Napoleon fights back a hiss at the full brunt of Illya's weight hastens the blood from his shoulder and soaks his shirt from black to burgundy.
"Vervain," Illya says, pulling himself up another step and pulling another hiss from Napoleon. The staff's stairway is steep, but empty, and fresh blood still soaks through Napoleon's shirt. They made do.
"That explains the burning." He leaves Illya to lean against the while while he fumbles for the key. How long has he been shaking?
"Is probably in your bloodstream now," words slurring, a glance reveals Illya's eyes staring somewhere far away. Familiar expression. Napoleon pushes the door open and drags them both inside. By all accounts he should be feeling much worse. Vervain should have him biting his lips bloody with pain. Vervain should have him still in the garden on the ground paralyzed by agony. But he scarcely feels his own body. Shoulder, the only point of sensation; he overworks the arm to feel it ache. Body, slipping from his control, hanging on the precipice of shock. The pain grounds him, carries him long enough that he can carry Illya to the couch.
"I'm going to take a shower," he announces to no one.
Illya's eyes slide shut.
Each crash of wave falls harder than the one before, audible to Napoleon even behind the bathroom door. Shower spray hitting white tile sounds much the same, both paving way for storm. He strips down listening for the crash of thunder, or a change in the pace of Illya's breath. He's not sure which. He's not sure if there's a difference.
The bullet won't go easily. The wound knit together, more scar tissue than functioning flesh. Even as Napoleon searches the bathroom for a first aid kit, he knows he'll have to tear the wound back open.
He pinches the bullet with the forceps, hissing as his skin tries to knit around the bullet. Medics often said it was safer to leave the bullet alone, but Napoleon wants no memento of this evening. Already he is burying the memory, blotting out lines of thought like a half-redacted dossier. Compartmentalize. Close the chapter. Leave loose ends and they'll fray until the whole thing comes unraveled and Napoleon is forced to remember tonight. He doesn't want t remember. The bullet has to go. He tugs, free hand sending spiderweb of cracks up the ceramic white sink, now polka-dotted red. Muscle parts. Napoleon works fast, not racing bloodless but the speed of his own body and its prognosis to heal.
Metal falls into the sink. Napoleon runs the tap hot. Vampires, not built for heat. They once chased a man to India at the height of summer and every word from Napoleon's mouth came as a complaint. Now he relishes the heat for how it makes his head fog with the mirror and beckons his eyes slip shut until his focus is narrowed down to the scalding heat on his back and not the searing throb of his shoulder twice-knitting back together.
The glass he left for Illya sits empty. Wordlessly, Napoleon takes the glass to refill, attention never leaving Illya even as he turns his back. Illya watches him, too; he lacks control of his body, but senses are the first to return. Sight and sound and smell come all at once; at first it is dizzying, so much to process. But KGB agents are trained to deal with that, aren't they? Sensory overload. Common precursor to interrogation. Illya tracks him with complete lucidity, even as the muscles of his neck remain at gravity's mercy.
Napoleon can do the same under similar circumstances, but that particular skill is an accident of circumstance. Illya's is cultivated. He returns with another glass of water, and Illya lifts a steady hand to meet him
"You look tired. How are you feeling?"
Illya grunts, "Bad. Had worse."
Outside, the first drops of storm begin to fall.
"You lied," a simple statement of fact. Napoleon pauses on his way to the door. He's hungry, and the room is thick with Illya's blood. His neck stopped bleeding but the smell still lingers, stained copper on the collar of Illya's shirt. "Sit."
And he does. He sits beside Illya; an excuse to not look him in the eye. Napoleon keeps palms his open atop his knees, back a careful slouch, broadcasting tired indifference and quieting the shake in his leg that whispered hungry violent blood on the air I need to hunt. His jaw squares itself into a flat line, muscle quivering. Too many emotions at once. He should sift them through and decide which could be most useful, which ones he could mold into the shape of feelings not so telling. But it's all Napoleon can do to focus on the conversation at hand.
"Well, Peril, we do that." It comes out sharper than he intended, desire for accusation jumping through his teeth. "Lie. We're liars. I'm a professional liar."
Illya considers this, takes it apart the same way he surgically takes apart all information, brutally efficient. "This is true," too simple a response; a lie of omission, and all Napoleon can glean is Illya's clipped tone. Napoleon tucks this answer beneath his serpent tongue, where he might later learn how it sits awkward in his mouth, "You are better spy than I thought."
Somehow that feels like an insult.
"I have moments of competency."
"You knew you could kill him," it's as much a statement as it is a question. It should be a question only. Illya gives him far too much credit. It feels far too much like trust.
"No," Napoleon looks down, "But I knew if I couldn't, then neither could you."
Illya sits up straight, "Then this was not your decision to make!" last word dropping into a groan, he falls back into the couch, eyes shut against the tilting room.
"See, Peril, I didn't give you a decision. I did what was pragmatic." There's a knife tucked beneath his tongue that he does not remember putting there, but it cuts his tender mouth to ribbons.
"You and your ulterior motives."
"I'm a-"
"Spy? No, you are a vampire. Spy would have told his partner the plan." Finally, finally the accusation. "Was never plan for me to kill Moretti."
"No," he confirms only what Illya already knows. "I couldn't best him in a direct attack. Little chance you could. No offense - we're different breeds."
"I am made to hunt this breed. Was my assignment, not yours." His jaw snaps shut, as if biting off his next words and the bite still seems too large for him to handle, jaw flexing. Napoleon knows body language, even slurred with exhaustion. He knows anger manifests first in the jaw, that the jaw is among the first set of muscles to regain control.
It is my fight. The words manifest by the shaking of Napoleon's leg, which he spares only the slightest effort to stop. "What do you want from me, Peril? Sorry I saved you from certain defeat?" Like hell he would have let Moretti take this from him, even if this is sending up warning smoke. Napoleon tries to swallow only to find he cannot, throat too tight. On top of it all, he's hungry. His leg starts its shaking again. He's losing it.
"I want-"
Napoleon slides from the couch, to his knees.
"Solo?"
He places a hand on Illya's thigh, and despite Illya's tightened jaw, the rest of him is still loose-limbed. For the best. Napoleon isn't sure if he could handle much movement. He's out of practice.
"What are you doing?" his voice is pitched lower than before, which tells Napoleon that he already knows the answer to his question.
"Making it up to you." Illya knows how this works. What Napoleon is good for.
Muscle manages to tense beneath his palm. "I do not want your payment," voice still low, it comes out near a snarl.
"Then call it a gift," he says evenly, remembering Illya on a different vouch, neck bared for no reason other than than Napoleon needed and Illya could give. Not a memory he allowed himself to linger on, but he wasn't above turning even this into a tool.
"There is nothing arousing about this."
Napoleon laughs. There's salt on the air. Sweat. Musk. They overwhelm the notes of petrichor blowing in from the window. Hunger burns hot beneath his skin, and it should be humid and suffocating but it all burns dry. He could choke on it.
"That's a lie," you should know better than to lie to a spy, to a whore, "I can smell it."
Illya narrows his eyes, "Was in a memory."
Rhythm of the tide, Illya's mouth of his clavicle, biting bruises as they tumble; room dark, Moretti not even a blip on their radar. Two nights ago. It seems longer.
Of their own accord, Napoleon's hands find belt buckle. "Good memory?"
Another twitch of muscle, the hips this time. Napoleon grins. He can't feel his face.
"Stop treating me like asset."
Napoleon does not roll his eyes, because he's focused on the belt, but it's audible when he says, "It's my job. Or have you forgotten?"
Above him, Illya gives a shuddering exhale- not shuddering. Shaking. Anger. "Stop this, Napoleon. I won't use you like he did."
His hands freeze over the skin-warm metal but it may as well be a brand for the way Napoleon's blood goes cold. "Excuse me?"
"Get off your knees."
"You must know, I'm comfortable on my knees," and he doesn't care that the smile hurt his face even more than craning his neck hurt his shoulder. "Tell me where you learned this sordid detail. It's not something the KGB has on file, I should hope, because then the CIA must have it on file and my, that is awkward," cared even less that he couldn't stop the words from coming. Illya knew. "The hunters. I wouldn't put it past them to keep track of what vampires are fucking who." Since they started working together, then. And he said nothing.
"No! He knew your scent. Remembered when we moved to his office. I am also a spy. Can put things together," Illya's heartbeat nearly drowns the words, but the hunger in his veins sits frozen. "I wanted him dead. Wanted to-" an exhale that bordered on growl, "He deserved to die."
Napoleon can feel his face again. The terrible smile sags to an expression that does hurt quite so acutely. "...Yes."
"Please, get off your knees."
Sighing, he stands, hand on the couch to support his spinning head. The air still tastes of salt, of sweat, dried blood. Hunger returns to his consciousness, no longer a dry ache but a cold stab. He would take it.
"Would be best if you leave."
Dully, the smell of sweat links back to desire. The door shuts quietly behind him, and he steps out into the storm.