Chapter 81:
It must be a curse to feel things so deeply. Really, it must be.
"How do you say 'I love you' in Draconic?"
It had just tumbled out. Laxus hadn't really meant to say it out loud. And then, after the space his words had filled was quickly consumed by an audible silence, he expected for those ruby eyes to be suddenly blown wide, a smirk on his lips. He expected a reply like wouldn't you like to knowdisguised as why do you ask? After all, Gajeel didn't often talk about his dad, his childhood, or Dragons. Instead, Gajeel looked at him solidly for a moment, glancing between each of his golden eyes, almost to see if he was being genuine, and then the gentlest smile alighted on his face.
"I love you?" he pushed himself up onto his arms, taking the blankets with him. He settled himself onto his knees and Laxus scrambled up with him, confused as to why he was suddenly kneeling in front of him, "Ic pro brôðorscipe êower."
Laxus repeated the phrase and Gajeel smiled softly when he butchered the words.
"Love is a human word," blush was rising to his cheeks and he suddenly wasn't able to meet Laxus's gaze, "the dragons never had a word like love until they started speaking with humans, learning about them. Love means a lot of things, ya know. You can love a lot of people different ways..."
He reached out to him, fingers ghosting up his cheek and finally resting at the nape of his neck. Laxus felt his magic skitter and writhe. He was nervous.
"The dragons didn't typically say I love you, because it didn't mean enough to them," his voice dropped to barely a whisper, "Êow cweðan mîn innoð pennflêon flêogan."
You give my heartwingsto fly.
Gajeel's eyes shimmered, "And if you love me back, you would say..."
Laxus shouldn't have known the words. How could he? He wasn't a real Dragon Slayer. He'd never spoken Draconic, had only heard it a handful of times. He wasn't raised by dragons, had never even seen one. But somehow, he knew to twine his fingers into the fine obsidian hairs at the base of Gajeel's skull, to gaze into his eyes and try not to be half as nervous as the raven had been. How did he know? How did he know?
"Êower goldmæstling dôð scinncræft oð mîn sprengan."
You are the magic in my veins.
Laxus wasn't an idiot. He knew what it meant to combine Magic, he knew what a Unison Raid was, but still this took his breath away. There was a prism of color, like being dropped into those fractals Gajeel's scales created once the light had touched them. There was lightning dancing across skin. Laxus didn't even know if he kissed him, but he was over the raven in the next second and he was shaking. Gajeel was shaking too, but he was smiling so widely Laxus could have kissed those vibrantly white canines of his.
"How?" his voice was wet. He could feelso much, too much. His mind and body felt like static was crawling beneath his skin from it, his throat closed like he was about to cry. It was startling and humbling and euphoric. Gajeel's hand never left him.
"You're a Dragon Slayer, Laxus..." he whispered, "...you're connected to old magic."
"I'm not..."
He chuckled, "You are... if you let yourself be," Gajeel pulled him close until their foreheads were touching, "Close your eyes."
Why was he shaking so much? Was it fear or excitement? Or both?
He closed his eyes.
"I'll show you how..."
Gajeel was so gentle, each stroke of magic like fingers, tender and light, coaxing him into secure hands. A piece of armor loosed and fell to the ground. He was being exposed, laid open and bare, a breastplate gone and then a then the raven was digging into chainmail and unfastening his buckles. Places he'd never dared to explore, that source of power trapped in his skull, throbbed at the foreign touch, a breath of life to something he kept dormant.
"Don't," he warned, and a tremor passed between them, unhampered by gritted teeth and tight eyes. Bare like this, there was nothing to do but understand. The fear of losing control was so much more visceral like this.
"You don't have to be in control," Gajeel kissed his scar, "Let me show you."
It was like being stripped apart, the laces of himself untied and left to drift to the floor. Only raw magic remained and it snapped and crackled like angry snakes, tinted black and smelling sweet and rotting. Fear.He felt like he was falling, a fog bleeding into his sight as he dug fingertips into the sheets. Gajeel's studs dug into his forehead and he didn't realize he had braced for impact.
"At your pace..." Gajeel whispered, and Laxus could feel his retreat. Those strings that held him together being retied with meticulous precision. He didn't realize his breathing had become so ragged. He opened his eyes and could see Gajeel gazing up at him with his own half-lidded, "Do you want to know what you're missing?"
The connection of Magic that had been a steady wire between them was a dam broken open. It was a rush. Laxus was drowning in it, in those ruby eyes that seemed to be the only thing now holding him steady. Adoration, affection, attraction, possessiveness, a need to protect, to keep safe, longing, lust, love. He felt it like a string around his throat suddenly going taught and drawing them closer. They were two stars circling around each other, binary, unable to exist without the other, destined to one day collide and make something new.
It tasted like passion and felt like warm steel. Laxus felt wilderness and sunlight falling across his face as he sunbathed in the hot midday, body still wet from swimming in the river. He tasted iron dug from rock, pilfered from ranches, and traces in the fresh blood of a new kill. It felt untamed and maddening. Laxus was falling in a midnight sky surrounded by stars, plummeting towards the earth and covered in the moon's frost. His arms were out and he was watching the navy grasses come for him up until the point when he closed his eyes and wings opened, wider than the earth and soft as velvet. He was spiraling up, up, up and the sun was peeking over the horizon, splitting apart the night in a dazzling reawakening. Fire was streaking across the sky. There were lifetimes here in this magic, centuries. There were voices of wisdom and strength and power and rage. There was death and life and a chain that strung back through time. Old Magic. Thiswas Old Magic.
In a moment it was over. Gajeel was shivering and gasped as it all collapsed between them, the rose once wide open in the late summer now folding back into a bud. For the first time that week, Gajeel's scales vanished and he fell into the bed breathless. A single eye opened, a smirk playing at his lips, and despite the fatigue in his limbs Laxus felt every bit of that invitation.
The floodgates were still open; both of their bodies sang with the tremors that wracked Gajeel's body as soon as Laxus's mouth claimed his. Every touch tore him to pieces and Laxus hardly contain himself. Those scales had kept him from truly feeling and now each movement Laxus made against him had him ablaze like orange marigolds upturned towards the sun. He ravaged his chest, leaving his own marks down his skin. Gajeel's back arched beneath him and a cry tore from his lips as soon as Laxus's tongue glided down the length of him.
The air swirled as Gajeel regretted not staying silent, his face quickly becoming warm with blush. No, no, it's beautiful. Let me hear more.
Both of his hands were tangling knots in his hair, pulling him down as his thighs shook. Both of their spines were alive with that electric current when Laxus released him and climbed on top of him. Being a wizard of Lightning Magic had its advantages when he was being this hasty. The way his name caught in Gajeel's throat, the exhilaration that flooded through them both, and the fact that Laxus could feelhow Gajeel thought his lightning was beautiful, it was nearly too much. With Gajeel's legs wrapped around him, tumbled from the same height. That feeling of falling towards the ground, stars falling with them, lips pressed to each other's, was absolutely, rapturously, sublime.
Gajeel was still reeling when Laxus spoke against his ear, "Gods alive... we're both a mess, aren't we?"
"Mmh... S'alright... if you don' wanna be... I'll be a mess... fer the both a' us," his breath fell to tatters when Laxus rocked into him. He settled there in Gajeel's arms, pressed kisses to his sweat-slicked temples. The air was still humming, electricity dancing around them, down his fingers, sparking his eyes. He wanted to melt because he knew what Gajeel was thinking. You're beautiful. So beautiful.
"Êow cweðan mîn innoð pennflêon flêogan," he whispered.
Gajeel's eyes looked wet and Laxus's heart froze.
"I'm... I'm sorry-"
Gajeel clicked his teeth, "Shaddup... just never thought I'd hear someone say it..." he pulled Laxus back down to him, hid his face in the crook of his neck, "Êower goldmæstling dôð scinncræft oð mîn sprengan."