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It was the winter of 1403.
The cold bit like a savage dog. No matter how many furs one wore, no matter how thick of hose one had, it still sunk into skin and caused a chill to settle in like no other. The snow was thick on earth, like a blanket with no warmth. And the crisp winds from the north held hands and cheek alike with their icy touch like an unyielding lover.
It was a brutal winter.
Yet Henry had never felt warmer.
It was his first winter with Sir Hans Capon as his lover. He had never felt lighter. His heart had never felt more fulfilled. Despite the secret of their relationship, the sun never felt brighter than these days he had now.
Every smile Hans sent his way with cold bitten pink cheeks made his heart soar. And every stolen kiss to chilled lips to warm them gave him such a feeling of home that the tender emotion nearly had dew at the corners of his eyes freezing solid on eyelashes upon their long horse rides together. His lord felt like home to him. Not a place, but a person held that title for him now.
The Sasau river was frozen over upon one late afternoon ride on the darkest evening of the year. They trotted alongside it after spending the entire day out. For a hunt, they would claim. Though that claim would be flimsy since no new furs or meat were attached to their saddlebags. A poor hunt, they would explain to any who pressed. After all, most rabbits were nestled in their burrows and bucks more wary in the cascade of white among winter stripped trees. At most, they may be admonished for their futile efforts.
The reality was that they had watched the woods fill with snow, together while fireside under a thick blanket, indulging in each other's company in the way they only could when completely alone. Far from any village or farmhouse or prying eyes. Far from duty or labor or combat.
The last rays of sunlight lay across the white snow like pale fire before dwindling. The sky lit up in more colors than the earth held beyond the clouds pregnant with fresh snow. The only other sound aside from the talk and laughter between Henry and Hans was the sweep of easy wind and downy flake.
Which is how it was all the more terrifying when a deafening crack erupted under hoof.
Despite years of walking along the rivers edge, in the darkening light, Sir Hans's horse had strayed just a little too far onto the ice from the bank. It was all too sudden. A hoof started to sink into the crack in the ice. The startled animal reared up. Hans was flung off his horse as the animal launched itself backward before charging back towards the forest, managing to get off the river. Yet its rider was only flung further in.
A sound like the crack of thunder echoed throughout the wintry air. Ice cracked in jagged edges like striking lightning. Henry had seen Sir Hans land upon the ice. But then he was gone, swallowed by the cold cracking pane under him giving way in the blink of an eye.
"Hans!"
Henry was dismounting Pebbles as fast as he could. He didn't even think before flinging off the thick wool cloak he wore onto her saddle, stripping down to the lightest clothing he could bare as he ran towards the broken ice his lord had fallen through. The river still flowed under the ice, dark and deep. Yet Henry didn't hesitate even a heartbeat to dive into it after Hans.
Swimming was not his forte, but he couldn't do nothing.
It mattered not that it could have been a death sentence to follow.
As far as Henry could see, it was equally a death sentence to watch the man who held his heart so fully disappear.
The rush of the water underneath was fearsome and horrid. Henry was swept away in it instantly, but that mattered far less than opening his eyes once under the ice and seeking his lord in the choppy current. It was dark save for the thin light of the setting sun breaking through the thick ice above. Cold sunk into flesh more violently and fiercely than the water soaking him through. Yet the need to find Hans was far more powerful.
Henry followed the flow of water intentionally, stifling his own fear of the rush of it as much as he could in an attempt to catch up to where it had whisked Hans. Moments after diving in, Henry finally caught sight of gold and crimson in the water. He flung himself towards it without hesitation.
Hans was clinging to a boulder within the harsh waters, bracing himself against the unbearable current while trying to press against the ice above him. He couldn't move without getting swept down the harsh river more, yet the ice above was far to thick to break. Henry could see his hits growing weaker. Hans had not managed to get a good breath of air before being thrust into the freezing waters like Henry had. It was clear that he was panicking.
The river current thankfully sent Henry right into Hans with only a few desperate swings of his arms through the water. He practically rammed into the young lord, but he didn't hesitate. Wrapping his arms around Capon's waist, Henry kicked them away from the hopeless spot. They were sent tumbling further down the stream, Henry holding Hans tightly and taking any hit of twig or rock as they tumbled through the currents. His own lungs started to burn.
A bend in the river thankfully made it easier to drag his lord out of the water without being skilled in swimming. They were lucky. Henry grabbed a log that rested just under the ice, ramming his shoulder at a thinner section of frost nearer the edge of the bank until it finally broke free and gained them freedom. A shaking hand pried the panels of ice out of the way, pulling both him and Hans out of the water and onto the log.
They were gasping for air. Cold wind bit at them as terribly as the chill in the water had, but the risk of drowning had thankfully passed. They followed the log back to its still attached uprooted roots barely hanging onto the frozen ground at the shore, pulling themselves out of the freezing water and far from the dangers of the ice. Once on land, Hans clung to Henry's remaining wet clothes as if letting go would send him back into the river again despite how they were crawling further and further up onto the banks of it. His hands trembled.
Henry was the more sober one still, looking around at where the river had taken them as Hans coughed water out of his lungs and cursed. They were far further down the river than where they had lost their horses now. He didn't recognize where they were. There were no farmhouses or signs of a village. No immediate help. That wasn't good.
The snow was still falling, brisk winds prickling their already frozen bodies. They had to get warm as quickly as possible. Henry's own hands were shaking badly. When he checked on Hans, his lord was white as the snow around them and shaking just as much as he was. His lips had already started to turn blue.
They didn't have time to waste on orientating themselves so they could return back to Rattay together. They had to get warm now.
First things first, Henry needed to get Hans out of the clothes he wore. Had they been wool, they would have still had decent isolation from the cold despite how soaked they were. Yet the young lord foolishly still wore silks and more lavish materials that only froze in the winter weather when wet. Henry needed to get him in front of a fire immediately.
To his surprise, Pebbles trotted down the bank of the river as if following them. Henry's thick wool cloak was still draped over her back. He knew he had a kit for making a fire in her saddle's pack, a dire need for anyone should they find themselves lost in the snow or in a terrible predicament like they had during the deadly season. She would know where Rattay would be when they were finally warm enough to dare to travel.
A Heaven-sent miracle.
Henry grasped Hans's hands and pulled him up to his unsteady feet. Other than the cold, he thanked every saint that Hans didn't seem injured.
"We need to get you warm. Follow me. I'll get you warm. I promise." Henry tried to reassure his beloved, but his own voice shook from the cold. Hans could only nod as his teeth chattered against each other.
In a nook of trees where the blistering wind could touch them less, Henry set to stripping them of their useless clothing. The dry wool cloak Henry had been wearing up until the river broke was tossed over Hans as Henry hurried in building a fire before he could freeze his arse off.
Chaga harvested from a birch tree at the start of winter's dry season and flint were ripped out of his kit. Henry stripped the wood and bark from a nearby birch, practically ripping the tree apart with the hatchet he had in Pebbles's pack in his haste. Henry's own fingers were shaky and numb from the cold. It was hard to get the flint to behave for him when his hands couldn't strike it well enough.
Just when he was about to curse, Capon's hands were grasping his and taking the flint from him. Hans was just as shaky as him, but he had at least a moment's time under the thick wool cloak. His strike managed a spark. The tinder thankfully took to it. Henry could have kissed him for it, but they had their hands full with needing to quickly tend to the small flame to make sure it stayed lit.
A sigh of relief was finally shared between them as the birch bark and soon wood built from spark to flame to roaring fire. Henry laid out their soaked clothes on a messily whittled spit before sitting down on the fallen log his lord already huddled upon. He was already starting to warm from the fire mixed with the amount of exercise he had been doing to create it in haste, but when Hans opened the wrap of cloak and beckoned him inside, Henry couldn't refuse.
Skin pressed against skin with no reservations in doing so. Hans put his arm around Henry's shoulders as his beloved page put his arm around his waist and drew him in closer. There were no villages or houses as far as the eye could see. And even so, they had the excuse of the cold biting into their skin from the river to hold each other so close. The only time they parted being when Henry would reach out a hand to toss another branch of birch into the fire to keep it ablaze.
"How are you doing?" Henry asked after enough time that the trembling in both their limbs had quelled. "You fell from your horse. Nothing broken, I hope?"
"Thank all the saints, no. And I'd be glad if you didn't spread it around that I did. I would be a laughing stock." Hans replied. Henry was glad to hear that his lord's voice was steady and no longer shivering from the cold sinking too deep into bone. "Seriously, though, thank you, Henry. I thought I was dead. And I also thought you couldn't swim?"
"Not really, no." Henry responded honestly. "Not sure what would have happened without that bend in the river there. But I couldn't just… not jump in after you. I couldn't bare it if I could save you but let the river dissuade me from doing so."
"Kurva, Henry." Hans swore softly, but he leaned in closer to Henry's touch. "You could have gotten us both killed."
"Aye. Better than leaving you behind to die alone though."
At those words, their eyes met. Hans was the first to lean in, kissing Henry tenderly. The feeling of his still cold lips and their pale blue color made Henry want to warm them even more with his own until their beautiful natural color flourished again. He reached up, his hands warmer from working the fire as one cupped Hans's chill-touched nape while the one at his waist pulled him closer.
It still wasn't enough.
The only presence around them was the faint drift of downy flake as the Heavens above them dotted their hair with a dusting of snowflakes. The fire crackled and warmed the cold within them, but Henry knew they could warm up even faster and better together.
Careful to keep them wrapped in the dry warmth of the cloak, Henry tugged Hans to him, gently pulling them off the log they sat upon and laying his beloved lord onto the warming earth in front of the fire. Pale blue lips and alabaster skin paired with his blond hair made Hans look ethereal underneath him, but Henry merely wished for his human lord back in his arms. He would kiss him a thousand times to bring him back from the Heaven he looked like he was from now. He would not let this angel be taken from him, even if he had a noble-worthy attitude sometimes and a keenness for trouble.
Despite the freezing waters that they had been baptized within, their blood still ran hot in their veins for one another. Henry could feel it rushing south, filling Hans's cock at his hip as he caged his lord underneath him and hoped the warm wool surrounding them encased him well enough in their shared warmth under the light of the fire in the growing dark.
Thumbs caressed the soft skin of the inner wrists where he pinned his lord. He wished to do so above Capon's head, to see his bare body stretched out so beautifully beneath him, but to do so would take his pale arms out of the thick wool of the cloak. He wanted Hans warm despite the desire burning within both of them to submit to lust.
Hans let himself be pinned without a fight, clearly enjoying Henry's warmer body pressed so fully against him without any barriers. His page's warmer hands felt like they burned as they trailed down frozen bare skin, first warming the skin from wrists to elbows, then up biceps to shoulders. When they curled around his collarbone, Henry laid his hands flat so he could boldly pet down pecs and the muscles within Capon's archer-bred sides. The warmth and touch sinking into flesh blessed him with a soft parting of lips and grateful moan.
The way that Hans arched into his touch was worth every minute of bearing the horrid cold of the frozen over river. To think that it tried to take this away from him was sin in its own right. Henry would never forgive the harshness of the waters at this rate.
But for now, he could warm his lord as he needed. And more. Far more.
Henry disappeared into the wrap of the wool cloak, warm hands and tender kisses the only way Hans could track where he was underneath it. Lips pressed to collarbone, tracing the jut of it from one side to the other meticulously. Warm hands rubbed at Hans's sides, tracing every curve and dip of muscle lower and lower with exquisite attention to detail. Lips trailed further south, pressing kisses to pecs and over Hans's heart as if thanking it for remaining beating and keeping his love within his arms.
A sudden hot tongue made Sir Hans yelp at its slick heat in a way that echoed across the stillness of the softly snowy evening. It echoed off of trees, creating a cascade of the sound that was more beautiful than any minstrel's music to Henry's ears. He laved his tongue across perked nipples, bold in every stroke against the cold tightened nubs. Once he was sure that they were perked from arousal more than cold, he took one into his mouth. His teeth worried it, tongue flicking against the tender nub, and sucked greedily until flesh was warm under his ministrations. He switched to the other once sure he had laved the other in enough attention to send his lord mad with desire.
Capon's hands grasped the wool blanket in a tight grip with one hand while the other shot to the back of Henry's head and tangled in his hair. He didn't try to pull the hot mouth away from his chest. Quite the contrary. Hans pressed on his beloved's nape, arching his back into his touch despite how the pleasure made him writhe against it. He was panting with desperate need.
Henry could feel how his lord's cock throbbed and filled further at the heated attention. It was a good sign that his lord's blood was flowing well despite his plunge into the depths of the icy river. He couldn't help it when the urge to mar the beautiful skin under his mouth seized him in response to his own arousal at the feeling, however. Teeth champed down, biting greedily into the flesh he had just warmed up to him. The shutter he felt and groan he heard in return encouraged him to leave a mark, a claim on the cold pale skin under his mouth.
"Henry…" The hiss of his name and soft thrash of Capon's head became a plea. Henry couldn't deny his lord.
Henry's hands rubbed warmth into his lord's hips, tracing the scar on his arse where arrow had hit as they curved around to grope muscular flesh hungrily.
Kissing down light blond hair that led to a fully stiffening cock, Henry was eager to sate that plea on his lord's lips in the darkening deep wood they had found themselves in due to the raging river. Come morning, they would need to find their way to Rattay and warm themselves with a proper hot bath and fireplace. But for now, they had each other's arms and the crackle of hastily cobbled together flames in the woods softly filling with snow.
It was more than they could have asked for after the near death occurrence that had very nearly pulled them into icy depths. They would have still been together had it fully taken them, at least. Henry wouldn't let it be any other way.
Hans's hand tightened in Henry's hair as his voice rang out in the still forest they were nestled in. Wet heat dragged across his stiff cock, tracing the thick vein on the underneath in a unhurried methodical lick. It was done with the pure intention of warming that flesh while eliciting the most lewd sounds it possibly could from Capon's lips. Henry couldn't get enough of them. It was easy to hear more and feel his hair pulled delightfully as he carefully took the head of Han's cock into his mouth. Twisting his tongue around the head and swallowing the taste of Hans's leaking cock felt wonderful.
Henry hummed his approval when Hans pulled on his hair; not to lift him away from devouring the throbbing length on his tongue, but to send tingling sharpness through Henry's scalp. Capon's lips parted and his chest heaved as the vibration surged through his cock. Yet he let Henry do what he greedily wanted with him.
Henry's fingers trailed to the cleft of his lord's perky arse, groping wholeheartedly the entire way to it and rubbing with his blacksmith-worthy hands until flesh warmed at the friction. As he did so, Henry bobbed his head slowly up and down the length of the noble prick in his mouth. It was unhurried, but never lazy in its intention. He laved the shaft with a plentiful amount of warm spit, taking more and more into his mouth once he had soaked Hans so thoroughly that he could tenderly give him a sloppy fuck into his willing throat.
"Oh! Oh, fuck! Henry!" Hans moaned heartily at the lack of effort spared on Henry swallowing down his cock. Henry didn't even balk as Capon's hips started thrusting upwards to slap his testicles against chin to meet the steady and greedy pace bobbing up and down his cock.
It was only when the cock in his mouth was hot and throbbing that Henry finally pulled his mouth away from downright molesting the sensitive flesh. The hand in his hair tugged sharply in protest, but relented. His lips pulled off with an audible pop that had the slick length in front of his face under the wool blanket twitching with the threat of painting his face in white from hearing the lewd sound.
But Hans wouldn't be happy with his pleasure alone. He had grown greedy enough to require Henry's too.
Henry decided to make sure to satisfy his lord.
The wool cloak was pulled open. Legs lifted up into the air that was thankfully just warm enough this close to the fire to only cause a light prickling of gooseflesh across pale skin. Hans was completely exposed to him, sprawled across the thick red of the cloak. He looked so handsome against the color that Henry couldn't hide how firmly erect his own cock was to have this beautiful knight under him.
In their secluded 'hunt' earlier that day, Henry had already taken Hans. Henry couldn't help how his cock visibly twitched at seeing that his lord's hole was still gaping from being fucked open while they had watched the snow pile up along the forest floor in warm clothes. Henry wondered if any of his seed remained inside where Hans had locked him in with legs around his waist to spend.
Hans had taken quite well to being filled with his beloved bodyguard's seed nearly daily. Every excuse given to feel it. Every moment taken to indulge in the feeling of the pleasurable nerves deep inside of him being rammed by Henry's thick and lengthier than average cock.
But Henry had a different idea to warm his lord.
It had been some time since they indulged in simple rutting against each other and caressing skin with skin. Not since Hans had adamantly protected his virtue like a young maiden; his fear of sodomy no where near his true fear of Henry's enormous size entering him. It was laughable now, as Sir Hans Capon of Pirkstein ended up loving taking it up the arse far more than anything once curiosity and preparation won out against fear.
Yet now, Henry simply wanted to worship his lord and show him every ounce of his bone-crushing love for him.
Henry slotted himself between Hans's spread legs, lining them up cock to cock. The shear warmth created between them from the tips of their cocks meeting, to the press of shaft against shaft, to the heaviness of drawn up testicles weighing against each other was enough for Henry to drop his forehead to meet Hans's. It felt so good to be so flush against one another despite how a small drift of snowflakes brushed against them and dotted their flesh in the open air.
They simply breathed each other's breath as Henry's hands tenderly rubbed the insides of his lord's spread thighs and felt each other's intimate weight against each other. Capon's fingers tangled in his beloved bodyguard's hair still. Deep blue eyes stared into those that rivaled the color of a clear summer's sky. The gaze they exchanged held unhurried heat as well as an abundance of care for the other. It was almost a shame to break the tender romance of the moment through the slow and steady rut of hip against hip.
Henry bucked his hips leisurely, slowly and steadily granting them both a gentle and toe-curling build of ecstasy. The friction was warm as was their locked gaze as they both steadily rode the waves of pleasure washing over them in the heat of the fire and stillness of the forest surrounding them. They only had eyes for each other despite the beauty of the lovely trees blanketed in white and soft drifting downy flake of crystal clear snow.
Hans was the first to voice the need.
"Just… Just the tip, Henry." His lord begged through needy panting breaths. Henry had him riled up enough that his tongue had abandoned any haughty quip. "At least give me the tip."
Henry couldn't deny his beloved lord anything. Especially not when he asked so breathlessly and close to the edge.
It was so clear that Hans was about to orgasm when Henry slid his cock between Hans's cheeks until the leaking tip caught on the gaping pucker of his rim. Henry kept his hand on his own shaft, knowing the second he prodded his lord's hole that it would be oh so very easy to cave to temptation and thrust fully inside. When he felt the softness there practically swallow the tip without much work on his part, it proved to be a good call. Hans moaned like a bathhouse whore when the full head pressed inside of him, his rim spreading tight around Henry's girth.
But there was somewhere else Henry wanted to spill his seed.
If he caved and thrust in deep, Henry knew he would lose his mind and rut into Hans like a man determined to fill his bride on their wedding night with a healthy son. It wouldn't be the first time he took his lord like that. It would be far from the last, if either of them had anything to say about it.
Instead, Henry prodded the tender hole of his lord over and over. His thick cock spread his lord's hole around the girth of his cockhead again and again, smearing the rim shiny with how much precum he leaked upon each pull out. Hans was a mess under him, needy and writhing at the shallow penetration. He kept his thighs spread, as if to tempt Henry to thrust fully inside of him a second time that day and spend within him all over again. He was a seductress worthy of the greatest warnings against sin in the monastery walls. Henry had to fight against his own lust quite hard not to give in.
Henry's hand not on his own cock to limit the rut of his hips moved to help ease his lord past the edge he seemed to teeter on. Fingers drifted to the arsehole he toyed with, pulling at the tight pucker's edges while taut around the head of his cock and rubbing boldly around it as he cruelly fed it only the tip as asked. Hans's breath came at a shaky pant. His legs spread, leaving him defenseless as that hand boldly moved up to caress his perineum wholeheartedly. Smoothing his palm over Capon's noble testicles so boldly, Henry let his heat linger and seep into his lord there.
Hans tensed, so close that it was clear he was trying to hang onto the cliff side of orgasm rather than tumble down its ravine. His cock throbbed so boldly that it slapped against his navel. Henry wouldn't let him hang on.
The blacksmith's boy leaned in, kissing Sir Hans just as his hand found his lord's straining cock. It only took two long leisurely strokes from base to tip and a slightly firmer thrust just a little deeper until he found the tender nerves of Hans's prostate to break his lord's restraint. Hans was crying into the kiss, his back arching up into Henry, arse pressing down onto cock, and seed spilling in a fresh warm mess that was stark upon their skin within the cold.
Just as his orgasm threatened to overtake him at the beautiful feeling of his love's hole tightening around him and milking him, Henry pulled away from the kiss and his throbbing cock out before he was too tempted to thrust into the tight heat begging to be violated so by him a second time that day. Instead, it only took a few thrusts along his lord's beautifully muscled thighs and a tight fuck into his own hand for Henry to be graced by the sight and feeling of coating his lord in a thick layer of white as proof of his love and devotion.
Each shot spilled in heavy and bold ropes. Each as warm as the last against once cold touched skin.
Henry moaned as he was cumming all over Hans's body, his seed hot and covering his love thoroughly. Hans accepted the painting of his abs, thighs, and own cock, basking in seeing his blacksmith's boy orgasm for him. Their cum mixed. The dollops of milky white across skin regaining its color from the warmth of hand and within firelight made Hans look even more ethereal. The redness of his nipples on his panting chest made his bodyguard wish to mark the other nipple with a firm bite mark to match the other.
Henry couldn't help but bend down and kiss him sweetly.
Once they were both warmed through heartfelt sex, they wrapped themselves in the wool cloak once again. A tangle of limbs curled around one another and lips pressing to flesh and other lips alike until the fire dried their clothes and burned down to the crackle of embers. There was no care for the drying seed that marred their skin save for the claim it staked. Hans would complain later, but not then.
They slept well together despite waking in the morning to snowflakes in eyelashes and hair. The gentle frost could not conquer their shared warmth no matter how it tried. They had a peaceful night in the arms of a lover. Even the harrowing danger of an ice covered river nearly taking them from each other could not take the miles they would have in the future. And they would have so, so many more miles together before they would sleep that final rest.
Together. Always together.