Concrescence

CONCRESCENCE

by marisol

"Do you believe love is fleeting?" she muttered, fingers mapping out the ridges and curves of his neck and collarbones, never quite reaching a final destination and, in the process, exciting his heart to thump at a most irregular tempo.

A quiet amusement stole over him at her question even as her incredibly distracting hands crept up the back of his neck, and plunged dauntlessly into the mess of tangles he sometimes acknowledged to be his hair. "Isn't this the sort of question one's supposed to ask before the wedding?"

"Seeing as you kind of tricked me into marrying you, I hardly think I had a proper chance to ask such things. Or to even think them, if you want the truth." How was he supposed to know that several versions of your everyday magical safeguarding rings also served the purpose of binding two magical essences together?

"Everything turned out okay," he protested.

"Perhaps." With that, she leaned down until they were both surrounded by the glowing, red curtain of her much neater tresses. He found himself even more acutely aware than he already was of every part of himself that touched any part of her. From the tingly weight of her deliciously exposed hips and thighs straddling his waist to the smallest brushes of her hair against his ears. The air was suddenly close and hot and full of her faint, sweet fragrance. It was all he could do not to crush her to him when her silky, smooth mouth finally found his comparably rough and chapped lips. Just as he was becoming accustomed to the firm, brisk rhythm of tongues and lips and teeth, she pulled away, and took her shining, red sanctuary along with her. "Seriously, do you believe that it's real and amazing and all that, but that it can't last in the end?"

There was a moment in which he could not for the life of him cotton on, in which he, instead, became entirely too preoccupied with the harrowing sight of her kiss-swollen mouth; the marvelous shapes it made as she spoke; and the deep, almost ruddy, pink hue of it. What had she said again? Oh, yes... "'Spose we'll find out won't we?"

Irises of dark sepia flew, as by some magnetic force, to the milky, white strip of marble-like stone encircling her left ring finger. The ring was intricately carved with minute Celtic symbols, and it glistened with contained magical energy. It was charmed for protection as well as a steady but faint pulse of warm, feel-good energy for as long as he should love her... or live. His was the same, pulsing always with evidence of her love and her well-being. A flash of rapt seriousness crossed her face as she gazed at it only to be wiped away by a playful expression a second later. "I sincerely doubt that I'll have much to be upset about if it's always like this. Having a shag on the sofa midday with zero possibility of interruption or reproval. It feels like absolute freedom to me."

His face wasn't the only part of him to heat notably at the mention of what had transpired a mere half-hour before. Which lead to thoughts of similar activities they'd engaged in today in such diverse settings as their bedroom, the shower, the pantry, that empty room at the end of the upstairs hallway the precise purpose of which still had yet to be decided... Oh, bugger it. Nearly every room in their, at present, not-so-modest cottage had at least one delectably wanton memory attached to it, and they were making quick work of the remaining unblemished few. He had to force his mind back to the conversation at hand. "That'll all change when we have-"

"Harry! You promised not to say the 'C' word."

"But-"

"Nor any word related to it for one whole year."

"I remember our agreement perfectly well, thanks." He recalled their arrangement alright. No mention and/or alluding to the topic of children, kids, offspring, sons, daughters, etc. for exactly one year following their marital vows. At which point, the terms would be reevaluated, and either reinstated or revoked, depending on their future opinions on the subject. Ginny, and by consequence Harry, had put aside even the idea of a family of their own for the moment, owing to the fact that they were currently among the most sought after witches and wizards in Britain, and not in the good way. Now that Voldemort was no more, there were more leaderless and unaccounted for quasi-ex-Death Eaters around than it was safe to be lax about. And if that weren't reason enough, Ginny had only just graduated from Hogwarts, and he too, the year before her. They were too young yet. Maybe in a few years. "All I was going to say was that once we finally have the family over, and everyone knows where we live, we won't be able to beat them off with a stick," he mollified easily, and then added with not small degree of sarcasm: "By the way, I find you utter faith in me truly moving."

She laid a lingeringly apologetic kiss on his lips. "Sorry, love. I was only checking. And we are seriously going to have to set up extra wards in order to fend off any invasion of the Weasleys."

"This place is almost as locked down as a Gringott's high-security vault as it is," Harry pointed out sagely. One of the reasons he had bought it nearly a year ago was its easily-defendable location. He'd wanted it from the moment he saw it. A relatively inexpensive two-story cottage home just on the outskirts of Godric's Hollow. He had named it Crysanta which meant "golden flower"; "golden" for Gryffindor, "flower" for his mother, Lily.

"Still, I don't fancy having Mum and Dad pop in for a visit and find... well this!" She gestured at their general dishabille. Harry blanched at the disconcerting mental image of Arthur and Molly Weasley seeing them as they were now. They each had a grand sum of four articles of clothing on their person; his being shorts and one sock, the other likely loss forever. As for his better half, he highly doubted that her current attire, that being a pair of knickers and a slip, would be considered appropriate by anyone other than himself, let alone her parents. More frightening still were the reactions he assumed her brothers might have.

"Right. I'll look into privacy wards first thing tomorrow," he managed to say before all thoughts of any Weasley besides the one bestriding him vanished completely. She was in the slow process of carefully shifting and stretching out until she was lying mostly on top of him, half on and half off. One of her long, pale legs snaked out to wrap snug around his torso, and her mouth was now in such a position that her every breath left a gust of steamy vapor on the skin of his neck. Automatically, almost with a will of its own, the arm she was now crushing into the pillows of their sofa slide around, and encircled her waist. He lightly ran his fingers along the silky fabric there, and distantly admired the slip's peach coloration, and the perfect way it complemented her pearly skin. He'd known it would when he picked it out. His first gift to her as her husband. He suspected he would never tire of seeing her wear it.

"As to that," she spoke abruptly after a long, comfortable lull. "When are we going to tell everyone anyway? Not that I don't love having this be just between to two of us- well, and Ron and Hermione-"

"Don't forget Moony," Harry interjected.

"Yes, and Remus, of course. But, I'm not sure how long Mum will believe we're still 'traveling the world' with them all. Sooner or later one of us is going to slip up and rouse her suspicions. Remus and Hermione are steel traps, I'll give you that, but even then anything can happen. And Ron is an abysmal liar."

"I know. He really is," Harry conceded. "'Spose it was wishful thinking to hope that they all simply never found out. We'll tell them soon. And..." he hesitated before continuing. "I'd sort of prefer if we told you parents before we told your brothers. That way, they'd know the true cause of death if anything should happen to me in the event of informing you siblings, and Molly could retaliate accordingly."

"Harry!" Ginny smacked him around the shoulders, which hurt considerably more now than it tended to when he was clothed.

"Ow! I was only being realistic."

"You were being a prat," his lovely wife corrected with a smile.

"Seriously? Let's start off small and work our way up to the Brothers Weasley, okay?"

"Fine, but I'll do all the talking. At least where Mum and Dad are concerned."

"Should I be relieved or offended?"

"Relieved, trust me." There were those fingers again; one set in his hair, and the other skipping a path down his side to toy with the waistband of his shorts. He was fast loosing any semblance of restraint that he'd even suspected himself to possess. "About forever?"

"Yes?" he rasped out as her playful hand came up to absently rub at one of the sensitive nubs on his chest. A moment later, her mouth found a moist area of her own breath-vapor on his neck, and he was ready to guarantee her forever, and anything else she could ever want if she'd just exist right there for the rest of their lives.

"Promise me one thing?" Her words slipped right out of her lips, warm and sweet, into his ear in such a way that the only response he could muster was a non-too-manly gurgle at the back of his throat. For an instant, he felt as though she was trying to put a spell on him, and maybe she was.

Then he realized that she was waiting for him to answer properly. All Harry could think or say was: "Anything."

Ginny sat up a bit, and leaned into him once more until the tips of their noses ever-so-slightly brushed together, and whispered very clearly: "Try to keep the toilet seat down, okay?"