Jak smirked at Hen and nodded, then whispered something back before slipping away. When the door locked behind him, Dagan stood and held out one hand. “Let’s see what’s upstairs,” he whispered, as Hen took it and came to him.
Hendrik nodded and followed him up the stairs, tiptoeing. The second floor was a long hall, at the end of which was another staircase, almost like an inn or winery. On a whim, Dagan climbed that staircase too, which led to something like an attic, dusty with low, bare-wood ceilings. He glanced over his shoulder, to see what Hendrik was thinking of—
And found himself pressed into the nearest wall, trapped between it and Hendrik’s hard, warm body. Hen slipped a thigh between his and bore down, catching his mouth in a breathless kiss. Dagan’s knees went weak; thankfully, Hendrik held him fast. “I don’t know how often we’ll find a moment, now we’re here,” he breathed into Dagan’s lips. “So let’s take this one.”
Dagan leaned against the wall and pushed Hen’s chest back slightly, so he could look him in the eye. “Are you scared?”
Hen shook his head, tugging downward on Dagan’s leather waistband. “I should be. But I’m not. Not today, anyhow. You?”
Dagan shook his head. “Not yet. I don’t know this place or these people, but it’s enough for me that you do.”
Hen kissed him again, pressing the muscle of his thigh against Dagan’s hardening cock, making him gasp. Something was eating at him, even if it wasn’t fear, but he didn’t seem inclined to discuss just then. Perhaps he would be once they worked out some of this desperation on both ends.
What was Dagan’s desperation about? He wasn’t entirely sure. The familiar taste of Hen’s tongue and the feeling of his warm hands sliding beneath his shirt was a relief, though. The smell of him, just the slightest hint of something green from the Heart Wood clinging to his hair and skin, buried the musty, disused smell of the covered furniture and languishing attic. Living, breathing, beating hearts, rushing blood.
“We’ll finish this,” Hen said into his neck, then licked, sucked at it. “We’ll finish with this City and we’ll go back to the forest. You and me. Nothing and no one else.”
“Yes.” Dagan ran his fingers through Hen’s hair. “We’ll be free.”
“No more gods. No more councils. No more priests.” Hendrik slipped downward, kissing, until he hit his knees. He looked up through his eyelashes, unlacing Dagan’s pants with frantic fingers.
Dagan pushed off the wall just enough to tear off his shirt and drop it to the ground. He tugged at Hen’s, and Hen let go of him long enough to do the same.
“Promise me,” Hen tugged at the lace and rolled Dagan’s pants down over his hips. “Promise me we’ll spend a moon, just us, in the woods, when this is done.”
“I promise,” Dagan breathed. “I swear it on all that’s good and green, Hendrik.”
Hendrik rubbed his cheek against Dagan’s prick through the soft fabric of his undershorts. Dagan bit back a groan and tightened his grip in Hen’s hair again.
“Promise me we’ll stay in our blankets all night and day. By the willow, at the pond. You remember the pond?” Hen nuzzled at him more intentionally, dragging Dagan’s undershorts down so his dickhead appeared, glistening and dark pink.
Dagan huffed. “I promise, my darling boy. We’ll do all the things we couldn’t the first time we were there. And more.”
“Tell me what you wanted to do. That day by the lake.” Hendrik let go of Dagan’s hip and reached down to unlace his own pants.
“Oh, sweetheart…” Dagan cast about in his mind, trying to come up with words but for a moment utterly muddled by the proximity of Hen’s mouth. The man had a positive gift for sucking dick, so much so that Dagan felt the need to up his own game considerably. And Dagan had always loved to give head. The sheer pleasure Hen seemed to take in it was beautiful.
And now, there Hen was, looking up at him with those bright, blue eyes, asking for something to believe in. Dagan would’ve given him the world, the Heart Wood itself, if he could’ve. So he did the best he could. “After we talked all night, you slept on my blanket for the first time.” He gave a gentle tug at Hen’s hair.
Hen tilted his head with it and tugged down Dagan’s shorts as far as he could without removing his leathers, too. Dagan’s prick bobbed free, arching upward, hot and hard. “I remember,” Hen said, then leaned forward and mouthed Dagan’s balls.
Dagan moaned but kept it quiet, raking at Hen’s hair encouragingly. “I imagined waking up to you, closer than ever. Touching you, like I did in the water…the curve of your spine and the back of your thigh. But this time, I wouldn’t stop there.”
Hen flipped his own laces apart and pulled out his prick, heavy and pink. He stroked it slowly as he sucked at Dagan’s balls, then nibbled at his inner thighs, edging them further apart.
Between shudders of pleasure, Dagan went on as best he could, with only the occasional stutter or interruptive and delicious moan “I was desperate to touch you, then. I didn’t think I could get more desperate, but I was wrong. Mmm, fuck. Hen… I wanted to kiss your mouth, your neck, your fingers. I wanted to show you what was growing in my heart the only way I know how.”
Hen hummed, a sound of perfect approval for this narrative, and licked his way up Dagan’s shaft, silky smooth and hot. Dagan shivered and clutched at him harder, mind going black as stars threatened to pop behind his eyes already. He fixed his gaze on Hen’s slightly upturned face, watched him slide puffy lips over Dagan’s prick, watched his eyelashes flutter before he glanced up through them again. Dagan groaned. “By all the gods, you’re so beautiful. And you’re mine. Finally, mine.”
Had it really only been a moon that he’d longed for this very thing? And now, here it was, and they stood to lose it all before they’d even gotten to enjoy each other fully.
It couldn’t happen like that. That couldn’t be their story. Dagan sighed as Hen went down on him, burying his dickhead in the back of Hen’s throat with magnificent eagerness. He bucked his hips but gently and was rewarded with another little hum of approval from Hen that seemed to rattle his whole body with delight. Hen worked his own prick with one hand, and the other slid downward from Dagan’s hip to his upper thigh. Hen curled his fingers, digging into Dagan’s skin with clipped nails.
“Do it,” Dagan huffed. “Harder than before, Hen. Make it last.” In case they couldn’t steal another moment for a while. It was the other thigh, the left this time; the mark on the right had already faded to faint pink lines.
Hen dug in and raked downward, even as he sucked his way down and back up Dagan’s cock. “Unh, yes, darling, just like that,” Dagan moaned. “I’ll leave my marks all over you when we go back to that lake. I’ll devour you whole, so every living thing in the forest knows you’re mine. Ah, fuck, that’s good…”
The fantasy fled in the face of more immediate pleasure. Dagan kept hold of Hendrik’s hair as he worked him relentlessly, deliciously, into a state of frenzy. He rocked his hips carefully, matching Hen’s rhythm, alternately watching his mouth on Dagan’s prick and his hand on his own. It glistened at the tip, as if dripping, and Hen made hungry little pleasure groans as he worked them both. For just a moment, Dagan found himself fully distracted by the picture he made, and then Hen buried him deep in his throat and hummed again. More of a growl, really.
Dagan shuddered once more, suddenly unable to hold back any longer. “Fuck. I’m gonna come.”
Hen came up for a quick breath, then took him all the way in again, sucking and tonguing. Dagan squeezed his hair, holding him steady though Hen showed no sign of moving, and fucked his mouth a few times until everything dissolved into one great quake of ecstasy. He felt Hen’s mouth fill with hot cum, then the constriction of his tongue and throat as he swallowed, and Dagan shook yet again, knees buckling. He opened his eyes just in time to see Hen’s hard, pink prick spurt, dousing his own hand and belly-fur, Dagan’s leathers, and the floor.
Dagan slid out of Hen’s mouth and to his knees, so they were eye-to-eye on the floor. He took Hen’s cum-slicked hand and drew the wettest finger into his mouth. He sucked it all the way into the back of his throat, making sure it was clean. Hen’s eyelashes fluttered at the sensation, a slight groan escaping his pink, swollen lips. He traced Dagan’s bottom lip with his thumb. “Sorry I couldn’t wait for your mouth. I just wanted to taste you…so much…” He trailed off as Dagan sucked another finger in.
When he’d licked him clean, Dagan released Hen’s fingers with a little popping sound, then kissed his palm. “I love that getting me off gets you off, darling. You know I can get my taste like this.”
“You fill my whole mind, sometimes. Nothing else fits.” Hen hiked up his pants so they covered his ass again, then reached out to straighten Dagan’s, too. Once they were safely tucked away, he pulled Dagan into his lap and kissed him. Dagan wrapped his legs around Hen’s middle and his arms around his neck, tasting himself on Hendrik’s tongue. For long, quiet moments, they stayed like that, kissing and holding each other tightly, almost hungrily.
Safe. They weren’t, actually, not by a long shot, but that’s what they were chasing, Dagan realized somewhere in his post-orgasmic clarity. They felt safe, like this. And that was all Hen had ever wanted.
He’d have it someday, and forever. Dagan would make it happen.
Eventually, Dagan didn’t want to open his eyes again. He was so warm and content in Hen’s arms. He wished they’d brought their blankets up with them. But he had to ask, now they’d taken care of most of their desperation. “Are you alright, Hen?”
“No,” he replied readily, resting his forehead against Dagan’s. “I’d rather be anywhere but here. Any-fucking-where, but especially…”
“In the Heart Wood,” Dagan guessed.
