A/N - Thanks for all the fantastic reviews :) #
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Whoosh.
"One."
Kaname never struck the same place twice.
The pain was all a jumbled up mess of ow that really fucking hurts and ow, that really, really fucking hurts in his mind- the blows individually indistinguishable from one another apart from the count - but he still managed to keep it together.
He knew better that to lose his head around Kaname.
The first lash had fallen across his shoulders, right under the neck, and with every stroke Kaname had worked his way down. Slow, steady and methodical.
Horizontal whipping? Yeah, Kaname was no amateur. There was less than a millimetre between the stripes, by the feel of it, and again, ow.
He just hoped it meant they were done when Kaname got to his arse.
Presumably, that couldn't be too injured if Kaname wanted to use it tonight but who the fuck could really know? The pureblood definitely went in for a side of pain with his pleasure and optimism wasn't exactly a safe habit in Zero's line of work.
"Thirty."
He would kill for a glass of water. Ice cold and just dripping with condensation. It would feel like sin as it glided over his tongue and down, down, down his aching throat.
The next blow didn't come on time– and Zero murmured a vague noise of confusion to the glass, feeling hazy and disconnected from the world. Fuck, what had been in that drink?
"Stubborn aren't you, pet."
Kuran.
"Mmm? Oh, are you still here?" Zero told the window, eyes firmly closed and most of his weight pressed against the steamed glass. Anybody looking up was going to get an eyeful and no mistake.
-He could really go for some blood right now -
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. No. No Blood. He pressed his forehead against the glass and used the pressure of it to fucking focus. No blood. Blood is disgusting. Blood is sick. Blood is wrong.
Kaname's blood was fucking perfect though.
Fuck.
Bad Zero. No. Kuran's fucking cursed blood was fucking cursed. Don't even think of his blood and especially not with the prick himself in the fucking room. You can't have it. Not that you want it. He'd kill you. Not that it wouldn't be worth it.
"Ignoring me, Zero? Well, we can't have that now, can we, pet."
Sometimes, Zero wished he knew stronger swear words.
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The instant Kaname spoke there were beautifully cold hands roaming all over his ruined back with possessive appreciation and suddenly all Zero could smell was Kuran's blood, hidden away under that skimpy layer of skin. Blood he remembered with painfully perfect precision. The taste of it had been literally mind blowing. The pleasure so intense thought itself had been obliterated. It had been… the best-goddamned night of his life. A spark of divinity in his mouth and – fuck.
Zero groaned aloud, hands fisting on the glass above his head as he tried to bury his head into it. The bloodlust was awful. His thirst felt like it was alive, primal need blazing in his throat, sending tsunamis of hormones and instincts and come on just go for it up into his head. Fighting it took all of his concentration.
He was better than this, he really, really was.
-Except that Kaname was right behind him. Touching him. That eternally beating heart was being a right tease. Each beat sent a fresh wave of ambrosia through that fragile body and it was so close. Each wave pumped that scent straight into Zero's brain and if he could just taste –
Too caught up in fighting his own head, his body gave out on him. The pattern had broken, and his knees were weak. Zero began to sink to the floor – and Kuran caught him because he was a sadist like that.
His posh clothes were like a grater on his skin, but even that new pain was nothing compare to the craving Zero suffered when Kaname pulled him back to lean on him – bringing him too close and not close enough to that gorgeous blood.
"Let go Kuran," Zero rasped immediately, slapping the hands on his waist away. "I'm not a fainting maiden here. It was just pins and needles, let go of me."
He kept his eyes closed, knowing all too well they'd be a demonic shade of red as the monster surged inside of his skin. No need to guess what Kaname would do if he saw that.
Kaname ignored him, which infuriated Zero all over again. Here he was trying to save the bastard when his good intentions got shat over and it wouldn't be his fault if Zero just turned around and had a quick nip now would it –
Fuck fuck fuck.
He risked a peek under the cover of his eyelashes.
The window's reflection said Kaname was in no state to be looking at his eyes. Oh no, the purebloods attention was entirely on his back. Those eyes were glittering with appreciation for the bruised and mottled mess.
"You took that beautifully pet."
His scent was otherworldly. Oh god, that need again. It was so much worse than Zero remembered. The weighty knowledge that just one sip, and all his pain would vanish, that he'd be in an ecstasy beyond heaven, beyond anything in the known galaxy with just a drop, made it so much harder to resist.
He'd never mock the pining of other vampires for Kuran ever again. God how he wanted to just -
"Let go," Zero repeated more urgently. They were too close. It was too much. His fangs were emerging, beginning to scrape his lower lip and he wouldn't give in. He was not a monster. He was not an animal. He was not ruled by instinct. He was his own master and he would. Not. Surrender.
For god's sake, he argued with himself furiously as he struggled, you wouldn't even get close. There's no point lusting after him like a bitch in heat, he'll break our fangs and make us eat them and then torture us horribly. Have some dignity.
It helped, a little, but blood lust didn't care for logic.
Kaname released the grip on his waist – and Zero fell forward a step, face first into the glass. He shivered. The window was ice against his flushed cheeks but his back might have well been bathed in acid it burned so much and bloodlust tore through him and he was starving and – it was too much for one body to feel.
He'd stopped losing an argument against himself though, so, you know, bonus.
The world blurred as he was spun about – and suddenly it was his back being flash-frozen and pushed tightly up against it and oh, god that was a whole new hurt, but it shocked his system enough to give him a breather.
"No tears?" Kaname put a finger under his chin and pulled Zero's head up, tilting his head from this way to that, examining his face under the light. Zero kept his eyes shut and the nausea down. His back, oh god, that burned too cold.
"A pity, a true pity." He stroked Zero's cheekbones, tenderly, one hand to his face, the other flat against his chest, pinning him to the wall like the butterfly under a collector's pins.
Zero mustered all of his willpower to keep his voice at a human decibel, his fangs concealed, and to remember what language was.
"Fuck off."
"Well, never mind," Kaname mused with a faintly martyred air, "there's still time. Can you walk?"
"Fuck off."
Kaname dropped his support and Zero did not stagger.
"My bedroom is down that corridor. Go lie face down on the bed."
Zero went, grateful for the chance to pull together. Anger was better than bloodlust and he focused on that above all else, trying to distract his slavering instincts with something else to fuel their obsession.
His shuffled along in a halting gait, painfully slow and cursing Kaname with every breath, trying to work up a good solid rant for his armour.
Seriously, this was an apartment, why was there even a fucking corridor? What was wrong with a one-roomed studio? The rest of them managed just fine. Think of the wasted space.
He stumbled again, but caught his grip on the moulding. His knees had been locked for so long to keep him upright that he couldn't seem to unlock them again, so he walked like a marionette instead, using his arms to push and pull himself along.
Fucking vampire and his fucking fetishes.
He tried to keep his back as immobile as possible to help the healing along – and reduce the pain to mere agony – but it was fucking impossible to move at the same time – and then he fucking tripped again.
This time, he landed with a fluffy thump onto the predictably gigantic bed, his head over one end, and his legs another, but whatever. Good enough. Kaname could fuck him right here and he wouldn't have to move an inch for it.
A few minutes passed and nothing happened.
His back throbbed in time with his heart and his throat echoed it. Fervently.
OK, Zero thought, he could admit it – this really sucked.
In his head, he knew that he'd heal perfectly. He wouldn't even get a scar for a keepsake. Kaname had been careful enough – as such things went. Zero knew the score; movement would be agony for a night or four, depending on how much blood he could stomach after they were done here. Then he'd be swollen and tender for a few more nights, and then he'd just be sore – and irritable, because he knew himself well.
In his heart, he was uneasy. He was too vulnerable; weak, thirsty, and he hated it. It didn't matter how many times he told himself that Kaname had had both the chance and the capacity to kill him a thousand times when they were younger and he'd never done it. He reminded himself that Kaname hadn't even hit him when Zero had been a child and stabbed him with a fucking butter knife for god's sake. He was safer here than in his own fucking apartment. Kaname still wanted to fuck him – and he wasn't going to snuff Zero out before he got his.
He still felt like he was a Hunter showing a pureblooded vampire his belly. It felt… monumentally stupid.
Kaname wasn't cruel by nature or anything, well, not the really mean spirited shit anyway – but he wasn't to be trusted either.
He was a predator – and he treated Zero like prey. Being wounded around him – well, that was just asking for it, wasn't it?
"How do you feel about photographs?"