#rated:e

-

By the time she gets there, Sebastian has picked up a considerable amount of her loose drawings, both to her relief and embarrassment. She scrambles to gather what else is there, her face heating up with every page she lifts. Comte, reading in the study. Comte, addressing the residents at a dinner party. Comte, in the more formal clothes he wears for events. Comte, Comte, Comte.

All her wandering thoughts about him, strewn across the grass like confetti.

Arthur arrives soon after, to reach out an arm to help. She frowns at him deeply, the corners of her eyes shiny with tears.

“Now, now, no need to be so up—”

“This is your fault,” Seiya whispers lowly, trying her best so that Comte does not hear her. The tone in her voice makes Arthur stand back up, hand scratching the back of his neck.

She doesn’t know what to do. Her little crush on le Comte wasn’t exactly a secret—but it sort of was. To Comte, at least. Her closest friends had an inkling, but Vincent and Isaac weren’t exactly the type that pried. She’s sure Sebastian knows just because he’s Sebastian. And the more observant ones like Arthur and Theo definitely would have known too.

And Maybe Comte, too, but—there’s nothing like confirming a rumor, confessing a crime, with a gallery’s worth of art stumbling out of a window, right?

It wasn’t that she didn’t want to say it: keeping it a secret was just the least she could do to quiet her heart.

Leonardo is one of her closest companions. He has also been with Saint-Germain longer than anyone else in the mansion. So when Leonardo told her not to keep her hopes up about Comte, she said, “okay.”

And at this point, she’s mastered the art of keeping her feelings bottled tightly in her heart. She pours it out only in the scribbles of her pen.

And now it was here, laid bare in front of Saint-Germain’s eyes.

She holds back the sniffle as she gets up from her knees. Sebastian approaches her while she’s dusting her skirt, a sheaf of her drawings in hand. Her heart rises to her throat once she notices that the Comte is, in fact, watching her.

She has only the briefest of moments to speak before her voice goes away altogether. With a nod to Sebastian in thanks, she says, “Sorry for interrupting your tea time, Comte,” bowing lowly in regret before turning away again, heading off to the mansion sadly, Arthur following close behind.

-

Comte watches her without a word as she makes her escape back to the mansion. He had wanted to help, rising from his chair to pick up some of the illustrations, but he was sent back down by Sebastian. The butler said he should leave the menial task to him. That was rather true, by etiquette, but in consideration of the contents of the drawings, Comte knew better.

He knows Seiya is an artist. She spends a lot of her free time drawing quietly in nooks and crannies she finds comfortable to work in. Sometimes she joins Vincent out when he paints. Sometimes she accompanies Napoleon and Isaac when they go to teach the kids, so she can sketch and draw out in the city with company. She had even shown him some of her illustrations in the past—but only with a little nagging from Leonardo.

…Ah, yes, Leonardo.

Seiya and Leonardo have a peculiar relationship, one that Comte has always thought was akin to lovers. When she first arrived at the mansion, Comte had asked his old friend if he could leave Seiya in his care. There were complaints—as he expected—but Leonardo took up the favor in time. It has been months since then, and she and Leonardo are rather intimately close to one another; it’s easy to find them snuggled against each other in random sofas in the mansion sleeping. There are also mornings when they both emerge out of Leonardo’s room in the morning for breakfast.

It was hard not to imagine that they were lovers.

But were they?

Comte had never given it much thought because while the hunger resides in him, a wolf sleeping in the cave, he isn’t the type to go after something, someone, that his friend already holds. He has no interest in coveting something that isn’t available to him, to begin with. In hindsight, he recalls that Leonardo hadn’t spoken to him about anything regarding his relationship with Seiya either, so perhaps—

“More tea, sir?”

He takes a deep breath. Thinks of Seiya with her lavender hair and her light blue eyes, glassy when she looked at him earlier, sheets of paper with his face on it in her hands.

The heart is a troublesome thing, he thinks, as he hands his teacup quietly to Sebastian.

-

Saint-Germain had intended to just let it unravel.

For the mystery to go on its own pace. For him to wait until Seiya is ready to tell her feelings for him to his face.

Unfortunately for the poor Comte, his heart is a stubborn one.

It happens before he even notices—how his eyes begin to wander. Up and down the mansion when he is unoccupied, hoping for a glimpse of her in the hallway. When he sees her and she is busy, he watches. Eyes grazing the curves of her body, the long lines of her legs, and the roundness of her breasts arching against the seams of her corset.

Seiya is a quiet girl, and for that, she does most of her talking through the rest of her body; the way she tugs at her sleeves when she is nervous, the little tug of the corner of her mouth when she is pleased, the crinkle of her nose when she is embarrassed, the way her eyebrows shoot up when she is surprised. Comte had noticed these in the past, and perhaps have teased her a little about it as well, but—until now, he hadn’t really thought much about it.

It’s different now.

Now, when he gets the opportunity to talk to her, he notices all the little things: the flush on her cheeks, the way she tucks her hair behind her ear, the way she curls forward toward him when he speaks. It even gets to the point where he gets embarrassed with how lost he is in the conversation, marveling at all the little details he is only now noticing. How much had he been missing all this time, and how long had he been blind?

This goes on for days, then weeks. Comte is astonished at himself for every little thing he notices. He and Seiya do not bring up what had happened with the drawings. Perhaps they do not need to. Eventually they return to their friendly conversations as if nothing had happened at all, as if it was just another mishap tucked away into the past.

He never sees the notebook again—as if she is much more careful with where it is now, away from his sight.

But there are other things Comte notices.

About himself. The way something in his heart stills whenever he sees her cuddled against Leonardo in the library while reading a book. The way a smile rises golden in his face whenever she comes up to him, to tell him about a new painting or a new musical piece or a new chapter of Sherlock Holmes. The way his heart pounds when it’s late at night and he remembers her, a fleeting thought that casts glitters all over his mind, thoughts he will try to brush away but still find there, hiding in its corners, an eternity from now.

The way he becomes more watchful of how Leonardo takes care of her—has she eaten? Where did she fall asleep, where are you carrying her to?—like he is trying to take on the role, see if he can fit a spot next to her in between the two of them, even if he isn’t so sure she is his for the taking.

Le Comte de Saint-Germain is a greedy man.

Leonardo knows this. And Leonardo notices.

Comte does not.

And just like that, the sleeping wolf begins to wake.

-

Leonardo doesn’t often go out on trips. In his long history of staying with Saint-Germain, Leonardo’s trips were often of the “I don’t know if I’ll come back” nature—the kind with the hanging goodbyes only those who have the rest of eternities to live can truly become accustomed to.

He goes to the city, sure, beloved as he is to the other citizens downtown, but to go out on long trips outside of Paris isn’t something that occurred a lot, except if he was running away. So when Leonardo announces that he would be out for “a couple of weeks to the countryside”, Comte knows that there is something up.

And true enough, there is something up, because when asked why he was leaving, Leonardo’s answer is the most deadpan “I’m getting tired of seeing you make that face.”

Comte understands without elaboration.

In a few days, Leonardo is gone.

The weeks leading up to Leonardo’s departure meant that Seiya hung around him like a baby koala a lot. Once he’d left, she is left drifting about, wandering the halls as if looking for anchor—spending time with Isaac, watching Vincent paint.

But it’s the nights that are ruthless.

Sleeping in her room with a too-big bed in a too-quiet mansion that smells too clean without the constant assault of tobacco—Seiya somehow cannot sleep properly without Leonardo around. Her sleep becomes so erratic she has become a sort of Leonardo herself, being found by the residents sleeping in the middle of the day in the most unexpected of places—on a stool in the kitchen, leaning against the countertop; in the gazebo at the garden, Vic and King at her side; on the sofa in the library, curled up uncomfortably.

Comte finds himself walking down the hallways of the mansion looking for her at odd hours of the day, a blanket in tow, to make sure she is comfortable, to make sure she is warm. He knows that to her he is not Leonardo, but he can try to be a suitable substitute.

In truth, she sleeps because when she is awake, the sound of Leonardo’s parting words with her echoes in her brain like an alarm. “There’s only so much time I can buy for you, cara mia,” he had said, ruffling her hair before he left. Seiya understands but at the same time she doesn’t. The deep-gold silhouette of Saint-Germain watching over them at the staircase burns itself at the back of her eyelids.

Leonardo is so cruel, telling her to not keep her hopes up but then opening the door. Shining the light. Leading her down the hall.

He’s just the same as his old friend.

A week into Leonardo’s trip, the dark circles under Seiya’s eyes have grown to a worrisome shade, the kind that Comte just can’t let pass. So on one afternoon, in-between sharing tea with her, even when he knows it would spell the death of him, he offers: “You could sleep with me, if you like.”

She nearly chokes on the jasmine tea she’s just taken a sip of. “Pardon?”

“You haven’t had good sleep the past week, have you not? If you want company, I can be a warm body.”

Seiya…hesitates. She could say yes, of course, as it ultimately means more time spent with him—and it wasn’t like she was admitting to anything by agreeing to it. Just friendly, platonic naps, the kind she also took with Leonardo. But at the same time she feared her will would break, at the touch of his arms around her, the thrum of his pulse underneath his clothes—he might just ruin her and make her surrender.

But when she looks up to make sure Comte is really offering her this, the honey gold of his eyes only gets her to say “Yes… please?”

It starts… slow. It’s a dynamic they’ve never tried before, as someone Comte has always felt one step higher than her, a distance she could never find the courage to cross. Being with Leonardo is easy, because he treats her like a younger sibling, the comfort, familiarity, and tease of an older brother to a sister he wants to protect. But with Comte? The race of her heart in her chest would only serve to get her caught.

But then it gets easy.

She first starts with accompanying Comte in his room as he’s working. As she readjusts her sleeping schedule, she sneaks in naps in his bed or on armchairs and sofas, the scribble of his pen on paper lulling her to rest. Later on, she begins to work around him as well—sometimes she reads, sometimes she draws; he spots the notebook she’d been hiding from him as she resumes making sketches of him. They have tea together in the afternoon. When he has something to do at town, she accompanies him. When she wants alone time but would still like him around, he stays in his room and she lays at the lounge chair in the balcony, the one overlooking the Paris horizon.

Leonardo has been gone for three weeks.

And at this point, it feels… just fine. Seiya misses him, for sure, but having Comte as company is an experience she appreciates having had. The incident at the garden is now long behind them. It’s as if they’ve found a suitable rhythm for the two of them, one they can live by.

But it isn’t enough.

Not yet.

And Leonardo is coming home soon, because there is only so long the Renaissance man can buy for Comte, and Saint-Germain knows this. The longer Comte spends with Seiya the more he learns how much her company means to him. Sure, he has driven the thought at the back of his mind for the longest time, and maybe he’s not taken care of the feeling properly. But it’s still there, growing roots in his mind, enclosing his heart, drawing nourishment out of it.

Making him thirsty.

Making him want.

The wolf quietly sitting in the bushes, waiting for the perfect moment to chase and pounce.

He can deny his heart but not the lunge of his pulse, not the pain of fangs growing sharper the more the scent of her lingers in his room, her shampoo on the bedsheets, her perfume in the air. His heart is patient but his hands are not.

And time and fate wait for no one.

-

Comte takes two bottles of rouge per day; one in the morning, and one in the evening. His thirst has placated through the years; it only flows calmly inside of him.

But not as of late. Sebastian’s brought him his fourth bottle late in the afternoon. The butler looks at him curiously, and offers to take the sleeping Seiya—out in the veranda—back to her room to sleep.

“No,” is Comte’s quick answer, a little too quick that Sebastian wavers, and with a deep breath Comte composes himself and adds, “it’s alright.”

(It isn’t quite so.)

He downs the bottle of rouge slowly, feeling the blood going down his throat. Making sure it’s there, as if telling his instincts: this is your share. Stop longing for something else. But his fangs still hang painfully in his mouth, searching for flesh.

Maybe if he covers her scent with a sheet, he’ll relax.

He stands up, picks up one of the folded blankets on the bed, and heads out to the veranda for Seiya. The southern-facing veranda lets the sun leave an angled golden glow on the balcony; Comte traces it with his gaze from the city, back to the lounge where the one he loves sits.

She’s lying on the sofa with her leg raised up, perhaps after having been used as a table for her sketching; the open notebook on her lap reveals a sketch of the city. The other sketchbook next to her is folded closed, but a couple of pages peek out from in between, revealing little sketches of Saint-Germain—the same kind he’d seen that afternoon in the garden.

Not that Comte is paying attention to the sketches when she’s right there, with the milky line of her long legs underneath her stockings; the plush flesh of her thighs where her skirt has ridden up; the curves of the top of her breasts under her blouse; the small, pink o of her mouth slightly open as she sleeps; the brush of her bangs light on her forehead; the flush on her cheeks a healthy, vibrant glow.

He’s about to drape the blanket he’s brought with him when her even breathing is interrupted by a sighed syllable. He holds the blanket in his arms as he waits for her to finish the word.

“…main…”

Hm?

“Ss…ger…”

Her breath hitches and she curls a little tighter, the notebook on her lap falling quietly on the floor. Her foot curls against her other ankle; her thighs rub against each other.

“Comte… Saint-Germain…”

And then she moans.

That’s it.

Something howls and sings inside of him and he listens to it. The blanket drops to the ground as Comte falls to his knees next to her like a devotee. He encloses her mouth with his; restraint snapping like a frail string. She makes a half-asleep moan at the feeling of it and it goes straight down his cock, lighting him on fire. When she reaches out for him on instinct, he envelops her with her arms right back.

She opens her eyes slowly, as if she’s still asleep. “Am I… dreaming?”

Comte brushes the stray hairs off her face and says, “Even better.”

It doesn’t register immediately. Seiya reaches out to press the palm of her hand against Comte’s cheek as if making sure he’s real. Comte slides a hand on her calf, feeling the warmth of her flesh through the stockings.

And then it hits.

Seiya jolts backward on instinct, knees bending in front of her as she lets go of Comte like he’s hot. “I’m—Comte, I—”

“Seiya,” he says, the syllables of her name rolling out of his mouth like something sacred, “Tell me. Tell me and I’ll show you.”

“Le Comte…”

His voice sounds strained. “Tell me, let me, and I’ll show you what you do to me.”

Seiya takes a moment.

Lets it linger; the gleaming glow of the afternoon sun over the both of them; the hunger in his eyes; the fear that was thrumming underneath her skin;

The need.

She brushes his bangs off his forehead so she sees him clearly, and then says, “I love you.”

And it’s like something snaps.

Saint-Germain kisses her like she’s the sun and he’s been underground for months. One of his hands cradles her head, tangling in between the lavender strands of her hair. The other holds her cheek, to prove that she’s there, as if convincing himself that he’s not just at wits’ end clinging into hallucinations.

He gives her a moment to breathe; holds her heart in his hands when he brushes off with his thumb the pooled saliva at the corner of her mouth and says: “I can’t believe you’ve gone on for so long without knowing how much I’ve wanted you.” And when she moves her lips as if to retaliate or to deny, Comte gets up and pushes her further onto the sofa, “Talk later” coming out harsh from his mouth.

His hands are quick as he undoes her garments, but the ease is nowhere near coolheaded. Something burns underneath his skin and only touching her can cool it. He starts with the ribbons and hooks of her skirt and then inward; tugs off her blouse in between leaving bruising kisses on her mouth—he still can’t get enough of her—and loosens the lacings of her undergarments with precision.

But by this time he’s run out of his patience, so he sinks his fingers into her stockings and rips them apart.

The gasp is half of surprise and half of pleasure. Comte does not stop until the stockings are nothing but tattered cloth pooling on the floor. Seiya does not feel fully bare until this moment. The thrum of blood in her ears makes her dizzy; she thinks of the scar she’s always had to hide on her leg, and in a panic, she suddenly whispers, “Wait—out here? We should go—”

Comte does not need to shush her; the words go back down her throat when his hands touch her bare calf. Time stills; his fingers, earlier all brute force and tearing apart, are gentle as they trace up her leg; he runs his fingers down the discolored flesh like a reverent worshipper. He raises her leg up toward him and presses a trail of kisses downward.

She sighs at the sensation and it makes Comte look up at her.

The full force of his gaze into hers leaves her unsteady—will she ever get used to him being this way?

For a moment, the instinct is to hide. The instinct of prey in the face of a predator, Seiya tries to jerk her leg back toward her but Comte does not budge. She decides to attempt to close them instead, to push him away, but his hands are on her knees, holding her thighs apart.

When Seiya catches Comte graze his tongue underneath his fang, like nursing it, she knows she is a goner. 

Comte positions her knees over his shoulders and then proceeds to have a taste of her. The heat and scent of her sex against his face nearly drives him to the point of insanity. But this is a meal he would like to relish. He presses small kisses down her slit before urging the folds open with his fingers, Seiya panting above him; his nose nudges her clit and her hands fly to his hair.

“Comte…” she cries out, her voice hoarse, tears escaping the corners of her eyes. When Comte looks up at her, a shudder runs down her spine.

“‘Abel,’” he says, gently, pressing a kiss on her inner thigh. “That’s my name. Call me that.”

Seiya nods; slides her fingers from the flaxen mop of his hair to his cheek, and croons out: “Abel.”

God, he thinks, just how much can this woman drive me insane?

Much to Seiya’s delight (and embarrassment), Comte has a sharp learning curve that points him in the right direction in no time. His tongue teases her sensitive bundle of nerves, circling and teasing until all she can do is sob out his name. Her fingers leave crescent-moon marks against his scalp but it only urges him on; lathers two fingers with the slick coming out of her before slipping them inside her wet heat.

The world is spinning. Has it been an eternity or only a moment?  Comte is not giving her what she wants, just dangling her over the edge, giving her the sweet taste of it but not enough to satisfy. Tongue making delicate work of her pussy, fingers of one hand curling inside of her, another squeezing her breast like seeking comfort—she lifts her fist to her mouth and bites into it as Comte toys with her a little bit longer, long fingers finding something electric, grazing it, molding it, and then—

She falls. The orgasm is unlike anything else—not when it means everything at the same time: that maybe Comte does return her feelings, that Comte wants to do this with her, that Comte is thinking of her—she shivers and her heels dig against his back as she spasms against him; and he lets her, continues to eat her out for the entirety of it, wringing her dry and overstimulated.

“Abel!” she cries out, hands flying to his face to get him to look up at her and to pause lest she loses all that’s left of her sanity. His face is slick with her juices and it sends a new wave of warmth through her but she’s had enough. “Take me, please. Have me.”

“If you so wish,” Comte says, running the back of his hand against his lips before kissing her again; he doesn’t let go even as he readjusts their position into a comfortable one. Her legs curl around his waist as if on instinct. Comte quickly undresses, his coat and vest landing on the floor and his bottoms kicked somewhere else; his shirt unbuttoned all the way. When her wandering touch strays onto the sharp curls of trailing yellow hair upward his stomach, he guides her hand toward his cock, relishing in her face’s darkening shade of red. She can barely wrap her hands around his girth; for a moment she worries about it being too big. “Guide me,” he says—an order and not a request—and it makes her breath stop in her throat.

But her need is stronger than her shyness, and so she guides his hardness against her dripping cunt, sighing as she rocks it between her folds before slotting it into her. Comte lifts her hips up once he’s in, supporting her as he slides inch by inch to fill her. He brushes her hair to the back of the sofa, out of the way; her hands cling onto her biceps as she begins to feel the weight of him inside of her.

She spots Comte looking at something beyond her but she doesn’t get to ask before he roughly jolts forward, causing her to cry out.

Seiya has always thought that Comte had a monster hiding inside of him; below his coolly composed demeanor, there was a hungry beast in him that he had long learned to tame. Now, here, fucking on the sofa at his room’s veranda, in the full view of whoever dared look up, the sun sinking into twilight, Seiya comes face to face with the wolf that Comte had shackled inside of him for so long.

His thrusts are frantic and rushed; there is only rhythm and speed, no patience or art. Seiya’s had her share; now, Comte is using her for his pleasure, sweat dripping down his brow, his grip harsh on her hips—there will be bruises tomorrow. He presses her face against the valley in between her breasts and moans. Her name falls from his mouth, “Seiya, Seiya,” in between syllables of “Fuck” and “So good,” the brusqueness of the words so unbecoming of Comte it makes her even more sensitive to them.

She curls forward, toward him, trying to meet his thrusts even when her legs have long turned into mush. When Comte realizes what she is trying to do, a new sort of enthusiasm fills him; it’s as if he has woken up from a trance. “Seiya,” he calls out, “mouth,” is all he can say, and she obeys; he slips two fingers into her waiting mouth and she suckles on them as if it were his cock. He hisses at the feeling and pulls them out as soon as he is satisfied; replacing his fingers with his tongue as he returns to making out with her; his now-slick fingers finding a spot in between the both of them to rub her still-sensitive clit, urging her now: come, Seiya, come for me.

Seiya is obedient. It doesn’t take long.

Comte cannot say he hasn’t dreamt of claiming Seiya for his own in the past. But none of his wildest dreams would have been close to what this is like: the feeling of her pulsing and squeezing around him, because of him, he brought this pleasure for her, the sound of her voice as she gasps for air, the broken syllables of his name and sputterings of thanks and disbelief as the white-hot pleasure brands her, her fingers curled around his arms for dear life. It takes all of his self-control to not just surrender at that moment, to pull her by her waist and just fuck into her until he is spent.

And then the door to the veranda clicks open.

By this time, the sun has already long disappeared under the horizon; while the shroud of darkness has comforted her in hiding her rendezvous with the man of the house, the brightness of the inside of Comte’s room with the lights turned up sends her reeling when it illuminates Leonardo’s form. Seiya’s eyes are wide as dinnerplates as she scrambles for something to cover herself—her hair—but Leonardo looks unbothered, only throwing a knowing kind of expression at his friend, half a smile on his face.

And then Comte speaks.

“I was wondering when you would come in.”

Seiya’s neck snaps with how fast she turns to face him.

“Well, I didn’t want to interrupt, and it finally seemed like a good time.”

“Haha, how polite of you,” Comte says, genuine amusement in his tone. He returns his gaze back to Seiya, who is looking up at him with such a panicked expression; her legs tense around him. “It’s alright, ma bien-aimée. He will not stay unless you want him to.”

Which meant: he will stay if you want him to.

She turns, one more time, to look at Leonardo. Leonardo, the one that has been with her for every tumultuous rise and fall of her emotions toward Comte. How similar and different he was to his friend. Their gentle, golden eyes like twin fires. But then, the fall of his brown hair against the sides of his face. The kind of half-smirk he always seems to wear. The familiar tobacco smell he brought with him wherever he go; the one she’d longed for the entire time he was absent. Just looking at him, she remembers the feeling of his body underneath hers, memorized after months of cuddled-up sleep.

Seiya isn’t sure.

She doesn’t know what she feels about Leonardo yet.

But she knows one thing.

“Want you to stay,” she says, softly, hand still curled around Comte’s arm. “Please, Leonardo. Stay?”

And the man smiles like he’s won the world. “Just for you, cara mia.”

Comte slides out of her comforting warmth so he can lift her into his arms; the motion makes her sigh lowly, causing the two men to tense for the briefest of moments. Leonardo holds the door open as the two lovers make their way to the room’s large bed. When they get there she is understandably nervous; Comte takes his time kissing every tense muscle. Seiya watches Leonardo move across the room; from shutting the door to pulling one of the plush armchairs so that it faces the bed.

“Don’t mind me,” he says when he spots her staring, but how can Seiya not, when he’s pulled down his trousers just enough to reveal his cock, still at half-mast but very obviously will be as impressive as Comte’s once it’s fully hard.

Seiya’s got the first syllable of Leonardo’s name on her mouth when Comte steals it away with a kiss, light at first but then deep, his tongue prodding her lips open as she relaxes, her hands making their way around him again.

In a moment of tenderness, Comte presses a kiss on her forehead, on her nose, and then on her lips before saying: “Let’s show Leonardo how beautiful you are.”

Comte guides her slowly into position; turning her so that she’s on her hands and knees, facing Leonardo. Her cheeks turn even redder once she catches Leonardo stroking himself quietly, a smirk on his face as he watches Comte maneuver her around for his pleasure. Comte presses a kiss on the dip of her lower back before he guides his still-hard cock to her, coating himself with her essence before slipping into the warmth of her pussy.

Something about being watched by Leonardo sends her brain haywire. Comte is fucking her against the pillow, but his one hand has tangled itself into her hair, pulling her backward and up, allowing her to come eye-to-eye with Leonardo’s careful gaze. She can’t deny the heat that sinks through every inch of her skin, through every bit his eyes land at, tracing the mounds at her chest, the fucked out look she’s wearing on her face—“Leonardo,” she croons, once the pre-cum begins to build around the head of his cock.

Comte’s arm suddenly comes underneath her, pulling her up from the underside of her breasts, forcing her against him. “Remember who is in you,” he growls, before sending her back down. She hears Leonardo’s soft “tsk tsk” before she lands on her elbows; it’s about all she can do to brace herself and stay upright as Comte properly pistons into her, filling the room with the sound of flesh meeting flesh. She can’t look up at Leonardo knowing it would be her ruin, but she can hear the sound of him jerking himself off; at the same time, the sound of Comte’s moans and groans go straight to her core, making her squeeze and contract and pulling Comte deeper into senseless ecstasy.

“I love you,” Comte suddenly says, out of nowhere, causing her to buckle forward onto her cheek. His tone is filled with love and possession and hunger. “I love you, Seiya.” He slides a free hand to the space between her legs, quickly finding the sensitive bud.

“Abel, I—” she cries out as Comte begins to play with her clit and her nipple; he pushes her back up, making sure he’s got her, pressing his face at the junction of her neck and shoulder to fill him with her scent, sweet and intoxicating. “I—I love you, I’ve loved you—” she nearly falls forward with the sudden jolt of pleasure when his cock brushes somewhere electric. “I’m gonna… cum—”

“Cum,” Comte urges, angling himself so he hits that spot that made her spasm over and over again. “Show me how beautiful you are. Show Leonardo.”

And then it was over.

She leans her entire weight against Comte’s arms when the most powerful orgasm she’s had today hits her, knocking the wind out of her. Like an avalanche that only gets stronger and stronger the longer it rolls through her. Comte fucks her throughout the entirety of it, dragging it out for as long as he can until it’s too much even for him, her scent, her warmth, the wetness, her voice—he presses his fangs against her jugular only to sate him but not to break skin, as he pours his cum, white and warm, deep inside of her.

They fall over each other sticky with sweat. Comte rolls off of her, careful to give her space to breathe. When she comes to, she turns toward him and presses a kiss—chaste but filled with love—onto Comte’s lips.

“Was wondering how long it would take the both of you.”

The two new-lovers turn toward Leonardo as if they had just remembered his existence. He’s still sprawled on the armchair, although this time, with his hands out on his sides, leaving his still-hard cock free-standing in front of him. Seiya tries her best not to stare.

“You arrived just in time, actually,” Comte says, as he helps Seiya sit up.

Leonardo shakes his head. “Your patience for the oddest things never made sense to me.”

Seiya considers, for a moment, what this is. Comte who held her heart in his hands for the longest time—Comte who didn’t know how to express it until it was all that consumed him. And across them, Leonardo, sitting there having watched them press their loves onto their bodies, smiling as Comte holds her in his arms. Leonardo who has always been there for her, from every up and down of her feelings with Comte—who, she realizes, probably left knowing this would happen.

Two of the people she loves the most in this mansion. Her heart sings for them.

In what way, they don’t know yet. But for now, the fucking, the loving, the adoration sends confidence fluttering in her heart.

Turning toward Leonardo, she licks her lips.

“Need some help?”

----

Jon Arryn’s recent death had ensured the support of the Knights of the Vale. It was said that the little Warden of the East wanted to see his father’s murder avenged, and had tasked the knights of the Vale with helping the young wolf. The boy was regarded by many as sickly and slightly deranged, but in this he would not listen to his mother. He wanted a war, for he had never seen one, and he wanted someone to punish his father’s killer, the Queen. The South bore such accusations in stony silence. The Knights of the Vale were feared and respected too much.

Lady Catelyn Stark was invaluable to her son. She secured the 100,000 men that marched under Renly Baratheon, and suddenly the threat that loomed over King’s Landing was greater than ever. Tywin Lannister had Stannis Baratheon coming from the sea and the wolves coming from the North, while the King in Highgarden ensured that the Southern Armies were starved of resources.

By the time Ned Stark had spent three months in the dungeons of the Red Keep, it felt as though the whole world was coming to avenge the slight. There were kings in every corner, and Lord Tywin seemed ill-equipped to deal with them.

Rumors flew about the king too, about how he had raged and screamed at his wife, how he beaten her severely before he had left her rooms in all haste. He had been screaming for the Kingslayer, it was said, and for his warhammer. If he hadn’t fallen down the stairs, the Kingslayer wouldn’t be alive, the whispers said. The whispers also wondered how their king could have fallen, how the sure-footed warrior could have missed a step.

The King wouldn’t live to see his friend beheaded, everyone knew. The deep sleep of death had claimed him, and the future was uncertain. The Kingslayer was a prisoner of Robb Stark, and Ned Stark’s daughter was humiliated in court everyday while the man rotted in prison. However it was going to end, it was not going to end well. Those who were wealthy enough to leave the city did so with haste, leaving the poor to beg in the streets.

Winter was coming to King’s Landing, and Lord Tywin seemed at a loss of what to do.

When winter knocked, the people feared an enormous war. Instead, Lord Tywin requested a parley with the King in the North, bowing his proud head and inviting the man to sit down and talk. They met in the small castle in Rosby, where young Prince Tommen had been sent very recently.

The young wolf had grown fearsome, and he came with his trusted bannermen, his wolf stalking and snarling next to him. He stared as his master did, but Tywin ignored the beast.

“I have a question for you, boy,” he said instead.

The Stark boy said nothing. He only nodded, and Tywin couldn’t keep his frustration from his face. The wolf growled in response, and none of the Northern oafs in the room said a word. “Do you wish to sit atop the iron throne?” He chuckled when he felt like screaming. “Let me tell you, that monstrosity is the worst thing you can subject your arse to.”

For a while, the boy did not speak. His mother was glaring at Tywin, but the boy seemed almost bored. “I want my sisters,” he said finally. “I want my father freed. It does not matter whether he spoke the truth or not. He will come home with us, as will my sisters. I want the heads of the men that torment Sansa on Joffrey’s orders. I want an end to your tyranny.”

“King Joffrey--”

“Prince,” the boy was quick to correct him. “The King is not dead yet.”

Tywin wanted to carve the smirk from his face. He made himself smile and nod. “Prince Joffrey can be overzealous in all his righteous anger,” he conceded. “But your sister is safe, as is your father.”

“And what of Arya?” asked Lady Catelyn.

“The little one?” Tywin had hoped he wouldn’t be asked about her. He had hoped they would simply assume they had her. He would have felt much better with three hostages instead of two, but there were some lies so transparent they weakened whoever uttered them. “The girl is lost,” he said finally.  

“Lost?” said Robb. “Is this your way of hiding what you have done to her?”

“I sent men after her,” said Tywin with rising temper. “They came back empty-handed. What would you like me to say? She ran away from her dancing lessons, and wasn’t seen again.”

Robb Stark’s brows furrowed. He looked confused by the notion of a high-born lady taking a dancing lesson. Perhaps that was not the way of the barbarians in the North. It seemed so, for his mother refused to let her tears fall. She sat stoically, her back rigid, her gaze flint. She looked as hard and solemn as a Stark. The wolves had eaten the fish in her.

“We will give you your Kingslayer for my father and sister,” said Robb Stark. “Was that all you wanted?”

“I want you to leave,” said Tywin. “I will deal with the King’s brothers, with Stannis in the water and Renly on the battlefield, but I want you to go back to your frozen homes. Take your sister and father with you.” He smiled. “That is why you came here, is it not?”

Behind the King in the North, his bannermen started to shift restlessly. None of them spoke, however, and Tywin was surprised. He had not thought that men like the Greatjon would ever let a green boy speak for them.

Robb Stark did not speak for a while, as though considering the offer. Then he began to laugh, throwing his head back as though Tywin had just uttered some great jape. No one else in the room so much as smiled. “I believe my father is a great man,” he said finally, “as many men do. But even for the greatest of all men, an army of thousands is too much of an escort, wouldn’t you say?”

Tywin hadn’t really expected the boy to accept. He had never lost a battle, and he had a huge army at his back. “Speak clearly, boy,” he snapped. The wolf straightened from its slouch at its master’s feet and snarled at him.

The boy merely stroked the beast’s back absently. He did not need to bend, even slouched on the ground the thing was almost as high as the boy’s elbow. Robb Stark leaned back into his chair. “I have not come alone, Lord Tywin,” he said. His smile didn’t reach his eyes. “These men with me, they love my father dearly, but they have lost their brothers and their sons. They did not sacrifice for things to go back to the way they were.” The smile dropped like a stone from a window. “They have named me the King in the North.”

“I wonder what that makes your father,” said Tywin drily, even as his mouth went dry.

“Once he is home in Winterfell, he will be the King in the North himself. So here are the terms that every Northerner will agree to. You give me my sisters, my father, and you give me the North. We will also take the ancestral sword of my house, Ice, as well as the remains of all those who have fallen in service to my father.”

“It is impossible,” said Tywin. “Least of all, because I do not have your sister.”

“You murdered her,” said the boy’s mother with anguished venom in her voice.

“Would that I could,” said Tywin with a shrug. “The little thing ran away, and none of my men can find her. She seems to have disappeared.” He smirked at the boy king. “Did you check under her bed before you left Winterfell?”

The boy said nothing. He continued to stare. Tywin felt a strange sense of respect for him. “You want me to believe that?”

“My men would be able to look for her better if they didn’t have to be afraid of wolves leaping out at them from behind trees,” said Tywin drily. “They say you command an army of wolves too.”

“So they do,” said the boy, and didn’t answer the hidden question. Tywin had expected him to boast.

“If I give you the North,” he asked, even though the words tasted like ashes in his mouth, “and all else you ask, will you leave?”

“I want my sisters,” said the boy. “Both of them.”

Tywin was not going to repeat himself. “Would His Grace like to think on the peace terms I have offered?”

The boy stood, and his mother stood with him. He left without a word, he left, his wolf loping at his side. None of the bannermen even looked at Tywin as they left. Greatjon spat in his direction as he left.