Sunbath by Celeritas

[labourslamp.livejournal.com]

Author: Celeritas
Title: Sunbath
Rating: PG-13
Theme: Some Like it Hot
Elements: 399
Author's Notes: Rating is for a married couple acting married.
Summary: There's a strange building in the Houses of Healing...
Word Count: 399 by MS Word

Rosie thought she would never be so happy to see growing things.  They had been in the White City but a week and already the height and the splendour were getting to her.  Things had, Sam assured her, improved since his first visit here, but a tree or a flowerbed did little to raise the spirits when there was nothing but cold marble under your feet.

 

Sam told her, of course, all about the gardens at the Houses of Healing, but what with all the ceremonies and business they hadn’t got much time in for leisure.  But today was May the first, and Sam had pointedly informed the King that if he did not get to spend it in private with his wife there would be consequences.

 

Here the gardens were larger, and even though if she looked the wrong way her head still swam Rosie appreciated the difference.  There were even a few corners where things looked untended.

 

Turning around, she saw near the parapet’s edge a strange roofless building, isolated from the rest.  “What’s that?” she asked Sam.

 

“That?” he said.  “Oh, that’s the sunroom.  Strange habit these Southerners have: sometimes when folk are ailing the healers say they need a sunbath.”

 

“A sunbath?  What in the Shire is that?”

 

“Well, it’s much like a normal bath, only there’s no water.  You just lie down in the sun without a stitch on and let it warm you right up.”

 

Rosie flushed.  “Without—”

 

“That’s why there’s a building for it.  And why it don’t have windows.”

 

“Scandalous!”

 

“Quite.”  He lowered his voice to a whisper.  “Do you want to give it a try?”

 

“Sam!”  There was a light in his eyes.  “Impatient, are we?”

 

He took her hand and started to walk towards the sunroom.  “All right,” she said quietly, eyes flicking over to him, “but only if you show me how it’s done.  And you can’t laugh at my sagging belly.”

 

“Laugh?  Why should I?  You’re still the prettiest lass I ever laid eyes on.”

 

He reached up to open the door.  “Good.  There’s no one inside.”

 

Laughing like truants, they slipped in and shut the door.  Sam locked it, then pulled her in for a kiss.  Rosie’s world exploded in fire.  And as she reached up to unbutton his waistcoat, she decided that perhaps not all the customs of the Southlands were quite so bad…