A/N: Eyyyy chapter four you guys! In which Tahno clearly has a type, is fabulous, my headcanon for Hasook's neck kink is made obvious, and also some plot progression I guess? Ugh also I upped the story to M - mainly for safety but also because I'm not sure how explicit you can be at T D: Augh why is this crack pairing suddenly the focus of my life you guys you don't understand there is like zero Tahsook out there and for good reason but still...these are the reasons why I should just keep this stuff to tumblr. Although my Tahno/Tarrlok and Tahno/Iroh II and Tahno/Tarrlok/Iroh II/Hasook headcannons are even worse lbr. OK ENOUGH TALKING pls enjoy!
He felt distinctly uncomfortable in the formal watertribe wear. He had asked for it specifically, since he hated the dandy fashions that were recently popular, and also because when he last had to show up to an event - Kihasa's sister's wedding - she had told him how great he looked in watertribe clothes. He adjusted his light parka and picked out a few strands of fur from his shoulder. Elegant people were lining up all around him and he felt even more out of place than usual. He kept his eyes fixed somewhere in the vicinity of the floor as he waited for Tahno.
When he finally came, he was dressed simply and darkly and sleekly, and his hair fluttered slightly in the breeze. He looked totally at home, and that made Hasook impossibly jealous. He looked down his pointed nose at Hasook's water-tribe wear. "I see you went native," he said carelessly. "Not a bad choice." he glared at the retreating waterbender's back, whispering away in midnight silk. This was definitely Tahno's element, and the way he worked the small groups of wealthy merchants and patrons made Hasook uneasy.
He had no idea what he was doing. A waiter came around with some rice wine but Hasook waved her away, too busy trying to stay comfortable and figure out what in all of Unga's underworld Tahno actually had planned. Tahno was drinking freely, he noticed, completely ignoring him, and the tips of his snowy ears bloomed in tandem with his cheeks and his neck. Tahno barely looked his way and Hasook found himself left largely to his own devices. He was able to make mild conversation with a few people, and from them found out that this was a gala held for the patrons of the pro-bending association of greater Republic City, whose existence was not unfamiliar to Hasook but whose activities had been held under scrutiny of late.
He was startled when an aristocratic-looking young woman handed him a glass of rice wine. "Might as well make yourself at home," she said in a bored voice, downing her own matching cup in seconds. "We're gonna be here for a while." They stood together for a few moments. Her eyes reflected the glint and glow of the paper lanterns strung all around them. He took a sip and blanched. The higher the quality, the more it seemed to burn.
"So...what's all this for, again?" he asked, when she didn't leave immediately. She turned to him sharply.
"You can't be serious. The gala is the fundraising event of the year - half the patrons here run the city! There's the state Magistrate talking to Nobleman Moru and his secretary," here she gestured to a tall fat man and a short, angry-looking lady, "and there's the head of Cabbage Corp giving Councilman Tarlok some kiwigrapes." She glanced back at him. "So don't act like you're so overbooked you can't remember what gala this is, newbie."
Newbie? "What-what makes you say that?" he managed, even as she put another glass in his hands.
"Well, for one thing you haven't asked me my name yet." Without waiting for a response she continued, "It's Tuya. And I haven't seen someone look so awkward and rough at these things since we first brought my brother." Her teeth flashed briefly as she smiled.
"Uh, okay, nice to meet you Tuya, I'm -"
"I didn't ask you to introduce yourself either, you know." He chanced a glance away from his reflection in the rice wine and noticed her smile broaden. "Relax, newbie. It was a joke."
"Ha ha."
"Look, I know you've probably heard some shady things about this thing, but you look like a waterbender, so you'll have a great time. Thank whoever let you crash." She smoothed the front of her crimson robe and took the glass back out from his grasp. "You haven't touched your drink," she admonished before emptying it much as she had done the first.
The first gong for the meal sounded. "Well, that's my cue." She began to drift away and he, clinging to her presence, began to follow. "I told you to relax. There's still half an hour before the banquet even starts, and yes, I know how dumb that sounds." She rolled her eyes and flashed her teeth again, then left him and stood near a tall dark man with piercing green eyes. He tracked her, a bastion of familiarity in the crowd, until he spotted dark silk once more. Tahno seemed intent on speaking to and flirting with as many people as he possibly could in the time they still had before the final dinner gong rang. He seemed to have forgotten entirely about Hasook's existence.
But when his gaze next slid over to Hasook, at last, it was filled with barely-concealed heat and muddled with drink. Had the idiot gotten drunk already? It had only been an hour! He disengaged himself from a too-young, too-eager girl, and began taking slightly unsteady steps towards him. His fingers clenched. Tahno's hair was already unruly, having been combed through nonchalantly too many times. He had unbuttoned his tall wide collar in the heat, and sauntered towards Hasook with the concentration and undivided focus of the truly drunk. He came close, in the way Hasook had become so used to, and whispered into his neck, "you looked like you were having a good time with...Tuna, was it? Well. After dinner, I'll show you a better one." His breath smelled of rice wine and pomegranates. He pulled away and licked his lips, made rosy with heat.
A brief fantasy ripped through him, with Tahno's white legs thrown carelessly over his own dark shoulders, his long neck a mess of nips and bites, his sweet, dark voice crying out in abandon and desperation. It was gone as suddenly as it came, and it left Hasook burning even as Tahno brushed past him and called to someone behind them. Spirits, this waterbending bastard. He teased more than the dancing girls down at Baki's club. He rendered Hasook breathless with a look, motionless with a touch. Desperate with a single word uttered in that dark honey voice. Spirits, it was so easy for Tahno to toy with him.
And he was loving it.
He sat next to Tahno at the banquet, fixing his gaze on the other waterbender to guide his actions. There didn't seem to be much to guide, but this formal event was definitely nowhere near Hasook's comfort level and he knew he stuck out like a sore thumb. But the food was excellent, and Hasook busied himself with trying to stuff as much as he could down his throat while maintaining a semblance of propriety. Hayal Moru stood up somewhere between the third or fourth course, and made some speeches about how pleased he was about the progress being made in his Bending Academy. Then he was followed by the dark, striking green-eyed warrior man Tuya sat next to. When he spoke, Hasook's rice fell from his chopsticks.
"We are all here for one thing and one thing only," he said, his green eyes looking faraway. "And that is to ensure that our talented benders are able to continue rendering their services to the city and the world at large. They give the…nonbenders… hope, they give us revenue, they work and train hard every day to ensure that the ancient gift of bending is available to the bereft masses. It is a gift we must help to continue and spread well beyond the walls of this city." There was a polite round of applause at this, but something about the short speech struck Hasook as being fundamentally wrong...if only he could put his finger on it... The quiet voice continued, silencing the hall with simple words. "Our bending sons and daughters reserve the right to exercise their gifts - gifts not available to all but only to the blessed few. We cannot allow these gifts to go to waste. There are those, the giftless, the lesser, who see our glory and want it for their own, and will not stop until the benders are broken and made to be like them. They would take away everything. But I assure you. The nonbending lunatics will be crushed, and their pleas for equality and their little straw leader will burn. Which is why I am holding this year's banquet in Councilman Tarrlok's honor." Next to him, he heard the clatter of Tahno's chopstick hitting the china. Tarrlok stepped up and looked at everyone through dark eyes. His handsome face was glowing in the lamplight, and his hair was coiffed to perfection.
"Thank you, Gao," he said with an affable smile, though his eyes lost none of their sharpness. "While I admire Gao's...enthusiasm, I must admit that I can't fully agree." Hasook relaxed a bit - the good Councilman's admission made this feel more like a gala and less like one of those bizarre, bending-element-worshipping cults he'd heard rumors about. Tarrlok smiled as the dark man - Gao - glared up at him. "Amon is the true threat here, and I wouldn't be speaking in jest if I said that if Amon and his pretense of equality succeeds, we would all feel the flat of his boot - bender and non-bender alike. I won't lie: I won't be able to take him down on my own. Which is why I proposed to have the Avatar on my task force." There was another polite round of applause, and Hasook found himself clapping along for lack of any other response. Tarrlok's beads glinted in the light and his large square hands adjusted his lapels. "If there are any questions or inquiries, please feel free to notify my secretary. I look forward to the next bending match - I hear the Fire Ferrets have really picked up their game." He heard Tahno's snigger next to him and felt the tips of his ears burn. Knowing he'd been summarily replaced, by the Avatar, of all people, still stung more than he felt comfortable letting on.
Tarrlok appraised the dinner guests before sitting down, allowing his glance to sweep down the long table. His gaze rested for a moment in Hasook's vicinity before a faint smile graced his lips and moved on, laughing with the city magistrates near him. Hasook thought his ears would burn off from the embarrassment - it seemed as though he noticed the lone ex-Fire Ferret at the table.
After dinner, Tahno kept him mysteriously close, taking his arm at some times and crowding him at others. The heat of his presence was not unwelcome but the twist in his stomach was. Tahno was slowly herding him to a more secluded corner, well in sight of the guests of honor but out of the way enough to be intimate. He felt his ears and chest heat with the blush of the mortification and the gratification of Tahno's rather public attentions. Finally, just as Hasook was going to shove him out of his personal space Tahno leaned in again, displaying his neck invitingly and murmuring to Tahno a voice pitched to sinful perfection, "Go ahead. Do it."
"Wha- wha- do what?" Hasook sputtered, trying to lean away from Tahno, trying not to drown in the heat.
That horrible smirking smile. "Cute, acting like you haven't wanted to all night. I can practically smell it on you."
His eyes widened as Tahno cast him a bored-looking glance.
Tahno sighed. "Fine, if you're going to be that way...I'll just do it myself." And he leaned in, tightening his grip on Hasook's shoulder. He smiled lightly as Hasook licked his lips on instinct. "See, you do know what I mean," he whispered, before lightly brushing his lips against Hasook's own. His lips tingled at the contact, and his nose was filled with the scent of Tahno - clove and rice wine and something else, something vaguely flowery. He felt the blush start in his chest, grateful it wouldn't show in the dim light of the lamps, even more grateful they were in at least some privacy. Tahno kissed him again, and it was as though the kiss awoke him from some heady slumber, and he came alive under those lips and responded in turn, not as precise as Tahno but enthusiastic, filled with more fervor. His arms came up and held Tahno close, the vision of Tahno's pale bared skin dancing behind his closed eyes, the feel of lean wiry muscle igniting a fire deep and low in him. He growled in satisfaction when Tahno's lips opened easily for him, but Tahno's answering moan was obscene and loud, breaking Hasook out from under his spell. Hasook broke their embrace hurriedly, and looked around only to see Gao and Tarrlok looking over in their direction. Wiping his mouth with embarrassment, he glanced over to look at Tahno, that infuriatingly delicate blush dusting over his cheeks, his lips looking swollen and red in the lamplight. There were footsteps from behind, and Councilman Tarrlok came up to them, a small smile playing on the corners of his mouth.
"I trust everything is alright here?" He said in his slick voice, clapping Hasook on the back with one of his large hands - hard - and grasping the back of Tahno's neck with the other, smiling between the two of them. Hasook couldn't bear to look at the Councilman, but Tahno made a small noise that would have been a whimper from anyone else and Tarrlok stayed with them. "I'm so glad two of Republic City's own rising stars were able to make it. Glad to meet you." His voice was jolly and affable, but underneath there was a hard sharpness, and Hasook felt a distant mistrust instantly.
Tarrlok turned his head towards Tahno, so Hasook could only see his handsome profile. "It's good to see you again, Tahno. Tell me, are you still training as hard as ever?" Tahno looked distinctly uncomfortable in Tarrlok's familiar grip, and squirmed a bit before muttering a response. "Good, good. Don't train yourselves too hard -" here he turned back to Hasook and addressed him as well. "It would be a shame to have you all bruised and broken up before the tournament, eh?" He left them, and Hasook could only look at Tahno, who still carried an irresistible blush and was rubbing his neck where Tarrlok had touched him.
Tahno was still rubbing his neck by the time the banquet was over. Hasook had asked him, just after Tarrlok had left, what had just even happened, but Tahno ignored him and kept his distance again. Bewildered, Hasook had resigned himself to grazing the buffet and filling himself for whatever Tahno had planned for them afterwards. His heart still thundered from the kiss, but Tahno's distance was confusing. Their kiss was amazing - why was he still playing hard to get? At last, he gave in, and decided to go along with Tahno's little game. Diva, he thought affectionately, even as he finished eating and walked over to where the other boy was sitting, his long neck on display as he rolled his head uncomfortably.
"Let me see it."
"What?"
"Your neck. Let me see it. You've been rubbing it since after dinner."
"No - it's nothing. Worry about your own neck." Hasook chuckled at this and leant in to kiss Tahno's jawline playfully. But Tahno swatted him away and sent him a warning glare.
It stung, but Hasook persisted. "Don't be a jerk, Tahno. Just let me see - " He took Tahno's wrist - " – for," He gripped Tahno's hair - " - a minute -" He was about to turn the back of Tahno's neck towards him as gently as he could when Tahno swiftly disengaged himself, wincing.
"I said it's nothing," Tahno growled. "Stop acting like a mother turtleduck. It's unattractive." His eyes softened when he looked back at Hasook, though. "Don't worry about it," he said again, touching Hasook's shoulder briefly before drifting towards a gaggle of girls and boys. "Meet me by the cook's entrance after this is over. I did promise you dinner and a show, after all."