Prompt Post No. 14

[inceptionsecret]

Welcome to Round 14 of the Inception Kink Meme. This post will be closed to new prompts once it reaches five thousand comments.

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FILL: Acutus Id Verberat (whip it quick) [6/9]

[anonymous]

Arthur returns often, no pattern that Eames can divine, though he rarely comes less than twice each month. Eames just opens the door, and Arthur is there, or he isn’t. Arthur never brings anything; he never takes anything. (Though he always checks his pockets before he goes, leaving whatever small bauble inadvertently ended up in his possession on Eames’ nightstand).

On the night that Arthur discovers Eames’ hand-drawn deck of Caroc cards, Eames is at work, inspecting a poisoned crossbow bolt, buried in a client’s neck, feeling for a pulse, to ensure quality execution of a contract. By the time he gets back to his rooms, he’s half-frozen, because it’s late autumn, and he’s spent a good hour skulking through the moonlit alleys of the city in the middle of the night.

"These are amazing," Arthur says, when Eames comes in. He has the Caroc cards spread out on the polished wooden floor. Eames notices that he's placed them in neat lines, but roughly in the order that Eames drew them, instead of by value or suit. This is impressive, because Eames didn't draw them in any kind of order, just drew as the fancy struck him, until he had one of each.

The first card was Death, the most beloved card in any Assassin's deck. Eames keeps meaning to go back and redo that one; it’s old and amateurish compared to the rest, but he’s never quite gotten around to it.

"You did all these?" Arthur murmurs. He flips them over to observe the kite-and-dart designs on the back, running his fingers over the intricate tiled patterns, each one subtly different. "You must be out of your mind.” But he says it in muted tones, awed.

He gathers up the deck and shuffles it. Nothing too showy, but he watches Eames’ face instead of his hands as he does it.

The one thing that Eames keeps as a reminder of his childhood is his mother's little charm that she gave him. It's only a mangled little ha'penny on a string, not valuable in and of itself. But she braided the cord herself, and Eames likes to remember her under the glass ceiling of the solar, sunlight gleaming off her auburn hair, gilding her eyelashes as she braided yards and yards of lovely cord.

He thinks he’ll remember Arthur like this, soft, hooded gaze and lean, moonlit lines, his hands full of Eames’ Caroc cards, more beautiful and more dangerous than an exquisitely-crafted blade.

Arthur flicks the cards back and forth, doing slight of hand tricks with an absent air that most people have while twiddling their thumbs. The Knave of Octograms disappears to be replaced by Death, and Eames can feel the surprise stretch across his face, right where Arthur can see. But Arthur frowns a little, and looks down at his hands like he had forgotten what he was doing.

"You don't like card tricks?" he asks. Eames just shakes his head and waves the question away.

"Never mind. Let's get to bed, hmm? It's bloody cold tonight."

Arthur shuffles the deck back together and lays it on top of Eames nightstand without another word, but his touch is strange when he slips under the covers, conciliatory, welcoming instead of demanding. Eames could remember Arthur like this, warmth and peace and home, only he doesn’t know how he’d ever let go.

Re: FILL: Acutus Id Verberat (whip it quick) [6/9]

[anonymous]

Really enjoying this.