[NO TRUE PAIR] Kindred Spirits Gather in the Gale; Hiru/Lapis
Title: Kindred Spirits Gather in the Gale Fandom: Original (Crystal Coast/Against the Moon) Character/s: Lapis, Hiru Words: 1 101 Prompt: June 1-7, Lapis/Hiru + first time Notes: Lapis is apparently a lot more skittish when he’s out of his depth than I thought he was. Tee hee.
The djinn in books didn’t look like this. They were all air and long fragile stick-limbs, soft-eyed and tractable, barely clothed in drifting silks. This was...
Well, barely clothed was right. And the wings and antennae were fragile enough, although the dusky patterning on the former was certainly not shy. That was where the similarities ended – this djinn, if that was what it was, had its arms crossed and a distinct expression of irritation and disdain on its patterned face. Its eyes were the poisonous, glittering green of an insect’s, and although they had no pupil that he could distinguish, they could not be focused on anyone but him.
“Something you wanted?” the djinn said, breaking all rules of summoning and leaving Lapis to school his expression into something other than an open-mouthed gawk. The djinn was slight enough that a lack of breasts was unsurprising, but painted and patterned as it was, he had not expected it to be male.
It took a few moments to master himself enough to speak, during which the djinn’s brows arched skeptically and the antennae moved with them, standing more or less straight where they had before curved backward over his skull. Lapis did not appreciate the implication. He was the only mage to have performed this summoning for the better part of a century, and he was not going to have a tiny moth-djinn give him lip.
Er, eyebrow.
“Djinn,” he addressed it. “I demand a wind to travel with.”
“Demand?” echoed the djinn, and its lips curled at the edges. The antennae dropped, lazy, amused. Lapis felt the djinn’s power stroke the borders of the circle into which he had summoned it, and the moisture went out of his mouth.
“Demand,” he agreed, less impressive for the hoarseness. “Favour our Farfalla with a wind to take us safely to the west.”
The djinn tilted its head and the colours shifted on its skin. “I will give you a wind strong enough to take you there,” it said. “But safety is your own responsibility, and I desire a token for my services.”
“Desire all you like.” The words emerged briskly, the smirk pure habit, and Lapis could have kicked himself.
“I’m afraid it wasn’t a request.” The djinn raised its hands, tiny and delicate, and flexed its power gently. Lapis struggled for a moment, but then the barrier evaporated and he went to one knee in the dirt, eyes watering, trying to get breath. He felt hollowed and winded, and the djinn was coming closer. If you can’t say something nice, he thought, in the voice of his sister, and barely restrained a hysterical giggle as the djinn’s hand grasped his chin, tilted his face upward. Even though he knelt, it was not much taller than him. “One way or another, I will have satisfaction of you.”
“What is your price?” Lapis asked, and the djinn smiled, though whether at the words or the pained quality of his voice, he could not say.
“Your breath,” said the djinn.
“No,” said Lapis. And after a moment, “One breath you may have, but not all of it.” The djinn’s smile widened.
“Well done, mage. Then, come.” The grip on his chin tightened, leading him slowly upward. “Give me breath,” whispered across his lips, and then there was a mouth on his own, soft and coaxing, and it took Lapis a few frozen moments to realise he was supposed to be kissing back.
The djinn tasted of honey and the faintest hint of flowers, and his tongue was—it was all Lapis could do to keep up. Despite his reservations, he felt the blood begin to pound in his ears; his hands found the djinn’s shoulders, stablising, allowing the creature to tilt its head and open its mouth even wider, to plunge its tongue deeper, twining around his own and halfway down his throat, lapping at the roof of his mouth until he could hear himself making soft, needy sounds, but couldn’t stop them.
The djinn’s teeth closed on his lower lip briefly, tugged, and then the djinn was sucking on Lapis’ tongue as if it were a lump of ice in a hot summer, rolling, pressing, and coming dangerously close to a swallow. Lapis felt the pent-up gasp leave his lungs because he felt an edge of power go with it, and then the djinn pulled back. Only the faint sheen of saliva on its lower lip betrayed that Lapis had not imagined the entire thing.
“Th-that was more than one breath,” Lapis said.
“Are you complaining?” The djinn’s eyes were half-lidded as it licked its lips, and it smirked as Lapis’ eyes dropped to follow the motion. “You remind me of my lover.”
Its hands rose to one long ear, and detached one of the many metal hoops along its edge. This, it dropped into Lapis’ waiting hand, and the mage’s eyes widened. If all of the earrings were made of iron, this creature was more powerful than... He felt abruptly very nauseous, and could not blame it on the metal hoop.
“Wear this until you reach the far shore, and when you dock, return it to the water,” the djinn commanded, and even sick with relief and nerves, Lapis was lucid enough to frown.
“But you are a djinn. An air elemental.”
The djinn’s green eyes narrowed in a smile of genuine, if sadistic, amusement. “And my lover is the ocean. He will return the earring to me.”
Lapis had a few seconds to think about travelling in a ship across the ocean, with the enforced assistance of the ocean’s lover, whom he had just kissed, and was glad he was already on the ground, because there were black spots in front of his eyes and he did not have the constitution for this.
“I should, I will, he is very, it was a great honour to share his, ah, bounty.” I am going to die. “However briefly.”
“You are less alike with every passing moment.” The djinn’s form began slowly to dissolve, like sand eroding in a gale. “Although at least you had the sense not to thank him outright.”
Perhaps, but Lapis thanked his vaguest childhood memories of his mother most fervently for her tales of the elementals and their oft contrary natures. When the djinn’s form had completely dissolved, he slipped the earring into his sleeve and rested his forehead on his knees, breathing carefully until the urge to pass out had subsided.
He was going to need to talk to Hamish about talking him out of things again, clearly.