sheffiesharpe (sheffiesharpe) wrote in kinkfest, @ 2007-09-30 13:13:00 |
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Current mood: | calm |
"moves not up, but down," FFXII (Basch/Vossler)
Title: moves not up, but down
Author: sheffiesharpe
Fandom: FFXII
Characters: Basch/Vossler
Rating: NSFW
Length: 1500 words
Prompt: “Leather: no shame, no hesitation”
A/N: Apologies: a day late. I blame the last prompt for that.
The boots are one of the few things he still has from home. One of the few things from home that could not be from anywhere else. The boots, his sword, what few pieces of armor (vambraces, greaves) he hadn’t had to sell. The two books are gone, one sold, one ruined by the river, and all else—his traveling gear—is what he could find anywhere. Even the woolen cape he could match in Dalmasca’s bazaar. The boots are all he has left that feels like luxury, like keepsake, and they are not that at all. They are meant for use. The thick dire-elkhide reaches the tops of his calves to protect from thorny underbrush, riding and walking. Under the lacing, a thinner layer of leather, soft and supple, wraps around the leg to confound melting snow, the seep of dew, puddles. The boots are without ornamentation save the beauty of their craft itself, and Basch does not know how much is actual beauty and how much is that he is so homesick some days that any sign of a Landisser’s hand can hold him rapt—the even rows of double-stitching, the uniform rich brown of the leather. Even his path has not blotched their finish. They are meant for use. But he does not wear them. It is too hot in Dalmasca during the day, and they are not military issue. At least in that, he is not alone: none of them wear much they can call their own. But Basch is afraid, too, of the moment the stitching will fray, the toes wear thin, or the sole slip loose. He has so little left.
He has little left of home, but Dalmasca has her own comforts for him. He has a cavalry mount—she is not his by definition, but her care is his, and her affection. He has friends who don’t know him well but encourage his company. The barracks door swings open, its inevitable crack against the wall halted just shy by a sun-brown hand.
“Basch. You have plans tonight?” Vossler fills the doorway, crosses the room.
Basch smiles to see him. And he has Vossler. That had happened quickly: between the moment Basch found his glances made welcome and the first time they’d exchanged rough-palmed strokes on bare skin, there had not even been an entire day. Abrupt—as Vossler is--but they have fallen into step easily. Vossler’s hard soles clatter on the floor, and Basch puts down the boot in his hand. It makes no sound, the four layers of pressed, boiled hide are strong enough to last, but supple enough for silence.
“No plans. Are there some in the making?” When Basch looks up again, Vossler is not looking at him. He is looking at the leather on the floor. Of course, he has never seen them before. His Landisser boots are usually wrapped in a piece of cloth, stowed carefully under his bed. He waits for Vossler’s answer, but Vossler is still looking at the boots. They are not so remarkable, are they? Basch reaches, prods Vossler’s leg. “Plans?”
Vossler shakes his head a little when he finally looks up, as though caught in some dream. His voice is distracted. “Kellon’s birthday. Our squadron got bumped to the night patrol tomorrow, so they thought to make a night of it at the Sandsea.” Vossler sits beside him on the bed, turns so he faces Basch, so his right hand is settled on the bed behind Basch. So he is close. “You’ll need to be in civilian dress, though. No drinking in public in military issue. Not ever.”
That makes sense to Basch. His father’s rule, too. And he has not gone anywhere, socially, off-grounds, yet. When he has an afternoon of leave-time, he rides into the desert. When he has an evening, he has Vossler, and if Vossler is not free, he has cards and the library. He is nodding even as he remembers: he has no civilian clothing. Not that’s fit to wear for this. Only the heavy homespun he left in, layered over with armor. Vossler sees that much on his face.
“You can wear something of mine.” Vossler says it as though he likes the idea, of Basch in his clothing.
“Thank you.” Basch wonders about shoes. He does not consider his boots. They are not for wearing. Maybe he can borrow a pair from Marle, because though Vossler is taller, his feet are slightly smaller. He says it out loud, asks if Vossler knows where Marle is just now.
“What about those?” Vossler points at the boots at his feet, bends past Basch, picks one up. Basch feels something squeeze in his chest, but Vossler’s fingers are—are—reverent on the leather. “Wear these.” There’s a flush in Vossler’s cheeks, and if he meant for Basch to wear what’s his, since he does have something, he would have said it like that, would have teased. But he is asking Basch something else now, it seems, something that makes Basch want to put them on, something that makes his thighs tense, though that cannot be it, surely Basch is misreading, and Vossler only wants him to wear what was obviously made for use. To save him the trouble of searching out Marle. That must be it. Vossler is pragmatic.
It will be the first time he’s put the boots on since he joined Dalmasca’s army. He still thinks his feet will be too hot, but Vossler has picked up the other one, is holding them out to Basch. His thumbs slide back and forth across the toes, and Basch’s groin warms. He takes the boots, and Vossler stands, more quickly than Basch expects, but maybe they’re leaving soon, and he’s going to get Basch trousers and a shirt—but Vossler only closes the door, and the tumblers churn to locked. The doors here are never locked. Even when they’ve coupled here, on Basch’s bed, the door was not locked, because it’s the barracks and if you walk in on someone, you either leave or you don’t. Everyone understands.
Vossler comes back, sits on the edge of the bed again. “Put them on. Please.”
Basch doesn’t ask why. If Vossler will keep looking at him like that, he does not care why. At first, he is vexed by the long process of lacing them up—they fit close, were made for his leg, his foot—but Vossler watches rapt the slide of the thong through each ring. And Basch slows his hands more. By the time he has tied them both, Vossler is no longer sitting beside him. He is crouched by the bed, and Basch doesn’t ask why. Vossler’s right hand closes around his left ankle, and the warmth of his palm seeps through the leather slowly. His left slides along Basch’s calf, and though there’s the boot’s upper between their skin, this is, Basch thinks, as intimate as they’ve ever been. All of the usual snarl and bite, the playful tumult that has seen them against walls and rolling in bed until they fall—in abeyance, as Vossler goes to his knees at Basch’s feet. He puts his hand on Basch’s thigh, and Basch spreads his legs, hopeful, but Vossler’s hand moves not up but down, where he pushes into the elkhide with the pads of his fingers and the backs of his knuckles.
He licks his lips, and his mouth opens, but the words catch, whatever they are. He puts his mouth to Basch’s knee, and Basch edges forward, willing him toward his cock, but Vossler bends more deeply. One side of his mouth touches skin, overlaps with leather, and the broad, wet stripe of Vossler’s tongue laps at both, and moves not up but down.
Vossler traces the sturdy stitching with his tongue, with his nose. Basch can hear his inhale, and the moisture sets the scent on the air, rich and warm, and Basch does not ask why Vossler laves his boots with such attention, why he keeps the hand he is not supporting himself with constant on Basch’s ankle when he could use it to undo their shorts. Basch does not know why he does not unlace his own, pull Vossler into his lap if he wants something to lick, but he is compelled to watch the pink of Vossler’s tongue against the mahogany brown, to listen for the slight hitch in his breath when Basch puts his hand on the back of Vossler’s neck. He tries to mimic the strokes of Vossler’s tongue with his thumb, and Vossler arches up, though he doesn’t move his mouth.
That he can feel Vossler’s tongue even through the leather is its own marvel; Vossler is pressing into the leather, leaning into it, and Basch wonders—wonders what it tastes like. The sweat of the cobbler’s hands, the grit of he does not know how many leagues, the dew and oil—Basch tightens his fingers on Vossler’s shoulders, pulls him up. He cups Vossler’s face in his hands, the rough of Vossler’s beard on his palms, and he opens his lips to Vossler’s hard-soft tongue. Vossler maps the seams of teeth, and his hands now move up Basch’s thighs, the way they’ve done before. Vossler’s mouth is musky with the scent of leather, and he’s tugging at the lacing on Basch’s shorts, and Basch pulls him closer, kisses him harder, because there, there on the back of Vossler’s tongue, or on the softness of his inner cheek, or where Vossler’s chipped bottom tooth is sharp and ragged—there, there something is familiar. Right there, he tastes enough like home that Basch could make it so.