She starts with a slip knot around his right wrist.

He watches, blue eyes calm and quiet. Both of them knowing if she's placed it wrong, if she pulls and it tightens she could do real damage to his hand, his sensitive hand.

She could ruin him, in this moment.

If she wanted.

They don't move. A second rope joins the first, red and black against the rustic brown of his skin. A third, thinner and gold as Rapunzel's straw but far stronger.

His lip curls, just a little.

She begins plaiting. Each rope carefully placed and sectioned and crossed at each juncture, up the smooth skin and muscles over the radius and ulna and a quick twisted band below his elbow. She does not pause, continues up bicep and tricep to the armpit where she shapes another knot of black and red and gold and the melanin she herself lacks.

He sits up; she reaches behind him and draws her materials across the leather covering his back. He doesn't make this part easy for her, but he doesn't make it difficult, either.

The strands and knots grow tighter as she works her way down his left arm, using the latticework on his right as an extra set of anchor points until she's satisfied with the red hourglass at the small of his back and she closes the loop with three more simple loops around his left wrist.

He could slip away, she knows, despite the care in her bondage. She can see his muscles trembling with the urge to prove she doesn't hold him.

But she does, and she traces a finger just inside one neatly-formed diamond. Symmetry, and black and white and gold on her unprotesting brown canvas.

(Commentboxed and not beta-read!)

'HOHMYGOD.

She could ruin him, in this moment.

If she wanted.

::IZDED::

So, I should consider this a success, then. ;)

Absolutely! :D

Normally? Bondage as artwork (while very pretty and artistically pleasing) doesn't really do much for me, but this? OMGGUH.

/is blushing.

Thank you. :)

Guh.

Gorgeous.

And perfect.

and

and

...yes, I wish to subscribe to this newsletter.

Thank you. :)

Quick question-- I'm putting a link on the master post. How do want to list the rating for this fic? Any warnings? Thanks!

Oops!

Let's call it R/mature for subject matter but no warnings.

My apologies. I just got so excite!

yuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuup. dead. i'm dead. dying. dying and dead.

Pokes sunny_serenity with a toe.

Looks up.

She's Dead, Jim.

(Thank you. :) )

Ohhhhhhh, this is gorgeous and insightful and also hot as anything.

♥

Thank you!

Oh my god oh my god oh my god she makes an hourglass on his back while tying him down/up/everywhere I think just died and went to heaven

This is PERFECT thank you!!

You're welcome! :)

Where is my kudos button? Lovely images!

Thank you, m'dear! :)

Delicious and beautiful and so so lovely! Fantastic images and descriptions of what's going on, and I love the trust you display between them.

Love! <3

Thank you so much! Yes, the trust was really important for me in this, so I'm glad it came through for you as well!

Oh hello Clint getting to be the one tied up in rope!fic :D And there's so much in this, wow. There's the whole thing of Natasha decorating him with her symbol, that hourglass at the small of his back where he can't even see it, so that he's not so much tied physically as, what, metaophorically? Since he can get out of it.

Also that to prove she doesn't hold him and But she does because just because he can get free doesn't mean that he will, doesn't mean that she doesn't have a hold on him anyway, and I want to draw a comparison to a spider's web here - I have no idea if that's what you meant to do - but that something so fine, simple, deceptively strong - as Rapunzel's straw but far stronger - like web, can hold him. That she's spinning a web of herself around him almost, and he let's her.

And that's a big guh for me here, that it's about him letting her. The trust of it. Even though She could ruin him. And he watches, because that's what Clint does, isn't it? Oh, gosh, workerbee73's meta is taking over my brain again - that Clint here is almost distant from the action, is taking in the detail, whilst Natasha is the one up close and hands on. But for Natasha to do that Clint has to let her, and for him to let her she has to earn/have earned his trust, and the mirrors, the opposites.

Plus, you know, it's hot ;) :D

So, um, wow.

Thank you so much for this lovely detailed comment; I'm so glad some of the deeper stuff I was trying to get through, some of the headcanon and the fact that it is that he's letting her, that he trusts her came through. That trust was so, so critical to how this shaped itself in my head.

But yes -- Thank you!!

Ah *grins* hello if we have not met before - I comment like woah on stuff that I like ;)

I love the trust between the two of them and it's a big thing for me when it comes to the two of them together. I really like how you treated that here and how you presented it :D

OH, that is so beautiful! It has a wonderful sense of predator/prey to it, as well as the whole "safety in our knowledge of each other" aspect. She rides right on the cusp of danger. Lovely!

Thank you so very much! I'm really glad you enjoyed.

(and now I'm wondering if the predator/prey dynamic makes her a bird-eating spider, because that's how my brain rolls. And don't google that if you're afraid of spiders.)

THEY CAN EAT BIRDS?