ellnyx (ellnyx) wrote in areyougame, @ 2009-02-16 20:09:00 |
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Entry tags: | *final fantasy xii, author: logistika_nyx |
who dares wins, ffxii (vaan/balthier)
Title: Who Dares, Wins
Author: logistika_nyx
Rating/Warnings: M, none
Word Count: 1570
Prompt: Feb 16 - Final Fantasy XII, Vaan/Balthier: fine clothing/undressing - i still don't know who you are'
Summary: Seven horizontal sailor's knots hold the shirt closed; Vaan struggles blindly before his blunt fingers read the complexity Balthier demonstrated only once before, reluctantly, for some task on the Strahl. Once recognised, the pirate's knots are unravelled easily.
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This is the easy part: the clasps at the back of Balthier's vest loose the tight-fitted taper with four quick flicks of Vaan's forefinger, where callus and the clumsiness of his touch cause no delay. The brocade is stiff enough that it holds Balthier's shape when Vaan sets it to the side, as carefully as he can.
Balthier's shirt proves like all his others, embroidered densely in parts, curled patterns of thick white thread at cuffs, along ribs, embellishing seams. The fabric is worn, though, thin enough that Balthier's colour shows through clearly, white and pink, sweat-speckled here in the heat of a Balfonheim pre-dawn. Without a cravat, Vaan sees the shirt's collar still bears the Pharos's grimy dust.
Balthier's snore disrupts when Vaan's unwary fingers touch his nape; Vaan flinches back, but Balthier does not wake.
There are stray curls of hair across Balthier's nape, missed by the barber's razor or perhaps re-grown too swift since their last stop in civilisation. Balthier must have been so tired, strained, to have drunk himself into unconsciousness before tending his grooming when they know they have to leave, so soon. Vaan has never seen the pirate so careless as to sleep in full dress before.
Vaan hesitates, grits his teeth and climbs onto the bed: he settles with his knees pressed against the outside of Balthier's lax thighs. He cannot reach otherwise. Vaan worms his arms against the press of man and mattress, works it, until he finds the rucked-up seam of Balthier's shirt. Balthier is – heavier than Vaan expected, the pirate breathing heavily, unsteadily. Seven horizontal sailor's knots hold the shirt closed; Vaan struggles blindly before his blunt fingers read the complexity Balthier demonstrated only once before, for some task on the Strahl. Once recognised, all the pirate's knots are unravelled easily. Vaan rises from the bed with a warm shirt in his hands, and checks to see that Balthier's eyes are still wrinkled tightly shut.
Vaan moves quickly now the pirate's shoulders are bare. Balthier's shin guards, ornate but scuffed, and scuffed hard; Balthier's sandals, the excess purposeless filigree belying the wear across the sole. The sandsea's grains still pent within escape across the floorboards. The leather pants: Vaan clenches his jaw tight when he reaches around Balthier's waist, keeps his eyes on the ceiling, and grapples against the excessive heat of Balthier's – ah – to find belt clasps, the button and fly.
When Vaan peels trousers from thick thighs, he discovers the leather's elaborate patterning leaves its impression on Balthier's skin, flushed red curlicues like tattoos against Balthier's native pallor. A bruise-red band crimps Balthier's calves where those tight trousers end, a full hand clear of prominent anklebones.
One other discovery: Balthier wears a string.
'Man,' Vaan says, hoarse, and strained, and because he has to say something against the fact that Balthier's lying in front of him now, ass to the ceiling, naked but for the tight black ribbon of silk that runs between his thighs: 'The things you do for vanity.'
Balthier pushes himself upright abruptly, palms buried in the blankets. Vaan has only one knee on the bed, and recoils; he clutches the pirate's pants to his chest, steps backwards, but Balthier merely throws himself onto his back and stretches.
Midway through the stretch, a soft snore escapes the pirate, and long, tense limbs suddenly go as slack as the line of half-open lips.
Vaan nearly laughs, muffles it in pirate-warm leather. Basch would disagree, but Vaan aligns his belief with Balthier: the clothes do make the man. Whatever glamour Balthier spins while conscious, now Balthier looks like – anyone else does, naked. Everything is pink and slightly fuzzy, firm but not muscled, not even as muscled as Vaan is – but then, Balthier flies for his life, doesn't fight for it, and that's the crux here, what Vaan wants; leisure, and choice. Balthier's bones are thick, as though he wants to hold more muscle, more weight than he lets himself.
Vaan's own clothes take far less time to remove; he dresses again, swiftly. The hem of Balthier's shirt – cool now – hangs well around Vaan's mid-thigh; he has noted Balthier's height before, but never considered it in relation to himself. Vaan's hands are too clumsy now to repeat the neatness of the sailor's knots, shaking so much he can barely hold the threads. He settles for an untidy double bow. The vest – Vaan can't work out how to fasten it once he's got it on, has to shrug out of it, spread it on the bed, where he fastens all the ties and still he slides it on too easily – his shoulders aren't broad enough – his chest too hollow against the width of Balthier's high ribcage – but it's on, and it doesn’t matter if it's swamping him –
-and gods, but Vaan's suddenly hot. He hasn't even got any pants on yet, and he's so hot. Vaan runs his wrist across his brow, startled at the sparkling wet there. Balthier runs in this every day, across a desert; he says the sleeves help because he can’t burn, but Vaan feels the weight of the night press on him so, as though with the vest he's suddenly donned a mantle unexpected.
There's a mirror in the corner of the room, a full height one. Vaan's never really had the luxury of a mirror like that before, but Balthier always made sure one of their rooms had one, and Ashe insisted likewise; even deposed nobility had to keep up appearances, Basch explained, scratching his bare chest idly, and Vaan figured yes -- because what else did they have to upkeep, Ashelia, Balthier, but their appearances?
Vaan picks up Balthier's pants and walks to the mirror, the floorboards cold. He can't quite look at himself yet, and bends to work his right leg into the leather.
'Stop right there,' Balthier says, tightly. 'Leave the pants off, if you please.'
Vaan freezes, and feels it happen, one leg caught between leather and air – he falls over.
By the time Balthier stands, one hand keeping his balance against the walls of the room, Vaan scrambles upright, thankful for the shirt's length. Balthier is entirely unconcerned for that all he wears is a scrap of scanty black silk, and his rings.
The pirate still manages a saunter, even drunk. Vaan will not look down. He will not look away. Mantle of brocade and Archadian frippery this might be, what he wears, but Vaan meets Balthier's blurred gaze with a silent challenge. In the pre-dawn grey, where all their edges are so indistinct, the pirate's eyes are dark, shadowed, and glittering.
An arm reaches; the pirate's palm presses firm against Vaan's nape. The pirate is – too tall, and he stands too close, naked heat making the weight of purloined vest and shirt unbearable. Vaan has to strain against Balthier's touch to meet the man's eyes, but he bites his tongue, swallows the whine that wants to come. He will not look down.
'Heh,' Balthier says, more an exclamation than the beginnings of a laugh. 'You just—' an unsteady breath, in and out, and Balthier smiles hesitantly— 'couldn't bring yourself to go all the way? Half-measures appease no one, anger everyone, and frustrate mostly yourself.'
Balthier's free hand wanders, not at all aimlessly along Vaan's chest where brocade sits loose, Vaan's stomach where the root of his breath quickens, the spurs of his hips, his thighs; Balthier lifts the hem of his purloined shirt—
Vaan bites his tongue, holds in the yelp. Silence is unfamiliar to him, as strange as this touch. Balthier's fingers are warm, wandering, and entirely like the pirate himself.
'I thought so.' Balthier bows, his forehead nearly against Vaan's, his breath heavy; Vaan breathes intoxication, and feels – something almost like anger, like anticipation. 'Never, boy, never, never wear another man's leather without first wearing underwear. It simply doesn't wash.'
'Don't have any,' Vaan manages, and detests the sullenness, and tries to smile, 'it's not like I can carry around a wardrobe the size of an airship like you do—'
Balthier staggers a half step backwards. Vaan scarcely has time to feel the relief of the absence of presence before Balthier rolls his shoulders, hooks his thumbs through that thin black waistband, and divests himself of that last remaining scrap of fabric between himself and Vaan.
Black silk dangles from an extended arm and half-curled fingers. Vaan – looks – despite himself, he looks, not at the mirror, not where he wants to be looking, but down—
Of course, the pirate's hard.
'Balthier, I'm really sorry, I shouldn't have.'
'Call me something else,' Balthier says, rueful, abrupt, contradictory even in his tone; 'call me whatever you want. Vaan. For tonight, at least. Let's leave the forgiving for tomorrow.'
The weight of vest and shirt vanish when Vaan squares his shoulders; all Vaan can think of, then, stepping forward, near compelled by the shape of his name on Balthier's curving smile, fingers piratically bold as they close around that skin-warm silky offering: 'Balthier—'
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