32
As it happened, Astarion had never bedded an aasimar before. Everything seemed to be correctly shaped and in the right places. The markings scattered down his chest and shoulders glittered like gold leaf in the candlelight.
He was a trifle startled when den Suriel knelt and took him in his mouth. Somehow, he hadn’t expected the other man to do that with such ease and enthusiasm. His body, well-trained beast that it was, knew what was expected of it and responded.
What a picture we must make, he thought, threading his fingers through den Suriel’s hair. Like an allegorical painting. Vice Seducing Virtue. Hedonism Having His Cock Sucked by Nobility. Gods, what I wouldn’t give for a working mirror.
The image was enough to bring him to the edge. “Gods!” he hissed as the heat of the aasimar’s mouth slid along his length. “Gods, Hells—fuck!”
When he opened his eyes, den Suriel was already reaching for the wine. “I must take back everything I said about seminary. Clearly it had its uses.”
Den Suriel laughed. “It definitely taught us ways to amuse ourselves.”
Astarion dropped back onto one elbow, watching the other man move around the room with careless grace.
For a moment, he couldn’t imagine why the paladin had picked up his dressing gown, but then den Suriel draped it over the window, adding another layer to the curtains.
“Hopefully this will keep out the light for a bit.”
“One hopes. It’s your turn now, and I would hate to suddenly burst into flames.”
“That would put a damper on the mood.”
“Indeed, I—hold on. What is that on your back?”
“Oh.” Den Suriel reached over his shoulder and scratched lightly at the offending area. “Another gift from my grandfather.”
“May I?”
“Certainly. They aren’t terribly sensitive. Though they do itch sometimes if my armor presses on them wrong.”
Astarion stroked a hesitant finger across the line of small feathers that sprouted from each of the aasimar’s shoulder blades. They were soft and downy, not stiff like a bird’s flight feathers. On den Suriel’s angelic ancestor, they would have been full wings.
“Pity you can’t fly. I could have avoided being a bat entirely.”
“I will go out on a limb and say that the priest might have noticed a man in armor flapping around the cavern, carrying an elf.”
“That is a fair observation.” Astarion let his hands slide downward past the feathers, onto warm skin. “But enough about the priest. He is not who I wish to be thinking about right now.”
“Ahh…” Den Suriel turned and picked up the bottle of lover’s oil. “As to that…if you’re willing…?”
“Very much indeed.”
It took a little time, as such things always did. The aasimar went slowly, taking his cues from Astarion. The sword calluses on his palms were the only roughness about him, but he was strong rather than gentle, which suited Astarion fine.
“Tell me if I hurt you,” den Suriel murmured as he entered.
“You’ll have to work harder than that,” Astarion said, then bit back an exclamation as den Suriel took him at his word.
It was good. They found a rhythm, a slow, hard slide inside him that made Astarion buck his hips helplessly against the mattress. Den Suriel murmured things in his ear, filthy things that no good paladin should know, and the trained beast responded with a will.
It was good. And if it wasn’t quite what Astarion wanted, it was still all he knew how to do.
* * *
—
Astarion climbed to his feet and took a moment to locate his boots. He shoved his feet into them, not bothering with stockings.
“What time is it?” den Suriel asked from the bed.
Astarion gave him a languid smile. “Not dark yet. Go back to sleep. I need to use the privy.” He pulled on a dressing gown, the pink one this time, and picked up the hem so he didn’t trip over it.
“Mmm…” The paladin watched him but clearly didn’t think that he was going anywhere without his clothes—or the silk-wrapped vials placed so carefully on the nightstand. Astarion bent down and kissed the aasimar on the cheek.
He closed the door gently behind him and padded silently down the hall, dodging beams of light that came in through cracks in the ceiling. First to the privies, as he’d said, and then to the attics, where the Rat’s Run stored things for certain select customers.
At the top of the staircase, he paused for just a moment.
There was still some daylight. He could go back to the room, slide into bed next to den Suriel, and warm himself at the aasimar’s hearth fire a little longer.
Pretend for a few minutes that he was someone else, somewhere else, and that nightfall wouldn’t bring on death and ruin.
But it would only be a pretense, and there were too many illusions in Astarion’s life already.
He entered the attics, found the correct chest, and pulled on the clothes he kept there. The vials of blood he’d palmed slid neatly into his inner jacket pocket. Den Suriel was going to be quite surprised when he opened the silk package on the table and found his bottle of lover’s oil in it.
Astarion hoped, in a distant sort of way, that the paladin would be furious. It was so much easier to be furious than lost in despair.
He’ll have his god, which is more than I got, Astarion told himself, and slammed the lid of the chest with more force than was required.
He found Lief at work in her office. “Going, then?” the goliath asked.
“Yes. The paladin is going to be very distraught when he realizes I’m gone. I’d like to leave him a note.”
Lief pushed a sheet of foolscap across her desk. Astarion wrote a single line and signed it with a dramatic flourish.
“Doubt that’ll make him feel better,” Lief said, not even pretending that she wasn’t reading the note upside down.
“I would rather he feel like a jilted lover than a mark.”
Her dark eyes were entirely too knowing. “And which one is he?”
Astarion gave her a rueful smile but didn’t answer the question. “I suppose the smuggler’s door in the cellars is still there?”
The goliath nodded. Astarion bowed and swept out of the room.
Lief picked up the note he’d written and read it again.
I didn’t want to be the one to break you.
—A
* * *