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“You may as well have a painting commissioned,” Luhan casually remarked one night as he was reading in his favorite armchair. He’d been feeling Chanyeol’s eyes on him all night. “That way you could stare at me when I’m gone.”
The tips of Chanyeol’s delicately pointed ears went pink. “I can’t figure out where you put them,” he replied mulishly, glaring back as Luhan smirked at him.
“What, my wings?” Luhan teased, fluttering them lightly. “I’m sure you’d love to know.”
Chanyeol scowled now. “Never mind, you’re more trouble than you’re worth.”
Luhan hummed and turned back to his book on modern fae trade agreements, letting silence resume, until: “You can touch them, if you want.” He was sure to keep his tone light and airy, keeping his eyes trained on his book instead of looking at Chanyeol to gauge his reaction. The guard the Winter court had assigned to watch over him during negotiations was delightfully easy to tease.
“Excuse me?” Chanyeol tried to sound affronted, but Luhan’s keen ears picked up on his intake of breath at the suggestion.
“I said.” Luhan stood slowly, uncurling from his armchair and approaching Chanyeol where he stood just inside the door of Luhan’s quarters. “You can touch them, if you want.”
He didn’t miss the way Chanyeol’s eyes fixated on his wings as he moved closer. “I-”
“Come on,”‘ Luhan purred, encouraged. “I’m not a winter elf. I don’t bite.”
Often.
He twitched one wing toward Chanyeol, turning slightly to the side so his wings were on direct display for Chanyeol.
He reached a hand out, his fingers lightly brushing over the iridescent, gossamer of his wing, trailing along the arched point of his wing.
Luhan’s wings
shivered
at the sensation, and Chanyeol gasped.
Their people had been at war for decades.
Ever since Luhan could remember, the Spring Court had been at war with the Winter court, fae against elf, and as far as he knew, nobody knew why they were still fighting. He’d grown up in the palace of Spring, the eldest prince, detesting the fighting and wanting it to end. He’d made it his personal mission to learn everything about the elves of snow and ice so that one day, he could put an end to the war himself.
Which was why he was currently living in the Winter Court, with a very large, lean elf guarding him at all times. The elves claimed it was for his own safety, but Luhan suspected that Chanyeol was more of a spy than a guard. Still, playing the role of ambassador while his younger brother Baekhyun ruled at their parent’s side was exactly what Luhan wanted, even if he was surrounded by terrifying, beautiful creatures that were definitely hungrier for war than he’d anticipated.
But he relished the challenge, even if the negotiation meetings were long, tedious, and often went nowhere.
With Chanyeol always near him, Luhan got used to his dark, burning eyes following his movements, watching him while he read, ate, everything. His fixation on Luhan’s wings had been transparent from the first moment he’d seen them. Luhan tended to keep them tucked away from sight, tight to his body and glamoured from prying eyes when he was out in public. But when he was in his chambers, he let them relax, fluttering about his body while he answered correspondence from his brother.
Chanyeol said he didn’t know where Luhan put them, but elves never were very good at glamouring when they needed to, or at seeing through it when it counted.
Luhan planned for everything. He saw variables before things happened, making contingencies in case his plan of action was thwarted and he had to adjust mid-course. He was quick on his feet and mentally sharp, his people’s best chance at ending the war once and for all. But none of his plans, none of his quick wits, could have prepared him for the way Chanyeol’s fingers felt against his wings.
“So pretty,” Chanyeol whispered, in a way that made Luhan think he hadn’t meant to say it aloud. “Like a butterfly.”
Luhan suppressed a full body shudder, looking over his own shoulder and watching as Chanyeol’s calloused fingers followed the streaks of cyan blue as they faded into indigo, blending to lilac at the edges of his wings. He rustled his wings softly as Chanyeol’s hands danced across them, his fingers circling the cream dots along the outer edges.
“Do all fae have hair that matches their wings?” Chanyeol nodded to Luhan’s lilac hair, an exact match to the lighter purple in his wings. “Or is that unique to you?”
“Everyone does,” Luhan answered, trying not to moan when Chanyeol’s fingers traced the place where wings became skin. If he’d known how good Chanyeol’s hands would feel against his wings and skin, he wouldn’t have offered so quickly. “But no two fae have the same wings.”
“Really?” Chanyeol’s lips pulled into a pout. “That doesn’t seem fair. All elves have the same ears.”
Luhan snorted. “My younger brother Baekhyun has these really deep, midnight blue wings with vibrant orange accents, and his hair is deep blue, almost black.” He sighed fondly, then tensed as Chanyeol’s hands ran up the column of his spine, settling on his shoulders.
“I can’t imagine they’re prettier than you, though.”
Luhan’s eyelids fluttered, his vision going hazy, and he cursed his own tendency to flirt. He didn’t know how he’d lost the upper hand in their exchange, but he suspected it had something to do with the way Chanyeol was currently exploring the exposed skin of his back. The fae were fond of wearing silky shirts that draped open down to the bottom of the spine in the back, held together with ties across the shoulders and mid back, so their wings were never restrained by fabric. It made flying easier. Luhan had never realized, until that very moment perhaps, how much of a liability it was.
Then again, the way Chanyeol had been staring at him for the last several days hadn’t been subtle, exactly. Even while he was distracted by negotiating for peace on behalf of his people, he couldn’t miss the tension that had begun to simmer between him and the guard they’d given him. He’d only been there for two weeks so far, with no end to the negotiations in sight.
He was running out of books to read, and Chanyeol was far more entertaining.
Luhan spun around to face Chanyeol, his breathing picking up as Chanyeol’s hands resettled at his waist. He studied Chanyeol’s features, his large, warm eyes that were full of want, the gentle slope of his nose, the delicate points of his ears. “Are all elves as pretty as you?”
If Chanyeol was going to call him pretty, he’d return the compliment in kind.
Chanyeol stepped closer, and Luhan tipped his head back slightly to maintain eye contact. “I don’t know, you tell me. You’ve seen many elves in the last few weeks. I’ve only seen one fae.”
Luhan gulped, stepping back only to have Chanyeol match him with a step forward. “I think that I’m glad they assigned you to guard me,” Luhan said, continuing to step back and keeping their dance, their game of push and pull, moving.
“Me too,” Chanyeol agreed.
Luhan’s back hit a wall, his wings spreading out on either side of him, displayed like vibrant splashes of paint against the grey granite the winter palace was made of.
“Nowhere left to run, butterfly,” Chanyeol whispered, resting his forehead against Luhan’s.
Luhan tilted his chin up, inviting. “Who said I was running?”
Chanyeol lifted one hand from his hip, cupping Luhan’s jaw and tentatively connecting their lips, growing more confident when Luhan looped his arms up and around Chanyeol’s neck, his fingers sliding into soft strands of icy grey hair.
They both sighed, releasing a week of pent up tension into each other’s mouths, Luhan coaxing Chanyeol’s lips apart to deepen the kiss. Chanyeol pressed into him, the hand at his waist sliding around to press into Luhan’s lower back, keeping them flush. Luhan shivered against Chanyeol as his hand brushed bare skin, arching against him.
He tugged at Chanyeol’s lower lips with his teeth, careful not to break skin with his sharp canines, drawing a quiet whimper from Chanyeol, prompting Chanyeol to release his jaw and reach down for Luhan’s thigh, hiking it up around his waist.
Luhan broke the kiss, letting his head tip back against the wall as Chanyeol ducked down to kiss along his throat, the hand against his back sliding down to grab at his ass and encourage the restless shifting of his hips into steady rolls. Chanyeol licked at his jaw, nipping and sucking against the line of it in a barrage of sensation that had Luhan tugging at Chanyeol’s hair.
In their current position, Luhan could feel where Chanyeol was starting to harden against him, pressing into Luhan, the thin fabric of his tight leggings doing little to disguise how affected he was by the clever things Chanyeol was doing with his tongue against Luhan’s neck.
He occupied his own mouth with outlining the delicate points of Chanyeol’s ears, fascinated by how different they were from his own softly rounded ears. Chanyeol whined against his neck as Luhan played with the many piercings in his ears, enjoying the way Chanyeol’s hips picked up their pace as he did. He accidentally bit down harder than he meant to when his tongue brushed against a bar through the top of his ear, hissing as it burned. Iron.
“Alright?” Chanyeol asked, pulling away to look at Luhan in a sort of dazed concern.
“Perfect,” Luhan replied, pulling Chanyeol back down for more, whispering, “Closer, pretty elf,” against his mouth.
Chanyeol made a desperate sound against Luhan’s lips, reaching for his other leg and lifting him entirely from the ground, Luhan’s legs locking around his waist as Chanyeol pinned him to the wall. “You’re much lighter than I thought you’d be,” Chanyeol muttered against his lips, tugging at his top lip playfully.
Luhan dug his fingers into Chanyeol’s neck and shoulders, keeping him close. “Hollow bones. Makes it easier for us to fly.” He dipped his tongue between Chanyeol’s lips, tracing his teeth. Curious, that they were so different and yet had the same sharp canines.
One of Chanyeol’s hands remained at his hip, keeping him aloft, while the other came back up to thumb at Luhan’s cheekbone as he pulled away slightly to study him in consideration. “Delicate, little butterfly,” he whispered, brushing soft kisses to Luhan’s forehead, eyelids, nose all while their hips continued the slow grind they’d started. “So beautiful.”
Luhan arched in pleasure when Chanyeol’s hand slid from his hip up along his back, fingers brushing his wings. His low groan of pleasure spilled from his lips only to be lapped up by Chanyeol’s deep, slow kisses, until Luhan felt more liquid than solid. Pleasure was beginning to coil low in his stomach.
“Guard change is going to be here soon,” Chanyeol murmured against his lips, reluctance clear in his tone. “We should stop.”
Luhan whined as Chanyeol slowed the pace of their hips, reducing their kisses from deep and passionate to shallow and sweet. “You only get to leave me like this once,” Luhan warned, fisting a hand in Chanyeol’s hair and making him look Luhan in the eye.
“Like what, beautifully disheveled?” He eased Luhan back to the ground, but still kept him in his arms.
“No. Upset that you’re not finishing what you started.”
Chanyeol’s eyes dilated.
“Next time you kiss me, it better be because you’re going to make me yours for the night.”
Chanyeol crushed his lips against Luhan’s in response, gathering him in his arms tightly and holding him close. “I never expected you to want me back,” Chanyeol confessed, separating their lips to catch their breath.
“I never expected to find an elf attractive,” Luhan remarked, reaching up to run his fingers over the point of Chanyeol’s ear. “And yet here we are.”
Chanyeol kissed his forehead.
There was a knock at the door, the night guard here to relieve Chanyeol.
“I’ll see you at dawn,” Chanyeol whispered, pressing a last, soft kiss to Luhan’s lips before shaking himself and striding to the door, opening it to let the next guard in. “Good evening, Sehun.”
Luhan hid his wings away.
Sehun stepped into the room and looked between Chanyeol and Luhan with blank impassivity before taking up his position to the left of the door.
Chanyeol looked at Luhan one last time, undisguised fondness in his eyes, before he slipped from his chambers.
Luhan ran his hands through his hair, noting distantly that it was noticeably disheveled, and walked into his bedroom to throw himself face-first onto the bed.