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D looks down at the body lying still on his bed, at the stake driven through it's heart. It's done expertly enough, though with the limitations of human physiology, they had to use a hammer to do it. It's still there, the hammer, lying on the floor where the terrified hero had dropped it when the vampire himself had been in his death throes.
"I am so sorry," the manager of the hotel tells him, her face deathly pale as she wrings her hands and looks at everywhere except at the body. "We don't know how he got in – the maid found him when she came in to clean. We can only assume he was waiting for you. Gladly we had a hunter in the premises – dragon hunter, mind you, but he knew what to do and..."
D doesn't say anything. Under his cloak, his hands are squeezed into tight enough fists that the parasite can't even try and push through his skin – just as well, he doesn't think he could handle the comments.
"We – the hotel will of course deal with any damages caused, and we will take care of the – the mess," the manager tells him quickly. "You will be well compensated – another room, a better room, of course, and if any damages were done to your possessions --"
"No, thank you," D says.
He's not reigning in his presence, he knows that – the manager is wavering on her feet now, looking a little faint – he can see the whites of her eyes all around her irises, and they are going red because she isn't blinking. He ignores it. "Leave."
The woman hesitates for a split of a second, teetering on the edge of whatever horror is crawling into her brain from D's unfiltered presence, and her ingrained duty. D slides her gaze to her and narrows his eyes. "Leave," he repeats.
She stumbles out without another word, the door banging shut after her. Outside, he can hear her crashing into a wall, into the bodies of the people crowding the hall, but he ignores them and their terrified, excited murmuring.
He walks instead to his bed, and the slain vampire lying deathly still on it.
"Well, shit," comes from the direction of his hand, as D slowly sits on the edge of the bed.
There's very little blood – Harry had been at the end of his blood cycle, another day or two until his next capsule. That, and the time of the day, makes him look less like a corpse less than hour or two old, and more like someone who died weeks ago, and was left to dry in the sun. His cheeks are hollow, again, his eyes sunken. In death, his mouth has fallen loosely open – his fangs are short, unthreatening.
D reaches out, running his fingers over Harry's cold skin and closing his mouth gently.
"Now what?" the parasite asks and D lifts his hand. "He comes back, right? That's what he always said, he dies and he comes back, that's how it works?"
D looks at him and then at the body. That was what Harry had said – but D has never seen it happen. Harry has never died in his presence, not really – and he is not counting the time Harry had lost his humanity and became a vampire. That, though Harry counted it as a death, D couldn't consider in such light.
But Harry had promised – while everyone else was a transient guest of life, Harry was transient guest of Death. Harry had promised to stay.
Slowly, D trails his hand down Harry's cold chin, his neck, over the shirt covering his chest, and to the wooden stake driven to it. it's in deep – it's gone right through.
They'd caught Harry during noon, when he'd been frozen and helpless in sleep. D can almost imagine, the maid stumbling in and then backing away with swallowed shriek, the alarm caused by the appearance of a vampire in their midst, the mad scramble for solution – the dragon hunter who'd offered to do the deed and take care of the threat.
D had rented a room in order to give both himself and Harry the chance to sleep in a real bed for once, he'd thought it was safe to enjoy comfort for once, but..
He closes his fingers around the stake and pulls it out. Harry's flesh is torn under it, his bones shattered, his heart pierced clean through. An admirably good blow, it had hit his target on first strike. In any other situation, D would've admired the professionalism of it.
Can Harry really heal around such a wound?
D presses his left hand on Harry's chest. "Anything?"
The parasite sniffs at the wound and then nudges at D's hand until he lifts it to Harry's head, pressing against his forehead. "Nothing," the hand says, sounding troubled. "But we don't know how this works."
All they can do is trust that Harry was right, that he was telling the truth.
After a moment of hesitation, D stands up. Using the sheets of the bed and Harry’s own robe, he gently wraps the vampire's body as tight as he can, throwing his own cloak over it to finish the job. It's not a Space of Darkness and were Harry still alive, he'd still burn – but he's dead, and D doesn't have a casket to put him in.
With the body wrapped, D lifts Harry’s still form into his arms and carries him out of the room, past the gaggle of terrified staff and guests outside, down the stairs and out of the lobby.
"... guess he knew him?" someone murmurs behind him, and he ignores it.
D hesitates just split of a second at the entrance of the hotel, where shadows thrown by the doorway and the sunlight meet. Harry doesn't so much as smoke at the touch of sunlight, however, so D steps out.
He would've commended the hotel for the speed with which they supplied him with his horse, so soon after he'd send it to it's stables – it's there, waiting for him by the time he steps to out to the street. D casts a look at the terrified servant boy and then ignores him, throwing Harry's body over the horse's back and then mounting the saddle behind it.
The gaggle of people from the hall are now crowding the windows above, spilling out of the door to watch. Someone, a staff member of the hotel most likely, demands to know what is going on, if there'd been any issues, telling D that the hotel would compensate, of course the hotel would compensate, sir, please just calm down...
D ignores them and takes the reins.
"Ugh," the parasite mutters. "I can't wait to get back to the Frontier. People there know to mind their own business."
D turns the horse without answering and then sets out – moment later he's riding out of the hotel grounds and soon after the town itself.
Uncertain about whether Harry would revive as human or as a vampire, D finds a shelter to wait it out. It's an abandoned house, about ten miles of the town where Harry had been slain, unused for years at least. Judging by the looks of it, the road it had been on had been disused.
D lays Harry down on slightly rotten couch still sitting in the abandoned house's living room, and eases the cloaks and cloths off him. No damage from the sunlight he can see – however, there is a change.
The wound is imperceptibly smaller.
"Still nothing, though," the parasite says. "However he's healing, it's nothing I can sense."
"Old magic, maybe," D comments.
"Impossible magic, more like," the parasite says and looks up at him past the edge of D's palm. "You know what happens to Harry, it's not natural. And I don't just mean it's magic – it's not natural."
D narrows his eyes but doesn't answer.
There'd always been rumours, whispers, stories, of things that went beyond the understanding even the most powerful and well learned Nobility. There were disciplines of ancient powers that even the Sacred Ancestor never understood.
Old Gods, he called them, because he could not comprehend them.
D checks Harry’s wound again, just in case – no change now, but it definitely looks better now than it had at the hotel. He is healing, though it has nothing to do with his body repairing itself, or his magic replenishing him. It is as if the very reality itself is repairing itself around the wound Harry's chest, like the universe demands Harry to be whole.
Unnatural.
D looks away and then stands up. He should seal the windows – there is light getting in.
By the time night falls, Harry's wound has closed up where it was smallest – at his back. The hole no longer goes right through. His heart is still torn, his ribs still broken, there is still a gaping pit where his chest should be solid and smooth. But there is no question of it now.
D breathes a little easier where he sits, on a chair he found in the kitchen, now dragged to stand by the couch. Outside, it's raining – the weather regulator had switched the area over to nightly rain, it seems.
"Wealthy sector," the parasite comments. "Not many places in frontier have the money for this kind of regular down pour."
D doesn't answer as he glances over to the window, to the water running down its still clean panes of glass. It has been a long, long time since they'd been to a sector like this, where cities and settlements were separated by miles upon miles of farm fields and orchards, rather than untamed, monster riddled wilderness. Here people don't even have to spend their money on electric barriers or powerful turrets and rifles – here, the government itself covered for them and they could live their lives in luxury.
The countryside was still spotted with the relics of Nobility, of course – there wasn't a sector without a grand castle looming over it even to this day, as of yet untouched by the rebellious humans that had once served it. But here, the land was tamer, safer...
For humans.
D's eyes slide back to Harry's still form on the couch.
"He looks a little better," the parasite offers, almost consolingly. "Still dead as a doornail, though."
D sighs and settles down to wait.
Harry's ears slowly lose their sharp edges. D isn't sure when it starts to happen – just that when he looks, they seem rounder. His skin is also gaining a more pink hue, making him look healthier even while remains, for all the world to see, dead.
"Human it is then," the parasite says, while D runs his left hand over Harry's face, just to be sure. "He's around six and half, right now. If this is how it goes, he'll wake up tomorrow maybe."
D nods and then brushes a strand of black hair from Harry's eyes. They don't look so sunken anymore, his cheeks aren't so hollow. He looks more human.
D isn't sure how well he likes it.
They'd been travelling together little over seven years now. D hadn't expected to get used to it so fast, but he had – Harry had fit into his life with ease that still sometimes surprises him by how simple it really was. He simply was there.
Sometimes the wizard helped him with his work, but usually not. D tended to go after his prey during the day time, when they were asleep – and at that time, so was Harry, usually in D's saddle bag where he curled up as a cat and slept the daylight hours away uncaring what D did.
Sometimes though circumstances were less than ideal – sometimes a vampire would come after D, or D was forced to stalk them during night hours, and then Harry's help could be invaluable. With magic he could always find what he was looking for, after all, and that was without even getting into his impressive repertoire of offensive and defensive capabilities.
Still, he had his weaknesses.
Harry would never be an older noble, his condition didn't allow it. Even if the Nobility's kiss was renewed on him every single year, time did not accumulate the same way on Harry as it did on a vampire. His body rejected it. He remained, forever, a young and weak vampire.
He could be – and right now was – a weakness D isn't sure he can withstand. Should the word of Harry's existence as anything other than a unnervingly intelligent cat he'd adopted get out...
What kind of vampire hunter travelled with a vampire?
D stares at the floor beside the couch where Harry lays and wonders, not for the first time, if he even could go to a life without this companionship. Like Harry, he is old, almost impossibly old, and he never had the benefit of amnesia to make the years seem shorter – and as a dhampir, he could never settle down within human settlements, the way Harry had. He has spent majority of those long years alone.
D thought he was satisfied with that, that he'd long since made peace with his existence. And yet now Harry is dead, and even as he heals D fears. What if... what if he won't wake up after all?
What if he is left standing there, a still rock in the ever shifting stream of time, alone again.
D's eyes slide over to Harry, to take in his condition. He looks fully human now, round ears, pink skin, not a fang in sight. His blood isn't flowing though – though fully human, right now it only means that he looks like a human corpse, rather than vampire one.
Healing in death.
Of all the unnerving things D has seen, this one is the first one that threatens to make his hair stand on end.
D's eyes snap open and slide over to the couch as Harry draws his first, rattling breath in almost two days. The wizard gasps and then freezes in place, holding his breath for a moment.
"Harry," D says and the wizard's eyes find his, blinking rapidly and then squinting.
"... what happened?"
D considers him, the expression on his now fully human face. it's a little distant, slightly pained, and full of confusion. "How much do you remember?" D asks, wondering how fast after such a revival does the dementia start affecting him.
"I – went to sleep?" Harry asks and then turns to lay on his side. He lets out a gasp and his hand goes to his chest, searching for a injury that isn't there anymore – all that remains is the hole torn into his shirt. "Oh."
"The hotel staff discovered you while you were asleep and they – overreacted," D says, hesitating. Part of him wants to touch him – every sense he has tells him Harry is alive again, alive and well, and yet he wants to feel it.
Harry feels around his chest and then closes his eyes with a sight, looking for a moment as if he is intending to go to sleep. Then he opens them again and looks up and around them. "I guess we left."
D says nothing. He couldn't have very well stayed. The hotel staff had probably already called the sheriff – D hadn't been about to let them dispose Harry's body.
Harry's eyes slide down from the slightly mouldy ceiling and down to D. "Hey, beautiful," he says and smiles. "Were you worried."
"Absolutely beside himself, you should've seen it, it was embarrassing," the parasite says and D sighs, closing his eyes.
Then he gives into the urge and reaches for Harry's hand, now warm and alive in his fingers. D looks at it as some tension within him in eases – Harry's veins are pumping his very human blood again. Alive, it beats. Alive-alive, alive-alive...
Harry turns the hand in his and slides his finger among D's paler ones and sighs. "You mind if I just lay here for a moment?" he asks and closes his eyes again. "Just for a moment. You could even join me."
D looks at the couch. He really couldn't. "Rest," he says instead and looks down at Harry's fingers. His nails are still like those of a vampire, long and sharp, but they've lost their crystalline hardness. when the tips dig into the back of D's hand, they do no damage.
Under his skin, D can feel his flesh, his bones, his veins, his blood. For once, it doesn't make his fangs itch to grow, doesn't make his throat tight with thirst.
Harry is a human, and D doesn't feel the urge to drink his blood. It's a novel sensation.
"Hey," Harry says and tugs at his hand weakly. "Sorry for dying on you."
"It wasn't your fault," D says and looks away from his hand.
"Yeah, you got caught while snoozing, totally not your fault for being utterly unobservant," the parasite says. "Should've stayed a cat, fuzz butt."
Harry frowns a little, not opening his eyes. "Oh, yeah," he then says, his expression smoothing out as the memory and knowledge clear out. "A cat. Animagus. Right."
D looks at his face and Harry, maybe feeling his gaze, opens his eyes. The wizard smiles, wryly. "You're going to have to Kiss me again," he says teasingly. "Almost makes dying worth it."
Does it? D wonders at it. From the way Harry talks about death, he makes it sound so cheap, so irrelevant – just tripping while walking down a street, death seems like a mere nuisance.
He wonders if Harry knows the terrible look he gets in his eyes when he speaks of it though – if he knows how desperately hopeless he looks.
D looks at Harry's hand again and then lifts the hand towards his mouth, pressing his lips against the warm knuckles. Under them, he can feel Harry's heart try and beat harder – but he's too tired, his heart probably still healing.
"Rest," D tells him.
"While you're doing that?" Harry asks amusedly. "How do you suppose I do that?"
"I could give you a hand, if you like," the parasite offers. "Put you right to sleep, you won't even feel a thing,"
Harry chuckles. "Sounds handy, but I think I'll pass," he says and looks at D again. His fingers shift in D's hold, flexing and then gripping tighter. "It's fine," he says.
D bows is head a little, not quite in agreement, and says nothing.
It's been a... long time since he has had something he fears of losing.
It's not a feeling he particularly enjoys.
Harry sleeps, not the deadened sleep of the Nobility, but the real, dream filled slumber of a human. D watches him, knows he should take his rest as well, but he can't.
All he can do is watch Harry breathe.
"He's right you know," the parasite says. "You're going to have to bite and turn him again."
D doesn't say anything. It hadn't been that long since the last time, and the idea of doing it again makes something in his chest tighten. He can still remember the feel and taste of Harry's blood on his tongue, flowing down his throat – the visceral edge of living human blood. And not just that.
Pure human blood.
It tastes like nothing else. Though synthetic blood is designed to be perfect for vampires, there is a tinge to the real thing that cannot be faked, a vicious, all consuming sweetness that had less to do with what the blood was or what was in it – but what it represented. Life, true Life, couldn't be replicated by machinery.
It was intoxicating – and Harry seemed to have an endless well of it, like Life was a fountain inside him, overflowing. It had been impossible to let go, once D had sank his teeth into it.
D's mouth waters and quickly he turns away from Harry, from the beat of his insidiously sweet blood. He would have to do it again, yes, otherwise Harry would fall back into his usual senility, and good lord, he is almost looking forward to it.
Thousands of years he'd avoided it – the closest he got was biting into the necks of monsters, but never a human. Not before Harry. And now that he had, now that he knows what it is like...
How easy would it to slip with some other human after this? How easy would it be to justify to himself...
The parasite, sensing his thoughts, cackles quietly. "It's your nature, you know," he says. "That good old Noble gene that runs right through you. And you know, you'd probably have easier time of it if you gave into it more often. Synthetic blood is well and good but -"
D squeezes his hand into fist. Nothing beats the real thing, he thinks and then forces himself to think nothing at all.
Harry wakes up again few hours later, obviously feeling better – but also, worse.
"Where are we?" he asks confusedly, sitting up and looking around. "D?"
"It's an abandoned house, I brought you here to recover," D says. "You died."
"... right," Harry says and rubs at his forehead. "I don't remember."
"You were asleep, I don't think you woke up."
"No, not that, I don't remember Death," Harry says and then shakes his head. "Never mind," he mutters and looks up again. "I was killed in my sleep, huh. That's almost nice."
D looks at him and then away. He was a vampire – that is how most of them died. Humans broke into their tombs and staked them while they slept, unable to do anything.
That was how the hundred and hundreds of sleeping Nobles lost their lives, when humanity went to reclaim their freedom from their seemingly immortal overlords.
"D," Harry says. "Is everything alright?"
"Fine," D says and stands up. He walks to the window which he'd blocked with a ragged piece of cloth he'd found in the upper floor. Sun is still up, but it's turning into late afternoon now, it would set in hour or so.
The wizard watches him from the couch for a moment and then stands up as well, coming to him. "That's not fine face," he says. "Extremely fine though it is. What's wrong?"
D doesn't answer. Death, life, immortality, and all of it's facets, perhaps.
"He wants to bite you," the parasite says. "And he doesn't want to want to bite you. And something terribly sad and gloomy about vampires and being killed in their sleep, the usual nonsense."
Sometimes, D really wishes he could just cut his damn arm off.
Harry hums thoughtfully, eying him. "Bad memories, huh?" he says and then, utterly shameless, leans against D's side. D closes his eyes at the feel of it, the warm weight of him pressed so close – even through his clothes and cloak, Harry feels...
"You don't have to," Harry says, leaning his cheek on D's shoulder. "I'll never, ever ask you to, if you don't want to."
D sighs and then looks down at him. Harry is good head's worth shorter than him, and even at his healthiest he remains a thin man. That supposed physical weakness, unfortunately, appeals everything predatory in D.
Harry could, probably, destroy him with a spell. D has seen him use his wand to set a vampire alight as if he'd brought day into the darkness of night, he's seen him render a dragon headless with a single muttered spell, he's even seen him kill a giant once with nothing but a flash of red light. D knows he's faster than the wizard, he could avoid any spell Harry threw his way, but speed isn't everything. And Harry once, millennia ago, withstood nearly half a thousand years of a siege. Longest anyone had stood against the Sacred Ancestor.
If they honestly fought to their deaths, D isn't sure who would come on top. Only Harry never would. He sees no point in it – after all... nothing can really destroy him. So, he never bothers putting his all into a fight, not unless someone else is at risk – like D, which so far has been the only reason for Harry to bring forth more serious spells.
Knowing Harry has power, knowing that the fact that he doesn't use that power is only by choice, doesn't make him seem any less vulnerable to D's senses. Even now Harry is baring his neck at him, and it makes D almost growl at him.
"You want it, though," D says, absolutely certain of that. Harry doesn't really leave much room for doubt.
The wizard smiles against D's shoulder, not quite hidden. He knows exactly what he's doing to him. "Yes," he agrees and tilts his head a little more. He stays there for a moment while D eyes his pulse point hungrily, and then, mercifully, he looks up and hides his neck in the shadow of his hair. "But only if you do."
"You are -" D stops and sighs while the parasite cackles, too quietly for human ears to hear.
Harry waits patiently, smiling a little, while D struggles silently with his own nature.
He can't even tell himself it's just a necessity, something that has to be done. Of course it is – Harry will once again fall into his human weaknesses if he isn't turned – but that even so... It's not necessity that makes Harry press so close, which makes his heart hammer in excitement in D's ear, which makes his scent grow dark and heady with arousal.
D exhales slowly and then turns to face the wizard. Harry stands still, his eyes sharpening in attention. Anything D would choose do, Harry would allow, even welcome.
D lifts his hand and touches Harry's chin, trailing a finger under it. Harry tilts his face easily to it – and then, when D puts slight pressure against the underside of his chin, Harry tilts his head away, baring his neck with almost sweet ease.
Harry's heart is a desperate hammer in D's ear, his breathing is already erratic. D's half convinced it's all intentional – Harry takes such delight in finding ways to bring him off balance, and this is by far the greatest success at it he's had.
He looks delicious.
D grinds his teeth for a moment and then lets them push through – let's his fangs drop. It still feels like a forfeit in a war that he's been waging for centuries, but Harry's slightly victorious smile is sweet enough to soothe that sting. Harry wants it. He wants so much it's almost as intoxicating as the scent of his ardour, the thrum of his heart.
D wants to devour him and every moment he fights against that desire is sweet torture.
"D," Harry says, definitely making it so breathy and low on purpose. He closes his eyes and tilts his head a little more and even without a dhampir's superior sight, D could've seen the rapid flutter at his neck, his pulse beating from under his skin.
D's fingers grip Harry's neck for a moment and his other hand is at his shoulder, he has him pinned, even if he had his wand he cannot get away now – D can just bite down now and -
It seems to take every ounce of his strength, but he doesn’t. Instead he tilts Harry's head back straight and while Harry's eyes flutter open with surprise, D kisses his lips.
It's awkward, he knows it is – his whole body is tense and with the need to Kiss something else and his own blood boils with something furious and desperate – his lips are similarly stiff, and he can't quite keep himself from snarling at Harry, even while he's the one denying his body it's desires. Harry, though...
Harry goes still in his hold for a moment and then it seems as if his knees give out – D has to hold him up to keep him from collapsing. Then Harry grabs a hurried, desperate hold of his cloak and all but tears him closer, moaning against his lips, turning D's awkward kiss into something else, something real.
It's still not as good as true Kiss would have been, D still craves blood more than anything else Harry might be willing to give – but Harry's lips are good at coaxing a reaction out of him and D finds his mouth opening to his insistence – finds that he doesn't mind this.
He's never been particularly interested in carnal pleasures – the duality of his nature always made it too difficult and too risky. With a human he'd always be in danger of biting them – with a vampire he'd be in risk of being bitten in return. With Harry both risks are present – and yet, neither is really a risk.
Harry hums, his arms coming around D's shoulders, his fingers sinking into his hair and no, it's not as nice as his blood – but it's still good. It's intimate in a different way, in way that is less primal and more tender. Harry kisses him and kisses him, one contact blending into other until D's mouth feels wet and warm, until some old tension he didn't know he had starts to loosen.
D sighs into the kiss and feels his fangs retreat.
"D," Harry sighs, his hands finding their way to the back of D's neck, his lips hot and wet and soft on D's cool cheek. "What was that?"
"Just, let me," D says, chasing after his lips again – he can see glimpse of Harry's neck from the corner of his eye again.
"Let you, what, D?" Harry asks. "What do you want? Use your words, now."
D closes his eyes for a moment, his face pressed against Harry's. It's all so warm, it's all too much, and he doesn't know what he wants here, exactly. To want Harry's blood less, perhaps. To be less of a urge driven monster. "You," he settles on saying.
Harry laughs, breathless, and pulls back a little. "Well it's a word anyway," he says fondly and takes D's face between his hands – and it's almost too much, his wrists are right there, his veins on the surface, throbbing at D.
"Give the poor idiot a break, fuzz butt," the parasite laughs against Harry's shoulder, where D's fingers are a clenching into Harry's shirt. "He's a little overwhelmed right now."
"Oh?" Harry ask with interest, his eyes almost shining – and his hands are still there, on D's chin, his cheeks, his wrists – his blood – "Oh, hello there," he murmurs and presses his thumb to the corner of D's lips – against the length of his fang.
"Harry," D murmurs feeling a little drunken.
The wizard licks his lips and then leans in. It's not quite a kiss, it's something infinitely better and worse.
While D opens his mouth, in a gasp, in a moan, he's not sure, Harry leans up and then, deliberately, cuts his own tongue on D's fang.
Moment later D has him pinned against the wall and he's got Harry's tongue in his mouth, the taste of his blood whirling on his tongue, heavy and delicious and full of raging hormones. The taste of his arousal is almost debilitating.
D's growl sounds utterly inhuman even to his own ears as he sucks on Harry's tongue, on the tiniest cut on it, licking at it desperately. Harry moans against him and then laughs, utterly carefree, as he's pinned down by a lustful monster.
"You are -" D tries to say, but there's not a word for how utterly reckless Harry is being.
"Yes, I am," Harry says, grinning, and happily rides on the thigh D hadn't even noticed thrusting between his legs. His grin is wild and carefree as he thrusts against D. "I absolutely am."
D stares at him, leaning one elbow onto the wall behind Harry's head and then looks down. He's not nearly as aroused as Harry is, but if this keeps going on like this, it's only matter of time. And that could either go very well for them – or very badly.
D swallows and tries to calm himself – and then Harry licks his lips with his still bleeding tongue, and the calm goes right out of the window. D almost rams against him in his chase after his tongue again, and Harry laughs in delight, throwing his arms around him, opening his thighs, wrapping them around D's hips.
"I could hurt you," D growls at him.
"I don't care," Harry says breathlessly. "What's the worst thing that could happen, D, really?"
Insane, utterly insane, D thinks, even as he gets a hand under Harry's thigh and angles him right. The wizard lets out a breathy laugh and throws his head back, thrusting back against him as much as he can, pinned against the wall as he is – and then there is his neck again, on full display right in front of D's eyes.
D turns his face sharply away, pressing his forehead against the wall next to Harry's head, and for a moment he just thrusts against Harry, trying to ignore the thrum of his blood, the proximity of his carotid artery. It's so unbearably close...
"D," Harry sighs, his hand's around his neck, pulling him back. "Come on."
"Not yet," D growls, even while every inch of him screams against it. "After."
"Mmm," Harry answers, his ankles locking behind D. "Maybe a change of position then," he suggests and laughs. "This one seems to be a little problematic for you."
D almost scoffs. A little problematic, sure, he thinks and just breathes for a moment. Then he grabs Harry's other thigh too, and pulls him away from the wall. "Don't," he grunts when Harry goes to throw his arms tighter around his neck – which would bring his neck even closer.
"I'm going to fall," Harry laughs, but leans back a little. He looks at D's face and his eyes are full of desire and mischief. "Hi," he says and then, utterly unsympathetic to D's difficulties, kisses him with his mouth still tasting like blood and life.
It's a struggle to get them to the couch, top sit down on it rather than to fall of it. Harry ends up in his lap, knees on each side of D's hips, and it's still a little too close for comfort – but D's not entirely sure he can even let him go farther away right now.
Harry grins down at him, his mouth red and swollen and wet. "How do you want me, then?" he asks, thrusting his hips slowly against D, who has to spread his legs a little to keep his tight trousers from strangling the life out of him.
D looks down at him – and then goes to open Harry's shirt. The wizard ceases his movements, thankfully, for long enough to D to get the thing off, watching him all the while, watching his hands. D's nails are long and sharp now, like a vampire's.
Right now, is he any better than a vampire, really?
The shirt slides open and D pushes it over Harry's shoulders and down his arms. There is not a mark on him from the stake that was once driven though him – his skin is completely flawless, pale and pink and alive.
Harry sighs as D trails his hand down his body, from shoulder to chest to his waist, warm and alive all through out. Warm inside and out.
"I want you," D says slowly, staring at his chest, his stomach, both of them heaving with Harry's slightly stuttering breaths.
"You have me," Harry chuckles roughly. "I'm right here."
"No," D says and looks at him. "I want you."
The wizard pauses a little at that, and then slowly the significance seems to dawn on him. His expression softens into a fond, gentle smile – and then he kisses D. It still tastes a little of blood, but the wound has closed now, and though D's fangs are still over long, he doesn't cut his tongue on them again.
"I'm right here," Harry says again, seriously this time. "And I am not going anywhere, D."
"Hah," the parasite mutters with something like triumph.
D ignores him in favour of claiming Harry's lips again. Harry hums against his lips in delight and then pulls back, smiling. He's holding his wand.
"Don't freak out," he whispers – and then they're both naked, their clothes appearing perfectly folded on the couch beside them.
Harry leans back and drops the wand carelessly onto the floor in favour of looking his fill. D shudders under him, the feel of Harry's skin now naked on his bare thighs, his weight pressing them close together.
"Merlin, you're otherwordly," Harry murmurs with a tremor of heat in his voice, and his hands come to D's chest, warm and greedy as they trail up and down. "I could just eat you up, you look so delicious."
"Mm," D answers, trailing his own hands up Harry's waist and down again. He's so slim, D could break his body without even trying. It's almost frightening, how much he likes that thought.
Then Harry presses closer, pressing their chests together even as he thrust his hips down in tight, teasing circles. "Oh," he sighs against D's cheek. "Oh, this is so much better than I imagined. And I'm not going to lie, I imagined it a lot."
"Yeah, we know," the parasite scoffs. "Sometimes we even heard."
"You know, you should be such a turn off," Harry says and takes D's left wrist in hand, while D himself is distracted tracking lines of his back, following them with his fingertips. There's a vein on the surface of Harry's back which thrums sweetly at D's touch. "You are such a third wheel. Go away."
"No, can do," the parasite grins. "We're very attached you know. I'm like his right hand."
"That's a pun I'd normally appreciate but -" Harry stops in a gasp.
D looks up at him as Harry snaps his eyes down at him. Then, smiling a little, Harry shifts to stand on his knees, spreading his stance just a little.
"Well I see when I'm not wanted," the parasite hums and finally withdraws, D's palm smoothing into normal shapes. D places it on Harry's hip and then slides it over the round curve to grip at Harry's behind. Through every inch of it he can feel the beat of Harry's heart echoing through his trembling, hot body, but it has nothing on the heat and clench of his entrance at the tip of D's fingers – it all but flutters with the heady flow of his blood.
"Yes," Harry says when D hesitates. "Yes, yes, yes."
Exhaling slowly, D slides his fingers in to the dry, tight heat. Harry leans his head back a little, frowning slightly even as he sighs and his hips twitch towards D's hand. D watches him closely, stroking slowly in and out, feeling the begrudging way the tight heat opens up for him.
Harry's cheeks are flushed deep red and there is perspiration on his brow and moisture on his eyelashes. He looks... viscerally alive and human and entirely too delicious – so much so that it takes D a moment to notice the pain and discomfort on Harry's face, though he's obviously trying to ignore it.
D licks his lips. "It's too dry," he says roughly. "I'm hurting you."
"Oh for Merlin's sake," Harry whines and then he's holding the knotted piece of wood again. "Hand," he commands and with a shuddering sigh, D gives it to him.
Moment later his whole palm is soaked with translucent, thick liquid which almost runs through his fingers, sluggish and slippery.
"There," Harry says, throwing the wand away again and then shifts his position, standing on his knees over D, thrusting his hips slightly against D's upper stomach. "Now get me wet and fuck me while we're still young."
D stares at him flatly.
"D, come on," the wizard whines, running his hands restlessly over D's shoulder. "Now, please. This is literally killing me."
D sighs and shakes his head at him. The way Harry moans when he slides his fingers back in, this time thoroughly soaked in whatever lubricant Harry had conjured up, is almost sweet enough to ignore the bad jokes – and the delicious clench of his body definitely makes up for them.
"Mmh, yes," Harry hums and pushes back into the thrust of his fingers. He sighs, arms wrapping around D's neck and his back arching to get closer. "Yes, yes, yes... nh, yes... "
D huffs a laugh against Harry's cheek and then nudges at his face a little. Harry leans back and falls onto his lips, his breath rapid against D's cheek and his whole body shifting and twitching into D's hand, greedy and relentless like his hands, again wandering down D's shoulders and chest, gripping at his waist, sliding lower.
"Fuck, even here you're gorgeous," Harry groans as he breaks the kiss in favour of looking down, as takes D in both hands, greedily stroking up and down. "Why are you so perfect everywhere? Merlin's sake..."
D hums in answer, licking his lips. Harry's body clenches around his fingers, throbbing and throbbing, and he thinks he could keep on doing this forever, just coaxing those twitches from Harry's hot body, just making his heart skip so deliciously when ever he hits a good spot.
Harry's wand appears again and then is once more thrown away carelessly, as Harry runs his slick hands up and down D's length, squeezing at the head and then stroking back down again. "Damn, you have amazing self control," Harry murmurs and then leans in. "You want to get your fingers out so that I can get something else in there?"
"I'm not sure," D admits, and gently strokes along Harry's prostate, enjoying the full body shudder it causes. He hums in pleasure and then does again, just to feel him tremble.
"D come on," Harry moans. "I've been watching you ride a horse for seven damn years, do you know how many fantasies I've dedicated to your core strength alone?"
D huffs a slight laugh and then pulls his fingers out. "Shameless," he murmurs.
"Utterly and completely," Harry laughs and then takes a deep breath. D leans back a little, resting his hands loosely on Harry's slim hips as the wizard positions himself just so – and sinks down.
It takes effort not to dig his nails into the man's hips – the feel of it around his fingers has nothing on this. Harry throbs around him, a desperate hot rush of blood inside his tight passage almost too much. D exhales, feeling his fangs lengthen, and Harry almost purrs as he sinks all the way down.
"Perfect," the wizard sighs, his eyes falling shut. "Ah, that is – absolutely perfect."
D's hands clench and unclench at his hips, unsure what to do. Part of him wants to sink into Harry's hot body and never leave – other part wants to utterly wreck it and make it tremble, and all the while, the frantic beat of Harry's heart surrounds him and overwhelms him until he can't hear anything else. And the way Harry is still twitching, his hips moving, getting D right where he wants him until he sighs with obvious pleasure is not helping.
"Ah, yeah, that's just..." Harry sighs and then smiles down at him, his eyes full of joy and pleasure. "You are – absolutely perfect. I'd say it's unfair, but from where I'm sitting I got no complaints what so ever."
D stares at him, smiling and joking at him and it strikes him just for a moment – what he's actually doing, what is happening. He can't even count the years since he last bedded someone, and it had never been like this, this warm, this full of obvious happiness. It always seemed to fade into horror and dismay.
Harry's smile softens a little and he touches D's face gently, his hands a little wet. D knows then he's snarling, his fangs are on full display, his face must be grotesque – and even so, Harry kisses him, humming in pleasure.
"Now about that core strength," Harry hums against his lips teasingly, and D shakes his head a little, going for another kiss instead. "D?" Harry asks after it, and then leans his head into a third kiss, and a forth. "D, what – mmm..."
"You're impossible," D murmurs against his mouth and kisses him again and again, until Harry stops trying to argue and the thing in his throat stops aching.
Harry seems to get it though, and his hands gentle on D's hair, stroking up and down as D devours his mouth desperately and tries not to feel anything but that.
"Hey, now," the wizard murmurs once D finally releases him for long enough to gasp a desperate breath against Harry's neck – for once, the thirst for his blood isn't the first thing in his mind. "It's okay, it's okay."
D shudders against him and buries his face in Harry's chest, holding him by the waist and just breathing him in. Harry's fingers tangle in his hair and he hums, so easy, so accepting.
"We have all the time in the world," Harry says.
And for the first time, the concept doesn't terrify D at all.