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Well you certainly don't bore me, if that's what you're wondering....
[Awash with blazing vigor coaxed up from keener embers: Vakares' physical response (dilated eyes, bated breath; hands that waver in their focus) the kindling that sparks beneath his words— and every visual it depicts in the lightless pith of his own tack. Shadows pooled around the image of a cock fit snug into its sheathe, with slick glimmers of glistening oil and precome flickering like starlight over vulnerable skin that wrings at its own bridle. His prick tipped skywards as it leaks, bouncing between buckled arms that brace his pistoning hips— neither hand touching— please the only thing on his lips between the constant slap of skin-on-skin. Percussion fit for desperation, when each beat's quicker than the last. Please come— please come so that I can come— touch me, sire— maker— lover—
Oh, love.
One who knows just how to rein him in when he's gone too far. No blunt pressure or cruder force applied through the sort of crass manipulation the other lords employ (it's easy to tell a slave to rut or a thrall to obey— it might even be easy to make them want it by rewarding them like a sotted hound: a couple of treats or a pat on the head the closest thing to careworn coaxing. But Vakares? Oh, no. When he herds them away from their worst instincts it might damned well be through learned knowledge of their needs, but he isn't some mastermind at work plotting moves across a board with a few expendable pawns, just a clever thing in love; easing off the worst of his consorts' pain or ambition. Their wants or their maddened streaks of mouthing lust.
In other words: it's no crime to be canny the way their sire is canny, where even his absent mind runs hot with mastery's keenest breath.)
His thighs sting from the biting pressure of his trousers and their straddled tension, muscles no doubt bruising when he rocks himself forwards into it (cold air cut across his exposed curves, wholly unguarded against clawed fingers or a waiting prick), but— ]
How could I ever resist?
[An answer to all things, that. Laid out sharp through the hollow rumble in his throat, hitching before it stops— (slick like those fingertips, pulled away from in one little roll of movement)— and speared fully on thick ardor in the very next beat.
To the hilt.
To the lurid flush.
Friction just a measure for how deep he runs inside the tightest narrows, bumping hot against malleable walls (no one else to reach between them, dulling down its blistering intensity: each twitch finding a corresponding pulse of entrenched force, left to right, forward and back, digging in as he arches forwards) into— fuck— ]
—you are mine....
[Through the grit of his teeth and the ache in his jaw: his. Through the unnfixed and unanchored movements outside the drag of rigid satisfaction rocked harsh against the figurative grain; his hips rolling before they work up into a steady rhythm evoking the exact images from before.
(Vakares was his from the moment he'd bitten him, and he always will be.)
Pact sealed by thready gasps and shuttling rhythms (writ by snaring snaps of rapid movement rather than trite words), hunched over well-braced palms.]
Don't you dare forget it just for shutting your pretty eyes.
[Awash with blazing vigor coaxed up from keener embers: Vakares' physical response (dilated eyes, bated breath; hands that waver in their focus) the kindling that sparks beneath his words— and every visual it depicts in the lightless pith of his own tack. Shadows pooled around the image of a cock fit snug into its sheathe, with slick glimmers of glistening oil and precome flickering like starlight over vulnerable skin that wrings at its own bridle. His prick tipped skywards as it leaks, bouncing between buckled arms that brace his pistoning hips— neither hand touching— please the only thing on his lips between the constant slap of skin-on-skin. Percussion fit for desperation, when each beat's quicker than the last. Please come— please come so that I can come— touch me, sire— maker— lover—
Oh, love.
One who knows just how to rein him in when he's gone too far. No blunt pressure or cruder force applied through the sort of crass manipulation the other lords employ (it's easy to tell a slave to rut or a thrall to obey— it might even be easy to make them want it by rewarding them like a sotted hound: a couple of treats or a pat on the head the closest thing to careworn coaxing. But Vakares? Oh, no. When he herds them away from their worst instincts it might damned well be through learned knowledge of their needs, but he isn't some mastermind at work plotting moves across a board with a few expendable pawns, just a clever thing in love; easing off the worst of his consorts' pain or ambition. Their wants or their maddened streaks of mouthing lust.
In other words: it's no crime to be canny the way their sire is canny, where even his absent mind runs hot with mastery's keenest breath.)
His thighs sting from the biting pressure of his trousers and their straddled tension, muscles no doubt bruising when he rocks himself forwards into it (cold air cut across his exposed curves, wholly unguarded against clawed fingers or a waiting prick), but— ]
How could I ever resist?
[An answer to all things, that. Laid out sharp through the hollow rumble in his throat, hitching before it stops— (slick like those fingertips, pulled away from in one little roll of movement)— and speared fully on thick ardor in the very next beat.
To the hilt.
To the lurid flush.
Friction just a measure for how deep he runs inside the tightest narrows, bumping hot against malleable walls (no one else to reach between them, dulling down its blistering intensity: each twitch finding a corresponding pulse of entrenched force, left to right, forward and back, digging in as he arches forwards) into— fuck— ]
—you are mine....
[Through the grit of his teeth and the ache in his jaw: his. Through the unnfixed and unanchored movements outside the drag of rigid satisfaction rocked harsh against the figurative grain; his hips rolling before they work up into a steady rhythm evoking the exact images from before.
(Vakares was his from the moment he'd bitten him, and he always will be.)
Pact sealed by thready gasps and shuttling rhythms (writ by snaring snaps of rapid movement rather than trite words), hunched over well-braced palms.]
Don't you dare forget it just for shutting your pretty eyes.
Never—
[Oh, never, never. Never, not his Astarion nor the way he belongs to his starlit boy— and it isn't because of this. It isn't because he takes a cock well (so well, and the lurid moan that sounds as tight, slick heat envelops Vakares to the hilt is far too loud as it echoes hoarsely down the hall). It isn't because he's so very clever in bed, coyly proposing new games or showing just how well he can handle a fuck (and it had taken Vakares so very long to realize that his consort thought he needed to be so inventive to keep his sire's attention— oh, darling boy, as if he ever needed to be anything but himself). When he goes to his slumber, he won't dream of all the lewd ways his consort has kept his bed warm, no.
He'll dream of his eyes, just as they right now. Crimson sparkled with darker flecks, narrowed in focus and yet eagerly triumphant, as smug as any kitten who just caught his first mouse. His voice, purring low in satisfaction even as his thighs shake for how much he enjoys this; the curve of his cheek and the scent of him thick in the air, as all the he ruts and grinds and bounces atop his prick, half-sated from being filled alone.
I love you, Vakares thinks and does not say. There's no room for it, not right now— but still, as his hands settle on Astarion's hips and darts his head up to catch his beloved in a swift kiss, he thinks it. I love you, I love you, I love you, so fiercely and so achingly that he has reconsidered his slumber too many times to count. I love you, and it is unlike any love he has ever had before; it is wholly different and separate than what he has with Fenris, and all the stronger for it. I love you, every bit, emphasized over and over the steady pump of his hips upwards, cock daggering in and out of his consort's slick hole. I love you for all that you are and more—]
Ah—
[— and for this, too.
For the goading taunt in Astarion's voice, yes. For the way he ruts so eagerly, his hole cinching so tight with rhythmic glee as his cock bounces between them, thick and swollen and untouched. But most of all: for the way he ignites a blaze unlike any other within his sire, coaxing him past all those centuries of self-control.
Before he realizes what he's doing, there's the sound of fabric shredding and seams ripping apart; in the next moment Astarion's trousers lie in tatters around him, thighs springing free even as he keeps up his bouncing rhythm. His hands lock around his hips, his eyes flicking down to drink in the frankly lurid sight of his cock bouncing between them, thickened hang flushed darkly in desire— and then up to that pretty face again, their eyes locking for one brief bursting second before Vakares surges up.
Mine, he thinks, or maybe it's yours, the two tangling up together in ouroborosian desire as his palms cup plush curves and he stands, yanking Astarion in close. His fingers dig in cruelly, spreading his consort open with vulgar intent (and he wishes he could see it: the sight of Astarion suspended in midair, spread open and speared atop a thick prick, oil dripping around the rim of his swollen hole) as he crosses the room in two strides and slams the elf against the wall.
There. There, his hips bearing Astarion's weight as his hands wrap around slender wrists, pinning him against the wall with cock and fingers and lips— a searing kiss, his tongue thrusting forward as he fucks into him. Hard and hot and fast, and every slap of skin against skin serves as echo for all of those words: I love you, you're mine, I'm yours, I will see you filled with my claim and mewling for my touch all because you said you wished it, I'm yours, I'm yours, I'm yours—]
[Oh, never, never. Never, not his Astarion nor the way he belongs to his starlit boy— and it isn't because of this. It isn't because he takes a cock well (so well, and the lurid moan that sounds as tight, slick heat envelops Vakares to the hilt is far too loud as it echoes hoarsely down the hall). It isn't because he's so very clever in bed, coyly proposing new games or showing just how well he can handle a fuck (and it had taken Vakares so very long to realize that his consort thought he needed to be so inventive to keep his sire's attention— oh, darling boy, as if he ever needed to be anything but himself). When he goes to his slumber, he won't dream of all the lewd ways his consort has kept his bed warm, no.
He'll dream of his eyes, just as they right now. Crimson sparkled with darker flecks, narrowed in focus and yet eagerly triumphant, as smug as any kitten who just caught his first mouse. His voice, purring low in satisfaction even as his thighs shake for how much he enjoys this; the curve of his cheek and the scent of him thick in the air, as all the he ruts and grinds and bounces atop his prick, half-sated from being filled alone.
I love you, Vakares thinks and does not say. There's no room for it, not right now— but still, as his hands settle on Astarion's hips and darts his head up to catch his beloved in a swift kiss, he thinks it. I love you, I love you, I love you, so fiercely and so achingly that he has reconsidered his slumber too many times to count. I love you, and it is unlike any love he has ever had before; it is wholly different and separate than what he has with Fenris, and all the stronger for it. I love you, every bit, emphasized over and over the steady pump of his hips upwards, cock daggering in and out of his consort's slick hole. I love you for all that you are and more—]
Ah—
[— and for this, too.
For the goading taunt in Astarion's voice, yes. For the way he ruts so eagerly, his hole cinching so tight with rhythmic glee as his cock bounces between them, thick and swollen and untouched. But most of all: for the way he ignites a blaze unlike any other within his sire, coaxing him past all those centuries of self-control.
Before he realizes what he's doing, there's the sound of fabric shredding and seams ripping apart; in the next moment Astarion's trousers lie in tatters around him, thighs springing free even as he keeps up his bouncing rhythm. His hands lock around his hips, his eyes flicking down to drink in the frankly lurid sight of his cock bouncing between them, thickened hang flushed darkly in desire— and then up to that pretty face again, their eyes locking for one brief bursting second before Vakares surges up.
Mine, he thinks, or maybe it's yours, the two tangling up together in ouroborosian desire as his palms cup plush curves and he stands, yanking Astarion in close. His fingers dig in cruelly, spreading his consort open with vulgar intent (and he wishes he could see it: the sight of Astarion suspended in midair, spread open and speared atop a thick prick, oil dripping around the rim of his swollen hole) as he crosses the room in two strides and slams the elf against the wall.
There. There, his hips bearing Astarion's weight as his hands wrap around slender wrists, pinning him against the wall with cock and fingers and lips— a searing kiss, his tongue thrusting forward as he fucks into him. Hard and hot and fast, and every slap of skin against skin serves as echo for all of those words: I love you, you're mine, I'm yours, I will see you filled with my claim and mewling for my touch all because you said you wished it, I'm yours, I'm yours, I'm yours—]
[You know, it doesn't matter how they got here.
Vampires are quickened things, even unto themselves; expending precious effort on even registering the scope of their own reflexive movements would be as pointless as it is a total waste— not including the inherent blindness attached to all present depravity (the distraction that'd only drag him away from just how good it feels to be held aloft in his master's claws over the drooling pinion of his prick: sensation melted into immoral weightlessness. Senselessness. Panting like an animal at bay for all the good it does him); loss of control one more ritual steeped in utter trust. Antithetical to sightlessness, the only leap of faith they've ever shared was in the narrow band of seconds just before sharp fangs pierced his living throat.
Well—
That, and whatever comes tomorrow.
But all that matters right now is that awareness is a passing footnote.
One more glimmering little afterthought devoid of reason. Purpose. Power. That it exists as something infinitely more primordial than its clever origins— good only for tracking the differences between cold plaster and kindled skin. The scuffing divide between their bodies once they hit the wall, harsher than before and coarser than the scrape of flint across steel. His own prick pushed against hard borders (like the rest of him), pressure nothing but a vulgar denouement for subsequent violence—
(Insobrietous violence. Decadent lust fed raucous little scraps for so long behind decorum's measured bars that when they give way at last, they snap.
Even behind Vakares' stunning eyes.
His shackled mind. His fettered heart. His soul so damp with discipline that he shines in a room full of fallow wretchings, lesser as they are— even then— he proves what Astarion has always known: no beast is ever tamed. No amount of filing could ever dull sharp fangs or claws. Paperwork does not a mortal make, and whenever he finally wakes, he ruts like the wanton thing he is.)
Oh.
Oh—
There's no time to brace. Before Astarion can stutter out even an acclimating bark, his vision blots with stardust. His lungs are empty. His throat— his mouth— that savaging tempo at his hips having pumped every last drop of air from him before he's fully readied, and he can't tell if he's baying like a beast in heat or silent as the grave for how deaf he is to everything beyond the rapid sound of every thrust— fuck, the dizzying vibration of it, a rhythm so inhuman it might as well be buzzing in ways mortal things could only dream of, shattering like brittle glass beneath his skin. So damned wet with slakeless lechery the floor has to be drenched already while his own claws scrabble wildly for purchase (at the wall. At the borders of his sire. At the barely-caught fringes of dark hair, wrapped in a snapping frenzy against the back of Vakares' neck as he whines or whimpers or wheezes or screams or groans or begs or— or or or)—
No one could fuck him like this.
No one could mount him like this, bruisingly untamed and brutally untempered: a lion mastering his herd or a wolf pinning down its pack until it bows with fierce obedience would whimper just to be caught beneath his gaze. Astarion's body raw and his voice hoarse and still it doesn't stop— faster. Harder. Deeper—
Until his eyes roll back and his belly feels damp, blank slate struck across his mind.
In (blinking against the blurred lines of the ceiling); Out (gasping as he lulls against his sire's shoulders, wracked with split sensation), his lips flecked with gloss and his limbs too limp to bother twitching where they hang. Hips bouncing still atop their wicked transgressor. Cock still jerking harsh against the wall. Neck slung back, profile nosing at— a cheek? A neck? He doesn't know.
He hardly cares. Scent alone tells him who it is he's nuzzling against.
That, and the fullness of his hips.]
Hnn— ngh— [Ah. Ah, catch your breath, Astarion. Inhale before you try to speak, Astarion. Teetering on the panting edge of molten ardor won't make you any more coherent unless you try, licking at your lips first.]
....so you do still....know how to charm....
Vampires are quickened things, even unto themselves; expending precious effort on even registering the scope of their own reflexive movements would be as pointless as it is a total waste— not including the inherent blindness attached to all present depravity (the distraction that'd only drag him away from just how good it feels to be held aloft in his master's claws over the drooling pinion of his prick: sensation melted into immoral weightlessness. Senselessness. Panting like an animal at bay for all the good it does him); loss of control one more ritual steeped in utter trust. Antithetical to sightlessness, the only leap of faith they've ever shared was in the narrow band of seconds just before sharp fangs pierced his living throat.
Well—
That, and whatever comes tomorrow.
But all that matters right now is that awareness is a passing footnote.
One more glimmering little afterthought devoid of reason. Purpose. Power. That it exists as something infinitely more primordial than its clever origins— good only for tracking the differences between cold plaster and kindled skin. The scuffing divide between their bodies once they hit the wall, harsher than before and coarser than the scrape of flint across steel. His own prick pushed against hard borders (like the rest of him), pressure nothing but a vulgar denouement for subsequent violence—
(Insobrietous violence. Decadent lust fed raucous little scraps for so long behind decorum's measured bars that when they give way at last, they snap.
Even behind Vakares' stunning eyes.
His shackled mind. His fettered heart. His soul so damp with discipline that he shines in a room full of fallow wretchings, lesser as they are— even then— he proves what Astarion has always known: no beast is ever tamed. No amount of filing could ever dull sharp fangs or claws. Paperwork does not a mortal make, and whenever he finally wakes, he ruts like the wanton thing he is.)
Oh.
Oh—
There's no time to brace. Before Astarion can stutter out even an acclimating bark, his vision blots with stardust. His lungs are empty. His throat— his mouth— that savaging tempo at his hips having pumped every last drop of air from him before he's fully readied, and he can't tell if he's baying like a beast in heat or silent as the grave for how deaf he is to everything beyond the rapid sound of every thrust— fuck, the dizzying vibration of it, a rhythm so inhuman it might as well be buzzing in ways mortal things could only dream of, shattering like brittle glass beneath his skin. So damned wet with slakeless lechery the floor has to be drenched already while his own claws scrabble wildly for purchase (at the wall. At the borders of his sire. At the barely-caught fringes of dark hair, wrapped in a snapping frenzy against the back of Vakares' neck as he whines or whimpers or wheezes or screams or groans or begs or— or or or)—
No one could fuck him like this.
No one could mount him like this, bruisingly untamed and brutally untempered: a lion mastering his herd or a wolf pinning down its pack until it bows with fierce obedience would whimper just to be caught beneath his gaze. Astarion's body raw and his voice hoarse and still it doesn't stop— faster. Harder. Deeper—
Until his eyes roll back and his belly feels damp, blank slate struck across his mind.
In (blinking against the blurred lines of the ceiling); Out (gasping as he lulls against his sire's shoulders, wracked with split sensation), his lips flecked with gloss and his limbs too limp to bother twitching where they hang. Hips bouncing still atop their wicked transgressor. Cock still jerking harsh against the wall. Neck slung back, profile nosing at— a cheek? A neck? He doesn't know.
He hardly cares. Scent alone tells him who it is he's nuzzling against.
That, and the fullness of his hips.]
Hnn— ngh— [Ah. Ah, catch your breath, Astarion. Inhale before you try to speak, Astarion. Teetering on the panting edge of molten ardor won't make you any more coherent unless you try, licking at your lips first.]
....so you do still....know how to charm....
[He doesn't answer at first. Sweet platitudes and clever words, oh, such things belong to the creature who reigns over this coven. The wearied diplomat, the overworked Duke— he'll have his turn soon enough, whispering sweet words of adoration to his darling firstsired.
But he's a creature of instinct now: his fingers still wrapped loosely around one narrow wrist, thumb stroking gently as he returns each of those nuzzles. Mine, their foreheads bumping together as his lips drift over the the curve of a pale cheek. A soft chin. Lips swollen and sore from overuse, and all the while his hips still pump inwards shallowly. Pearl streaks down the length of his prick, viscous droplets slowly drooling down to puddle on ancient wood as Vakares slides his lips down. Mine, the mindless mouthing of a predator finally at ease— though not thoughtlessly so. It's no mistake his mouth settles just atop those twin scars he'd given his beloved so many years ago.
(This will hurt, he had whispered to the wounded thing in his arms, until it won't. I promise you it will ease, little one. Just take a deep breath, his fingers smoothing through curls clotted with dried blood even as his fangs ached with phantom longing. It would take nothing to make him yours, that awful little voice had whispered to him. He's too weak to fight, and no one will dare intervene— take him. Strip him down and rut into him like the mewling prey he is. Fuck him from both ends and listen to him scream around the press of your cock. Flip him over and sink your teeth into his neck; promise him that you'll turn him and make him earn it, and when you've had your fun, drain the last bits of blood out of him and throw the corpse into the canal until he rots beyond recognition—
And the trick has never been that he doesn't desire such things.
The trick is knowing how to store it all up until he needs it.)
They aren't done. Even now, as the focus slowly returns to his ruby gaze, he can feel his hunger gnawing in the pit of his stomach. Astarion feels too good in his arms, lithe limbs and cool skin; he just feels so delicious wrapped so tight around his prick, tight and hot and perfect. Mine, he thinks again, and his gaze is still a blackened thing as he stares up at his consort. His hips still pump in deep, hungry to claim every inch of that tight little cinch, and never mind how many times he's done it before, for it's never enough. It's not enough, that ugly part of him whispers, not when this time tomorrow he'll be in someone else's bed—
Enough. One last lick to those scars before he speaks.]
Mm, I have not forgotten, no. But I tell you this: I have not begun to charm you, little one.
But he's a creature of instinct now: his fingers still wrapped loosely around one narrow wrist, thumb stroking gently as he returns each of those nuzzles. Mine, their foreheads bumping together as his lips drift over the the curve of a pale cheek. A soft chin. Lips swollen and sore from overuse, and all the while his hips still pump inwards shallowly. Pearl streaks down the length of his prick, viscous droplets slowly drooling down to puddle on ancient wood as Vakares slides his lips down. Mine, the mindless mouthing of a predator finally at ease— though not thoughtlessly so. It's no mistake his mouth settles just atop those twin scars he'd given his beloved so many years ago.
(This will hurt, he had whispered to the wounded thing in his arms, until it won't. I promise you it will ease, little one. Just take a deep breath, his fingers smoothing through curls clotted with dried blood even as his fangs ached with phantom longing. It would take nothing to make him yours, that awful little voice had whispered to him. He's too weak to fight, and no one will dare intervene— take him. Strip him down and rut into him like the mewling prey he is. Fuck him from both ends and listen to him scream around the press of your cock. Flip him over and sink your teeth into his neck; promise him that you'll turn him and make him earn it, and when you've had your fun, drain the last bits of blood out of him and throw the corpse into the canal until he rots beyond recognition—
And the trick has never been that he doesn't desire such things.
The trick is knowing how to store it all up until he needs it.)
They aren't done. Even now, as the focus slowly returns to his ruby gaze, he can feel his hunger gnawing in the pit of his stomach. Astarion feels too good in his arms, lithe limbs and cool skin; he just feels so delicious wrapped so tight around his prick, tight and hot and perfect. Mine, he thinks again, and his gaze is still a blackened thing as he stares up at his consort. His hips still pump in deep, hungry to claim every inch of that tight little cinch, and never mind how many times he's done it before, for it's never enough. It's not enough, that ugly part of him whispers, not when this time tomorrow he'll be in someone else's bed—
Enough. One last lick to those scars before he speaks.]
Mm, I have not forgotten, no. But I tell you this: I have not begun to charm you, little one.
[It's hours before they return. Long enough that night has turned to day, and it's Astarion's laughter that rouses Fenris from his dozing slumber. And then—
And then it begins.
Not the ceremony itself, but oh, there are endless preparations to be made. They're dressed in their finest, silk and satin dyed black and stitched together with the most delicate silver threads. Kohl lines their eyes, eyeshadow and accessories added to their personal tastes. Jewelry adorns their ears and throats (though not their fingers), all of it tastefully placed and obscenely expensive. Witnesses are introduced; outside, the crowds are slowly prodded into gathering. And in that way hours somehow pass, though to Fenris' mind it all goes by far too quickly.
They head into the main hall, standing before Vakares in front of what feels like the entire population of Baldur's Gate. Eyes dart between Astarion and Fenris, whispers filling the hall as people place their final bets, and gods, but Fenris hates it. He has never done well in the spotlight, and today is no different: his eyes go shuttered, his expression turning to stone as he stands next to his—
Well. Not fiancé, not really. And yet perhaps Fenris is still too tied to morality, even a century later, to not think of all this in terms of a wedding.
Thank you for your patience these past three days, Vakares says, and just like that, it's begun. Fenris' stomach pitches, but it's too late to protest. Too late to do anything but fixate on a vantage point in the distance and try not to glance over at Astarion, lest he look too much like an anxious bride. And I hope the celebrations were to your liking. It is not often I have cause to revel for so long, but the announcement of one's heir is cause for celebration, I think.
It goes on. He speaks of his family, his followers, and how loyal they all have been; he speaks of the joy of partnership, and how it was not reclusiveness but unity that made him a stronger politician and better person. He emphasizes community and teamwork over isolation, and Fenris wonders if the brighter ones in the audience have picked up where he's going with this. Certainly they all know this isn't normal; there's whispers here and there, a susurrus that only grows as Vakares sets his hands on both their shoulders.
But I digress. You are all here to see me choose my heir, and I have done so. A pause, and more than anything Fenris wishes he would just get on with it. I have chosen both of them. Both Astarion and Fenris will share command, joining together in a ceremony more ancient than even I.
And there are other words, of course. More introduction, because ceremony is nothing but talking, but Fenris is too busy scanning the crowd. Most are shocked. Some are pleased, though whether that's a good thing or not remains to be seen. The whispers grow louder— and then, just loud enough to be heard, there's a giggle. It's brief and swiftly hushed, but it's there.
Vakares ignores it. So does most of the crowd, to be fair: their whispers settling as Vakares urges them both to face one another. Join hands, he commands, and Fenris extends his own, not daring to tear his gaze away for a single second.
Do you, Fenris, swear your fealty and loyal to Astarion? Vakares' voice is low and rolling, his confidence absolute as he utters the first part of their oaths. Fenris' stomach feels like lead, his tongue numb— and yet the words slip past his lips nonetheless, for all that he stares warily as he utters them.]
I do so swear.
[There's no going back now.]
And then it begins.
Not the ceremony itself, but oh, there are endless preparations to be made. They're dressed in their finest, silk and satin dyed black and stitched together with the most delicate silver threads. Kohl lines their eyes, eyeshadow and accessories added to their personal tastes. Jewelry adorns their ears and throats (though not their fingers), all of it tastefully placed and obscenely expensive. Witnesses are introduced; outside, the crowds are slowly prodded into gathering. And in that way hours somehow pass, though to Fenris' mind it all goes by far too quickly.
They head into the main hall, standing before Vakares in front of what feels like the entire population of Baldur's Gate. Eyes dart between Astarion and Fenris, whispers filling the hall as people place their final bets, and gods, but Fenris hates it. He has never done well in the spotlight, and today is no different: his eyes go shuttered, his expression turning to stone as he stands next to his—
Well. Not fiancé, not really. And yet perhaps Fenris is still too tied to morality, even a century later, to not think of all this in terms of a wedding.
Thank you for your patience these past three days, Vakares says, and just like that, it's begun. Fenris' stomach pitches, but it's too late to protest. Too late to do anything but fixate on a vantage point in the distance and try not to glance over at Astarion, lest he look too much like an anxious bride. And I hope the celebrations were to your liking. It is not often I have cause to revel for so long, but the announcement of one's heir is cause for celebration, I think.
It goes on. He speaks of his family, his followers, and how loyal they all have been; he speaks of the joy of partnership, and how it was not reclusiveness but unity that made him a stronger politician and better person. He emphasizes community and teamwork over isolation, and Fenris wonders if the brighter ones in the audience have picked up where he's going with this. Certainly they all know this isn't normal; there's whispers here and there, a susurrus that only grows as Vakares sets his hands on both their shoulders.
But I digress. You are all here to see me choose my heir, and I have done so. A pause, and more than anything Fenris wishes he would just get on with it. I have chosen both of them. Both Astarion and Fenris will share command, joining together in a ceremony more ancient than even I.
And there are other words, of course. More introduction, because ceremony is nothing but talking, but Fenris is too busy scanning the crowd. Most are shocked. Some are pleased, though whether that's a good thing or not remains to be seen. The whispers grow louder— and then, just loud enough to be heard, there's a giggle. It's brief and swiftly hushed, but it's there.
Vakares ignores it. So does most of the crowd, to be fair: their whispers settling as Vakares urges them both to face one another. Join hands, he commands, and Fenris extends his own, not daring to tear his gaze away for a single second.
Do you, Fenris, swear your fealty and loyal to Astarion? Vakares' voice is low and rolling, his confidence absolute as he utters the first part of their oaths. Fenris' stomach feels like lead, his tongue numb— and yet the words slip past his lips nonetheless, for all that he stares warily as he utters them.]
I do so swear.
[There's no going back now.]
[It's already started.
The ceremony and the leers. The judgment. Encouraged by every instance of giggling or muttered commentary, their audience is a palpable chasm of shock and indignity and amusement cut through by little pulsework echoes, each one reverberated in someone else's mouth before passing on (and on, and on).... He feels the harshness of firm knuckles pressed against his own once their fingers intertwine, and from the narrow gap between them (sire and sired, all), it feels as if he's being choked by everything he's wanted for so long: the regalia fit for Vakares' shoulders is far too scratchy along its seams and artful hems (it worries at his shoulders; leaves him itching just to touch it or scrub it or rip it free); the attention from established eyes, hawkish and overtly loud (later, it will be worse); the coronating esteem his maker's always carried, stamped down in slow farewells; the brute that is his younger kin, compelled to listen to him— if only so they share.
But he's not a child, for all his frequent whinging.
The ridicule waiting for them in the wings didn't start when their sire opened their mouth to speak. It started long, long before now. (Before his tantrum or their isolation. Before Vakares treated them as equals at his heels. Decades upon decades ago, before the fresher idea of better started to eclipse the notion of is and always has been, razor lips were already peeling back to show off equally jagged fangs.) The other vampires wouldn't have spared them if Vakares uttered I choose Fenris any more than they would've done to hear Astarion: one configuration of voices might differ in isolation, true, but still— if a chorus trills from its left or its right side in equal volume, does that really make it any different a scenario?
No.
Obviously not.
Petty things— like Astarion— will always be petty things. Takes one to know one (or a lot of ones), as they say: he doesn't like it, but there's comfort to be found in the fact that Leto clearly doesn't, either. Their shared grip so stiff and obligatory that it could be a metaphor for its surrounding pomp— and you know, when it comes to a pair that looks only towards their waiting master rather than at one another, it is, actually.
But again, he's not a child. Not a fledgling. Not a spoiled prince whining for a wetted throat to suckle from, rather than standing on his own buckling legs. Eventually, the din feels more like background noise. Rustling wind equal to a drunken baroness teasing her own spawn by tugging at their ears and suggestively whispering it's such a good idea— making favorites breed for life. Literal husbandry, someone mutters back, and Astarion hears it as much as he doesn't, just like a noisy gust of wind. Birds chirruping. Shutters flapping in a breeze. Peripheral distraction warranting little as he tightens his already rigid grip, his kohl-lined eyes narrowed into lightless puddles when he adds:]
I do, of course.
[Temptation part of his own incorrigible existence, consigned to keeping quiet dignity at bay.]
If only because it'll be fun to see how many of our esteemed kin might finally strain their poor fragile little minds to tell us apart, now that they'll have to look up to call us by our names.
[Tsk tsk. So much for graceful vows— though Astarion silently smiles as a clawed thumb is dipped in blood before being brushed across his lips by an attending hand (and vice versa), staining their respective mouths a striking shade of crimson.]
The ceremony and the leers. The judgment. Encouraged by every instance of giggling or muttered commentary, their audience is a palpable chasm of shock and indignity and amusement cut through by little pulsework echoes, each one reverberated in someone else's mouth before passing on (and on, and on).... He feels the harshness of firm knuckles pressed against his own once their fingers intertwine, and from the narrow gap between them (sire and sired, all), it feels as if he's being choked by everything he's wanted for so long: the regalia fit for Vakares' shoulders is far too scratchy along its seams and artful hems (it worries at his shoulders; leaves him itching just to touch it or scrub it or rip it free); the attention from established eyes, hawkish and overtly loud (later, it will be worse); the coronating esteem his maker's always carried, stamped down in slow farewells; the brute that is his younger kin, compelled to listen to him— if only so they share.
But he's not a child, for all his frequent whinging.
The ridicule waiting for them in the wings didn't start when their sire opened their mouth to speak. It started long, long before now. (Before his tantrum or their isolation. Before Vakares treated them as equals at his heels. Decades upon decades ago, before the fresher idea of better started to eclipse the notion of is and always has been, razor lips were already peeling back to show off equally jagged fangs.) The other vampires wouldn't have spared them if Vakares uttered I choose Fenris any more than they would've done to hear Astarion: one configuration of voices might differ in isolation, true, but still— if a chorus trills from its left or its right side in equal volume, does that really make it any different a scenario?
No.
Obviously not.
Petty things— like Astarion— will always be petty things. Takes one to know one (or a lot of ones), as they say: he doesn't like it, but there's comfort to be found in the fact that Leto clearly doesn't, either. Their shared grip so stiff and obligatory that it could be a metaphor for its surrounding pomp— and you know, when it comes to a pair that looks only towards their waiting master rather than at one another, it is, actually.
But again, he's not a child. Not a fledgling. Not a spoiled prince whining for a wetted throat to suckle from, rather than standing on his own buckling legs. Eventually, the din feels more like background noise. Rustling wind equal to a drunken baroness teasing her own spawn by tugging at their ears and suggestively whispering it's such a good idea— making favorites breed for life. Literal husbandry, someone mutters back, and Astarion hears it as much as he doesn't, just like a noisy gust of wind. Birds chirruping. Shutters flapping in a breeze. Peripheral distraction warranting little as he tightens his already rigid grip, his kohl-lined eyes narrowed into lightless puddles when he adds:]
I do, of course.
[Temptation part of his own incorrigible existence, consigned to keeping quiet dignity at bay.]
If only because it'll be fun to see how many of our esteemed kin might finally strain their poor fragile little minds to tell us apart, now that they'll have to look up to call us by our names.
[Tsk tsk. So much for graceful vows— though Astarion silently smiles as a clawed thumb is dipped in blood before being brushed across his lips by an attending hand (and vice versa), staining their respective mouths a striking shade of crimson.]
[Fenris smirks.
It's not a nice thing. Certainly no one in the waiting audience would mistake it for the radiant smile of a bliss-filled vampire eager to be even closer to his counterpart, starry-eyed and sweet. At best, it's a sardonic thing, there and gone and yet so very vivid now that blood coats his lips.
And you know, Fenris is still such a young thing. Only barely a century old and so terribly disinterested in vampiric politics, but still. He knows how people work. He knows what details they will remember in the coming years, when all the words have faded and all that's left is the stark impressions. No matter that Vakares squeezes both his consorts' shoulders in warning, for Fenris thinks that perhaps this is what will matter most in the coming years.
This exchange. This quiet little moment when Astarion speaks and Fenris responds, the two of them suddenly allied together in a moment of quiet camaraderie.
There is so little they agree on, after all. Vakares has always been their chief point of connection, the two of them setting aside their rivalry to make their beloved happy— but perhaps they can join in on this, too. The two of them unifying not for the sake of peace or love (oh, Vakares is such an earnest thing, so eager to see the future as nothing but good and bright), but sheer bloody spite.]
A hundred golden coins says that they get us mixed up more than half the time—
[What a dedicated thing their sire is, for he doesn't pay his whispering spawn any mind. He doesn't even break his stride, intoning the next part of their oath with all the enthusiasm and muster his position requires. But the sudden squeeze of his fingers against their shoulders speaks volumes, as does the sharp little glance he darts down at both of them. Shut up.]
I do so swear—
[Loyalty. Partnership. The vows settle on their shoulders like mantles, binding them together with more than just spoken words. There's magic woven in these rituals, Fenris realizes. Not the paltry spells that wizards use, their powers torn from the Weave; this is far more ancient. It's a bitter aftertaste beneath the blood slowly dripping down his tongue, so subtle that his lyrium doesn't bother to react. Not a deliberate thing Vakares kept from them, no— simply a pledge. A binding pact, as definitive as the ties that bind they two to their sire. Each promise a lash, each vow a cinching knot, until at last—
Seal your pact before the world, Vakares commands, and Fenris' eyes focus up once more.
And maybe it's nerves. Maybe it's grief for Vakares, sudden and yet all the more painful for it. Maybe it's the wariness of a century's worth of rivalry suddenly flaring its head, sparking old instincts born of a lifetime ago that whisper that nothing is certain. That to trust is to lead oneself to destruction; that everyone, everyone is out only for themselves, and Astarion most of all. And it doesn't matter that they just exchanged a teasing joke; it doesn't matter that they both of them promised Vakares they'd do their best. Emotions don't ever need rational thought, and all Fenris knows in that moment is this:
That whatever comes next, he will have to fight to keep himself from harm.
So he hesitates. It's the briefest thing, a half-breath's balking as wariness and rebelliousness and loathing all tangle together. He doubts anyone in the audience notices, but the two near him surely do.
Act, those instincts insist— and without a moment's thought, Fenris does. His hand darts to the back of Astarion's neck, drawing him in with one quick motion so Fenris can fit his lips to his so pointedly. For if they are to do this— to embark on this partnership, to be a duo instead of a singular ruler— Fenris will not be a passive partner. He will not be the younger brat constantly waiting for his elder to take control, no: Fenris kisses as though he means to take, domineering and rough. Mine, hungry pushes and eager pulls a vulgar rhythm once, twice—
Before he draws back, his tongue flicking out to lap at the blood coating Astarion's lip.
There, now. That's far better, and he does not realize just how self-satisfied he truly looks.]
It's not a nice thing. Certainly no one in the waiting audience would mistake it for the radiant smile of a bliss-filled vampire eager to be even closer to his counterpart, starry-eyed and sweet. At best, it's a sardonic thing, there and gone and yet so very vivid now that blood coats his lips.
And you know, Fenris is still such a young thing. Only barely a century old and so terribly disinterested in vampiric politics, but still. He knows how people work. He knows what details they will remember in the coming years, when all the words have faded and all that's left is the stark impressions. No matter that Vakares squeezes both his consorts' shoulders in warning, for Fenris thinks that perhaps this is what will matter most in the coming years.
This exchange. This quiet little moment when Astarion speaks and Fenris responds, the two of them suddenly allied together in a moment of quiet camaraderie.
There is so little they agree on, after all. Vakares has always been their chief point of connection, the two of them setting aside their rivalry to make their beloved happy— but perhaps they can join in on this, too. The two of them unifying not for the sake of peace or love (oh, Vakares is such an earnest thing, so eager to see the future as nothing but good and bright), but sheer bloody spite.]
A hundred golden coins says that they get us mixed up more than half the time—
[What a dedicated thing their sire is, for he doesn't pay his whispering spawn any mind. He doesn't even break his stride, intoning the next part of their oath with all the enthusiasm and muster his position requires. But the sudden squeeze of his fingers against their shoulders speaks volumes, as does the sharp little glance he darts down at both of them. Shut up.]
I do so swear—
[Loyalty. Partnership. The vows settle on their shoulders like mantles, binding them together with more than just spoken words. There's magic woven in these rituals, Fenris realizes. Not the paltry spells that wizards use, their powers torn from the Weave; this is far more ancient. It's a bitter aftertaste beneath the blood slowly dripping down his tongue, so subtle that his lyrium doesn't bother to react. Not a deliberate thing Vakares kept from them, no— simply a pledge. A binding pact, as definitive as the ties that bind they two to their sire. Each promise a lash, each vow a cinching knot, until at last—
Seal your pact before the world, Vakares commands, and Fenris' eyes focus up once more.
And maybe it's nerves. Maybe it's grief for Vakares, sudden and yet all the more painful for it. Maybe it's the wariness of a century's worth of rivalry suddenly flaring its head, sparking old instincts born of a lifetime ago that whisper that nothing is certain. That to trust is to lead oneself to destruction; that everyone, everyone is out only for themselves, and Astarion most of all. And it doesn't matter that they just exchanged a teasing joke; it doesn't matter that they both of them promised Vakares they'd do their best. Emotions don't ever need rational thought, and all Fenris knows in that moment is this:
That whatever comes next, he will have to fight to keep himself from harm.
So he hesitates. It's the briefest thing, a half-breath's balking as wariness and rebelliousness and loathing all tangle together. He doubts anyone in the audience notices, but the two near him surely do.
Act, those instincts insist— and without a moment's thought, Fenris does. His hand darts to the back of Astarion's neck, drawing him in with one quick motion so Fenris can fit his lips to his so pointedly. For if they are to do this— to embark on this partnership, to be a duo instead of a singular ruler— Fenris will not be a passive partner. He will not be the younger brat constantly waiting for his elder to take control, no: Fenris kisses as though he means to take, domineering and rough. Mine, hungry pushes and eager pulls a vulgar rhythm once, twice—
Before he draws back, his tongue flicking out to lap at the blood coating Astarion's lip.
There, now. That's far better, and he does not realize just how self-satisfied he truly looks.]
[That kiss.
A lesser creature would snap under its boundless gravity, caught off guard the way Astarion finds himself in those passing seconds while his master's grip still holds him and his wedded consort's fangs settle coolly against his lips (but he's not lesser, is he? Astarion). Softer than it should be. Sweeter than it should be. Oh no, he's not some stumbling cub on buckled legs— (Fenris, that is— ) not with his profile leading before either of their minds have a moment to keep pace. Thoughtlessness begetting thoughtlessness, considering it's Astarion that gives chase in the narrow aftermath, smearing red beyond the border of their mouths.
Then there's wine, and there's drinking, and a shocking number of slighted guests even deftly pretend to be happy for them— and partway through all those necessary overtures involved in such a dizzyingly attended coronation, the old, embattled lion that devised all this knotwork-solemnization slips away.
Small in stature.
Subtle gestures.
Misunderstood in the moment (or not, depending on attentiveness), just a single sweep of passing pressure along his darling's shoulders as they endure a flood of accolades and deferential flattery— capped by a silent kiss to their respective cheeks— their temples. Common as the contact traded each and every night before sleep or during dullest conversation. No more words to shed when everything's already been long uttered between them (and punctuation can hardly overstay its welcome without bleeding into the next chapter).
By twilight's stumbling entrance, when the doors have all been shuttered and the grand hall hushed down to a dispersing din already rife with drowsied calm, Archduke Vakares sleeps.
It's nothing they didn't know was coming.
Inevitability has a habit of kissing their shoulders just as frequently as their sire always— (ah) did.
But they aren't led by his spawn to his bed. Or to their own bedchambers either, for that matter. Call it a belated gift, perhaps, on behalf of an apologetic patron that had one last little card tucked high within an unassuming sleeve:
An atrium.
A former one, converted with blacked out windows where gossamer arches had likely held aloft old skylights— only mosaics now, but the oil-black mirror shine of countless tiles overhead is as fittingly stunning for a pair of heirs that seem as at odds with each other as that selfsame show of vivid stars and swirling void. Less prone to mixing than battling each other for dominating clarity, yet underneath: one bed. One half-study. One storage chest. One grooming table. One to one to one to one, with the bottom line being the same rule their clever maker always tried to impose— share.
Astarion slips in last, through a half-cracked door frame; such a serpent of a beast that he can't suppress his own nature even in a slumbering manor. Winding his coils into empty space, and setting those albinic eyes on the only other figure present.
(And gods, they do look so small in a room this expansive, don't they?)]
Did you mean it?
[He asks dryly between the sounds of (inherently) prowling footsteps. No clarification given, naturally.
—well.
At least not without a clever, weighted pause.]
That smart little quip about the coins.
A lesser creature would snap under its boundless gravity, caught off guard the way Astarion finds himself in those passing seconds while his master's grip still holds him and his wedded consort's fangs settle coolly against his lips (but he's not lesser, is he? Astarion). Softer than it should be. Sweeter than it should be. Oh no, he's not some stumbling cub on buckled legs— (Fenris, that is— ) not with his profile leading before either of their minds have a moment to keep pace. Thoughtlessness begetting thoughtlessness, considering it's Astarion that gives chase in the narrow aftermath, smearing red beyond the border of their mouths.
Then there's wine, and there's drinking, and a shocking number of slighted guests even deftly pretend to be happy for them— and partway through all those necessary overtures involved in such a dizzyingly attended coronation, the old, embattled lion that devised all this knotwork-solemnization slips away.
Small in stature.
Subtle gestures.
Misunderstood in the moment (or not, depending on attentiveness), just a single sweep of passing pressure along his darling's shoulders as they endure a flood of accolades and deferential flattery— capped by a silent kiss to their respective cheeks— their temples. Common as the contact traded each and every night before sleep or during dullest conversation. No more words to shed when everything's already been long uttered between them (and punctuation can hardly overstay its welcome without bleeding into the next chapter).
By twilight's stumbling entrance, when the doors have all been shuttered and the grand hall hushed down to a dispersing din already rife with drowsied calm, Archduke Vakares sleeps.
It's nothing they didn't know was coming.
Inevitability has a habit of kissing their shoulders just as frequently as their sire always— (ah) did.
But they aren't led by his spawn to his bed. Or to their own bedchambers either, for that matter. Call it a belated gift, perhaps, on behalf of an apologetic patron that had one last little card tucked high within an unassuming sleeve:
An atrium.
A former one, converted with blacked out windows where gossamer arches had likely held aloft old skylights— only mosaics now, but the oil-black mirror shine of countless tiles overhead is as fittingly stunning for a pair of heirs that seem as at odds with each other as that selfsame show of vivid stars and swirling void. Less prone to mixing than battling each other for dominating clarity, yet underneath: one bed. One half-study. One storage chest. One grooming table. One to one to one to one, with the bottom line being the same rule their clever maker always tried to impose— share.
Astarion slips in last, through a half-cracked door frame; such a serpent of a beast that he can't suppress his own nature even in a slumbering manor. Winding his coils into empty space, and setting those albinic eyes on the only other figure present.
(And gods, they do look so small in a room this expansive, don't they?)]
Did you mean it?
[He asks dryly between the sounds of (inherently) prowling footsteps. No clarification given, naturally.
—well.
At least not without a clever, weighted pause.]
That smart little quip about the coins.
Edited (motherfuckin ARCHDUKE CANON TIME) 2023-07-07 20:39 (UTC)
[It's a beautiful room.
That's saying a lot. Vakares has always been a soft hand with his coven no matter their rank, but it was his consorts he adored spoiling the most. Both their rooms had been marvelous things: airy and bright, artwork lining the walls and books stacked on shelves. They'd been allowed to customize them to their liking, and for Fenris, that meant half of it became a place to train: stone overlaid with tile and racks of weapons lining the far wall. You don't need to fight anymore, Vakares had told him, but I can appreciate the need for routine. Simply try not to stab anyone within the household.
(He has to stop thinking of Vakares. He has to stop longing for a past that no longer exists, for lingering there too long is the right way to ruin. And he will. He will, but oh, give him a day's grief, at least).
And understand, Fenris loves that room. He had spent a century marveling over the sizable grandeur, thrilling over ownership and marveling over the privacy it provided.
But it might as well have been a closet for how it compares to this.
It's almost too much. It is too much— certainly it is for Fenris, who even now does not quite know how to handle all the wealth and power at his fingertips (and that's a far different thing than learning to enjoy it). But perhaps, he thinks as he wanders into the room, perhaps it's just enough for an Archduke or two.
His fingers slide almost idly over the oaken desk (where already there is paperwork waiting for them both, Vakares' neat script making his heart pang once more); they drift over the marble inset on their grooming station, taking note of the fact both their personal things have been brought over already. He wanders and he tries so hard to take it all in, but he knows even now that it will take a long while before it feels like anything belonging to him.
Just like this title.
Gods. Archduke Fenris, and in the echochambers of his mind, it sounds like a joke. A cruel jibe slipping off the tongue of his counterpart, perhaps, or a particularly uninspired taunt from Danarius— but ah, he won't say so aloud. Whether or not he feels it fits, the title is still his— and it will be all Fenris can do to hold onto it in the coming years. There is more than just Astarion to fear when it comes to their coven, and perhaps they should talk about that—
Did you mean it? a voice calls, and Fenris turns.
Later.]
I did.
[Their tones match in dryness. And you know, anyone listening in would think it friendly banter and little more— and to an extent, that's true. But Fenris does not imagine Astarion has forgotten that kiss— nor if it comes to it, his vulgar promise from a few days ago. I want to take my new whore out for a ride before I fit him with a bit and bridle, and it's surely only a matter of time before Astarion tries just that.]
You saw them tonight. They barely knew how to look at us both, never mind which to defer to first.
[It was almost funny, honestly: watching all the nobles stumble in their bows, piggish eyes darting back and forth as they still tried to determine who to suck up to.]
But I suppose they will learn, in one way if not another.
[They'll have to.
Fenris steps forward. There's a thousand ways he could coyly approach this topic, but subtle gestures have never suited him, not when he can be blunt. So:]
Have you?
[Another step forward, his eyes bright and tension beginning to form in the lines of his body.]
Or do you still insist on the fantasy that I am here to be your consort and not your partner?
That's saying a lot. Vakares has always been a soft hand with his coven no matter their rank, but it was his consorts he adored spoiling the most. Both their rooms had been marvelous things: airy and bright, artwork lining the walls and books stacked on shelves. They'd been allowed to customize them to their liking, and for Fenris, that meant half of it became a place to train: stone overlaid with tile and racks of weapons lining the far wall. You don't need to fight anymore, Vakares had told him, but I can appreciate the need for routine. Simply try not to stab anyone within the household.
(He has to stop thinking of Vakares. He has to stop longing for a past that no longer exists, for lingering there too long is the right way to ruin. And he will. He will, but oh, give him a day's grief, at least).
And understand, Fenris loves that room. He had spent a century marveling over the sizable grandeur, thrilling over ownership and marveling over the privacy it provided.
But it might as well have been a closet for how it compares to this.
It's almost too much. It is too much— certainly it is for Fenris, who even now does not quite know how to handle all the wealth and power at his fingertips (and that's a far different thing than learning to enjoy it). But perhaps, he thinks as he wanders into the room, perhaps it's just enough for an Archduke or two.
His fingers slide almost idly over the oaken desk (where already there is paperwork waiting for them both, Vakares' neat script making his heart pang once more); they drift over the marble inset on their grooming station, taking note of the fact both their personal things have been brought over already. He wanders and he tries so hard to take it all in, but he knows even now that it will take a long while before it feels like anything belonging to him.
Just like this title.
Gods. Archduke Fenris, and in the echochambers of his mind, it sounds like a joke. A cruel jibe slipping off the tongue of his counterpart, perhaps, or a particularly uninspired taunt from Danarius— but ah, he won't say so aloud. Whether or not he feels it fits, the title is still his— and it will be all Fenris can do to hold onto it in the coming years. There is more than just Astarion to fear when it comes to their coven, and perhaps they should talk about that—
Did you mean it? a voice calls, and Fenris turns.
Later.]
I did.
[Their tones match in dryness. And you know, anyone listening in would think it friendly banter and little more— and to an extent, that's true. But Fenris does not imagine Astarion has forgotten that kiss— nor if it comes to it, his vulgar promise from a few days ago. I want to take my new whore out for a ride before I fit him with a bit and bridle, and it's surely only a matter of time before Astarion tries just that.]
You saw them tonight. They barely knew how to look at us both, never mind which to defer to first.
[It was almost funny, honestly: watching all the nobles stumble in their bows, piggish eyes darting back and forth as they still tried to determine who to suck up to.]
But I suppose they will learn, in one way if not another.
[They'll have to.
Fenris steps forward. There's a thousand ways he could coyly approach this topic, but subtle gestures have never suited him, not when he can be blunt. So:]
Have you?
[Another step forward, his eyes bright and tension beginning to form in the lines of his body.]
Or do you still insist on the fantasy that I am here to be your consort and not your partner?
Aren't you?
[Consort. Partner.]
Our maker— [He starts slickly, bile sharpening the blade of a sentiment he— just can't finish. It's like a pill stuck in his throat, you know. The same feeling. There, meant to go somewhere— meant to hammer home with his typical acidic bite that there's a lot more intent than truth on the table— but no amount of pressure or flexing can keep it on its course.
Their master sleeps. He isn't here, gifts or fucking not.
And Astarion doesn't want to think about it.]
—imagined a lot of things.
[Like a sigh, it slips through his teeth alongside a slackening expression. Footfalls far from slowing even as Fenris creeps ever closer. Meaning that it's a simple thing to reach out with one hand in (sort-of) passing, palm pressed against a pair of slender hips crosswise— dragging as he continues on his way (again, like slithering coils before moving behind his companion), still getting a lay of the room for now.]
We both know reality wasn't his strong suit. Not any more than it fits in with all those highborne fangs.
[A beat, his eyes fixed on high glass:] An admirable effort, though.
[His sire's gift, their kin....or both?]
Not that it matters, in the end.
[Consort. Partner.]
Our maker— [He starts slickly, bile sharpening the blade of a sentiment he— just can't finish. It's like a pill stuck in his throat, you know. The same feeling. There, meant to go somewhere— meant to hammer home with his typical acidic bite that there's a lot more intent than truth on the table— but no amount of pressure or flexing can keep it on its course.
Their master sleeps. He isn't here, gifts or fucking not.
And Astarion doesn't want to think about it.]
—imagined a lot of things.
[Like a sigh, it slips through his teeth alongside a slackening expression. Footfalls far from slowing even as Fenris creeps ever closer. Meaning that it's a simple thing to reach out with one hand in (sort-of) passing, palm pressed against a pair of slender hips crosswise— dragging as he continues on his way (again, like slithering coils before moving behind his companion), still getting a lay of the room for now.]
We both know reality wasn't his strong suit. Not any more than it fits in with all those highborne fangs.
[A beat, his eyes fixed on high glass:] An admirable effort, though.
[His sire's gift, their kin....or both?]
Not that it matters, in the end.
[Our sire, and for just a moment, there's a moment of camaraderie. For just a moment Astarion's voice sticks and Fenris' heart pangs, and he wonders if they will join together. If the vulnerability will last. If he, himself, can reach out, though in truth he has no real idea how he might do that. And before he can even begin to figure it out—
Ah.
Heat ripples through him at that sliding touch. The ghost of Astarion's fingers lingers on his skin. And what a thing it is to be a vampire, that his teeth ache to bite even as a pulse of arousal courses through him. The lyrium embedded in his palms pulses, his fingers curling as the phantom urge to sink his talons into soft flesh and rip courses through his mind. He knows what's going to happen next. No matter that he refuses to be the one to strike first, there's no way this won't end in blows.
And truth be told, he won't be sorry for it.
It's been a century of enduring Astarion's jealousy. A century of snide remarks and petty revenge; a century of cruelties great and small, humiliations tangling together with rage and grief. Decades of hands yanking at him during parties, shoving him down to his knees and fucking his mouth until he was drooling come; of vicious cruelty that always had the vague excuse of accidental, Fenris writhing in agony as Astarion watched his blood pool on the stone floor.
Years on end of the two of them barking at one another helplessly, impotent dogs collared and leashed by their master, but not anymore.
Fenris' eyes darken as he turns, and oh, but his smile has taken on a mean edge.]
A bold proclamation from a vampire who was taken in front of a thousand witnesses. Do you imagine your posturing will erase that from their minds?
[His head tips.]
Their first impression of our union was you submitting to me . . . and what will you do to remedy that? Tie me to the bed and fuck me? And yet that won't change what happened.
[The smirk fades.]
Try and make me yours, Astarion. You do not have Vakares to hide behind, not anymore— and older you may be, but I am trained for this. And I will not hesitate to finally put you in your place like the rabid dog you are.
Ah.
Heat ripples through him at that sliding touch. The ghost of Astarion's fingers lingers on his skin. And what a thing it is to be a vampire, that his teeth ache to bite even as a pulse of arousal courses through him. The lyrium embedded in his palms pulses, his fingers curling as the phantom urge to sink his talons into soft flesh and rip courses through his mind. He knows what's going to happen next. No matter that he refuses to be the one to strike first, there's no way this won't end in blows.
And truth be told, he won't be sorry for it.
It's been a century of enduring Astarion's jealousy. A century of snide remarks and petty revenge; a century of cruelties great and small, humiliations tangling together with rage and grief. Decades of hands yanking at him during parties, shoving him down to his knees and fucking his mouth until he was drooling come; of vicious cruelty that always had the vague excuse of accidental, Fenris writhing in agony as Astarion watched his blood pool on the stone floor.
Years on end of the two of them barking at one another helplessly, impotent dogs collared and leashed by their master, but not anymore.
Fenris' eyes darken as he turns, and oh, but his smile has taken on a mean edge.]
A bold proclamation from a vampire who was taken in front of a thousand witnesses. Do you imagine your posturing will erase that from their minds?
[His head tips.]
Their first impression of our union was you submitting to me . . . and what will you do to remedy that? Tie me to the bed and fuck me? And yet that won't change what happened.
[The smirk fades.]
Try and make me yours, Astarion. You do not have Vakares to hide behind, not anymore— and older you may be, but I am trained for this. And I will not hesitate to finally put you in your place like the rabid dog you are.
[A word here.
A scrape there.
A playful snippet of mockery suddenly pushed too far.
It takes so little, is the point. Hairpin triggers set up on eggshells over glass compared to their maker's inexhaustible control, and it never starts out as wanting violence (or the marrow-deep satisfying sound of whimperering cries)— they don't begin their nights by waking and rubbing sleep from crimson eyes only to crow about what sort of cruelty they'll force upon their mate— it just grows in after one of them laughs a little too loudly. Gets flattered with a different word. Drinks too much. Speaks too bluntly. Bites down too hard, too fast.
Now this.
Innocuous discussion won't stay that way if it's flanked by less-than-innocuous stares. Grins that don't quite meet their eyes, and touching that's tantamount to smoking tinder.
Maybe that's the point.
The leash is gone. The collar loose. Unhappiness hardly solidifies a truth that's lasted the better part of one hundred— two hundred years— promising that whenever they showed teeth, he'd be there. (And this room still smells like him, and it's his writing on that desk, and even if it's only the smallest fragment of their minds that hopes this might all just be a test while the rest of their thoughts prepare themselves for war— ) how could they not intrinsically tug just to see if it might give?
One way or another, something will make it real. Something else will grieve for them. Take the blame for them. Be angry or hurt or resentful for them.
(Or afraid for them. That, too.)]
Word to the wise, little one.
Unlike you: a rabid dog doesn't know to submit.
[His back still to Fenris. His arms still loosely at his hips. Little one, not little wolf, for he'd reduce the creature just behind him to a timeline of fresh-abandoned masters just to soothe his paper skin. An artful twist of his neck angled just around his shoulder punctuating one seemingly smug stare.]
But I can't say it's a surprise a formerly kenneled broodbitch still can't tell what acting is even when it's dangled right in front of his stunted little snout. [Half-turning on his heel in that next breath, it's his chin that leads the way. His reddened eyes narrowed into lightless slits. His lips twisted high around long teeth. Sharp teeth. Mean teeth.
Suffer for him, Fenris, and maybe he'll call it even.]
I don't have Vakares to hide behind anymore?
[Oh, catulus.]
I've been waiting centuries for this.
I'm glad he's gone.
[Throw the first stone. Twist the knife. Snap bone. Lap blood. Scrape salt— make it hurt. Make it hurt, even if you're the one bleeding from it, too.
His mouth to Fenris' ear after a handful of silent strides, voice a pitchbound hum.]
I'll be glad when you are, too.
A scrape there.
A playful snippet of mockery suddenly pushed too far.
It takes so little, is the point. Hairpin triggers set up on eggshells over glass compared to their maker's inexhaustible control, and it never starts out as wanting violence (or the marrow-deep satisfying sound of whimperering cries)— they don't begin their nights by waking and rubbing sleep from crimson eyes only to crow about what sort of cruelty they'll force upon their mate— it just grows in after one of them laughs a little too loudly. Gets flattered with a different word. Drinks too much. Speaks too bluntly. Bites down too hard, too fast.
Now this.
Innocuous discussion won't stay that way if it's flanked by less-than-innocuous stares. Grins that don't quite meet their eyes, and touching that's tantamount to smoking tinder.
Maybe that's the point.
The leash is gone. The collar loose. Unhappiness hardly solidifies a truth that's lasted the better part of one hundred— two hundred years— promising that whenever they showed teeth, he'd be there. (And this room still smells like him, and it's his writing on that desk, and even if it's only the smallest fragment of their minds that hopes this might all just be a test while the rest of their thoughts prepare themselves for war— ) how could they not intrinsically tug just to see if it might give?
One way or another, something will make it real. Something else will grieve for them. Take the blame for them. Be angry or hurt or resentful for them.
(Or afraid for them. That, too.)]
Word to the wise, little one.
Unlike you: a rabid dog doesn't know to submit.
[His back still to Fenris. His arms still loosely at his hips. Little one, not little wolf, for he'd reduce the creature just behind him to a timeline of fresh-abandoned masters just to soothe his paper skin. An artful twist of his neck angled just around his shoulder punctuating one seemingly smug stare.]
But I can't say it's a surprise a formerly kenneled broodbitch still can't tell what acting is even when it's dangled right in front of his stunted little snout. [Half-turning on his heel in that next breath, it's his chin that leads the way. His reddened eyes narrowed into lightless slits. His lips twisted high around long teeth. Sharp teeth. Mean teeth.
Suffer for him, Fenris, and maybe he'll call it even.]
I don't have Vakares to hide behind anymore?
[Oh, catulus.]
I've been waiting centuries for this.
I'm glad he's gone.
[Throw the first stone. Twist the knife. Snap bone. Lap blood. Scrape salt— make it hurt. Make it hurt, even if you're the one bleeding from it, too.
His mouth to Fenris' ear after a handful of silent strides, voice a pitchbound hum.]
I'll be glad when you are, too.
[It hurts.
It hurts, it hurts, and worse still: Fenris cannot tell why it hurts. He is not so emotionally aware that he knows that some part of him longs for his sire so badly that it aches— oh, young thing. Young, stunted thing, and that's the thing about vampires, isn't it? A century old, but that does not mean he has all the maturity of an elder. Vampires are frozen in time, and in some ways, he is still the same bloody slave he'd been when Vakares had found him. And Fenris had learned to lean on him, to look to him for guidance, to mold himself to him—
Oh, young thing floundering without a master . . . he does not know just why he longs for his sire. He does not realize that perhaps he picks a fight so that Vakares, indeed, might return. He does not know why anger sparks so easily; why his blood boils when it usually takes far longer to rouse him into defensive snappishness. He knows only that his heart hurts— and that in these moments of newfound freedom, his collar cut and his tether released, when they both of them are charting the new way their dynamic might go, he is desperate not to come out the lesser.
I'll be glad when you are, too—
Turn, grab, shove— his forearm braced against Astarion's chest, striding forward until Astarion's back hits the wall with a dull thunk. His fangs are bared in a snarl, though he doesn't realize it; his talons slice through thin silk, his crimson eyes narrowed as he glares at his counterpart.]
Then try it.
[He leans forward, pressing his weight against the vampire's throat. They don't need to breathe, but that won't stop his voice from sounding strained from the pressure he puts on it.]
Go on. Do it. Kill me if you can— or is it that you intend only to gossip and whine until I slink away in shame? But you will have to try harder than that.
It hurts, it hurts, and worse still: Fenris cannot tell why it hurts. He is not so emotionally aware that he knows that some part of him longs for his sire so badly that it aches— oh, young thing. Young, stunted thing, and that's the thing about vampires, isn't it? A century old, but that does not mean he has all the maturity of an elder. Vampires are frozen in time, and in some ways, he is still the same bloody slave he'd been when Vakares had found him. And Fenris had learned to lean on him, to look to him for guidance, to mold himself to him—
Oh, young thing floundering without a master . . . he does not know just why he longs for his sire. He does not realize that perhaps he picks a fight so that Vakares, indeed, might return. He does not know why anger sparks so easily; why his blood boils when it usually takes far longer to rouse him into defensive snappishness. He knows only that his heart hurts— and that in these moments of newfound freedom, his collar cut and his tether released, when they both of them are charting the new way their dynamic might go, he is desperate not to come out the lesser.
I'll be glad when you are, too—
Turn, grab, shove— his forearm braced against Astarion's chest, striding forward until Astarion's back hits the wall with a dull thunk. His fangs are bared in a snarl, though he doesn't realize it; his talons slice through thin silk, his crimson eyes narrowed as he glares at his counterpart.]
Then try it.
[He leans forward, pressing his weight against the vampire's throat. They don't need to breathe, but that won't stop his voice from sounding strained from the pressure he puts on it.]
Go on. Do it. Kill me if you can— or is it that you intend only to gossip and whine until I slink away in shame? But you will have to try harder than that.
Will—
[Ah, so it does work well, that pinning pressure: trying to swallow, to speak— to suck in air of any sort or exhale in the slightest— all of it cracks where Fenris has him, keeping him held fast, his own claws planted against skin in a threat that doesn't quite match its catalyst.]
—will I, now....?
[It's better than chatting, isn't it? Better than thinking. Being angry, being nasty, being cruel. When everything's a flaring burst of overwrought emotion (the likes of which no mortal could ever sustain without weeping nigh on end), it's at least a mercy knowing the smallest ripple of fresh sensation can wipe clean the slate of all their scars.
At least for a little while.]
I don't need gossip to make you— look like the bitch you are, dressed up in a silk ruff like a joke.
[His grin twisted high, his fangs leading when he hisses (serpentine— pricked forwards). Cruelty the shine within his stare, and that much brighter by the second.] They'll laugh you out of court by the end of the week.
[Hiss. Hiss.
Death by a thousand little whispers such an appealing prospect, but when in the clutches of a brute—
His claws wrench. In half a blink, he's snapped his arms down into the fault lines of that hold— the whipcrack start to a countering offensive carved from vicious lunges and powerful swipes: elder strength a boon in moments such as these (feel it in every strike, little wolf— ) until the mirror's on its side. The parallel complete. A haggard slam defining shattered seconds when Fenris' own body's rammed against the wall and his throat is savagely pinned to the point of pain.
Hooked talons anchored into stone. Lips brought close enough to kiss, breath pooling in the bow of bloodstained mouths.
The true face of their joining.]
Do you want to know what our master said about you?
[Tongue to his canines, his own blood wrapped around its tip; grin like a wildfire. Like a knife. Like a start.] The things he whispered to me when you weren't around to hear them, riding my cock just to find a little succor....
[It's a crude imitation, his voice. Even so:]
He needs you, Astarion.
If he fled these halls, it would not be a year before he was killed. Such a young thing. Such a hopeless thing, yet I love him all the same.
[Fingers tugging at light lacework, opening the front of Fenris' trousers with probing demand, cool against little glimpses of skin— threatening to take. His every lie stitched in deep.
Come here. Come here.]
I'll shelter you. I'll be your new master. I'll do my duty just like he asked....
And keep you safe by putting a fresh muzzle on that pretty mouth of yours.
[Ah, so it does work well, that pinning pressure: trying to swallow, to speak— to suck in air of any sort or exhale in the slightest— all of it cracks where Fenris has him, keeping him held fast, his own claws planted against skin in a threat that doesn't quite match its catalyst.]
—will I, now....?
[It's better than chatting, isn't it? Better than thinking. Being angry, being nasty, being cruel. When everything's a flaring burst of overwrought emotion (the likes of which no mortal could ever sustain without weeping nigh on end), it's at least a mercy knowing the smallest ripple of fresh sensation can wipe clean the slate of all their scars.
At least for a little while.]
I don't need gossip to make you— look like the bitch you are, dressed up in a silk ruff like a joke.
[His grin twisted high, his fangs leading when he hisses (serpentine— pricked forwards). Cruelty the shine within his stare, and that much brighter by the second.] They'll laugh you out of court by the end of the week.
[Hiss. Hiss.
Death by a thousand little whispers such an appealing prospect, but when in the clutches of a brute—
His claws wrench. In half a blink, he's snapped his arms down into the fault lines of that hold— the whipcrack start to a countering offensive carved from vicious lunges and powerful swipes: elder strength a boon in moments such as these (feel it in every strike, little wolf— ) until the mirror's on its side. The parallel complete. A haggard slam defining shattered seconds when Fenris' own body's rammed against the wall and his throat is savagely pinned to the point of pain.
Hooked talons anchored into stone. Lips brought close enough to kiss, breath pooling in the bow of bloodstained mouths.
The true face of their joining.]
Do you want to know what our master said about you?
[Tongue to his canines, his own blood wrapped around its tip; grin like a wildfire. Like a knife. Like a start.] The things he whispered to me when you weren't around to hear them, riding my cock just to find a little succor....
[It's a crude imitation, his voice. Even so:]
He needs you, Astarion.
If he fled these halls, it would not be a year before he was killed. Such a young thing. Such a hopeless thing, yet I love him all the same.
[Fingers tugging at light lacework, opening the front of Fenris' trousers with probing demand, cool against little glimpses of skin— threatening to take. His every lie stitched in deep.
Come here. Come here.]
I'll shelter you. I'll be your new master. I'll do my duty just like he asked....
And keep you safe by putting a fresh muzzle on that pretty mouth of yours.
Edited 2023-07-09 08:18 (UTC)
[It's not the lie that sets him off.
(Hopeless, and it slips beneath his skin, embedding itself deep like a barb. It doesn't hurt, not yet, but it will: Vakares' gentle tones taking on the sneering dismay of Danarius, his sire standing in the doorframe of a stone-lined cell: all that lyrium and you still disappoint me. Pain flooding his body with every breath, his eyes wide and red-rimmed, his mind little more than a blank slate— knowing only that his sole purpose in life is to please his master, and he is failing in that task. Hopeless, and though he thinks it a lie, that will not stop that gnawing seed of doubt to embed itself within him and grow like a festering thing).
It isn't the cold fingers wrapped around his neck, nor the ones that so boldly pry open his trousers. It's not the way his own cock twitches in panting anticipation (and yet still some part of him burns in humiliation to feel it, his body betraying him even as he growls low in his throat). It isn't the ghost of chilled breath on his lips, or the crude names that Astarion tries to cast upon him (and yet he does look ridiculous in this ruff, he knows; he does look like a silly little slave caught dressing in his master's robes— or at least, that's how it feels).
But then again, maybe it is. Maybe all of those build up in those precious few seconds as they stare at one another: a swirling whirlpool of resentment and insecurity that pushes him into the past farther than he realizes. Little slave, little one, his own mind betraying him even as he shoves resentfully against it. Did you dare to dream you hadn't traded in one master for another, boy? As if you could ever survive on your own— it won't be a year before you're killed. Stupid thing. Stupid, mindless vampire, only ever good for rutting and fighting, building and building in the back of his mind—
I'll be your new master. I'll keep you safe. Muzzle that pretty mouth—
Fenris bites.
Like the feral dog he'd just been labeled: his throat straining at that tight grip as sharpened teeth slice through pale flesh with bitter precision. His fangs catch at Astarion's lip, his tongue, a vicious parody of a kiss— blood smears over his lips, spilling down his chin, and still he lunges forward again and again, not caring what he bites so long as he does. So long as Astarion hurts, oh, he will earn that muzzle. His hands grab for lithe hips, talons shredding delicate fabric into tatters with one swift motion; his fingers wrap around that thickened prick, his grip so tight.
Fenris cannot pull away, it's true. Astarion has him beat when it comes to sheer strength, and so he'll stay put so long as those fingers are wrapped around his throat. But that goes two ways— and if Fenris is to be trapped here, so will Astarion.]
Don't you dare move.]
You will never be my master.
[Oh, it's too angry. It's too desperate, his seething rage only barely covering his panic— and yet there's no hesitance to the way he keeps a tight hold on that prick. If they're to fight, let them fight— and to Fenris' mind, he has the advantage.]
Try again, old man. Or are you so arrogant when you have your cock caught in the palm of my hand?
[And yet it's a goading stroke he offers: his wrist snapping as he shuttles his hand along his cock with all the familiarity of a doting partner. His grin bloody and mean as he feels the other man swell against his fingers, throbbing in needy eagerness— oh, he is hungry, isn't he? Of course he is.
I can beat you with one hand . . . His thumb smearing over his welling slit. His grip tightening as he picks up the pace, hard tight pullsanyára, pull away now. Dance out of range and see what it gets you.]
(Hopeless, and it slips beneath his skin, embedding itself deep like a barb. It doesn't hurt, not yet, but it will: Vakares' gentle tones taking on the sneering dismay of Danarius, his sire standing in the doorframe of a stone-lined cell: all that lyrium and you still disappoint me. Pain flooding his body with every breath, his eyes wide and red-rimmed, his mind little more than a blank slate— knowing only that his sole purpose in life is to please his master, and he is failing in that task. Hopeless, and though he thinks it a lie, that will not stop that gnawing seed of doubt to embed itself within him and grow like a festering thing).
It isn't the cold fingers wrapped around his neck, nor the ones that so boldly pry open his trousers. It's not the way his own cock twitches in panting anticipation (and yet still some part of him burns in humiliation to feel it, his body betraying him even as he growls low in his throat). It isn't the ghost of chilled breath on his lips, or the crude names that Astarion tries to cast upon him (and yet he does look ridiculous in this ruff, he knows; he does look like a silly little slave caught dressing in his master's robes— or at least, that's how it feels).
But then again, maybe it is. Maybe all of those build up in those precious few seconds as they stare at one another: a swirling whirlpool of resentment and insecurity that pushes him into the past farther than he realizes. Little slave, little one, his own mind betraying him even as he shoves resentfully against it. Did you dare to dream you hadn't traded in one master for another, boy? As if you could ever survive on your own— it won't be a year before you're killed. Stupid thing. Stupid, mindless vampire, only ever good for rutting and fighting, building and building in the back of his mind—
I'll be your new master. I'll keep you safe. Muzzle that pretty mouth—
Fenris bites.
Like the feral dog he'd just been labeled: his throat straining at that tight grip as sharpened teeth slice through pale flesh with bitter precision. His fangs catch at Astarion's lip, his tongue, a vicious parody of a kiss— blood smears over his lips, spilling down his chin, and still he lunges forward again and again, not caring what he bites so long as he does. So long as Astarion hurts, oh, he will earn that muzzle. His hands grab for lithe hips, talons shredding delicate fabric into tatters with one swift motion; his fingers wrap around that thickened prick, his grip so tight.
Fenris cannot pull away, it's true. Astarion has him beat when it comes to sheer strength, and so he'll stay put so long as those fingers are wrapped around his throat. But that goes two ways— and if Fenris is to be trapped here, so will Astarion.]
Don't you dare move.]
You will never be my master.
[Oh, it's too angry. It's too desperate, his seething rage only barely covering his panic— and yet there's no hesitance to the way he keeps a tight hold on that prick. If they're to fight, let them fight— and to Fenris' mind, he has the advantage.]
Try again, old man. Or are you so arrogant when you have your cock caught in the palm of my hand?
[And yet it's a goading stroke he offers: his wrist snapping as he shuttles his hand along his cock with all the familiarity of a doting partner. His grin bloody and mean as he feels the other man swell against his fingers, throbbing in needy eagerness— oh, he is hungry, isn't he? Of course he is.
I can beat you with one hand . . . His thumb smearing over his welling slit. His grip tightening as he picks up the pace, hard tight pullsanyára, pull away now. Dance out of range and see what it gets you.]
Edited 2023-07-09 21:34 (UTC)
[Pain slices through him.
Not once. Not twice. Too many times to count before he feels light fabric rip— iron flooding through his senses, bitter and chalky and blunt, and they're both a little senseless aren't they? Neither one caring which blows hit (lies and obscured half-truths void of all their vital context; insults, swipes, digs, snarls, snaps— groping at anything in reach, and) the only thing that matters is that something lands inside their hateful fray, akin to animals warring over a single bone. Friction caught between their jaws, and it could be elation or concupiscence, avarice or hatred—
It soothes.
(Or: it roils.
Or: it aches, but it feels good.)
Fingers stroking over him while he keeps his prey well pinned, and if they're lamenting the fact that no hand comes down between them (no voice from the doorway, knowing and wearily-cut while it utters out they've failed), they can revel in that selfsame truth: martial law's the path to dominance now, both its coronet and vulgar chain. Deadened heart rammed against his throat while glassy fingers tease against his slit (his own twisted tight enough to cut within those laces), and were this just a battle on equal footing, they could play at that face-forwards for hours. Slipping the lead of their pain by testing prowess in all fairness, teeth and tongue and nails accompanying the rhythm of their hands while they stroke and stroke and stroke to see who's best. Who's weaker. Who wants it more— either victory or defeat.
The thing is, you see, Astarion wants to win.]
Oh you're showing me all right. [False breath collapsing in his lungs, delving into the base of his throat before slithering through crimson lips. Grin so wide it seems to split around the glimmer of his fangs, where pretense is unseated by the roll of his own spine, and the pressure nudged against marked palms.] Why don't you dig the knife in a little deeper and service me a little more fiercely....? I'm sure I'll learn my lesson, then.
[One part bluff. One part—
Oh.]
You're my bride after all. I want to see what your virgin little hole looks like stretched around my prick.
[Dig. Past the front of those unstrung trousers. Past supple heat trapped and left defenseless in pursuit of his assault, soft fingers skirting over the base of Fenris' scalding prick— feeling how it twitches in the rise towards his touch, almost begging for retaliating focus despite its master's whims— denying temptation by slipping lower still. Around velveteen contours that tuck heavily between soft thighs; up within their shadow, wrist cut against the waistband of coarse leather for just how far he's delved, utilizing the angle of his hold at his companion's throat in order to prevent rejection (without taking both hands back to break Astarion's hold— or at the very least abandoning his efforts to wring across his cock— ) the most Fenris could do like this is close his own thighs, and what good would that do, really? Those claws are already there by now, after all. Tapping slowly at the entrance to his cinch.
How unguarded you've left yourself, little wolf....]
Deny it all you want....once you get a taste, you'll be shivering again to be mounted with your back bowed and your head slung low in my grip.
Can you picture it, Fenris? [Fingers probing at him just to make him measure that heavily impending threat. Teasing with the very tips of his touch as he twists his head to bite that waiting throat (though in the struggle, it might be hard to reach— ) opening the way for feathered little pushes in. Out. In. Out. In. In. Pull— stretch (just the barest trace of slickness makes it rough and wholly forceful): dragging its bounds wide in little circles under the press of just one finger. This is what defines you. This is what I have. Spread wider for me. Lift your leg. Arch your back.]
I promise you'll enjoy it when I break you in.
Not once. Not twice. Too many times to count before he feels light fabric rip— iron flooding through his senses, bitter and chalky and blunt, and they're both a little senseless aren't they? Neither one caring which blows hit (lies and obscured half-truths void of all their vital context; insults, swipes, digs, snarls, snaps— groping at anything in reach, and) the only thing that matters is that something lands inside their hateful fray, akin to animals warring over a single bone. Friction caught between their jaws, and it could be elation or concupiscence, avarice or hatred—
It soothes.
(Or: it roils.
Or: it aches, but it feels good.)
Fingers stroking over him while he keeps his prey well pinned, and if they're lamenting the fact that no hand comes down between them (no voice from the doorway, knowing and wearily-cut while it utters out they've failed), they can revel in that selfsame truth: martial law's the path to dominance now, both its coronet and vulgar chain. Deadened heart rammed against his throat while glassy fingers tease against his slit (his own twisted tight enough to cut within those laces), and were this just a battle on equal footing, they could play at that face-forwards for hours. Slipping the lead of their pain by testing prowess in all fairness, teeth and tongue and nails accompanying the rhythm of their hands while they stroke and stroke and stroke to see who's best. Who's weaker. Who wants it more— either victory or defeat.
The thing is, you see, Astarion wants to win.]
Oh you're showing me all right. [False breath collapsing in his lungs, delving into the base of his throat before slithering through crimson lips. Grin so wide it seems to split around the glimmer of his fangs, where pretense is unseated by the roll of his own spine, and the pressure nudged against marked palms.] Why don't you dig the knife in a little deeper and service me a little more fiercely....? I'm sure I'll learn my lesson, then.
[One part bluff. One part—
Oh.]
You're my bride after all. I want to see what your virgin little hole looks like stretched around my prick.
[Dig. Past the front of those unstrung trousers. Past supple heat trapped and left defenseless in pursuit of his assault, soft fingers skirting over the base of Fenris' scalding prick— feeling how it twitches in the rise towards his touch, almost begging for retaliating focus despite its master's whims— denying temptation by slipping lower still. Around velveteen contours that tuck heavily between soft thighs; up within their shadow, wrist cut against the waistband of coarse leather for just how far he's delved, utilizing the angle of his hold at his companion's throat in order to prevent rejection (without taking both hands back to break Astarion's hold— or at the very least abandoning his efforts to wring across his cock— ) the most Fenris could do like this is close his own thighs, and what good would that do, really? Those claws are already there by now, after all. Tapping slowly at the entrance to his cinch.
How unguarded you've left yourself, little wolf....]
Deny it all you want....once you get a taste, you'll be shivering again to be mounted with your back bowed and your head slung low in my grip.
Can you picture it, Fenris? [Fingers probing at him just to make him measure that heavily impending threat. Teasing with the very tips of his touch as he twists his head to bite that waiting throat (though in the struggle, it might be hard to reach— ) opening the way for feathered little pushes in. Out. In. Out. In. In. Pull— stretch (just the barest trace of slickness makes it rough and wholly forceful): dragging its bounds wide in little circles under the press of just one finger. This is what defines you. This is what I have. Spread wider for me. Lift your leg. Arch your back.]
I promise you'll enjoy it when I break you in.
[In and out, in and out— he wants it (and he doesn't), he wants it (he'd rather die), and the trick isn't that neither are true, but both are. Every false breath made ragged with lust is just as genuine as the snarl that paints his lips. Every little twitch from his waiting hole (please please please, and he hates his body for how it betrays him, his cock drooling as he spread so eagerly around that probing finger, fighting not to roll his hips down and rut) is just as real as the way his talons slice viciously along the skin of Astarion's hip, bloody lines a testament to his own rage.
You're my bride, and his cock twitches in response. I want to see what your virgin little hole looks like stretched around my prick, and he has always been so weak to filthy talk. His mind reels involuntarily, his body remembering just how good it felt to have that thickened prick split him open (and that was just the tip). Drifting into the fantasy of white lace and whimpering cries, corruption thrilling him even hands grip his wrists, that cock pounding into him as Astarion's voice hisses viciously in his ear—
Oh, sweet little virgin, what a wedding night I will give you . . .
And he wants to give in (good boy). He wants to be good (what a good pair I have, Vakares' voice so terribly warm in his memory). He longs for the security of a hand gripping his leash, fingers in his mouth and a fat cock splitting him open— and that's exactly why he can't give in.
Roll over now and sign away any hope of a partnership. Submit willingly (willingly) and know that this above all else will define you both for centuries to come. And Fenris could recover, he knows he could— but how long would it take? How many times would Astarion hold it over his head, a deliciously juicy secret to slip out at fêtes: oh, he was such an eager thing, my bride, so ready to feel his lord master's guiding hand—
No.
Whine for a good breeding . . .
The cleverest way to win a fight isn't head-on, but with tactics.]
As if you are capable of breaking me.
[Breathed out, and he does not mind the teeth at his throat. Vicious things that slice through skin and lyrium with ease, welling droplets of blood dripping down into his disheveled shirt as his hands suddenly release. Astarion's prick bobs in the air, heavy weight dragging it down— and then all at once forced up, pinned between their writhing bodies as Fenris drags his counterpart in. Closer, closer— til there isn't an inch of space between them, and no matter that it traps Astarion's hand against his hole, for it gives him all the reach he needs to grip those overfull cheeks and spread them.
Remember this?]
Mount me, if you wish. [Oh, he wants it, they want it.] Shove your way into me like the breeding stud our sire picked you out to be— the silly little noble who has nothing to his name but a big prick and an ego to match. Take me, if you can, but do not imagine that makes you a conquerer— or do you think you were the only one he confided in?
[He arches his back, a grin he doesn't feel sparking over his lips: come take me, then. As his hole is bared to the cold air, his cock throbbing between them untouched— mount me, little prince, and see what difference it makes.]
Settle down and perhaps I'll tell you what he said . . .
[A goading carrot as his fingers spread those cheeks wider still, groping and refusing to tend to him all at once.
You'll submit to me no matter how we do this.]
You're my bride, and his cock twitches in response. I want to see what your virgin little hole looks like stretched around my prick, and he has always been so weak to filthy talk. His mind reels involuntarily, his body remembering just how good it felt to have that thickened prick split him open (and that was just the tip). Drifting into the fantasy of white lace and whimpering cries, corruption thrilling him even hands grip his wrists, that cock pounding into him as Astarion's voice hisses viciously in his ear—
Oh, sweet little virgin, what a wedding night I will give you . . .
And he wants to give in (good boy). He wants to be good (what a good pair I have, Vakares' voice so terribly warm in his memory). He longs for the security of a hand gripping his leash, fingers in his mouth and a fat cock splitting him open— and that's exactly why he can't give in.
Roll over now and sign away any hope of a partnership. Submit willingly (willingly) and know that this above all else will define you both for centuries to come. And Fenris could recover, he knows he could— but how long would it take? How many times would Astarion hold it over his head, a deliciously juicy secret to slip out at fêtes: oh, he was such an eager thing, my bride, so ready to feel his lord master's guiding hand—
No.
Whine for a good breeding . . .
The cleverest way to win a fight isn't head-on, but with tactics.]
As if you are capable of breaking me.
[Breathed out, and he does not mind the teeth at his throat. Vicious things that slice through skin and lyrium with ease, welling droplets of blood dripping down into his disheveled shirt as his hands suddenly release. Astarion's prick bobs in the air, heavy weight dragging it down— and then all at once forced up, pinned between their writhing bodies as Fenris drags his counterpart in. Closer, closer— til there isn't an inch of space between them, and no matter that it traps Astarion's hand against his hole, for it gives him all the reach he needs to grip those overfull cheeks and spread them.
Remember this?]
Mount me, if you wish. [Oh, he wants it, they want it.] Shove your way into me like the breeding stud our sire picked you out to be— the silly little noble who has nothing to his name but a big prick and an ego to match. Take me, if you can, but do not imagine that makes you a conquerer— or do you think you were the only one he confided in?
[He arches his back, a grin he doesn't feel sparking over his lips: come take me, then. As his hole is bared to the cold air, his cock throbbing between them untouched— mount me, little prince, and see what difference it makes.]
Settle down and perhaps I'll tell you what he said . . .
[A goading carrot as his fingers spread those cheeks wider still, groping and refusing to tend to him all at once.
You'll submit to me no matter how we do this.]
[Fenris might not mind the dig of teeth against his throat, but Astarion—
He sees red the moment that the knife's edge turns.
Just for a second, his agile mind isn't thinking at all— his fingertips half-submerged in supple depths, his lips jammed tight (alongside the rest of his own body, now) against the map of Fenris' form where he's been dragged towards it— shared borders outlining the ties between microcosms and macrocosms. Every inch of him locked under the guillotine hang of a simple set of words: perhaps I'll tell you what he said.
And isn't it funny (it isn't) how the details always get lost in the belly of the most ambitious schemes. How it never once occurred to him, grand manipulator that he is, that a street this cutting could run both ways, or that Fenris would stoop low enough to lie to him like that (when all he's ever seen of the beast he bridles is how slavishly he'd tucked his ears back to be pet beneath his sire's hand)— or if it's even a lie at all.
After all, one man's bluff might warrant its own call.
The deck doesn't bless each player equally.
And suddenly Astarion has to know what it was. If it was. The rough shapes in his mind unfurled. (Ah, maybe Vakares did say something. Maybe maybe maybe, with his prick buried too richly and the lights of his study drawn low, lyrium-glazed fingers curled so sweetly round his cheeks that he forgot his firstsired ever existed, and whispered only praise for his spoiled little second; oh, little one, words churning high between sharp teeth that curve away from skin to kiss instead of bite, oh, only you— not him. You eclipsed him from the moment that I found you. He doesn't charm me anymore. He doesn't shine. He doesn't tempt, and his demands for my attention only exhaust me now. Needy Astarion, it isn't his fault. I loved him, but— )
By force, and only just, Astarion yanks away from it with his foot half in that trap (rough hands across his cheeks, and a groan behind his teeth snapped shut at just the last second), recognizing it all for what it is, no matter how his head swims and his deadened heart aches in fretted pain.
The only thing left within the harbor of his chest once that tide of insecurity goes rushing out is barbed, embittered hatred.
He wants to ruin the memory of Vakares for him. Etch his name across it all. Take his throne. His title. How dare he, the vile little beast. Little spread-legged whore. Little cur. Little mongrel. Look, Vakares. Look what he made me do, the little wretch that couldn't handle your vision. He was ungrateful. He forced my hand.
And while Astarion holds the thinnest advantage in a void, like this, leverage is on Fenris' side; he can't outmatch that captive strength outright— but sinking further into it? Oh, now that's a different game entirely: let his rival palm those cheeks with such enticing little whispers (and he's shivering up his spine, though enmity's far keener), it won't stay a thing when he rushes forwards in a lunge within tight spaces— slamming Fenris' back against the wall once— twice—
The third time harsh enough to daze a lesser thing, slid in before Astarion's pinning hand finally drops to meet its twin, hoisting his companion's legs high into the air until his knees come close to kissing smooth stone— and his cock slavers thickly at the entrance to that cinch, prettier than ever before when it's already so flush from crude attention, precome welling at its lip.
That his eyes glint with anticipation (oh, he will take you) is a sickly breed of gluttonous indulgence left to burn amongst dry tinder.]
Such boldness.
[In the faultline of his tongue, it doesn't sound like a compliment.]
Let it console you when I leash you under the table to service every cock and cunt in waiting with that lying tongue of yours.
[His eyes black. His voice humming with abyssal promise. And to punctuate that claim— he shoves himself in deep. Grinding. Shifting. Bucking down while sawing the thickset crest of his own cock across a tender bundle of soft, subverted nerves. There. There.] Shh shh shh— just like that, little wolf. There you go, writhe for me.
Good boy. [A knife, that praise. Retaliation.] That's a good boy.
I'm not normally a fan of sharing what's mine, but for the sight of you in lace....mhm, I'd lose the respect of my peers if I didn't let them taste.
He sees red the moment that the knife's edge turns.
Just for a second, his agile mind isn't thinking at all— his fingertips half-submerged in supple depths, his lips jammed tight (alongside the rest of his own body, now) against the map of Fenris' form where he's been dragged towards it— shared borders outlining the ties between microcosms and macrocosms. Every inch of him locked under the guillotine hang of a simple set of words: perhaps I'll tell you what he said.
And isn't it funny (it isn't) how the details always get lost in the belly of the most ambitious schemes. How it never once occurred to him, grand manipulator that he is, that a street this cutting could run both ways, or that Fenris would stoop low enough to lie to him like that (when all he's ever seen of the beast he bridles is how slavishly he'd tucked his ears back to be pet beneath his sire's hand)— or if it's even a lie at all.
After all, one man's bluff might warrant its own call.
The deck doesn't bless each player equally.
And suddenly Astarion has to know what it was. If it was. The rough shapes in his mind unfurled. (Ah, maybe Vakares did say something. Maybe maybe maybe, with his prick buried too richly and the lights of his study drawn low, lyrium-glazed fingers curled so sweetly round his cheeks that he forgot his firstsired ever existed, and whispered only praise for his spoiled little second; oh, little one, words churning high between sharp teeth that curve away from skin to kiss instead of bite, oh, only you— not him. You eclipsed him from the moment that I found you. He doesn't charm me anymore. He doesn't shine. He doesn't tempt, and his demands for my attention only exhaust me now. Needy Astarion, it isn't his fault. I loved him, but— )
By force, and only just, Astarion yanks away from it with his foot half in that trap (rough hands across his cheeks, and a groan behind his teeth snapped shut at just the last second), recognizing it all for what it is, no matter how his head swims and his deadened heart aches in fretted pain.
The only thing left within the harbor of his chest once that tide of insecurity goes rushing out is barbed, embittered hatred.
He wants to ruin the memory of Vakares for him. Etch his name across it all. Take his throne. His title. How dare he, the vile little beast. Little spread-legged whore. Little cur. Little mongrel. Look, Vakares. Look what he made me do, the little wretch that couldn't handle your vision. He was ungrateful. He forced my hand.
And while Astarion holds the thinnest advantage in a void, like this, leverage is on Fenris' side; he can't outmatch that captive strength outright— but sinking further into it? Oh, now that's a different game entirely: let his rival palm those cheeks with such enticing little whispers (and he's shivering up his spine, though enmity's far keener), it won't stay a thing when he rushes forwards in a lunge within tight spaces— slamming Fenris' back against the wall once— twice—
The third time harsh enough to daze a lesser thing, slid in before Astarion's pinning hand finally drops to meet its twin, hoisting his companion's legs high into the air until his knees come close to kissing smooth stone— and his cock slavers thickly at the entrance to that cinch, prettier than ever before when it's already so flush from crude attention, precome welling at its lip.
That his eyes glint with anticipation (oh, he will take you) is a sickly breed of gluttonous indulgence left to burn amongst dry tinder.]
Such boldness.
[In the faultline of his tongue, it doesn't sound like a compliment.]
Let it console you when I leash you under the table to service every cock and cunt in waiting with that lying tongue of yours.
[His eyes black. His voice humming with abyssal promise. And to punctuate that claim— he shoves himself in deep. Grinding. Shifting. Bucking down while sawing the thickset crest of his own cock across a tender bundle of soft, subverted nerves. There. There.] Shh shh shh— just like that, little wolf. There you go, writhe for me.
Good boy. [A knife, that praise. Retaliation.] That's a good boy.
I'm not normally a fan of sharing what's mine, but for the sight of you in lace....mhm, I'd lose the respect of my peers if I didn't let them taste.
[(This wasn't how it was meant to go, some faint thought whispers. The ghostly remnants of Vakares drifting through the back of his mind behind all the terror and rage and arousal: this wasn't how it was meant to go, but maybe that was always a foolish dream. Maybe they were always fated to end up like this: bitterly vicious, sinking their claws savagely into one another until one of them falls dead to the ground and the other triumphs. Power is never evenly shared, and it was stupid to think it could be. It was stupid to think they could get along. Stupid, stupid—)]
Ah!
[It's a bitten-back cry, his eyes rolling back even as his fangs sink deep into his lip, all of him such a brutal dichotomy right now. He wants so badly to hide his pleasure and deny Astarion the vicious satisfaction— but oh, little wolf, he can't, not this close. Not when his body overrules his mind, all enmity temporarily forgotten in face of molten pleasure— gods, he can't help it. He doesn't want this, he doesn't want this—
But he does.
His thigh shake as they're pinned back, saliva pooling in his mouth as he's impaled so brutally. Thick and hot and perfect, spreading him open with no regard for delicacy, and oh, he loves every roughened inch. He loves how deeply Astarion's cock pushes in, spearing him and filling him, spreading him open wide and satisfying him like nothing else ever does. Greedy and gluttonous, his eyes glazed over as heat searing as the sun rises within him, his cock drooling against his belly as his desperate squirming only sinks him down further. Helpless and thriving, and that would be bad enough. The way his thighs tremble and those muffled moans sound in his throat would be bad enough.
But then there's that insistent rubbing. The blunt crown of his cock grinding against that bundle of nerves over and over, and with every pass, it gets worse. White sparks burst in front of his vision as his cock twitches, his mouth finally dropping open as moans timed to that vicious assault slip past his lips, oh, oh—
Writhe for me, and he does. Instinctively, desperately, his body responding to commands far swifter than his mind can catch up— so that by the time he manages to grab some semblance of sanity with white knuckles, it's too late. He's all but drooling as he speaks, his eyes black and glazed with pleasure— and yet still, though his breath hitches and his toes curl, that's that spark of defiant rage.]
N-no—
[Oh, gods, no, he can't, he can't— but oh, he would. Why not? Why not parade his hated rival around, cementing his place as whore and humiliating him all at once? He sought their deaths, Fenris, and the depths of his jealousy was nothing compared to what he feels for Fenris. And as for the other vampires— oh, they'll see it as droll comeuppance and little more. A squalling brat put in his proper place, a slave kept down by his betters, oh, they'll eagerly settle in, hungry to play with the novelty of a pet leashed, his mouth forced open and his protests muffled by a thickened cock or slick cunt—
No, and the horror of it eclipses any humiliating heat that leaves his cock drooling for the thought.
And yet: what can he do? What can he offer? Astarion is older and stronger, and right now, he has the advantage. Protesting will only cement him in his line of action; pleading is out of the question, for no matter what happens, Fenris will not beg. Threats flood through his distracted mind, flickering wildly, I'll bite off anything you shove in my mouth, I'll hunt you down, I'll rip your tongue out, and he will, he will he will he will— but right now, they're impotent things, desperation woven in every word.]
A-and [nn, his tongue flushed and dripping, his eyes fluttering,] and let everyone know y-you couldn't even tame me yourself? That you n-needed a whole host of elders to do it for you?
[It isn't submission, but it's . . . something close to it. As close as he can bear. One hand darts out, wrapping around Astarion's neck; with a moan Fenris tips his head, bringing their lips together in a hungry kiss that tastes of sweat and blood and hate. Their tongues slide together, their mouths pulsing— and when he breaks away, strings of scarlet saliva bind them temporarily together, both their teeth still coated in blood.]
Such talk from a vampire lord w-who cannot even manage to tame his replacemen— ah!
Ah!
[It's a bitten-back cry, his eyes rolling back even as his fangs sink deep into his lip, all of him such a brutal dichotomy right now. He wants so badly to hide his pleasure and deny Astarion the vicious satisfaction— but oh, little wolf, he can't, not this close. Not when his body overrules his mind, all enmity temporarily forgotten in face of molten pleasure— gods, he can't help it. He doesn't want this, he doesn't want this—
But he does.
His thigh shake as they're pinned back, saliva pooling in his mouth as he's impaled so brutally. Thick and hot and perfect, spreading him open with no regard for delicacy, and oh, he loves every roughened inch. He loves how deeply Astarion's cock pushes in, spearing him and filling him, spreading him open wide and satisfying him like nothing else ever does. Greedy and gluttonous, his eyes glazed over as heat searing as the sun rises within him, his cock drooling against his belly as his desperate squirming only sinks him down further. Helpless and thriving, and that would be bad enough. The way his thighs tremble and those muffled moans sound in his throat would be bad enough.
But then there's that insistent rubbing. The blunt crown of his cock grinding against that bundle of nerves over and over, and with every pass, it gets worse. White sparks burst in front of his vision as his cock twitches, his mouth finally dropping open as moans timed to that vicious assault slip past his lips, oh, oh—
Writhe for me, and he does. Instinctively, desperately, his body responding to commands far swifter than his mind can catch up— so that by the time he manages to grab some semblance of sanity with white knuckles, it's too late. He's all but drooling as he speaks, his eyes black and glazed with pleasure— and yet still, though his breath hitches and his toes curl, that's that spark of defiant rage.]
N-no—
[Oh, gods, no, he can't, he can't— but oh, he would. Why not? Why not parade his hated rival around, cementing his place as whore and humiliating him all at once? He sought their deaths, Fenris, and the depths of his jealousy was nothing compared to what he feels for Fenris. And as for the other vampires— oh, they'll see it as droll comeuppance and little more. A squalling brat put in his proper place, a slave kept down by his betters, oh, they'll eagerly settle in, hungry to play with the novelty of a pet leashed, his mouth forced open and his protests muffled by a thickened cock or slick cunt—
No, and the horror of it eclipses any humiliating heat that leaves his cock drooling for the thought.
And yet: what can he do? What can he offer? Astarion is older and stronger, and right now, he has the advantage. Protesting will only cement him in his line of action; pleading is out of the question, for no matter what happens, Fenris will not beg. Threats flood through his distracted mind, flickering wildly, I'll bite off anything you shove in my mouth, I'll hunt you down, I'll rip your tongue out, and he will, he will he will he will— but right now, they're impotent things, desperation woven in every word.]
A-and [nn, his tongue flushed and dripping, his eyes fluttering,] and let everyone know y-you couldn't even tame me yourself? That you n-needed a whole host of elders to do it for you?
[It isn't submission, but it's . . . something close to it. As close as he can bear. One hand darts out, wrapping around Astarion's neck; with a moan Fenris tips his head, bringing their lips together in a hungry kiss that tastes of sweat and blood and hate. Their tongues slide together, their mouths pulsing— and when he breaks away, strings of scarlet saliva bind them temporarily together, both their teeth still coated in blood.]
Such talk from a vampire lord w-who cannot even manage to tame his replacemen— ah!
Aren't you adorable, wriggling so nicely on a hook when you know you've been outfoxed....
[Tsk. Fool thing. Does he really expect that to work? Does he imagine Astarion so ineffably susceptible to distraction that one thinly veiled goad let out through spit-drenched fangs will somehow convince him to relent? Change his mind? Shy away from sadism in favor of being rational just this once, compared to an unliving lifetime of killing hens in his own coop?
Well.
The downside is: he's right.
Vakares had assessed his consorts correctly to begin with, be it ages or weeks or months or decades ago— their patterned strengths and weaknesses alike (you need each other— ) that depthless voice still humming fresh as snowfall in his mind. Where they'd flourish. Where they'd falter. And Astarion could sway courtly hearts through captivation, but in matters of strength? No doubt already they suspect his softness, nothing to be said about the compounding fact that what is two hundred years to any of their kind, really? There are spawn older than him. There are living elves older than him. The tablewear they'd dined on over the last few days could prove their eldest sibling. Ergo, what then? When the soft-soled heir usurps a waiting throne only to flex how his conquest had mewled for him without hanging his own head— and does still. That's no sign of power; that's hardly worth respect. A rabid dog cowed by many hands belongs to no one and nothing alone, and Astarion can't let that be his start, no matter how avidly it tempts.
But that isn't something Fenris needs to know.
While his mind reels over itself in oscillating forethought, Astarion bears into that kiss in full: catching tongue between his teeth with scraping little flicks of hungry movement while his hips count out a host of heartlessly supplanting seconds— all of his body still angled in pursuit of its captive dinner— tracking time through shallow thrusts and inlaid swells of depraved pressure. It's not obedience that he craves right now while his shoulders ache and his swallowed prick throbs inside hot leylines.
It's the taking.
And so when he pulls away, it's to look downwards into the heart of their vulgar alignment. The twisting, writhing spearpoint that keeps them locked in dripping struggle, one shoved tight atop the other. Hand rushed swift to the back of Fenris' skull, bending him forward until his still-prone posture bows— and he's treated with the obscene sight of his sore cock laid (and bouncing dazedly) on its side in the crook of his own legs: their slender, branded measure shoved back so far and so wide that they bracket either side of his slim torso, folded knees tucked up near his shoulders, toes twisting in dead air while mapped out in their shade—
It's only a glimpse, you see.
Only visible when Astarion draws back— revealing just how thick and long and rigid he is as if for the very first time between them— that the glossy base of his crude length shines in such romantic light as that of their christened room. Drawn back to the limits of his hips and yet still so harshly buried (too expansive not to feel just as full as their master had ever left them; too vindictively heavy not to mock the very same anatomy it defiles), keeping Fenris' body well aware of what it serves, massive and yet waiting just to pounce.]
Watch, now.
[Watch, little one.
As he rolls his hips by slight degrees at a probing angle, bruisingly blunt tip ramming and scraping at that singularly pliant spot. A jab to hunt for it— a dig to mark it— and then a lambent grind, dragging eagerly back and forth across its measure, his thickened shaft stretching out the roseated base of Fenris' tight hole. His fault for clinging. For fighting. For not relaxing and letting Astarion have his fill with servile ease. If it stings, there is a cure. If it maddens, he knows how best to appeal it. Be good. Open wide. Keep your hips relaxed, just like that— be a good boy, let me in.]
I've no choice but to tame you before I let them admire you, then.
—ah ah, watch, I said. [Don't shut your eyes. Don't look away.] You need to see what I'm doing to you to understand how perfect it'll all feel when you let me have my way. That's how it works, domestication.
....or so I've read. I've never tamed my own broodbitch before, after all.
And if you let me— [One pair of fingers lifting just to feather at Fenris' untouched tip, playing more than kindling his dripping need; inciting subservient bootlicking through imperious strokes and the conjoined efforts of his hips, dark lashes having fallen low across his downturned eyes while pleasure flutters through him (oh, through them both, no doubt). His own throat burning like soot. Like smoke. Like the heat of a kill drawn close— ]
I'll make it so much better.
[Calling for assistance is easy.
A single shouted word and one of their sire's— one of their spawn comes running, easily instructed on what to bring.
A bit. A set of cuffs. A collar. A chain. Toys upon toys resting on their waiting bed and a promise to track down 'something suitable to wear'. And all the while Astarion teases. Fucks into him only to stop once Fenris comes even remotely close— again and again and again.]
Relinquish his gift. Surrender.
[A nose bumped against his jaw, slipping over countless welling bites.]
Just say it....and I'll let you come.
[Tsk. Fool thing. Does he really expect that to work? Does he imagine Astarion so ineffably susceptible to distraction that one thinly veiled goad let out through spit-drenched fangs will somehow convince him to relent? Change his mind? Shy away from sadism in favor of being rational just this once, compared to an unliving lifetime of killing hens in his own coop?
Well.
The downside is: he's right.
Vakares had assessed his consorts correctly to begin with, be it ages or weeks or months or decades ago— their patterned strengths and weaknesses alike (you need each other— ) that depthless voice still humming fresh as snowfall in his mind. Where they'd flourish. Where they'd falter. And Astarion could sway courtly hearts through captivation, but in matters of strength? No doubt already they suspect his softness, nothing to be said about the compounding fact that what is two hundred years to any of their kind, really? There are spawn older than him. There are living elves older than him. The tablewear they'd dined on over the last few days could prove their eldest sibling. Ergo, what then? When the soft-soled heir usurps a waiting throne only to flex how his conquest had mewled for him without hanging his own head— and does still. That's no sign of power; that's hardly worth respect. A rabid dog cowed by many hands belongs to no one and nothing alone, and Astarion can't let that be his start, no matter how avidly it tempts.
But that isn't something Fenris needs to know.
While his mind reels over itself in oscillating forethought, Astarion bears into that kiss in full: catching tongue between his teeth with scraping little flicks of hungry movement while his hips count out a host of heartlessly supplanting seconds— all of his body still angled in pursuit of its captive dinner— tracking time through shallow thrusts and inlaid swells of depraved pressure. It's not obedience that he craves right now while his shoulders ache and his swallowed prick throbs inside hot leylines.
It's the taking.
And so when he pulls away, it's to look downwards into the heart of their vulgar alignment. The twisting, writhing spearpoint that keeps them locked in dripping struggle, one shoved tight atop the other. Hand rushed swift to the back of Fenris' skull, bending him forward until his still-prone posture bows— and he's treated with the obscene sight of his sore cock laid (and bouncing dazedly) on its side in the crook of his own legs: their slender, branded measure shoved back so far and so wide that they bracket either side of his slim torso, folded knees tucked up near his shoulders, toes twisting in dead air while mapped out in their shade—
It's only a glimpse, you see.
Only visible when Astarion draws back— revealing just how thick and long and rigid he is as if for the very first time between them— that the glossy base of his crude length shines in such romantic light as that of their christened room. Drawn back to the limits of his hips and yet still so harshly buried (too expansive not to feel just as full as their master had ever left them; too vindictively heavy not to mock the very same anatomy it defiles), keeping Fenris' body well aware of what it serves, massive and yet waiting just to pounce.]
Watch, now.
[Watch, little one.
As he rolls his hips by slight degrees at a probing angle, bruisingly blunt tip ramming and scraping at that singularly pliant spot. A jab to hunt for it— a dig to mark it— and then a lambent grind, dragging eagerly back and forth across its measure, his thickened shaft stretching out the roseated base of Fenris' tight hole. His fault for clinging. For fighting. For not relaxing and letting Astarion have his fill with servile ease. If it stings, there is a cure. If it maddens, he knows how best to appeal it. Be good. Open wide. Keep your hips relaxed, just like that— be a good boy, let me in.]
I've no choice but to tame you before I let them admire you, then.
—ah ah, watch, I said. [Don't shut your eyes. Don't look away.] You need to see what I'm doing to you to understand how perfect it'll all feel when you let me have my way. That's how it works, domestication.
....or so I've read. I've never tamed my own broodbitch before, after all.
And if you let me— [One pair of fingers lifting just to feather at Fenris' untouched tip, playing more than kindling his dripping need; inciting subservient bootlicking through imperious strokes and the conjoined efforts of his hips, dark lashes having fallen low across his downturned eyes while pleasure flutters through him (oh, through them both, no doubt). His own throat burning like soot. Like smoke. Like the heat of a kill drawn close— ]
I'll make it so much better.
[Calling for assistance is easy.
A single shouted word and one of their sire's— one of their spawn comes running, easily instructed on what to bring.
A bit. A set of cuffs. A collar. A chain. Toys upon toys resting on their waiting bed and a promise to track down 'something suitable to wear'. And all the while Astarion teases. Fucks into him only to stop once Fenris comes even remotely close— again and again and again.]
Relinquish his gift. Surrender.
[A nose bumped against his jaw, slipping over countless welling bites.]
Just say it....and I'll let you come.
Edited 2023-07-12 23:42 (UTC)
[The world swims.
Swims, spins, blurs, and though Fenris knows they have taken no drugs, it hardly matters, for he feels high as anything. Punch-drunk off searing sensation and overwhelmed arousal, and his defiant desperation only makes it worse. He's torn between the two, Astarion a siren dragging him into the darkest depths even as he struggles for air. I can't and don't and no all gracing his lips, barked out fitfully as his mind tries so hard to remember just why he'd resisted in the first place. Thoughts of hatred do no good, for the resulting humiliation burns through him as potent as any aphrodisiac, and as for plans for the future— oh, that means nothing at all. What future? What world? Nothing exists outside of this moment. Nothing exists outside of the two of them, locked together and yet still biting at one another's throats, collared together as surely as if they both had bands wrapped around their throats.
It's everything. It's everything, so blindly overwhelming that each time he thinks he's found a foothold through the scarlet haze of arousal, he's swept off his feet once more. It's the hypnotically vulgar sight of Astarion's prick gleaming in the candlelight as it saws temptingly in and out of him, earning a ragged moan each time it so cruelly grinds over that bundle of nerves (back and forth, back and forth, saliva pooling in Fenris' mouth as his jaw goes slack). It's they way Astarion's hands are always there to pin his own back each time he tries to reach for his prick, lilting voice whispering taunts in his ear (naughty thing, you know better). It's the trembling temptation that comes of featherlight fingertips toying with his welling slit, earning whimpering little whines that only grow as Astarion's cock grinds and ruts within him.
It's the rage that comes from hearing the word broodbitch, and the goading laughter that results when Fenris surges forward to bite that offending tongue. Blood runs hot between them and it doesn't matter, for no matter how he sinks his teeth in (and oh, he does), it's still him helpless. It's still him impaled, spread open upon his twin's cock and helpless to do anything save that. And so Astarion takes even that from him: turning his dripping fangs into a demonstration of his own helplessness, for what else does he have? Not his hands, held captive whenever he tries to seek relief. Not his legs, pinned back and dangling helplessly in the air, trembling wildly as Fenris tries not to lose his mind.
And it's the growing desperation as he is denied his release again and again and again.
Vampires are gluttonous creatures, and he is no different. A single orgasm doesn't approach satisfying him— and so this endless edging is the worst sort of torment. He loses track of how many times he verges on coming, his whole body tensing, his back arching, every inch of him surging up— only to be cruelly suffocated by a tight grip and a vicious thumb. Each waves leaves him reeling higher and higher, every potential orgasm more powerful than the last— so that by the time that spawn (only dazedly seen and vaguely registered) slips in and out of their rooms, Fenris feels nigh-mad from desire.
And the world swims . . .]
I—
[Oh, what a mess he is. Hair hanging damply in his unfocused eyes, his cock drooling as it bobs helplessly in the air. A soft nose bumps against his jaw and instinctively he nuzzles back against it, There's the faintest trace of a flush to his cheeks, the remnants of their wedding feast making itself known. Again the door opens, that same spawn coming in with a bundle of something white in his arms; drunkenly, Fenris thinks once more of ravaged brides and virginal first times. Of himself in torn skirts and stockings with runs in them, mewling as his body melts itself to the shape of Astarion's prick— his eyes rolling back, his mouth slack as he's fucked into his fourth, fifth, sixth orgasm of the night, a captive consort ridden hard and put back wet each and every night . . .]
I won't.
[Panted. Whined. His hips rocking forward desperately as he tries and fails to fuck himself, his skin gleaming with sweat and dripping with blood— and yet still some trace of defiance remains.]
I w-won't, I won't—
[Collar me, if you can. Fuck me. Tie me to the bed. Dress me as your bride— but I will not renounce my claim. That's what he wants to say. He wants to sound brave and defiant and unbreakable— but oh, two words are all he can bear. And in the end, he sounds more like a desperate thing than a defiant one.]
P-please, please, please, Astarion, please—
[Gods, it's been hours, please—]
[Desperate tears filling his eyes and tracking unheeded down his cheeks, his whole body shuddering as another pulsing wave of orgasm rises and falls— and Fenris in the middle, teeter-tottering frantically between his two selves, reeling and yet trying so hard even now to fight. Mouth dropping open before curling in a snarl, his teeth clicking in the open air as he snaps them.]
You will have to break me before you manage to ever come close to taming me— vishante kaffar mentula!
Swims, spins, blurs, and though Fenris knows they have taken no drugs, it hardly matters, for he feels high as anything. Punch-drunk off searing sensation and overwhelmed arousal, and his defiant desperation only makes it worse. He's torn between the two, Astarion a siren dragging him into the darkest depths even as he struggles for air. I can't and don't and no all gracing his lips, barked out fitfully as his mind tries so hard to remember just why he'd resisted in the first place. Thoughts of hatred do no good, for the resulting humiliation burns through him as potent as any aphrodisiac, and as for plans for the future— oh, that means nothing at all. What future? What world? Nothing exists outside of this moment. Nothing exists outside of the two of them, locked together and yet still biting at one another's throats, collared together as surely as if they both had bands wrapped around their throats.
It's everything. It's everything, so blindly overwhelming that each time he thinks he's found a foothold through the scarlet haze of arousal, he's swept off his feet once more. It's the hypnotically vulgar sight of Astarion's prick gleaming in the candlelight as it saws temptingly in and out of him, earning a ragged moan each time it so cruelly grinds over that bundle of nerves (back and forth, back and forth, saliva pooling in Fenris' mouth as his jaw goes slack). It's they way Astarion's hands are always there to pin his own back each time he tries to reach for his prick, lilting voice whispering taunts in his ear (naughty thing, you know better). It's the trembling temptation that comes of featherlight fingertips toying with his welling slit, earning whimpering little whines that only grow as Astarion's cock grinds and ruts within him.
It's the rage that comes from hearing the word broodbitch, and the goading laughter that results when Fenris surges forward to bite that offending tongue. Blood runs hot between them and it doesn't matter, for no matter how he sinks his teeth in (and oh, he does), it's still him helpless. It's still him impaled, spread open upon his twin's cock and helpless to do anything save that. And so Astarion takes even that from him: turning his dripping fangs into a demonstration of his own helplessness, for what else does he have? Not his hands, held captive whenever he tries to seek relief. Not his legs, pinned back and dangling helplessly in the air, trembling wildly as Fenris tries not to lose his mind.
And it's the growing desperation as he is denied his release again and again and again.
Vampires are gluttonous creatures, and he is no different. A single orgasm doesn't approach satisfying him— and so this endless edging is the worst sort of torment. He loses track of how many times he verges on coming, his whole body tensing, his back arching, every inch of him surging up— only to be cruelly suffocated by a tight grip and a vicious thumb. Each waves leaves him reeling higher and higher, every potential orgasm more powerful than the last— so that by the time that spawn (only dazedly seen and vaguely registered) slips in and out of their rooms, Fenris feels nigh-mad from desire.
And the world swims . . .]
I—
[Oh, what a mess he is. Hair hanging damply in his unfocused eyes, his cock drooling as it bobs helplessly in the air. A soft nose bumps against his jaw and instinctively he nuzzles back against it, There's the faintest trace of a flush to his cheeks, the remnants of their wedding feast making itself known. Again the door opens, that same spawn coming in with a bundle of something white in his arms; drunkenly, Fenris thinks once more of ravaged brides and virginal first times. Of himself in torn skirts and stockings with runs in them, mewling as his body melts itself to the shape of Astarion's prick— his eyes rolling back, his mouth slack as he's fucked into his fourth, fifth, sixth orgasm of the night, a captive consort ridden hard and put back wet each and every night . . .]
I won't.
[Panted. Whined. His hips rocking forward desperately as he tries and fails to fuck himself, his skin gleaming with sweat and dripping with blood— and yet still some trace of defiance remains.]
I w-won't, I won't—
[Collar me, if you can. Fuck me. Tie me to the bed. Dress me as your bride— but I will not renounce my claim. That's what he wants to say. He wants to sound brave and defiant and unbreakable— but oh, two words are all he can bear. And in the end, he sounds more like a desperate thing than a defiant one.]
P-please, please, please, Astarion, please—
[Gods, it's been hours, please—]
[Desperate tears filling his eyes and tracking unheeded down his cheeks, his whole body shuddering as another pulsing wave of orgasm rises and falls— and Fenris in the middle, teeter-tottering frantically between his two selves, reeling and yet trying so hard even now to fight. Mouth dropping open before curling in a snarl, his teeth clicking in the open air as he snaps them.]
You will have to break me before you manage to ever come close to taming me— vishante kaffar mentula!
Edited 2023-07-13 04:39 (UTC)
Oh but I will....if that's what it takes. [So little space between them that his cold breath clings to bitter tear-tracks when he murmurs. Holding fast the way Astarion holds fast; no part of him willing not to cling in its own right.] We could spend days together. Months. Years.
I know I always said I reviled you, but seeing you like this....
It's starting to bring me around.
[Oh it's torture for Astarion, too.
He's exhausted. Tested. Tried. Thrilling at the game around the shape of his own grin still means battling to make it last, and the map of their vampiric traits endure both ways: if he can last, so can Fenris; if Fenris can push himself to hold firm, so can Astarion—
Quite literally.
But that doesn't make it easy. In fact, as is proven under the weight of their vicious back and forth, that just makes it a fight. A true one. The sort they've never faced before between them, and for once (for now, while his idle thoughts are too busy drowning to hiss into his ears), he's glad to realize their sire isn't coming. That as the harshest minutes tick on— that obedient spawn still in the doorway (a tall, willowy young thing with deepset eyes and dark hair, always glancing towards Fenris as he listens to his master's call), finishes the last of his work ferrying items— it's a different kind of excitement lancing through his chest to think they can finally begin to test their limits unimpeded, the way any true vampire would.
There are no windows in this room. He can't tell how long it's been since they've started, and he won't risk asking his own slave for an answer that might tip Fenris off as well (let him think it's an eternity. Let him assume that it's been just as long as it feels); Astarion will see to his guests later.]
Our wedding night has to take priority, my love. [Cruel. Mocking. Poured from a tongue that plays it like it's true (and maybe— through that strange bond of theirs— in some way it could be), though he grins like a shark with a bloodied muzzle and reaches high to pin his thumb to the very center of Fenris' oozing lip in that same breath, smearing it again in a mockery of their ceremony. Hades and his pomegranates. Red as love. Red as lust. Red as torment.
Passion always wears the same cloak, and no poet worth his salt forgets the ugliness that makes cannibalism the very same act as kissing. Fucking. Loving. Longing.
Fenris took him before a crowd.
Astarion waited for this.
With a blink, his hands are free, his captive; the vampire could wrench at himself to try and work himself to rapture in the seconds he's afforded— but Astarion's already stilled himself while flush: their hips jammed together till Fenris' cheeks swell against the lower edges of pale hips and perched thighs, forcing them higher into rises that he freely palms (like stroking a horse run well, its nostrils foaming as it bucks and bites and falters)— and what sort of miserable orgasm would that be? Crumbs licked from the floor instead of a waiting feast—
Astarion of all people would know: that only makes it worse.]
I've been too eager to satisfy you.
[A lie. Not a lie.]
Rattus— [He barks out roughly, pulling Fenris forwards into his arms while letting his cock slide free. The boy behind him running, though that was never his name. His title.] Slave.
Help me tie him to the bed. I want him dressed properly.
[And it's two against Fenris' one in that instant: even if they were evenly matched rivals— even if that harried wolf thrashes or screams or snarls fangs-first— his arms are shackled to high bedposts; his ankles clapped in looser chains ('so that we can still attend to him', his betrothed says offhandedly), exhaling only once the job is done.
And from there, they both prepare.
In their own ways, that is. Not to be mistaken for equal ceremony: Astarion almost immediately demands blood (brought some whelpling noble who shrieks to be devoured— sobbing, wailing till every outcry quietens in death or slack unconsciousness; Fenris can't see well enough to tell), and spends the better part of an hour afterwards dabbing spare blood across his wounds, watching them heal while he's brushed, perfumed, dressed in sweeping midnight black and crisp glints of ornate gold. You'd think he'd pin a thorny crown to his temple in the last few beats— and maybe he will, eventually, knowing his own temperament— but he settles for jewelry instead: a choker of barbed obsidian briars, no doubt meant to guard his most vulnerable asset from the reach of his lover's fangs. Never mind that it cuts his own skin when it digs. Never mind that spite will always hurt.
In that same hour, Fenris is dressed, too.
White lace. Sheer silk. Thinner than gossamer and as revealing as a favored concubine's regalia. They pierce his ears and drive gilt jewelry into them before they heal (those ordered spawn who can't well disobey), they tether his nipples with golden chain and leash it to a collar round his throat. They pull aside the very same sheer lingerie they'd fit him in with all its unsubtle symbolism to squeeze a plugging toy between his legs with aphrodisiatic oil— (they paint his lips, they wipe his tears to re-line his eyes and brush his bloodied mane, they smooth with salve to heal the worst of all his bites and scrapes)— while from his distant perch Astarion occasionally toys with the enchanted little rune that powers said device, forcing it to spring to life and stop, spring to life and stop; no reasoning beyond his mood, and always quick.
Until it isn't.
Until he's standing there at the foot of their grand bed admiring the beauty of his conquest: lean musculature rippling beneath sheer fabric whenever the poor thing flexes— smooth and supple and devourable when it isn't. Sunset skin and ember eyes, painted and flocked with gold and cream.
How stunning.
It reminds him of the desserts he used to dine on when he was still uniquely mortal. His favorite, in fact— brûlée dancing on his tongue as it melted beneath crisp sugar, complimented by the cold bite of flaked gold and just a kiss of blood-colored, muddled raspberry—
Red stain bright on Fenris' lips.]
My my....
[He exhales from a distance. Just a step or two away from the foot of their bed, and the perfumed span of Fenris' captive legs.]
Don't you look good enough to eat.
[And if Fenris dares to open his mouth—
The rune is pressed; a jagged, world-shaking buzz rattling through him from the base of his tight hole— left to build this time. Higher. And higher.
And off.]
Well don't be so dour, my darling. Open your legs for me.
Greet your husband properly.
I know I always said I reviled you, but seeing you like this....
It's starting to bring me around.
[Oh it's torture for Astarion, too.
He's exhausted. Tested. Tried. Thrilling at the game around the shape of his own grin still means battling to make it last, and the map of their vampiric traits endure both ways: if he can last, so can Fenris; if Fenris can push himself to hold firm, so can Astarion—
Quite literally.
But that doesn't make it easy. In fact, as is proven under the weight of their vicious back and forth, that just makes it a fight. A true one. The sort they've never faced before between them, and for once (for now, while his idle thoughts are too busy drowning to hiss into his ears), he's glad to realize their sire isn't coming. That as the harshest minutes tick on— that obedient spawn still in the doorway (a tall, willowy young thing with deepset eyes and dark hair, always glancing towards Fenris as he listens to his master's call), finishes the last of his work ferrying items— it's a different kind of excitement lancing through his chest to think they can finally begin to test their limits unimpeded, the way any true vampire would.
There are no windows in this room. He can't tell how long it's been since they've started, and he won't risk asking his own slave for an answer that might tip Fenris off as well (let him think it's an eternity. Let him assume that it's been just as long as it feels); Astarion will see to his guests later.]
Our wedding night has to take priority, my love. [Cruel. Mocking. Poured from a tongue that plays it like it's true (and maybe— through that strange bond of theirs— in some way it could be), though he grins like a shark with a bloodied muzzle and reaches high to pin his thumb to the very center of Fenris' oozing lip in that same breath, smearing it again in a mockery of their ceremony. Hades and his pomegranates. Red as love. Red as lust. Red as torment.
Passion always wears the same cloak, and no poet worth his salt forgets the ugliness that makes cannibalism the very same act as kissing. Fucking. Loving. Longing.
Fenris took him before a crowd.
Astarion waited for this.
With a blink, his hands are free, his captive; the vampire could wrench at himself to try and work himself to rapture in the seconds he's afforded— but Astarion's already stilled himself while flush: their hips jammed together till Fenris' cheeks swell against the lower edges of pale hips and perched thighs, forcing them higher into rises that he freely palms (like stroking a horse run well, its nostrils foaming as it bucks and bites and falters)— and what sort of miserable orgasm would that be? Crumbs licked from the floor instead of a waiting feast—
Astarion of all people would know: that only makes it worse.]
I've been too eager to satisfy you.
[A lie. Not a lie.]
Rattus— [He barks out roughly, pulling Fenris forwards into his arms while letting his cock slide free. The boy behind him running, though that was never his name. His title.] Slave.
Help me tie him to the bed. I want him dressed properly.
[And it's two against Fenris' one in that instant: even if they were evenly matched rivals— even if that harried wolf thrashes or screams or snarls fangs-first— his arms are shackled to high bedposts; his ankles clapped in looser chains ('so that we can still attend to him', his betrothed says offhandedly), exhaling only once the job is done.
And from there, they both prepare.
In their own ways, that is. Not to be mistaken for equal ceremony: Astarion almost immediately demands blood (brought some whelpling noble who shrieks to be devoured— sobbing, wailing till every outcry quietens in death or slack unconsciousness; Fenris can't see well enough to tell), and spends the better part of an hour afterwards dabbing spare blood across his wounds, watching them heal while he's brushed, perfumed, dressed in sweeping midnight black and crisp glints of ornate gold. You'd think he'd pin a thorny crown to his temple in the last few beats— and maybe he will, eventually, knowing his own temperament— but he settles for jewelry instead: a choker of barbed obsidian briars, no doubt meant to guard his most vulnerable asset from the reach of his lover's fangs. Never mind that it cuts his own skin when it digs. Never mind that spite will always hurt.
In that same hour, Fenris is dressed, too.
White lace. Sheer silk. Thinner than gossamer and as revealing as a favored concubine's regalia. They pierce his ears and drive gilt jewelry into them before they heal (those ordered spawn who can't well disobey), they tether his nipples with golden chain and leash it to a collar round his throat. They pull aside the very same sheer lingerie they'd fit him in with all its unsubtle symbolism to squeeze a plugging toy between his legs with aphrodisiatic oil— (they paint his lips, they wipe his tears to re-line his eyes and brush his bloodied mane, they smooth with salve to heal the worst of all his bites and scrapes)— while from his distant perch Astarion occasionally toys with the enchanted little rune that powers said device, forcing it to spring to life and stop, spring to life and stop; no reasoning beyond his mood, and always quick.
Until it isn't.
Until he's standing there at the foot of their grand bed admiring the beauty of his conquest: lean musculature rippling beneath sheer fabric whenever the poor thing flexes— smooth and supple and devourable when it isn't. Sunset skin and ember eyes, painted and flocked with gold and cream.
How stunning.
It reminds him of the desserts he used to dine on when he was still uniquely mortal. His favorite, in fact— brûlée dancing on his tongue as it melted beneath crisp sugar, complimented by the cold bite of flaked gold and just a kiss of blood-colored, muddled raspberry—
Red stain bright on Fenris' lips.]
My my....
[He exhales from a distance. Just a step or two away from the foot of their bed, and the perfumed span of Fenris' captive legs.]
Don't you look good enough to eat.
[And if Fenris dares to open his mouth—
The rune is pressed; a jagged, world-shaking buzz rattling through him from the base of his tight hole— left to build this time. Higher. And higher.
And off.]
Well don't be so dour, my darling. Open your legs for me.
Greet your husband properly.
[His chest heaves as he stares up at Astarion.
(He knows them, those spawn that tended to him. The one with dark eyes who tied him to the bed and clad him in silk stockings and white lace; the pretty red-head who stained his lips and lined his eyes with such care. There was no emotion on their faces, no glee nor grief as they worked to pierce his ears til they hung with gold rings— but they can't disobey, can they? And though they avoided his eyes, though they none of them could escape the call of their new master, it doesn't matter. They'll still remember this.
Good or bad. Humiliating or pitying. Poor thing or he got exactly what he's deserved, spoiled little pup— they'll remember, and worse yet, they'll tell the others. How can they not? It's such a striking picture, after all. Out with the old master and in with the new, and with it a whole host of changes that will affect them sooner or later, for this is just the start. One consort triumphing while the other buckles, and as he lies there, hips twitching with every merciless thrum of that swollen toy, he thinks of how the image will travel, searing itself into the coven's collective memory. Dark and light. Chained and free. A lord husband dressed in the finest of clothes, tended to until he looks every bit as powerful as he feels— and his captive bride, writhing and moaning as he's prepared for his master to devour.)
Lace presses tightly against his hips. His collar is snug against his throat, just tight enough that a mortal might whine for how they strain to breathe. Silk rustles as his knees brush against one another, chains clinking gently for how his fingers curl and uncurl. He'd been wiped clean before, sweat and precome vulgar intrusions on the fantasy of virginal brides— and yet still his neglected cock drools onto his belly, unheeded and yet still throbbing for that cruel punishment.
(And the line is this: he does not renounce his claim. He does not cede that which belongs to him, no matter how bad it gets. He is still Astarion's partner, despite it all; he still rules half of this coven, no matter how it seems right now. He is equal in law if not in deed, and that is important. He has to remember that's important. He has to hold on to that fact throughout the coming days and weeks and years, for it's so vitally important.
But any slave knows that bullheadedness will only end up hurting you in the long run. That defiance is a beautiful thing, and it must be kept burning internally, a flame that never goes out . . . but that to defy one's captors indiscriminately and without thought will never end well.
He could fight right now. He could refuse. And what would that get him?
And maybe he doesn't want to).
He spreads his legs, obedient little whore that he has become.
Slowly, jerkily: his feet slipping over cool sheets until the chain binding his ankles clinks in protest, straining at its limit. His panties inch up, pulling taut between his thighs as tanned cheeks peek out, azure dots of lyrium revealing themselves from behind sheer silk. And that toy— slickened with aphrodisiac oil so potent that even he, eternally undead, feels so hot as it burns through his veins and sinks into his skin— presses against him. Still, now, and yet Fenris swears he can feel it tremble in anticipation— or maybe that's just him. Maybe lust and loathing have tangled into one, and faced with an unwinnable scenario— oh, who wouldn't want to give in? After hours (or is it days, now?) of captivity, his body so spent from screaming that all it can do is whine and whimper and mewl, gods please, oh, is it any wonder he's lost the edge of his defiance?
Fuck me. Take me. Make me yours, but let me come, be sweet to me: his hair glossed and falling in his eyes, his scarlet lips parted as he tips his head to one side. His back arching so needily as his pinned cock strains at its lace prison, swollen and overheated, desperate to be tended to—
And yet his eyes burn with rage.
Come closer, and let me test the mettle of my jaw against that collar.]
Such a brave husband I have with that collar on you . . . why not chain my legs open and make it easy for yourself?
[And gods, he doesn't care what it earns him, so long as he can still speak to say it— for there's losing and losing, and though he's sure he'll howl and moan and beg soon enough, he has to try.
(And yet: he wants him. And yet: his nostrils flare as the scent of lilac washes over him; and yet his eyes are dark as pitch, darting up and down Astarion's form as his tight little hole throbs in memory of that thick cock sinking so deep into him. His mouth aches as his tongue longs to feel something heavy on it; those piercings fitted to his nipples pinch and tug each time he twists his head, and it's no mistake he does that again and again. Saliva pools in his mouth as his thighs tremble in anticipation, his fingers curling in wariness— and impatience.]
Or are you only pleased when you have some form of victory to hold over me?
[Oh, little pup barking just as loud as he can while he has breath still to do it— and yet that doesn't stop Astarion's shadow from falling over him as he comes closer still. His chest heaves, his eyes narrowed as he tries so hard not to squirm: come take me, please.]
(He knows them, those spawn that tended to him. The one with dark eyes who tied him to the bed and clad him in silk stockings and white lace; the pretty red-head who stained his lips and lined his eyes with such care. There was no emotion on their faces, no glee nor grief as they worked to pierce his ears til they hung with gold rings— but they can't disobey, can they? And though they avoided his eyes, though they none of them could escape the call of their new master, it doesn't matter. They'll still remember this.
Good or bad. Humiliating or pitying. Poor thing or he got exactly what he's deserved, spoiled little pup— they'll remember, and worse yet, they'll tell the others. How can they not? It's such a striking picture, after all. Out with the old master and in with the new, and with it a whole host of changes that will affect them sooner or later, for this is just the start. One consort triumphing while the other buckles, and as he lies there, hips twitching with every merciless thrum of that swollen toy, he thinks of how the image will travel, searing itself into the coven's collective memory. Dark and light. Chained and free. A lord husband dressed in the finest of clothes, tended to until he looks every bit as powerful as he feels— and his captive bride, writhing and moaning as he's prepared for his master to devour.)
Lace presses tightly against his hips. His collar is snug against his throat, just tight enough that a mortal might whine for how they strain to breathe. Silk rustles as his knees brush against one another, chains clinking gently for how his fingers curl and uncurl. He'd been wiped clean before, sweat and precome vulgar intrusions on the fantasy of virginal brides— and yet still his neglected cock drools onto his belly, unheeded and yet still throbbing for that cruel punishment.
(And the line is this: he does not renounce his claim. He does not cede that which belongs to him, no matter how bad it gets. He is still Astarion's partner, despite it all; he still rules half of this coven, no matter how it seems right now. He is equal in law if not in deed, and that is important. He has to remember that's important. He has to hold on to that fact throughout the coming days and weeks and years, for it's so vitally important.
But any slave knows that bullheadedness will only end up hurting you in the long run. That defiance is a beautiful thing, and it must be kept burning internally, a flame that never goes out . . . but that to defy one's captors indiscriminately and without thought will never end well.
He could fight right now. He could refuse. And what would that get him?
And maybe he doesn't want to).
He spreads his legs, obedient little whore that he has become.
Slowly, jerkily: his feet slipping over cool sheets until the chain binding his ankles clinks in protest, straining at its limit. His panties inch up, pulling taut between his thighs as tanned cheeks peek out, azure dots of lyrium revealing themselves from behind sheer silk. And that toy— slickened with aphrodisiac oil so potent that even he, eternally undead, feels so hot as it burns through his veins and sinks into his skin— presses against him. Still, now, and yet Fenris swears he can feel it tremble in anticipation— or maybe that's just him. Maybe lust and loathing have tangled into one, and faced with an unwinnable scenario— oh, who wouldn't want to give in? After hours (or is it days, now?) of captivity, his body so spent from screaming that all it can do is whine and whimper and mewl, gods please, oh, is it any wonder he's lost the edge of his defiance?
Fuck me. Take me. Make me yours, but let me come, be sweet to me: his hair glossed and falling in his eyes, his scarlet lips parted as he tips his head to one side. His back arching so needily as his pinned cock strains at its lace prison, swollen and overheated, desperate to be tended to—
And yet his eyes burn with rage.
Come closer, and let me test the mettle of my jaw against that collar.]
Such a brave husband I have with that collar on you . . . why not chain my legs open and make it easy for yourself?
[And gods, he doesn't care what it earns him, so long as he can still speak to say it— for there's losing and losing, and though he's sure he'll howl and moan and beg soon enough, he has to try.
(And yet: he wants him. And yet: his nostrils flare as the scent of lilac washes over him; and yet his eyes are dark as pitch, darting up and down Astarion's form as his tight little hole throbs in memory of that thick cock sinking so deep into him. His mouth aches as his tongue longs to feel something heavy on it; those piercings fitted to his nipples pinch and tug each time he twists his head, and it's no mistake he does that again and again. Saliva pools in his mouth as his thighs tremble in anticipation, his fingers curling in wariness— and impatience.]
Or are you only pleased when you have some form of victory to hold over me?
[Oh, little pup barking just as loud as he can while he has breath still to do it— and yet that doesn't stop Astarion's shadow from falling over him as he comes closer still. His chest heaves, his eyes narrowed as he tries so hard not to squirm: come take me, please.]
Edited 2023-07-15 22:34 (UTC)
Because you won't learn if I do everything for you.
[Pomegranate seeds. Sickles over bloody earth. Thorny collars. Wedding bands. Bitten lips. Proximity synonymous with covetous envy, or so every cautionary fable swears— and if their master dreams of anything, it isn't this (though his bookshelves were lined with warning signs; old fiction shoved beside penned accounts of fallen empires. The very same tomes Astarion had fit his claws to). Too little, too late now. They're past the point of no return, and a hungry beast with its jaws spread wide won't stop because of hindsight— and that's if there even is hindsight to speak of. As things are now, the only thing Astarion would see if he looked behind him, is every step that it's taken to get here.
Soothed by the sight of cream and lace. Gold and tender red. The same pretty mouth that used to snarl at him only whimpers while it barks. Maybe their maker should have said 'I brought him for you' when he'd first brought Fenris home, for there's nothing in Astarion that doesn't leap to see his twin all but stamped with his own name. Nothing in all his fantasies of ownership that quite compares to its own truth.
(He's beautiful.
And what a sin that is for a creature caught.)
But Astarion is placid on approach. His footsteps slow, halfhearted. Dressed in cruelty and dark silk, adorned in intent that looms more viciously than his shadowed silhouette, eclipsing those caught heels to settle in between them. Fingertips light as they stroke upwards over sheer white fabric gone a few shades darker for vulgarity alone— discovered dampness such a pretty sight.
Prettier when it stirs.
Stiffness straining towards the backs of his knuckles, begging where its master doesn't. Touch me. Take me. I need this. I want this. Please. Please— ]
I'll be kind.
[Cross his blackened, deceitful heart, he can be. And isn't that better than his claws?]
You don't have to surrender anything to me.
We're already wed, after all. [Leaning in shifts his weight against the lines of those raised thighs; pressure slow and steady (those panties tensing as the contours that they cling to shift— providing less room, less coverage, less comfort— ) while their contrasting outlines intermingle, bottled pressure caught tight in lightless planes.] Be sweet for me, and we can make our own truce. Christen our first night together. [Testing the waters with his finger first; letting it smooth over the centerline of Fenris' mouth before pressing its way in without request until it meets the very tip of all those waiting teeth. Toying at what it aims to take.
(Try again. Again. Again. Repetition is key.)]
Open for your husband. Tongue first— no fangs.
[For a while, that's fun enough. Tease at him while the toy plugged deep and tight shudders at his behest: too quick and there's a violent buzz between those shackled legs, too slow and there's a buzz; too sharp, too passive, too resentfully— all ending the same way. With Fenris' teeth chattering from the rune his lover keeps, always correcting him when he strays.] Get this right and you can have something nice and thick to suckle on instead. You must be starving by now, after all. [They vampires are such needy things.] Just think about how warm you'll feel with a full belly to sate you.
Your throat comfortably squeezed around my cock. Your mind blissfully blank, relieved just to take in more of my claim. [With a twist, Astarion's spare hand turns around the shape of that held stone— one leashing chain yanked to push a stocking-clad leg high across his shoulder, furthering the violating scrape of their pinned outlines. All of Fenris' lower body raised, providing one more glimpse of soaked lace and thin fabric pushed aside for the sight of his sore cock, its livid crown drooling down the slope of his lithe belly towards gold chain. Towards him. (His lips, his face, his collared throat— )
If Fenris is lucky, he might be able to grind— force scant lingerie and bare skin over thick brocade and dark leather— for some small amount of satisfaction against the measure of captivity, particularly in those moments when Astarion is briefly distracted; brought a glass of wine (no, blood) by waiting servants, the iron in the air makes sense— or to have some small piece of his appearance belatedly groomed mid-game.
Trying to take too much without Astarion's permission, though....
Well, the toy is there for a reason, isn't it?]
[Pomegranate seeds. Sickles over bloody earth. Thorny collars. Wedding bands. Bitten lips. Proximity synonymous with covetous envy, or so every cautionary fable swears— and if their master dreams of anything, it isn't this (though his bookshelves were lined with warning signs; old fiction shoved beside penned accounts of fallen empires. The very same tomes Astarion had fit his claws to). Too little, too late now. They're past the point of no return, and a hungry beast with its jaws spread wide won't stop because of hindsight— and that's if there even is hindsight to speak of. As things are now, the only thing Astarion would see if he looked behind him, is every step that it's taken to get here.
Soothed by the sight of cream and lace. Gold and tender red. The same pretty mouth that used to snarl at him only whimpers while it barks. Maybe their maker should have said 'I brought him for you' when he'd first brought Fenris home, for there's nothing in Astarion that doesn't leap to see his twin all but stamped with his own name. Nothing in all his fantasies of ownership that quite compares to its own truth.
(He's beautiful.
And what a sin that is for a creature caught.)
But Astarion is placid on approach. His footsteps slow, halfhearted. Dressed in cruelty and dark silk, adorned in intent that looms more viciously than his shadowed silhouette, eclipsing those caught heels to settle in between them. Fingertips light as they stroke upwards over sheer white fabric gone a few shades darker for vulgarity alone— discovered dampness such a pretty sight.
Prettier when it stirs.
Stiffness straining towards the backs of his knuckles, begging where its master doesn't. Touch me. Take me. I need this. I want this. Please. Please— ]
I'll be kind.
[Cross his blackened, deceitful heart, he can be. And isn't that better than his claws?]
You don't have to surrender anything to me.
We're already wed, after all. [Leaning in shifts his weight against the lines of those raised thighs; pressure slow and steady (those panties tensing as the contours that they cling to shift— providing less room, less coverage, less comfort— ) while their contrasting outlines intermingle, bottled pressure caught tight in lightless planes.] Be sweet for me, and we can make our own truce. Christen our first night together. [Testing the waters with his finger first; letting it smooth over the centerline of Fenris' mouth before pressing its way in without request until it meets the very tip of all those waiting teeth. Toying at what it aims to take.
(Try again. Again. Again. Repetition is key.)]
Open for your husband. Tongue first— no fangs.
[For a while, that's fun enough. Tease at him while the toy plugged deep and tight shudders at his behest: too quick and there's a violent buzz between those shackled legs, too slow and there's a buzz; too sharp, too passive, too resentfully— all ending the same way. With Fenris' teeth chattering from the rune his lover keeps, always correcting him when he strays.] Get this right and you can have something nice and thick to suckle on instead. You must be starving by now, after all. [They vampires are such needy things.] Just think about how warm you'll feel with a full belly to sate you.
Your throat comfortably squeezed around my cock. Your mind blissfully blank, relieved just to take in more of my claim. [With a twist, Astarion's spare hand turns around the shape of that held stone— one leashing chain yanked to push a stocking-clad leg high across his shoulder, furthering the violating scrape of their pinned outlines. All of Fenris' lower body raised, providing one more glimpse of soaked lace and thin fabric pushed aside for the sight of his sore cock, its livid crown drooling down the slope of his lithe belly towards gold chain. Towards him. (His lips, his face, his collared throat— )
If Fenris is lucky, he might be able to grind— force scant lingerie and bare skin over thick brocade and dark leather— for some small amount of satisfaction against the measure of captivity, particularly in those moments when Astarion is briefly distracted; brought a glass of wine (no, blood) by waiting servants, the iron in the air makes sense— or to have some small piece of his appearance belatedly groomed mid-game.
Trying to take too much without Astarion's permission, though....
Well, the toy is there for a reason, isn't it?]
Edited 2023-07-17 01:01 (UTC)
[It's too much (it's not enough). It's too much (and it's nothing, it's nothing, minimal maddening malicious). An endless ebb and flow, a torturous rhythm that never, ever works in his favor—
The slow fucking of his mouth. The seductive lack of a single finger pressing down teasingly against his tongue, taunting him with what he's all but salivating for. Astarion's eyes black as pitch as he stares down at him, his tones dulcet as he plays at teacher: wrap your lips around me, little one. Harder, faster— no, not like that, and it's nothing like he craves. It's the faintest pressure, the most meager drag as it slides slickly past swollen lips, and when his impatience (his rage, his grief, his lust) rises—
Buzz, and Fenris thrashes wildly, his eyes rolling back as frantic moans vibrate in his throat— please I can't please, for that toy is nestled so firmly above that bundle of nerves. Viciously thick, menacingly powerful— he can't think, he can't breathe when it's on, it's like lightning sparking through his veins. Too hot, too powerful, too much I can't too much please, his back arching and his hips wriggling in a futile attempt to escape&dmash;
It ceases.
And then it all begins again.
Over and over and over, and he knows what Astarion is doing. He knows that he is being trained, a nubile little consort educated on how best to please his master— but knowing it doesn't help anything. Fighting doesn't either— how long Astarion had kept him screaming the one time he'd dared to nick his finger with a stray fang? Hours, surely, or at least that's how it felt. Hours upon hours of merciless vibration twitching between his thighs, thrumming and pulsing against his prostate, his cock drooling in whimpering need as it strained against his panties, his orgasm rising, rising, rising—
Only to be cruelly smothered each and every time.
He doesn't know how many times they play like that. All he knows is that suddenly the scent of blood cuts through the sex and sweat, and he realizes that Astarion is drinking. The dark-eyed spawn is near, and oh, Fenris should feel some measure of humiliation for having a witness, but he doesn't care. Not anymore. His thigh tenses where his leg is hoisted over Astaron's shoulder; the other dangles uselessly, leather biting into soft skin as it strains against its cuff.
And Fenris grinds.
Desperately at first: a stop-start rut meant only to work his cock against stiffened leather, gasping softly each time a spark of pleasure travels lazily down his spine. But he can feel Astarion's own cock thick and stiff against the curve of his ass, straining against black leather— and it's easy, then, to adjust. To make sure that every slow grind ruts against that straining length, soft cheeks rocking against him again and again. Rhythmic, eager— and so clearly not trying to take, but give. Every slow push of his hips surely must be bliss to Astarion, a balm to those howling instincts that demand that he take.
Enjoy it. Enjoy what your consort gives you. Enjoy what his body so clearly can't help but offer up in needy tribute . . .]
Do not pretend at kindness as though you have anything but a blackened heart. The lie does not suit you. You wish to take my mouth? Then take it and spare me your lying tongue, for you have never been kind to me—
[His leg jerks, thrashing— and it's an awkward angle, not his best work, but still Fenris manages to wrap one calf around Astarion's back, yanking him forward. Blood spills everywhere, crimson soaking into white lace and pattering on his skin; it matches the smear of red stain on his lips as he bares his fangs. Click, click, and his teeth echo in the air once, twice, straining to meet flesh—
A satisfied growl rumbling in his throat as his fangs scratch at pale flesh, and it doesn't matter if that collar scratches his face in return, for he tastes blood.]
Or are you too frightened of your captive to do anything but tease like a noble, too scared to dare go further?
The slow fucking of his mouth. The seductive lack of a single finger pressing down teasingly against his tongue, taunting him with what he's all but salivating for. Astarion's eyes black as pitch as he stares down at him, his tones dulcet as he plays at teacher: wrap your lips around me, little one. Harder, faster— no, not like that, and it's nothing like he craves. It's the faintest pressure, the most meager drag as it slides slickly past swollen lips, and when his impatience (his rage, his grief, his lust) rises—
Buzz, and Fenris thrashes wildly, his eyes rolling back as frantic moans vibrate in his throat— please I can't please, for that toy is nestled so firmly above that bundle of nerves. Viciously thick, menacingly powerful— he can't think, he can't breathe when it's on, it's like lightning sparking through his veins. Too hot, too powerful, too much I can't too much please, his back arching and his hips wriggling in a futile attempt to escape&dmash;
It ceases.
And then it all begins again.
Over and over and over, and he knows what Astarion is doing. He knows that he is being trained, a nubile little consort educated on how best to please his master— but knowing it doesn't help anything. Fighting doesn't either— how long Astarion had kept him screaming the one time he'd dared to nick his finger with a stray fang? Hours, surely, or at least that's how it felt. Hours upon hours of merciless vibration twitching between his thighs, thrumming and pulsing against his prostate, his cock drooling in whimpering need as it strained against his panties, his orgasm rising, rising, rising—
Only to be cruelly smothered each and every time.
He doesn't know how many times they play like that. All he knows is that suddenly the scent of blood cuts through the sex and sweat, and he realizes that Astarion is drinking. The dark-eyed spawn is near, and oh, Fenris should feel some measure of humiliation for having a witness, but he doesn't care. Not anymore. His thigh tenses where his leg is hoisted over Astaron's shoulder; the other dangles uselessly, leather biting into soft skin as it strains against its cuff.
And Fenris grinds.
Desperately at first: a stop-start rut meant only to work his cock against stiffened leather, gasping softly each time a spark of pleasure travels lazily down his spine. But he can feel Astarion's own cock thick and stiff against the curve of his ass, straining against black leather— and it's easy, then, to adjust. To make sure that every slow grind ruts against that straining length, soft cheeks rocking against him again and again. Rhythmic, eager— and so clearly not trying to take, but give. Every slow push of his hips surely must be bliss to Astarion, a balm to those howling instincts that demand that he take.
Enjoy it. Enjoy what your consort gives you. Enjoy what his body so clearly can't help but offer up in needy tribute . . .]
Do not pretend at kindness as though you have anything but a blackened heart. The lie does not suit you. You wish to take my mouth? Then take it and spare me your lying tongue, for you have never been kind to me—
[His leg jerks, thrashing— and it's an awkward angle, not his best work, but still Fenris manages to wrap one calf around Astarion's back, yanking him forward. Blood spills everywhere, crimson soaking into white lace and pattering on his skin; it matches the smear of red stain on his lips as he bares his fangs. Click, click, and his teeth echo in the air once, twice, straining to meet flesh—
A satisfied growl rumbling in his throat as his fangs scratch at pale flesh, and it doesn't matter if that collar scratches his face in return, for he tastes blood.]
Or are you too frightened of your captive to do anything but tease like a noble, too scared to dare go further?
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