It begins, as always, with an invitation.
It begins with dinner and a bottle of Nevarran red in the older mage's quarters. It's the first night of the College of Magi and so they talk of things dry and theoretical, of research and politics and templars and nothing, studying each other sidelong in the flickering candlelight. Each new year brings more lines to the elf's face, more weariness. His hair has just begun to gray but Uldred thinks it will suit him and he smiles when he knows he's watching, thumb tracing the flat edge of the dinner knife.
And then, when the candles have burnt down to beeswax stubs and the templar outside the door is one of his , he takes that knife and draws it slowly across his palm.
He knows the other man's mind, knows it well,knows just where to press and twist to have him shivering as he slides Uldred's robes off with a kind of dread and reverence. He knows the way his mouth tastes of wine and lyrium and some sort of mint – and he knows, most of all, the way he whines and arches against him when Uldred bites. He smirks, slow burn of power on his lips. He pushes the elven mage away and skates his mouth over his ear, his throat, kissing and claiming, teeth and possession, and then he pushes him down.
You want this, he reminds him as the man takes him in, slick heat and eager tongue. You asked for this. You want this. And because he cannot reply with words he hums. Uldred curses, letting his head fall back, control slipping for a moment. He presses his hips forward, slides into the blazing heat of his throat until the mage is gagging, clearly, muscles tense and twitching around him, but then he slithers back deep into his mind until there is no more struggle. He does not pull back. He does not let up. He does not allow the man to touch himself, even though he can see he needs to, even as his hands tremble from obeying and he pleads with soft whimpers and sweeps of his tongue. He keeps him down, keeps him on his knees and begging, takes his mouth as firmly as he's taken his mind until he comes apart.
It's only then that he lets him touch himself. Uldred lies back on the couch, eyes lidded, as the man takes himself in hand and stares at him with spell-fogged eyes. There's still blood on his hand and his lips, and it's not so hard to make him say things. Things like please and let me and yours. They are words that he found in his mind already, hidden away – the mage shudders as he speaks them, his shame almost palpable in the little room.
You asked me for this, Uldred reminds him again, gently, when he tries to look away.
"I did," he manages, "I – I want this –" he gives a soft moan, head falling forward before another pulse of power makes it snap up. Uldred wonders, briefly, if this would be different if there were no mist of blood magic between them – if the other man would still stare at him with those pretty green eyes, stroke at his flesh with the same rough desperation, still beg to be to be cowed and claimed and used.
He wonders if he could make him crawl.
He wonders if it would be better.
He makes him stop and the man cries out, the word fuck spills over his lips, untainted by blood and unbidden, followed by me, and Uldred laughs aloud.
That's how it begins.
That's how it always begins.
It ends the same way it always does, too, when they lie in the dark with sweat cooling on their skin and he watches the man lick the drying blood from his lips. "Teach me how to do that," he asks.
"It would be easier if you tried it yourself," Uldred purrs, as ever, catching his hand in his own and pressing nails to his palm. But Orsino pulls away.
"Next time," he murmurs.
And because next time means next time Uldred smiles and lets it pass.