Captive Prince: Volume Two

by S. U. Pacat

  He felt Laurent pulling back, pulling away, shuttering himself, trying but not quite able to manage a cool snap withdrawal.

  Laurent said, ‘Adequate.’

  Breathing roughened, still trembling with climax, Damen was pushing up, chasing the look in Laurent’s eyes to catch it before it was gone.

  He caught Laurent’s wrist, felt the fine bones, and the pulse, before Laurent could rise from the bed.

  Damen said, ‘Kiss me.’

  His voice was husky with pleasure that he yearned to share. He felt the warm flush that suffused his own skin. He had pushed himself up, so that his body made a curve, the planes of his abdomen shifting. Laurent’s gaze splayed out instinctively over him, then lifted to his own.

  He’d caught Laurent’s wrist before, to hold him back from a blow, a knife strike. He held him now. He could feel the desperate urge for retreat. He could feel something else too, Laurent keeping himself apart, as though, this act being finished, he had no template for what to do.

  ‘Kiss me,’ he said again.

  Dark-eyed, Laurent was holding himself in place as though pushing himself past a barrier, the tension in Laurent’s body still telegraphing flight, and Damen felt the shock with his whole body when Laurent’s gaze dropped to his mouth.

  His own eyes fell closed as he realised that Laurent was going to do this, and he held himself very still. Laurent kissed with a slight parting of his lips, as though he was unconscious of what he was asking for, and Damen kissed him back carefully, dizzy with the idea that the kiss would deepen.

  He drew back before it did, just far enough to watch Laurent’s eyes come open. His heart was pounding. For a moment, looking felt like kissing, an exchange in which the distinctions of intimacy blurred. He was leaning in slowly, tilting Laurent’s jaw with his fingers, and kissing him softly on the neck.

  It was not what Laurent had expected. He felt the slight shock of Laurent’s surprise, and the way Laurent held himself, as though confused as to why Damen wished to do this, but he felt the moment when surprise turned to something else. Damen allowed himself the minor delight of nuzzling. Laurent’s pulse reached a little crescendo under his lips.

  This time when he drew back, neither of them broke fully from the other. He lifted his other hand to brush Laurent’s cheek, slid fingers into his hair—shifting gold under his marvelling fingers. Then he took Laurent’s head gently in his hands and delivered the kiss he’d longed to deliver, long, slow and deep. Laurent’s mouth opened under his. He couldn’t stop the slow, spreading flush of heat he felt at the touch of Laurent’s tongue, the feel of his own, sliding into Laurent’s mouth.

  They were kissing. He felt it in his body, like a tremor he couldn’t still. He was shaken by the force of all he wanted, and he closed his eyes against it. He drew his hand down Laurent’s body, felt the raised gathers of the jacket. He himself was naked, while Laurent was fully, untouchably clothed.

  Laurent had been careful, since that first momentous disrobing in the palace baths, not to strip fully in front of him. But he remembered, from the baths, how Laurent had looked; the arrogant balance of his proportions, the fall of translucent water over white skin.

  He hadn’t appreciated it then. He hadn’t known, in the palace, how rare it was for Laurent to appear in anything less than full, impeccable dress, in front of anyone.

  He knew now. He thought of the servant he had seen attending Laurent earlier, how much he had disliked it.

  He lifted his fingers to the tie that closed Laurent’s collar. He had been trained to do this, he knew every intricate fastening. A sliver of opening widened, his fingers sliding up the fine line of Laurent’s collarbone, revealing it. Laurent’s skin was so pale that the veins in his neck were blue, stria in marble, and with silks and tents, shaded awnings and high-necked collars, its pristine fineness had been preserved even through a month on the march. Against it, his own skin, sun-darkened, seemed brown as a nut.

  They were breathing in tandem. Laurent was holding himself very still. When Damen pushed the jacket open, Laurent’s chest rose and fell under the thin white shirt. Damen’s hands smoothed down the lines of the shirt, and then, parting, opened it.

  Exposed, Laurent’s nipples were hard and puckered, the first tangible evidence of desire, and Damen felt a wild surge of gratification. His eyes lifted to Laurent’s.

  Laurent said, ‘Did you think I was made of stone?’

  He couldn’t stop the rush of pleasure he felt at that, said, ‘Nothing you don’t want.’

  ‘You think I don’t want it?’

  Seeing the look in Laurent’s eyes, Damen deliberately pushed him back onto the sheets.

  They were gazing at one another. Laurent was sprawled on his back, slightly mussed, one leg drawn up and pushed out slightly to one side, still wearing its immaculate boot. He wanted to slide his hand up Laurent’s ribcage to his chest, press his wrists down into the mattress, take his mouth. He closed his eyes and called on a heroic effort of restraint. Opened them.

  Lifting a hand idly to the exact place above his head where Damen might have pressed it, Laurent gazed back at him through veiled lashes. ‘Like being on top, do you?’

  ‘Yes.’ Never more so than at this moment. To have Laurent beneath him was heady. He couldn’t help drawing his hand down over Laurent’s taut stomach, over the controlled rise and fall of Laurent’s breath. He reached the faint line of hair, touched it with his fingertips. His fingers were now resting on the place where the line disappeared under symmetrical lacing. He looked back up.

  And found himself pushed backwards, sudden, unexpected impetus, and he sat back between Laurent’s legs, a little breathless. Laurent had placed his boot flat against the plane of Damen’s chest, and pushed. And he didn’t remove his boot from its position, he held Damen in place with it, the firm pressure of the ball of Laurent’s foot a warning to stay back.

  The flare of arousal he felt at that must have shown in his eyes.

  Laurent said, ‘Well?’

  It was a directive, not a warning: what Laurent was waiting for suddenly made itself plain. Damen put his hand around Laurent’s calf, the other on the heel of his boot, and pulled it off.

  As the boot hit the floor on the side of the bed, Laurent drew back his foot and replaced it with the other. It came off as deliberately as the first.

  He could see the rise and fall of Laurent’s breath, near his hipbone. Despite the cool tone, he was aware of the extent to which Laurent was holding himself in place, allowing himself to be touched. Tension still glinted in Laurent’s body, like the shine on a blade edge that would slice you open at the wrong touch.

  He was suddenly shaky with everything he wanted. He felt dizzy with competing impulses. He wanted to be gentle. He wanted to tighten his grip. They were kissing again, and Damen couldn’t stop touching him, couldn’t stop the slow slide of his hands over Laurent’s skin. There was an interval of touching, and Damen kissed him softer, sweeter. The edged seams and criss-crossings were distinct beneath his fingers. He pushed a finger between lacing and fabric, felt the slow draw of the lace, growing longer as he reached the vertex.

  Needing it suddenly, Damen pushed away and down and Laurent half-followed, hazily pushing up on one arm—uncertain, perhaps, of the purpose of this detour—until the moment Damen curled his fingers and pulled the fabric down to mid-thigh, then further.

  He tugged the pants down and off, smoothed his hand up Laurent’s thigh, feeling it flex. Reaching the juncture between leg and hip, he thumbed it, feeling the pulse beat wildly under the very fine skin there. Damen let himself experience dizzily just how much he liked the idea of controlled Laurent betraying himself in salt flavoured need into his mouth. He touched it with his hand and encountered a texture like hot silk.

  Laurent had hitched up, his jacket and shirt pushed down to his elbows, holding his arms half-restrained behind him.

  ‘I am not going to reciprocate.’

  Damen looked up. ‘What?�
�

  Laurent said, ‘I am not going to do that to you.’

  ‘And so?’

  ‘Do you want me to suck your cock?’ said Laurent, precisely. ‘Because I don’t plan to. If you are proceeding on the expectation of reciprocity, then you had best be forewarned that—’

  This was too convoluted for bed play. Damen listened, satisfied himself that in all of this talking there was no actual objection, then simply applied his mouth.

  For all his seeming experience, Laurent reacted like an innocent to this pleasure. He let out a soft shocked sound, and his body re-formed around the place where Damen was giving his attention. Damen held Laurent in place, hands to hips, and allowed himself to enjoy Laurent’s slight, helpless shifts and pushes, the quality of his surprise, and the hard act of repression that followed, as Laurent tried to even out his breathing.

  He wanted it. He wanted every stifled response. He was aware of his own arousal, half-forgotten, pushing against the sheets. He drew up to the head and furled his tongue there, so well pleased with the experience that he lingered, suckling, before sliding back down again.

  Laurent was, by far, the most controlled lover Damen had ever taken to bed. The head tossing and cries, the easy, open sounds of past lovers were in Laurent a single tremor, or slight hitch of breath. And yet, Damen found himself primed to each reaction, the tension of his stomach, the faint trembling of his thighs. Damen could feel Laurent’s cycle of reaction and repression beneath him, as impetus gathered, building in the lines of Laurent’s body.

  And felt it stymied. As rhythm built, Laurent’s body locked down, his responses repressed. Looking up, he saw that Laurent’s hands were fists in the sheets, his eyes closed, his head turned to one side. Laurent, out on the shattered edge of pleasure, was holding himself back from climax by sheer force of his impossible will.

  Damen drew off, pushed himself up to search Laurent’s face. His own body, fully primed, took up barely a quarter of his attention as Laurent’s eyes came open.

  After a long moment Laurent said, with painful honesty, ‘I . . . find it difficult to let go of control.’

  ‘No kidding,’ said Damen.

  There was a drawn-out pause. And then: ‘You want to take me, as a man takes a boy.’

  ‘As a man takes a man,’ said Damen. ‘I want to take pleasure in you, and to please your body with mine.’

  He said it with soft honesty. ‘I want to come inside you.’ The words rose, like this feeling within him. ‘I want you to come in my arms.’

  ‘You make it sound simple.’

  ‘It is simple.’

  Laurent’s jaw tightened, the shape of his mouth changed. ‘Simpler to play the man than to roll over, I venture.’

  ‘Then tell me your own pleasure. Do you think I’m just going to flip you over and mount?’

  He felt Laurent react to the words, and the realisation opened up inside him, like something tangible transmitted through the air.

  He said, ‘Is that what you want?’

  The words fell into a stillness between them. Laurent’s breathing was shallow, and his cheeks were flushed as he closed his eyes, as though he wanted to block out the world.

  ‘I want,’ said Laurent, ‘I want it to be simple.’

  ‘Turn over,’ said Damen.

  The words rose up from within him, a low, soft command, full of surety. Laurent closed his eyes again, as if in decision. Then he acted.

  In one smooth, practiced motion, Laurent turned onto his stomach, yielding to Damen’s gaze the clean curve of back and buttocks, the latter canting slightly upwards as his thighs slid apart.

  Damen wasn’t prepared for it. To see him present that way, the scintillant unfolding of limbs, it was nothing he’d ever thought Laurent would . . . this was where he wished himself to be, where he hoped—he’d barely let himself hope—they both wished him to be, but the words he’d meant as a prelude had brought them here before he was ready. He felt nervous suddenly, green, as he hadn’t felt since he was thirteen—uncertain of what lay on the other side of this moment, and wanting to be worthy of it.

  He drew his hand softly up Laurent’s side, and Laurent’s breathing went uneven. He could feel uneasiness pass over Laurent in waves.

  ‘You’re so tense. Are you sure you’ve done this before?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Laurent. The word came out sounding strange.

  ‘This,’ Damen persisted, placing his hand where it made his meaning explicit.

  ‘Yes,’ said Laurent.

  ‘But—wasn’t it—’

  ‘Will you stop talking about it.’

  The words were ground out. Damen was in the process of smoothing his hand up Laurent’s back, gentling his nape, kissing it, his head bent over it. He lifted his head when he heard that. Gently but firmly, he pushed Laurent back over, and looked down at him.

  Revealed beneath him, Laurent was flushed and his breathing was shallow, and in his glistering eyes was a desperate irritation that overlay something else. Yet Laurent’s exposed arousal was as hot and hard as it had been in his mouth. For all his bizarre nervy tension, Laurent was indisputably eager, physically. Damen searched his blue eyes.

  ‘Contrary, aren’t you,’ said Damen softly, thumbing over Laurent’s cheek.

  ‘Fuck me,’ said Laurent.

  ‘I want to,’ said Damen. ‘Can you let me?’

  He said it quietly, and waited, as Laurent’s eyes closed again, a muscle sliding in his jaw. The idea of being fucked very clearly had Laurent out of his mind, as desire competed with some sort of convoluted mental objection that really needed, Damen thought, to be dispensed with.

  ‘I am letting you,’ said Laurent, the terse words pushing out. ‘Will you get on with it?’

  Laurent’s eyes opened, meeting Damen’s gaze, and this time it was Laurent who waited, heat in his cheeks at the silence that opened up around his words. In Laurent’s eyes, impatience and tension overlay something unexpectedly young and vulnerable. Damen’s heart felt exposed, outside of his chest.

  He slid his hand up the length of Laurent’s arm where it lay outflung above his head, and, catching hold of Laurent’s hand, he pushed it down, pressed their palms into one other.

  The kiss was slow and deliberate. He could feel the light trembling in Laurent’s body, as Laurent’s mouth opened under his. His own hands felt unsteady. When he drew back it was only far enough to find Laurent’s gaze again, seeking assent. He found it, alongside a new flare of tension. Tension, he understood, was a part of it. Then he felt Laurent press a glass phial into his hand.

  Breathing was difficult. He could look nowhere but at Laurent, both of them here with nothing between them, and Laurent, allowing it. A finger slid inside. It was so tight. He moved it back and forward, slowly. He watched Laurent’s face, the slight flush, the fractional changes of his expression, his eyes wide and dark. It was intensely private. Damen’s skin felt too hot, too tight. His ideas of what might happen in bed with Laurent had not moved beyond an aching tenderness, which was only now finding physical expression. The reality of it was different; Laurent was different. Damen had never thought that it could be like this, soft and quiet and acutely personal.

  He felt the slide of oil, Laurent’s small, helpless movements, and the impossible sensation of his body beginning to open. He thought Laurent must be able to feel the beating of his heart inside his chest. They were kissing now, slow, intimate kisses, their bodies in full alignment, Laurent’s arms twining around his neck. Damen slid his free arm beneath Laurent, palm travelling over the flexing incurvations of his back. He felt Laurent draw up one of his legs, felt the slide of Laurent’s warm inner thigh, the press of Laurent’s heel into his back.

  He thought he could do it like this, coax Laurent with mouth and hands, give him this. Damen felt tight, slick heat with his fingers. It was impossible that he could put his cock there, yet he was unable to stop imagining it. He closed his eyes, felt the place where they were meant to interlock, to fit
.

  ‘I need to be inside you,’ he said, and it came out raw with desire and the effort of restraint.

  The tension in Laurent crested, and he felt Laurent push it down as Laurent said, ‘Yes.’

  He felt a rush of that sensation that pushed at his chest. He was going to be allowed this. Every connection of skin against skin felt too hotly intimate, yet they were going to draw closer. Laurent was going to let him in. Inside him. That thought came over him anew. Then it was happening, and he couldn’t think of anything but the slow press forward into Laurent’s body.

  Laurent cried out and his world became a series of fractured impressions. The head of his cock pushing into oiled heat, and the simultaneous feedback of Laurent, shuddering; the slide of muscle in Laurent’s bicep; his flushed face; the half fall of his yellow hair.

  He felt some sense that he needed to hold onto this, to hold it tight and never let it out of his grip.

  You’re mine, he wanted to say, and couldn’t. Laurent didn’t belong to him; this was something he could have only once.

  His chest hurt. He closed his eyes and forced himself to feel these slow, shallow thrusts, the slow push and drag that was all he could allow himself, his only defence against the instinct that wanted to push inside, deeper than he’d even been, to plant himself inside Laurent’s body and hold onto this forever.

  ‘Laurent,’ he said, and he was breaking apart.

  To get what you want, you have to know exactly how much you are willing to give up.

  Never had he wanted something this badly, and held it in his hands knowing that tomorrow it would be gone, traded for the high cliffs of Ios, and the uncertain future across the border, the chance to stand before his brother, to ask him for all the answers that no longer seemed so important. A kingdom, or this.

  Deeper, was the overwhelming drive, and he fought it. He fought to hold on, though his body was finding its own rhythm, his arms winding around Laurent’s chest, his lips at his neck, some closed-eyed desire to have him a close as possible.