For the 'New' Challenge.
Title: Favourite
Fandom: Renaissance art
Pairing: Leonardo/Salai, Leonardo/Melzi
Rating: PG 13
Note: All of it new; my first RPS (of a sort), first timed piece (about 90 minutes - sorry, I missed the bit saying the time limit was one hour) and first post to Contrelamontre. Feedback greatly appreciated.
Favourite
I wonder if he’ll give you a name. Maybe he’s already done so. You’re his sweet angel, perhaps; he won’t see much of the devil in you.
He’ll never have to teach you how to wear rich silks and velvet, nor to eat at table without disgusting the company. He won’t have to slap your hands away from his money nor scold you for breaking the glassware. You brought your pretty drawings with you and he exclaimed over them, delighted. The studio work is going to come easily to you. And if you need plenty of instruction in certain more private arts, I doubt that he’ll complain. The thought of it sickens me more than the stench of week-old fish.
There’ve been other boys, of course, since he first remarked that I’d become a man. None of them had your beauty, and he smiled at none of them the way he once smiled at me, groping blindly for his notebook and chalk, unwilling to tear his eyes away. I saw it on the day you walked in here, and knew I was right to hate you.
He imagined he was acquiring an innocent when he took me on, and it suited me to let him think it. Though I’d no education but what the street had given me, I wasn’t a fool. He always said I’d to be myself in his presence, and for the most part I took him at his word, but what man doesn’t want to believe that he’s your first?
As it turned out it wasn’t so far from the truth. Young as I was when I came to him, I knew all about men who sought pleasure with boys. Does that shock you, you with your sheltered, comfortable life? But I’d no idea what it meant to receive pleasure in return, and that I learned from him.
Lucky for me that I happened to be a far better pupil in bed than I ever was in the studio. I’d been with him a good few years before I had the chance to prove it. He wanted me from the start, I’d never a doubt of that, but he didn’t think me old enough to touch, and playing innocent I wasn’t about to tell him otherwise. In reality I’d have been happy enough had he approached me on that first night; it would have been a small price to pay. Food sufficient for five men at every meal, fancy clothes and a master as sparing with the birch as he was free with his silver: I couldn’t have dreamed of a better life.
I laughed at his peculiarities in the beginning, his cutting up stinking bodies in the dead of night, his standing for hours before a painting with the brush immobile in his hand, his endless notes and sketches and every answer the seed of a new question. No matter that much of his thought was beyond my understanding; he rejoiced in sharing it, and wherever we went together he talked to me, not as a man to a boy, but as a scholar talks to an equal. I wasn’t so ignorant as to be unmoved by it. He’s always delighted in calling me a scoundrel and I wouldn’t disappoint him, but the truth is I loved him long before he took me in his arms and brought me enlightenment of a rather different kind.
And now it’s your turn to make that heady discovery for yourself, that our master in love is just as he is in life, a restless genius. Every act for him is a quest of learning, and in striving for knowledge of you he’ll all but forget himself. He’ll seek out the truest notes and craft them into the most exquisite of melodies, and he won’t ever be satisfied that he’s yet achieved his best. I don’t doubt that you’ll find yourself overwhelmed by his zeal. The bedchamber is one place where he never left a work unfinished.
I’ll be watching you as you strut around the studio with all the shining novelty of youth, and waiting for you to put the first foot wrong. Once I’m certain that I’ll win, I’ll force him to choose between us, and see you sent back to your privileged family in disgrace. And in the meantime, just in case he hasn’t yet given you a name, let me provide some, you cuckoo in the nest, you sweet-faced thief, you upstart.
Fandom: Renaissance art
Pairing: Leonardo/Salai, Leonardo/Melzi
Rating: PG 13
Note: All of it new; my first RPS (of a sort), first timed piece (about 90 minutes - sorry, I missed the bit saying the time limit was one hour) and first post to Contrelamontre. Feedback greatly appreciated.
Favourite
I wonder if he’ll give you a name. Maybe he’s already done so. You’re his sweet angel, perhaps; he won’t see much of the devil in you.
He’ll never have to teach you how to wear rich silks and velvet, nor to eat at table without disgusting the company. He won’t have to slap your hands away from his money nor scold you for breaking the glassware. You brought your pretty drawings with you and he exclaimed over them, delighted. The studio work is going to come easily to you. And if you need plenty of instruction in certain more private arts, I doubt that he’ll complain. The thought of it sickens me more than the stench of week-old fish.
There’ve been other boys, of course, since he first remarked that I’d become a man. None of them had your beauty, and he smiled at none of them the way he once smiled at me, groping blindly for his notebook and chalk, unwilling to tear his eyes away. I saw it on the day you walked in here, and knew I was right to hate you.
He imagined he was acquiring an innocent when he took me on, and it suited me to let him think it. Though I’d no education but what the street had given me, I wasn’t a fool. He always said I’d to be myself in his presence, and for the most part I took him at his word, but what man doesn’t want to believe that he’s your first?
As it turned out it wasn’t so far from the truth. Young as I was when I came to him, I knew all about men who sought pleasure with boys. Does that shock you, you with your sheltered, comfortable life? But I’d no idea what it meant to receive pleasure in return, and that I learned from him.
Lucky for me that I happened to be a far better pupil in bed than I ever was in the studio. I’d been with him a good few years before I had the chance to prove it. He wanted me from the start, I’d never a doubt of that, but he didn’t think me old enough to touch, and playing innocent I wasn’t about to tell him otherwise. In reality I’d have been happy enough had he approached me on that first night; it would have been a small price to pay. Food sufficient for five men at every meal, fancy clothes and a master as sparing with the birch as he was free with his silver: I couldn’t have dreamed of a better life.
I laughed at his peculiarities in the beginning, his cutting up stinking bodies in the dead of night, his standing for hours before a painting with the brush immobile in his hand, his endless notes and sketches and every answer the seed of a new question. No matter that much of his thought was beyond my understanding; he rejoiced in sharing it, and wherever we went together he talked to me, not as a man to a boy, but as a scholar talks to an equal. I wasn’t so ignorant as to be unmoved by it. He’s always delighted in calling me a scoundrel and I wouldn’t disappoint him, but the truth is I loved him long before he took me in his arms and brought me enlightenment of a rather different kind.
And now it’s your turn to make that heady discovery for yourself, that our master in love is just as he is in life, a restless genius. Every act for him is a quest of learning, and in striving for knowledge of you he’ll all but forget himself. He’ll seek out the truest notes and craft them into the most exquisite of melodies, and he won’t ever be satisfied that he’s yet achieved his best. I don’t doubt that you’ll find yourself overwhelmed by his zeal. The bedchamber is one place where he never left a work unfinished.
I’ll be watching you as you strut around the studio with all the shining novelty of youth, and waiting for you to put the first foot wrong. Once I’m certain that I’ll win, I’ll force him to choose between us, and see you sent back to your privileged family in disgrace. And in the meantime, just in case he hasn’t yet given you a name, let me provide some, you cuckoo in the nest, you sweet-faced thief, you upstart.