Log -Death and Perturbation

[umgekehrt]

Who: Stildyne and the Marquis de Sade
Where: The Marquis' quarters
What: The Marquis is bothered. Stildyne wants to know why.
When: The night of this thread.
Warnings: Likely talk about sex, possibly sex outright. Mentions of very mild bloodplay.


Stildyne had promised to stay out of whatever was bothering the Marquis, at least until they could talk it over in private. But he was curious, and worried. He owed the nobleman quite a bit and wouldn't be happy if it runed out he'd been neglecting him.

He came in casual clothing-- a short-sleeved shirt, as he'd been wearing, to conceal the bandage still fresh on his shoulderblade-- and knocked on the Marquis' door.

Comments

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

The Marquis was actually redressing his bed when the knock came. His sheets from the night before lay crumpled on the floor, spatters of blood still visible on them. He left them for now, though he uttered his dog's name to warn her away from them. Since she'd first gotten a whiff of it the night before she'd been whistling unhappy under her breath, and she would not be satisfied until the scent was gone from the room.

The door distracted the both of them, thankfully. She beat him to it, and seemed happy, knowing before he did who it was, and the Marquis opened it to Stildyne and a tired smile on his own face.

"Come in, Brachi."

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

Stildyne stepped in, closing the door behind him quickly so that he could greet the other man with a kiss on the cheekbone. "Donatien. What's wrong?" His eyes flickered around the room, lingering on the discarded sheets, and he frowned.

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

"Short and to the point," he murmured. "Come and sit." He led him over to the area by the fire and sat down on the sofa. "I am happy to have helped you," he assured him. "Still, in retrospect it has left me...somewhat unsettled."

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"Well. That's not what I'd wanted." Again, short and to the point. Stildyne sat next to the other man, a hand on his knee in reassurance.

He wasn't sure who had suggested it, but he remembered that it had come on the tail of a particularly lengthy rant on his own part about the mental beating the death toll had subjected him to and how much it unnerved him not to have any physical proof of so much damage, and the upshot was that three clean cuts were healing nicely on his right shoulderblade. The number had been in debate between them, but the port had bothered Stildyne enough to push for the third.

"Tell me about it," he urged, rubbing the Marquis' leg with his thumb.

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

"Brachi, I have done things in the past that I own but of which I am not especially proud. Drawing blood from another person, with the exception of wartime altercations, was a very rare occurrence and not one that I relished."

This, perhaps, belied his rather blatant reaction to their excursions the previous evening. And he knew this.

"I enjoyed myself with you last night, in so many ways, moreso than I have in a while, actually. But it must be because of the control it represented, the trust you afforded me," and there he went couching a very intense, animal act in the terms he'd in the last three years learned to analyze his own behaviors. "...But I'm not a violent man. I do not wish you to think that I am."

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"I don't think you are," Stildyne assured him. "It's never an impression I've taken of you. I didn't take any particular pleasure in the physical half of it, either. But I do trust you. Implicitly. And trust you not to be violent."

The irony was that if de Sade was a real sadist, of the caliber Stildyne knew-- had been a man like Koscuisko, to whom power was an aphrodisiac and screams were a lover's invitation-- Stildyne never would have let him within a mile of him with an edged weapon. This man, for his apparent reputation and what he had heard were pretty shocking writings, he'd trusted implicitly to sit on his back and open his skin so that he stopped waking up in the middle of the night and wondering if he'd only dreamt dying.

"I hadn't wanted it to bother you. If it did, I'm sorry-- a little easy peace of mind on my part isn't worth yours."

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

He shook his head. "I am pleased to put your mind at ease, dearheart," he murmured. "And given how easily I rose to the occasion you had little reason to think any differently."

Oh Marquis. You and your double entendres.

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"We've got our games, you and I." Stildyne lifted the hand up to the other man's face, stroking his brow and cheek with his knuckles. "And games are all, for both of us. You had as much right to think I'd suddenly developed a taste for pain, the way I acted after." Enthusiastically, frankly. The adrenaline that had resulted from the first act had found a very useful place in the aftermath. "Is there anything else, besides fear I'd read you wrong?"

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

He found himself leaning into him with ease, rather enjoying the ease with which a companion had suddenly come into his existence again. It was such a mundane thing, to take pleasure simply from sharing warmth with another human body, but it was one he had taken for granted in the past and then sorely missed in times between. It should not have, but the thought reminded him of Pavi, and how he had tried to do things with him in a way he thought might be considered "normal".

The disaster that had been his birthday present, and so uncharacteristic of him.

But whatever the implications, however it looked, he had especially enjoyed a warm body to cling lean against. Scents to inhale.

Now it was much the same, and he wondered, then, if he should hesitate.

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"You're thinking harder than an overloaded engine core," Stildyne said quietly, his windy, ruined voice pitched low. He shifted closer, thigh to thigh, shoulders brushing, and let his hand linger against the Marquis' face.

"Anything I can help with?"

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

I'm simply thinking of where I was at this time a year ago, and a year before that. ...And simply supposing the state of being mildly disturbed is perhaps not so bad.

[He offers a little smile.]

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"Why don't you tell me about where you were last year? You know I like hearing you talk," Stildyne offered. On the one hand it wasn't a very subtle offer to play counselor; on the other hand he really did enjoy hearing the man talk.

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

"Lonely, married to my work as always." That was the short of it, anyhow. "I remember going into port, catching the eye of a lovely young local, and then feeling especially bitter and ugly that one little shit of an Inmate had charmed her right out from under me."

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

Stildyne sucked air through his teeth. "Bad hour, then. I can't imagine someone out-charming you." He leaned in to chase off the reminiscence with a kiss to the jawline, a thumb swiped across the cheek as he cradled the Marquis' chin.

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

"Oh, I would dispute that he was more charming, just younger and better looking." He murmured this with half-bemusement as Stildyne's lips touched his jaw. He turned his face to catch them with his own in a lingering kiss part to return the gesture in kind and part to stop any immediate objections, much as they would have fed his ego.

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

Catch him not indulging, when it was on offer. He kissed the other man with patient thoroughness, essaying a little bit of escalation, the offer that things could get a good deal less verbal very fast, if that was what they both wanted.

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

The Marquis flattened a palm against the man's chest to steady him -- the hint of toned muscle hidden under layers of clothing inviting memories of interludes previous not just the night before but now some months speckled with nights, mornings and sometimes afternoons in mostly gentle congress, caution exercised to favor his stubbornly slow-healing ribs and the pressure it placed upon his back. He had read somewhere that sometimes the injured would continue to feel pains even past the point of full recovery -- not because of the nature of the injury but want for medicines. The notion that the pain might be all in his head might have been comforting if it did not still inconvenience him -- if Brachi did not still hesitate when he commanded him vigoureux with good reason, because he knew the difference between the cry of a man ecstatic and a man in agony.

The thought was enough that he hesitated.

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"You're doing it again. Getting deep in your own head," Stildyne rumbled, an undertone of amusement.

He knew that the sex wasn't always what his lover wanted, tried to indulge him as much as possible in his desire for the hard and rough without doing damage. It hadn't yet gotten to the point where he'd been turned down for the lack. Well, perhaps it had, at that.

"Donatien. Tell me how I can make it good for you. I've got a few limits. You know them." Outright rape, or the illusion thereof-- not if Stildyne was the one performing. Anything that smacked of formalized torture, whether Stildyne was doing it or taking it. "Beyond that... I'm not easily shocked. Can we find a side road into what you like? Make up the lack in some other quarter?"

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

"It is good, Brachi," he purred, "and far more than I have come to hope for in the last year, certainly. I am more frustrated at my own limitations than any I could perceive in you."

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"Mm, it is good. But what if I want to spoil you?" Stildyne asked, dropping his hand to squeeze a thigh significantly. "What if I want to see you surprised into delight? A bit helpless at your own reaction? What then?" He nipped the other man's lower lip in punctuation.

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

The Marquis jumped at that, just slightly, a tingle of interest crawling along his spine. "Well I should think -- " He tilted his head back to glance at him mischievously. "-- that if I told you what to do it would no longer be a surprise, oui?"

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"You give me credit for too much creativity," Stildyne grumbled, but stood up sharply, reaching down to haul the other man up into a two-armed carry. "I'll see what I can do."

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

The Marquis made a soft noise, perhaps of surprise, as he was lifted, and he quickly wrapped his comparatively smaller arms around the neck of the other man for balance. It always surprised him how much stronger Stildyne was than he, physically, and he tried not to tell himself it was old age to blame, more that the Marquis had never himself been the warrior type. This was quite how he tended to view Chief Stildyne; they were each of clearly differing birth, each with their own flaws and perks.

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

Stildyne had felt his age coming on. Couldn't rebound like he once had. Maybe he had only years left of active security work, instead of octaves.. but he'd always been strong and likely would be up onto his death bed.

And his back and knees complained slightly at the lift, but not in any really prohibitive way, so he carried the Marquis to bed and laid him out on it, flipping him onto his stomach, still fully clothed, and sitting beside him.

"I'm going to need you to tell me how much you like the feel of the rough stuff. And how much you like the idea. I'll beat it out of you if I have to," he said mildly, but the slap he laid on the man's attractive hindquarters, cushioned by the trousers, was more promise than real pain of any kind.

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

"Mm." He shifted on the bed, the smallest twitches of interest promising this could become rather deliciously uncomfortable if carried on too long, but the Marquis turned slightly to place a gentle hand on Stildyne's arm. "Brachi, you must be kind," he said with seriousness, but care. "Things got under way rather quickly last night, and I'm still a little tender."

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"When it comes to that-" and Stildyne meant to drag it out to the point of frustration- "why don't I see if I can take the receptive end and still make you feel overtaken?" He was a little too stiff, maybe, for the athleticism that Stoshi had shown, but damned if he didn't want to see how the other man would like it. "Cousin Stanoczk showed me a trick or two. And it would give tender parts a chance to rest."

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

The Marquis raised an eyebrow, turning onto his side to look at him more fully. Since he had a habit of avoiding women of a dominant nature, with some exceptions, it was rare that what Brachi described was something he put into practice. He was apt to take the more dominant role with Paviche time and again and that...even despite his brief visit...felt distant. And Paviche was simply not the man sitting before him.

"You have my attention, Chief Stildyne."

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"I'm only saying, it may not be the experience you expect to lie under while someone takes the top seat, keeps you from moving the way you'd like. He may have tied my hands, at the time." A discrete cough. "Put plainly. For all I was inside him, with him over me that way, it didn't feel like I was the one doing the fucking."

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

"And would that please you?" he inquired, trailing a carefully manicured and shaped fingernail along his arm. His own interest was spelled out in his eyes as he considered his form, perhaps imagining the sight of him that way.

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"I haven't tried it from his position. But I'd like to." Stildyne's look was hot, predatious. "Been a while since I had a good solid seeing to. I can't say I haven't missed it."

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

"Well, that is dire," the Marquis mused. "And you're certain I'll be enough for you?"

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"Fishing for compliments?" That was a wicked double entendre if you know what the Aznir called a man's piece, but he'd bring that up later. He was more interested at the moment in jamming a hand under the other man's hips to roughly cup and handle his groin. "I know what caliber you're shooting with and it's plenty to keep me satisfied. I like it a little easier than you. Being the fragile soul I am," he smirked.

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

He shut his eyes, sighing long and deep as he felt a spasm of interest swelling beneath Stildyne's hand. "You are anything but fragile, dumpling."

[der-umgekehrte.livejournal.com]

"Mmm, I want to know how it feels with a gravity assist," Stildyne muttered, leaning down to mouth along the man's cheek as he molested him. "You can lie back and take it, and I'll take this." He squeezed sharply.