Lord of Unkindness Ch. 16

 Notes: Happy Halloween, my darlins! Let's have something sugary sweet today :)

Title: Lord of Unkindness Ch. 16

***

Chapter Sixteen

 

He feels so alive.

Ciro wasn’t dead before, but he didn’t really feel like he was living either. Stress and pain, anger and power created a maelstrom in his body that left him with so few good things that the goodness he feels now is magnified a hundred times over. His skin tingles everywhere he can still feel it—not in his fingers, sadly, although his palms can detect the warmth and smoothness of Angelo’s skin and revel in it—and every breaths is tinged with the taste of the man in his lap. He’s heat and salt and the faint bitterness of cologne long gone stale, but his eagerness is sugar-sweet and the sounds he makes are like caramel, decadent and clinging. Ciro holds on tightly, maybe too tight as he devours the sounds Angelo makes, swallowing them with his body and mind. Somewhere to the right, he hears his magic caw with pleasure.

Angelo winds a hand into Ciro’s hair and holds him still as he plunders his mouth with his tongue, grinding down with his hips. He’s hard already while Ciro isn’t quite there yet; too much sleep deprivation, too little food. But hard or not, it feels incredible to have Angelo thrust against him, to have the evidence of his desire pressed against Ciro’s battered body.

It’s almost like their first time again—Angelo was so many firsts for Ciro. They’d gotten off in the back of Ciro’s car while they were out on “official business” away from the Hambly’s tower, and it had been the most subversive and delightful thing Ciro had ever done up to that point in his life. He’d thought it was the danger, at first, that made it so good—if they’d been caught it would have ended so badly for him.

Now he knows the truth. It’s not the danger, it’s not the sneaking around and the excitement and the potential terror of the reveal. The only terror he feels now is the thought of being pulled away from Angelo for any reason. He wants to stay, he’s desperate to stay, so desperate that he doesn’t realize who’s making the whimpering sounds filling the air until Angelo kisses him firmly and pulls back.

“I’m here,” he whispers, and Ciro’s on the verge of falling apart again because Angelo is here, he’s here and he saved Ciro, has saved him twice now, and he doesn’t feel like he deserves it but he knows that’s an argument he’ll never win. Ciro deliberately chooses lust over every other feeling storming inside of him, twists them until they’re lying down on the couch and he’s on top of Angelo, longer than him but lighter, light enough that he feels a bit like one of his own birds, hollow-boned and fragile.

Whatever Angelo sees in Ciro’s face, he ignores it for lust as well, and Ciro is so grateful he could cry. Angelo twines their legs together and pulls Ciro down hard before biting the tender skin just below his ear. “Do you remember how wet you used to get for me?” he asks. “So wet I wondered if you’d come already before I even got my hands on you the first time, remember? All I had to do was run my fingers over your dick and I could jerk you off.”

Ciro remembers. He’d been so embarrassed for Angelo to reach inside his pants and bring his hand out wet and glistening; he’d bitten his lip so hard it almost bled. Angelo had used one sticky fingertip to free his flesh from his teeth and kiss him before shoving his hand back into Ciro’s pants and stroking him in his strong, tight grip until Ciro came not a minute later. He’d never said anything mocking, just used Ciro’s spend to stroke himself, show Ciro how he liked it, then let him take over.

“I wanted you to fuck my mouth,” Ciro says, and Angelo’s hips jump. “The second I saw your cock. You were wrapping my hand around it but all I wanted to do was suck you inside and let you fuck my face until you came.”

“You weren’t ready for that…”

“No,” Ciro agrees, “but I would have let you do it. I probably would have cried a little when you hit the back of my throat, but I would have loved it too.”

“Astaga,” Angelo groans. “You were so fucking new. I didn’t want to break you.”

“And now I’m all used up,” Ciro says mockingly, in part to distract him from the orgasm racing toward him after nothing more than dry humping, and in part to get this out in the open. He hasn’t been celibate. He’s fucked around, and even though there was never anything formal between him and Angelo, he feels like he should have been better. Like he should have held himself apart for the other man, kept some part of himself sacred instead of fucking random men in alleys when he needed to scratch an itch. “I didn’t wait for you.”

“Why would you?” Angelo replies, pushing Ciro back a little so he can meet his eyes. “We didn’t make promises back then.”

“I don’t want you to think I’m something I’m not,” Ciro insists. “I’m—I’m not a good person. None of us Hamblys are, and now I’m not even a—”

He finds their positions switched before he can finish the sentence, air knocked out of him as his back pressed down into the soft surface of the couch and Angelo presses into him from above. His lover’s eyes are bright, his expression is fierce, and he has a halo of golden tendrils that make him look like an avenging angel.

“I don’t care what you were,” Angelo snaps, angry—but not at Ciro. “I’m not here with you now because of your family, or some imaginary version of you, or what I think I might get from you. I’m here because I can’t stop thinking about you, Ciro. I’ve never been able to stop. You’re always on my mind, and it wrecked me not to know what happened to you. And now you’re here, and you want me.”

“Yes,” Ciro agrees.

“And I want you back. That’s enough.” For now, Ciro hears very clearly in the body language between them. He knows Angelo will ask more of him, but the urgency of that is nothing compared to how much he wants to come. He nods frantically when Angelo rubs his hand over the front of his jeans, sighs with relief when he pulls down the zipper and draws Ciro’s wet, shining cock out from his briefs, then chokes on air when Angelo glides down his body and sucks his dick into his mouth.

“Oh god.” Ciro gets the sense that Angelo is laughing, but he can’t focus on that, not when everything feels so amazingly good. Angelo’s tongue pressed against the base of his tip, swirling around and delving into the slit, heat and wet and pressure and so much good that he can’t help but thrust, and Angelo just takes it, he always lets Ciro in, always lets him have so much and he doesn’t deserve it but he can’t stop and—

Coming is so intense, so pleasurable, so much. It washes over Ciro like Angelo’s golden light, blinding and warm and beautiful, and he knows he’s got to sound like he’s dying when in reality this is the most he’s felt alive for far too long. God, god, god, oh god—

“Just me,” Angelo murmurs against his mouth, and Ciro can taste himself there now, taste the evidence of their shared desire like a fucking drug, and when he realizes that Angelo is jerking himself off he wants to tell him not to, to let Ciro do it, but the truth is he’s about to pass out.

He settles for wrapping his legs around Angelo and pulling him in closer, letting him see the truth in his eyes and hear it in his voice when he says, “Fuck, I love you.”

Angelo bows, bends in two like a reed in a windstorm, a harsh moan scraping past his throat as he comes in a rush. His spend stains the cloth between them but Ciro hardly cares, he can’t care about anything except the sheer relief he feels from being honest, the pleasure still wracking him from coming, and the sure knowledge that he’s about to pass out from fatigue.

Yep. It’s time to pay the piper. The last thing he sees is the fuzzy outline of his bird settling on the arm of the couch just over his head as he finally loses the fight against exhaustion.

Hadrian's Colony: Chapter Eight, Part One

 Notes: Back to the main story! Let's have a revelation I know some of you saw coming ;)

Title: Hadrian's Colony: Chapter Eight, Part One

***

Chapter Eight, Part One

 

Against all odds, Kieron did make it to the creche before his targets did. Or at least, that was what his readout said; no heat signatures visible, and Kieron was positive they wouldn’t hesitate to fire on him if they got the chance to do so. It helped that, for all his height, Doubles was a pretty light guy. It took only five minutes to carry him to the building, and it the work of just a glance to figure out a way to make sure the pirates talked first and shot later when they got here.

Kieron, now better aware of the precarious situation with the floor, stood back in a defensible corner of the room adjacent to a door where he could retreat if needed. His hostage was a different story. Kieron used his length of survival rope to tie a knot around Doubles’ ankles, thread the rope over an exposed beam in the ceiling, and then with a few heaves and a bit of a balancing act with his own bodyweight on the other end of the rope that he finally settled by tying the free end to an old chair and sitting in it, he’d taken advantage of a rather nice pit trap.

Not a second too soon. He’d just sat back into the chair when a red light appeared in the center of his chest. Kieron couldn’t see the shooter, but they had a clear shot through the front door he and Elanus had used earlier. Their ship had to be close…

How far did Catie and Elanus get? Are they okay? Did they manage to land safely?

“I don’t recommend it,” Kieron said into the com in Doubles’ helmet, one hand on his pulse rifle and the other resting on the backpack in his lap. Blobby was in there, with just enough of him poking out the top to use his recording equipment. Kieron didn’t know if any of the footage would be useable, but it was better to have it and not need it, he assumed.

“Bold of you to think I care what you recommend.” That was the woman again, cool and controlled.

“You do if you want to save your guy here.”

“What makes you so sure that I do?”

Kieron smiled. “You already had the chance to kill me, and you didn’t take it. Someone on your crew values this guy’s life, even if you don’t.”

There was a pause on the other side of the com, probably for a discussion but maybe for a scuffle if he was lucky, and then she was back. “It doesn’t look like you’ve been taking good care of him. How do I know he’s still alive?”

Kieron resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “Use your thermal cameras to verify.”

“You could fake a heat signature.”

“With what?” he demanded. “My portable heating unit? Putting him into my gear? Do we look like the same size to you? Be serious.” His patience, sorely tested, wasn’t tried further as Doubles groaned audibly and began to blink his eyes. “If you want to deal, come deal with me face to face,” Kieron said. “Don’t try to send someone around the back, I’ve boobytrapped it.” He hadn’t, but they didn’t need to know that.

“Let my man go first, then we’ll talk.”

Kieron tisked. “Oh, you don’t want me to let him go right now, I think. He’d be in for quite a rough ride.” He glanced theatrically toward the hole in the floor. “I mean, I don’t think there’s a reptilian down there right now, but I can’t verify that. There was a few days ago.”

Doubles opened his eyes all the way. “B…boss?”

“He’s calling for you,” Kieron added. “You don’t want to disappoint him, do you?”

There was silence. After a few seconds, though, the red light on his chest vanished. That didn’t mean anything, of course—those lights were nothing but toys in this day and age, a way of intimidating an opponent into giving up when you didn’t want to immediately fire on them. That boded well for Elanus and Catie getting away clean, actually; pirates usually valued what they could take more than their crews. If she didn’t want to kill Kieron outright, her man be damned, then she wanted information from him.

“Boss?” the guy called more strongly, twisting a little as he got a handle on his situation. “What the fu…”

“Don’t move too much,” Kieron called over, getting the man’s attention. “I did my best on that knot, but you know how it is when you’re in a hurry.”

“What the fuck is this, man?” Doubles didn’t take his warning to heart and began to writhe madly on the end of the rope. “Who the fuck are you?”

“I’m the guy keeping you from falling into a hole in the ground,” Kieron said.

“A croc hole? Stars, you crazy bastard, are you trying to get me killed?”

“I would prefer not to,” he said with perfect honestly, “but the more you struggle, the harder it is for me to stay seated.”

Doubles finally seemed to understand his situation and stopped moving. He didn’t shut up, though. “Boss!” he screamed, staring from the hole to Kieron with a desperate look in his eyes. “Boss, Lis, Trapper—fuck, you gotta get me out of this! I can’t go into a croc hole! Boss! Lis!”

“Calm down, Doubles,” the woman said as she stepped into the room, and…huh. Kieron hadn’t realized she was so close. Points to her for stealth, although admittedly it was helped by the chameleon armor she was wearing, right down to the full facemask she wore. She had her gun down at her side, but Kieron was sure she could have it up and on him in under a second. “It’s going to be fine. We just need to have a conversation with this nice young gentleman here.”

Kieron smiled. “Sounds perfect. Why don’t we start with introductions?” He leaned forward slightly, and the change in the chair’s balance made the rope start to swing. Doubles let out a shriek that echoed in the hole beneath him. “I like to know who I’m dealing with.”

“You’re dealing with someone who won’t hesitate to make your life short and hellish if you kill her crewmember,” the woman said, but reached her empty hand behind her head to unclasp her helmet. She pulled it off, and—

Kieron froze. It was—no—but it had to be. She was different, obviously she was different, her short black hair threaded with gray and her right eye partially cybernetic, but Kieron knew that face. He saw it in his dreams. He saw those arching eyebrows, that chin, every day he bothered to look in a mirror.

My mother. Stars, it was his mother, his—

“Lina Carlisle. Captain Lina Carlisle,” she said.

That was someone else’s name, but this was his mother. Kieron was sure of it. Still…

“Zakari,” he said tightly. “Zakari Desfontaines.”

Lord of Unkindness: Chapter Fifteen

 Notes: Time for something nice, darn it!

Title: Lord of Unkindness: Chapter Fifteen

***

Chapter Fifteen

 

Is he still actually asleep? Did he fuck up his eyes somehow? Because this looks nothing like what Ciro expected when he walked into this ramshackle building. No narrow hallways or faded paint; this is an expansive room, the floor covered in soft cobalt-colored carpet that gives a little under his feet, the walls a soothing violet color, and every shaft of sunlight appears in a different shade thanks to the delicate, rainbow curtains that cover the windows and skylight. There are living plants on every surface, some of them blooming and perfuming the air with their scents. A massive couch takes up the center of the room while there’s a fountain in a corner, and the few rooms that branch off from this one have open doors and warm, inviting interiors. Music plays over speakers up by the ceiling, something comprised mostly of drums and cymbals. Ciro’s never heard anything quite like it before.

Ciro barely realizes he’s being maneuvered to the side until he hears the door shut behind him. Angelo, weighed down under the weight of half a dozen reusable shopping bags, sets them all down in the entryway with a sigh of relief. He glances at Ciro and grins at whatever the expression is on his face. “You like it?”

“What is it?” Ciro asks, feeling both deeply relaxed and discomfited by what he’s walked into. He knows magic when he sees it, and this place is so full of magic that he can’t even point at a specific object as its source. It almost feels like the building itself is magical, which—that shouldn’t be possible. Natural places can have natural magic, and homes can take it on if they’ve been lived in by a witch for long enough, but—“Is this your actual house?”

Angelo shakes his head. “Not mine,” he says.

“Whose, then?” Who would Angelo trust enough to bring them to? How can he expect Ciro to trust them? “We shouldn’t drag anyone else into my situation. It’s not safe for us to be here.”

Angelo puts a reassuring hand on Ciro’s arm. “No one else is being dragged into anything,” he promises. “This place belonged to my parents.”

The anxiety churning in Ciro’s stomach stills, but doesn’t vanish completely. He very clearly hears the past-tense being used there. “Are they dead?”

“Close enough,” Angelo says, which doesn’t clarify things at all. “Go sit down on the couch before you collapse, okay? I’ll make some tea and we can start figuring out how to get your magic to—”

Ciro jerks his arm away. “Tell me the truth about what’s going on here or I’m leaving.” He doesn’t want to give ultimatums, but this isn’t just a matter of his own life anymore; this is about keeping Angelo safe as well. He’s not going to take advantage of the man’s kindness. He can’t.

Angelo sighs. “Fine. But you have to be patient with me. I don’t talk to people about where I came from for a reason.”

What kind of reason? Angelo is a witch, isn’t he? A different kind of witch, for sure—he doesn’t keep his own familiar, for starters—but he has the sort of healing and nature powers that a lot of witches do. Despite himself, Ciro’s curiosity is piqued. “All right,” he agrees, and lets Angelo take his hand and—after the man reminds him to remove his shoes—tug him over to the couch. He accepts another bottle of water as he sits down, then looks expectantly at Angelo, who sits beside him close enough to touch if Ciro chooses to reach out.

He wants to. His fingers itch to, in fact; being out of danger and slightly better rested have given new life to Ciro’s baser urges, but he holds himself back. Facts first, distractions later.

Angelo sighs again and runs a hand through the longer top section of his hair. It’s not shining and clean anymore; everything about Angelo radiates exhaustion right now. A swell of guilt washes over Ciro, but he forces it back. He didn’t make Angelo help him, and he’ll let him sleep soon enough. But he has to know what’s going on first, for both their sakes.

“I suppose the most important thing for you to know is that I’m not entirely human.” Angelo meets Ciro’s eyes as he says it, voice bold but expression a bit nervous. Ciro knows why, too; consorting with either godly powers or magical creatures is the sort of thing that a hell of a lot of witches have heavy prejudices against. “God-whores and monster-fuckers” are a category of magic that can come with immense power, but that power generates fear as well as awe.

“Okay,” Ciro replies, and Angelo relaxes a bit. “Um, do you want to tell me what you are, exactly? You don’t have to, but—”

“No, no,” Angelo says lightly. “It’s time to rip off the band-aid. You of all people should know the truth about me.” Before Ciro can ask why, he says, “My parents were kinnara. Well, mostly kinnara.” He smiles. “And you have no idea what those are, do you?”

Ciro thinks hard. “Something to do with Buddhism?” he says at last.

“Good guess. They are connected to Buddhism in several countries, as well as Hinduism. Kinnaras manifest in many different ways depending on the culture, but they’re usually depicted in myths as half human, half animal. Almost all of them are associated with music, pleasure, and love.” Angelo smiles and gestures at himself. “As you can see, the reality is way different, at least for me.”

Ciro’s not so sure. He could definitely see how Angelo could be associated with pleasure and love, but… “Yeah, you’re missing the animal half.”

“True kinnara can transform themselves to appear entirely human,” Angelo replies. “Both my parents did for most of the time I was with them, but they also had avian characteristics.”

Ciro grins as the thought of it sinks in. “Are you saying you’re part bird?”

“No, dumbass.” Angelo knocks him gently with his knee, and the mood is so light for a moment that Ciro almost feels like he could float away. “It’s a manifestation, not a true physical reality. Compare it to your own magic. Are your ravens actually ravens?”

“No,” he says instantly. “They’re magic given physical form but not limited by that form.”

Angelo nods. “Exactly. Kinnaras are very similar to that. They’ve got celestial magic, or at least my parents did, and that magic manifests differently depending on their needs.”

“You talk like you’re not the same as them.”

“I’m not.” Angelo looks away for a moment. “Celestial magic doesn’t work the same way as witch magic does. It doesn’t follow the same direct heritability. A kinnara might have a fully celestial child, or they might have a child that’s almost entirely human. I wasn’t born with the musical abilities that my parents have, and without access to that celestial music, I’m much closer to a human than a full kinnara. My magic isn’t as strong as theirs, and their community doesn’t recognize me as a true member.”

Ciro frowns and scoots closer, taking Angelo’s hand and squeezing it. “That’s bullshit. You’re one of the most powerful people I’ve ever met. You’ve saved people on the brink of death, you’ve saved their magic, you—”

“I’m not saying I’m not powerful,” Angelo clarifies, but he clings to Ciro’s hand like a lifeline. It’s clear he’s not as casual about being rejected by his parents’ people as he wants to pretend. “I’ve got abilities that most kinnaras don’t, and I’ve still got some of their magic as well, enough to give me an edge in a lot of things. But I’m not one of them, and I’ve come to terms with that. So have my parents. They made this place for me before they ascended.”

“Ascended?”

“Became one with their celestial magic,” Angelo says. “It’s a whole thing, don’t worry about it. Anyway, they imbued this place with as much of their magic as they could so that I would always have a safe haven, somewhere to protect me and let me recharge when I needed to. Think of it like an extra-magical vacation home.”

And here he is, sharing it with Ciro. “Thank you for trusting me to be here with you,” he says, his throat a little tight.

Angelo looks at him for a long moment, like he’s weighing something in his mind, before finally shaking his head slightly. He reaches over and cups Ciro’s cheek with his free hand, then pulls him in close and presses their foreheads together. “There’s no one else I’d ever bring here,” he says, and the words ring with a sense of importance that Ciro doesn’t really understand but feels acutely. He can’t help but tilt his head and bring their lips together in a kiss.

A second later Angelo is straddling his lap and kissing him like he’s been dying without it, all the reserve he displayed in their earlier encounters gone. He kisses like a man with something to prove, and as golden tendrils of light blossom between them and wrap around Ciro like a loving embrace, he lets go of his fear and lets Angelo show him just how much he wants him.