Death Stalking Abroad - The Masquerade

[closeyourfist]

Dusk has barely arrived but the Upper City is alight with life and fervor. The glow of lanterns and candles, and the sparkle of dancing lights mingle with the shimmer of fine banners and hangings, all filling the square with color even as all but the natural light of the moon has begun to fade from the sky. All manner of coves and dark corners, alleyways, passages for the more adventurous and indulgent to sneak off and play in.

Tonight is about excess in a way only the especially wealthy could devise.

The guests, all dressed in opulent costumes and masks, each unique and many so intricate and many-layered as to completely obscure the identity of the wearers. Even those who might be easier to tell -- public figures and the like -- well unless they were conducting duties within the event themselves, the rule was that you don't TRULY know who they are until the unmasking. Workers from the lower city consider the yearly soiree a life-changer for one's business, positions here whether it is vending, serving, or performing, are highly coveted and sought-after, as well as sorely guarded. Falling out of favor one year meant being replaced the next.

At the start there is a murmur of excitement, discussions of the city's goings on of late, none so fervently and favorably mentioned as the unveiling of the first completed Steel Watchmen, designed by none other than tonight's Master of Ceremonies: Enver Gortash.

Truly an honor and a sign of one moving up in the world, celebrated here with greater zest owing to his more recent contributions to city security and a commendatory reputation among some of the elite -- rumors of why were known and kept track of with interest. However, there were still a few who only looked on the news with...polite acceptance. Blue bloods through and through, unsurprised at persisting whispers that a pretty face can get you far when you are useful.

Dressed in coppers and carnelians and a mask that obscures the top half of his face, he commands rapt attention as he declares the evening's festivities open, to thunderous applause. The rise in voices and the din of music overtakes the space as he descends to mingle.

Tonight is about establishing a calm. Things going right at a point that will elevate them before the more grisly aspects of the plot are to begin. Establishing trust. Comradery. Ownership.

And the people of the upper city play this game with ruthless precision. No one better to parry, really.

By the time he has made himself visible and available, he is settled into the evening, able to identify far more magisters and patriars by voice and body language than he is sure rules allow, but it allows him to know them, carve a place among them, and forget anything else he had been considering for the time being.

When he and the Dark Urge had more than just a meeting of the minds a couple weeks ago, he resolved that it need not have been more than that. It was deeply satisfying, sated a number of curiosities, and even if it said nothing of how a life of eventual rule might contain a few lively diversions? It was also fine as just a memory that would warm him on occasion.

He didn't expect the subject to suddenly come up again, or to leave it as angry as he was. Even if it concluded that it, apparently, WOULD be happening again.

Probably not for the better when it wound up not occurring at all. And Enver Gortash was not the sort to simply wait in the wings and pine.

Especially when the Dark Urge all but alluded he might as easily seek out the same ends with anyone else.

So perhaps the Black Hand's Chosen might follow suit. Already he's caught a few curious gazes. A few charming introductions. Even the offer of a drink of two (too early yet, at first). But why not? Everyone was here to have fun, after all.

Comments

[unspooling]

Echoing the sentiment becomes something on the verge of uncontrollable, something that he skirts close to time and time again without actually ceding his control. This had been something of a risk when he'd settled on his plan to attend this evening's festivities, reasoning with himself that the whole point of it was to remain anonymous. He'd plan to leave well before the masks slid off and revealed rosy-cheeked partygoers, all too far off centre with alcohol and the rest to mind or notice.

Collaring Enver and removing him far enough from the crowd had been something he'd been prepared to bide his time with. An acceptance that while this is a risk, he doesn't leave it entirely to Enver to shoulder the responsibility of mitigating it.

And yet here they are, just out of sight and reach of the rest of the soiree and yet so totally wrapped up in each other that he struggles to hold back his own sound of enjoyment. The sudden soft heat of the man's guts squeezing the hard length of his cock is almost too much to keep a firm grasp of his control and the other man. But he succeeds, fingers tightening a fraction more and bound to leave marks long after just today.

Mere seconds trickle by as his hips strain to keep him deep, his pulse climbing as he exhales heavily and only when he can't bear to remain still any longer does he move again. Establishing a rhythm at the expense of feeling the tight heat grip at him is a worthy next step, one that he drives forward for the both of them, almost mindless of how close the other man is to being ground into the wall ahead of him.

[closeyourfist]

Whatever rumors like to fly regarding the rising star Military Advisor's path to power, especially in circles such as this, the situation that Enver is currently in is fairly new. Whatever dalliances he has been part of over the years have generally been in more intimately secluded places. The bedroom of an heiress or heir. Fairly innocuous in scope, secret, the sort of thing that did not lead to a lot of rumors flying, if not for his sake then for theirs. A stark contrast to the environment he grew up in, to be sure, and for a long time it was why he preferred it, if it was to be the sort of thing he engaged in at all.

Fitting that this be so different in so many ways. To come from a fairly equal meeting of the minds, where he found himself being pursued rather ardently, when before it was very much an advantage that he himself was chasing.

It is probably why for all his caution, for all his insistence at propriety versus overindulgence, this does not invite in his mind thoughts of anything threatening or beneath his notice. Not that in the moment there is much room for anything in the abstract as far as thinking goes.

There is only this bottomless well of desire meeting an equally brilliant flame and expediently climbing to that apex of pleasure with desperation and fervor. His free hand claws at the stone beneath his touch, the fingers of the other ready to close and tighten against the pain the hold on his hip could far too easily spring, but stroking encouragingly, presently against the backs of rough, tense knuckles. Each full slam inward threatening to rock his head back, pushing another choked moan from his lips.

He bites his lip. He'll be close soon.

[unspooling]

Had he the wherewithal to think outside of the sparks of pleasure with every thrust, he might laugh at how this started. The other man had been so irritated to see him, and it's not that he doesn't understand why. But he feels Enver's deep and complete surrender to the invasion, the way his body welcomes every slam of his hips. The sight of nails scratching down stone tell a story all of their own.

He allows himself to fall into the moment bodily, no such urge otherwise to distract him or competing with his arousal and desire to climax. But he isn't so lost that he's forgotten Enver's desire, his palm now dry of oil but distantly he's assuming the other man's cock is still slick.

He doesn't wait around to guess for long. His left hand releases Enver's hip, fingers snaking around the bare strip of his waist before wrapping around the evidence of his desire. There's no need for him to stroke, the force of his hips slamming against Enver's behind and forcing his hips forward into his grip.

It seems as though he's getting closer too, and whether that's because he can feel the other man's desire against his palm now remains to be seen. His hips continue their incessant back and forth, breath still hot in Enver's hair as he wrestles them both towards their conclusion.

[closeyourfist]

It's hard not to just fully lie back into him, but the position they are doing this from requires some degree of separation to keep those thrusts deep and impactful, and Enver's hips roll into them, with greater relish when the Dark Urge's moves a hand, and he feels utterly engulfed from every direction by his warmth. His moans are the beginnings of words he cannot fully form.

Pleas. Praises. Vain warnings that he will arrive too soon. Meaning conveyed more by tone than language, which is gone from him.

His own hands are more firmly anchored where they are as he puts more into his efforts, determined not to let the pace falter because he was off balance. A fool's errand; he can feel it coming, the fluttering clench of his inner walls around his member. Demanding, releasing and demanding yet again with no controlled tempo as his own member begins to release.

For a moment he is still, his entire body drawing taut, and he falls silent.

[unspooling]

Eventually he drives himself towards his climax like waves dashed against a shoreline, bodily and without a single intervening moment to stop him. Had anybody deigned to join them in this particular moment, there would be nothing for it. A complete lack of ability to stop the flood of his seed into a masked Enver Gortash.

His breath is halting against the man's ear, mask slipping upwards only fractionally as he grunts into his dark tresses. Whatever tension he's kept residing in his body starts to loosen, though his large frame also leans forward until he's almost draped over the smaller man's back.

For a few moments he has nothing at all to say, the satisfaction of this newly discovered method of fucking - sans the maiming and murdering - sating him completely. A quiet moment of purity amidst the unholy noise of his blood.

But eventually sound starts to filter back into his awareness, the titter of those soft, wretched patriar and their infantile jibbering to suck at the teat of something alcoholic. The thought that he'll be glad to bring his blade to their innards comes unbidden, but it's far more fleeting than usual.

Without a sound he releases Enver's cock from his grasp, pulling his own from the confines of his flooded guts. Seemingly in the same move he's plucking at the sides of the man's trousers, pulling them up until he's decent no matter the mess likely gathering on the inside of that fabric. Only once that's done does he drag up his own, his still semi-hard but wilting cock an impressive outline in his own trousers despite his release.

Finally he turns the man, both hands taking a position at his shoulders and revolving until he's got his attention, icy eyes seeking out umber irises even in the low light of this pocket of semi-privacy.

"Hospitable as ever. Though I believe it's time I take my leave" he says, quiet but not quiet enough that the hoarseness isn't apparent. A signal to the other man that while this had been a risk showing up at all, he's not foolish enough to remain now that he's got what he wanted.

[closeyourfist]

The haze of exhausted afterglow is finally pierced when the Dark Urge withdraws from him. There is something akin to a sound of objection mixed with relief -- he doesn't think more than one round in this position is feasible. And then he's being put back together, and comfort courses through his joints as he is finally able to fall into a more relaxed stance (and good luck that he did not simply collapse altogether). It's an odd sensation, to feel himself gently tucked away, his clothing pulled back on him and some decency restored.

At last he's turned away from the wall and steadied (he would definitely have lost his footing otherwise), and the bhaalspawn's eyes pierce through the dim light of the corridor.

He lets out a sigh less tremulous than before. "Only too happy to."

But he doesn't step away, instead taking a moment to straighten the Dark Urge's robes, smooth away wrinkles, reach up and adjust his mask so that it sits perfectly straight on his face. A handkerchief dots away a spot of sweat at his brow, and then with the backs of his knuckles brushing his chin, he presses forward, not too insistently, coming up again on his toes.

The kiss is a chaste goodbye rather than an insistence that he stay.

"Should you require further...attending to later. I will be back in my office in a few hours."

[unspooling]

It all happens in quick succession, and in a way that he's wholly unused to. It isn't the first time he's had somebody fixing his clothes but there's far less deeply religious undertones. A cult member serving him on the back of a kill is a long way from what this seems to be. It's not business-like and yet it's also not subservient. He doesn't recognise it for what it might resemble more because he doesn't have any experience of a connection anything like this.

In the end it's the kiss that strikes him as the most strange, his expression half concealed in the darkness. But he looks confused, as though he's not entirely sure what is happening, but not disliking it either.

His lips tingle even as he reaches up, fingertips brushing over them. He looks like somebody who has just had their first kiss, and perhaps this is his first kiss that hasn't been driven by a carnal desire of some kind.

"Until then," he eventually says, corners of his lips ticking up briefly before he's turning and walking away.

Should his exit from the grand hall be monitored at all, it's clear he sweeps out without paying a single pawing patriar a shred of attention. The ripples of gossip after that only last for as long as the well-to-do can be bothered to be offended by such a slight. But soon enough their attention has shifted to something else.

Hours later, when he invariably comes looking, he finds Enver's office empty, though small signs that the man has at least been here are dotted around. When the man himself returns it'll be to the sight of a half-drow fully reclined across the table he likes to use as a desk. Bhaal's Chosen, in an entirely different set of clothes, occupies himself with a blade he's been throwing up and down in the air over himself. Nothing like a pointy game of don't drop to keep him entertained while he waits.

[closeyourfist]

Enver's bath is attached to the chamber but mostly cut off. He drew some water almost as soon as he came in, not yet ready to sleep but in no mind to see to any business while there was so much of the evening to wash off of himself. Masks came off at midnight, with some surprises and delights as the energy wound down. But from there, the evening's business had closed and it was not long before he had been able to make his own exit, leaving the rest for the planners and workers to wind down, with some tasks for cleanup left for the following morning.

He emerges now, clad in a silken bathrobe of black and gold, and little else. Hair slightly damp and drying against his scalp, feathers of it once freed from the weight of water already beginning to take shape. He had tendered an invitation, but there was no expectation that it would be answered, given the late hour and the fact that there had been no set time for these kinds of encounters yet.

He stops short, the candleabra he has in hand casting a soft orange glow across the shadows, curves and lines of an only partially-concealed body. There are a few other sources in the room, candles, torches, the fireplace, enough that if he had intended to read until he tired enough to sleep at last, it would have been achievable.

It was enough to see that he was not alone, and while there was the immediate impulse to lecture about being careful with his papers, or to launch right into why that little detour at the party had been a dangerous gamble? The beginnings of a fond smile begin to form, as well as a greater awareness of how little stood between his skin and the cool night air.

"Having fun, are we?"

[unspooling]

"It's been a fun evening," comes the reply from the low light, the light of the fire catching in the blade every time he throws it up and it takes a tumble back down. He throws a few more just for the fun of challenging himself to remaining sharper than his blade, and then sits up. Whatever order Enver had his papers in before, they're mostly still preserved close enough to their original configuration. But he does have to pull a sheaf from his back as he throws his legs over the side of the table and stands.

He's not unaware that it would be slightly inflammatory to the other man that he was stretched out across his business, but there's something he relishes about the fact that he can hear the smile in the other man's voice. A voice that he belatedly realises leaves him with a strange warmth in his chest.

"Did you enjoy your night, Enver?"

As though he isn't painfully aware that he knows Enver's enjoyment is likely still on the wall from earlier. Now he's grinning himself, his blade left neatly on the table and he only just avoids the urge to stab it into the wood with a violent thunk because he can. It's certainly not lost on him that the other man is wearing a robe and nothing else, something that's easy enough for him to see even in this low light. He doesn't need a lightsource to see very effectively in here thanks to the half-drow his father made him resemble.

[closeyourfist]

Because Gortash is Gortash he is making a mental inventory of every written missive and map he sees and where they are meant to be. A task he can see to later. Much later. The ink is all dry, and nothing appears to be missing or damaged, so that is all that matters about that.

But he can imagine the Dark Urge smugly stretching out over his work as he's attending to business matters, languid as a cat while still demanding attention. Just a breath away from a kiss all while the man insists on finishing the last of his notes before any indulgence will be allowed.

Never liked that mental image, a different flavor from what was also likely: that once the half-drow decided he tired of waiting, they would both wind up on that tabletop anyhow.

And he would do that if he let him, damn the mess. The thought is dizzying on its own, and Gortash sets the candelabra on the mantle to give himself a little more balance.

"Yes, I believe I did. A moment or two worth the price of admission alone."

[unspooling]

Unlike his usual attire when he's visited the man in the past - and in contrast to his party outfit - he's wearing something casual, soft and comfortable. As much as he has to look the part when he's enacting worship to Bhaal, there's no need here and now. The dark coloured tunic and equally dark coloured trousers are simple cotton, pleasant enough to the touch to indicate quality.

He joins the smaller man at the fireplace, an elbow propped on the mantle as he fully embraces the heat from the fireplace warming him immediately. The orangey-glow plays across his features and catches in the metal of his piercings as he casts his gaze upon Enver, as though he hasn't seen him for some time.

It's impossible not to allow his eyes to drop further, the open neck of the robe the man is wearing certainly leaving enough on show for him to feel the stir of want again. A heat far surpassing that of the flames that crackle and dance to his side.

"I assume the additional, private invitation implies a continuation of the conversation we started earlier." Conversation very much engaged in using their bodies rather than their words. A mere starting point is what he's been contemplating for the past few hours, something that perhaps the other man could also assume has been something the bhaalspawn has been revisiting regularly in his mind.

[closeyourfist]

"It would have been rude of me to leave matters unfinished," Gortash answers smoothly. Because he had asked specifically about attending to him, yes. And of course he inwardly hoped he would take him up on it, even if there was no longer the same finery to unwrap from his body. (It felt nice to be free from it himself; he wasn't weighed down by nearly as many layers as some, but it all feels like a lot, even to him.)

Right now, this feels lighter. Comforting even.

The Dark Urge is radiant in the dim light, pinpricks of illunination caught by his piercings, his eyes, the glow illuminating his pale skin in all is perfections. Even though they are both standing near the fire, Enver feels suddenly chilled.

"I hope you're of a similar mind."

[unspooling]

Of similar mind and still deeply curious about more than just what Enver's version of 'attending' means. The kiss is even more memorable than the climax that had spilled over and that's something he's unused to. Big, intense sensations are what he usually takes away from experiences that get his pulse racing. And yet the tingle is still barely a moment's recollection away.

A hand reaches between them, fingers brushing over the knot of the tie keeping the robe together before stroking down the length of it. Eventually he takes a hold, but he doesn't yet choose to tug. His eyes lift back to Enver's face, drift around his features slowly before back to his eyes, question inbound. Yet he doesn't ask it with words, his brows pulling together in such a way to ask 'may I?'

[closeyourfist]

It is only when the Dark Urge reaches for the wash at his waist to untie it that it dawns on Gortash that he knows he's marked from earlier in the evening. He's always been easy to bruise, not that he is sure that could have been avoided either way. He felt them rising and dull through the night, even itching on occasion but by the time he had gotten out of his clothes and into the tub there they were: near-purple marks that perfectly matched the grasp of his lover in the throes of passion.

Not as egregious as the first time, where the Dark Urge had left deeper and larger marks in similar places.

But in the moment, he had to ask himself for several reasons whether it was safe to reveal that. Would it induce the bhaalspawn's bloodlust to override any other and seek deeper marks? The kind that leave scars? The kind that kill? Does it make him appear weaker, perhaps too frail to handle?

Are they ugly?

There's hesitation, and a blush forms in his cheeks as his eyes cast themselves toward the fire.

But the pause there pulls his eyes back to his companion's. That he was waiting. That he was asking, if wordlessly.

Enver takes a steadying breath, and finally a short, assenting nod.

[unspooling]

He watches as Enver's eyes move fluidly to the fire, catches the flames dance in the reflection before they're back on him. The hesitation is confusing, the lack of understanding at why the other man seems to need a moment to consider. As though there's a reason to not want the fabric slipped from his frame as a precursor to something that feels good. Chasing that has become his favourite want and, in a reality where he's governed by his need, it makes it all the more attractive.

Enver's pause gives him pause too, a moment where a pinch of that confusion tugs at his features and he waits a beat more as though unspooling extra rope to create some slack. A space in which Enver can decide if he really means that nod.

Without protest, he satisfies that thought to wait just a breath longer, eyes not leaving the other man's face as he starts to pull. The fabric starts to slide almost immediately, the folds of the robe getting looser as the tension evaporates. He's still watching Enver's expression as each side falls away, creating a strip of nakedness right down the middle.

"Is there something you wish to tell me?"

Finally a question, a query as to what the hesitation had been about. It prevents him from going much further as he dips his head as though trying to keep the man's eye contact if he thinks about letting it drop away again.

[closeyourfist]

At this juncture, it is not as though he has not been naked in front of this man. So it's strange that a few simple things can change the atmosphere so much as to leave him feeling a little rudderless. The moody darkness. The feeling of newness on your skin after a fresh bath. The brush of silk over bare, sensitive bands of flesh. The contrast of one of them being far more cloaked than the other.

Even the way the Dark Urge fills the full tract of his senses and won't let him avoid his gaze in a way that leaves him blinking more.

"No. Just...treading unfamiliar water, I suppose."

And that's more than once tonight that he's caught himself not thinking of important possible consequences until the moment it is really too late to do anything about it. That's a failing on his part that he can't afford to take lightly.

"You didn't remain long enough to have seen last time." And he only loses his eyes because he's using them for direction. A hand traces near one of his hips and the larger finger marks there.

[unspooling]

It's been many years since he's felt hesitation within himself, a curious affliction that the cult had rid him of a decade ago, more most likely. When he stays his hand it is never out of hesitation. Control is something entirely different, and a measure he exercises more often than not.

But hesitant is what he feels now, hurtling him back to a time far before the cult. Before they had found him and inducted him after what he did to his adoptive parents. He feels a different kind of heat in his blood at that memory, one that has nothing to do with the fire or his desire for the smaller man. He's yet to even put his gaze remotely near where the man is indicating, taking a moment to get that spiked urge under control again. Bhaal fuels his need and it feels uncomfortable in this particular moment with Enver, and that feels even more uncomfortable.

So when he eventually does drop his gaze, for a moment he looks almost expressionless. As though his entire head full of thoughts has ground to a halt before starting back up again. The bruises look so fresh against the pink of newly bathed skin, a curved row of marks each side that would have corresponded with his own hands. His murderous hands.

"I..." didn't think he gripped that hard, usually able to control how hard he's squeezing with the precision of a killer with an interest in strangulation when he feels like a change from the blade.

He's acutely aware that this entire situation would be comical against the backdrop of cultists regularly dishing out and taking injures far more permanent. And yet he can't help but feel a squirm of something that feels deeply unsettling, something unfamiliar and itching beneath his skin.

Guilt.

Unadulterated, unbridled guilt, like a boulder in his stomach.

It throws his entire sense of this moment on its side, knocked off balance and not sure how to right himself.

[closeyourfist]

I may have just ruined this.

But there is a symphony of emotions that swim across the Dark Urge's face that are at first hard to decipher because they simply do not belong there. There is the thought that perhaps he should have told him, but when this was up in the air and he did not expect for there to be a repeat performance -- well, that was a liability that did not need to be introduced.

But he thinks he understands. This man does his work with precision, and if he didn't know that for whatever reason Bane's Chosen had a body that did not respond normally to bruises and lacerations, then it looked like he had committed an error, in spite of his expertise.

That feels the most logical. It makes the most sense when considering the avatars chosen as their gods' mortal hands in the world, tyranny and murder, who did not shrink at the sight of blood, who did not turn away from the suffering they caused in other people. Who did not bare weak spots, or fail.

And yet.

A hand rests on the Dark Urge's cheek, guiding him to meet his gaze again. And now he was ducking his head to chase after it, to stay in his view. "You have committed no error," he says quietly. "This is me. I...saw no point in revealing it, when there was no certainty it would happen again." Even if he wished for it.

[unspooling]

This is me.

The words hang in the air for longer than the rest of the other man's sentence, still curled in his ear and turning down the volume on the rest of the explanation, even if he may not recall until later what came after. Three words so incredibly powerful that, for a moment, he just returns the gaze and still can't find the words.

What eventually seeps deeper than the words is the cool hand at his fire hot cheek, shocking him out of his reverie and snapping him back to the present. He blinks, gaze sharpening on Enver's face.

"Your skin marks easily."

It's the first thing that can work its way loose from his brain, the first thought of a few that suddenly rush to the front of his mind the moment he can make his mouth work again. The flash of guilt might have fallen into oblivion but he hasn't forgotten it existed to begin with.

With the heat of the fire still baking them from one side, he takes the initiative in scooping up the candelabra from the mantle again with one hand, taking the wrist of the hand at his face in the other. He doesn't need the light, but he knows the human does. His touch is light, proof perhaps to both of them that he can control his strength.

"Will you show me?"

[closeyourfist]

"Yes. Very."

So he has to be careful.

He cannot really describe how this feels, mainly because even if there are moments of uncertainty, that is what they have been: moments. Plans change, and he can come up with another. This has gone on longer than a moment. The Dark Urge takes his wrist and he follows. He allows himself to be uncertain. Because maybe they both are but they are doing what they were put together to do: figure it out.

So he comes with him away from the heat of the flame, robe still open, his body kissed by the rush of cooler air taking over.

The question stops him short. The reply comes out a little more halted and uncertain than he planned. "You want me to?"

[unspooling]

It's not difficult to understand where the halting hesitation comes from, especially given how familiar Enver is with bhaalist fascination with injury. A shortcut to arousal and excitement in a way that's very specific to the cult's incredibly gruesome manifesto.

And yet it isn't that driving his question, perhaps yet another black mark against his already dark title. The Dark Urge. He pushes aside the complications of trying to fit both Bhaal and his own curiosities in his head, never a problem before - not since the very early days, at least.

"I do."

So he leads the other man across to the small bedchamber made from a corner. The bed small as it was last time without a comment forthcoming this time. At least the lines of his frame don't suggest an excitement that would be something to feel concern over, whether Enver has learned enough yet to discern that.

Sitting on the bed, and parting his legs for the man to stand between them, he tilts his jaw up, eyes flicking up to Enver's face. He doesn't intend to remove that robe until the man signals that he'd like to.

[closeyourfist]

For the moment, Gortash is allowing this to be as uncertain as it is. He sees the Dark Urge is working his way to some manner of conclusion, and as much as he feels tempted to say something to stop this whole thing from coming apart. But he has no idea what that something would even be at this point. So he has to trust; he has no choice. This alliance is nothing if they will not allow each other to do their own work.

So he follows him back, pulling the robe closed while they are in motion and drawing further away from the fire, but not re-tying it. He made a mistake in not saying anything. Everything in this moment feels up in the air because of this, and the nudity, the change in atmosphere, the silence, all of it leaves him feeling small in a way that does not reassure him. This isn't just about these momentary, pleasurable distractions -- it could harm the plan. And then his one mistake harms him, harms them, but it slights even their gods, and that is a good deal of weight suddenly bearing down on him.

He's waiting for the Dark Urge to let go.

When he doesn't and even when he sits, and keeps him near enough to touch but still standing, there for him to clearly see, to be shown, Enver Gortash does not know what he expected, but he will pursue it.

Whatever happens next, he bought it.

He lets the robe fall away, and it pools like shimmering ink at his feet.

[unspooling]

The signal becomes clear when the robe slips off the man's frame as though water, rolling off his body to collect at his feet in a puddle. Eyes stay flicked up, though there's an urge tugging at the very fibres of his muscles, daring them forward until fingers meet bruised flesh. He swallows audibly, a strange response from a man whose very existence was made to maim and murder. Bruises are the very least of what he's left lovers with in previous times, and never the only thing.

It eventually occurs to him that this is quite the show of trust. The derobing at such a vulnerable moment. He's asked the man to show him his physical weakness and Enver is giving him that willingly. There hasn't been any strong-arming or pressure to induce a specific reaction, just a request and the return in simple terms that aren't simple at all.

In the end he releases the wrist his fingers are encircling, both hands reaching up and settling incredibly gently against the skin at his slender hips. He's careful not to go over where the bruises already are, but even as he looks he can see the bruises offset from where his fingers land in a mirrored pattern. This time he's holding Enver from the front, but earlier he had gripped him from behind and paid no mind to any damage he might be doing. Next time he'll remember.

"Does they bother you?" The bruises, he means. Whether that's in a physically aching sense or that it is his experience of a hard fuck either way, he's curious what impact this has on the other man and, more than that, his preferences.

[closeyourfist]

It's a mixture of things that lets calm back into his bones: Being let go a gentle reminder that the Dark Urge hadn't until just then, and only for his hands to go elsewhere. The gentle touch of his fingers on his hips, a familiar place even without the bruises there. A correct place. It sends warm waves of hopefulness through him, radiating from there alongside that dull, insistent ache of the marks themselves. Then the question.

It puts him on more even footing. It gives him a chance to assert more control on the situation. And it allows him to ignore any silly feelings of self-consciousness that had no place here. Not in his domain. Not between them.

"No." The answer is quiet, but firm. "It seemed better not to complicate matters at the time. You asked for pleasure without pain, it would have muddled things to talk of gray areas." With one hand he lets his fingers trace over the other man's. "I... enjoy how they feel in some places. Mementos. Reminders in the hours after."

But they heal. Sometimes faster if he applies a salve or takes a potion because work will not allow for time to wait.

[unspooling]

It's clear that he allows the thought to permeate beyond his own set of assumptions and experiences, especially when it comes to the idea of pain. His relationship with inflicting it is oftentimes rapid and physically violent, not stringing it out before his final assault on life itself. The expectation of pain as a default is difficult to shake, and part of the reason he had approached the other man asking for something else. Something new.

Despite his own preference for not playing with his prey, the violence he has wrought on others in service to Bhaal has always been nothing but foreplay to the final act. The true climax. And yet here he's presented with the idea of life after pain. Of pain to serve as a reminder of something that had been overwhelmingly pleasurable. That had celebrated life and living, where everybody had walked away with a heart still beating. There's a complicated squirming in his stomach, as though a sensation he's very familiar with has had its wings momentarily clipped, unable to take flight.

The hand beneath Enver's stays where it is, the softness spiking such a different type of experience he doesn't want to not explore it. But his other hand reaches up, thumb brushing over the scar decorating the other man's chin.

"And this? Is this a memento?"