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With her husband finally home, and unwanted intruders gone from their palace, Penelope thought it'd be nice to explore the piles of old things — Telemachus' old toys, gifts they'd been given after his birth, gifts from their marriage day. After a while of looking through the newer memories, time spent recounting moments from a childhood he'd missed and reminding him of the joy of finally conceiving, they reaches the baskets of old wedding gifts, at least ones they hadn't so immediately displayed. There, something catches her eye in the midst of paintings and tapestries; a Spartan shield leant up against the wall with a toppled-over helmet, passed down to her to remind her of the home she'd left behind to build this new one with her beloved. With a curious hum, Penelope picks up the equipment, straining slightly with the weight of the heavy brass, and sets them in her lap as she sits.
"I remember your father gifting those! Is he still the same proud man, my Penelope?" His fingers trace around the subtly worn paint of the shield before lifting to cup her cheek, and, despite the gentleness, she still has to fight her instinct to flinch away.
In an attempt to push that instinct further down, she rests her hand over his and keeps his palm to her cheek. "I presume so. I haven’t seen him in a while, truly. I stopped leaving the palace at some point in your years away…"
"Oh… I’m sorry, my love." His eyes cast back down to her lap and she can sense his hesitation. With a soft sigh, Penelope bends down and catches her beloved in a chaste kiss, feeling a part of her relax when he makes the effort to restrain his instincts to touch and grab her.
When they part again, he furrows slightly and grumbles as she pulls back, making her stifle a laugh, "What’s wrong, darling?"
"We’ve stopped kissing, my love, it’s a tragedy." She doesn’t know how such a rugged and dangerous man manages it, but he is simply adorable. This time she doesn’t bother holding back her adoring giggle as she holds his face and strokes through his greying beard.
For a moment, both their gazes dip down to stare at the old armour again, "I hope I never have to pass these down…"
"We should take advantage of them while we still have them, no?" He picks up the helmet and hums.
"How so?"
"I don’t know, have you ever thought about being a warrior, my love?" He tips the crested helmet towards her, "I know my sister did when she was small, used to run around after me and beg me to spar her." His voice lightens and softens at the memory, the sweetening of his features warming her heart.
Truthfully, the idea had crossed her mind, though she’d never put too much thought into it, now that it’s being brought to the forefront, it is becoming more and more appealing. "Briefly." Carefully, she takes the heirloom from her husband’s hands and brushes her fingers through the horsehair crest with some idle humming before simply shrugging, pulling her own hair out of its loose bun and slipping the heavy helmet over top. Straightening her back and trying not to crack as she puts on this vague performance of a soldier, or more so of a man, she hops up onto her feet and poses dramatically, "I think I would make a good warrior, my homeland taught me well enough." She holds out the shield and sets the brim under her lover’s jaw, tipping his head up slightly and watching something flash across his eyes, something that makes her heart thud and her mind start to cloud slightly, something that sends an electric sense of power through her veins. "What do you think?"
For a moment he just stares at her through the darkness of this small room of memories, his cheeks rose-dusted and a smile playing on his lips, but eventually Odysseus breaths out a half-laugh and seems to play into her performance, demurring himself and dramatically swooning, a playful girlishness to his voice, "Oh, don’t hurt me, strong warrior, I’m only a peasant girl!" Though he stifles laughter, it seems like his cheeks only flush deeper.
Lifting her helmet up to rest on top of her head, she bends down and grabs the hand he’d dramatically draped over his forehead, pulling him up to his feet and hooking her shield behind his back, that same flash of something appearing behind his eyes with a shaky breath, that same electric power surging through her chest at the response she’s given, pushing her forward to kiss him again.
"I have an idea..." its whispered between meetings of lips, spoken into the slim space between them, only earning an affirmative hum from her distracted husband. Cupping his cheek with her free hand, she parts from their kiss again with another petulant huff from Odysseus, "do you want to listen to my idea?"
"I'd listen to anything you say, of course. What's your idea, my Penelope?" Unlike her, he leans into her touch, making her heart warm.
"I want to put on our own personal play, just for the two of us." The idea starts to solidify in her mind as she speaks it into existence, bending slightly and laying kisses across her beloved's cheeks between her words, "A brutish soldier come to take the defenceless queen for himself."
His body stiffens slightly, his voice gentle, "I don't wish to take you by force, my love..."
"That is why you would be my queen, darling."
"Oh." His muscles ease as the thought settles in his mind, he nods and presses his body to hers, prodding against her thigh, answering her unasked question before he even speaks, "I think I can do that."
"Would you like to stay in these clothes, or do you want to wear my dress?"
...
...
Fiddling with the pins that hold plum fabric over his body, Odysseus stands at the door to their shared balcony and listens to the soft breathing and clink of metal behind him, waiting for his Penelope to signal the start of their private play. Though he's not an actor, he is an adept liar, and with the aid of wearing his wife's dress and the plan laid out for him in the forefront of his mind, he tries to settle into his role, instinctually imitating the idle habits of his wife, resting his hands over each other in front of his lap and adding a subtle arc to his back. When, finally, the door to their bedroom clicks open and closed again, he feels his heart jump and lets out an anticipatory breath before returning the signal by taking a step forward. By the time he makes his second step, there’s already strong arms around him, a hand clasping over his mouth and pulling him back, behind open balcony doors and into a familiarly full chest, a shielded arm barring over his forearms and pinning them to his chest. Her hold is strong, keeping him still through his played up struggles with the help of her family’s shield pressed against his chest.
"Your guards aren’t very good at their jobs, are they? Leaving their Queen defenceless up here in your little palace." Her voice still holds that same softness that endears him so deeply, but spoken through a tinny filter of her cold helmet that presses to his warm cheek, giving her a more believable edge of intimidation, making his heart stutter in his chest.
With a groan made in the shape of language but with no true meaning, he decides to test that strength of hers, furrowing and rolling his shoulders in an attempt to writhe out of her grip, but instead of releasing him, she lifts him. His feet leave the ground and his pulse thumps, heat blooming across his face and under his peplos. Somehow this woman has managed to make him feel small, delicate even. He can’t fight back. He couldn’t have fought back.
"Stop fighting, it will never work. You're mine now, Queen." His Penelope's words drip beautifully with the power he gives up to her, a power that must course through her and pulse through her heart like his own enforced weakness flows through him, and yet, a subtle airiness infects her voice, like even she is stunned by her own strength as she pulls his feet from the floor and squeezes him tighter in her grasp, taking her first few steps back towards their wedding bed. Once she's brought them close enough, in spite of his wriggling, he's thrown down onto his front, giving him the opportunity to grasp at the bedding and attempt to pull himself away before his attempts are stopped by a hand pushing him onto his back. Seeing her like this, imposing and aggressive, makes his stomach twist, her typical gentleness disappearing entirely behind the brass of her helmet as she stares down at him through the only true window to her features. Even with her face obscured, her delicate features made harsh behind sharp lines of metal, she looks strangely beautiful — not her typical beauty, but gorgeous nonetheless.
Breaking through his adoration as she bends down over him slightly, Odysseus remembers his role and returns to his fight, giving a few purposefully misplaced kicks that never land until Penelope catches his ankle and uses it to pull him closer to the edge of their bed, pushing herself between his strong thighs and leaning over him to pin his wrists to the bed sheets with her forearm and the help of the weight of her shield. She’s trapped him, pinned him down, not by some intangible magic or manipulation, but by the pure virtue of her strength, something physical that he can’t argue.
For a moment he acts out mild defeat, dying his struggle down to some squirming and failed attempts to curl up to protect his dignity, focusing instead on watching his wife untie the belt around the waist of her, previously his, chitoniskos with her free hand, holding one end between her teeth as she slips the other end under his head and ties it tight around his jaw, the knot pushing against his cheek and the soft woven leather sliding between his teeth and over his tongue. Allowing himself to sink into defeat, Odysseus simply shakes his head and groans, imitating the sound of sobs without the tears, squeezing his eyes shut and playing up his surprise with a flinch when he feels that same empty hand go for his own belt, the removal of it widening the split down the side that already left him with minimal cover in this position, only to repeat the tie, now to bind his wrists, another welcome reminder of just how physically he’s been overpowered, how definitively he’s being taken rather than being made to give. Testing his binds, he tries to tug his wrists free, only for Penelope to pull the knot tighter, though the brief brush of her fingertips slipping between his wrists shows him the care she takes to do no true harm. It doesn’t take long for those delicate fingers to trail down from their sweet check-in to instead run down his chest and stomach, her voice soft and patronising behind the brass, "You fight back so hard and fruitlessly, and yet…" her fingers hook under the richly dyed cloth and pull them aside, a whine escaping him as she removes the very last of his dignity and reveals the truth beneath this act of unwillingness, "would you look under here. Maybe their Queen was left unguarded for reasons other than incompetence. Seems like you enjoy my company, don’t you?"
Pulling his bound wrists down from over him, Odysseus tries to push his dress back into place and draw his thighs together, but it seems to be in vain, his drawing into himself instead only giving his Penelope more opportunity to leer over him, hooking her thumbs behind his knees and pushing them closer to his chest. For once, his large stature feels more like a hinderance than a gift, feeling like his own weight is trapping him, inhibiting his movement.
He can just barely still see her eyes through the sharp shapes of metal, the shadows make them seem just as sharp, pools of blue seeming endlessly deep while they rake over him, something cold replacing the usual adoring warmth in her features, an iciness that makes his heart stutter and race; its like she's looking through him. Strangely enough, this feeling, of being completely at his wife's mercy, of being beneath her, of being manhandled, of being treated more like an object than a husband or royal, makes him feel unbelievably safe. He can’t move enough to be able to do much of anything wrong, he can’t sink into his own thoughts, he doesn’t have to fight back memories, he can simply be, allow his wife to take him as she pleases and melt into this role he’s found himself in.
Hiding his face against his bicep, he listens to the subtle sounds of Penelope’s movements rather than watching, even so, he jumps when he hears, then feels, her spit down at him, the feeling of saliva rolling down between his thighs pulling a low, rumbling whine from him that vibrates through his chest. It’s such a subtle yet powerful ‘touch’, despite it not being a touch at all, that it makes his back instinctively arch and his body rock to one side. A firm hand ensures he stays flat on his back before venturing down to follow the trail of spit, a pair of fingers drawing a line down from his prick, lower and lower with subtle changes in pressure, until they make him flinch again, pushing into him ever so slightly with a new touch that forces him to lift his gaze to meet hers, taking a second to process before giving her a silent nod to show his true willingness before changing his performance to act the contrary, squirming under her and curling in to shield himself from her. "P’ease!" His plea comes out distorted, his tongue pinned and unable to move to make the correct sounds, though that soon enough becomes irrelevant when those pleads turn to just noise as she starts to move her fingers, the already drying spit doing nothing to help the rough friction, though she gives him the mercy of spitting onto her own finger as she pins his thighs to his abdomen under the weight of her forearm and shield.
With just a simple fold of his body, he’s rendered almost entirely immobile below his shoulders, only able to kick his feet uselessly and writhe and pull against the binding around his wrists, feeling his wife’s shield dig into the back of his knees, only further limiting his movement. Though his position makes it difficult to see much of anything, blessedly, Penelope leans over him, shadows obscuring her features, but he can just about make out a smile, such a small thing yet it makes his heart stutter, feeling almost like it stops the moment she meets his eyes.
"You're mine, dear queen, you will never escape me." Her eyes narrow slightly with the venomous sarcasm in that word he’s so used to hearing lovingly from her voice, pulling the breath from his lungs. All too soon for his liking, her fingers stop moving and instead retreat, leaving him with a low groan as he tries to hide in his arms, eventually being given with more opportunity to do just that when the hold on his legs finally lets up and, instead of pinning him on his back, she flips him over, somehow both giving him back some dignity while stripping him of more, grabbing his ankles when he tries to push up and away, shoving the loose fabric of his peplos, only kept on his body by the pins over his shoulders, to one side and leaning over him. The feeling of his wife's hips against his, though without the added bliss of being inside her, still makes his mind fuzzy, his hips instinctively rolling into the sheets to fulfil some of that need, though it doesn't go unnoticed, a soft voice suddenly so close that is brushes along his ear, "You are a needy one, aren't you? As much as you fight, you need a man to take care of you," one of her hands releases its grasp on his ankle, the subtle feeling of movement giving him the opportunity to try to squirm a little further away, "and your dear husband isn't going to be around to do it anymore."
Just about, he manages to press his cheek to the sheets and take a glance up to see his Penelope, now upright, holding a tool he'd once disdained, a tube of softened leather, stuffed and stitched up to mimic the — though much more smoothed-out — appearance of his own prick, specifically made to his measurements, as his darling wife made sure of. Penelope holds it up to the bottom of her helmet by the secure leather strap looped around her fingers and spits, the sight of spit drooling from the rounded tip mixing brutally with the knowledge of exactly what she plans to do to him to turn him to writhing mush, a part of him still working within his role and wanting to push away and fight, but his true self can barely contain himself, wanting to push back against her hips and arc like an animal in heat, but instead he acts out defeat. Groaning and burying his face into the slim space between his bicep and the bedding below him, he releases his grasp on the sheets below his bound hands and sighs, his voice garbled by the gag over his tongue, "P’ease, mercy…"
"Oh, I have no mercy to give you, darling," once again, his Penelope’s tongue turns sharp as she calls him something so adoring with such venom, and his mind dissolves and his pulse throbs, a rumbling whine escaping involuntarily, his heartbeat settling further and further down as she continues speaking, her voice drawing closer to his ear, "make me your king." His body only aches for her more at the thought of her stealing his title, squirming when fingers previously around his ankle now lace through his hair, when subtly dampened fingertips brush across the back of his thigh, sending shivers up his body and prickles over his skin. "You will already bare me more Spartan children, spare yourself the shame," before she finishes her sentence, that pressure returns, though it’s not the small push of her fingers, instead it’s something much fuller, the thin layer of saliva barely easing the aching stretch of stuffed leather, forcing a deep groan up from the bottom of his lungs, muffling it by shoving his face deeper into the bedding, barely hearing her finish her thought, "make me your king."
The hand in his hair twists and pulls, tugging his head back and depriving him of his hiding spot, forcing the masterfully made toy deeper until her knuckles press against against his hips. It hurts, of course it does, the pull too strong and the toy too big, but it feels real, inescapable, and wonderfully humiliating. His wife treating him as a defenceless queen, making him lowly and weak under her self-imbued power, turning him into a drooling mess of a man, if even a man. One thing she says, once he has enough mind to process it, sticks out and worms it’s way deeper into his thoughts, that he’ll bare her children, an impossibility, yet that takes nothing away from its appeal; stories of the younger generation of Spartan men being encouraged to impregnate the wives of their elders, of the heavy weight placed on fathering as many as many kin as possible, resurface in his mind, though he was never one to share, the idea of the one being shared however sticks. An image, of Penelope in her armour with the rest of her army taking him, sharing his spoils and breeding him like livestock, swirls through the cloudiness of his mind. Drool spills over his lips and down his chin, his body rocks with the pulsing pushes and pulls of the leather toy inside him, and his eyes haze over, unbroken groans laced with breath mercifully being muffled by the bedding beneath them when Penelope pins his hair to the sheets, making any movement painful for his scalp. Through the blurry haze of his vision, he can just barely catch sight of brass and shadow leaning down over him, her chest pressing flush to his back and the cold metal of her helmet pressing to his neck, the rhythmic feeling of her thighs meeting the backs of his only adding to the feeling of being taken. "Oh, you look beautifully ruined like this. As hard as you fight, you take me so well. You will bare me more than you ever did your coward husband." Her words are so perfectly brutal, like a punch to the gut or a twisting of the knife, forcing strangled groans up from the back of his throat, drool and precum staining the sheets under them, the friction of his body’s coerced rocking under each thrust of his Penelope only emboldening his low, pulsing, blissful noises.
Strangely, it’s as if all his instincts have softened and muted themselves, his fight-or-flight, for the first time in decades, going silent. All he can do is allow himself to be moved. Without a thought in his mind, he doesn’t bother to question the airy breaths that come beside his ear that only start to lace with the focused silence that he instantly recognises as his wife’s repression of moans when her knee presses into the bed beside him. All her subtle sounds do is encourage his mindless enjoyment, holding his hand and guiding him closer to the edge of euphoria, of this shared paradise of sex afterglow and empty thoughts. As rough as everything is, this world they’ve created for themselves and the softened leather coated in drying spit, the lead up to that peak is usually gentle, the quiet ecstasy of his Penelope guiding him along to the same fate.
He's gone for her, always has been, and always will be. He simply closes his eyes and revels in the mindless bliss cloaked in roughness and acted out brutishness and ruggedness, allowing himself to be gladly ruined.
His wife, his Penelope, takes him up to the edge of the cliff and leaps off with him. It’s a slow fall, his body carrying on its languid rocking and drawing out the spill beneath him, long groans intermingling with more choked sounds flowing free as he stretches up and grasps the bedding, lifting a foot up to gently lock around the back of her leg. When they both land, he feels weightless, the sound of heavy brass dropping to the floor and bed pulling a low rumbling hum from the back of his throat.
After a while of nothing but heavy breathing, Penelope gently breaks the silence, "Are you alright, my love?…" Her voice is beautifully clear now, sweet and doting as always, bringing a smile to his lips, a barely-there nod acting as his answer, even as the withdrawal of her toy makes his features scrunch and furrow. "That was…" his dear Penelope’s voice is light and airy with the breath of exhausted excitement as she drops to lay beside him, giving him just enough of a view to make eye contact as she finishes, "… exhilarating."
Though their bodies ache, it seems his fairing far worse with creaking joints and weak muscles, smiles stay etched on their lips, even as the belt straining his jaw is untied and pulled free from between his teeth, a trail of pooled saliva and strings a spit following suit, as the bind around his wrists is undone and his arms are finally allowed to move freely, as he’s rolled onto his back to make his heavy breaths more fulfilling. He adores this woman. As she cares for him, her smile never fades, giddy and youthful even as it gladly deepens the wrinkles around her eyes and on either side of her lips, her long hair brushing against him as she leans over him, her skin glows with sweat and he’s sure his does the same. Though his arms feel heavy and weak, he still makes the effort to reach one up to cup her face in his hand, his soul warming and finally feeling truly whole when he notices she doesn’t flinch away, doesn’t tense at the gentle touch, her smile never even wavers. Blessedly, she leans down and kisses him, and, for some reason, his eyes well with tears. When he runs his hand up through greying hair and strokes down her cheek and jaw, she doesn’t cower at his touch. He loves her so deeply.
When she pulls away, though she stays close enough to nudge their noses together, holding his face in her hands, she whispers into the small space between them, "How do you feel, my sweet husband? Can you speak?"
Swallowing and taking a moment to gain his strength, Odysseus nods and sighs, "Yes. I feel..." it takes a moment to parse through his words, none of the ones that he can think of feel grand enough, "I don't know, amazing. Divine. Perfect." He breathes out a short laugh and shrugs, nuzzling into her touch when she draws his attention to the few teardrops that she wipes away, "I can't... think very well."
"That's perfectly alright, there's no need for thinking now. I'm glad these are good tears." His dear Penelope litters kisses across his cheeks, and a warm joy surrounds them, aiding them in their joint recovery, bleeding through into her voice and blooming in his chest, "I love you so much, my Odysseus. Thank you for letting me be strong."
"You never needed me or my permission to do that, my Penelope." A half-formed laugh escapes him at the absurdity, but nonetheless, he leans up to press a kiss to her flushed cheek, "I love you too, darling, you're my everything. Thank you for letting me be weak..." Her giggles as he trails his kisses down her jaw and the side of her neck only make his heart flutter, "I enjoyed not being let go, having you physically trap me and keep me from getting away. Thank you for making me feel safe..."
"You are safe, my love." Her arms lock tight around him, once again giving him no room to move, and rolls over to hug him close to her chest, the plush warmth immediately easing his aches and taking him from exhilarated exhaustion to easy sleepiness, pulling him to try to nuzzle somehow deeper with a deeply content groan, a noise that seems to earn another giggle from his love, "I love you so much, my Odysseus. You’re so precious to me."
"I love you too, my Penelope, so so much… my everything, my power, my queen… Gods I love you…" he can only groan again and snuggle closer, finding there’s not enough words in the Grecian language, or any other language out there, to describe how he feels for his beloved wife.