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The low crackle of fire resounded through the room, dying it in colours of red, orange and yellow; a muted sunset that cast the room in shadows. At the altar, the dragon lay still, trying to tune out the sound of the humans that flitted this way and that as they fixed the remaining decorations and spoke to each other in words that he didn’t care to hear. No. Instead, he closed his eyes an listened to the crackle of flames, trying to imagine the warmth of them on his skin in some other time and place. The walls of the cave collapsed, letting the world expand infinitely around him as he was finally released from his confines and winter finally gave way to the heat of summer. The air, bright with stars and plumes of gray that wafted up and away to some unknown resting place, and heavy with the scent of cooking food. The scent of sweat and happiness. The human’s voices, raised in a feverent chorus as they whooped and hollered, grasping onto his hands and dragging him forwards towards the fire which burned so bright for them all.
If he focused enough, he could almost imagine the words that fell from their mouths; their delighted gasping, and words of congratulations as they draped garlands of flowers and beads on Ajaw’s body and dragged him over to where his faceless companion sat to the side, watching on. Their feet stamping, twisting and turning in frenzied motion. Punctuated by the sounds of laughter, and of marital advice thrown this way and that across the circle of people dancing around the fire. His bride’s hand so warm in his own, their face, somehow always void of features, but so happy nonetheless; throwing themselves into the madness and frenzy beside him with nothing but a smile and a snippy comment about how Ajaw would need to keep up with them if he wanted to prove himself as a good husband. A smile tugged at his lips as he imagined the scene laid out before him. His feet bare, dirtied from the earth and the dust that dyed his clothes in a fine red mist; standing at the altar, pretending to study the flowers and the decorations, the rainbow-bright patterns on the guest’s clothes until finally, finally, he see’s them.
The prayers to their ancestors, blessings for vitality – the music and the sounds of joy falling away until nothingness until only they remain. Him and his bride, together, at last. Their presence intoxicating his every sense as he held their hands in his own and felt the warmth flowing between their bodies.
The saurian’s paws flexed a little as he sought out the warmth for himself, brows furrowing more as he searched for the weight of their hand in his own and came up empty. “My lord,” The shaman whispered. Ajaw looked at him for a moment, feeling a little bit embarrassed to have missed his cue in his reverence of his bride. Yet when he turned back, he found himself faced with the cold emotionless face of his bride, dressed not in their colourful huipil, but a stark white robe. In his paws, their pulse thrums, far to fast and unsteady, their eyes blown wide like a rabbit staring into the jaws of a hungry wolf. There is no warmth. Only something vaguely clammy, bordering on wet as their fingers flex on his, twitching as if caught in a snare. The twitches of a dying animal, looking into the face of it’s killer as his mouth opens wide – wider – wider-
“My lord, it’s time.” The shaman tells him with a smile. Blood splatters onto Ajaw’s face. The bride’s fingers grow limp and cold in his own, yet Ajaw holds them tightly until the warmth is long gone, and they lie stiffly intertwined with his own – their blood does nothing to move him to tears. Yet as Ajaw lowers his stiff bride to the floor, her face some strange concoction of every iteration of her – the eyes belonging to one, the mouth to another (the look of terror belonging to them all) – he finds that the tears come silently. There is no warmth. No brightness. Only the suffocating feeling of his chains, and the unending darkness that creeps in from every corner.
“My lord. It’s time.” The shaman says.
-
When Ajaw awakened at last, it wasn’t to the usual sound of the shaman rousing him with offerings of wine, or his usual words of encouragement for Ajaw about the vitality of the new bride. It was to the sound of shouting. In the sliver of light allowed in to his sacred chamber, he could see that the sky had long since been drenched in the colours of dusk, tipped in purple and deepening blue velvet with became studded with stars.
He stared at it in wonder.
The time for the ritual had long since come and gone, and yet, they had nothing to show for it.
Absently, he gazed around the room, noting how the shaman and his retainers stood by exchanging hurried words, their brows creased in frantic worry as they occasionally looked at Ajaw in panic. Outside of his chamber, there was an exchange of words that Ajaw instinctively strained to hear. There was shouting on one end, yet the person on the other end seemed to refuse to match the tone, keeping their voice very cold and flat, and refusing to raise it even an octave. Their footsteps seemed to scuffle on the stones for a moment, and then, the resounding slamming began to ring out, getting closer and closer with every moment. Instinctively, Ajaw raised himself from his position and assumed his position at the altar. Eyes averted to the ground in the hope that just one time, he wouldn’t be forced to see the poor woman’s look of utter terror as she was dragged to the altar before him. Her screams would haunt him enough already, her begging for him to look her in the face and see her as a person. Her pleas for him to consider her family, her friends, sometimes even the children she had at home who would wonder where their daughter, friend, mother had gone. Just one time, he would like to pretend that the person doused in white had donned it of their own volition, instead of wearing it like a straightjacket, or worse, a condemnation for death.
A sharp gasp made him draw his eyes upwards, expecting to find the poor soul shaking in terror already. Yet, as he did so, it quickly became apparent that the gasp had not belonged to his bride, but rather, the shaman, who stared with bug eyes as the bride came down the aisle towards them. Ajaw’s eyes bulged as he took in the sight for a moment, having to clamp his hand over his mouth quickly to hold back the bubble of laughter that threatened to escape him at the sight of his spouse. His sweet, blushing bride – hand picked for sacrifice for their demureness and virtue by his retainers – seemed to be anything but.
The sound of their footsteps echoed as they stamped down the aisle, kicking up the dirt with every step, decked out in thick-soled boots and a huipil that had clearly been modified in some sort of botched job before their arrival, if the torn seams were anything to go by. Perhaps though, the most scandalous part of it all was the fact that his bride had chosen to turn his wedding attire black. The purity of white, and the brightness of the threads they’d spared for that particular piece, lost to whatever they’d poured all over it to turn it as dark as it could possibly be.
Ajaw could hardly repress his smile as he stared at the bride, finding himself unable to pull himself away from their rapturous magnetism, even though he knew it would cause the least friction to simply listen and nod along with the shaman. How could he be expected to listen with such a creature standing across from him?
Beneath the veil they’d managed to shove on their head, their expression was unreadable. Yet Ajaw knew that there would be no smile to be found there; nor would there be the usual look of terror, he surmised. No, the bride stood with their shoulders squared, their fingers wrapped in a white knuckled grip around the scrappy flowers shoved into their hands. Though as Ajaw studied them closely, he saw that their grasp on those flowers never faltered. Not for one moment. The tension in their body, their black clothes, the way that they’d made their displeasure known and broken the rules of an eons old tradition. His bride was special. No, exceptional. Resigned to the idea of their death, but wanting to go out with such a bang that no one would be able to forget their face.
“My lord, if you will.”
The saurian rose to his feet, ready to take his bride over the ceremonial table to finish the binding of their souls. Though it seemed they had other ideas, as the bride simply turned on their heel and stomped over to the table, not sparing them the indignity of tears or pleas as they lay down and stared at Ajaw with such expectation that he found himself shivering with pleasure. When it came to such acts, Ajaw usually found himself flipping the veil over his bride’s face to spare them the indignity of having their last moments witnessed in such a way. Still, as he leaned over the bride he found his breath catching with anticipation.
One paw hovered, hesitating, as he debated what the point of tormenting himself in such a way would be. Barely a hair away from where the bride’s tender skin lay. To touch would be to make the person below him real - to add them to the never ending list of people who screamed and begged him not to snuff them out – and yet they called out to him like a siren. An angel of death, dressed in black to torment him as their tenderness called out to him to take that which he desired; to indulge in his greed. Indeed, it seemed that his bride’s mind ran along the same tracks, as after a moment, their head tilted, pressing the soft skin of their keep to his palm and seeming to melt their under his touch. Breath catching, Ajaw allowed himself a moment to simply indulge in such a feeling. Their warmth, of their skin burned his paws, yet as he let his claws gently caress their face (always so careful not to scratch his pretty treasure), he found that it was not the skin that was hot at all. No, there was something deep within this bride that burned fire-bright and unrelenting even in the face of abject horror, and the reality of his own death.
With his free hand, he flipped back the veil, and immediately found himself consumed by the fire. It burned bright their – his – eyes, smouldering orange and yellow embers that glowered at him with careful countenance. Dipped in verdant green, the colour of the earth beneath his feet, the colour of his scales-
The boy’s face was black, giving nothing away, nor even daring to blink as he stared back at Ajaw with the same rapt attention he’d received in kind. Ajaw found himself huffing a little laugh as he drank in every inch of him. For a bride in black, there was little that Ajaw could see that made him impure; his skin bronzed from the sun, and mostly unblemished, smattered with patches of freckles here and there, his hair breaking free from the incessant smoothing that the elder’s had undoubtedly subjected it to, with a few little braids poking up here and there, which had been poorly concealed between the layers of his hair. Perhaps, the only thing that ruined such a vision was the sullen expression that he wore – not scared like his predecessors, but rather, resigned. He knew he was going to die, and yet, as he stared up at the dragon with those doe-like eyes, Ajaw found that the light within them never flickered. Not even for a moment. His fearless bride, staring death in the mouth, and still choosing to go out, burning bright with resistance and rebellion. His paw free paw moved up to caress those blue strands for a moment, admiring the handiwork of those braids and the way it made his bride’s face pinken from the attention.
Such mediocre touches weren’t enough to satiate the kind of hunger the boy evoked within Ajaw.
He lowered his head, bumping his forehead against the boys with a single silent plea: let me in.
As if hearing his prayer, the boy obliged.
In an instant, hundreds of imaged filled Ajaw’s mind; flitting in an out in moments of flickering reality. The happiness of his childhood, the agony that had come so soon afterwards, the isolation, the misery, the darkness that had threatened this boy everywhere he had tried to turn. His history of bloodshed, and survival, of communing with the earth, and turning his back on the people who defiled it. The pretty face, the burning soul, the impenetrable spirit. Wrapped up together in one neat parcel and delivered into Ajaw’s hands; blessed by the forces of the universe as Kinich.
Kinich.
Kinich, how perfect you are, Ajaw sighed. The boy seemed to be dazed by his words, perhaps not able to digest them properly over the thousands of years of bloodshed, and pain and panic that had flooded his mind from Ajaws. How kind of the world to intertwine the threads that have brought us together at last.
“I don’t understand.” Was all Kinich could muster, staring up at him as he eyes flitted from side to side, searching for that was unseekable in the eyes of the monster before him.
Something fond rumbled in Ajaw’s chest, as he found it within himself to speak for the first time in hundreds of years. Barely above a whisper as he breathed into the human’s ear. “I’ve seen the truth within you Kinich. Your soul is black and twisted from the darkness of your past, and yet, you burn with a light so bright that it devours everyone around you.” He smiled, baring his teeth to his bride “When I roamed the earth, the people used to call me ‘Flame Devourer’ as my power came from the phlogiston that flowed freely across the land.”
“You want to devour me, I presume?”
“No. I’m greedy, but I’m not wasteful. You were brought here to unite our souls so that the power of my faction can remain strong, and I think we should do just that.” His hand moved from Kinich’s cheek, moving downwards to seek his hand. “Intertwine our souls for eternity, and scorch Natlan with our power until nothing stands in our way. What do you say?”
For a moment, those fingers lay limp in his own. Ajaw searched those eyes for anything to indicate where Kinich’s thoughts were going, and yet, he could find nothing. It was only when they curved a little, and those fingers tightened in his own, that he knew that Kinich was his as much as he was Kinich’s. For better or worse. In sickness and in health. In life, and in death. Until death do they part.
“I do.”
-
As Ajaw lounged around on the bed of their little home, he found his mind wandering idly to a phrase that he’d heard thrown around in his youth. A child who is denied the embrace of the village will burn it down to feel it’s warmth…
Hell, he didn’t know how else he could have shown his embracing of the depths of Kinich’s soul. He’d held those hands in his own, let the power flow between them as he thumbed the paper-thin skin, the ridges of his veins, and melded their very viscera together until they were so fundamentally intertwined that no force could try to separate them. They’d razed the temple to the ground, hand in hand. They’d become drunk on the sound of screams, feasted on the smell of burning flesh, and at long last, walked into the rays of the rising sun – the same as they’d always been, yet twisted together and bound by the words of the contract that united them irreversibly. Kinich’s hand had felt so warm in his own on that day. His eyes so bright, dancing with an almost child-like glee, and his smile so big as he’d watched those who opposed him reduced to ash.
For so long, Ajaw had wished so simply. His only desire to walk the earth again, to be warmed by the rays of the sun, to smell the scent of the rain, to taste the fruits of the earth that bore him like a mother. Though in that single moment, he’d found every fibre of his being thrumming with the single thought that he would do anything, trade any other pleasure he desired, to see such a sight again.
Still, as quickly as it had come, it had gone. By the time the sun had risen over the horizon, Kinich’s hand had grown cold in his, and he regarded his husband’s new form with such calculating curiosity that it made Ajaw shiver.
His tail thumped against the mattress as he stared at the door. If he tried hard enough, maybe he could make it explode! Or, if he wasn’t allowed that, he could will his companion to come back a little bit faster. There would be no exchange of pleasantries, nor of those silly rituals that human couples indulged in where they touched mouths or wrapped themselves around each other so tightly that it seemed they were trying to crawl inside of each other’s bodies. Oh no, Kinich was too good to indulge in such dalliances with his husband. In fact, Ajaw had only tried it once at the start of their marriage, and the swift jab he’d had to avoid from earth shaker had quickly clued him into the fact that his darling wife was not the affectionate type. If he was in a good mood, Kinich would indulge him in a shared meal; perhaps a few details of his day-to-day activities, or if he was truly benevolent, he’d not swat him away when Ajaw crawled into bed next to him. They weren’t allowed to touch under any circumstances, that was a hard and fast and rule. But the act of simply lying next to him, seeing his chest rise and fall, his face twitch with sleep, to simply breathe his air was more than enough to satisfy the little part of Ajaw that screamed to hoard as much of his wife as he could.
Kinich’s good moods were few and far between though. If he was angry, then Ajaw could feed on that and make something of it, they could plot the downfall of whoever or whatever it was that incited the fury together. If he’d been sad, they could work with that too! Kinich, however, was indifferent at best, and cold at worst. Never daring to share more than a few scant details at a time, as though Ajaw hadn’t been allowed to gorge himself on every detail engraved on the boy’s soul. That smile, that warmth, had faded away as quickly as it had come, and nothing Ajaw seemed to do was able to bring it back.
He'd tried being attentive. He’d tried to hunt, and gather, and cook for Kinich, who ate silently before scolding him a little bit about wasting their resources when he didn’t know what he was doing. He’d tried cleaning. Again, it was met with a raised eyebrow and a comment asking what exactly he’d cleaned, as the nest he’d made from their belongings seemed to have made a bigger mess than anything he’d actually put away. When he’d tried to make jokes and amuse Kinich during their (very) boring workday, he’d been met with a scowl and a comment about how his comments were ‘rude’ and how it was ‘inappropriate’ to make jokes so soon after someone had died. Really, there was no pleasing him!
The sound of the key turning in the lock has Ajaw perking up, bolting into the air to wait by the table under the pretense of grabbing some fruit so that the human’s head didn’t get any bigger from the thought that someone as noble as Ajaw was waiting with bated breath for his return. “I’m back.” Was all Kinich offered him. The saurian turned, cheeks stuffed with quenepa berries which dripped juice down his face as he turned to grin at Kinich “Welcome back, darling-!” He crooned, stopping short as he took in the sight before him. The mush of berries fell out of his mouth and splatted onto the floor as Ajaw zoomed across the room in two seconds, seizing Kinich’s arm in his paws with a hard grip as he stared at the abundance of bandages covering his arms and his neck. A low growl tore from the dragon’s throat as followed the trail of bandages down and saw that they dipped further under the neck of his jumpsuit and were spread more expansively over his whole body.
Ajaw didn’t even blink as he tried to keep his touch gentle. “What happened?” He asked gruffly.
His companion glowered for a moment, but made no move to pull away from him. “Nothing happened, just the usual stuff at the Canopy…”
“Did they do this to you?” Kinich paused as he took in the darkening look in the dragon’s face. His pixels flickered at the corners as his tail sliced throught the air with a sharp whistle. There was no denying that Ajaw was irritated, and yet, he couldn’t figure out why for the life of him. Not that he needed to, as Ajaw, in his growing irritation, deemed it worthy to continue his thought with bared teeth. “What? Offering you up as a human sacrifice wasn’t enough? Now they’ve gotta do… whatever the hell this is?”
His grip tightened. Paws digging into the tender flesh for a moment until a low hiss escaped from Kinich’s lips, which soon dissolved into nothingness as he clamped his teeth into his lip. It was too late for the sound to escape the dragon’s notice though. With wide eyes, Ajaw ran his claw along the seam of the bandages, watching them split and peel away, revealing the raw skin underneath. The saurian’s breath seemed to catch as he rolled Kinich’s arm over and took in the sight of it. The tanned skin was warm to the touch, slightly swollen and raised with new patters which had been etched into Kinich’s skin. Pixels and stripes detailed in green dye. His green. They covered every part of Kinich’s body, wrapping their way up his arms, down the lengths of his legs, cradling his throat before reaching a pixelated apex in the centre of his throat. Absently, Ajaw felt his mouth pool with saliva at the thought of sinking his teeth into the mark to seal his claim over Kinich’s body properly. In this form, they’d barely make an indent, but the thought of tearing away the blood and viscera and lapping at the space left behind which would ooze into his mouth was just-
Clearing his throat, Ajaw tried to turn his gaze away from the marks. His face blazed under the weight of Kinich’s gaze. “You let them draw on you, huh? To think that you wasted a whole day of our precious time to get that garbage done-“
“They’re tattoos,” Kinich supplied with a sign. He kicked his boots off, pulling off the heavy layer of his jumpsuit with a little noise of relief as his swollen skin was soothed by the cooling night air. “It’s a tradition in the Scions of the Canopy for couples to get matching tattoos to signify their union, and to ward away any unwanted attention from other suitors.”
The silence that stretched between them was heavy for a moment as Ajaw’s eyes grew wider, then bulged a little. Crimson flushed up to the tips of his ears as the blood began to pound there, a thousand little voices whispering with joy that Kinich had done something at long last to indicate the reciprocity of their marriage. To be so bold as to decorate himself head to toe in patterns that could never allow his ownership to be misconstrued – Ajaw had never expected him to take such a daring step to make his emotions known! The happiness that flooded him was palpable as he ran tender fingers along the ridges of the skin. Of course, if he’d been consulted before hand, he could have suggested something more personal to decorate Kinich’s body. He could remember eons ago, the patterns that his friends had decorated their skin with. The intertwining vines, the waves of roaring flames, or the delicate folds of flowers… he could imagine how each would decorate Kinich’s body so beautifully, how each could accentuate his beauty while telling anyone who looked exactly who he belonged to. Still, it was refreshing to see that such traditions of ceremonial skin marking had survived to become part of the scion’s culture. Even if tattooing was the least ideal iteration of the tradition, it had blessed him with such joy that Ajaw never considered complaining about it.
Of course though, Kinich found it within himself to cut that joy short. “Don’t get the wrong idea about it. I did it so that people would see them and stop commissioning me for stupid stuff to try and ask me on dates. They might not be the smartest, but they know better than to pursue a married man.”
“Oh.” Was all Ajaw could offer in response. What else was there really? His chest was aching with pain, and yet he couldn’t allow his mask to slip even a little bit lest it reveal his hand to Kinich. Instead, he simply snickered, dropping his partner’s wrist as he floated back to the fruit bowl and began to shovel more berries into his mouth. “You really are a cowardly pig, aren’t you? I gotta give it to you, being willing to modify your body to that extent instead of just telling them that you’re not interested is real dedication to the bit. I’m almost impressed by the lengths of your cowardice.”
“Yeah, yeah… when you have suitors that persistent wasting your time, I’ll listen to what you have to say about how to deal with them.”
“I’ll have you know that I used to have suitors lined up around my temples ready to prostrate themselves at a moment’s notice for the chance to get so much as a glimpse of their glorious lord Ku’hul Ajaw-!”
“Mm, sure you did. It totally wasn’t in the hopes of getting their eyes burned out so they didn’t have to see you more than once.”
“Arrrghhhh, Kinich you bastard-! Get back here!”
-
The night air was still, dyed only with the watercolour wash of the moon which cast the canyons and crevices in watery shades of blue and white. Under the covers, Kinich slept on, completely unaware of the world around him and the pair of eyes that watched him from inside the bathroom. In the thin sliver of moonlight, Ajaw found himself squinting at the figure across from him with a bittersweet smile. What did he have to do to make Kinich want him? He wandered. Their endless stream of bickering over dinner and dessert had earned him the privilege of sharing the bounty hunter’s bed for the night which was new. Usually such behaviour would earn him an evening of banishment, locked up inside the wristband, but tonight Kinich had found it within himself to be benevolent and allow Ajaw to stay and bask in the sight of him vulnerable for once. It was that in itself which summarised their relationship. Their routines were so well known to him now, that Ajaw could pick his way along the paths of action and dialogue and know with relative certainty where it would lead him; and yet, Kinich’s growing unpredictably was more confusing than anything else he’d experienced after so many years of living. Hot one minute, then cold the next. Pushing Ajaw away, then wanting him close the next moment. Tempting him with that which he wanted most, as if Kinich could read the thoughts etched into his mind, only to snatch the hope of such a thing away from him and leave him in despair again.
His eyes roamed the free expanses of skin, mouth drawn into a thin line as he took in the new tattoos. They were pretty, undoubtedly. In fact, anything would have looked divine against Kinich’s skin. A little part of him ached as he looked over them though, wishing vainly that there had been more thought and symbolism to them instead of being a simple act of defiance once again. Perhaps for Kinich, the act of altering his body was simply another thing to tick off his list, but for Ajaw, who had lived and breathed the formation of such traditions, he couldn’t help but to wish for more. It was futile to wish that he could have been the one to etch the design into Kinich’s skin, but he could not hold back the deep resentment of the thought that such precious space had been lost to something so mindless when he could have had something infinitely better instead. For generations, Ajaw’s followers had imbued themselves with the histories of their lives, twisted irrefutably into their flesh by loving hands that welcomed them into the community and cherished them until the day that they returned to the dust. The heroics, their triumphs and failures, the darkness and the light, twisted and knotted into the skin with meanings that few could understand and even fewer could hope to understand. It was the deep desire to understand Kinich, and to, in turn be understood that had led Ajaw to such lengths.
His form flickered a little as it stabilised, growing larger until a distinctly humanoid shadow invaded the sliver of moonlight that spilled across the floor. Ajaw wasted no time on admiring the form, knowing in his heart that whatever stared back at him, for better, or for worse, would simply be a reflection of that which Kinich wanted him to be. As he drew the hem of his borrowed clothing into his mouth, sinking his fangs in deep until there was nothing left but the indentation of his teeth, he reminded himself that it was the pursuit of closeness that drove him there. He dared not close his eyes as he drew the tip of the blade down his arm, pausing when the adrenaline made his hands tremble and quake. Sweat beaded across his brow as he painstakingly carved through skin and tissues, watched the blood dribbled in rivulets and dye his skin with so much red that it seemed impossible for one person to have made it. It coated everything. The floor. The walls. His clothes. Ajaw made no attempt to wipe it away during his single-minded pursuit of his goal.
One arm, then two.
Stomach.
Legs.
Then his throat.
In the other room, the wristband beeped with a warning message that went unheard as its owner continued to sleep peacefully. With unfocused eyes, Ajaw stared at Kinich and smiled as he dug the blade into the tender skin of his neck. The blood thrummed beneath the skin, beading on the surface before running free as a terrible bout of laughter shook Ajaw’s body. How it would have shaken for his friends to see their almighty lord reduced to such a state at the hands of a mortal! How they would laugh at the depths of his despair and desperation, to sink as low as to mutilate himself for someone as perfect human as Kinich.
And yet… as he dragged his sorry form over to the bed and collapsed beside him, he dared, for the first time, to lean close enough to drink in the stale air he exhaled as if it were ambrosia. With a smile, Ajaw found that there was no regret to found. Only a deep and profound sense of devotion that had etched itself into his soul the moment that Kinich had spoken those two words that had bound them together for life. That had now been etched into his skin and declared that he could belong to no one else but the human that lay across from him. He intertwined their hands, eyes crinkling with sheer delight as the beads of blood fused their skin together and refused to part them. Every inch of their bodies intertwined as the cooling blood sank into the whorls of Kinich’s fingertips, caked under his nails, and declared that they belonged to each other irreversibly better than any shallow contract could.
-
(The next morning was agony when Kinich jostled him with a growing sense of panic in his voice, and wild eyes. Still, there was no remorse to be found. Only a deep sense of satisfaction as Kinich caressed that swollen, damaged skin with almost rapt attention. His bride’s eyes on him and him only. Kinich yelled of course, about the state of the bedding, and the hundreds of notifications he had to sort through, but never spoke of the scars. The weight of his eyes following Ajaw’s body was enough to say all that he needed to.)
-
The pair lay quietly, swinging from side to side as the gusts of wind blew in from outside. Neither spoke, simply choosing to relish in the feeling of comfortable silence punctuated by the patter of raindrops soaking into the earth. The room was filled with the scent of the damp earth, of unfurling leaves, and as Ajaw turned his head a little and pressed his face closer into Kinich’s hair, he could smell the scent of sweat and smoke that clung to him like a second skin. His fingers traced the length of Kinich’s tattoos. The image of them had become so ingrained into his mind that there was no need to look to know where they started and stopped, where they met junctures and dissolved into pixels. Blue eyes slipped close as he simply basked in the feeling of being able to hold his wife, and, in turn, be held.
Kinich’s hands were almost hesitant as they ran down the length of Ajaw’s scarred skin, touching it almost reverently as if he were afraid that doing so would cause some sort of irreparable damage. From the corner of his eye, Ajaw watched those hands wander, as if they were mapping out some unfamiliar territory, some untreaded ground. With a huff, he relaxed. Trying to figure out whatever was going on in the human’s mind was like trying to trying to wade through liquid phlogiston; dangerous, and in need of skills that Ajaw wasn’t sure he had. Yet, as he enjoyed the sensation of those roaming hands he found himself resolute on one fact – if he’d known that earning his wife’s sole attention was as simple as carving himself up like a pheasant, he would have done so a long time before.
A weight settled around Ajaw’s neck, cradling it gently at the apex of his scar. Firm, but not squeezing. For a beat, he stared down at Kinich who returned his gaze with a neutral expression from where he laid against Ajaw’s chest. The human had clearly tried had to school himself to not give anything away, and yet as Ajaw stared into his eyes he found that Kinich was far too obvious for his own good. Those eyes betrayed his curiosity – no longer cold and calculating, but observatory, watching every tick and twitch Ajaw made to try and puzzle out the answer to whatever was going on in his head. Whatever it was, Ajaw had no idea. Nor was he fond of playing games where there was no way to win. Instead, jhe reached up and squeeze Kinich’s knuckles so that his grip tightened around his throat. Tight enough for discomfort, but not enough to be a concern. There was tenderness behind Kinich’s touch as his thumb gazed over his husband’s windpipe. Instinctively, Ajaw’s breath caught. He was quick to cover it with a breathy laugh and mirthful eyes. “Decided to try your hand at mariticide, little one?” He huffed. There was the silent hope that the joke would distract Kinich from the way his pulse jumped and hammered away beneath his skin.
Was he… hallucinating? Or was Kinich smiling?
With wide eyes, he moved a little, noticing that for a single moment a smile ghosted over Kinich’s face despite his irritation at being jostled. “No. You’ve been quite for so long I started to wonder if changing form had destroyed your vocal chords. Guess even I can’t be that lucky…” Ajaw bristled a little, but soon calmed as he realised that Kinich’s words lacked the usual bite and sarcasm that they usually held.
“Don’t you know greed is a sin, dear wife? Why would the heavens spoil you by frying my voice when they already blessed you with the incredible luck to find and marry someone as incredible as myself?”
The hunter shifted a little, tilting his head a little to observe the sight of his companion. “You think marriage is a blessing?”
Marrying someone like Kinich was a blessing, that much was for certain, even if he’d never say it out loud. “Well, isn’t that the kind of stuff humans like to talk about – when they get all gooey eyed and talk about how marriage is the greatest gift they could be given, and about how their partners are the missing parts of themselves and yadda yadda yadda…”
“My mother used to say the same.” Outside the door, the rain pounded against the ground, soaking it through, and for the first time Ajaw found himself with no desire to say anything. His hand came up to run through Kinich’s hair, smiling when the boy instinctively leaned into the touch as if seeking comfort. “She always said that my father and I were ‘the greatest joys in her life’, and she liked to walk round showing off as much of herself as possible so when people stopped and looked at her she’d have the opportunity to brag to them about the wonderful life she had.”
“She had tattoos like yours?”
“All over her body… she even had a face tattoo, and she’d hoped that I might get one too when I got old enough to learn more about our ancestors. She told me that she wanted so many so that even if time passed and she forgot everything including her name, she could look at herself and see the story she’d lived with my father on her skin.” There was a pregnant pause for a moment. “I never understood until the end.” Ajaw tugged on the black strands lightly, twirling them around his fingers to signal to Kinich that he was present with him and was able to comfort him no matter what he did or didn’t choose to share. “Two days before she left, I saw her getting dressed after the bath. She’d been sliced and scarred, beaten and bruised so many times that the ink from those tattoos had disappeared and she was more scars than a person. I think – I think that was when she knew? When the story of the beautiful love she’d told her friends about just ceased to exist, and there was no soul left in her body to show off to anyone else.”
The thickness in Kinich’s voice was alarming. Still Ajaw knew better than to look down to meet the sight he knew was inevitable. His finger’s removed themselves from his wife’s hair and moved to carress his tattoos again; feather light, and full of worships as they ran over the scars that had long since imprinted themselves on Kinich’s body. On his soul. The vibrant green of that art. The green of his body, the green of Kinich’s eyes, mixed together and painted in layer upon layer upon the skin until even those imperfections that Kinich concealed under his jumpsuit, the history of torment carved upon his skin, was reduced to nothingness. The green cradled each scar, wrapping around them and shielding them from the view of prying eyes that wanted to know knowledge that they had no right to. Perhaps, they had been designed in such a way by one of the scions desperate to absolve their guilt about the hand they’d played. But, inside himself he knew that it was a grander choice, a sign from the universe itself to Kinich, that no matter where he went, no matter what happened, every part of himself – the good, the bad, the light and the darkness – would be forever cradled by Ajaw’s love for him.
In silence, he turned his head and pressed his lips to Kinich’s cheeks. The rain tickled his lips. Salty, and warm, but and yet it made Kinich so cold that he began to shake. Ajaw simply stays silent, and holds him close.
-
It is that truth that brings warmth to their home. The distance between them feels shorter than it did before and with every day it feels as though they tangle together more. Ajaw revolves around Kinich like a planet around the sun, and with every day, he creeps close enough to feel the warmth radiating from his sun. It burns. It hurts. There is an ache in his chest every time he holds Kinich’s sleeping form in his arms. He craves the very marrow of Kinich’s bones, every fibre of his muscles, yet he is satiated with the morsels of food is fed by those gentle fingers. With the morsels of information that Kinich shares on those days where the weight of the world feels like it is too much to bear
Each act of intimacy draws them together, and repels them simultaneously. These actions mean everything, and nothing at all. The smiles shared with Mualani. Nourishing Kachina with food between stints of training. Comforting Ororon with scrappy details of his own past. These people touch Kinich so familiarly, having earned a place that seems to be out of reach for Ajaw with no effort needed at all. What is he to Kinich?
A husband?
A loyal companion?
Or a dog who begs for any scrap that Kinich deems worthy to spare him?
Ajaw know the answer, and it hurts. Yet with his tail between his legs, he returns to his wife time and time again. Willing to be hurt to feel a ounce of the warmth that Kinich offered to him.
-
In summer, the sky began to fall. The sky was dyed in hues of red, orange and yellow, burning bright I streaks that blazed across the sky then fizzled out to nothingness. Somhow he’d thought that Kinich would worry about what such a phenomenon could mean – how it would affect their commissions, or their surroundings, or hell, even what it meant for the impending doom of the place that he’d found worthy to claim as his home. Yet as they lay on the graze, eyes turned up to the burning red sky, Ajaw found that there was nothing but a sheer sense of wonder in the hunter’s eyes. They were wide, flitting from side to side every few seconds as if he was trying take in every inch of the scene as it unfolded before him. There was a slight flush to his cheeks, and a sparkle in his eye that could not be so easily dismissed as the light of the meteor showers – not when his expression was so relaxed and awe stricken.
Rolling onto his side, Ajaw found himself growing warm in the cooling night air at the sight of his bride so unguarded. Those previous moments where all airs and graces, the sarcasm and wit, were set aside in the pursuit of pure, unadulterated joy were the moments that Ajaw lived for, breathed for, fought for. To see that smile again. That burning light. It was reflected there in Kinich’s face – so close that Ajaw could reach out and touch it to feel it take over his senses again-!
His hand hovered in midair for a second, stuck halfway across the gap that separated them. It remained there for a moment, completely unacknowledged before he let it slump back to the ground. That was the way it was meant to be, wasn’t it?
Him watching Kinich, and Kinich’s attention eternally turned elsewhere. A star, always just out of reach.
“You know, for someone that never shuts up, you’re being unnervingly quiet tonight.” The dragon’s mind tuned back in at those words, just in time for him to meet eyes with Kinich who had turned onto his eyes and sat staring at him. His tongue rang with bitterness as he stared at his partner across from him, and realised that that look of warmth and happiness remained even in the sight of that which seemed to cause Kinich the most pain in life. If he were to pretend for just a moment, he could say that that warmth was reserved for him too. Kinich reached across the gap to take Ajaw’s limp hand in his own, pressing it to the side of his face. His eyes were lidded as he cupped the skin of the dragon’s hand and leaned into the touch more. “I thought you’d want to tell me all about the last time this happened and how secretly it was your scheme to scare the humans shitless so they’d worship you, or whatever you had in mind.”
“Did you know that when the meteors used to fall like this, we used to say it was showing us that the world was ending?”
“Really? The Great Ku’hul Ajaw letting someone else take the credit for the ‘end of the world’-“
“Well, when theres no way to describe what’s happening to people who have never experienced it before, it feels lik the end of the world to see the stars falling out of the sky.” A little snort escaped Kinich. For a beat, Ajaw let his own smile grow larger at such a thought. Though as quickly as it came, it was gone. He withdrew his hand from his chest and rolled over onto his back to stare up at the meteors.
“Ajaw…?”
“For them, the sky falling down would be the end of the world. You mortals are far to puny and fragile to survive such a thing! But for me – for me, it would only be a blip in the long history of my life.”
“It’s a bit of a weird thing to be bragging about-“
“Why would I brag about that?” Ajaw asked suddenly “My life will continue until the day that the heavenly principles decide to wipe me off the face of the planet, and as time carries on I’ll have to carry my burdens with me even past the point when no one remembers what they are anymore.”
Kinich was silent for a moment, before his face popped up into Ajaw’s line of vision. Forehead slightly creased with concern as he stared down at his companion with a strange intensity.
“If you have a burden, it makes it lighter to carry if you share it. God knows that you’ve shared enough of mine.”
A bubble of laughter escaped from his lips. How oblivious could this man be?
“I love you, Kinich.” It came out so softly that Ajaw wondered if Kinich had heard him at all, but a quick peek at his companions face was enough to tell him that he’d heard. It was the point of no return. “I adore you – no, that’s not enough. I crave you Kinich. Every moment of every day, I think about what I have to do to get you to give me even an ounce of the devotion you showed on our wedding day. I think about how if the world were to end, and I were to be left behind, I would have to carry that with me until the end of time – the memory of you, that consumes me at every waking moment. And still, you barely notice me unless I can do something for you. I’ll spend my life chasing you like a dog eternally after whatever scraps his master can bare, and yet, when it comes down to it, what proof would there be that you belonged to me at all?”
“Ajaw-“
“It’s fine.” He gritted “I know that you’re not that kind of person who has such single-minded devotion to another, but it doesn’t stop me from wanting more than those flimsy words you gave me to save you from the fate you’d been assigned. It doesn’t stop the hunger that devours me when I see the warmth inside your soul, or the desire to be the one you rely on when you need someone. I know I’m not –“ A little laugh came out of him sounding hollow as he tried to hold back the weight of his words a little. “I’m not the person you wanted, and it’s not the relationship you wanted. Hell, I don’t even know what we can call this! You’re hot one minute, then cold the next. We take one step forwards and eight backwards half the time. I want to be close to you, but… I can’t make you love me in the way that I desire.”
“Is that why you cut yourself?” The question was a little odd, but still Ajaw couldn’t stop himself from answering it with honesty. If it would help Kinich to understand the depths of his feelings, and the way they rang so true and clear, there was no point in concealing the fact any longer.
“The tradition that the scions developed comes from a more ancient tradition from my people. They would carve the history of their love into the skin as a sign of eternal devotion, and that they would suffer even the greatest agony for the sake of their love.”
Soft fingers caressed the ridges of his scars gently. “And yet, for a being as old as yourself who always speaks of the suitors and concubines you had, and of the devoted worshippers, you only have my markings.”
“Kinich. My history on this land has been longer than your entire life, I’ve walked among humans and dragons alike, seen the rise and fall of archons, and yet it was the birth of your soul after thousands of years of life that left an impression so deep that it consumed my entire body. Even if I were to live a thousand years more in the future, no one else would be worthy to mark my skin when everything I am belongs solely to you as the master of my power, and of my being.”
After a moment of silence, Ajaw opened his eyes to find Kinich’s face was completely unreadable. His mind raced with a thousand thoughts as the hunter got to his feet silently and began to walk away. “Kinich.” He tried. The hunter paid him no mind; all thoughts of the sight before them disregarded in whatever blend of anger, annoyance, disgust had over taken him at Ajaw’s words. Ajaw scrambled after him, trying to keep pace with his partner’s long strides as Kinich re-entered the house and began digging through the various items in the kitchen. “Kinich, I – I shouldn’t have told you anything. I wouldn’t have if I knew you were going to freak out like this – can you just- put the knife down!”
The muscles in Kinich’s body were pulled taught as he grasped the knife in a white knuckled grip. There was a fierceness in his face that Ajaw was sure he’d never seen before. Some kind of resolution that indicated that there was no turning back from whatever Kinich had in mind. The dragon’s heart pounded in his ears as the human stalked closer and pulled on his arm. He waited for a stab, a slash, something – but instead was surprised when Kinich simply pressed the blade into his hand. Their lips hovered barely an inch apart, hands clasped around the handle of the blade with neither daring to move it an inch. That particular weapon was well known to him. The lone survivor of their first massacre together, where they’d danced amongst the flames of the temple where they’d been wedded, and bound their union in the blood slit from their palms.
“Mark me.”
“You – you don’t know what you’re asking me to do here-“ He gulped thickly.
“All those months ago, when I looked at you and told you I wanted to be one with you until death do us part – I meant that. On that day, you cut my palm open and we were married as simply as that. If I could understand that that cut represented binding our souls together for the rest of our lives, why do you assume I don’t understand this?”
“It’s more significant.” Ajaw tried “And it’s painful and-“
“And it would show everyone, irrefutably, that I love you. That I belong to you.” Mouth hanging agape, Ajaw found his fingers tightening around the handle of the blade as Kinich let go and stepped impossibly closer. His chest pressed into the space between them, drawing blood where the sharp edge began to dig in. Still, Kinich didn’t bat an eyelid. “You asked me how you would know that I belonged to you, even after I’m long gone. With this, generations would know, even after my flesh rots from my bones and my soul is scattered in the wind, that the one called ‘Malipo’ belonged so wholly to the one that loved him that it was etched into his skin and soul alike. So please,” Soft lips grazed along the corner of Ajaw’s mouth “Record our history on my body. I want it all. Your pain, your disappointment. The unending darkness that came before and the light on the other side. Let me be greedy. Let me devour it all and become yours.”
A low growl rang out through the air, giving only a few seconds of warning before Kinich found himself being hoisted up into the air and all but thrown down on the bed. In an instant, Ajaw was leaning over him. His appearance was dishevelled, combine with slitted pupils that stared down at his wife as if he were a prize waiting to be claimed, still his teeth remained clamped into his lip as the last line of defence against the act that he knew would be the point of no return for them.
“If I do this – “ He choked “If I do this you’ll never be allowed to leave me. You’ll never be allowed to have anyone else.”
A smirk danced on the human’s lips as he sank back into the bedding “You said it yourself, it took thousands of years to craft me for you. I never stood a chance of belonging to anyone else.” That was all it took for the da to break. Quickly, the dragon bent down and captured Kinich’s lips in his own, noting their softness and the taste of Kinich that invaded his every sense as he gorged himself on his kisses.
Their lips dragged against each other, pulling a groan from Kinich’s throat as Ajaw’s tongue pludged forwards and filled his throat with thick muscle. He could only choke for a moment before it retreated a few inches to allow him to suckle desperately at the tip of it, wanting to fall to the tempatation and intoxication of Ajaw’s presence with no regard for himself. The long appendage mapped the crevices of his mouth before seeking his own and beginning to rub at it gently, teasing it into chasing as it they tangled together in a mess of saliva. Candy sweet and addicting with every swipe of their tongues together, drawing out even sweeter moan as they responded to each other efforts and moved in tandem
Again. Again. Again.
The intoxicating feeling of losing themselves in one another bringing them back for more until they were too breathless to continue. After a moment Ajaw turned his attention to the column of the human’s neck and began to press feverish kisses there, stripping away later upon layer of clothing and discarding it with no mind in pursuit of that which they both desired above all. He drew a section of skin into his mouth, worrying it between his teeth until it bloomed red under his tongue and he was satisfied that it would stand purple given time. Tilting his head, Kinich fell into the sensation, not caring about how many marks he would inevitably be left with.
“I love you –“ Aajw whimpered, pulling Kinich up to loop his arms around his neck so that they were impossibly closer. Hips grinding, mouths gasping for air from each other’s mouths in their desperation to hoard every sensation they could from each other’s bodies. “I love you so much-“
“I love you too-“
“You’re mine Kinich.”
Kinich let his arms drop, making Ajaw pause in disbelief. There, laid out against the pillows, dyed in red, and orange and yellow, was an angel who stared up at him with total adoration. “I am. You’re my Ajaw, for better or worse, until death do us part and not a moment before then.”
His heart softened with familiar tenderness that had him leaning forwards to press a kiss – softer than the others they’d shared – to his wife’s lips, running a hand his sweaty locks for a moment. “It’s going to hurt a lot. If you need to stop let me know, and trust in me.”
“Always.”
Their fingers intertwined on the mattress as Ajaw began to craft their story. His mouth sought out his little lover’s chest first. Kisses were pressed along the defined ridges of his collar bones, open-mouthed and feather light as they ventured along the line of his sternum and followed the trail of hot skin downwards until he was down by Kinich’s feet.
With the first press of the knife on Kinich’s left foot, their story began. Marked in ridges of fire, and flowers. Decorations of black lace and leather boots. Pixels and stripes. Woven together carefully into a tapestry of red and white; cum, and blood. Hands carving so carefully, touching with desire so intense that it could diminish even the most horrendous of pains. Lips, tender and warm to kiss away the tears, to silence the whimpers when the pain of the process of the light headedness from the bloodloss got too severe. Tongue feeding more and more of his saliva to Kinich, allowing him to suckle upon it like a babe to ease his mind from the agony, and narrow down his thought to only his husband. Ajaw. Ajaw. Always Ajaw. Forever, his Ajaw.
When at last they were done, the first rays of dawn peeked over the horizon. Blue, and yellow and green. Their bedsheets dyed in red and so much white, as the two of them rocked together in ecstasy. Feeling the rawness of their carved up skin against the cool morning air, and breathing in the scent of copper with greedy breaths as they sent up a single prayer silently to the heavens.
Thank you for bringing him to me.
-
“Good morning.” Ajaw whispered wrapping his tail around his wife’s middle.
The human stared at him in the mirror for a second as he finished tying his headband into position, then instinctively turned to receive a kiss on the corner of his lips. Then another. Then another. Then-
“Stop.” Kinich chastised him “I have to finish getting ready, and if you’re coming with me to meet the client, you need to get ready too. We’ll have to leave in a few minutes.”
The saurian pouted for a moment then seized the arm that Kinich was trying to slide into his shirt. His lips pressed feverish kisses along the pink-ish lines of Kinich’s scars. Ghost of a smile was drawn upon it as he recalled the pattern of black bridal lace that imbued the flesh there, sliding upwards before sinking his teeth into the only bare space on the back of his wife’s neck. “In case they need reminding who you belong to.”
A laugh tore out of him as he avoided a quick slap from his wife, who quickly pulled the rest of his clothes on and moved to slide on his boots. Ajaw didn’t even need to see him to know that Kinich’s face would be flushed pretty and pink as such a blatant display of their relationship. Somehow, despite the rather… unconventional aspects of it all, it was the simple things that made Kinich blush like a teenage girl. “Like you’d let anyone forget anyways.” The pads of his fingers, dragged along the ridges with pride.
“Mm, if it meant I could keep this view all to myself, I might. Don’t forget who suggested changing his outfit to show them off because it wasn’t me that did that ‘nich!”
“You’re a freak, it was only a matter of time before you started asking me to show them off to people.”
“You keep telling yourself that, little one. One day, it might just make it true.”
With a huff, Kinich grabbed onto Ajaw’s scarred hand and began to tug him out of the door ready to start their day of work. Adorned in scars of black bridal lace and of falling stars. Dyed pink with deniable warmth that sang out a single phrase.
“I do.”
“I do.”