Chapter 3 #2
Zazyrus's grip loosens. Slowly. Deliberately. His clawed fingers release Lethe's wrist one by one, a controlled uncurling that is its own kind of language, and his hand lowers to rest on his own thigh. His expression doesn't change. His eyes don't leave Lethe's face.
Permission. Grudging, guarded, conditional. But permission all the same.
"Thank you," Lethe says, and means it.
He reaches again. This time Zazyrus doesn't stop him. Lethe hooks his fingers into the waistband of his pants and pulls it down, carefully, over the hip, exposing the wound and the skin around it.
The gash runs from Zazyrus's hipbone down across the hollow where his hip meets his thigh, and the skin around it is dark and marked and taut over muscle that is dense and hard.
The waistband pulls lower, revealing the cut of his hip in full, the deep V of muscle that frames his lower abdomen, and the thick, powerful curve of his upper thigh.
Lethe can see the edge of his glute where the fabric pulls, the heavy swell of it, and the markings that trace the ridge of his hipbone in patterns that follow the contour of muscle and disappear further down.
His mouth goes dry.
He stares at the wound. Just the wound. He forces his eyes to the wound and keeps them there and begins cleaning it with hands that are steady because they have to be, because if his hands aren't steady the stitches won't be even and if the stitches aren't even the wound won't heal properly and this is about healing, this is about the work, this is about the gash and the threat of infection and nothing else.
The skin beneath his fingers is hot. The muscle twitches when he touches the edge of the wound and Lethe's breath catches and he covers it with a cough that fools no one, least of all himself.
He's close. He has to be close to work on this area, his face level with Zazyrus's hip, and he can smell him again, that warm, animal scent that isn't unpleasant, and the heat radiating off his body is extraordinary and Lethe's hands are steady and his stomach is tight and he is not thinking about the shape of this body under his hands. He is not.
He threads the needle. "This is a deep one," he says, and his voice is professional, controlled, perhaps a half-tone too high but serviceable. "It's going to take more stitches than the others. Try to hold still."
He sets the first stitch. Zazyrus's abdomen contracts, the muscles clenching hard under the skin, and Lethe's free hand presses flat against his hip to steady him and the contact is firm and broad and his palm spans the curve of Zazyrus's hipbone and the heat of it burns through his skin.
Stop. Stop it. Focus.
He stitches. One, two, three. His narration has gone quieter, thinner, the words coming automatically while the rest of his mind splits between the precision of the work and the growing, terrible awareness of the body beneath his hands.
Four, five. The wound is closing cleanly.
Six. His thumb shifts against Zazyrus's hip and he feels the ridge of the marking there, the raised texture of it, and his thumb traces it without permission and he catches himself and stops and his face burns.
Seven stitches. He ties off the thread. Cuts it. Applies salve. Bandages.
"Done," he says, and his voice is not quite steady on the word. He pulls Zazyrus's waistband back into place, his fingers careful not to linger, and sits back on his heels and busies himself with his satchel because he needs something to do with his hands that isn't touching Zazyrus's skin.
He can feel the beast's eyes on him. He doesn't look up.
If he looks up, Zazyrus will see the color in his face and the heat in his eyes and whatever is happening in Lethe's expression right now that he doesn't have the composure to control.
So he packs his supplies with methodical precision, tin first, then thread, then needles, and he keeps his head down and his breathing even and he does not think about the cut of Zazyrus's hips or the weight of his hand on Lethe's wrist or the way the muscle felt under his palm.
"I'll come back tomorrow," he says. He stands.
His knees ache from the cold stone and he's grateful for the ache because it's grounding, real, something to focus on that isn't the heat still sitting in the pit of his stomach.
"Those hip stitches especially need monitoring.
Deep wounds in that area are prone to reopening. "
He makes it to the cage door. Calls for the guards. The lock turns.
He does not look back.
***
In his cot that night, Lethe stares at the ceiling and his body won't settle.
He lies on his back with his hands folded over his stomach and he thinks about Zazyrus's grip on his wrist. The controlled strength of it.
The way his clawed fingers curled around the bones with a pressure that said stop and not I will hurt you.
The distinction matters. It matters enormously, and Lethe keeps turning it over in his mind, examining it from every angle, because the creatures in the pits don't make that distinction.
They react. They lash out. They bite and claw and snap because they're afraid and in pain and have learned that violence is the only language humans understand.
Zazyrus didn't lash out. He stopped Lethe with exactly as much force as was needed and not an ounce more. He communicated a boundary without breaking bone, without drawing blood, without doing any of the things he is clearly capable of doing. And when Lethe explained the necessity, he let go.
He chose not to.
The phrase echoes in Lethe's head. Not couldn't move but chose not to.
The chains are thick, yes, but Lethe has been around fighters long enough to know the difference between a creature restrained by iron and a creature restrained by decision.
Zazyrus could have had his hand around Lethe's throat before the guards registered the sound.
The chains are for show. They both know it.
The beast sits still because he decides to sit still, and that decision is the only thing standing between Lethe and a very brief, very final end.
He should be terrified by that.
He rolls onto his side and presses his face into his pillow and breathes and his body is still warm, still restless, still thrumming with something that isn't fear.
The sense-memory of skin under his hands.
The heat of Zazyrus's hip against his palm.
The smell of him, warm, alive, male, nothing at all like the cold, wine-sour stench of Demos that Lethe associates with touch and intimacy and the things that happen in the dark.
He hasn't been attracted to anyone in years.
Hasn't felt this pull, this ache, this specific, targeted wanting that fixes on one body and won't let go.
He thought he was past it. He thought the years of Demos had scraped him clean of anything resembling desire, leaving only function and endurance and the blank, practiced absence he retreats into when his body is being used.
But today, kneeling between Zazyrus's legs with his face inches from the beast's hip, Lethe's body remembered something he thought it had forgotten. And now it won't let him sleep.
He presses his face harder into the pillow. His skin is hot. His stomach is tight. He can feel his own pulse in places he hasn't felt it in years, insistent and undeniable, and he thinks no. Not this. Not now. Not him.
Because wanting is dangerous. Wanting in the pits is suicide.
Wanting a fighter, a beast, a creature who kills humans on instinct and has every reason to kill Lethe too, is a particular kind of madness that he cannot afford.
He can't want Zazyrus. He can't want anyone.
The last time he wanted something, Demos found out, and what Demos does to the things Lethe wants is the reason Lethe stopped wanting.
He rolls onto his back. Stares at the ceiling. The bells ring in the corridor outside. A guard passes, boots heavy on the stone.
He thinks about Zazyrus's hand on his wrist. The weight of it. The warmth. The careful, deliberate release.
He thinks: don't do this to yourself.
He doesn't sleep for a long time.