#dongfell

“Yer doin’ it again.”

Frisk was so lost in thought that it took him a moment to realize Sans had said something, and another to properly hear it. “Doing what again?” the priest inquired, sitting up from his half-slouch over the table.

The giant skeleton sauntered over and tapped the wood surface. Frisk thought at first that he meant the plates from dinner they hadn’t cleaned up yet, but no: Sans was looking at Frisk’s hands. “That thing with yer fingers. Ya wiggle ‘em sometimes when you’re really out of it.” Sans demonstrated with a waggle of his own phalanges, seating himself not far away. “Are ya mad about somethin’? If you wanna wring somebody’s neck, I can do it for ya,” he added generously.

Frisk snorted, scratching his ribs through the shirt he wore under his robe, noticing how Sans’ gaze instantly followed the motion. Better stay on topic; he wasn’t eager for more questions about why human males only sort of had boobs or whether there was as much hair on his chest as his head. “I think I’ve made my stance on murder clear, Sans,” said the High Priest, trying very hard to sound stern.

“Nope, doesn’t wring a bell,” the skeleton said cheerfully, and was rewarded with a snrrk that made him grin about a mile wide. “Ha! I win. Now ya hafta tell me what you’re doin’.”

“That was a good one,” Frisk admitted, rubbing his nose. “All right, then.” He looked at his hand, sobering a little, tapping the thumb and forefinger together. “Here.” With no further warning, he snapped his fingers so hard that Sans flinched. “Sorry,” said the priest, offering a rueful smile that made Sans scowl back. “I just took the barrier off the closet in the corner of my office. Would you please go and open it for me, and bring me what’s inside?”

Nonplussed, the boss monster obediently vanished. A few long moments later, he reappeared with something that looked like a toy in his massive hands. “Ta-da,” he said gravely, trying to hold it properly.

Frisk laughed and took the guitar from the skeleton’s loose grasp. “Thank you,” he said, tilting it onto its side. Something rattled, and he turned the instrument over to shake out a small tortoiseshell pick. “This, sir, is the answer you seek. Sometimes when I’m tired, I’ll think about playing it.” He slid off the chair to retrieve the pick and find a patch of floor to sit cross-legged. “I haven’t touched this in months,” he murmured, stroking the long neck.

He missed Sans’ swift glance at his lap, and how the skeleton’s cheekbones flickered with a few shades of red before he said, “Weird. I get bein’ too busy, but why’s it locked up? Habit?”

“Sort of. When I first moved up here, I thought the servants might take it.” Sans made a disbelieving sound, and Frisk clarified, “I don’t mean they’d steal it. I was afraid that if His Holiness knew it was here, he’d have them remove it.”

The skeleton disbelieved louder. “The hell? Does the Church think they’re evil or somethin’?” He settled on the floor a few feet away.

“Not evil, no,” said Frisk, still examining the guitar, “just…frivolous. If I had a piano or a cello up here, that would be one thing, but this is considered uncouth.” The young man plucked gingerly at the top string, and winced. “Now that’s bad. Positively E-vil.” He plucked again, then fiddled with a knob.

Sans had a good chuckle at that, and didn’t hide his further amusement at how the sound wobbled up and down, but he stayed quiet while Frisk hummed under his breath and turned another knob, wibb-wobbling the string’s pitch till it was as accurate as the young man could get by ear. Then Frisk tried the next string, humming, adjusting till it was in tune with the E; when the next string proved accurate almost immediately, though, he caught Sans’ disappointment and very, very gently turned the knob the wrong way to make it go wooooaaaaooo.

The boss monster cackled in appreciation. “Do it again,” he urged Frisk, reclining on his side and scooting closer for a better look.

“I can’t do it too much,” Frisk replied. Far from minding an audience literally looming over him, he found himself rather pleased to show Sans how the knobs worked. “This works by tightening or loosening the strings, see?” He demonstrated again, letting the skeleton lean in close enough to almost bump heads. “I haven’t replaced these in a while, but I don’t have any spares. I should probably take care of that before I play anything.”

Sans cocked his enormous head. There was a long moment of Frisk conspicuously not stopping and in fact continuing to tune the thing, and the boss monster nodded in understanding that guitar strings were probably not okay, either; however, the truth was that he was watching with such interest that Frisk was too flattered to stop. It was stupid to toodle around with a poorly maintained instrument just to show off, but all.he could think was that he should’ve known Sans wouldn’t care whether this was a waste of time or not, or that he could barely play anything.

The skeleton was evidently thinking the same thing. “So your boss wouldn’t want you doin’ this?” he asked. “The hell does he care as long as yer work’s gettin’ done? He’s not your friggin’ dad. …Is he?”

Frisk played a few mildly amused notes. “No. But I was only nineteen when they made me High Priest, and he thought I was going to be easy to manipulate.” Sans snorted in such derision that Frisk felt a little tingle of pride. “It was exactly the sort of thing he would have done to keep me in my place,” the latter continued. “He’d also tattle to my actual father, and he would have said something. But I’m of age now, so…” He tried another chord, and let it trail off.

“Why’d they teach you ta play it if it’s that bad?” the boss monster persisted. “Ya know all yer music stuff from school, right?”

Frisk tapped the pick absently on the guitar’s belly. “Yes, but not from the monks. I learned it when we were all working in the kitchen.”

Sans lifted a browbone. “Was that a normal thing? Learnin’ discipline or humility or somethin’?”

“Well, yes, and no.” The young man tried a short scale, correcting the last note. “Everyone in our dormitory was being punished. We had to go down after dinner and clean up after the entire monastery.” He couldn’t help wincing. “I hadn’t done anything wrong, so they let me sit with a lay worker who played guitar to entertain everyone. I sang with him and watched how it was done, and nobody told on me for a few months.”

“‘Lay’ worker?” Sans’ tone was much too innocent, and he answered Frisk’s don’t you dare squint with a cheerful “I didn’t know gettin’ laid was a church job.”

The High Priest snorted so hard that he almost dropped the pick. “That’s not what that means,” he informed his apprentice, barely fighting down his amusement before he resumed, “It just means someone employed by the church who hasn’t taken any vows.” But his smile faded to a grimace. “You’re actually not far off. That’s…” Frisk played a few more notes at random. “I think I was seventeen. There was a bad cold going around the monastery. Most of the acolytes got over it in a few days, but everyone in charge – the abbot, the higher deacons, et cetera – all caught it at once.” He strummed an overly dramatic chord. “I’m still impressed how bad things got. It was chaos for a solid month. Anyone who wanted to really misbehave had a good time.”

“Yeah?” To Frisk’s disappointment, the skeleton moved away and turned to lie flat on his spine, stretching his huge limbs across the workroom floor. “So who got laid? Thought humans don’t count it if you’re both guys.”

Frisk was now glad that Sans wasn’t watching: his entire head felt beet-red. “No, it was women working in the outbuildings,” he said with decent composure, trying another chord. “They were supposed to stay out of the monastery, but someone bribed the guards into letting them ‘visit’ back and forth. When the abbot found out, he sent off every female in a five-mile radius and had us take over their work. But then they started writing letters claiming paternity—I think there were over thirty acknowledged pregnancies after the dust settled.”

It was Sans’ turn to snort. “Holy shit. That fast?”

“That fast,” Frisk said shortly.

The boss monster scrunched up his nasal bone, obviously remembering what Frisk had told him about humans’ treatment of unwed mothers. “Well, that was a shitty thing to do. Not like any of those guys could marry ‘em, right?”

Frisk hesitated. How to put this? “Yes, but the ladies knew that. For a lot of them, it was a…we’ll call it a different opportunity,” he said, much more rueful than judgmental. “Noble families want their sons educated at the monastery, but it’s also to keep them from having their own children.” He flipped the pick over the backs of his fingers, a trick he was inordinately pleased to still do. “I will say this. If someone does leave a girl in difficulty, he’s expected to provide at least something for her and the child. Their families had a lot of questions.” He sighed in exasperation. “Word got all the way back to His Majesty. It was a huge mess. You could say the ‘lay’ worker was the only one who shouldn’t be called that.”

He expected Sans to laugh, but when Frisk peeked at him, the boss monster seemed more pensive than amused; his sockets were fixed on the basket of letters. It took Frisk a second to guess what he might be thinking, and when Sans finally shifted back onto his side to look at him, he found the priest glaring at him, daring him to even ask about his own participation. “Glad nobody was a hardass about you gettin’ blamed,” the skeleton said amiably, and Frisk relaxed a little. “Ya know what? Never mind all that crap.” Sans shifted and settled onto his side again. “Knock yerself out on that thing, I don’t care. I’m not gonna tell on ya.”

The young man sat for a moment, tapping the pick against the strings one after another. Sans was right: no need to get into how he had had to literally hide from his peers trying to drag him along to meet some of their new “friends,” or how his father – a prolific creator of children – had publicly commended Frisk for behaving like a true man of the Church, but hinted privately that he would understand if his son started sowing some oats in the very near future. It wasn’t just normal for a gentleman of his rank, but more or less expected to prove his manhood and create more magically gifted progeny of his own, whether or not he was married. Being a busy clergyman had saved Frisk from direct pressure thus far, but— “Here’s a good one,” he said to the skeleton, who obligingly scooted closer. “Don’t laugh, if you please.”

“Not unless it’s funny,” Sans said lazily.

Fair enough. Frisk shut his eyes for a moment, letting his fingers arrange themselves the way they had whenever he could sneak in some practice back when he was just a priest, a former student who could have a damn second to himself that he didn’t have to account for. People had popped their heads in to check if he really was just playing a borrowed guitar, but he was regarded as such a goody-goody that nobody gave him a hard time. He had stumbled across a few young men taking private moments for themselves or with each other, but he never told…

Well, no point getting angry now. It was too nice to sit near-ish the fire and do nothing useful, just empty his mind of everything but what to do to make the sounds he wanted to play. He wasn’t alone, either; the massive skeleton looming over his shoulder was a warm, solid presence that made the High Priest feel less like he was being monitored and more protected, accepted for whatever he wanted to do—just the pleasure of his company. That was what he’d told Sans back when he gave him his new clothes, wasn’t it?

Now there was an idea, so interesting that Frisk barely noticed himself picking out the bare bones – ha – of a favorite old song. He should really get Sans another set of clothing, something he could change into that wasn’t ragged canvas or just nothing at all. Not that Sans was particularly modest: he hadn’t been bothered by the notion of Frisk forcibly removing him from the bathroom, reminding the human that they were both male and he didn’t have anything private to see. Was that why he kept asking Frisk questions about humans that he could find in any of his textbooks? The notion of fleshy bits that changed consistency and produced weird fluids at inconsistent intervals couldn’t be an appealing one, not to a being made of solid bone.

…

Why did that thought suddenly bother him?

…Dirt, he’d just played a very bad note. The priest mumbled an apology and adjusted his grip, chagrined at ruining a peaceful moment with more of that nonsense. Not for the first time, he reminded himself that it was not all right to let his imagination charge off after someone who was not just under his care, but in his power; it was immoral at best to use Sans to investigate whether his libido – always plenty strong, simply refusing to attach itself to anyone, no matter how attractive they were – might just be resistant to humans. He’d keep relaxing and enjoying his apprentice’s literal support—Sans was close enough that Frisk caught himself about to lean back against his gigantic lower ribs. That was what most top scholars called a “no-no.”

…Was it, though? When Frisk glanced up, he saw Sans closing his sockets, and the skeleton’s expression and body language were so peaceful that Frisk had to smile again. Never mind thoughts of fleshy bits and bones, just enjoy having him here. No more recurring thoughts of how monsters didn’t care about gender or how fond of him Sans might be. No wondering what bone felt like on fleshy bi—on totally normal skin, or whether Sans would let him poke the gaps in his metacarpals…or what bone might feel like on his hands, maybe running along his—

And something happened that Frisk had never experienced before, at least contextually. He was a healthy young man, and he had had his body act out at complete random just as often as anyone else; what had not happened was specifically thinking of one person who was right here and then having a specific reaction to that specific person. And it wasn’t—stopping at all, it was getting worse and he had to focus harder (ha!) on distracting himself. Maybe if he played louder?

There was a sharp sound and a burst of pain, and Frisk dropped the guitar, Sans jerking upright as the priest clutched his hand. “Frisk! What happened?! You okay?”

“I’m fine. The string snapped,” Frisk said tersely, holding it up for the skeleton to see the near-bleeding welt on the back of his hand. At least it was the ideal excuse to rise to his knees and lean forward enough for his nightshirt to hang forward, because the burst of adrenaline had not quieted anything down. “It’s my fault, I even said I shouldn’t play the damn thing—”

And of course, that was Sans’ cue to scowl and give Frisk another jolt by seizing his wrist between his thumb and forefinger, holding him utterly still in a huge, inescapable, but gentle grasp. It was for the best that Frisk froze in place, heat flooding his senses as the boss monster summoned a wisp of green magic. “There we go,” he said after a moment. “All better?” And it might have been okay if he hadn’t absently rubbed Frisk’s forearm with his thumb.

Neither of them would ever be sure exactly how Frisk did it, but the next second, he was somehow on his feet and turning away in a blur of “Thankyouvermch”; before Sans could get a solid look at him, the human was already disappearing into the bathroom and slamming the door.

~

Sans knelt in silence long enough for the blankness to recede and confusion to step into its place. What the fuck was that? Was Frisk really that upset over one crappy judgment call?

…Or…Sans had been watching very close – almost got caught that one time – and he wasn’t sure that he hadn’t seen something. He had read that human males just kind of did that sometimes without meaning to and it was considered hugely embarrassing, which would explain why Frisk had run off like that. Funny, he had never had that problem before in all the time Sans had spent around him, though the boss monster had admittedly tried to avoid looking.

Humans were weird. Sans picked up the guitar very delicately, examining the broken string. Stupid damn thing, he had half a mind to throw it in the fireplace—but that would probably not help. Besides, Frisk had been really happy whenever he wasn’t talking about other humans being stupid. Sans had never seen him so relaxed; it was almost a given that the only people who could boss Frisk around didn’t want him to.

At least Frisk had felt comfortable enough to play with it in front of him. …The guitar. Comfortable enough to play the guitar. Yep. It kind of suck—it was kind of shitty that the dumb thing was unusable now, and fucking stupid that someone this rich and powerful couldn’t get something so simple without…hmmm. Sans daintily retrieved the pick, and got up.

~

Frisk was debating how to leave the bathroom in the most face-saving way when a sound made him nearly fall over: the workroom’s double doors were open and Sans was talking, presumably to the guards. What the—the priest grabbed a towel, speed-dabbed the rest of the cold water away, adjusted his garments, and…hesitated, milliseconds before striding into view wearing his nightclothes. Instead he listened, and thus heard a guard saying, “…you mean…er…sir?”

“Is there some other meanin’ of ‘Gimme some new strings for this thing’?” Sans’ voice was so exaggeratedly polite that Frisk didn’t know whether to laugh or bang his head on the doorframe. “His Eminence has graciously allowed me t’learn about human stuff, and all I can learn from this thing is that guitars need all the strings or they sound like crap. So the next time somebody delivers stuff up here, they can bring ‘em. Right?”

Frisk could almost hear the guards giving each other uncertain looks. “Er…”

“Right. Thank you!” With obscene cheer, the giant skeleton slammed the doors shut. Then he opened them again. “Oh. Wait. Here.” The dirty dishes flew from the table to the trolley, which was shoved out, and the doors slammed again. “There we go, boss,” Sans said over his shoulder. “You good now?”

Frisk half closed the bathroom door, eyes squeezed shut as he flicked on the witchlight. He slumped against the sink, groped around for the left handle, and ran the water at full blast, yawning mightily as the steam rose. First step, wet his face: grab a washcloth from the pile he knew was beside the tap, shake it out, and reach down to...jerk his hand back, his stupid brain catching up just in time to avoid being scalded. He forced his eyes open and adjusted the water temperature to a less damaging heat, muttering under his breath. He needed to hurry up and finish shaving, couldn't be late to tea with—

To his surprise, the door opened and Sans ducked inside, slumping onto the floor behind him. The skeleton gave him a little salute in the mirror and yawned wide enough to make Frisk wince a little. “Mornin', chief. Gettin’ dolled up already?”

Frisk didn’t dignify that with an answer—Sans had initially believed that “dolled up” applied to all humans dressing nicely, and when Frisk tried to explain that it mostly meant a woman putting on makeup, Sans insisted that all humans were the exact same, and Frisk was a human, and it was therefore a correct thing to say and he now said it almost every morning. Unfortunately, that happened to be how often he came in as Frisk was trying to shave, sitting far too close in the narrow space to pester him with smart remarks.

Well, Frisk had heard much, much worse, and on mornings when he wasn't tired and cranky, he generally didn't mind if Sans wanted to amuse himself observing human grooming rituals. At least he wasn't saying "Okay, I'll shave it for later" and making Frisk laugh too hard to get a blade near his face safely; he had had to order the giant skeleton out of the room and shut the door at least twice now.

Luckily, Sans remained silent as he watched this morning's routine unfold. Once Frisk had dunked the washcloth in the basin and scrubbed his face in a still-too-hot attempt to wake up, he tapped the vanity's middle drawer to remove the barrier. Therein lay a spotless straight razor, a large silver case of shaving soap, and an immaculate brush, kept locked up out of habit from the days at the monastery where everyone stole everyone else's bath items. The priest checked the soap and made a face at how thin it was getting, which amused Sans, judging by his smirk as their eyes met in the mirror; Frisk ignored him and wetted the brush down, swishing it across the soap till he worked up a good lather, and dabbed along the lines of his beard and mustache, tilting his head to slather it thickly beneath his jaw. Then he checked the mirror one more time to see if Sans thought that was funny, too - no, he just seemed mildly interested - and picked up the razor. It was time-consuming but not too difficult, just quick, careful movements to scrape the stuff off a few little strokes at a time—

Except Frisk was so tired and squinty that it wasn't long before he gave one little stroke too hard and flinched. “Dirt on a frigging—”

“Atta boy. Cuss away,” Sans said cheerfully, and gave another huge yawn, ignoring Frisk’s glare in the mirror. “Yer face is leakin’," he added. "Need some help?”

Frisk stared at the tiny trickle of blood that was indeed starting its way down his cheek, then sighed in defeat, wiping the blade on a hand towel. “If you could, please.” However smirky Sans was, there really was some benefit to having company with the power to heal stupid inju—

The razor was suddenly enveloped in red mist. "All righty, one sec." Frisk jumped as the blade tugged itself out of his grip and settled on the counter. “There we go. Now hol' still.” The priest watched Sans raise a bony finger and rest the very tip on Frisk's sleep-ruffled hair; a flick of green later, Frisk's cheek tingled as the cut vanished. "Done."

“Thank you,” Frisk said, scrubbing the blood away and steeling himself - ha, steel - to get back to work. Tired as he was, he couldn't walk out of here with only one side of his face done. But he’d probably be fine now that he was more awake, right? He wouldn’t be more nervous and likely to make another mistake in front of Sans, right? Ha ha, of course not. His hands weren't shaky at all from nerves or exhaustion...

Sans broke into his thoughts with a thoughtful sound. “Ya know what? Just lemme do it. Hold real still, okay?” He sat up, his finger curling very gently to rest over the crown of Frisk's head and keep him in place. “Seriously, don' even breathe wrong," he added, lifting the razor on another wisp of magic.

The human’s eyes widened, hands rising in protest as his brain caught up. "No, no, no thank you," he almost whispered, and cleared his throat, pulling enough of himself together to say louder, "Don't worry about that." He ducked out from beneath Sans' finger, smoothing his ruffled hair. "You're a bodyguard and a diplomat, not a valet."

"Dunno what that is. I'm guessin' somebody who shaves rich people?" Sans waggled the razor in midair. "Ya hired me to protect you from gettin' cut up, an' now you want me t'just sit here and watch ya play with sharp objects in your goddamn sleep? Dunno if I'm good enough ta heal you if ya take yer ear off."

That gave Frisk far too much pause before he could answer, "I'm not going to cut my ear off," with very patient dignity, trying to ignore a bit of lather dripping off his neck.

The boss monster snorted. Up came the shaving brush, but before Frisk could tell him to put it down or at least be careful with it, Sans' magic dipped it into the case almost daintily and worked up more soap. "Look, kiddo, lemme try it. If I fuck it up, I'll heal you an' I won't ever mention it again." The brush rose and drifted close enough to dab Frisk lightly on the neck, which tickled enough to make him crack a smile. "See?" Sans said gleefully. "We're good. Just hold still." And his forefinger settled again on the priest's rumpled head.

Frisk opened his mouth to order him out of the bathroom. But…after a long moment of panic warring with irritation and self-doubt, and hearty embarrassment...he swallowed, and, against his better judgment, said, “All right.” He allowed the razor to approach, and watched in the mirror as it drifted close enough for the lightest experimental scrp, scrp on his cheek. It paused, Sans meeting his eye for an inquiring stare; Frisk started to nod, and was stopped by a growl. He tried a smile instead, but that made his cheeks bunch up; he rolled his eyes instead, gesturing to keep going.

Sans chuckled. It seemed he had been watching the morning routine closer than Frisk thought, because there was no need to tell him to pull the skin taut for a closer shave: a speck of magic pressed just hard enough to help the blade pass over the stubble just so. A few swipes, a wipe on the towel, and Frisk let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding. "I lied. You can breathe," Sans deadpanned, but when Frisk tried to smile, he got another reproving tap.

It was easier to mock-glare at Sans in the mirror than watch as the blade moved a little faster, with increasing surety, though the skeleton was intent on his work. Difficult as it was shaving oneself for the first time, never mind someone else, the razor made absolutely no nicks, no missed bits; Sans did pause frequently, forefinger tilting the priest’s head this way and that to check his work in the mirror— “Screw this,” the skeleton said presently. “Just turn around.”

With all the cool indifference of a boy letting his mother spit on her hand to fix his hair, Frisk shuffled around in a half circle and waited for more, only for Sans to chuckle again. “Don't give me that look, pal,” he said, sounding…exasperated, but something else, too.

That was it: the High Priest gave up any remaining dignity and sat down cross-legged on the bathroom floor. Sans shifted onto his side, jaw propped up on on hand, then took a sideways one-fingered hold on Frisk’s head and began scraping away again, much quicker and more confident than he ever was.

Well, dirt. The priest wanted desperately to say something, but his skin would be in peril if he moved his mouth; he opted to keep his eyes closed, allowing Sans to turn his head this way and that to get each side, gentle as always. He never touched him with any more force than necessary, Frisk thought, at least after that first encounter in his prison cell; even when the assassin was after him and Sans was physically maneuvering him to safety, he had been careful not to hurt him. Having much more direct proof of the monster's determination to protect him, trusting Sans with a literal blade at his neck? It was incredibly endearing.

Actually, given Frisk's thoughts of skeleton parts and pondering conjugal relations, it was better – worse? – than that. Definitely more confusing; all these years of struggling to muster interest in any of the women chasing him, of ignoring accusations of preferring men because if he did like them, he surely would have noticed it in all those years at the monastery—Frisk had started to think he was just...broken in that respect. Why in every circle of Hell was he feeling so strange about exposing his throat to a gigantic monster in total security that Sans wasn't going to hurt him? It wasn't fear that made his skin tingle like that, or at least not more than a tiny bit. It definitely felt nice, except that that wasn't the word for it.

When the process was finished, Sans gave a satisfied grunt. “Ha. See?” He nudged Frisk’s shoulder, and the High Priest shook himself, then obediently shuffled around in another half circle, then remembered to open his eyes and pull himself to his feet for an inspection in the mirror. “Beautiful,” the skeleton said triumphantly, setting the razor on the sink.

Wha— Frisk couldn’t help staring at him in the mirror, eyes wide, feeling and seeing his nicely shorn cheeks redden further. “Once again, you have the wrong word,” he said as coolly as possible, and tore his gaze away to busy himself rinsing and drying the brush and razor.

“Wha?” Sans blinked at him, sockets also going wide, and Frisk watched his cheekbones suddenly change color. “Not you, goddammit! Beautiful work,” snapped the boss monster. “As in, I told ya you needed help, an’ then I did it totally perfect. Not like I was gonna cut yer…” He gave a fake cough, evidently remembering that Frisk might not like to hear any hyperbole about having his throat cut.

“Yes, well done. Thank you,” Frisk said hastily, reaching for the towel and barely remembering to run cool water to splash his cheeks first. He needed something cool right now.

...

...

...

(His more everyday garb:)

Over a day later, the High Priest shut the outer door to his chambers, whistling to himself. He set a covered tray on the table, sat down at the mirror, and checked that his eyes were clear, or at least not too red. Then he picked up his coronet and settled it over his head. He stared at his reflection for a full minute, as if waiting for the young man in the mirror to get up first; with a sigh, he finally pushed himself to his feet.

Just outside his bedroom, he let the whistle peter out into a thread of magic that ran ahead to check the loose barriers he'd set around the bed. Two echoes came back, one very close by. "Good morning. Please step back," he said into the slight crack in the door.

A pause, then a soft creak of floorboards, unnervingly quiet for something – someone – his size. "Further, please," he ordered.

The skeleton made a noise he couldn't interpret. Floorboards creaked again, and the bedframe groaned under his weight. The priest turned the doorknob, picked up the tray, and elbowed the door open.

Sans was sitting near the edge of the bed, legs crossed, elbows on his knees. He had left the nearly transparent inner bedcurtains closed, but opened the windows, and even just his outline through the thin curtain looked menacing; the light shone through his filthy shirt, shadowing the spaces between his ribs, and the fire in his sockets fully illuminated his features. The young man made himself place the tray on a side table and pull up a chair with perfect unconcern, as if he couldn't feel him staring his down. "I see you're all healed. You must have slept well," he said coolly. "I know I did."

The skeleton glanced behind him at the rumpled sheets. "Uh..."

"You were alone the whole time," the priest hastened to assure him. "There's a very comfortable couch in my office that I've been using."

skip

That didn't feel quite right, but without more evidence, the priest decided to leave it for now. Instead, he pulled the side table closer and removed the tray's cover.

Sans twitched at the sight of steaming hotcakes, piles of cheese-sprinkled eggs, tomatoes, and crisp-crusted sausage links. The priest cut a tomato slice into quarters with his fork, speared one and popped it into his mouth; rather than making Sans share the napkin, he dabbed his lips in passing with the very edge of one sleeve.

This courtesy was lost on the skeleton. "Need somethin’ ta wipe with?" he inquired, and plucked at the curtain. “How ‘bout this?”

The young man ignored him and made a show of chewing, swallowing, and lifting another tomato to his mouth. Sans didn't have a stomach, but if he had, the priest probably would have heard it growling; the monster was shifting around and scowling, clearly agitated. So the human quickened his pace, taking a huge bite of egg, a chunk of hotcake, and a sausage in turn, eating as fast as he could.

Sans' eyes had lit to orange again, and the human was glad to put the fork down. "There. You see? It isn't poisoned," he said briskly. he stood and pushed the side table over to the bed. "Help yourself."

The orange faded. Sans’ skull tilted this way and that, like a wary but curious animal. "What?"

"I had breakfast over an hour ago. This is for you," the priest explained.

Sans glanced at the tray, then back to him. The human waited for a full ten seconds, almost holding his breath, before he was rewarded with a rude noise. "Can I have another fork? Don't want your germs," he said.

skip

The skeleton's face was impossible to see clearly. Now that it was quiet, it reminded the young man too much of when he'd grabbed him in the cell. His instincts screamed at him to pull his hand back and throw a barrier between them, but determination surged as he remembered how he'd already faced down the boss monster’s attempts to kill him. He was going to forge a lasting bond between their worlds and hand over a kitchen utensil like a normal person or die trying.

Slowly, Sans reached down through the gap in the curtains, and the human fought to keep from panicking as the massive hand approached. The skeleton paused...and plucked the fork from his grip with delicate courtesy, holding it up between them. "Hm. Too small. Still dirty." He tossed it to the floor.

The High Priest stared at the fork. He stared at him. He retrieved the fork, stood up, dropped it into the pitcher, and plunged his hand in after it. Out came the utensil; the young man strode over and shoved the bedcurtain aside enough to gather up a fistful of it as a makeshift towel. This bed was centuries old and the curtains worth as much as a commoner’s entire wardrobe, but they belonged to the High Priest, which meant they were his. And as High Priest, if he wanted to use his antique linen to dry a mostly-clean fork in order to please a giant monster who was intimidating him and somehow also being a complete snot, then who was going to stop him? No one, that was exactly who.

With a righteous huff, he turned back around, still polishing the bedamned fork. "Here," he said, fully facing Sans for the first time. "I hope this is satisfactory."

Sans looked at him. He didn't say anything.

The world always seemed a little too bright with the bedcurtains open, and the light from the window was in his eyes. The priest rubbed them on his sleeve, and scratched under his jaw where the curtain had brushed it. "Well?" he demanded.

Sans didn't take it. He was leaning forward, hand dangling as if he'd started to reach for it and somehow forgotten what he was doing. His sockets were blank, an odd color washing over his bony face. "Uh," he said. "It's."

The priest didn't know that that could be a complete sentence. It probably wasn't, he thought in growing irritation. "Sans," he said carefully, "are you going to use this, or would you like to eat with your hands?"

The skeleton shook himself and turned away. "Never mind. 'm not hungry," he grumbled.

The human bit back the urge to call him a colorful name or two. "Sans, this is not a joke. There is nothing wrong with your food, except that it's cold. Eat it. Please."

"I will, I will." Sans hunched his shoulders. "Just gimme a couple minutes."

He did not have the time or patience for this. "Sans. Look at this." The monster glanced up, and in one motion, the human stabbed a sausage and another chunk of hotcake. "Say 'ahhh,'" he ordered, and when Sans blankly repeated, "Ahh?" he thrust the fork into Sans’ mouth.

skip

Sans was not wondering the same thing. He was thinking how he'd woken up not knowing where he was and had had to figure out that he wasn't dreaming about the battle in his cell: a human witch really had trapped him and knocked him out with some kind of weird brain-magic. Once he got over the fact that he couldn't take any shortcuts and wouldn't fit through the windows, though, he had to admit things could be worse; the bed really was the most comfortable thing in the world.

Talking with the witch was not comfortable. It was bad enough when he was asking Sans questions about his capture and not breaking out of prison, but then he had to give him food and say things that made sense, and things that made even more sense, and then...

Sans did not like anything about humans, especially their looks. He never understood how they could be attracted to each other long enough to reproduce; they seemed far shallower than monsters, for whom the inside really did count more than the outside, except maybe when it came to reproduction. But that was a rare occasion for them, and they thought humans' obsession with it was shallow and weird at best. Sans in particular had no interest in the human form unless he was trying to destroy it: male or female, they were all just skeletons with varying degrees of hair, meat and fluids in the way.

And then this infuriating human had turned around in the sunlight, curtain and stupid fork in hand, and Sans suddenly couldn't breathe. The overall picture was what made him feel a huge mess of feelings he didn't like or understand, but he could see every detail perfectly: lips pursed in annoyance, the sun reflecting off that black circlet thing, chestnut hair shining and reddish-brown eyes half closed against the light…even the seemingly dull, coarse hair on his face showed wavy patterns picked out in golden threads.

And then the human had tipped his head and shown a glimpse of his throat, and now Sans couldn't think things right. All he could try to do was turn away, then eat it all in order to make him go away, and only his punning instinct had saved Sans from saying or doing anything else stupid.

Why did Frisk have to like puns, too?

This was bad. It had gotten very complicated, very fast. He had to get out of here. The human had demonstrated some emotion behind his priest-y facade; maybe Sans could appeal to it, persuade him to pick some other monster and not risk boning things up? Priests weren’t supposed to bone, right? Ha, ha, etc.

…Granted, this one could probably manage it, given how powerful he was, not to mention easy on the eye sockets, but there was no telling if he was—

"...going to do it," he was saying, wiping away tears of laughter. "I'm not all-powerful, but I have enough influence at court and with the Church to guarantee your safety." Frisk looked up at him, bright-eyed, and his SOUL did another loop-de-loop. "So, Sans. Will you stay?"

He didn't want to, it was a bad idea, and he said, "No," in his mind.

Frisk smiled, tilting his head.