for ambitious_woman Back to Earth, 1750

[quitehomoerotic]

There's something about Earth.

Out of all the places out there, all the little planets in the sky, Earth just has something special. He wanted to go back, and he hated that he wanted to go back. He'd ran away from there for a reason; he couldn't cope with it any more. It wasn't like he was even born there, sure he spent over a hundred years there, kicking his heels, saving the place on countless occasions, but it shouldn't matter so much to him! But there he was, sitting on some dirty transporter, wondering about getting back.

He couldn't go back though. He couldn't go back to there and then and the people he left and the people that left him. He'd ran so far across that planet to get away from the things that hurt, but it was just too small. Impossibly small and those troubles were right behind him, peering down from him from above. Guilt weighing down on him that he just couldn't escape.

So he stayed away. He stayed away and kept quiet. Frequented corners of dingy bars and found solace in the bottom of a bottle.

But it wasn't what he wanted, and pretend as he might that he was okay with wallowing, he wasn't. He wanted to be doing something, anything, and that damn feeling that Earth was where he should be just wouldn't quite go away.

That's when he realised; he had only one option. Go back. But not now.

It's also when he realised that he had to fix what had been broken for over a hundred years. He had to get himself back in the game.

Out in space and with the resources on the various ships he'd found himself travelling on, it was surprisingly easy to happen upon the little components and tools he might need. He'd never found them on Earth, but then he never did have that sort of luck. It took a while, but he got there, bit by bit amassing what he needed until finally he could sit down and with care take apart his vortex manipulator and put it back together again with new and renewed working technology.

He could go anywhere.

But where? Earth, of course. But not a place he'd been, not a time he'd been. Somewhere new, but somewhere that would be enough to comfort him in knowing he was 'home'. So he didn't make a decision as such, he just put in some parameters to avoid (Cardiff being the biggest), and he pressed the button and hoped for the best.

When he arrived, without even needing to check he knew he was on Earth. It had that smell, that slight mix of something in the air that always seemed to be there, no matter where or when you were. Good, he thought, good. This was good. He didn't check when or where he was, that could come later. For now he'd explore (and he'd forgotten how nice that could be).

So that's what led him to walking around a vast (and likely very private) garden, lined with intricate designs of flowers and plants. French, he suspected. That was okay, he hadn't been to France in a long time.

Maybe he'd enjoy this.

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[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

Reinette laughed softly, which only further proved how close they stood. She could feel her own breath where it returned to her following a brief meeting with his own. People were talking, and she could not care.

No. That was not precisely true. But they were speaking of her with curiosity again. Disapproval. A great many were obviously offended. And Louis? Well, she would face him later.

But there was no more pity in their gazes. And she could not help but be anything but glad for it.

Reinette turned slightly, allowing the palm of one hand to rest against his chest. Her fingers curled slightly. Intimately.

This was a game, she knew. But she could do no less than fully engage in it.

"Did you know I am a great patroness of the arts?" She smiled warmly. "I have taken a great many of them under my care. At some point you must give me a full demonstration of your skill."

[quitehomoerotic.livejournal.com]

Much to his surprise, Jack found himself laughing again. Laughing in a way that seemed to free up trapped air from his lungs, so that the next breath he took was deeper and richer. He threw his head back a little to fully appreciate the laugh, before returning his head back down, eyes focused to meet her gaze.

He took a step in closer, in what little space there was left between them, and smoothed his hand back and forth over her back. An idle, almost unconscious movement.

"Well a demonstration like that could take up a considerable amount of your time. Sure you're ready for that now?"

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

Reinette was captivated by his laugh.

She remained utterly still under the spell it cast, watching how it worked its way across his already attractive features. She sensed others were lost in it as well. Much like an actor speaking his lines to a rapt audience.

Only this was genuine. That is what held her. That is what she wanted to gather up close and keep for herself. That moment of genuine warmth. It was a rare thing in the court of Versailles. The cold, drafty hallways seem ill conceived to support it.

Reinette felt herself smile up at him and for once she could not say what she looked like.

"I pride my self on being extremely thorough, as I am sure you will find."

[quitehomoerotic.livejournal.com]

In her smile, Jack felt for a moment as though he shared something with her. Something wordless. Something that in fact required no words at all. But shared it was.

"I wouldn't imagine you'd settle for anything less," he smiled.

Again his eyes shifted and caught sight of gazes levelled in their direction. It amused him how little had to be done to fuel a fire. And here he was thinking the French were up on this sort of thing. Well, he didn't want to disappoint them.

Reaching over, he touched his hand to her arm and slipped it along to catch her hand, gripping it gently. He lifted it to his lips and placed a soft kiss to the back of her fingers. His eyes, all the time, were open and focussed on hers, and even when his mouth wasn't visible, his smirk could be seen in the crinkle of his eyes.

"Jeanne-Antoinette," he whispered, "I think we'll be the talk of the town, tomorrow."

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

She was happy.

How remarkable. Her cheeks flushed with awareness of it, though to the room that watched them with rapt attention it looked very much like a blush. Madame de Pompadour, abandoned mistress to a king was, was blushing. And they could not look away.

"Why wait for tomorrow, when we have tonight?"

Her gaze slipped to where his mouth brushed her hand and she felt unallowed laughter sit warmly in her chest.

"I believe, Monsieur Harkness, the time has come for us to retire for the evening."

[quitehomoerotic.livejournal.com]

Jack stood himself up straight and shifted his hand from where it sat on her back to place it over her fingers in place of his lips.

"Something tells me," he smiled, "we're going to get on very well."

He looked to the door and back to her. It was a movement that was entirely unnecesarry, and in such obvious it was for the display to others in the room, not the pair of them. It was writing a story for people to whisper into ears. It was amusing to ink people's pens and let them write the story themselves.

He had no doubt they would.

"Best offer I've had all night," he said, removing his hand from atop hers and gesturing an arm out in the direction of the door. He spoke her language (and not the French) well enough to understand they weren't suggesting anything that would demand a different level of intimacy, or at least the level the people in the room expected would occur.

"Lead the way."

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

Lifting her skirts Reinette lead Jack through the ballroom and out into the tiled hallway. Dozens of candlelit scones gave the cast the space with flickering color. As she turned to speak to him a rustle -- a mere whisper really -- caught her attention.

They were still being watched.

Without thought or hesitation she guided him into a shadowed alcove, pressing her body against his own with ease.

No, not with ease. But with a skilled, practiced imitation of it. Men did not like to think of the awkward manner in which bodies were more inclined to meet than not. Nor did they wish to be distracted by the numerous difficulties. But Reinette long learned to use her knowledge and training as a dancer to meet such challenges, and overcome then. What might be difficult or uncomfortable for her seemed the easiest of embraces for them. It was what she knew. What she was trained to be.

She lifted her mouth to his and encouraged him to open his own to her, and then met him in a slow, easy rhythm. The fingers of one hand threaded through the hair that sat just at the collar of his coat.

[quitehomoerotic.livejournal.com]

Stepping from the room Jack pays no attention to eyes that might follow. They follow, he's sure of that, but he knows too that should he look then they'll look away. Why spoil the game with such an elementary mistake. No, he wouldn't do that.

So his attention remained rapt on Reinette beside him, barely a breath away, even as they walked.

He could see what she was doing, even as she was doing it, and he barely concealed the smirk beneath his lips. He'd show it later, of course, wide and proud, but not now, not to shatter an illusion.

Her touch was responded to by a curl of his own hand around her waist. Fingers pressed into fabric to make their presence known, subtle in their demand, but noticeable.

Her lips though, even though they ought to have been expected, were not. Not immediately. And it was perhaps a mark of the man and how long he had gone without such a gesture. For barely a second he was frozen without response. Barely perceptible to most, but the trained would know. She would know.

His recovery though, was swift, and he moved into the kiss as though he'd been the one to demand it in the first place. His free hand caught around her cheek and held, palm curved around her face, and his lips met hers with a practised talent (and he easily recognised the talent in her too).

It was strange, to kiss again. Strange but nice, in a way he might not have expected. He didn't pull back; he brushed a thumb against her cheek, and his lips against hers curved into a smile.

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

Awareness washed over her. The places where his fingers brushed over her back, in between the laces of her corset. The touch of his hand to her cheek.The clean, confident smell of his skin in contrast to the musky, aged air that permeated his clothing. Whatever compromised Jack making an effort to dominate over it all. It was entirely male, and not all together unappealing.

She had not kissed anyone since kissing Louis goodbye. And even then, it was an entirely different matter. A little lost and mostly lonely being replaced with something fresh and unassuming. A long, languorous stretch in one's warm bed.

He was extremely good at this, Reinette thought idly. The women -- and men -- of France had best beware.

Reinette pulled precisely a breath away, so that when she spoke her mouth still moved over his own in a whispered caress. There was the faint, faraway sound of a door closing.

"We had an audience."

[quitehomoerotic.livejournal.com]

Jack could tell, just in that one kiss, that Reinette's skill was extensive. A kiss could be so much more than an indelicate fumble. It was a keystone to talent, and the delicate way the lips moved could tell a lot to the trained.

When she broke the kiss his lips very nearly followed hers to claim them back. A testament, were any needed, to just how good she was at this.

His eyes opened slowly and he looked over her and to the door that had been closed behind them.

"So we did," he whispered back, lips curved up into a smile. His hand, still on her cheek, held in place, and his thumb gently stroked back and forth; a tender gesture, and a wholly intimate yet entirely natural one.

He looked at her a moment, that half smile on his face and he shifted his thumb from her cheek to brush over her lips.

"Jeanne-Antoinette, I do believe we might have caused a stir," he smiled again and gently leaned in to press his lips to hers once more. But this kiss was not like the last, it was soft and showed the measure of the man for who he really was behind the painted image. It wasn't long, just a short kiss, and as he pulled back he smiled at her.

Smiled at her, with his smile steadily widening until he pinched her at the waist and started laughing.

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

She felt her face lift to his touch, and felt vaguely like one the flowers in her many gardens. It might be mortifying, such a public display of her own loneliness, if it did not feel so good.

Simple, yes. But so very good.

She wondered at the stories held in the texture of his fingers, what was caught up between the ridges and valleys there.

Contentedly she met him for a second kiss, and felt herself smile at Jack in return. Caused a stir, indeed. She was not ready to imagine the scene the next time they appeared socially. She was just about to ponder the question aloud when Reinette felt something sharp at her waist.

She pulled back, attempting to look stern but all she managed was a single choked breath of air. Of course he had ferreted out one of her most sensitive patches of skin.

"Did you just pinch me?"

Only of course she was laughing as well.

[quitehomoerotic.livejournal.com]

Her laughter warmed him. He realised then that it had been a long time since he'd shared laughter. Far too long. He tried to remember it and he couldn't. He was sure it was before everything changed, back in the Hub in an easier time. A time he took so readily for granted. He wished now that he'd held onto it tighter.

"So what if I did?" he asked, his grin wide and pleased.

He stepped closer, closing the distance she'd put in between them and he wiggled his fingers faux-menacingly in her direction.

"I'm a delicate innocent little thing," he said with a tone and a grin that said anything but, "you took advantage of me. You naughty, naughty woman, you."

He laughed again, and caught her again at the waist, pinching his fingers in the spot that seemed to cause such reaction before.

"I think it's only fair I get my revenge."

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

She laughed again, the sound blending with another intake of air as his fingers nipped at her waist once more. Reinette pulled away once more, her skirts twisting and swirling.

"You are no gentleman," she accused, pulling a breath.

"Nor delicate. Nor innocent." And continued it a very specific, very teasing tone that fit snugly within their evening?

"Nor little."

Her smile felt unbalanced and easy as as if it did not entirely belong to her.

"And you are well aware of it."

She knew about this man, and his dancing. But Reinette rather thought she would like to know more.

[quitehomoerotic.livejournal.com]

Jack continued to step towards her, hands reaching out to nip in again each time she withdrew. He continued too, to laugh, and to grin at her words, eyes creasing as she spoke.

"Such accusations!" he said in mock shock, laughing even as he spoke the words.

Though even while he was laughing, he was aware, and as his hand reached out again to grip her waist he heard the twist of the door in the distance. His head didn't turn to it, but he did act.

He stepped forward, and leading as though in a waltz, he stepped her back towards the alcove they'd previously occupied. The hand that would pinch instead embraced and pushed against her back to press her to him and with her back to the wall and his back to the open corridor he leaned in and kissed her again, and continued to do so as he heard the footsteps echo as they got closer and fade as they passed.

When the echo returned to nothing, he lifted his head back again and smirked, "Sorry, what was that you were saying?"

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

There was the wall, and then there was Jack. Of the two, one was far preferable. When Reinette allowed her body to fit against him this time, there was far less effort in it.

Delicate, innocent and little indeed.

The sound of footsteps were hardly audible from her position against the wall. That was his responsibility now -- one he was filled with particular skill -- and that left Reinette with little to do but focus on Jack.

She also owed his a certain measure of repayment.

Her mouth still moving easily with his own, she considered how effected she had been by his own touch. The man had pinched her, twice. One hand slipped into the narrow space between their bodies and past the fine fabric of his shirt to rest on warm skin. She palmed it, her fingers splayed with gentle pressure.

Only then did it occur to her it was not any nip or pinch she was repaying at all, but the soft touch to her cheek prior.

[quitehomoerotic.livejournal.com]

To feel the touch of a hand against his skin was a shock to the senses. It was good, far too good, far too nice to just be touched again. He never was touched too often. He was distant and for good reason. But there were always those, the odd few that he held himself with. It had been longer than he knew.

For a moment, his breath caught and it might have quite easily registered in the kiss. He scolded himself inside; he should have been adept enough to stop that. But he wasn't as practised as he once might have been.

And for another moment, he was terrified. Just a brief rush of endorphins as he realised that he was opening. Opening himself to smile, to laugh, or just to feel, and he'd stopped himself from feeling for so long. It was frightening to think what he'd open him up to by allowing any of those things again.

His forehead touched against hers and he took a long breath, his eyes pushed tightly closed. He focused himself on the touch of her hand, just for a pause, just to allow himself to drink it in and burn it to memory.

"Time to go," he said, and there was uncertainty and struggle even in those three words. "Time I went."

His attempt to sound more forceful and solidify the sentiment... didn't really work.

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

Reinette stood utterly still, her own eyes shuttered closed as well. When she did breathe, she could feel both their bodies move with the effort of it, the connections between them still sound.

Something had changed between them. Something tenuous and difficult to grasp. She understood that touch, which however brief had brought a sense of healing to her? Had somehow had the opposite effect on Jack. Something had been opened, raw and wide. He might as well be bleeding onto her. Her gown with be stained with it. Because Reinette understood that kind of pain. She had lived it. Blood stained sheets taken away time after time after time and for all that she hated them. For all that her weaknesses were laid bare? They were substantial. Real. It was something she could even hate, when it was needed.

But this was invisible. It tucked itself into the few spaces between their two bodies and was already pushing them apart, but it was invisible all the same. Nothing to see or to hate or to attack. Thus there was nothing left but onesself. To hate. To attack. To see.

And then you find yourself planning your day as to not encounter a single mirror.

He did not want to hear this from her. She could not imaging exposing herself to say it to him.

Reinette opened her eyes.

"Do not give time more credit than it deserves. I grow increasingly wearly of it."

Her voice was low and direct.

"If you wish to go, merely say so."

[quitehomoerotic.livejournal.com]

Were Jack a stronger man, he might have been able to do what he felt he ought and easily step away from Reinette. But then he never was as strong as he painted himself to be. And now, especially now, he was only just held together at the edges. He was cracked and it took little more than a gentle tap to make him fall apart.

He didn't open his eyes, even as she spoke, and even as he responded.

"I didn't say that," he said to her, evenly. It wasn't that he wanted to go, and he didn't want her to think that, though of course she would and he'd be foolish to think otherwise.

Finally, he opened his eyes, and the air felt cold as his vision focused.

He knew, really, that he shouldn't ask. He should just go, that'd be the right thing to do. The proper thing to do. Stay away, it's not fair to expose people to him.

But still... he asked.

"What do you want me to do?"

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

Still she did not pull away. Not even the offending had that had seemingly been the cause of this breech. Reinette supposed that to anyone walking past they would still look as if they were locked in an embrace. She fount that it no longer mattered.

Reinette looked up, meeting Jack's gaze evenly.

"Until this night, I cannot remember the last time that I laughed. Wat do you think?"

Her expression shifted slightly under the shadows.

"And perhaps that is selfish. But we are all at our core selfish creatures and at least I can have the grace to admit it. I would have you stay Jack. I would have you walk the slow path with me, at least for a while. Because unlike every person in that ballroom you would fully comprehend that that means if only because you know there is more. I would talk to you, and have you talk to me. Perhaps I could inspire you to laugh as well."

Her fingers compressed, feather light, against his skin.

"I would see if we might be friends."

[quitehomoerotic.livejournal.com]

Jack's eyes filled and he shifted his head away to the side as if to hide the tears that threatened to appear. It was a shock; he never let himself be so visible in front of people, not like that. He never allowed himself tears in public, and he hadn't allowed himself tears at all in such a long time. He thought perhaps he hadn't the ability to cry any more.

He pulled a hand back and wiped it over his face, letting out a slight laugh. It wasn't an amused laugh, more surprised, shocked.

"I'm not good for people," he said evenly, looking back at her. "People around me, they end up dead. Dead or hurt or broken. And I don't--" his voice started to break a little and he shook his head and took a deep breath, annoyed at himself for losing composure so very easily.

The shift of her hand made his eyes close, just for a blink that lasted too long, and he took a deep breath.

"I'm cursed," he said to her plainly as his eyes again opened. No ceremony or feeling sorry for himself in the words, just utter belief of their truth. "I don't want to curse you too."

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

Her face tilted to follow the lines of his profile as it shifted. She did not once look away.

"Curses. Prophecies. Fortune tellers." There was something unfinished in her tone, the words precise and clipped. "It was foretold when was a mere seven years old that I would become the lover of a king. I fell into my mother's ambitions and accepted them as my own. I dutifully accepted every lesson, even those my mother had no right to give. I practiced and excelled and truthfully can imagine no other life but this. But you must forgive me if I am weary of it now. I am done living other people's expectations and dressing it up as my life. Even yours, Jack. I find I cannot accept this notion that I would be cursed for you."

There was a brief smile, but it was there.

"I will die one day Jack, and it will have very little to do with your presence here. It will be sooner rather than later if this body has any say in the matter, but we are currently in negotiations. As for hurt, or broken?"

She thought about Louis. About the Doctor. About a great many things.

"Are we not both that already? Let us distract one another, even if only for a while."

[quitehomoerotic.livejournal.com]

Jack listened to her and watched her with interested eyes as she spoke. He didn't shift his head or look away. There was a respect in the way he listened, though it remained silent and under the surface.

"Everyone dies," he said with a shake of his head. His word trails off and the 'except me' was spoken silently in his mind.

He laughed again, that same hollow and empty laugh as before. "You know I think sometimes that's what life is. Steadily breaking you down until it's done with you."

He shook his head. A voice in his mind repeated that he should go, but it was becoming increasingly difficult to listen to it. He didn't want to leave. If he left where would he go? Who would he go to? Would he truly end up better off anywhere else? He didn't suspect so, not really. Not by a long shot.

Taking a deep breath, he looked down and back up again, shaking his head, letting out a laugh that had a much richer quality.

"Yeah," he sighed. "Yeah. Distractions. Can't argue with that. And you know what?" he smiled and touched his hand back to her cheek, "I think you're just my sort of distraction."

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

"Perhaps it is at that," Reinette agreed. "Life. But at the very least we can take something of it with us."

And she meant that. It was a part of her now. The hectic days and frantic pace and demanding life of court. Reinette had no doubt her life would not been a long one. Illness had dogged her heels since she was removed from her convent school at the age of seven. But make no mistake, it would be a full one.

She was often exhausted. But there was no doubt she was alive.

Jack laughed. And she smiled.

It was as simple as that. There was no calculation or though behind it, only pure reaction. Privately she reveled in it as her smile grew by degrees.

"I shall take that as the compliment I know you intended it to be."

Reinette pulled back, though just barely as she extended a hand.

"Come, Jack. I think it is time for bed."

[quitehomoerotic.livejournal.com]

"Well good," Jack said, "I'd hate for it to be taken any other way." Smiling down at her still, his fingers twisted and he tucked back behind her ear a few strands of her hair that had come loose from its delicate hold.

There was a pause when her hand was held out to his, but it was nothing more than a moment, and he was soon closing his hand around hers.

"Oh now that's quite the offer," he said, a smile in his tone, a little cheeky and delicately teasing.

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

Again, the touch gave her pause. It was not that Louis had not loved her, and indeed he loved her still. Love, as was often the way with things, not the issue between them. But he was still selfish as only a king could be. In what what he was raised for. And she, is turn, what what she was raised to be. She gave herself fully to him. Filling his days, indulging his whims. Creating entertainments and distractions.

If her fair was out of place --- well, he would not think to return it. He would not do as much for his own. This was the man that thought she desired payment for her bravery after a particularly hard bleeding. That could not remain in the room with her, out of his own weaknesses. It never occurred to him she would far rather have his hand than any bit of money.

No, he would not have given such attention to a few strands of hair.

Reinette kept her steps brisk as she lead them through hallways and back to her own suite of rooms. It had been designed for a Duke and a Duchess that had lost their title after a failure to produce as heir. At their passing, and her own displacement Reinette inherited their rooms. After her own bedroom and a sitting room sat another independent bedroom. She had already instructed a fire be laid there in anticipation.

It was there she led Jack.