sterngaze | open post

[ This time, Cardan doesn't protest the caress at his back -- rather, he will pause for half a breath to reach back and pull the bothersome shirt wholly off, dropping it carelessly into the grass. After, he presses close again, into the touch, loath to let go for longer than he absolutely must, longing to feel skin on skin. The little burst of pain left by Liem's teeth pulls a heated little sound from his throat; the rush of his own blood is deafening in his ears, frantic as his breathing.

He'll smile, then: a secretive, lazy thing, tucked against the line of Liem's jaw. ]

...I didn't.

[ It's true enough.

And it gives him time to breathe, for a second, having wrestled open his own troublesome trousers. Then he'll reach for himself. His cock -- hot, so much hotter than even the rest of him -- slides against Liem's, Cardan's long fingers wrapping around them both, his exhale shivery against Liem's skin. His's hips rock forward, shallowly -- and again, and again as he strokes them both off, and it feels wonderful, and strange, and triumphant all at once.

In the back of his mind, he realizes that he cannot remember the last time he's felt so overwrought from simple touch. ]

[Liem is reminded, as Cardan leans back briefly to rid himself of his shirt, that he has never actually seen Cardan unclothed before. The sight of him stripped to the waist, bare but for the glitter of jewellery against his skin, only makes him more curious, more eager to touch—and more frustrated that he's let himself wind up flat on his back without having removed so much as his jacket first. There are still too many layers between most of him and Cardan's skin, and it is too late to do much of anything about it.

It's too late because Cardan is already pressing close again, and because Liem can't imagine sitting up at this point so that he might shed some of his clothing. He doesn't want to imagine anything that isn't Cardan's weight on top of him, the long, lean line of his body hemming him flat against the grass. He just wants to slide one hand into that crown of dark hair and the other over that warm, slim back, and lean up to kiss the shell of one pointed ear.

So he does.

And when Cardan's cock slides fever-warm against his own, when those clever fingers begin to stroke them both, Liem clutches him close with another unsteady breath to press greedy kisses against the crook of his neck, the bared line of his shoulder.

He could bite him. He wants to bite him. But he also wants to hear Cardan say it first—or maybe again would be more correct. Either way, he's feeling just petty enough at the moment to not want to give him this specific thing, the reason for their fight in the first place, without him asking for it. So he kisses him, and he does tease, deliberately, with the light scrape of teeth—

But he doesn't bite.]

[ It's perfect.

For a moment, it's only perfect: the way their bodies fit together, the way Liem's mouth leaves pleasant goosebumps blooming on Cardan's skin, each uneven breath he coaxes out of his husband's lungs-- Cardan cannot think of anything he'd like more just then than the friction of their bodies and this quiet rhythm they're finding between them.

...then those teeth tease over his skin, again. He feels it, again, the shiver of want and fear; Liem might feel it too, in the way Cardan's cock pulses with it, in how his fingers tighten on them both... and then stutter to an abrupt halt. Even though Cardan aches for the sudden absence of touch, of movement, when his whole body feels like it's burning up with need.

Even then. ]

...Liem.

[ He sounds deceptively mild about it.

Cardan is going to lift his head, and then push himself up -- just enough for him to look at his husband's face. His own is flushed, and the little half-smile he wears is irritated -- as is the persistent twitch in his tail. A hand finds its way to Liem's face; Cardan's fingers brush over his mouth, his lips-- ]

I have asked from you only one thing: don't tease that which you will not do.

[ The fingers press, asking -- no, demanding -- admission to Liem's mouth. Demanding leave to press down on the soft pillow of his tongue, as if it were naught more than Cardan's plaything. It's as intentional as the thumb that whispers over the head of Liem's cock, with so little pressure it may as well have been a breath. ]

Surely you cannot have forgotten.

[Even though he is directly responsible, Liem still has to swallow a frustrated exhale when the spike in Cardan's pulse, the tightening of his grip, the jolt of hot, animal desire all culminate almost immediately in— Stillness. In Cardan's hand halting abruptly, in him pushing himself away from the touch of Liem's mouth to aim an annoyed look down at him. He can feel the tip of that tail twitching against his leg, an irritable flick that he barely notices compared to the affront of absence where heat and friction were just moments before.

He looks up at Cardan, rumpled and impatient and feeling a little thwarted, and he shivers slightly at the brush of warm fingers over his mouth.

When they push inside, he's too shocked to do more than flicker his eyelids, his irises thin, pale rings around pupils blown wide. No partner has ever dared to treat him thus, at least without express invitation. It's hypnotically attractive.

As Cardan presses down against his tongue, it doesn't occur to Liem to refute him—to tip his jaw enough to slice open skin, to let the scent of his immortal blood flavour the air. But he does let out a sharp, wanting little breath as humiliation shivers beneath his skin and pulses straight to his cock. He swallows, and tries his utmost to keep that shiver from turning into a squirm as that whisper of contact brushes over the tip.

There is nothing he can do to meaningfully respond to Cardan in this situation, so he assumes his input isn't important. Still, he gives the barest shake of his head, careful not to disturb the fingers in his mouth.]

[ He wouldn't have been surprised by anger or indignation -- had half-expected the bite of teeth at least now. It would have been fine; more bickering, more hunger, the hot pleasure of touch -- none of those require Liem to be happy with him.

But those blown-wide pupils and that careful movement of Liem's head tell a different story entirely, and Cardan would be lying if he hadn't suspected this, too. Still, it's-- a stronger reaction than he's expected. Cardan's fingers press down just a touch harder; his own lips part, the annoyance replaced by an intent, considering stare.

Something clicks into place, as silently and smoothly as if it'd always been there. ]

...you like this.

[ When I'm mean to you.

It's half accusation, half statement of fact. He doesn't need Liem's confirmation -- or rather, he already has it, plain as day in the cool moonlight. The smile will curl over his face again, slow and indulgent. Liem's mouth is softbeneath his touch, intoxicatingly pliant, except for the sharp edges where Cardan's fingers drape over teeth. But that's good too, because the whisper of danger has never made him want anyone less.

Although this isn't about the things Cardan wants, just for the moment. ]

Since your mouth is so restless, let me put it to use.

[ The hand between their bodies pulls away; Cardan's long fingers curve over Liem's hipbone, instead. It takes most of his self-control to do this, because it's not like he doesn't-- want to be touched, isn't hard and straining for it just as much as his partner.

Thankfully, his spite has always outlasted his more immediate desires. ]

Suck.

[ His voice all soft, considered menace. ]

And if you do a fine job, perhaps I will give you something you want.

[Part of Liem is indignant. Most of him is, actually. He's indignant at the temerity with which Cardan makes demands of him, at the way he doesn't hesitate to put his hands wherever he pleases, at the way he seems to delight in putting him off-balance. The indulgent smile that curves his lips in the light of his revelation makes heat prickle over Liem's face and frustration carve its customary home between his brows.

But the frustration is mostly for himself, because Cardan is right: he does like it. Having his dignity trampled a little bit; being bullied, teased and tormented. It's been driving him crazy for weeks, and it's driving him crazy now—enough so that he lets slip an aggrieved whimper when Cardan's hand pulls away from their erections entirely, leaving him bereft and aching.

In its own perverse way, he likes that too.

His gaze holds Cardan's for another moment before he takes a soft breath that he doesn't need, before his lashes dip and his parted lips close around his fingers. He is careful about it, attentive with his tongue and wary of his teeth—but the attention he's content to spare glancing back up at Cardan suggests that he's well used to taking this kind of care.

Even if his own fingers do rub absently at Cardan's skin as he does it, and even if his hips do move a little restlessly now and then beneath his hand.]

Edited 2022-12-03 00:53 (UTC)

[ It's difficult.

It's difficult because of the wet, pliant mouth that encloses his fingers; it's difficult because of the expression on Liem's face -- the embarrassment and the frustration; and it's difficult, too, because Cardan is so hard he could cry, and every minute movement of Liem's hips reminds him of the fact that he's the one who chose to deprive them both of contact, of delicious friction.

Most of all, it's difficult because Liem does as he's told, and despite his own display of shameless arrogance, Cardan hadn't actually fully expected him to. It's a heady amount of power, given freely to him by a man who doesn't have to give Cardan anything at all.

Cardan absolutely cannot let on how much it undoes him.

It takes every ounce of his self-control to keep the astonished arousal out of his face; his jaw is tight with it, and the hand on Liem's hip presses down, hard, intent on holding him still. He cannot do anything about his own flush, but he at least manages to keep his features in some semblance of princely arrogance.

But only just. The tail is restless, the tip tapping softly. As Cardan's impatience mounts, so does its twitchy rhythm, until-- ]

Enough.

[ He'll move to pull his fingers back, trying not to stare at Liem's mouth as he does. ]

Tell me what you want.

[ It is decidedly not a request. ]

[It's impossible to do as Cardan has asked — as he's demanded — and not burn with the impatient awareness of his eyes watching the entire time. Liem feels pinned and scrutinized like an insect on a display board, distractingly conscious of both Cardan's attention and of his own painfully keen arousal — which is a heady, frustrating combination. The unyielding pressure of the hand on his hip and the imperious gaze spearing him are only making him desperate for the touch Cardan has decided to withhold. Considering the fraught relationship he has with his husband, this desperation is humiliating to contend with.

Tragically, that does nothing at all to lessen his excitement.

His eyes have slid closed by the time Cardan tells him to stop — which, to Liem, feels like an eternity. He opens them to look accusingly up at him as those fingers finally slip from his mouth, and runs the tip of his tongue over his lips.]

Cardan.

[His hand finds its way once again around to the back of his neck: tenderly. Perhaps in defiance of a desire to scruff him like an aggravating cat.]

I want you to stroke us off, completely.

[Despite his best efforts, the bleeding edge of his desperation makes his answer sound more aggrieved than he'd intended.]

Please.

Ah.

[ It's all he can do to sound smug instead of just-as-desperate. A part of him wonders how long he could go on-- how much he could tease Liem and get away with it. He doesn't fail to notice that despite his irritation, his husband has not seen it fit to take matters into his own hands. Has, in fact, obeyed any of Cardan's commands bar one.

He's almost certain Liem wouldn't throttle him.

Still. The bigger, keenly aching, desperately horny part of Cardan cannot deny himself any longer. Cannot deny either of them. His fingers -- still slicked with saliva, an obscene little detail that drives a shiver through him -- close over them both once more, and the contact alone drives the air out of his lungs. This time he will not stop. This time he only arches into the touch at the back of his neck, his eyes on Liem's face, still every bit as feverishly intent. ]

...come, then. Come for me.

[ He doubts it's going to take either of them very long. Not at the merciless rhythm he's setting. Already Cardan feels jittery with it, with need and anticipation both, with the heat rising in his body-- ]

Let me see you.

[ And though he'd meant it to be another demand, it comes out softer than he intends. ]

[It doesn’t take very long at all.

It doesn’t take long for the slickened touch of Cardan’s fingers to throw Liem’s breathing into a disarray of shallow, sporadic pants; it doesn’t take long for his irritation to surrender to frantic, greedy want; it doesn’t take long for the relentless pumping of Cardan’s hand to shove him right to the edge of his climax, so suddenly after his denial that Liem’s head is left spinning.

His eyes keep wanting to flutter closed, but he keeps them open until the last moment, hungry for that implacable, intent look on Cardan’s face. He wants to see him, too — wants it desperately, despite the way his skin feels ready to ignite under the attention of his gaze.

Then that frantic pleasure overtakes him and he tips his head back into the grass, fingers trembling as they clutch harder at the back of Cardan’s neck, at his back, hips bucking hard into his hand as he does just as he’s asked; he comes between them with a low groan, unwilling and unable to wait any longer.]

[ If there's any reason that Cardan doesn't come immediately, it's because he's too distracted. It's Liem's face, it's the tension in that elegant body, the cadence of frantic breaths that he doesn't need except that he must, now, and it's because of Cardan, it's Cardan's hand that's coaxing those sounds and movements and frantic little touches out of him, and it's--

It's so arousing he might just forget to breathe, too.

In the end, it's the fingers on his back -- biting into sensitive, scarred skin -- that push him right up against the edge, right as slickness spills between them, wet on his fingers. He makes a noise that's somewhere between a groan and a whine, and presses forward, burying his face against Liem's cool neck. There is so little space between their bodies that those last few desperate strokes happen by sheer force of determination. He bites the juncture between Liem's neck and shoulder, if only to muffle the sound that threatens to rise out of his throat, and then he's shuddering through his own orgasm, Liem's taste still on his tongue.

It will take him a few seconds to calm his thundering heart. A moment to push himself up, though his muscles feel shaky. To look down at Liem in all of his sex-mussed glory and grin a satisfied feline grin, and then blink and glance up at the sky--

At which point Cardan will start to laugh. ]

[Somehow, even after Cardan's proven willingness to use them, Liem isn't expecting the bite of teeth gripping the crook of his neck. He meets the strangely bloodless experience with a gasp, and his arm slides further around Cardan's shoulders to clutch him closer, feeling the wild beat of his heart beneath the lean angles of his back; it's an oddly discordant combination.

Also strangely foreign is the sensation of a living, warm yet utterly non-human body lying on top of him as he lets his breaths subside and the shivers of tension gripping his body ease. He can still feel Cardan's heart bumping against his ribs and feel his breath warm against his neck. Strange as the experience is, it's actually… nice. It's very nice.

But not so nice that he won't let Cardan push back up to look down at him. That's nice in its own way: the flash of a grin on that lovely, wicked face, the interesting way the moonlight falls over his unclothed frame. Liem offers a small, pleased smile in return — a smile that skews a little wry when Cardan looks up and begins to laugh.

For a moment, he just lets him, regarding his sudden mirth with quiet bemusement. He murmurs, after a moment:]

That's not the reaction I usually get.

[ The dry commentary will set Cardan off a little more; he goes to cover his mouth, then realizes his hand is a mess, and lets his forehead drop to Liem's shoulder instead. It helps, actually: the cool, solid shape of him is oddly grounding. ]

You're going to be late again.

[ Even in this foreign sky, the slant of moonlight remains easy to read. ]

...I'm not apologizing this time.

[ Because it's Liem's fault, obviously, for taking them here, and for letting Cardan drape all over his lap, and for patiently teaching him about stars, and for being attractive and easy to bully, and--

Anyway, Cardan will take zero responsibility, is the point. But he does think of that little smile and decide that maybe things hadn't gone so poorly, after all. ]

[Liem doesn’t quite know what to do with the sudden reality of his husband trying to subdue a laughing fit atop him. It’s a strange follow-up to the frankly adversarial tone of their coupling — strange in that he doesn’t find anything to object to in the tremors he feels through Cardan’s back, or the weight of his head against his shoulder. He wasn’t expecting to be charmed by it.

He is right, though. Liem flicks his eyes skyward to regard the tapestry of moon and stars as he slides his hand, absently, up Cardan’s neck and into his hair. They’ve lingered here longer than he had originally been intending to stay.]

Mm.

[He aims a pensive hum at the moon, as though in disapproval for its hasty transit through the night sky. Awfully inconsiderate of it not to consider his schedule on its celestial journey. But he cannot find the energy to be more than just disappointed by this newest inconvenience.]

I should have foreseen this. It was optimistic of me to think I could fit a jaunt to the woods into just half a night.

[His fingers card idly through his husband’s hair as he considers the slow-wheeling stars. Even if they make good time back to the house, he’s going to need a bath and a change of clothes before he’s even remotely presentable, and that’s going to make him much, much later than he’d hoped for.

Perhaps the evening after a sleepless day had not been the best time for him to be making scheduling decisions.]

[ Cardan is a little surprised to find there isn't a sudden flurry of activity from Liem's end; for the entirety of their short marriage, he's known his husband to be dutiful to a fault, and dogged in his pursuit of said duty.

But it has been a strange night from the very beginning. It occurs to him, for the first time, that maybe he's been a more significant cause of Liem's tension than he realized. Is he... relaxed? It's hard to tell without breathing or heartbeat to go on, but the calm touch in his hair suggests as much. And besides, Cardan himself hasn't felt this content in a while. His eyes threaten to fall shut at the sensation of those fingers in his hair; selfishly, he wonders just how long he could convince Liem to stay here.

...well, they should probably not fall asleep, at any rate, given that the sun's merciless ascent is but some hours away. He sighs, and wonders if his husband has somehow managed to transmit some of his annoying sense of obligation to Cardan. Because. ]

If this was a jaunt in the woods, then you've set quite a standard.

[ He's going to... sit up, which is a truly heroic effort, considering it forces him to pull away from Liem's hands on him. He's carelessly wiped his hand clean on the grass, and being on top has let him avoid most of the mess between them, but he holds no illusions: they both still look well and thoroughly fucked out.

Which is fine, actually. He'll raise a black eyebrow at Liem, unruffled. ]

I'm going to develop expectations.

[Liem does intend to sit up and attempt to put himself back together. In a little while. It's just that he suddenly seems to be melding a little into this patch of hillside, and his husband's presence on top of him is — despite this not being a word he would ever think to associate with Cardan — comforting. He likes having him there, basking in the shed heat from his skin while he listens to the slowing murmur of his heart.

But they do need to get back, after all. When Cardan pulls away to finally sit up, Liem lets out a small sigh and resolves himself to smoothing ruffled feathers at some very, very late appointments.

He pushes himself onto his elbows, meeting Cardan's gaze levelly for a thoughtful moment. After that brief pause, he smiles.]

I think that may be the highest compliment you've yet paid me.

[Did Cardan even mean it as such? Perhaps not, but he'll take it regardless.

In any case, he needs to put himself back in order — though no amount of neatening will threaten him with anything close to presentability — and they have a flight back home to coax from Cardan's pet. Hopefully the lingering satisfaction from having gotten thoroughly laid will give him the patience to treat with Gusairne even on zero hours of sleep.]

[ All-in-all, the longest part of the way back is convincing the moth to do it. It's not a creature that excels in planning, nor in considering long-term rewards, and its relationship with Cardan hinges strongly on Cardan's ability to bribe it into compliance. Making it understand that he will give it alcohol after they get back is a trial and a half. He has all but resigned himself to the necessity of finding ragwort to magic into horses instead... which is, of course, when it finally deigns to stretch out its wings and allow them to mount its fuzzy back.

From there, it's the same dizzying ascent and descent through the skies.

Once they are on solid ground again, Cardan takes one look at Liem, frowns, and demands to take over the meetings instead. He's not so daft that he cannot handle some merchants, surely, and in his current state, Liem is liable to scare away any visitors. Besides, does Liem really wish to look upon Gusairne's unsightly visage in his current state?

Of course not.

Surely he would prefer to put himself to bed instead.

Cardan hasn't had much sleep, either. What he does have are endless reserves of spite for the house seneschal, and servants who will bring him coffee, and cream, and sugar, and he manages to harness enough of the above to get through the night. That morning, when he slips into bed, it's the second day in a row that he does not bother with clothing, though he's expecting marginally better results this time around.

Not that either of them have much energy left for fucking.

Still, Cardan will reach one long arm over the chasm that is their bed and curl warm fingers against Liem's side before he drifts off.

It's a promise, or maybe a warning: he doesn't intend to go without touch again. ]

[Liem expected the ride through the skies on their trip home to wake him back up — and it does, after a fashion. Listening to Cardan attempt to convince the moth to carry them back nearly makes him succumb to laughter — though he restrains himself for Cardan's sake — and the dizzying climb has a similarly nerve-tightening effect on him as it did on their flight to the woods to begin with. He's certainly not in any danger of dozing off before they land.

But his wakefulness doesn't stop his brain from feeling like it's full of bees, or his thoughts from struggling to form as though through syrup, and he suspects this is more obvious than he'd like. If it's apparent enough for Cardan to insist on taking over his obligations for the night, he'd rather not show his face to any of the people he's meant to be seeing. In any case, he's curious what kind of results his husband will get when left to his own devices.

So he retires to their rooms for a much-need bath and a change of clothes. (He sneaks a trip to his study, but he's there for less than an hour before his attention starts to wander badly enough that even he admits he'd better just go to bed.) By the time Cardan joins him, Liem is completely dead to the world.

Though he does rouse enough to turn toward the warmth of his fingers and cover Cardan's hand with his own.

The following nights vanish under a welter of activity. A distant cousin of Iago's arrives without warning to stay for the week, and keeping the Duchess both entertained and out of mischief is a full-time job. Even with Cardan's assistance, Liem feels almost as exhausted by the end of that week as he had the night before she arrived.

It does not make for a fruitful atmosphere for getting to know his husband any more intimately.

But life goes on, as it must. The Duchess does finally consent to depart, and Liem has the opportunity to catch up on some of the work he'd neglected during her stay. He also has the opportunity to attend a dinner hosted by a neighbouring count, and this time, his husband is welcome to accompany him.

Obviously, as at any good vampire dinner, the food on the table isn't considered to be the main course, but when the "entertainment" portion of the evening begins, he finds himself glad of the excuse to slip away with his decidedly non-blood-drinking spouse. A little after-dinner drink has never gone amiss, but he's far too married to enjoy even a private vein with anyone now, more's the pity. And privacy does not seem to be the popular consideration of the night.

Well, he knows this manor well enough to find his own. There's a parlour across the house that's too small to see any use at an event of this size, and at this point in the night, no one will miss them if they vanish to make use of it. He guides Cardan unfailingly there, fingers twined furtively with his warm ones, so they can make their own entertainment.]

[ Cardan would have been glad for most any excuse to leave once the blood feast starts. It’s not that he’s squeamish about public sex – nor most acts of public violence – but looking around to see nothing but blood-stained fangs and writhing mortal bodies makes him hyper-aware of the warm reserves of blood contained in his own body. He’s certain he’s delicious, but he rather prefers not to feel like a meal on a platter.

Attending these things with Liem is both better and worse. In this particular case, it’s decidedly worse, at least up until the point his husband takes Cardan’s hand and leads them out. Cardan follows, curious about the determined way Liem plunges them into the depths of the manor – only realizing his intent once the crowd thins out around them.

At that point he only grins and laces his fingers more tightly with Liem’s.

A week. A full week of nothing more than half a dozen hastily stolen kisses, lingering glances from across dining tables, and dull conversation about the Duchess’s favourite hunting dogs. Sometimes, Cardan wonders if he isn’t in a fairy tale – one where the handsome, wicked villain inevitably gets punished with a taste of his own villainy. But that hardly explains why Liem (also handsome, decidedly less wicked) is suffering also.

Regardless, Cardan is all too happy to remediate past wrongs. The parlour door hardly has time to shut behind them before Cardan presses his husband against it and proceeds to put his hands all over him, determined to sneak under his beautifully tailored suit as soon as possible. ]

I am, [ he promises – rather laconically, considering that he’s speaking in-between frantic kisses, ] going to ruin you.

[Admittedly, a full week of unintended celibacy right after he finally got a proper taste of his husband has made Liem more than a little distracted. He's wanted Cardan's hands on him again for the entirety of the Duchess's visit, when circumstances could not possibly have been less favourable; now that they have no demands on their time, he cannot think of anything that he wants more, and that has affected his priorities.

It means that as they leave the sounds of revelry behind them and the manor around them goes quiet, he is much more intent on navigating the halls than on paying attention to the servants they pass, and the glance he gives the parlour as they enter is equally cursory. He sees no one within; he hears no breathing but that of the man next to him. By the time the door has closed behind them, his thoughts have already turned to warm hands and that impatient mouth.]

Oh, good.

[He murmurs as he's pressed back against the dark wood, his fingers tangling in Cardan's collar, sliding over the hot skin of his neck and jaw as he chases those kisses, careless of petty concerns like breathing. A shiver of keen-edged desire lances straight down to his cock. Good; he wants Cardan to ruin him. He's full to the brim with frustrated need, and he wants to feel wrung dry.]

[ Cardan’s own initial examination of the parlour hit only on the one thing he cares about: its lack of other guests. And though he is loath to pull himself away from Liem’s hands, from his mouth, he also knows what he wants to do next. Typically Cardan doesn’t plot out his trysts – much – but the past few days have given him more than enough time to think about it. In lurid, excruciating detail; at dinner, at outings, while consolidating menu lists. Sometimes first thing in the evening, upon rolling over to find Liem’s side of the bed long abandoned in favour of his office.

So.

He is going to sink to his knees. His palms drag down Liem’s sides; Cardan will mouth at the fly of his trousers, warm breath ghosting over fine fabric, even as his hands pin Liem’s slim hips against the door. For a short moment Cardan relishes the feel of him, the scent of him, swallowing down his impatience long enough to tease both of them, still–

He doesn’t hear the silent movement of well-oiled hinges; his first indication that something is off is a slightly misplaced foot on a creaky floor board. Even then, he only scowls and twists to look over his shoulder, expecting to find a guest but spotting the drab colours of a servant’s uniform instead. Was there another door–?

That's the last thing he thinks before pain blooms in his shoulder, sudden and unexpected. He only barely registers it before she’s already moving, fast, and there is the glint of something in her hands–

And all he can really think, through the haze of shock-pain-lust, is that he really, truly doesn’t deserve this. ]

[Liem's eyes follow Cardan down, hungrily, as he sinks to his knees. How could they not? The smell of blood still lingers in his thoughts from the feast they left behind, and the warmth of his hands, his mouth through the barrier of fine clothes is tantalizing. He resists the urge to squirm against the hands pinning his hips to the door — for now. For now, he just—

Hears a small noise, here in the room with them. His gaze flicks up to find a human figure in servant's garb, and it's this incongruity — that any servant would appear so soundlessly, in a room where servants have no business currently being — that makes his heart clench even before her arm moves to send a blade spinning towards them.

Alarm snaps him away from the door with violent haste.

He circles Cardan in a few short steps, details flaring like lightning strikes through his awareness: the glint of blades in her hands, the un-servant-like economy of her movements, the sharp note in the air cutting through Cardan's usual scent. Somehow it takes him the space of another quick, stalking-cat step toward her to register that she must have been sent here specifically to kill them, and the understanding sends an unpleasant thrill through him.

His hands, poised and open between him and the assassin, flex very slightly.]

[ She smells like ash and blood.

Probably not her own, though there is something subtly wrong in how she moves – fast, unnatural, her bones too mobile beneath the skin. Liem's moving in front of Cardan gives her a half a breath's pause. She seems to evaluate whether he's worth the trouble – as with most assassins, she's far more content being an ambush killer. But he's unarmed, she's decidedly not, and her target is too close to ignore.

So she lunges, anyway. Her arms spread as she does... and then spread more, pulling the skin along her wrists and elbows open. It will shred like tissue paper when touched, revealing mottled, bone-white skin and feathers beneath. Once ripped, the whole thing deforms like a deflated water skin; her face sags at her jawline and then splits entirely, revealing her true features: a down-turned beak, amber owl eyes, and a mass of feathers and hair.

She is also still horrifyingly fast. The stick-thin limbs close in, her shining knives gripped in taloned hands -- one slash across the vampire's throat, and if he dodges that, surely he won't dodge the one thrust into his stomach. What help will his little outstretched hands be, then? Surely none.

And the bleeding princeling behind him will be even easier work. ]

[Even before she attacks, Liem knows the woman is Wrong for a human; her scent is too alien, her movements too strange. The details ping as important, but he has neither the time nor the capacity to puzzle out their meaning. Shortly enough, the answer is made clear to him regardless, though too suddenly for him to process before it’s too late. He’s already moving, human opponent or not.

Because Cardan is still behind him, bleeding — and whatever this woman is, Liem can’t end her life without getting closer.

When she pauses, Liem tenses in his half-crouch; in the next moment, he explodes toward her. His arm snaps up to absorb the momentum of her first swing, contacting flesh with impact that doesn’t just bruise, but — horribly — tears that outer layer entirely. Liem registers the sensation with shock, even as he continues his movement to hook his arm around hers in an attempt to lock her elbow against him.

He’s not just trying to get inside her reach — though as he registers the true length of her arms, the necessity of that does become clearer to him. His momentum carries him directly into her lunge: into her chest, slamming his entire weight up through his head and shoulder — attempting to break her poise and force her back as he tries to wedge his head under her jaw and into the crook of her skin-and-feather-covered neck.

And it carries him into the dagger she thrusts into his stomach, jarring a strangled hiss from his lungs. The blade slides in with the telltale sting of silver, and if nothing else thus far had managed to sink fear into his heart, that alone would have been enough. His free arm snatches at her wrist, intent on denying her the chance to do any worse damage, but his attention on it is still peripheral; fear and hunt-lust spike indistinguishably in his gut, and they’re both snarling for her blood.]

[ Somewhere in the background of this, Cardan has managed to get to his feet. The knife – split from its path by his unexpected turn – had only left a nasty gash. It hurts, and it's bleeding, but he's almost certain he's going to live. In theory, he could probably even help.

In practice, all he can do is stare, frozen, at the two monsters tangling with each other before his eyes.

She’s fey, obviously – just what kind is difficult to tell, but there are as many shapes of fairies as there are stones in a forest. Why she’s here, why now, why murder– those things get shuffled to the background, largely unimportant: ultimately, he knows why. Ultimately, this was always going to happen one day.

It’s Liem who catches him off balance: though he knows, should have known, what his husband is and was, he has neglected to fully engage with it until now. It has been easier to think of Liem as quietly restrained, long-suffering, obedient to Cardan’s many caprices.

“Swift, brutal predator” was hitherto not part of Cardan’s impression. He watches, with mounting horror, the slip of her knife into what must be Liem’s abdomen, smells the hot scent of new blood, hears her aborted, choking screech when he slams into her feathered chest, shattering bone. Liem is lucky; the proximity of teeth to her throat spooks her, aborting her attempt to pull the knife up in a gutting motion. Instead, there is a suggestion of flapping wings; she will claw at him with her feet – razor-sharp talons there, too, burst free of shredded human skin – desperately attempting to gain distance. She is not built for endurance, and she had not expected his speed; this is already going much worse than what she had planned. ]

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