was not the first word that leapt to mind.
"Try it. It's not poison." She had stopped smiling; now she stared at him with dark unblinking eyes.
He grimaced weakly. "It's not like we need more food. We have enough hardtack to last a bad winter." The food seemed to weigh heavy in his hand and he felt an irrational wave of guilt wash over him.
(Not that there was any reason to feel guilty. He had told the others that he was going to go look for Rose. Just to let her know that she had third watch. He had told them. That he had not made eye contact with Shana when he said this was just coincidence. He had told them. There was no reason to feel guilty.)
Rose regarded him with unsettling intensity and then something seemed to shift deep within her black eyes and underneath the red interior of her ribcage, as if a wind-up motor had just run down. She slung one pale long leg over the branch and then she jumped. Dart felt his heart physically expand -- and then she landed lightly on her feet. Dart breathed again.
(She was a Dragoon, after all. What was a little jump to her? Why did he worry? Why?)
She straightened and her black leather armaments creaked seductively.
"You amaze me, Dart. You hold in your hands a fruit of which few, if any, of your countrymen have dreamed, and you don't even want a taste?"
The fruit throbbed against his hand. His mouth was dry. "I'm really not hungry."
She took a step towards him. "Try it."
He shook his head and thought suddenly of Shana, for no reason at all.
(Shana's voice had a way of reaching an odd high pitch whenever she was unhappy or peevish. When she nagged him about some trifling matter, her voice grated on his nerves like cheesewire. And she had a way of holding her arms and tilting her head that made him suddenly see her in twenty years, and the vision was not a pleasant one.)
Rose took another step. "But you may never have the chance of eating this fruit again." She took another step and was up close next to him, her face very near his.
"But it's not necessary. Hardtack is good enough for me."
"One does not eat this fruit from necessity." Her breath was hot against his face.
"Still..." He looked down into the deep pools of her eyes.
She smiled. "Still, you must taste it." She kissed him.
(When Shana kissed him, she kept her mouth firmly closed and Dart could feel her teeth pressing flatly against his lips).
He opened his mouth and kissed Rose back.
She had eaten of the tree before he had arrived; her mouth tasted wild and sweet and sharp. He tasted fruit juice and saliva. Her tongue was warm and wet. Dart felt red hard lust impale his soul.
He broke free and took a step back, gasping for breath. "Rose. I...I can't."
She was still for a moment. "I know. That's why." She exhaled, and then she strolled past him. Back to the camp. Dart listened as the sounds of her feet faded and finally disappeared.
He realized his hand was wet and looked down to discover that he had clenched the fruit in his grip so hard that it had burst, soaking his skin with stickiness. He reached back and threw the fruit as hard and as far as he could, but its distant crash into the undergrowth was no comfort at all.
****** ****** ******
Author's Note: I wrote this in an hour and fifteen minutes, and doesn't it show?
I honestly spend portions of my life trying to think of a logical and reasonable way to insert a Rose/Dart lemon into the game's plot, but this is the closest that I'm likely to get. Alas!