The Weakness in Me
I'm not the sort of person who falls in and quickly out of love Autsu is dreaming, a troubled twitching form on a bed of black cotton. The shadows, dark guilts, are after him again, filling his mind with images.
Narin dragging him down behind the underbrush after a long day riding. Everyone else left far behind and nothing but sky and trees and sun warm scaled flesh and…. Yes. Their mounts look on, uninterested.
Kian, his head thrown back to expose his neck, the dark skin not yet bruised but only because skin so dark did not. His fingers, sharp nailed, digging into the sheets, leaving strips of fabric where once it had been whole.
But to you, I gave my affection, right from the start. Moments of passion… but passion fades. A simpler memory then, to court guilt in darkness. Kian and Autsu at their first meeting. Two seeming children chasing after a small animal. Their eyes meet in silent understanding as they plan a method of an attack. They don't need words.
I have a lover who loves me - how could I break such a heart? Too easy to take comfort in such a memory, to forget what came after and before, and so he finds himself back in Narin's chambers, a guard watching his master pace. Narin's expression is one of irritation touched with cunning. Esuth watches, incapable of fully understanding the revolutionary nature of the ideas his Prince is ranting about. What he understands is that his lover needs him there, needs an audience to this passion.
Yet still you get my attention. Even in dreams, the guilt lurks, twisting tension in muscles that dared to relax. Mocking, taunting. This one needed him. This one had depended on him. Genius, hungry, wild Narin desperate for understanding or only to be seen. And still… the sensation of Kian's breath at his neck. The feeling of those arms around him as they lay on the floor. Stay, he'd said. Sleep.
Why do you come here, when you know I've got troubles enough?
Why do you call me, when you know I can't answer the phone? And as that moment of guilt drenched comfort is wretched away from him, he finds himself in what can't be a memory, can only be the dream doing its best to dig the knife a little deeper. There is the room where he awaited exhile, there is his body, unconscious.
There is the guard, a brown scaled, heavily plated Di', standing at the doorway. And there's Narin in that doorway, lithe, dark and formed of fury. There's the guard, moving to block him, and there's quick green Meska throwing the guard against the wall, hissing dark threats and pressing a gun into his gut.
And as Esuth, he slumbers through this while Narin clings to him saying—something. Lips moving but no sound. And then his ring, his birth ring slipped off his finger and Narin's folded into his hand. For an instant, the dark ring glows red, before fading to dark. Narin whispers, kisses him, leaves.
You make me lie when I don't want to,
And make someone else some kind of an unknowing fool.
The not memory—because how could he remember—fades. Where lithe Narin was is solid Kian. Where he was unconscious Esuth he is now teenage Autsu, sparring in the units backyard. He and Kian test each others defenses, Autsu quick and light, Kian powerful and tireless. After, when it turns to sex, to a passion not far removed from their sparing, to bites that leave bruises and hungry clawing caresses.. and after.. when they lay spent, the tension melting out of them, he tries to speak.
To say something, to admit to leaving. But he says nothing, and Kian smiles at him with rough contentment and perhaps some level of possession. He can smile like that, at such times. They both can.
And you make me stay when I should not,
Are you so strong or is all the weakness in me?
But then everything comes out, eventually. That too, is a memory here. The disgusted confusion on Kian's face as he attempts and fails to explain. As he admits that he can't, will never, say no.
Weak.
Weak again at Kian's return. A fragile, emaciated figure in contrast with Kian's solid form. The anger in his lovers eyes, the sharply barked orders. The weight of hands and the murmured words, attempts to speak a language neither of them understood. And… stay. And he can't refuse.
Why do you come here, and pretend to be just passing by?
I need to see you - I need to hold you - tightly. Except, it's not always like that. It's not always hurt, sometimes it's just desire, and isn't that what tied him in the first place? Walking in from a sparring session with Avrin to find Kian there, Kian and an unfamiliar child. And it could have been nothing at all but two friends glad to be reunited. But it wasn't that, not when need overcame reason. Not when lips met and hungers ignited and…
He should not have allowed it to happen.
Feeling guilty,
And worried, waking from a tormented sleep
'Oh this old love, has me bound, Regrets. They're always there. They haunt his sleep. He dreams of dreaming. The dreams themselves often seem kind. It is the waking that breaks him. In dreams, everything comes clear. The sunheated warmth of Narin, the taste of him sweet on the tongue, a kiss stolen in the dark of a hallway where it shouldn't have been. And Meska, coming upon them there, the look in her eyes. A certain sort of anger.
In the barracks she paced in fury, shouting at him for being so careless. She was a slender green streak of anger, hissing and pushing. He yelled back in a worthless, foolish way. He told her he wasn't a fool or a child. She was right, though. She saw truly what would happen.
She expressed worry in anger. Kniene expressed it in silence. The dark of a room, the realization of his own powerlessness. His father's patient eyes, solemn with understanding. Because they both did it, stood hopelessly bound to distant loves. Because he was Narin's and he didn't know how to belong to anyone else.
But this new love cuts so deep. And Kniene's eyes were always sad on him, weren't they? The gaze followed him. It'd been there when he'd walked in, still shaking, his expression one of stricken shock. Father's eyes met son's but there was no way to explain. A light touch, furious unforgiving words. And there was no going back.
Kniene, watching, as he slams in and out of the house at odd hours. Knine watching him run until he stumbles. Kniene who sees him, wings unkempt, eyes bloodshot, skin tight over bone and muscle. Kniene with a bowl of soup insisting he eat, but other than a grunt and a headshake, he gets no response.
Kniene, watching him destroy himself, because he can't have both.
If I choose now, I'll lose out;
One of you has to fall... Again the shift in the dream, memory turning to what can only be fantasy. The opening of a door and Narin is there, perfect. Always perfect. And Autsu falls instinctively to his knees, can not help but do so. Even as he does, as he lowers his head in ingrained obedience he can see Kian's disapproving gaze, the anger in his eyes.
He dreams the two of them standing opposed. Narin ran cool, a sleek perfect creature with an icy ironic smile. Kian though, was hard, a wall of solid anger. There would be no explaining them to each other. Kian couldn't understand a Di's helpless instinct to service. Narin could not know what it meant to stand strong with a comrade at your back.
And I need you.Kian fades, and there's only Narin. Only the two of them as they had been. Narin murmuring clever, subtle insults to court women while Esuth stood at his side and fought to keep from laughing. Narin smirking at him while looking down at a failed assassin's corpse. Narin making bold innuendos at a court dinner, his tail brushing Esuth's ankle. Narin soaked and laughing in the rain, dodging attempts to drag himself inside to warm, his scales glistening, his eyes bright with joy. Narin touching him, leaning against him, clinging to him in a moment ecstasy. Narin's voice desperate and demanding, calling him home.
And you. But the memory of that voices fades, leaving Kian in its place. A whole new set of memories came flooding in. Gaian memories. Kian's rare smile, rare joke, as their fathers looked on in confusion. Kian looking at him in mild puzzlement, inquiring after what it meant to 'be shamed'. Kian teaching him how to make a sling, their silent invasion of Savius's room. Kian leaning forward, kissing him firmly, pointedly. Kian moving with solid, deadly grace, his staff in hand. Kian's tail sweeping him from his feet and a dark hand reaching down to help him to his feet. Kian watching him though three eyes with patient curiosity while he struggled to explain, and understand, Marxist theory. Kian asking him to stay.
Why do you come here, when you know I've got troubles enough?
Why do you call me, when you know I can't answer the phone? And now Kian fades. Because Kian would fade. Because he had to follow Narin. And so he finds himself in a room he'd never seen, decorated in blue and black and silver, with a creek running through its center. He stands at one side of the room, being dressed by a pair of nervous Di' servants. The clothes are heavily embroidered in the Ex' style, silver and dark blue.
Narin looks on, hissing irritation and swatting at the servants when they don't get it quite right. Autsu, for he is Autsu, does his best to hold still because when he moves he earns glares from servants and Narin both.
He stands stiff and uncomfortable, at attention, and as he stares into the middle distance, he finds his gaze drawn to a window. A black scaled guard crosses his line of vision, echoing Kian so that he expects him to turn his head and fix him with a three eyed amber gaze. But the moment passes when one of the servants clicks her tongue in irritation. He had winced.
You make me lie when I don't want to,
And make someone else some kind of an unknowing fool.The vision blurs, a whirl of color, of crowds. Autsu lays in the darkness of the blue and silver room, staring into the folds of the canopy. Narin, sleeping against him, is still and calm. The room too, is still, and sweet smelling, clean. He should be sleeping. He should be. He should be at peace. His limbs sing with tension, and he can not remain in bed.
Looking at the form beside him, his expression mingles affection and guilt as he slips his arm away from the prince and sits at the edge of the bed. The two of them are shadows, Autsu with his wings held tightly against his body, disappearing, fading.
He's standing when Narin begins to stir, missing body heat or perhaps something deeper. Blue eyes meet blue and they could have been the same eyes, except that their darknesses are different. Autsu's demons were only just meeting Narin's.
Narin's expression is concerned as it should be, but guarded as well. And Autsu, facing that expression can only do what he is to do. The haunted darkness in his eyes retreats and he shakes his head, smiles, and runs his fingers gently over his lover's scales, returning to the bed.
Make me stay when I should not.
Are you so strong or is all the weakness in me?And maybe that's a good moment or maybe it only seems to be, but it too fades, as it all does. And again, in dreaming he watches the day. The ornate clothes, the fussing servants, the pleasantries said and said and said and said and there had been a time where he'd only stood silent at his Prince's shoulder. But the prince wears a crown now, and Autsu wears a slender circle of silver.
No surprise when at the end of the day, his slender form, too long now without a workout, is lined with tension and his words when they come are short. There had been a time when the two of them moved with the wind's grace. Watching the window he sees their shadows on the practice ground. But no, it's a pair of guards sparring. Almost, he goes to join them, he sets his hand against the door.
And then Narin is there, and he's left trying to explain, pacing and gesturing inarticulately. Their eyes meet, not so much with love as with mute confusion. Narin's expression is haughty but his posture is one of pain and defeat. It's too much. Autus isn't meant to hurt him. And so once again he shakes his head and closes the distance between them.
Why do you come here, and pretend to be just passing by?
I need to see you - I need to hold you - tightly.He wakes with a start and finds himself in the unit dorms, his arm draped lazily over Kian. They'd fallen asleep, dozing at midday. And Autsu, waking, is hit for a breath by a series of images, by haunting memories of dream. Kian and Narin and the dark of the night and… a sigh from the form beside him, the opening of eyes, the flight of memory.
