Sorry, I Can't Hear You Over The Sound Of How OTP They Are
This here is for all the people who will be bored by the second half of this post. Look! Amazing caps from onthecount . They are so fucking OTP it hurts me. Hurts me so good. I was going to write a thousand words of meta about this scene and how I think it demonstrates their chemistry and shit, but it is heading towards six am so that can wait till another day now. BUT STILL. LOOK AT THEM. JUST LOOK.
iAlso. LOOK AT THEIR FACESSSS. <3<3
AND NOW FOR SOMETHING YOU SHOULD PROBABLY IGNORE UNLESS YOU ARE abuseofreason BECAUSE I AM RIDICULOUS AND THIS FUSION WILL MAKE NO SENSE TO ANYWAY. If you must have some background though, this is pre-canon and Arthur and Eames are guardians, aka bodyguards for Moroi royalty. THEIR LOVE IS SO SOCIALLY TABOO, OKAY? And when they kill bad guys called Strigoi they get really socially important tattoos to count the kills on the backs of their necks and their first ones are REALLY IMPORTANT. Anyway abuseofreason has promised more commentfic covering some of the backstory to this (IE ARTHUR AND EAMES PINING USTILY AFTER EACH OTHER WHILE ARTHUR IS STILL IN GUARDIAN SCHOOL). Basically this is just an excuse to write about tattoos being sexy. I hope. Although I will add the actual sexing part after I get some sleep. WATCH THIS SPACE. PORN TOMORROW. I PROMISE. DEFLOWER-Y PORN.
ETA:
1. Ficlet detailing how Arthur first met Eames
2. Gorgeous gorgeous NSFW art that is essentially a spoiler for the porn I am still finishing up
“Arthur will need his marks,” Mal says in that lilting, perfect French that’s still so hard to follow sometimes.
Miriam doesn’t even look at him, glancing straight up at Eames. “You will vouch for the kills?”
“Clean, honest kills. Both of them, on my honour.”
She nods, as if Eames’s word has weight Mal’s doesn’t. “I’ll talk to Luke once we’ve locked down the catacombs. You’re lucky,” she says, and it takes a second for Arthur to realise she’s finally addressing him directly. “Luke’s nearly done more molnija marks than there are kills between the entire enclave here. You’re in good hands.”
“No.”
They all look at Eames, and he shrugs. “He’s my protezhe.” He looks straight at Arthur then, and it’s as if he knows every single filthy thing Arthur has imagined in the last four years. “I’ll do it.”
It’s not a question. It’s a statement of fact so absolute that it makes Arthur’s breath catch in his throat.
“Yes, of course!” Mal grins. “Eames should do it for him. I assume this is acceptable?”
Miriam looks like she just swallowed glass, and Arthur can’t even make himself care that Eames effectively told the hierarchy to go fuck itself on his behalf.
“Of course. I’ll make the arrangements. For the moment, however, Princess, I will recommend you retire to your rooms while we ensure there aren’t more Strigoi nearby.”
Mal inclines her head. “Thank you, Miriam.”
They file out behind her and Arthur closes the door. When he turns around Eames is waiting, Mal conspicuously examining a weaving hanging on the rough stone wall just down the corridor.
“Here.” Eames holds out a bloodied stake. His bloodied stake, Arthur realises, as he reaches to take it.
“The ceremony starts at sundown,” Eames says, gripping the stake even after Arthur wraps his fingers around the heel. “We can watch Mal. You do what you need to do.”
There's no official protocol, not that Arthur knows anyway. Even if there were the feel of Eames's palm against his fingers would probably be enough to push it out of his head entirely. "What do I need to do?"
Eames releases the stake, but Arthur leaves his hand resting on Eames's skin anyway.
"Make your peace," he says, tucking his hands in his pockets in that deceptively nonchalant way and turning to follow Mal.
Arthur frowns down at the silver stake. The blood's dry, flaking off onto his hand. Whatever the fuck Eames is talking about. Arthur made his peace with the blood he knew would hit the ground at his hands years ago.
He tightens his grip on the stake, remembering the feel of muscle and bone giving way under the press of his hand. It's nothing like a punch, nothing like shooting someone. The Strigoi had bled out all over his hands and he watched it run red down the drain as if it were his own.
It only takes him a few seconds after that to turn on his heel and head to the chapel.
Eames knows. Eames always knows.
*
Time is impossible to measure in the catacombs with the constant pale light from lamps and candles, but Arthur leaves the bloody stake on the altar in the chapel and changes a little before sunset anyway. Anxiety skitters across his skin like a living thing as he dresses. Even though this should be nothing. He's seen it dozens of times before, and sure, it's something different now that it's his turn. It's not really that different to getting his promise mark really.
He heads down the rough hewn corridors to the ceremony chamber rubbing his hands against the chill. Of course, it wasn't Eames then. Eames wasn't the one holding the needle, bracing a hand against his shoulder and wiping blood and ink from his nape.
Arthur takes a deep breath.
Somehow, that changes everything. Even though he shouldn't let it.
The ceremony chamber is more brightly lit than most of the corridors, open and warm. There are more guardians than he'd expected really, as well as Mal and the other French Moroi who'd retreated to the relative safety of the catacombs when the Strigoi alert went out. Every other time he's seen this there has been more than one guardian getting their marks, and the focused stares of everyone in the room are going to burn Arthur by the time this is over.
Then he sees Eames, talking to Miriam on the dais at the other end of the room, and the room narrows to the familiar breadth of his shoulders, the slight crook of his nose where it was broken in a bar fight in Chelyabinsk a few years ago.
"Are you ready?" Mal asks, close enough to reach out and touch his elbow.
Arthur swallows, taking in the oppressive stone ceiling and the clots of people milling about, Moroi standing away from the Dhampir. His eyes fall on the simple stool set next to a table on the dais. "I'm ready."
The room falls silent as he takes his seat, hands folded in his lap. Eames is a heavy presence behind him, every movement he makes loud in the quiet. Arthur wishes he’d say something, anything, to break the tension.
Thick fingers brush across the back of his collar. “You’ll need to take this off.”
Arthur freezes for a second before starting to unbutton. He focuses on the floor of the dais in front of him, not on the crowd, not on the sound of Eames adjusting tools on the table behind him.
This is just another test, something new to overcome. And if he can stick a stake in two Strigoi that even Eames needed help with... he can handle this.
He hopes.
Arthur passes his shirt back to Eames and folds his hands again, tipping his head forward just like he did when he received his promise mark. He’s not expecting the broad thumb pressing against the vertebrae just beneath his hair line, firm pressure feeling down over each ridge until Eames’s hand is cupping the base of his neck.
Right then he realises, too late, that this will be nothing like getting his promise mark.
“Are you alright?”
The words come from right behind his ear, warm and close and rough enough to make Arthur shiver. “I’m fine,” he says.
There’s the sound of more movement behind him. “Do you trust me?”
It’s a stupid fucking question, and Arthur bites down a retort. “Yes,” he whispers, for nobody but Eames.
“You want this?”
Arthur’s fingers tense in his lap. There are a million things Eames might mean and only a few Arthur wants him to, and he hesitates on the answer until that thumb rubs over the notch where his spine meets his skull. It’s gentle, but he knows Eames could snap his neck within half a second if he wanted to, if he just threw a fraction of the power his arms are capable of into it.
“Yes,” he repeats, and Eames exhales close enough for Arthur to feel it on his skin.
He drops his chin to his chest and slowly, slowly closes his eyes.
A wet swab swipes over his spine before Eames’s left hand closes over his shoulder. Arthur tries to relax into that touch, savour it somehow, but knowing the pain that’s about to come he tenses instead.
Eames’s thumb rubs soothing little circles against his shoulder blade for a second and then it’s gone. The first tap sends pain ricocheting across his skin, the second not so much. By the tenth there’s warm trickling down the curve of his neck and Arthur imagines the black ink marred with his blood dripping down, before Eames wipes it up and continues tapping out the tiny marks on the nape of his neck.
“That’s one,” Eames says finally, rubbing just behind Arthur’s ear.
Arthur nods, resisting the urge to lean into the touch. There’s a part of him that wonders if Eames should even be doing that in front of everyone, if they can even see or if the angle means they can’t. Most of him couldn’t give a fuck what the other guardians think, what the Moroi think, what anybody fucking thinks so long as Eames keeps touching him like that.
The first tap of the second mark doesn’t hurt at all, just blends into the dull ache settling over the back of his neck. Arthur feels the tension slipping away with each successive tap of the needle. He can smell blood and ink and Eames, almost like Eames is slipping himself under Arthur’s skin along with the black.
The thought drives more goosebumps over his back, and he twists his fingers together to stop from shuddering. He’s always wanted Eames, that’s hardly a surprise. But right now he wants so badly... Eames under his skin, Eames over him and around him and pushing hard and hot into him... that it’s like a physical vibration in his bones to echo the vibration from each blow of the needle.
Arthur flexes his hands against his thighs. Really, it doesn’t feel like he’s getting his first molnija marks at all. It feels like he’s getting Eames’s mark. Like those kills were the last thing Arthur needed to do to prove himself and Eames is claiming him, finally.
It takes the touch of sticky tape on his skin for Arthur to realise Eames is finished. He blinks as the dressing is fastened over the fresh tattoos, conscious of breathing like he wasn’t a few seconds ago.
“All done,” Eames says, letting his hand drag down from the nape of Arthur’s neck to the divot just above the swell of his ass.
Arthur can’t control the way his entire body shudders into the touch any more than he can control the rapid-fire pulse of his heart against his ribs or what time the sun rises every morning. And it’s cruel, so fucking cruel, unless Eames means it.
But then Eames is pushing Arthur’s shirt back into his hand, and Arthur wonders if the effect of this will be as permanent as the ink now lodged in his skin or as fleeting as the Strigoi he snuffed out in less than a heartbeat.
He buttons up as fast as he can, fingers still unsteady. Eames walks behind him when he leaves the dais, staying just outside Arthur’s field of vision while the others greet him as a freshly blooded guardian. It feels strange being at the front while Eames fades to the background. For years he’s been the one standing back watching Eames. But now... even as he shakes hands and takes light kisses, he can feel Eames watching him. It’s infuriating and arousing and Arthur just has to feel the sting where Eames marked him and smile and nod like it’s nothing.
“We can go now, if you like.”
We.
Arthur tilts his head, enjoying the sharp tug against raw skin. “I’d like that,” he says, shifting his focus to Eames’s solid bulk behind him. He wants that broad hand covering his spine again, splayed across his throat, dragging down over the small of his back and tugging him in close. Fuck the Moroi. For once, just once in his fucking life Arthur wants to be selfish.
They’ve almost slipped out when Vera calls across the crowd. “Eames! We need you.”
Arthur can see the curse in every taut line of muscle in Eames’s body.
“I’ll be five minutes,” Eames calls back, grabbing Arthur’s hand and tugging him the last few steps into the hallway.
iAlso. LOOK AT THEIR FACESSSS. <3<3
AND NOW FOR SOMETHING YOU SHOULD PROBABLY IGNORE UNLESS YOU ARE abuseofreason BECAUSE I AM RIDICULOUS AND THIS FUSION WILL MAKE NO SENSE TO ANYWAY. If you must have some background though, this is pre-canon and Arthur and Eames are guardians, aka bodyguards for Moroi royalty. THEIR LOVE IS SO SOCIALLY TABOO, OKAY? And when they kill bad guys called Strigoi they get really socially important tattoos to count the kills on the backs of their necks and their first ones are REALLY IMPORTANT. Anyway abuseofreason has promised more commentfic covering some of the backstory to this (IE ARTHUR AND EAMES PINING USTILY AFTER EACH OTHER WHILE ARTHUR IS STILL IN GUARDIAN SCHOOL). Basically this is just an excuse to write about tattoos being sexy. I hope. Although I will add the actual sexing part after I get some sleep. WATCH THIS SPACE. PORN TOMORROW. I PROMISE. DEFLOWER-Y PORN.
ETA:
1. Ficlet detailing how Arthur first met Eames
2. Gorgeous gorgeous NSFW art that is essentially a spoiler for the porn I am still finishing up
“Arthur will need his marks,” Mal says in that lilting, perfect French that’s still so hard to follow sometimes.
Miriam doesn’t even look at him, glancing straight up at Eames. “You will vouch for the kills?”
“Clean, honest kills. Both of them, on my honour.”
She nods, as if Eames’s word has weight Mal’s doesn’t. “I’ll talk to Luke once we’ve locked down the catacombs. You’re lucky,” she says, and it takes a second for Arthur to realise she’s finally addressing him directly. “Luke’s nearly done more molnija marks than there are kills between the entire enclave here. You’re in good hands.”
“No.”
They all look at Eames, and he shrugs. “He’s my protezhe.” He looks straight at Arthur then, and it’s as if he knows every single filthy thing Arthur has imagined in the last four years. “I’ll do it.”
It’s not a question. It’s a statement of fact so absolute that it makes Arthur’s breath catch in his throat.
“Yes, of course!” Mal grins. “Eames should do it for him. I assume this is acceptable?”
Miriam looks like she just swallowed glass, and Arthur can’t even make himself care that Eames effectively told the hierarchy to go fuck itself on his behalf.
“Of course. I’ll make the arrangements. For the moment, however, Princess, I will recommend you retire to your rooms while we ensure there aren’t more Strigoi nearby.”
Mal inclines her head. “Thank you, Miriam.”
They file out behind her and Arthur closes the door. When he turns around Eames is waiting, Mal conspicuously examining a weaving hanging on the rough stone wall just down the corridor.
“Here.” Eames holds out a bloodied stake. His bloodied stake, Arthur realises, as he reaches to take it.
“The ceremony starts at sundown,” Eames says, gripping the stake even after Arthur wraps his fingers around the heel. “We can watch Mal. You do what you need to do.”
There's no official protocol, not that Arthur knows anyway. Even if there were the feel of Eames's palm against his fingers would probably be enough to push it out of his head entirely. "What do I need to do?"
Eames releases the stake, but Arthur leaves his hand resting on Eames's skin anyway.
"Make your peace," he says, tucking his hands in his pockets in that deceptively nonchalant way and turning to follow Mal.
Arthur frowns down at the silver stake. The blood's dry, flaking off onto his hand. Whatever the fuck Eames is talking about. Arthur made his peace with the blood he knew would hit the ground at his hands years ago.
He tightens his grip on the stake, remembering the feel of muscle and bone giving way under the press of his hand. It's nothing like a punch, nothing like shooting someone. The Strigoi had bled out all over his hands and he watched it run red down the drain as if it were his own.
It only takes him a few seconds after that to turn on his heel and head to the chapel.
Eames knows. Eames always knows.
*
Time is impossible to measure in the catacombs with the constant pale light from lamps and candles, but Arthur leaves the bloody stake on the altar in the chapel and changes a little before sunset anyway. Anxiety skitters across his skin like a living thing as he dresses. Even though this should be nothing. He's seen it dozens of times before, and sure, it's something different now that it's his turn. It's not really that different to getting his promise mark really.
He heads down the rough hewn corridors to the ceremony chamber rubbing his hands against the chill. Of course, it wasn't Eames then. Eames wasn't the one holding the needle, bracing a hand against his shoulder and wiping blood and ink from his nape.
Arthur takes a deep breath.
Somehow, that changes everything. Even though he shouldn't let it.
The ceremony chamber is more brightly lit than most of the corridors, open and warm. There are more guardians than he'd expected really, as well as Mal and the other French Moroi who'd retreated to the relative safety of the catacombs when the Strigoi alert went out. Every other time he's seen this there has been more than one guardian getting their marks, and the focused stares of everyone in the room are going to burn Arthur by the time this is over.
Then he sees Eames, talking to Miriam on the dais at the other end of the room, and the room narrows to the familiar breadth of his shoulders, the slight crook of his nose where it was broken in a bar fight in Chelyabinsk a few years ago.
"Are you ready?" Mal asks, close enough to reach out and touch his elbow.
Arthur swallows, taking in the oppressive stone ceiling and the clots of people milling about, Moroi standing away from the Dhampir. His eyes fall on the simple stool set next to a table on the dais. "I'm ready."
The room falls silent as he takes his seat, hands folded in his lap. Eames is a heavy presence behind him, every movement he makes loud in the quiet. Arthur wishes he’d say something, anything, to break the tension.
Thick fingers brush across the back of his collar. “You’ll need to take this off.”
Arthur freezes for a second before starting to unbutton. He focuses on the floor of the dais in front of him, not on the crowd, not on the sound of Eames adjusting tools on the table behind him.
This is just another test, something new to overcome. And if he can stick a stake in two Strigoi that even Eames needed help with... he can handle this.
He hopes.
Arthur passes his shirt back to Eames and folds his hands again, tipping his head forward just like he did when he received his promise mark. He’s not expecting the broad thumb pressing against the vertebrae just beneath his hair line, firm pressure feeling down over each ridge until Eames’s hand is cupping the base of his neck.
Right then he realises, too late, that this will be nothing like getting his promise mark.
“Are you alright?”
The words come from right behind his ear, warm and close and rough enough to make Arthur shiver. “I’m fine,” he says.
There’s the sound of more movement behind him. “Do you trust me?”
It’s a stupid fucking question, and Arthur bites down a retort. “Yes,” he whispers, for nobody but Eames.
“You want this?”
Arthur’s fingers tense in his lap. There are a million things Eames might mean and only a few Arthur wants him to, and he hesitates on the answer until that thumb rubs over the notch where his spine meets his skull. It’s gentle, but he knows Eames could snap his neck within half a second if he wanted to, if he just threw a fraction of the power his arms are capable of into it.
“Yes,” he repeats, and Eames exhales close enough for Arthur to feel it on his skin.
He drops his chin to his chest and slowly, slowly closes his eyes.
A wet swab swipes over his spine before Eames’s left hand closes over his shoulder. Arthur tries to relax into that touch, savour it somehow, but knowing the pain that’s about to come he tenses instead.
Eames’s thumb rubs soothing little circles against his shoulder blade for a second and then it’s gone. The first tap sends pain ricocheting across his skin, the second not so much. By the tenth there’s warm trickling down the curve of his neck and Arthur imagines the black ink marred with his blood dripping down, before Eames wipes it up and continues tapping out the tiny marks on the nape of his neck.
“That’s one,” Eames says finally, rubbing just behind Arthur’s ear.
Arthur nods, resisting the urge to lean into the touch. There’s a part of him that wonders if Eames should even be doing that in front of everyone, if they can even see or if the angle means they can’t. Most of him couldn’t give a fuck what the other guardians think, what the Moroi think, what anybody fucking thinks so long as Eames keeps touching him like that.
The first tap of the second mark doesn’t hurt at all, just blends into the dull ache settling over the back of his neck. Arthur feels the tension slipping away with each successive tap of the needle. He can smell blood and ink and Eames, almost like Eames is slipping himself under Arthur’s skin along with the black.
The thought drives more goosebumps over his back, and he twists his fingers together to stop from shuddering. He’s always wanted Eames, that’s hardly a surprise. But right now he wants so badly... Eames under his skin, Eames over him and around him and pushing hard and hot into him... that it’s like a physical vibration in his bones to echo the vibration from each blow of the needle.
Arthur flexes his hands against his thighs. Really, it doesn’t feel like he’s getting his first molnija marks at all. It feels like he’s getting Eames’s mark. Like those kills were the last thing Arthur needed to do to prove himself and Eames is claiming him, finally.
It takes the touch of sticky tape on his skin for Arthur to realise Eames is finished. He blinks as the dressing is fastened over the fresh tattoos, conscious of breathing like he wasn’t a few seconds ago.
“All done,” Eames says, letting his hand drag down from the nape of Arthur’s neck to the divot just above the swell of his ass.
Arthur can’t control the way his entire body shudders into the touch any more than he can control the rapid-fire pulse of his heart against his ribs or what time the sun rises every morning. And it’s cruel, so fucking cruel, unless Eames means it.
But then Eames is pushing Arthur’s shirt back into his hand, and Arthur wonders if the effect of this will be as permanent as the ink now lodged in his skin or as fleeting as the Strigoi he snuffed out in less than a heartbeat.
He buttons up as fast as he can, fingers still unsteady. Eames walks behind him when he leaves the dais, staying just outside Arthur’s field of vision while the others greet him as a freshly blooded guardian. It feels strange being at the front while Eames fades to the background. For years he’s been the one standing back watching Eames. But now... even as he shakes hands and takes light kisses, he can feel Eames watching him. It’s infuriating and arousing and Arthur just has to feel the sting where Eames marked him and smile and nod like it’s nothing.
“We can go now, if you like.”
We.
Arthur tilts his head, enjoying the sharp tug against raw skin. “I’d like that,” he says, shifting his focus to Eames’s solid bulk behind him. He wants that broad hand covering his spine again, splayed across his throat, dragging down over the small of his back and tugging him in close. Fuck the Moroi. For once, just once in his fucking life Arthur wants to be selfish.
They’ve almost slipped out when Vera calls across the crowd. “Eames! We need you.”
Arthur can see the curse in every taut line of muscle in Eames’s body.
“I’ll be five minutes,” Eames calls back, grabbing Arthur’s hand and tugging him the last few steps into the hallway.