[That explains the rather biased exclamation that had echoed around the entirety of the Moulin Rouge. But oh, that derision . . . he lets the statement linger in the air for a few seconds, and then, gently:]
It's a foolish thing for him to say. Even if you were, it certainly wouldn't be of Elise of all creatures. [Sorry, Elise.] And experience doesn't necessarily make anyone better— growing up here, he should know that. There's plenty of whores who stay third-string for a reason.
[The brush moves higher, his head tipped low. But then, as golden eyes peer up through dark lashes, he adds gently:]
But . . . one might wonder whether or not you felt a bit of jealousy that someone else got to kiss him first.
[Oh the look Astarion angles towards Kanan in the mirror is accusatory. Scrunching in on itself in rankled disgust that's one part childhood instincts and two parts defensiveness outright, poorly mixed. That he'd been worked up in the moment— red from the tips of his ears to the end of his collar— that's irrelevant, now. Because now is when the suggestion feels affronting. Now is when it steps on the choreography he'd imagined for this whole exchange, veering away from talk of 'poor darling Astarion' into territory where his wants are questioned, and those questions—
He doesn't have an answer to.
So he does the next best thing. He scoffs.]
You think I wanted to kiss him?? That I planned the whole thing out just so I could get to him first!?!
[Honestly, it's the test of a lifetime not to laugh at that expression. It's the exact same face that Astarion used to level at anyone who dared tease him, equal parts deeply offended and fiercely indignant. For a moment he can almost see that chubby face surrounded by untameable curls, ears flushed in embarrassment and a little frown on his face . . . oh, precious thing. Darling boy. He finally compromises by biting his lip, only semi-successfully hiding a smile, and that will have to be enough.]
Did you?
[And then, before a screeching indignant no can ring out:]
When was the last time you ever did anything you didn't wholeheartedly want to do? Half the time Zevlor can't get you to do your chores without having to twist your arm, much less kiss anyone.
[A beat. He works the brush carefully through a stubborn knot, then catches Astarion's eye in the mirror. There's an amused little smile on his lips as he adds:]
Besides: the two of you have been inseparable from the moment you brought him here. You were endlessly possessive of him even as a friend, and now that you're both older . . . don't tell me you've never thought about it before.
[Kanan is so dangerously close to being bitten. Not on the neck, of course— because only an uncivilized, rabid elf would do something so unhinged. Probably something contagious Fenris got from Elise even, Astarion thinks— before he winces at that knot's tender resistance giving way, leaving behind a few white locks shaped like odd zig-zag crinkles, forgetting his anger in place of another sore sensation.
But he doesn't stop his sulking. And he doesn't pull his burning stare away from Kanan, either. As much in the dog house now as he was when telling a small, pudgy-fingered child he couldn't have dessert early.]
I take this seriously, Kanan, that's why it's different! I'm not going to be washing dishes or scrubbing floors when I'm eighty unless I royally fuck up— which at this rate—
[Helplessly he huffs. He puffs. He throws his hands into the air near shoulder height before they collapse back down into his lap.]
How in the world did he manage to kiss someone else first....
[Oh, there it is. There it is, and his smile disappears as his heart aches in sympathy. Beneath all the dramatic sulkiness and frustration lies a heart so terribly fragile, and so few ever manage to get at it. The steady brushstrokes cease, but only so he can run a warm hand against the side of Astarion's neck, slipping down to rub between his shoulderblades.]
Because she had nothing to lose, I suspect.
[His voice is far softer now.]
She kissed him, didn't she? I thought so, [for he knows Fenris, and knows how he gets around the performers and courtesans both.] If it went wrong, you know her: she would simply laugh it off, for she cares little about the creatures she beds. He meant nothing to her beyond an afternoon's entertainment . . . and I suspect he was swept up in her wake.
[Which doesn't make it any better, and it certainly won't ease that aching, wailing heart. But maybe it will help a tiny bit. Maybe some part of Astarion can soothe himself with the thought that at least it wasn't a deliberate choice, with Astarion made the loser.]
How long had you been planning it?
[Gods, it must have been like a slap to the face, he thinks, still rubbing his back. It must have felt like the cruelest little drop back to reality in a place where romantic fantasies are meant to thrive . . . oh, his little Astarion, and Kanan fights the urge to gather him up as if he were still a child.]
[Every inch of muscle that he has sinks into those waiting hands, thick tears welling in his eyes; the back of his throat feels clotted with compressed spit before he knows it. He's not a child anymore but he feels like it, crying into Kanan's arms over stupid things like skinned knees and ruined toys. A bad dream that felt too real.
This one isn't, though.
A bad dream, that is.
Eventually, he's going to have to face it again. The next time he sees Fenris— or the next time he sees Elise. There's no coming back from this, he's convinced of it, and it aches like the throbbing of his neck.]
....since last week, when Satine told me I'm old enough to start practicing if I want to.
[He swipes his nose across the sleeve of that robe, leaving a wet trail across the back of his wrist through sheer silk. In the mirror, his reflection looks angry, but that's always how he's looked when hurt. Burning from the inside out.]
[It's so obvious a lie as to not need counteracting, but that's all the more reason to do so. You matter, this matters, for he will grow up in a world that tells him so often that his feelings don't. Soon, he'll have to learn how to hide everything, rage and grief and joy and delight. He'll have to learn how to put on a mask and keep it on almost always, and that's fine. That's the bargain. That's what it means to become the Sparkling Diamond, but—
Not yet. Not here in this room, when he's still a child nursing a broken heart.]
Come here. Come here, now—
[It's an awkward angle and it doesn't matter, not when it's his son— one way or another Kanan gathers him up, wrapping his arms around him and pulling him towards his lap. Clawed fingers work through silken curls as he makes wordless noises of comfort, just as he always did for every scraped knee and broken toy.
And when the worst of the grief seems to have subsided— when the tears abate, or the anger cools— Kanan murmurs:]
[Yes it is— and as pale fingertips curl in fine fabric, he's angry yet again. Yes it is— and he can't fathom anything but this: frustration hot as coal beneath his ribs, an overwhelming sense of wasted everything, as if everything that mattered is long lost and done for. All the chapters of his life till now, all the ways he'd pictured this going— he's young. Willowy and stubborn-minded and ambitious, which is, when he can't see past the tips of his fingers and knows nothing of the world outside these walls beyond the market down the street, a disastrous combination of traits. Raised by theatrics and thespians, what else could he be other than a little firebomb, wearing too-large clothes: wanting everything to be perfect, or it's nothing at all.
He clings to Kanan like he did when he was that wailing child. Angry still. Latched on till his fingers go completely numb, snuffling and chuffing and muttering low.]
You can't make him un-kiss her.
[His voice barely clears the edge of Kanan's shoulder. He's nothing but curls and balled-up fingers and a pair of glowering, red-limned eyes staring off at nothing at all.]
You can't make him not have bitten, with everyone and the fu— [he bites his tongue to correct himself] bloody Maker listening in, telling me I was jealous.
[It feels pretty fucking unfixable, is the point here.]
[No, he most certainly can't, though his gentle hum of agreement is meant to soothe as well as agree. I know, dearest, I know, not patronizing insomuch as making sure he doesn't snag at the edges of that spitting temper.]
Satine wasn't the first Diamond, you know. She wasn't even the first to come up with her routines— those were inherited, just like her costumes and most of her jewelry, not to mention her . And yet I cannot tell you the name of her predecessor, not off the top of my head, for she outshone them so brilliantly.
You need not be the first to have kissed him. Just better than Elise— and that will not be a hard bar to clear, Astarion, for I know him and I know her, and she means nothing to him.
[He tips his head.]
A lesson for you, before you begin with Satine. What makes for a good kiss is not just technique, nor focus, but passion. Cultivating that heated desire for your customers is what she'll teach you, but I would wager a month's sums that Elise had none of it for Fenris— and you have plenty.
[It's deft, that interruption. The swiftness of Kanan's intrusion into everything he'd wreathed himself in so thorough that for a moment he forgets he's weeping. Forgets his ire, too, drawing back by half a centimeter with the most bewildered look of fascination— as if some hidden codex is revealed. As if his world is shaken.
He's scarcely in his teenage years; to him, Satine had existed ages and ages beforehand. Since the dawn of time, before the Moulin Rouge, to Astarion's young mind, he'd imagined her a touchstone. In the beginning, there was sunlight, and the dust of the earth, and Paris, and Zevlor and Kanan, and the Moulin Rouge, and Satine.
He wipes his eyes, bleary and confused. Awestruck to say the least. (And beneath all that, hopeful now.]
—I....[Another blink, pausing.] I don't know. I wasn't thinking. [I was upset.]
It was.... [Warm. Hot. Comforting. Suffocating— in a good way: his blood boiled and his temples ached from the dizzying rush.] Nice? I think. I kept getting distracted every time I tried to focus, I mean, and he kept instructing me, but....
You know, I don't think he was faring any better, either.
[The way he'd shifted, the way he moved. Even the way he stuttered.]
[Oh, Astarion is so sweetly endearing when he looks at him like that. So sweetly shocked, tears still clinging to his lashes and yet his mind already shifting past his anger and his grief— he never tires of seeing it. And as for that description: Zevlor might well flinch at the thought of his son kissing his beloved friend, but Kanan feels nothing but vague, triumphant vindication. How many years had they watched the two of them orbit around one another? Astarion and his little shadow, Fenris and his eternal partner-in-crime . . . he smiles faintly throughout it, nodding in agreement at that rather more believable assessment. He cups his cheek, his thumb swiping away an errant year, and offers Astarion a little half-smile.]
Yes. Once or twice, before I realized the life of a courtesan was not for me. And it is very, very different than truly desiring someone.
The former, I can give you lessons on, though Satine will be more of an education. It involves finding something— some trait, some feature— that you can turn into something that appeals. Whether it's pretending you're a person who gets off on red hair or terrible jokes, or simply leaning into enjoying the hue of their eyes . . . it helps. It becomes less about what you, yourself, find appealing, and more about becoming whatever it is they desire— which is, after all, someone who desires them in turn.
[It's a bit of a twisted explanation, admittedly, and he wrinkles his nose as he says it. But ah:]
But for the latter— for someone like Fenris— Astarion, little wonder you kept losing focus, for that's precisely what you ought to have done.
Unless you meant to kiss him solely as practice and nothing else, that is.
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illithidnapped) wrote2025-05-31 06:45 pm
no subject
[That explains the rather biased exclamation that had echoed around the entirety of the Moulin Rouge. But oh, that derision . . . he lets the statement linger in the air for a few seconds, and then, gently:]
It's a foolish thing for him to say. Even if you were, it certainly wouldn't be of Elise of all creatures. [Sorry, Elise.] And experience doesn't necessarily make anyone better— growing up here, he should know that. There's plenty of whores who stay third-string for a reason.
[The brush moves higher, his head tipped low. But then, as golden eyes peer up through dark lashes, he adds gently:]
But . . . one might wonder whether or not you felt a bit of jealousy that someone else got to kiss him first.
1/2
2/2
He doesn't have an answer to.
So he does the next best thing. He scoffs.]
You think I wanted to kiss him?? That I planned the whole thing out just so I could get to him first!?!
no subject
Did you?
[And then, before a screeching indignant no can ring out:]
When was the last time you ever did anything you didn't wholeheartedly want to do? Half the time Zevlor can't get you to do your chores without having to twist your arm, much less kiss anyone.
[A beat. He works the brush carefully through a stubborn knot, then catches Astarion's eye in the mirror. There's an amused little smile on his lips as he adds:]
Besides: the two of you have been inseparable from the moment you brought him here. You were endlessly possessive of him even as a friend, and now that you're both older . . . don't tell me you've never thought about it before.
no subject
But he doesn't stop his sulking. And he doesn't pull his burning stare away from Kanan, either. As much in the dog house now as he was when telling a small, pudgy-fingered child he couldn't have dessert early.]
I take this seriously, Kanan, that's why it's different! I'm not going to be washing dishes or scrubbing floors when I'm eighty unless I royally fuck up— which at this rate—
[Helplessly he huffs. He puffs. He throws his hands into the air near shoulder height before they collapse back down into his lap.]
How in the world did he manage to kiss someone else first....
[A beat, small.]
....and why did it have to be her?
[Maybe. Maybe he has thought about it before.]
no subject
Because she had nothing to lose, I suspect.
[His voice is far softer now.]
She kissed him, didn't she? I thought so, [for he knows Fenris, and knows how he gets around the performers and courtesans both.] If it went wrong, you know her: she would simply laugh it off, for she cares little about the creatures she beds. He meant nothing to her beyond an afternoon's entertainment . . . and I suspect he was swept up in her wake.
[Which doesn't make it any better, and it certainly won't ease that aching, wailing heart. But maybe it will help a tiny bit. Maybe some part of Astarion can soothe himself with the thought that at least it wasn't a deliberate choice, with Astarion made the loser.]
How long had you been planning it?
[Gods, it must have been like a slap to the face, he thinks, still rubbing his back. It must have felt like the cruelest little drop back to reality in a place where romantic fantasies are meant to thrive . . . oh, his little Astarion, and Kanan fights the urge to gather him up as if he were still a child.]
no subject
This one isn't, though.
A bad dream, that is.
Eventually, he's going to have to face it again. The next time he sees Fenris— or the next time he sees Elise. There's no coming back from this, he's convinced of it, and it aches like the throbbing of his neck.]
....since last week, when Satine told me I'm old enough to start practicing if I want to.
[He swipes his nose across the sleeve of that robe, leaving a wet trail across the back of his wrist through sheer silk. In the mirror, his reflection looks angry, but that's always how he's looked when hurt. Burning from the inside out.]
It doesn't matter.
[Is a lie.]
no subject
[It's so obvious a lie as to not need counteracting, but that's all the more reason to do so. You matter, this matters, for he will grow up in a world that tells him so often that his feelings don't. Soon, he'll have to learn how to hide everything, rage and grief and joy and delight. He'll have to learn how to put on a mask and keep it on almost always, and that's fine. That's the bargain. That's what it means to become the Sparkling Diamond, but—
Not yet. Not here in this room, when he's still a child nursing a broken heart.]
Come here. Come here, now—
[It's an awkward angle and it doesn't matter, not when it's his son— one way or another Kanan gathers him up, wrapping his arms around him and pulling him towards his lap. Clawed fingers work through silken curls as he makes wordless noises of comfort, just as he always did for every scraped knee and broken toy.
And when the worst of the grief seems to have subsided— when the tears abate, or the anger cools— Kanan murmurs:]
It isn't as unfixable as it appears, Viniquessë.
no subject
He clings to Kanan like he did when he was that wailing child. Angry still. Latched on till his fingers go completely numb, snuffling and chuffing and muttering low.]
You can't make him un-kiss her.
[His voice barely clears the edge of Kanan's shoulder. He's nothing but curls and balled-up fingers and a pair of glowering, red-limned eyes staring off at nothing at all.]
You can't make him not have bitten, with everyone and the fu— [he bites his tongue to correct himself] bloody Maker listening in, telling me I was jealous.
[It feels pretty fucking unfixable, is the point here.]
no subject
[No, he most certainly can't, though his gentle hum of agreement is meant to soothe as well as agree. I know, dearest, I know, not patronizing insomuch as making sure he doesn't snag at the edges of that spitting temper.]
Satine wasn't the first Diamond, you know. She wasn't even the first to come up with her routines— those were inherited, just like her costumes and most of her jewelry, not to mention her . And yet I cannot tell you the name of her predecessor, not off the top of my head, for she outshone them so brilliantly.
You need not be the first to have kissed him. Just better than Elise— and that will not be a hard bar to clear, Astarion, for I know him and I know her, and she means nothing to him.
[He tips his head.]
A lesson for you, before you begin with Satine. What makes for a good kiss is not just technique, nor focus, but passion. Cultivating that heated desire for your customers is what she'll teach you, but I would wager a month's sums that Elise had none of it for Fenris— and you have plenty.
What was it like, before he bit you?
no subject
He's scarcely in his teenage years; to him, Satine had existed ages and ages beforehand. Since the dawn of time, before the Moulin Rouge, to Astarion's young mind, he'd imagined her a touchstone. In the beginning, there was sunlight, and the dust of the earth, and Paris, and Zevlor and Kanan, and the Moulin Rouge, and Satine.
He wipes his eyes, bleary and confused. Awestruck to say the least. (And beneath all that, hopeful now.]
—I....[Another blink, pausing.] I don't know. I wasn't thinking. [I was upset.]
It was.... [Warm. Hot. Comforting. Suffocating— in a good way: his blood boiled and his temples ached from the dizzying rush.] Nice? I think. I kept getting distracted every time I tried to focus, I mean, and he kept instructing me, but....
You know, I don't think he was faring any better, either.
[The way he'd shifted, the way he moved. Even the way he stuttered.]
Have you ever done it? Not—
[kissing. Not that. No.]
'Cultivating desire'. For someone else.
no subject
Yes. Once or twice, before I realized the life of a courtesan was not for me. And it is very, very different than truly desiring someone.
The former, I can give you lessons on, though Satine will be more of an education. It involves finding something— some trait, some feature— that you can turn into something that appeals. Whether it's pretending you're a person who gets off on red hair or terrible jokes, or simply leaning into enjoying the hue of their eyes . . . it helps. It becomes less about what you, yourself, find appealing, and more about becoming whatever it is they desire— which is, after all, someone who desires them in turn.
[It's a bit of a twisted explanation, admittedly, and he wrinkles his nose as he says it. But ah:]
But for the latter— for someone like Fenris— Astarion, little wonder you kept losing focus, for that's precisely what you ought to have done.
Unless you meant to kiss him solely as practice and nothing else, that is.