One perfect eyebrow arches, the corner of Dream’s lips curling up to reveal a single sharply-pointed fang. His hair’s slicked back and glossy, his face paler than ever and lips stained ruby red. There’s another touch of red in the form of a waistcoat, nipping in his already tiny waist under the silk-lapelled evening jacket and either expertly tailored or slightly too small trousers. Over all of it, he’s wearing a flowing satin cape that swings around his ankles in place of his usual cardigan.

The whole effect makes Hob’s heart leap into his throat. Not that he doesn’t always think Dream is the most gorgeous creature ever to have walked the earth, but there’s something very sexy about the vampire getup.

“Are you all right?” Dream asks, closing the distance between them in a single stride. There are a few other parents milling about, but they’re alone just now in the kitchen, with a good view of the back garden with all its lights and happy kids, but concealed in a darkened corner.

“Umm,” Hob says. “Think I’m in the process of discovering an exciting new kink.”

Dream’s eyebrow arches again. “Really?” he asks, voice a low rumble. He reaches out with sharply pointed claws, running the tip of one along the ridge of Hob’s cheekbone.

Hob shivers under the touch.

Dream smirks. Hob loves it when he smirks. He loves knowing Dream’s secure enough to give him hell.

He loves Dream. So much.

“And what might that be?” Dream asks.

It takes Hob a solid handful of seconds to work out what he’s asking.

“Well there is a sexy bumblebee out there,” Hob says.

Dream narrows his eyes.

“But I’m obsessed with my beautiful creature of the night husband just now,” he says, toying with one of the buttons on Dream’s waistcoat. “You look stunning, love.”

Dream brightens, smiling broadly enough to show off both of his cute little fangs.

“Your stitching is very realistic,” he says, gently touching the thread Hob has glued to his forehead to make it look like he’s had the top of his skull sewed back on. He went through a couple of options before deciding on Frankenstein’s monster, and ultimately decided based on ease of movement in costume.

Dream’s cape is bound to get him into trouble between now and when the kids go to bed, but he looks fantastic in it.

“Is there more under your clothes?” Dream asks, running a hand down Hob’s jumper.

Hob laughs. “You’ll just have to wait and see,” he says, with a lovely little flutter in his belly. It’s so good to have this. To be so comfortably in love, so secure in being wanted.

Dream makes an unhappy noise.

“No one’s more upset about that than I am,” Hob says. “Could get away with a kiss?”

Dream hums, and all five of the claws on one hand scrape down Hob’s neck as he leans in, encouraging Hob’s mouth open one-handed and digging his false fangs deep into the flesh of Hob’s lower lip.

Thankfully, Dream also swallows down the needy moan he wrenches out of Hob. He chuckles, low and soft, and nips at Hob’s lips again.

“The fangs stay on, then,” Dream murmurs.

“And the claws,” Hob insists.

“And the claws,” Dream agrees easily. “I’m so glad you like it.”

“I love it,” Hob says, laughing helplessly. “I love you. Have I said?”

“Not for at least an hour,” Dream says.

“At least an hour, gosh. And you’re still with me?”

Dream smiles, eyes glinting as he looks over Hob’s face, the pad of his thumb stroking his cheek.

“Luckily,” Dream says. “I am also hopelessly in love with you. So I’m afraid we’ll have eternity together.”

Hob whines. "It's not—you know I'm happy to see you, always, I just—" His hands paw at Dream's waist, seeking skin beneath the layers and layers of sheer silk that make up Dream's robes. "Just…can't…"

Clearly his instincts are warring with his capacity for words, and Dream is moved to help. "This is only your second moon, since being turned."

"Yes, right, and it's—I'm not very good at—at controlling everything yet. I don't…I don't want you to see me like that."

"Hob." Dream cards gentle fingers through Hob's sweaty hair, cradles him close. "I am not in the habit of casting judgment upon you, not in all our centuries of acquaintance. Do not think me so callous as to start now."

Hob shudders, noses hotly from Dream's shoulder to his ear, breathing him in the whole way. "I might—hurt…I don't want to hurt you."

Dream threads his other hand into Hob's hair as well, guides Hob's eager mouth up the length of his throat and over his chin, tightens his grip and pulls Hob's head back until their eyes meet. "You cannot harm me, Hob Gadling, nor can you. Hurt me, in any way that matters." Hob's eyes are dark with lust, with the shadow of his impending transformation, and something in Dream thrills to the sight. "I would have you share this new facet of yourself with me, that I might know all of the ever-changing man who lays claim to my heart."

The noise Hob makes at that is very canine, a whimpering sort of whine, and he buries his face in the crook of Dream's neck again, inhaling shamelessly.

"Do you know how incredible you smell?" He's nosing into Dream's hair, panting, clutching at Dream's ribs.

"Tell me," Dream breathes, enchanted by this side of Hob, the rapid waning of his inhibitions by the moment.

"Always smelled good," says Hob, nosing down the side of his neck, kissing his bare shoulder where his robes have slipped. "But now it's so much more. Soft sheets n' clean air. Starlight." His parted lips trace over Dream's skin, back up behind his ear, and Hob inhales again. "Winter skies. When the moon is rising an' the frost's like diamonds in the trees."

"Such poetry, Hob Gadling," Dream breathes, and pulls Hob's head up and around to kiss him.

It is a thing of heat and urgency, this meeting of their mouths; Hob whines, surging forward, Dream pushing back, deftly avoiding the nip of Hob's teeth, biting lightly at Hob's lips in return. He coaxes Hob's tongue into play, stoking the fires of arousal between them until he feels near to combusting from the fervor of Hob's attentions.

"Wanna fuck you," Hob slurs, all breathless raw lust and desperate unfiltered passion as Dream finally draws back from the kiss.

"I should be gravely disappointed if you did not," he agrees, a gasping acquiescence, vanishing his robes for the sake of having Hob's hands upon him faster.

"But I'm about t'change, I can't—" Hob shudders all over, head to toe, hands splaying over Dream's narrow naked back despite himself. "You want me like that? You don't mind I'll get…feral?"

"Do you think, truly, that the king of nightmares would disdain the affections of a werewolf, whatever his state of transformation?" Dream presses himself up against Hob, groin to chest, pushes his hips brazenly forward and pulls one of Hob's hands to grip his arse, to indicate to Hob that he should take such liberties himself. "Feel, how you arouse me, how I want you—"

With a whine, Hob seizes the backs of both thighs and yanks them apart, lifting Dream up and around him, and Dream is. Delighted, to note the thrill that runs through him to be manhandled thus. His arms have wrapped behind Hob's neck already and he dives in for another kiss, eager, demanding.

Hob meets him with tongue, with teeth, the promise of devouring in the growl that rises in his throat, and then Hob is turning, stumbling forward; he throws Dream onto the bed with a soft bounce and crawls after, panting, trembling.

The moon is nearly cresting the horizon.

Dream opens his legs, wide, inviting Hob between them. "Take off your clothing, that it might be spared—" He is tugging at the hem of Hob's t-shirt, yanking it up and off over Hob's head, and then Hob falls upon him as he is attempting the confounded buttons of Hob's jeans. Hob's mouth is hot and wet and desperate, mauling Dream's with delicious fervor; Dream manages to open Hob's fly at last and immediately he plunges a hand inside, beneath underwear, seizes the hard length of Hob's cock with a groan.

Hob cries out, gasping, rutting into Dream's fist until Dream lets go, grasping at the opened trousers and wrestling them down Hob's beautiful hairy thighs. Hob drops his face to Dream's chest, mouthing at his skin with abandon and wriggling to help be rid of his jeans, kicking them off at last and grabbing Dream's arms, pushing them up over his head. Dream stares back with challenge and invitation simmering in his gaze, but Hob has buried his face in Dream's chest again, inhaling deeply and moving over a nipple with a passing lick, dipping down to scent up the side of Dream's rib cage to under his lifted arm, where he laves his tongue in long licks.

"Want you," he whimpers, eyes fever bright when they turn to meet Dream's from that vantage. "God, Dream, I want you so bad—"

"Then have me, Hob Gadling." Dream's own want shivers through him, prick throbbing where the hair of Hob's belly drags against it, and he is bereft at this point of all but the thinnest veneer of patience and pride. "Have me as you wish to; let the moon shape you anew and sate your appetites upon me—"

A sliver of moonlight spears through the window and Hob rears up, head thrown back, lets out a fearsome cry as his form shifts. His arms and legs go sleek and sinewy, claws growing in on his fingers and toes; the hair on his body thickens and spreads into proper fur, rich and golden brown. His cock juts proudly between his thighs, glistening dusky red and dripping, and he has sprouted a tail which bobs eagerly behind him as he falls forward again, caging Dream between his arms. His hair is longer, shaggier, ears tapering up into tufted points; his face is somewhat elongated, velvety fur along the burgeoning shape of a muzzle, nose keen and twitching, sharp teeth bared in excitement. And his eyes—

They are still Hob's eyes, dark and warm beneath the feral veneer, and they still burn with want of him.

"Hob, my Hob—" Dream wraps eager legs around Hob's body, draws Hob in to where he has made himself slick and open and ready, and Hob slides easily home with a whine. His hips move on instinct, immediately finding a rhythm until he is fucking with glorious abandon, and Dream arches his head back, moans his pleasure, digs his heels into the sleek fur of Hob's buttocks. Hob's tail brushes his toes intermittently; Hob's clawed fingers rake over his skin, clutching, possessive, soft pink lines rising along Dream's arms and ribs in their wake. Dream reaches up, buries his hands in the thick glory of Hob's mane and kisses his jagged mouth, tongue skirting the dangerous teeth with ease.

He caresses the soft velvet tip of Hob's ear and Hob tilts into it, needy noises spilling from him as he breaks the kiss; he licks a stripe up the length of Dream's throat, bites at his chin, tucks his reshapen face into the crook of Dream's neck, scenting him as before.

"Smell good," Hob manages, voice a guttural fractured shadow of his usual tones but lavishing the same ardent praise upon Dream, who thrills at the duality of it. Hob is still fucking him with delightful abandon; he rises up, leans back on his knees—knees which are still more human than canine—and grasps Dream firmly by the hips, careful with his claws. The full moon through the window casts the golden tones of his fur in molten highlight, magnificent to behold as he towers above Dream. He pulls Dream down onto himself in the same motion as he's thrusting in, and the deep jolt of pleasure has Dream's head lashing back, voice rising, back arching. He lets his arms fall above his head, the picture of passive debauchery even as his legs clench and shift about Hob, heightening Hob's rhythm, and when Hob speeds up just a little bit Dream cries out as orgasm tears through him like wildfire.

Hob grunts his satisfaction as Dream comes down from it, draws out despite the fact he clearly has not yet come. He shuffles about, clawed hands careful as they push Dream higher along the bed until Hob can dip to the mess on Dream's stomach. He laps it up, cool nose and warm tongue going everywhere—Dream's abdomen, the spent length of his cock, his testicles and the creases of his thighs. Dream arches into the attentions, already wanting for more, petting restlessly through Hob's hair as Hob finishes cleaning him up.

"Taste good," Hob says, looking up, overlong tongue curling across his semi-canine nose and licking his own short muzzle clean. He rises up and his claws grasp Dream's hips, and there's a sound in his throat halfway between growl and purr with nothing of humanity in it. It is clear in his demeanor that he wishes to resume fucking; it his clear in his eyes that he wishes assurance that Dream is amenable to whatever happens next. "Dream—" His claws flex, grip tighter.

His name spoken in that gutteral, primal voice swells the currents of want within Dream, makes him ache with need. He pushes up on one elbow, reaches to caress Hob's face with tender desperation, thumb running soft and restless over the fine fur, reaching to stroke behind his pricked-up ear. "Do as you please with me, beloved," he pants, keyed up, fraught with anticipation. "I am at your mercy, I submit to your ardor, willingly—"

And abruptly he finds himself thrown onto his front, lifted and turned and tossed down again so swiftly as to seem instantaneous, with Hob heavy atop him, pressing him into the bed. He is not rough, precisely, but neither is he gentle; his hands are all over Dream, grasping, claws pricking. His breath huffs hot against the back of Dream's neck, followed by his tongue, which then travels in lapping strokes down the knobs of Dream's spine to his open hole. Hob noses into him with an eager huff and Dream whimpers, clutches at the bedclothes and spreads his legs wider. Hob licks at him enthusiastically, little grunts and whines of delight, claws pricking at the backs of his thighs as he presses them still further open; his thumbs brush along their soft inner curves, claws gentle, and Dream is left trembling with want at the perfect balance of care and danger implicit in that touch.

He whines, bereft, when Hob at last abandons his hole and licks back up, up, until Hob is looming over him and setting first tongue and then teeth to the nape of his neck, a careful scrape that makes him shudder, makes him moan, makes him beg.

"Hob—please—"

Hob rises up, plants one clawed hand between Dream's shoulder blades, presses him down with a breathless growl. His cock bumps along the cleft of Dream's arse and Dream shudders, ready, wanting, his patience spent. Hob's hips move, the tip of his prick nudging at Dream's hole and Dream whines, trembling, thighs spread as wide around Hob's splayed knees as they will go. His voice spills from him, short and desperately eager.

"Have me—take me—Hob, please—" Hob's cock slides swiftly into him all at once, all the way to the hilt, and Dream gasps a short shuddering moan, squirms fruitlessly in pursuit of more. "Be ruthless in your use of me, Hob, my Hob—!"

Hob is nothing if not obedient.

Dream surrenders readily to the molten relief of finally being well and thoroughly fucked face down in Hob's bed, one of Hob's clawed hands gripping the back of his neck and the other laced with his own from behind; he gladly allows himself to be pinned thus. His face is mashed sideways into the pillow, muffling his open-mouthed cries somewhat; his hips are pushed up to welcome every fierce thrust, open and greedy, wanton in his need to let Hob claim and consume him. He struggles experimentally, mewling like prey; Hob's clawed grip clenches tight on his neck and the snarl that tears out of Hob's throat nearly has Dream coming again.

Hob somehow increases the ferocity of his thrusts and Dream trembles in his implacable hold, giving voice to his pleasure as Hob slams into him again and again and again, crying out as Hob moves faster, harder. It is exquisite, everything, a savagely beautiful inferno kindling within him, roaring to life in a glorious conflagration of possession, of claiming, of lust and want fulfilled.

He will feel Hob deep in the core of him for days.

It is precisely what he wishes.

He knows full well that he will not last, not in the face of Hob's primal vigor; indeed, all too soon he is verging on climax and frustratingly, exhilaratingly, there is absolutely nothing he can do about it. Hob pins him down and pounds him inexorably up to the precipice and then over into the throes of orgasm, continues relentlessly as Dream shakes and sobs with it, fucks him mercilessly through it such that his eyes are streaming with the sharpness of his pleasure and his voice has gone ragged, hoarse. He thrashes in Hob's grip, crying out breathlessly, body spasming around Hob's pistoning cock again and again; Hob pins him all the more firmly, fucks him snarling and growling all the harder until he is coming again, helpless, screaming and overwrought, mindless in his pleasure and soaking the pillow with his tears and saliva.

And then, and then Hob comes, at long last, howling to the heavens, and the heat of his spend flooding into Dream is exquisite; the way his body swells to keep them locked together after is the most precious and priceless sensation that Dream can imagine. He sobs and squeezes himself tight around it, unable not to, still shaking, and revels at the feel of yet more spend jetting weakly into him, oozing from Hob as Dream clenches hard on his knot and bears down again and again to milk him dry.

Hob collapses to his side at last, Dream caught close up against his velvety chest, furry-sinewy arms wrapped about Dream's ribs and stomach. He noses contentedly into Dream's hair, snuffling his scent, and Dream lies fucked out and slack and blissfully content, the fullness of Hob swollen within him, lets all of his disparate thoughts drift idly together, slowly coming back to himself.

He is not offended when Hob falls asleep still tied inside him, wrapped possessively around him. He is the Shaper of Forms. It would be less than a thought to shift himself free of the knot, out of Hob's lax hold, to return to his own realm and find Hob there.

He waits it out, content in Hob's embrace, warm, sated, coveted and treasured.

When nature has run its course and Hob's cock at last shrinks from within him, Dream slips free of Hob's corded and clawed arms and out of the bed, turns and leans over Hob's half-shifted form, presses a kiss to the furry slope of his forehead. "Sleep, Hob," he murmurs, breathing his power into it, and Hob's body loses all tension, transforms smoothly and quietly into his full wolf shape. He snuffles into the pillow with a little whine, still deeply asleep; Dream gives him another kiss, this one brushed to his snout, letting Dream's scent waft into his twitching nose. Hob snuffles again, contentedly, and Dream draws up the bedclothes to where Hob can easily reach them when he changes back in the morning. Dream has seen the vague shape of Hob's worries in nightmares, of running rampant, of causing harm; his power will ensure that Hob sleeps soundly through the night, at home and at peace.

He expects to find Hob in his usual human shape when he slips naked back into the Dreaming with the leavings of their lovemaking leaking from his body, but it is Hob's full wolf form that greets him—whining happily, tail wagging, nosing eagerly between Dream's legs to lick at the mess spilling down his thighs. Clearly Hob's appetites are yet unsated, as Dream had hoped, and Dream entertains the thought of kneeling for him just like this, of allowing Hob in wolf form to mount him and claim him while he yet wears his human shape.

But such privilege, he knows, is sweeter if one is made to work for it.

He shapes himself as a wolf, then, sleek and night-shaded where Hob is broad-chested and finely colored, and drops to all fours while Hob is still nosing about his genitals, eagerly scenting and licking. He draws away, presents his backside with tail raised in invitation; he allows Hob a few licks of interest there, where the remnants of their waking tryst have left him wet and open and ready. But when Hob sets paws about his flanks and moves to mount him he jumps away, flicks his tail lightly across Hob's snout and dashes off, checking over his shoulder to see that Hob follows.

Hob is leaping after him in an instant, jaws grinning open; Dream shoots into the underbrush and races deep into the dense woods of Hob's dreamscape, thrilling to the sounds of Hob's pursuit. He leads him a satisfying chase, always barely out of reach among the trees just ahead, tantalizing, a tease, and when Hob howls with exhilaration, Dream echoes him in kind. And when at last he allows Hob to catch him, to wrestle him to the ground with teeth clamped in the fur of his neck, to mount him and fuck him and knot him again, the surrender is all the sweeter for having been earned.

=== Started: 10/13/23 Drafted: 10/31/23 Posted: 11/2/23

He stumbles upright, nearly falling over his trunk that's somehow made it all the way from the car to the front of his armchair. His head feels fuzzy; maybe he's coming down with something. Maybe he should have skipped the conference after all - he'd been so intent on leaving and getting back to Morpheus that he can barely remember the whole sodding drive back. Morpheus had started to grow withdrawn, the more he had been left alone for these kinds of scientific gatherings. But still, money needed to be earned and Morpheus had been in a bit of a state for a while now.

He stretches, neck popping, and wanders through the darkening hallway to the stairs. There's light coming from the small second bedroom that Morpheus calls his study. Of course, his dependably byronic dream of a partner would hole himself up in there on a day like this. Morpheus has always been prone to moods and depressive episodes - they'd always overcome them together. There's a strip of light creeping into the dimness of the hall where Morpheus had left the door ajar and he stops just outside of its reach.

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