Florian making no comment and taking no action on Johann's disgruntlement is not the same as being unaware of it or believing that it will simply fade away. There is a small part of him that feels a vicious sort of satisfaction that Johann might feel the echo of what he'd felt upon arrival, upon learning of Johann's 'friends' and warden and hookup, the feeling of being apart and outside of something so important to someone who is everything
Important to him.
The rest of him, the more practical part, the more reasonable part, knew that he would have to deal with it, both because this place had made Johann even more independent and assertive and because the whole debacle with the Mage Hunter would give him a bit of an edge in any discussion on the dangers of this or that and whether one should engage in them.
So it is with some appreciation that he huffs, half amusement and half fatigue, after hearing Johann's muttering, puttering frustration after the third or fourth time a vase has been shifted two feet to the left or right.
"I thought you'd realize, given your own experiences: it's much easier for power to travel through flesh than air."
That vase is in danger of being dropped. Not because of any clumsiness on Johann's part, but because he has the overwhelming desire to see it shatter on the floor. Perhaps Dorian's little lessons on aggression are helping, perhaps letting him get it all out in a room full of breakable things just like this was a brilliant call, but right now they seem to be a hinderance.
He places it down and keeps his back to Florian.
"You looked like an idiot, fawning all over him," he says because if he makes this about Archer, then he doesn't have to say it. He doesn't have to express 'I'm worried about you' and have it accidentally sound like 'I don't like change.'
"Is that what all your lessons are going to look like?"
"I often look like an idiot to get what I want, Johann, and it's never bothered you before," he points out in a lazy drawl, not looking up from his book on magecraft. Because of course he's already reading the book on magecraft.
"And I believe you were the one who insisted on coming with me. I didn't think Herr Archer was planning an assassination quite as quickly as all that."
He turns away from the vase and places a hand on his shoulder. "You like it when I'm nearby," he reminds him, fingers digging into his collarbone. "Besides, I like his cat."
Johann lets out a breath. "Look, I don't know much about magic, but do you think this might end up going too far?"
He moves his hand eventually, toying with strands of Florian's hair. "Too far means too far," he mutters. "Finding something new and exciting to obsess over until it consumes you."
And that's when his hand gets slapped away, when Florian moves out of the chair and away from him and Johann will see it, the heat that starts to shimmer around him once again.
"I'm not the one who got sloppy, Johann. Who was it who let the little Mage Hunter get past him?" He doesnt like the smugness of his tone. Not one bit. "She was content to keep watching; she wouldn't have attacked for days, until she got word that the others were sick. I had time until you decided to take matters into your hands."
He stands his ground, letting Florian pull away. But he'll see how that stings. How that perfectly placed barb cuts him in a way that even Johann can't heal.
"She wouldn't have even known what you fucking are if you hadn't given yourself away."
"It was only a matter of time, Johann," he snaps back. "Even our beloved bitch of a city can only be but so cursed. They were bound to send a hunter, and how else to find them than flushing them out when the lion's share was already finished?"
Justification after the fact, the cleverness of a clever man who's known since he showed up and found out Johann was here that he'd need a reason.
He'd been ready to die. He'd left his death up to Halandrette and she had let him be washed away into the abyss.
Or perhaps washed away to find himself on a most curious vessel. He's not sure which idea he hates more.
He crosses the floor in two steps, looking down at the small mage.
This isn't what he wanted when he started this fight. This, he tells himself, is the consequence of being on the Barge. This is Dorian's doing, giving him a new voice. And he hates it.
His next protest comes less freely. More hesitant. He can't and he won't speak against him so much. He's not ready for that.
"You need to be more careful, is all," he finally mutters.
Every instinct in him screams to go for the kill, wretched and curling thing that he is, but he might as well stab again at his own heart. Something in him balks at concern for him, for his safety. Calling Johann his bodyguard is a ruse, a game. Johann will toss him in the gutter as soon as save him. Johann is his not the other way around.
He's too much of a coward to push the blade in and too much of a coward to pull it out.
"You think too short term," he says quietly, no edges or points to the complaint. It's soft and wet and clings as he doesn't turn away. He doesn't look up, he looks away, but he stays standing, the heat of his body like a furnace against Johann in his blacks.
"Careful isn't just about risks. It's also taking opportunities. Herr Archer is a warden, one restricted by the laws of this place against harm to me as long as I offer none to him."
He points to the communicator on the table beside them, innocent enough.
"There are horrors and abominations in this place, Johann. I would arm myself better for the next danger that comes my way, especially when your Dorian can take away your means of protecting me on a whim. Can you tell me he won't?"
He can't. He can't because Dorian has done it before. He's threatened it, done it, and uses it like a carrot over his head.
Instead of answering, he leans down and grabs his face in his hands, kissing him firmly. It's an apology as much as it is a displacement of his affection.
He can only hope part of his argument sticks. He's worried. He doesn't want him to get involved in this if it's going to lead to his own demise. Mage hunters and magic - it's all over Johann's head, but who the fuck cares when he can just take his knife to it?
He doesn't pull away from the kiss, doesn't fight it. He bites, but it's a bite of claiming, a bite of reconnecting, a consecration of blood over the bond that stretches between them. He'll deny it to his last breath but it steadies him as well as Johann.
He'll shed his own blood a different way.
"If we are to play this place as we did Elendhaven, I can hardly do it without using all at my disposal." A sigh. "The lessons are necessary. And you should most certainly attend."
The secret between them grounds him almost as much as the kiss. They have this connection to show for all of their hardships, and no one can strip it away. Johann was born from the ocean of magic and grief and love and anger in Florian, and he relies on that to soothe him. "I go where you go, boss."
He buries a kiss in his neck.
"I'll pay attention, but don't let them distract you. That's what they do here. They give you the shit that you want and then use it against you. Take it away."
Florian would never call it nuzzling to his jaw, might be more comfortable with 'burrowing' or 'burying', but that is the more accurate word, the softness of his skin making it a caress by default.
"When have I ever let someone take from me without paying their due?"
He has faith in Florian, but this system, this place, can be sneaky. It can creep up, take them by surprise, make them fall to their knees if they're not careful. That's what he wants to prevent.
"Mm, I do enjoy listening to you drone on about ledgers."
Not at all what Florian meant, but Johann slips back into his more comfortable role. That teasing voice, wandering hands, all of it a show of familiar normalcy.
This is Dorian's doing, he tells himself, even as he aches for missing his first non-Florian friend.
Florian lets those hands wander, wants them over him, suddenly, viscerally, wants to indulge them both even though he knows that book on magecraft won't read itself. He feels as if he's ricocheting between wanting to rebel against Johann, against Archer, against the Admiral and himself. Even against Trevor and his foul-mouthed accusations.
Which have been wriggling through his brain for the last day or so.
"Is that the heights of your ambitions, Johann? To make me 'drone'?"
When Florian doesn't pull away, doesn't stop him, Johann pushes him back against a side table. He loves this part of their routine. Either Florian will stop him or he won't. Either way, his teeth rake along delicate skin and Johann gets what he wants.
"No, sometimes I want to shut you up," he purrs. "You talk too much."
He's not thinking about the barge. He's not thinking about Dorian or Trevor or Archer or Kanya or the image of Florian dying on the floor. All he has is him here, very much alive.
Florian can't think of anything else but that moment, that moment he accepted Johann, that moment he realized what he had been given, what he had wanted more than anything.
Small fingers cling tightly, one leg lifting to sling up to Johann's hip, to beckon him. He won't be stopping him tonight.
"And whose fault is that?" Left to hang in the air while Johann leaves bruising along his neck.
"Well what the fuck has gotten into you?" he grins, very much not complaining as he pulls him flush against his chest and lifts him up like he weighs nothing.
It's hard to think too much when he's being given so many green lights all at once, so the question is entirely forgotten after only a few moments.
The destination is very clear, but he takes his time, pausing to press Florian's back against the doorframe to kiss him again.
"Not you," he says raunchily enough as both legs wrap around Johann's middle, ankles crossing to hold tight. His muscles are what they are but they can hold him there well enough with Johann's arms to support them. Then he huffs and nips at the corner of Johann's lips, eyes sparkling and the reflection of the room dark in the glass of them.
He pulls back, searching his face. Florian's sometimes duplicitous nature doesn't usually fall on Johann, but he's still surprised enough to want to double check.
But then a slow smile spreads across his face and the next kiss is hungry, more insistent, like he would devour him right there.
Tempted as he is to simply throw him onto the bed, he walks him there instead, laying him down gently and sitting up.
Florian most certainly has it in him to be as cold as the wind off of the Nord Sea, but right now, he is all heat and warmth and fire, bloodhot and earnestly wanton. He has been told he needn't be nearly as careful here, and more importantly shown it and that is certainly a part of it. But the greater part is the heart-deep knowledge that has been churning inside of him that Johann is his, was the gift given to him, was his goddess's own creation from his suffering, no longer a question.
He has accepted it in his heart but he's a Nordenman. The physical, the visceral, the real- he wants that too.
Johann is hungry, and he is hungry in return. Small hands and clever fingers are going to start working on his clothes, the same that carefully straightened them to attempt to make him look like a gentleman now opening them with desperate speed. And when Johann lays him down, something in his chest goes heavy and cracks and he grabs at him, says without words.
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Important to him.
The rest of him, the more practical part, the more reasonable part, knew that he would have to deal with it, both because this place had made Johann even more independent and assertive and because the whole debacle with the Mage Hunter would give him a bit of an edge in any discussion on the dangers of this or that and whether one should engage in them.
So it is with some appreciation that he huffs, half amusement and half fatigue, after hearing Johann's muttering, puttering frustration after the third or fourth time a vase has been shifted two feet to the left or right.
"I thought you'd realize, given your own experiences: it's much easier for power to travel through flesh than air."
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He places it down and keeps his back to Florian.
"You looked like an idiot, fawning all over him," he says because if he makes this about Archer, then he doesn't have to say it. He doesn't have to express 'I'm worried about you' and have it accidentally sound like 'I don't like change.'
"Is that what all your lessons are going to look like?"
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"And I believe you were the one who insisted on coming with me. I didn't think Herr Archer was planning an assassination quite as quickly as all that."
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Johann lets out a breath. "Look, I don't know much about magic, but do you think this might end up going too far?"
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He looks up from his book and farther up at Johann.
"It's hardly begun. Besides, what does 'too far' even mean?"
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"You don't know the first thing about what you're talking about," he says, warning in the red of his cheeks as he speaks.
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"Don't I, sweetling? That's what you do. And that's when you get sloppy."
He grins, still trailing fingers along his hair.
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"I'm not the one who got sloppy, Johann. Who was it who let the little Mage Hunter get past him?" He doesnt like the smugness of his tone. Not one bit. "She was content to keep watching; she wouldn't have attacked for days, until she got word that the others were sick. I had time until you decided to take matters into your hands."
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"She wouldn't have even known what you fucking are if you hadn't given yourself away."
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Justification after the fact, the cleverness of a clever man who's known since he showed up and found out Johann was here that he'd need a reason.
He'd been ready to die. He'd left his death up to Halandrette and she had let him be washed away into the abyss.
Or perhaps washed away to find himself on a most curious vessel. He's not sure which idea he hates more.
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This isn't what he wanted when he started this fight. This, he tells himself, is the consequence of being on the Barge. This is Dorian's doing, giving him a new voice. And he hates it.
His next protest comes less freely. More hesitant. He can't and he won't speak against him so much. He's not ready for that.
"You need to be more careful, is all," he finally mutters.
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He's too much of a coward to push the blade in and too much of a coward to pull it out.
"You think too short term," he says quietly, no edges or points to the complaint. It's soft and wet and clings as he doesn't turn away. He doesn't look up, he looks away, but he stays standing, the heat of his body like a furnace against Johann in his blacks.
"Careful isn't just about risks. It's also taking opportunities. Herr Archer is a warden, one restricted by the laws of this place against harm to me as long as I offer none to him."
He points to the communicator on the table beside them, innocent enough.
"There are horrors and abominations in this place, Johann. I would arm myself better for the next danger that comes my way, especially when your Dorian can take away your means of protecting me on a whim. Can you tell me he won't?"
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Instead of answering, he leans down and grabs his face in his hands, kissing him firmly. It's an apology as much as it is a displacement of his affection.
He can only hope part of his argument sticks. He's worried. He doesn't want him to get involved in this if it's going to lead to his own demise. Mage hunters and magic - it's all over Johann's head, but who the fuck cares when he can just take his knife to it?
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He'll shed his own blood a different way.
"If we are to play this place as we did Elendhaven, I can hardly do it without using all at my disposal." A sigh. "The lessons are necessary. And you should most certainly attend."
A small smile.
"He has no idea he has two pupils, after all."
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He buries a kiss in his neck.
"I'll pay attention, but don't let them distract you. That's what they do here. They give you the shit that you want and then use it against you. Take it away."
Don't get complacent.
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"When have I ever let someone take from me without paying their due?"
Don't forget who your master is, Johann.
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"Mm, I do enjoy listening to you drone on about ledgers."
Not at all what Florian meant, but Johann slips back into his more comfortable role. That teasing voice, wandering hands, all of it a show of familiar normalcy.
This is Dorian's doing, he tells himself, even as he aches for missing his first non-Florian friend.
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Which have been wriggling through his brain for the last day or so.
"Is that the heights of your ambitions, Johann? To make me 'drone'?"
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"No, sometimes I want to shut you up," he purrs. "You talk too much."
He's not thinking about the barge. He's not thinking about Dorian or Trevor or Archer or Kanya or the image of Florian dying on the floor. All he has is him here, very much alive.
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Small fingers cling tightly, one leg lifting to sling up to Johann's hip, to beckon him. He won't be stopping him tonight.
"And whose fault is that?" Left to hang in the air while Johann leaves bruising along his neck.
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It's hard to think too much when he's being given so many green lights all at once, so the question is entirely forgotten after only a few moments.
The destination is very clear, but he takes his time, pausing to press Florian's back against the doorframe to kiss him again.
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"Were you intending on changing that?"
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But then a slow smile spreads across his face and the next kiss is hungry, more insistent, like he would devour him right there.
Tempted as he is to simply throw him onto the bed, he walks him there instead, laying him down gently and sitting up.
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He has accepted it in his heart but he's a Nordenman. The physical, the visceral, the real- he wants that too.
Johann is hungry, and he is hungry in return. Small hands and clever fingers are going to start working on his clothes, the same that carefully straightened them to attempt to make him look like a gentleman now opening them with desperate speed. And when Johann lays him down, something in his chest goes heavy and cracks and he grabs at him, says without words.
Mine.
Mine mine mine.
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Continuing ventures towards NSFW
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