Carry Me Down

By Seishuku Skuld (skuldchan [a] gmail dot com)

Series: One Piece ~ Skypeia Arc

Pairing: Calgara/Norland

Warnings: yaoi, spoilers for Skypeia, NSFW

Date: September 2006

Blue, blue caravan winding down to the valley of lights. 

My true love is a man who would hold me for ten thousand nights.

In the wild, wild wailing wind, he’s a house ‘neath the soft yellow moon.

So blue, blue caravan won’t you carry me down to him soon.

Blue, blue caravan won’t you drive away all of these tears.

For my true love is a man that I haven’t seen in years.

He said, “go where you have to for I belong to you until my dying day.”

 So like a fool, blue caravan I believed him and I walked away.

                                    ~ Vienna Teng “Blue Caravan”

*~*~*~*~*

They first met in the rain, beneath a cloud-filled sky.  They were both fighting for a woman, Calgara to end his daughter’s life and Norland to save it.  But they were also both fighting for the livelihood of the village, both men in their own different ways.  The day Great Warrior Calgara first met Admiral Norland was the day he first tasted defeat, and that left a bitter film in his mouth, one that fortunately had been washed away, perhaps all too quickly.

Calgara had first caught Norland unawares, the Admiral, explorer, and botanist with a drunken, good-natured grin on his face, his shoulders shaking with mirth for no other reason than he was drinking with his friend.  That laughter stopped abruptly when he hit the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust, Calgara’s knee between his thighs.  Norland did not remember seeing the sun dip below the horizon that night, and when he came to Calgara was snoring loudly and drowning out the pleasant crash of the waves against the island cliffs. 

Being the Great Warrior Calgara he was not required to tend to the fields by day.  He was not required to rebuild the rotten fences that had not withstood last season’s harvest of dead and barren crops, he was not required to help the men sharpen their spearheads or pass on the village’s lore at night around a crackling campfire—he much preferred to spend his time with Norland.  Calgara had once spared little thought for anything else other than the island’s defenses or for praising the Gods that watched over them and their ancestors’ spirits.  Never once did he stand at the edge of the sandy beach and let the sea lap at his ankles, never once did he gaze out beyond the ocean to the horizon and wonder what there was in the world beyond the tiny scrap of island he called his home.  At least he had never wondered what sort of people the seas of the Grandline would bring him until Norland appeared that one day, rain coursing down his face and soaking his clothing, a defiant look on his face the likes that Calgara had never seen before.

Sleep was long in coming to Calgara; Norland slept deeply.  But Norland always awoke at least once in the night, which was why Calgara liked to linger even after the explorer nodded off.  Calgara had accepted Norland’s eccentricities—his childlike curiosity and his insistence on progress and development—those were things that had little meaning to Calgara, but he felt that they were key components to Norland himself, and indeed to the attraction between them.

Norland shifted against him, a soft shuffling of the black coat he normally wore, now all but draped about his naked shoulders.  Calgara opened an eye lazily, sensing that Norland was about to awaken and disturb his quiet repose.  Calgara raised an eyebrow, meeting Norland’s questioning, if sleepy gaze.

“What time is it?” Norland asked, peering over Calgara’s chest at the horizon which was still dark.

Calgara chuckled in response.  “What does it matter what time it is?  There is still enough left of the night.  Sooner or later it will be morning and you will go and explore more of the island, so what does it matter whether you finish one day or the next?”

“Of course it matters,” Norland pushed himself up on his elbows to regard Calgara.  “Eventually there won’t be another day left on the island.”  Norland’s face fell a little, taking on a serious quality that Calgara both liked and hated at the same time.  “I have to leave eventually.”

“Are you trying so hard to hasten that day?”

Norland shook his head.  “Perhaps,” he said after a long silence, “I am just thinking that the sooner I leave here, the sooner I’ll come back…and stay.”

Calgara laughed loudly and Norland almost shushed him.  So far they’d managed to carry on their affair away from the eyes of the villagers and Norland’s crew, but with Calgara the way he was, Norland didn’t know how long it would be before either of the parties—or worse, both—found out about their clandestine relationship, and what would he do then?  Calgara didn’t seem to mind the consequences of their intimate liason being discovered, and Norland half-suspected that half the village, and probably most of his crew, knew already.

“Maybe you don’t have to leave at all,” Calgara said when his laughter quelled.  Norland averted his eyes.

“Come now,” Calgara slapped him in the back, “don’t give me that look.  I think…” and then he paused and looked at the stars, listened intently to the waves lapping at the cliff’s treacherous rocks, “I think your mind’s already made up.”

Maybe that was why the hands suddenly gripped Norland were so strong, and why the arms that wrapped about him were so fierce. They were in their little spot on the cliff, where the forest trees had given way to a little patch of earth and grass overlooking the sea, just big enough for the two of them where they liked to laugh, drink, sleep, and occasionally make love.

“Ow,” Norland protested as Calgara flipped him over and inserted a thinly lubricated finger into him.  Calgara only laughed and slapped him playfully in the rump, not missing a beat.

“Now Norland,” Calgara murmured as he bent over his lover, whispered words into his ear and let his lips play over Norland’s neck.  His words started from nowhere and nowhere they went, save that they might have been created for the sole purpose for Norland to hear or for Calgara to utter, simply because he liked saying them.  The warrior ran the tip of his shaft up and down Norland’s ass, teasing him as the air around them suddenly seemed to turn chill, and a sheen of sweat appeared on their bodies. 

Norland winced, forced himself to relax as Calgara took him without much preamble, just a familiar pressure at his entrance and a grunt in his ear.  Calgara, amazingly was much better at this end of things than Norland was, but seemed to prefer the way things went now as ‘the usual way.’  The first time Norland had tried topping Calgara, the warrior had only laughed, saying that he had no skill.  Subsequently Norland had bottomed for a whole week straight, as a part of what Calgara had termed the missing part of his education.

If there was something that Norland had discovered about the love between men, was that it was completely different from the love between a man and a woman.   Calgara disliked to kiss, first of all.  And second there was no pillow talk, no whispered promises of love eternal, Calgara simply would lie down on the ground beside him, a sated grin on his face, his arms and legs spread open and inviting to the night sky.

It seemed a long time to Norland, who was near-naked with his pants pooled about his knees and his elbows digging into damp forest grass, before the hand at his waist moved to grasp his shaft.  Calgara’s long, calloused fingers wrapped around his arousal and pumped it, sliding up and down its length in rhythm with his thrusting.  Norland bit his lip to keep from crying out, but Calgara did not indulge in such restraints, when he came it was with a wild howl that was quickly swallowed by the silence of the forest and the whispers of the waves on the cliffs far below them.  After a few moments, Calgara pulled out with a feral growl in Norland’s ear, biting the skin of Norland’s shoulder so hard he almost pierced skin. 

“Ah!” Norland gasped, arching his back, but he liked it.  He liked it when Calgara’s flame red hair tickled his back, when they fell at his sides like a great crimson waterfall and for a moment, enveloped him in a world that was only big enough to hold two men and nothing more. 

It was not until late morning, long after the dawn mist had cleared, before Norland woke again, to find Calgara beside him with two mugs and a bottle of grog.  Norland rubbed his eyes.

“You don’t take your time do you?” he asked, stretching out the morning’s soreness and noting rather belatedly that he had neglected to pull his pants up from the early morning’s exertions, and that Calgara had similarly neglected to pull them up for him.

“Not entirely true,” Calgara replied, pouring him a drink.  “I take each day as it comes.  And today,” he handed Norland a mug, and the explorer accepted it gratefully.  “I decided it would be a good day to start the drinking a little bit early.”

Their mugs clinked and they drank in silence for a time, Norland feeling some of the warmth stolen from him by the morning chill return as the liquor entered his system.

“Another half a month, maybe less,” Norland said finally.  He stared out at the sea, mostly because he didn’t want to see what sort of expression Calgara had on his tattooed face.

“Hmmm,” Calgara replied, “then I suppose I’ll have to take advantage of what few days are left.”

“And what will you do afterwards?” Norland asked suddenly.

“My wife.”

Norland laughed and turned to his friend, his lover.   “That’s not what I meant.”  Calgara had dodged the question rather skillfully, but Norland had fired again.  An uncomfortable silence followed. 

“I have my duties,” Calgara replied finally, having drained his drink and poured himself another.  “As do you.”

Norland nodded.  His mug of grog was still half-full.  “I’ll come back.  Someday.  Soon.”

Calgara nodded, his face hidden in the shadows of his wild, unkempt hair.  The warrior chuckled and Norland suddenly wondered if that was Calgara’s way of warding himself against the sadness and the melancholy.  “I’ll be here,” Calgara said simply after a time.  “I for one, don’t have anywhere else to go.”  He laughed again.  “Well, not until the final journey anyway.”

Norland turned to glare at Calgara, his expression intense and serious.  “Don’t you dare take that before I do.”

“You don’t need to worry about that.” 

Calgara and Norland clinked mugs together—to the past, to the present, to the future which they were sure would hold their silent promises fulfilled.

When they parted the day was clear and the wind was strong, the sun’s rays reflecting clearly over the sea and making glistening drops of a rain of another kind.  That day Great Warrior Calgara came to regret many things and promised many things as well, one of which was that when he would see the sails of Lvneel again on the horizon, he would be the first one in the water to welcome Norland back home again.

End