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Church Source 5
Claude is in an excellent mood tonight. For one thing, he's particularly proud of the food he's brought Dimitri for the evening, and he can't wait to see his friend try it; food is perhaps the most concrete pleasant thing Claude can offer Dimitri, the only luxury Dimitri is able to have while Claude works out his arrangements for freeing him, and as such finding delicacies for him has become a deeply important and genuinely enjoyable activity for Claude.
On a separate but equally satisfying note, he and Dimitri will have an engaging subject of conversation tonight(though they usually tend to find one even if one doesn't readily present itself these days): the incident with Carnius. Claude isn't sure how much Dimitri picked up on - enough to be entertained, sure, but the full impact probably missed him. Claude can't wait to give him all the juicy details; he might even get to hear Dimitri really laugh again. Just the possibility puts a bounce in his step.
And, finally...he's got a little something to show off. When Claude had changed his hairstyle for the church, he hadn't really done much except stop putting in the braid every morning and slicking his hair back. It hadn't been a different cut, just a different way of styling it; as such, it had been incredibly easy to simply undo those things. To wash out his hair and let it dry naturally into the dark curls so many of his people have, and put that traditional braid back in his hair. He's been going without those tiny hallmarks of his culture for a long time, and honestly he hadn't expected how good it would feel to have them back. (Besides, he's always thought he looks better this way.) Considering that Dimitri had gone out of his way to ask about Claude's braid...Claude's definitely eager to see his reaction. Especially since his friend has never seen Claude with this hairstyle as an adult.
He notes that Dimitri seems to be rather out of sorts before he even reaches the cage, however, and his steps slow a bit as he approaches. "Hey," he calls softly, all else momentarily forgotten. "Everything okay?"
--
He supposes it's the opposite of a surprise to hear Claude's voice flit through the silence of the yard in the dark of night. After all, he'd clearly come earlier in the day, so why not tonight? Dimitri tries to remind himself of this fact, even as he blearily blinks upwards. "Yes. It's-" And he abruptly pauses, tail stilling at the same time his ears flick sharply upwards.
It hadn't really occurred to him yet in hindsight that his dream hadn't included everything about Claude as an adult... and that his hair had been one of them, more loose and free. Yet it hadn't gone completely all the way, either... And seeing the braid frame one side of his face, how much better it makes him look in a way that Dimitri hadn't actually contemplated when he'd noted it the first time...
He needs a second, just staring.
--
Claude needs a second, too; he'd been momentarily distracted by his concern, enough that he'd temporarily forgotten the changed hairstyle. But then the neurons fire, and he grins at Dimitri. "Does it look that bad?" he teases, suspecting it's very much the opposite. He doubts he can manipulate a denial out of Dimitri, but hell, anything's worth trying once.
--
Claude speaking up reminds Dimitri that speaking is a thing, and also that he'd been staring. He quickly looks away, a thing that is a little hard to tell with the way Intsehli eyes are structured and only given away by the slight tilt of Dimitri's head. "...No. It... suits you."
That's certainly the least incriminating way Dimitri can think to say it, at least.
--
That's a delightful surprise, and Claude's pleasure is visible. He grins broadly at Dimitri as he sits down outside the cage, holding out the usual food parcel. It seems extra bulky today. "I brought a real haul for you tonight."
He's not kidding. Inside the wax paper is a large fillet of smoked salmon; a trio of hardboiled eggs; a scattering of pine nuts and candied almonds; small smoked peppers that appear to have been stuffed with creamy, mellow cheese and bits of olive; a small cylindrical goat cheese that appears to have been rolled in herbs, with bits of garlic and shallots mixed in; and what looks (and, more importantly, smells) like a small circular honey cake, speckled with nuts.
--
That they can even get the package through the bars is amazing enough, and that's enough to draw Dimitri's gaze back if only so he can raise his eyebrows over at Claude. The other man always seems to bring something new with him... which he supposes he can't really complain about, not with the same bland old (literally) food that the church feeds him every day. He struggles a little just to keep it all together once it's shoved through, setting it down on the ground for unwrapping. Enough practice has done well to make the wrapping paper not a shredded mess now, claws only occasionally catching on fragile paper.
When he finally sees all of it... Something in him almost aches. It's not his stomach, for once. Certainly, it all looks good, but... Reaching down, he slices a bit of salmon off and brings it to his mouth. This, more than anything else, draws up that nostalgic feeling. "It's good," he says quietly, a rare bit of commentary on the state of his food when Dimitri normally just eats whatever is offered to him after some testing and experimenting.
--
"Should I take that to mean I should bring you more fish?" This is the most enthusiastic response anything has gotten since the honey and cheese combination, which means it's significant. Claude files this away.
--
"Is there water near?" Dimitri has no idea, frankly. What sort of things are near the monastery or its city is a mystery to him, so he can't even begin to say what might be local or what might not be.
--
"There's a lake a day's travel from here. Having water so close is one of the reasons the monastery is here." Claude rests his chin on his hand. "But no oceans. The nearest one is far south of here - two weeks of travel on horseback, at least. That's where the Intsehli population seems to be thickest in this part of the world." That may have inspired Claude to specifically get Dimitri fish, even if it's just freshwater fish.
--
"Is there..." It's somehow always strange to hear that there are Intsehli out there still, with how long he's been isolated from his own kind and the rest of the world in general. Dimitri makes another small slice of salmon to eat, another giveaway of his preference when he tends to experiment with his new food. "...Then, yes."
Two bites is all he goes for, however, before he goes back to the usual state of taste testing everything Claude has brought for him in relative silence. It might seem to be a bit of a slide back compared to the language lessons they've had in the past... but the more he watches, the more Claude may be able to pick up just how much Dimitri is avoiding looking at him properly. For some reason, everything seems combined to bring about that soft warmth that had accompanied his arousal from earlier- Claude's hair, the nostalgic taste of fresh fish, even just how much he's clearly being... pampered with this haul of food. He doesn't know what to make of it... and he's almost worried that if he looks at Claude too much, it really will bring that dream back in full force, and all that accompanied it.
--
Claude picks up on the strangeness of Dimitri's body language, the careful aversion of his eyes, fairly quickly. It might have been even faster, except that Dimitri is usually very absorbed in his food and so it takes a bit for Claude to determine that he's not just chalking food preoccupation up as a false positive. But once he's sure, he cocks an eyebrow at his friend.
"You're awfully avoidant tonight," he remarks. "Did something I say earlier upset you? When I was talking this afternoon? You know a lot of that was just me covering my ass, so...if I said something offensive, I'll apologize, but I probably was just saying it for their benefit in any case."
--
Dimitri abruptly freezes at being called out, as though it wasn't quietly obvious to those who know what to look for in an Intseh, and pauses his tasting of the almonds. For a second, he can't even remember what might have been said, at least that what he was able to make out. Unfortunately for Dimitri, however, he's never been much of a liar. He can only really ever give the truth, or at least what he perceives as such. He doesn't have to give all the truth, but... "No. It's not that."
--
"Then what is it?" Claude studies him. "Am I just too attractive to look at now that I've gone back to my old hairstyle?" He grins. "I mean, I can't say I blame you. Even an Intsehli could probably get impure thoughts from a human who looks this good. Nothing to be embarrassed about when it'd be harder not to."
He's really just bullshitting, filling dead air. He's hoping to either glean information from Dimitri's actions, or - equally possible - aggravate him into spilling the truth, if only to shut up his deliberately ridiculous theories. It genuinely doesn't occur to him he could actually be close to the truth.
--
From Dimitri's point of view, this isn't bullshitting at all. No, this is just another instance of Claude being near telepathic with his ability to read him (something that has nothing at all to do with how easy to read Dimitri honestly is to anyone with basic social skills who views him as a person). So when Claude brings up his own attractiveness, Dimitri's ears flick down in time with the flustered bristle of his tail, and the talk of impure thoughts actually makes Dimitri jerk his head up with a look of outright embarrassed distressed. That expression alone says how did you know!? before Dimitri himself can actually form words.
"It is not my..." He's actually floundering a little bit on that word front, actually, not entirely sure where he's going with this.
--
Claude stares at him for a moment, and Dimitri may take a tiny bit of satisfaction - somewhere within his mortification - at seeing Claude, for once, completely blue-screen.
"Not your what?" he asks, distractedly, while his mind tries to reboot. Tries to wrap around what his powers of observation tell him, which is that Dimitri is doing the opposite of denying Claude's ridiculous claims, that he's actually confirming them. The incredulity hasn't quite hit yet because Claude is still working his way up to believing he's processing this right.
--
Later, his brain will definitely tuck that look away in Dimitri's mental storage of various Claude expressions. Right now, his own mouth is still tripping over itself, unable to be stopped with his embarrassment in full force. "Not my fault that I thought..." That's around the time more embarrassment strangles the words out of him, unable to admit any further, let alone any details.
Then again... Considering the topic at hand, it shouldn't be too hard to guess just what kind of thoughts Dimitri has had recently.
--
"So you're saying...you actually did have dirty thoughts about me?" The way Claude says this, and the expression on his face, aren't judgmental - merely a bit thunderstruck - but the mere fact that Claude was apparently joking, not reading Dimitri's mind, and that Dimitri absolutely gave himself away assuming the latter is going to be more than enough to deal a lethal blow to Dimitri's dignity.
--
No immediate answer. Instead, Dimitri's own expression goes completely blank as he just stares at Claude with a slightly wide eye. It's nearly possible to see the way complex math equations are floating around the Intseh's head as he cracks the code of him having completely fucked up in this conversation.
Even when he was at his most suspicious and worked up, Dimitri has never really rejected the food Claude has brought him. As a matter of fact, it tends to go fairly quickly, save for anything he explicitly sets to the side for later. Right now, however? Right now he outright gets up , turns, and goes to curl up on the exact opposite of his cage with his tail wrapped tightly around him.
He needs to silently die of mortification and humiliation right now, and may start tearing up the floor of his cage if that doesn't happen soon enough for the sake of burying himself alive to speed up the process.
--
As the new knowledge finally settles itself in Claude's brain...he begins to laugh. Not at Dimitri - he's never been cruel like that, even with his tendency to tease, and he wouldn't laugh at Dimitri for something he's this blatantly self-conscious about. No, he's laughing at both of them, and maybe as a way of coping with his own shock and growing giddiness. He's thought Dimitri was attractive from the moment he laid eyes on the Intseh as an adult, but he hadn't really moved any further in his thoughts than that (barring some private nighttime fantasies) because there hadn't seemed to be any point yet. He's been working just to reforge their friendship; he'd thought being able to do anything at all with his attraction, that even the most basic flirting, was well off into the far-flung future. And, specifically, he'd thought that he'd have a lot of work to do to win Dimitri over in any sort of sexual sense. (Never mind romantic, but he supposes that may still not be on the table yet. It's not something to assume just yet, anyway.)
"Man, clearly I never should've stopped braiding my hair." There's some indication here that Claude is welcoming of Dimitri's interest, but it's subtle in the kind of way Dimitri isn't always so great at picking up on. Which is fine; if Claude has to be more direct about it, he's willing to. He doesn't go there quite yet, however.
--
Definitely something he's not great at picking up, as judged by the quiet way he bristles over on the opposite end of the cage. Intsehli fur isn't normally something that shows up a lot when they react to something. More often, it's too short, and a lot of reactions are seen in the body language that comes from having such large ears and tails. It takes a lot of emotion for it to stand out on end... and Dimitri is practically puffed up from what can be seen with the moonlight.
For something this embarrassing to happen... Forget just tonight, with the dream still haunting the back of his mind every other second. He doesn't think he'll ever be able to look Claude in the eye again, or maybe at all in general.
--
Claude can see it, too. He recognizes that it may take drastic action to help Dimitri get past this, to put him at a place where he's comfortable with Claude again. Fortunately, the first and easiest way to accomplish this that Claude can think of doesn't seem the least bit unreasonable to Claude - so he takes it.
"I'm not laughing at you, you know," he says easily. "I'm mostly laughing because I thought it'd be ages before I could admit I was having the same kind of thoughts about you. At least, before I could admit it without you freaking out or getting ticked off..." He grins. "And here it is, only a couple weeks in. It's a pretty flattering way to realize you've underestimated your own appeal."
--
The soft quivering of bristling fur abruptly freezes, and one of Dimitri's ears twitch. It takes a second or two longer before he peers up over his shoulder, bright blue actually looking back towards where Claude is sitting so comfortably despite what's just been admitted between both of them. That alone is a massive step back to where they were- at least on the comfort level, even if the conversation alone is already changing things enormously in their relationship as it once was.
"The same?" he echoes back, as if making sure he's heard right- not something too uncommon for him, sometimes, with how he's constantly had to doubt his own sense of reality. And this is certainly a moment clearly neither of them could have ever expected to happen between them. One can't fault Dimitri for double checking.
--
"Yeah." Claude grins at him, but there's a sense that this is personal for him, this is something close enough to his vulnerable parts to be self-conscious about, in a way that many things he talks and laughs and smiles about are not. There's a touch of tension to him - nerves that not even Claude can fully hide - and that may be immensely reassuring to Dimitri. Claude can't be blasé about this, either, even if he'd like to be.
The way he feels about Dimitri, the things he thinks about Dimitri, aren't a joke to him. Enough that he's tense about ridicule, about letting himself be vulnerable on this subject, the same way Dimitri was. (Or, arguably, is.)
"I mean, I don't know if you've had the chance to look in any mirrors or anything, but you've grown up to be built like a better class of god. Which, you know, maybe not so surprising for someone who's basically a gladiator, but they could model statues off of you. Actually, I've seen less impressive statues."
--
Slowly, his fur begins to lower itself back to its usual smooth state, and the tension in Dimitri's own curled up form slowly begins to dissipate. He begins to brace his palms against the floor, pushing himself onto feet and hands once more. Once again, there's something fluttering in him at seeing yet another new expression from Claude, and the feeling is more clear now that he's not worked up in chagrin.
The slow movements might be familiar to Claude, from other large predators he's seen in the wild- a cautious but intrigued curiosity, Dimitri's ears turned in his direction as he keeps his eye on him, approaching inch by inch. There's a flicker of pink as his tongue darts out over his mouth and teeth. "Describe them," he says quietly, voice a low husk. This turn of events is... setting off some sort of reaction in him, eager and electric. Dimitri has never had to really focus on long term planning before, never had reason to as executioner... So all he can think of is in the immediate present, of getting confirmation and seeing where that leads him.
--
"What, the statues?" Claude suspects that isn't what Dimitri's asking at all, but he's checking for more than just confirmation. The way Dimitri is moving, the way his voice sounds, is pounding in his chest and pooling in his gut in a hot, breathless way, and he thinks he'd like to hear Dimitri say exactly what he means out loud.
--
It wouldn't be an encounter with Claude if there wasn't some obtuse teasing. Dimitri's eye narrows slightly and, if Claude is really looking for more of him at his most predatory, then he certainly gets it in the form of the low growl that rolls out of the Intseh. It carries in his words when he speaks next. "You know not that." He roams a little closer, gaze still transfixed perfectly on Claude. "The thoughts you've had of me... I want to hear them."
--
Now it's Claude's turn to lick his lips. His eyes are as riveted on Dimitri as Dimitri's eye is on him. It's definitely not hard to call up the kind of thoughts he's had about Dimitri like this; he's having more of them right now. "A lot of them have to do with how big you are," he murmurs. "How you could hold me down and do just about anything you wanted to me." He smirks a little. "I've even thought about how you crept up on me that one day and touched my neck...how you could've choked me. That should be scary, but...something about it's kind of hot, too." His gaze flicks down to Dimitri's hands. "I've thought about what you could do with your claws...and your teeth."
His eyes go back up to Dimitri's, and his grin is accompanied by a knowing, sly look. "I could go on."
--
There's something about Claude's voice like this, the way he can't stop looking at him, that has that heat curling up in Dimitri's gut again. He's never particularly cared how he looked to other people, although he'd long accepted being a monster himself, but now.... Watching Claude watch him.... His tail flicks sharply behind him as he listens to him describe so much in the same vein as the dream he'd had only a few hours prior, almost as if they'd truly been sharing their thoughts.
They're both equal distance from the bars, now, and that's enough for Dimitri to reach forward, claws grazing along the ground and then along Claude's leg. "I want to," he says, still low and rough with a desire that's more than quickly growing, both emotionally and, well.... "I could. You're so easy to pin..." His claws dig in just slightly, a point, or rather a series of ones.
--
Claude shifts closer to the bars, closer to Dimitri, his interest obvious now. "If only the damn bars weren't in the way, right?" he murmurs. He'd already had plenty of reasons to want to get Dimitri out of his cage before, but right now one reason feels like the most pressing. He reaches out through the bars in turn, to run light fingers along the curve of Dimitri's jaw.
"Also, I'm not that easy to pin...except maybe by people I want to pin me." He grins. "That might be another story."
--
Their touches have all been so one-sided before, often Dimitri solidifying their places in reality. Having Claude reach out and touch him, now.... Those fingers so fleeting against his jaw... Dimitri's eyelid flutters, even as he turns his face against Claude's hand. There's the briefest bit of softness as his mouth brushes against skin, quickly replaced by the points of his teeth dragging along his fingers. "Other people aren't me," he growls, fangs digging in just slightly at the same time that his hand shifts higher to press a clawed thumb into the inside of Claude's thigh.
It's as much a statement of Dimitri's own confidence when it comes to the physical as much as it is of their relationship to one another, changing and shifting even as it may be .
--
"That's kind of the point, yes." Claude shivers a little at those teeth against his hand, even as his hand falls from Dimitri's jaw to trail fingers down his chest. They run languidly down his sternum to his stomach, then lower, fingertips dragging through fur.
--
Underneath Claude's fingertips, Dimitri's muscles tense and shiver under such a soft touch. It's here that he almost seems to flounder. After all, the things he knows he wants to do- his claws against Claude's body, his teeth at his throat, touching him so completely- those things are literally barred from him. Being rough is easy. He knows how to do that. Yet reciprocating so gently is... unknown to him. His fingers begin to knead into Claude's thigh, no doubt liable to leave scratches and bruises when morning comes.
But he certainly doesn't stop the trailing of those fingers, even when they reach his pants... and the bulge pressing out against them. Dimitri just watches him, breath low and hot.
--
Claude finally breaks Dimitri's gaze as he looks down at what he's doing, hand cupping that bulge in Dimitri's pants...and god, it's kind of embarrassing and slutty but unbelievably enticing to note how big that bulge is. Nice to know the reality is living up to any of his fantasies in that area... "You know," he murmurs, even as he slowly rubs his palm over Dimitri's erection through the material of his pants, "I've gotten to know some Intseh over the years....but none so well that I have any idea what you look like down here." His eyes flick back up to Dimitri's face. "I haven't even known exactly what to fantasize about..."
--
Finally being touched- and in such a different manner than he's ever bothered to touch himself- draws out a long low growl of a moan from the bit of Dimitri's stomach. There's a purpose to the roll of Claude's palm that he's never bothered to use on himself. Realizing there might be a use for that pleasure, that it can be good...
His own hand readjusts, going from Claude's thigh to his waist where he can roughly tug him all the closer. "I could say the same about you," he rumbles. It's not as though he's had a chance to get to know anyone like this. Or, really, at all.
--
Claude grins. "Well, I've never been able to resist satisfying my curiosity." He's all but pressed against the bars now. His hand leaves off of Dimitri - no doubt a loss that will be complained about - but only to reach up and tug, pointedly, on the waistband of his pants. Encouraging Dimitri to get them at least somewhat out of his way.
"Don't forget, though," he murmurs, voice low. "As much as I'd love hearing all the sounds you want to make...as much as I'd love dragging sounds out of you...we can't be loud. Either of us. Especially if it's the kind of sounds that the guards haven't heard you make before."
--
The low growl Dimitri makes says without words that he's not particularly happy- both from Claude's hand leaving him and the idea of having to stay quiet. "Do you ever make noise?" he asks accusingly, even as he lets go of him to tug at his own pants in hasty frustration. There are probably better ways to take his pants off, and he'll probably have to undo them properly anyway so that he can put them on again... But impatience wins against sense sometimes. His tail has to wiggle out a little bit through the hole in his pants, or else they can't quite get down to where they need to for the next catch to be passed.
Whatever Claude has imagined Dimitri to have, exactly, well... Now he has to real thing to compare to: the flushed color standing out sharply against his pale fur, pointed length thick ... and made slightly thicker near the base, although Dimitri isn't fully aroused just yet.
--
Claude's breath catches; it's distinctly non-human in ways he hadn't quite predicted, and that really shouldn't turn him on more but somehow it does. Maybe the church is right about him...although he thinks this thought without any particular regret. There's no moral purity that could be worth passing this up, at least not in Claude's opinion.
"Wouldn't you rather find out for yourself?" he asks sweetly in response to Dimitri's question, even as he shakes off the inaction of admiration in order to reach out and run his fingers up along the shaft of Dimitri's cock. Gods, it feels so much hotter than the rest of him...probably because he can feel Dimitri's bare skin here, unimpeded by fur.
--
Teasing, teasing, teasing- always teasing, whether with his words as he challenges Dimitri even after having just now warned him on the importance of quiet, or his fingers as he glides them against burning hot skin. Dimitri presses his forehead against the bars while his free hand digs into one, a rumble of a noise shaking through him. Every hot breath can be felt now, sending those dark curls fluttering. Still, Claude made the challenge. He won't back down.
That's why the hand at his waist moves upwards, claws dragging against and catching various bits of Claude's clothing until he can scrape them against the side of his neck and along his jaw. Not for the first time, Dimitri finds him so delicate... and it feels good to remind himself of that as his fingers go into those soft curls and twist.
--
Claude makes a low sound in his throat that's only partially pain at his hair being pulled. Honestly, there's something hot about it, and not just the roughness of it being suggestive; the pain itself seems to have an intoxicating quality. There's a promise of pleasure to contrast it almost baked into the sensation, like salt used to enhance the sweetness of a dessert.
But Claude doesn't want to get too distracted from what he's doing. They have a decent amount of time yet, he just got here, but this is definitely something he doesn't want either of them to have to cut short. Besides, after weeks of dwelling on fantasies of sex with Dimitri, how can he resist exploiting this opportunity for all it's worth? Even if he could hold back and go slow, Claude doubts he'd have the discipline to do it...this time, anyway.
So after exploring Dimitri's length with his fingertips, getting a feel for him...he wraps his hand around Dimitri's length and moves his hand, slowly. It's dry, for now, so he can't afford to go too fast or too rough yet; maybe once he's worked Dimitri up enough, gotten enough pre-come out of him to slick his hand. (He hopes Dimitri's biology mimics a human's in that regard.)
--
Faintly, Dimitri had thought that would be the reaction, considering how worked up Claude had gotten at the idea of what his fangs and claws could do. It hadn't been particularly focused a thought, but it had been somewhere in the back of his mind. Before he can explore this more, however, those calloused palms wrap around him, and a full body shudder wracks Dimitri's body. His claws graze along Claude's scalp as his fingers tighten their grip so slightly. The rest of his body seems to know what to do, however, hips jerking into Claude's hand.
The good news is that Claude doesn't have to work particularly hard to coax something from Dimitri's cock. All too soon, it seems, and he's dripping that translucent liquid out from the tip, down onto Claude's hand. The slowly growing knot at the base of his cock might indicate some of the reasoning for that, on a biology level... Better to slide in and anchor one's self if the passage is nice and wet. But that's only if he's paying any mind to such fun little biology lessons, and not the way Dimitri experimentally dips his hand lower again to curl his fingers around Claude's neck.
--
Oh, heaven help him.
Claude hadn't quite processed that Dimitri's cock has a knot until it starts expanding as he strokes him, and once he realizes it he feels as though the knowledge may straight up kill him. He can't not think about it - about how it would feel to have Dimitri fuck him with that, what it would be like, if it could even fit. (Claude doesn't know the answer to any of those questions, but his eagerness to find out is downright embarrassing.)
He wants to tell Dimitri what he's thinking - he's sure it'd work Dimitri up like nothing else, telling him that he's thinking about having that cock inside him, about being fucking knotted by him(gods the church really was right about him, he wishes he had some kind of shame because he feels like this is the sort of thing one ought to feel shame about). But...he can't, can he? It'd be cruel. Dimitri's stuck in that cage. Claude's going to have him out of there eventually, but getting him worked up over something Claude can't make happen in a timely fashion, over something that's straight up impossible right now...that's exactly the kind of thing Dimitri doesn't want. The kind of thing that's hurt Dimitri in the past. So he's forced to bite his tongue - almost literally - as he stares at Dimitri's knot, trying to think of some way to tell Dimitri how appealing he finds it without teasing him with something he can't have.
He's so preoccupied that it doesn't occur to him that the fixed attention may say something on its own. Of course, his hand is working even as he thinks, more readily as it becomes slicker and is able to stroke Dimitri without any risk of hurting him, so the Intseh may not be in any state to notice anything.
--
Frankly, Dimitri does get extremely close to not noticing just what's ensnared Claude's attention so much. Feeling this level of attention, this sort of pleasure, has thrown all his senses off. All he can focus on is that hand along his arousal, slick and working ever faster to the point that he's rocking his hips against it. The entire time, his hand at Claude's neck keeps the man's head angled just enough for Dimitri to drink in his expression: the flush that's darkened already dark skin, the way those lips are parted and slick, that brilliant gaze focused completely on him. It's an attractive sight even ignoring what's happening down at his cock... which means that the two only enhance one another, his claws pricking into and releasing from Claude's neck in quiet rhythm.
But such focus on Claude's face means he eventually does realize that something in particular has grasped his attention, and Dimitri takes a gulp of air so that he can pull his attention down to see what exactly has got it. The good news for Claude is that he doesn't realize what he's actually thinking. Instead... Dimitri's gaze flicks towards Claude's own pants, a faint curiosity remembering to rear its head. It occurs to him, then, that if he has the opportunity....
Claude may want to pay attention to where Dimitri's hands are going now. One stays at his neck, claws still twitching against skin with every stroke of Dimitri's cock... but the other goes to his pants, now, Dimitri's hand considerably larger than Claude's as it roughly presses up between his legs.
--
Claude's so wrapped up in his own head that his gasp when Dimitri's hand presses against him through his pants as almost as much surprise as arousal. It feels like fire is coursing through his veins now, and his free hand grips the bars to brace himself as he rolls his hips into Dimitri's hand. "Oh, fuck," he breathes.
He slows his stroking briefly, if only so he can slide his hand all the way down Dimitri's length, slick palm smoothing over that swelling knot. A brief thought occurs to him, out of nowhere - how much is Dimitri likely to come? Is it...a lot? Claude doesn't have a lot of experience with knotted dicks(in point of fact, he has zero), but it seems like logically the knot might be to seal in...a lot of semen. How much of a mess are they going to have on their hands here? And can Claude - who has to walk back to his room, through a monastery that might not have totally empty halls, keep his clothes respectably clean?
That doesn't stop him from testing what happens if he squeezes that knot a bit before sliding his hand up the rest of Dimitri's cock, though. His curiosity is going to get him killed one of these days, he swears.
--
It's such a little thing, that gasp. It's soft, feather light, hardly a noise at all... Yet the sound of it out of always confident and controlled Claude ignites a hunger in him that no food could ever satisfy, and there's no stopping the way his fingers twitch tighter into his neck to the point of actually scraping across his skin, leaving deep red marks. Fortunately for Claude, the hand between his legs is a bit more controlled. No claws, only the grinding from the heel of his palm right into the firm arousal he can feel there. It's not the most expert movement... but at this stage, Dimitri still might be able to get away with it. Anything to try and draw out more of those noises from Claude's lips.
Of course... that's when Claude isn't doing the very same to him first. New as it may be, Dimitri has been adjusting to the pleasure of those fingers stroking him, enough that he almost doesn't think too hard when they drift even further downwards. Not until they squeeze down, however, and the sudden burst of pleasure is an electric spark to his entire spine. He jolts sharply against Claude's hand, forehead digging against the bars while his face contorts in a look of almost violent pleasure. He actually snarls, low and deep, lip curling across the white of his fangs.
In Claude's grip, there's an even hotter pulse from his cock, a giveaway even without Dimitri trying to rut further into his fingers.
--
Claude makes another sound, low in his throat, that's almost a groan. Even he couldn't say for sure what it's in response to - those claws on his neck, the hand rubbing roughly against him through his pants(he'd better pull himself out of them soon, he notes absently, or he's going to come in his pants like an awkward teenager), or that delicious reaction he gets out of Dimitri when he squeezes his knot. Probably all of those things combined, if he's honest with himself...and he's one of the few people he doesn't often lie to.
"Damn, you're so hot like this," he murmurs, voice breathless and hungry in a way Dimitri's never heard it before. "You'd wreck me if you could really get your claws on me, wouldn't you? And I'd love it..." He's stroking Dimitri still, slower than before now - but what he's lost in speed he's made up for by being thorough, hand stroking all the way from knot to tip instead of just the more slender part of the shaft. Worse(or better), he gives the knot a squeeze every time he strokes upwards, incorporating it into the rhythm. He's clearly not trying to drag this out.
--
Dimitri has wanted very few things, for a very long time, now. Peace, quiet, a satisfyingly violent end to his life- those were the only things he let himself want. With Claude's inclusion into his life again, the occasional food has also edged itself into its subconsciousness, despite him trying to temper his own expectations for the future when such visits will inevitably end.
Yet now, right now, hearing him like this, seeing him like this-
"I want you." Three words that come from deep in him, from the back of his throat to the pit of his arousal. Deeper still, maybe, although that's territory that's far harder for Dimitri to currently understand than this. His hand shifts, claws meant to keep Claude right in face even as the Intseh squirms against the bars. The other hand moves as well, threatening to dig into Claude's pants and tear them right off. "Claude- it's-" There's no language he really has, has ever learned, to signify he's approaching his end in quick order now... although it's probably easy to tell with Claude's hand on his dick.
--
Claude makes another breathless, heated little sound in his throat; he doesn't think anything has ever sounded hotter than those three words from Dimitri do. Even through his pants, Dimitri might feel how they go straight to Claude's cock.
Fortunately for them both, Claude knows full well what Dimitri is trying to say - and would be able to pick up on the cues even if he didn't say anything. Getting Dimitri off has kind of become his goal here, after all; of course he ought to expect it happening imminently. He tips the head of Dimitri's cock slightly back towards Dimitri himself; fur, he reasons, will be easier to clean off than Claude's clothes, even if Claude has to spend several minutes of their precious time fetching him water to clean himself up with.
"Show me what you look like when you're coming for me," he breathes, hand sliding down to Dimitri's knot again and giving it a rougher squeeze than he's yet dared before dragging his fingers back up the shaft again - tight, like he's trying to pull the orgasm out of him. He's watching Dimitri with an almost feverish intensity burning in those emerald eyes.
--
Both of them are lucky that this is Dimitri's first proper experience. It's the foreign pleasure more than anything that strangles his snarles, reins back the moans he wants to make, or else, well... The sounds he'd make when his arousal hits its absolute peak would be far from quiet.
It's hard to think, hard to speak, hard to do anything but grip the bars of his cage so tightly that the metal seems to make a soft whine of complaint itself, and Claude is lucky that Dimitri repositioned his other hand as claws tear through his pants. His orgasm splatters against his fur, a thick and heavy mess that's enough to drip back down onto Claude's hand, hotter in the immediate aftermath, at least for the time being. And then, in direct contrast to the simple shot of a human... It doesn't... stop. Claude was right. A knot is, in fact, meant to lock in quite a bit of semen. If there's any good news, it's that the initial orgasm is the only thing to shoot it out with so much strength. The rest is much more... low pressure, although part of that may be how Claude has used gravity against it, hitting more Dimitri's hips when it manages to get that far at all. The rest, well... The rest is something Claude will find coating his fingers and the rest of Dimitri's cock quite steadily.
Dimitri himself hardly seems to notice the mess. Hardly surprising, considering its his first good orgasm in... ever. He slumps against the bars, hair mussed up where it clings to metal, and his heavy breathing comes in slow steady pants, occasionally broken by a shudder as he works through his orgasm.
...It may take some minutes.
--
Claude is, in keeping with his other reactions so far, much more turned on by this than he should be. In the cold light of practicality, it may occur to him to wonder just how comfortable it'll be if Dimitri knots him and pumps that much into him; right now, when he's painfully turned on, all he can think of is how hot it is, and how much he wants it. The potentially uncomfortable consequences don't even cross his mind.
It's hard to tell if it's wickedness or consideration that keeps Claude working Dimitri's cock - albeit at a slightly slower pace - as Dimitri just keeps coming. His hand becomes a lost cause almost immediately, so having accepted that, he resolves to help Dimitri ride out his climax until it's completely over. He may have a sore wrist by the end of it, but this is absolutely worth it.
"I didn't know there would be so much," he murmurs, eyes flicking up to Dimitri's face. He's not entirely sure Dimitri's going to be able to process anything he says right now, but he feels like he should say something. "I guess you wouldn't know if all Intseh come like this, so maybe I'll just take this as confirmation that I'm just that good."
--
If there's any good news for the future state of Claude's ass and all that's connected to it, it's that the amount of come seems to quietly but steadily decrease on its own. Still coming, mind, but less and less as the second pass on. Even for all that Intsehli are generally a lot more sturdy than their human counterparts, they still have their own limits, after all. And who knows... Maybe Claude's own hand is helping speed up the process.
Dimitri definitely can't give any answers. All he can do is slowly recover, even as his hips grind closer to Claude's hand with another shudder. It's hard to pull his mind together when he's still being touched like this... And Claude will get to witness the shift from twisted in pleasure to something a lot more... quiet. Almost relaxed, even when Dimitri's brow winds together in response to a particular movement of Claude's hand. It's the most at ease the Intseh has ever looked outside of being asleep, the kind of pleasant blank headed space that comes with something near an afterglow.
Eventually, he seems to recover enough to blink a few times out of it, and his mind manages to remember that he's still holding onto Claude. Refocusing on him, his hand reaches up to start tugging loose at Claude's pants. "You..."
--
Claude shivers; he's still very obviously hard. "Looking to return the favor?" he asks lightly. "I'm not going to complain..." Granted, with one of his hands positively coated, he can't help much in getting his pants unfastened, and he'd prefer it if Dimitri doesn't rip them any more than they already are. Hopefully the Intseh can manage.
It's only when Dimitri's cock seems to have stopped pulsing entirely that Claude finally relinquishes his hold on Dimitri, casually flicking some of the excess come off his hand. There's enough that it actually splatters somewhat onto the dusty ground when he does.
--
That's rather a lot to ask of someone who's really only recently stopped accidentally destroying wax paper. Still, Dimitri seems to have a slightly better grasp of things now that he's no longer in the throes of his own pleasure. He's by no means gentle as he pries his claws from Claude's neck to undo his pants, by at least they're still... mostly... in tact.
With his own dick now well known, Dimitri is curious to see just what he has to compare to, and pauses as he frees Claude's own, ears flicking slightly. This is just as different for him as it is for Claude, after all.
--
"It's...not as impressive as yours, I know." Claude laughs self-consciously. Granted, Dimitri's a monster and a lot of his size is just proportional, but still...after seeing Dimitri, after all that, Claude can't help but feel like his own climax is going to be an anticlimax.
--
"Does it matter?" In contrast, Dimitri hardly cares at all what the size difference between them is, so long as he can pin Claude in place one way or the other. Not completely to his satisfaction... but right now even a grip is more than enough. He displays that adequately enough as he sinks his fingers around Claude's neck again to pull him upwards, forcefully tilting the other's head up until he's looking at nothing but Dimitri. The bars are too close together for him to even think of getting his head through, and it's a close call honestly even with just the more muzzle like structure of an Intseh... But Dimitri presses all the same, pulling Claude close enough until he can drag his tongue hotly along the curve of his neck. "I want you. All of you."
It hadn't escaped him how Claude has reacted to hearing that the first time, after all.
While Claude is distracted by his mouth and claws, Dimitri gets back to the point, folding his fingers carefully folding around that arousal. Even as foreign territory as this might be, he still knows enough to mind where he puts his claws. It's by far not an experienced grip... But it will certainly be different, with the soft fur and pads of his hands enveloping Claude.
--
It's different from anything Claude's ever felt, and he shudders even as his hips rock into Dimitri's touch. Dimitri's tongue is a rough, hot swipe against his skin, and the words are a jolt of heat directly to his gut. (It's more than just that, there's flattery and even feelings involved in hearing Dimitri say that - in Dimitri bothering to go so far as to actually reassure Claude that he wants him, at Dimitri emphasizing that it's Claude himself that he wants more than he wants any specific physical part of him. But right now, so close to his orgasm, those parts are too tangled in the pleasure he's feeling to fully process; they'll get properly digested later.)
And he really is close, so much so that it hurts. His hips are seeking that friction because it's really all he needs; as soon as Dimitri actually starts moving his hand properly, Claude's going to be finished.
--
If it's friction he wants, even Dimitri can do that much. His eye narrows at the way Claude squirms in his grip, directly to his hand, and he mimics the way that Claude had touched him- long strokes from base to tip, pad grinding against the hot skin he has a hold of. It really is a surprise at how quickly Claude comes in his hand, the mess joining the white already sticking to Dimitri's fur to begin with, and he keeps Claude in place as he drinks in every little bit of his reaction.
He still doesn't let him down, even then.
--
Claude groans Dimitri's name as he finally climaxes, turning his head to press his mouth against the arm still holding onto the bars to muffle himself as Dimitri strokes him through it. He's breathing hard as he comes down again - which happens much faster than it does for Dimitri, the Intseh will note - but doesn't make any immediate move to pull away. Not that he could.
"Fuck," he murmurs with something like breathless amusement, turning his head so that he can speak clearly again. "That was...incredible. And probably insane to do, under the circumstances, although as long as we can avoid getting caught I'd still do it as many times as we could get away with..." He grins at Dimitri. "I can't even imagine what the church would have to say if they caught me at this, though."
--
"Sin and blasphemy, likely," Dimitri says in the kind of bored tone of someone who's heard the words tossed around so much for worthless reasons that they, in turn, have ceased to have any worth to him. With Claude now more into it, Dimitri carefully lowers him back with something almost approaching reluctance and removes his fingers from around his neck. (Claude will have some fun trying to figure out excuses for those marks.) His other hand is a bit messy now as well, although it doesn't hold a candle to what he's done to Claude's own. A slight shake doesn't get nearly as much of it off, either, and he stares blankly down at it for a moment in thought... before raising it up to his mouth for a quick lick.
He's going to have to clean his fur one way or another, isn't he?
Even as he does that, however, he glances quietly up over at Claude. Now that he's seen his impulse through and the arousal is fading... Another quiet feeling is ebbing through, and he doesn't know what to make of it.
--
Claude can't help grinning as Dimitri tastes him on his fingers. Holding the Intseh's gaze, Claude raises his own dirtied hand to his mouth and, rather deliberately, sucks one fingertip clean while Dimitri watches.
Unintentional eroticism is incredibly charming from Dimitri, but Claude's a fan of intentional, carefully executed flirtation when it comes to the things he does.
Still, there's no way he's cleaning his entire hand that way. There's so damn much of it that it'd quickly become more gross for him than erotic. Luckily there's a water pump in the courtyard. Claude tucks himself back into his pants with his free hand, then gets to his feet. "I'm gonna go clean up with some water. Should I bring you some to wash up with yourself?"
--
Oh.
Well. There's definitely something to be said for experience and purpose when it comes to some things, and Dimitri is quickly learning that when it comes to the sexual as he watches Claude's lips wipe away all traces of him from one finger.
He's only snapped out of it when Claude starts to get up, and he blinks a few times. "I suppose that is an option..." Even with how much Claude spoils him with his visits, it's still easy for him to forget that little things such as this are within his reach and he doesn't have to rely on his own methods for getting clean and such. While Claude goes to get the water, Dimitri takes the time to just shuck out of his pants entirely. Better to be thorough if he's getting a chance like this. And... it helps keep his mind occupied now as well, still puzzling over how things are now undeniably different between the two of them.
--
Claude returns a minute or two later, both hands now clean and carrying a small bucket full of water. He sets it down just outside the cage - there's no way to get it through the bars - within easy reach of Dimitri. He'll put it back (and rinse it out, just to make sure there's no evidence) when Dimitri's finished with it. Then he sits down again, eyes warm as he watches Dimitri.
"Not really how I expected my visit to go tonight...not that I'm complaining, mind you."
--
"...Thank you." The water definitely makes his job easier, although it's strange to clean himself when often he's just dunked into water to be rid of the blood after executions. Still, he doesn't tally with it. It's not as if he's doing it for fun. Once he's clean as he can make himself, even where things got sticky beneath the waste, Dimitri shakes his hands free.
It hasn't escaped him that the food is still right where he left it, not that far from where he and Claude touched one another. Dimitri settles himself near it again, glancing back over at Claude almost uncertainly as he does so. "...It was not something I intended to do." Then again, Dimitri did a lot of things he hadn't exactly planned to do. That's nothing new, in some ways, although this particular result certainly is. Now he sort of wants to go to sleep, but his hunger, as always, leads his decisions tonight.
...But not entirely. As they sit there together, Dimitri making his way through an egg, the Intseh keeps glancing up at Claude- the exact opposite of how their night had started. Yet it doesn't take long for a decision to be made, and he cuts through the honey cake roughly in half. He's not starting with dessert. Rather... Putting his half on the majority of the wax paper, he tugs more of it free to nudge over to the bars. It's an awkward, almost shy move... and, for once, more than the gentle touches in their early meetings, more than the sharp bursts of mocking laughter from that very afternoon, Claude might be able to see more of the boy he'd first met so many years ago. The same one who'd been able to smile at him so easily, who'd reached out to him from the bars of his room, who'd wanted to make sure that Claude had honey candy to savor on his own as well so that the two of them could be happy together.
Claude has always known, had faith, that Dimitri is still himself beneath everything the Church has warped him to be... but for right now, in the comfortable afterglow and more comfortable food, it might be a little easier to see that through the cracks.
--
Claude smiles at the gesture, and this one reaches his eyes in a way that many of those quick, easy smirks never do. He doesn't make any protests that he doesn't need any treats, that he can go get his own if he wants them; instead, he accepts Dimitri's generosity, taking his half of the cake and taking a deeply contented bite.
More than ever, he's convinced of two things: one, that his plan to free Dimitri is absolutely necessary; and two, that the larger plan of giving Dimitri the good life he wants him to have, the good life Dimitri deserves, is going to work. Dimitri - the real Dimitri, the one capable of the full spectrum of emotions, who can be happy and shy and normal - was never destroyed. Just buried. And the defensive layers over him are capable of being removed.
"I'm glad you did," he says, taking another bite. Then he grins. They don't have time for a too in-depth discussion of feelings or ramifications tonight, and there's a lot of things that can't be said yet while Dimitri is still at the church's mercy, so Claude opts to change the subject - and he has the perfect topic to jump to. One that's plenty fun to talk about on its own. "By the way...how much did you get of that whole incident with Carnius earlier? I know it wasn't in Intsehli, so I thought you might've missed some of the nuances, and I'd hate for you not to be able to enjoy the full extent of it. I don't mind offering a translated version..."
--
New emotions are difficult. Taking pleasure at the expense of people he hates isn't. Dimitri perks up a little bit at the reminder of the afternoon, pausing where he's about to stuff a smoked pepper into his mouth. "You humiliated him," Dimitri says, eye narrowing in clear pleasure that's partially from the memory and partially as he takes in the pepper and all its cheesy glory. He pauses, savoring both with a few flicks of his tail, before looking to Claude again. "Deer were mentioned, but I am not sure how."
--
Claude grins - smug, confident, relaxed - and launches into a proper retelling of exactly what he said, now in a language Dimitri knows well. He's able to repeat much of what he said word for word, letting Dimitri in on the nuance, on how he trapped Carnius with humiliating lies that the man had to pretend were true because Claude framed the actual truth as even more mortifying. How Claude had encouraged the boy to be respectful to even things that can't speak, and even more so to things that can. How Claude all but called Carnius incompetent to his face, and stupid too, and got away with it by couching it in careful words and diplomacy and potentially innocent misunderstandings.
--
Claude's clever tongue has always been a point of note, from the way he so easily weaves Intsehli on his tongue to how even Dimitri has been able to tell he's a wordsmith in his native language. That's always been a sort of vague distant understanding, however. Now, there's another word Dimitri can think of that suits the handsome man before him, and that's storyteller.
Dimitri had actually been there when Claude had dragged Carnius through the mud, yet he feels as though he's experiencing all of it anew as it's described to him in detail. He's not been good at holding back emotion or action for a long time... and hearing Claude talk, of course it's impossible for him to fight back the vindicitve grin that spreads over his face. It's hard to eat as the other weaves his tale, because it feels as though he's always on the verge of snickering, if not laughing.
It's... been a long time since he's felt he could laugh like this for anything, even if it's more than a little spiteful this way.
By the time Claude finishes, Dimitri has curled up slightly on his side, still picking through his food with clear satisfaction. The night feels too good; he doesn't know what to do with it. "He deserves that and a bit more," he says around an egg, tongue flicking out to make sure no bits are left on his mouth. "I've never liked him. He'd be missing an arm if not for how I'm restrained."
--
Claude chuckles. "Just don't get yourself in too much trouble, all right? The last thing I want is to show up here some night and they've moved you to a more secure cage, or they decide you're too much trouble and get a new executioner." Claude's eyes darken for a moment. "If we can't improve your situation in any other way...then at least I want to be able to keep having this."
Mostly, he's saying this to encourage Dimitri to behave himself for the next week. Claude thinks he can get his plan to break Dimitri out finalized by then, with his nose to the grindstone; he's certainly more motivated than ever, and he wasn't lacking in that area before. And while he could always improvise...it'd be better if Dimitri doesn't do anything that'd change their plans before Claude comes for him.
He rises, reluctantly, to his feet, grabbing the handle of the bucket so he can take it with him as he leaves. "I'll visit again tomorrow night, but that'll be the last night I can come for a little while. Have to take another trip outside the monastery. I've been cooling my heels here for too long, really." He smiles at Dimitri. "But I promise to bring you a better treat than any you've had yet once I come back."
--
At least... He wants to keep having this. Dimitri's gaze goes a bit distant as he looks out to the rest of the courtyard- the same sight that he's seen hundreds and hundreds of nights before, empty and dark and miserable. Distantly, he thinks of the more philosophical tangents he's gone on occasionally with Claude. More specifically, when he'd been so firmly wanting to do nothing but be entrenched in his steady misery because at least he'd grown numb to that instead of small bits of happiness making it worse.
He's feeling a little bit of that now. Everything is so- warm, soft, that he loathes the idea of returning to the same miserable food from the same hateful people in the same painful life. He wants to hold onto this. To Claude. That he can't, not really, is...
His claws curl in slightly against his palms. "They've kept me alive thus far," he says quietly, "and I can't promise anything." Dimitri's tail sweeps across the ground, already feeling restless. "...But I shall be here."
--
Claude smiles at that, another soft look that makes his eyes warm. He steps closer to the bars, not away from them. "Come here a sec."
--
"I was lead to believe that you were taking your leave." Still, Dimitri pushes himself up slightly, at least enough to move around what's left of the food and to the bars.
--
"I am. There's just something I want to do first." And Claude reaches through the bars, hooking a hand around the back of Dimitri's neck and pulling him close enough to press to the bars, head pressed against them and face between them. Then he leans in and kisses Dimitri, as best he can given the situational limitations.
It's neither long nor particularly deep, and then Claude pulls away, grinning, eyes sparkling. "I'll see you tomorrow, Dimitri."
And then he turns and saunters over to the pump, dumping the dirty water down the drain (and then rinsing the bucket out just to be safe) before finally leaving the courtyard. He's got some patchwork to do on his pants.
--
Claude's tongue really is too clever. Even after all they've done tonight, something as simple as a kiss leaves Dimitri off balance and staring in confusion. One would think it's the other way around.... but no. After all, a lot can happen that results in sex. But a kiss? That seems....
Good job, Claude, you've left him even more confused about his emotions than before.
At least the next night isn't so strange, and in fact might almost seem more in line with how their nights with one another usually pass, with the only notable difference besides a few awkward glances being that Dimitri tries to learn some of the English Claude had used to tear Carnius into next year. There's some minor inquiring on where, exactly, Claude is going- a change from the beginning where Dimitri seemed to ask about the outside world with more than enough reluctance for an army.
He still doesn't promise anything. But he does wait.
On a separate but equally satisfying note, he and Dimitri will have an engaging subject of conversation tonight(though they usually tend to find one even if one doesn't readily present itself these days): the incident with Carnius. Claude isn't sure how much Dimitri picked up on - enough to be entertained, sure, but the full impact probably missed him. Claude can't wait to give him all the juicy details; he might even get to hear Dimitri really laugh again. Just the possibility puts a bounce in his step.
And, finally...he's got a little something to show off. When Claude had changed his hairstyle for the church, he hadn't really done much except stop putting in the braid every morning and slicking his hair back. It hadn't been a different cut, just a different way of styling it; as such, it had been incredibly easy to simply undo those things. To wash out his hair and let it dry naturally into the dark curls so many of his people have, and put that traditional braid back in his hair. He's been going without those tiny hallmarks of his culture for a long time, and honestly he hadn't expected how good it would feel to have them back. (Besides, he's always thought he looks better this way.) Considering that Dimitri had gone out of his way to ask about Claude's braid...Claude's definitely eager to see his reaction. Especially since his friend has never seen Claude with this hairstyle as an adult.
He notes that Dimitri seems to be rather out of sorts before he even reaches the cage, however, and his steps slow a bit as he approaches. "Hey," he calls softly, all else momentarily forgotten. "Everything okay?"
--
He supposes it's the opposite of a surprise to hear Claude's voice flit through the silence of the yard in the dark of night. After all, he'd clearly come earlier in the day, so why not tonight? Dimitri tries to remind himself of this fact, even as he blearily blinks upwards. "Yes. It's-" And he abruptly pauses, tail stilling at the same time his ears flick sharply upwards.
It hadn't really occurred to him yet in hindsight that his dream hadn't included everything about Claude as an adult... and that his hair had been one of them, more loose and free. Yet it hadn't gone completely all the way, either... And seeing the braid frame one side of his face, how much better it makes him look in a way that Dimitri hadn't actually contemplated when he'd noted it the first time...
He needs a second, just staring.
--
Claude needs a second, too; he'd been momentarily distracted by his concern, enough that he'd temporarily forgotten the changed hairstyle. But then the neurons fire, and he grins at Dimitri. "Does it look that bad?" he teases, suspecting it's very much the opposite. He doubts he can manipulate a denial out of Dimitri, but hell, anything's worth trying once.
--
Claude speaking up reminds Dimitri that speaking is a thing, and also that he'd been staring. He quickly looks away, a thing that is a little hard to tell with the way Intsehli eyes are structured and only given away by the slight tilt of Dimitri's head. "...No. It... suits you."
That's certainly the least incriminating way Dimitri can think to say it, at least.
--
That's a delightful surprise, and Claude's pleasure is visible. He grins broadly at Dimitri as he sits down outside the cage, holding out the usual food parcel. It seems extra bulky today. "I brought a real haul for you tonight."
He's not kidding. Inside the wax paper is a large fillet of smoked salmon; a trio of hardboiled eggs; a scattering of pine nuts and candied almonds; small smoked peppers that appear to have been stuffed with creamy, mellow cheese and bits of olive; a small cylindrical goat cheese that appears to have been rolled in herbs, with bits of garlic and shallots mixed in; and what looks (and, more importantly, smells) like a small circular honey cake, speckled with nuts.
--
That they can even get the package through the bars is amazing enough, and that's enough to draw Dimitri's gaze back if only so he can raise his eyebrows over at Claude. The other man always seems to bring something new with him... which he supposes he can't really complain about, not with the same bland old (literally) food that the church feeds him every day. He struggles a little just to keep it all together once it's shoved through, setting it down on the ground for unwrapping. Enough practice has done well to make the wrapping paper not a shredded mess now, claws only occasionally catching on fragile paper.
When he finally sees all of it... Something in him almost aches. It's not his stomach, for once. Certainly, it all looks good, but... Reaching down, he slices a bit of salmon off and brings it to his mouth. This, more than anything else, draws up that nostalgic feeling. "It's good," he says quietly, a rare bit of commentary on the state of his food when Dimitri normally just eats whatever is offered to him after some testing and experimenting.
--
"Should I take that to mean I should bring you more fish?" This is the most enthusiastic response anything has gotten since the honey and cheese combination, which means it's significant. Claude files this away.
--
"Is there water near?" Dimitri has no idea, frankly. What sort of things are near the monastery or its city is a mystery to him, so he can't even begin to say what might be local or what might not be.
--
"There's a lake a day's travel from here. Having water so close is one of the reasons the monastery is here." Claude rests his chin on his hand. "But no oceans. The nearest one is far south of here - two weeks of travel on horseback, at least. That's where the Intsehli population seems to be thickest in this part of the world." That may have inspired Claude to specifically get Dimitri fish, even if it's just freshwater fish.
--
"Is there..." It's somehow always strange to hear that there are Intsehli out there still, with how long he's been isolated from his own kind and the rest of the world in general. Dimitri makes another small slice of salmon to eat, another giveaway of his preference when he tends to experiment with his new food. "...Then, yes."
Two bites is all he goes for, however, before he goes back to the usual state of taste testing everything Claude has brought for him in relative silence. It might seem to be a bit of a slide back compared to the language lessons they've had in the past... but the more he watches, the more Claude may be able to pick up just how much Dimitri is avoiding looking at him properly. For some reason, everything seems combined to bring about that soft warmth that had accompanied his arousal from earlier- Claude's hair, the nostalgic taste of fresh fish, even just how much he's clearly being... pampered with this haul of food. He doesn't know what to make of it... and he's almost worried that if he looks at Claude too much, it really will bring that dream back in full force, and all that accompanied it.
--
Claude picks up on the strangeness of Dimitri's body language, the careful aversion of his eyes, fairly quickly. It might have been even faster, except that Dimitri is usually very absorbed in his food and so it takes a bit for Claude to determine that he's not just chalking food preoccupation up as a false positive. But once he's sure, he cocks an eyebrow at his friend.
"You're awfully avoidant tonight," he remarks. "Did something I say earlier upset you? When I was talking this afternoon? You know a lot of that was just me covering my ass, so...if I said something offensive, I'll apologize, but I probably was just saying it for their benefit in any case."
--
Dimitri abruptly freezes at being called out, as though it wasn't quietly obvious to those who know what to look for in an Intseh, and pauses his tasting of the almonds. For a second, he can't even remember what might have been said, at least that what he was able to make out. Unfortunately for Dimitri, however, he's never been much of a liar. He can only really ever give the truth, or at least what he perceives as such. He doesn't have to give all the truth, but... "No. It's not that."
--
"Then what is it?" Claude studies him. "Am I just too attractive to look at now that I've gone back to my old hairstyle?" He grins. "I mean, I can't say I blame you. Even an Intsehli could probably get impure thoughts from a human who looks this good. Nothing to be embarrassed about when it'd be harder not to."
He's really just bullshitting, filling dead air. He's hoping to either glean information from Dimitri's actions, or - equally possible - aggravate him into spilling the truth, if only to shut up his deliberately ridiculous theories. It genuinely doesn't occur to him he could actually be close to the truth.
--
From Dimitri's point of view, this isn't bullshitting at all. No, this is just another instance of Claude being near telepathic with his ability to read him (something that has nothing at all to do with how easy to read Dimitri honestly is to anyone with basic social skills who views him as a person). So when Claude brings up his own attractiveness, Dimitri's ears flick down in time with the flustered bristle of his tail, and the talk of impure thoughts actually makes Dimitri jerk his head up with a look of outright embarrassed distressed. That expression alone says how did you know!? before Dimitri himself can actually form words.
"It is not my..." He's actually floundering a little bit on that word front, actually, not entirely sure where he's going with this.
--
Claude stares at him for a moment, and Dimitri may take a tiny bit of satisfaction - somewhere within his mortification - at seeing Claude, for once, completely blue-screen.
"Not your what?" he asks, distractedly, while his mind tries to reboot. Tries to wrap around what his powers of observation tell him, which is that Dimitri is doing the opposite of denying Claude's ridiculous claims, that he's actually confirming them. The incredulity hasn't quite hit yet because Claude is still working his way up to believing he's processing this right.
--
Later, his brain will definitely tuck that look away in Dimitri's mental storage of various Claude expressions. Right now, his own mouth is still tripping over itself, unable to be stopped with his embarrassment in full force. "Not my fault that I thought..." That's around the time more embarrassment strangles the words out of him, unable to admit any further, let alone any details.
Then again... Considering the topic at hand, it shouldn't be too hard to guess just what kind of thoughts Dimitri has had recently.
--
"So you're saying...you actually did have dirty thoughts about me?" The way Claude says this, and the expression on his face, aren't judgmental - merely a bit thunderstruck - but the mere fact that Claude was apparently joking, not reading Dimitri's mind, and that Dimitri absolutely gave himself away assuming the latter is going to be more than enough to deal a lethal blow to Dimitri's dignity.
--
No immediate answer. Instead, Dimitri's own expression goes completely blank as he just stares at Claude with a slightly wide eye. It's nearly possible to see the way complex math equations are floating around the Intseh's head as he cracks the code of him having completely fucked up in this conversation.
Even when he was at his most suspicious and worked up, Dimitri has never really rejected the food Claude has brought him. As a matter of fact, it tends to go fairly quickly, save for anything he explicitly sets to the side for later. Right now, however? Right now he outright gets up , turns, and goes to curl up on the exact opposite of his cage with his tail wrapped tightly around him.
He needs to silently die of mortification and humiliation right now, and may start tearing up the floor of his cage if that doesn't happen soon enough for the sake of burying himself alive to speed up the process.
--
As the new knowledge finally settles itself in Claude's brain...he begins to laugh. Not at Dimitri - he's never been cruel like that, even with his tendency to tease, and he wouldn't laugh at Dimitri for something he's this blatantly self-conscious about. No, he's laughing at both of them, and maybe as a way of coping with his own shock and growing giddiness. He's thought Dimitri was attractive from the moment he laid eyes on the Intseh as an adult, but he hadn't really moved any further in his thoughts than that (barring some private nighttime fantasies) because there hadn't seemed to be any point yet. He's been working just to reforge their friendship; he'd thought being able to do anything at all with his attraction, that even the most basic flirting, was well off into the far-flung future. And, specifically, he'd thought that he'd have a lot of work to do to win Dimitri over in any sort of sexual sense. (Never mind romantic, but he supposes that may still not be on the table yet. It's not something to assume just yet, anyway.)
"Man, clearly I never should've stopped braiding my hair." There's some indication here that Claude is welcoming of Dimitri's interest, but it's subtle in the kind of way Dimitri isn't always so great at picking up on. Which is fine; if Claude has to be more direct about it, he's willing to. He doesn't go there quite yet, however.
--
Definitely something he's not great at picking up, as judged by the quiet way he bristles over on the opposite end of the cage. Intsehli fur isn't normally something that shows up a lot when they react to something. More often, it's too short, and a lot of reactions are seen in the body language that comes from having such large ears and tails. It takes a lot of emotion for it to stand out on end... and Dimitri is practically puffed up from what can be seen with the moonlight.
For something this embarrassing to happen... Forget just tonight, with the dream still haunting the back of his mind every other second. He doesn't think he'll ever be able to look Claude in the eye again, or maybe at all in general.
--
Claude can see it, too. He recognizes that it may take drastic action to help Dimitri get past this, to put him at a place where he's comfortable with Claude again. Fortunately, the first and easiest way to accomplish this that Claude can think of doesn't seem the least bit unreasonable to Claude - so he takes it.
"I'm not laughing at you, you know," he says easily. "I'm mostly laughing because I thought it'd be ages before I could admit I was having the same kind of thoughts about you. At least, before I could admit it without you freaking out or getting ticked off..." He grins. "And here it is, only a couple weeks in. It's a pretty flattering way to realize you've underestimated your own appeal."
--
The soft quivering of bristling fur abruptly freezes, and one of Dimitri's ears twitch. It takes a second or two longer before he peers up over his shoulder, bright blue actually looking back towards where Claude is sitting so comfortably despite what's just been admitted between both of them. That alone is a massive step back to where they were- at least on the comfort level, even if the conversation alone is already changing things enormously in their relationship as it once was.
"The same?" he echoes back, as if making sure he's heard right- not something too uncommon for him, sometimes, with how he's constantly had to doubt his own sense of reality. And this is certainly a moment clearly neither of them could have ever expected to happen between them. One can't fault Dimitri for double checking.
--
"Yeah." Claude grins at him, but there's a sense that this is personal for him, this is something close enough to his vulnerable parts to be self-conscious about, in a way that many things he talks and laughs and smiles about are not. There's a touch of tension to him - nerves that not even Claude can fully hide - and that may be immensely reassuring to Dimitri. Claude can't be blasé about this, either, even if he'd like to be.
The way he feels about Dimitri, the things he thinks about Dimitri, aren't a joke to him. Enough that he's tense about ridicule, about letting himself be vulnerable on this subject, the same way Dimitri was. (Or, arguably, is.)
"I mean, I don't know if you've had the chance to look in any mirrors or anything, but you've grown up to be built like a better class of god. Which, you know, maybe not so surprising for someone who's basically a gladiator, but they could model statues off of you. Actually, I've seen less impressive statues."
--
Slowly, his fur begins to lower itself back to its usual smooth state, and the tension in Dimitri's own curled up form slowly begins to dissipate. He begins to brace his palms against the floor, pushing himself onto feet and hands once more. Once again, there's something fluttering in him at seeing yet another new expression from Claude, and the feeling is more clear now that he's not worked up in chagrin.
The slow movements might be familiar to Claude, from other large predators he's seen in the wild- a cautious but intrigued curiosity, Dimitri's ears turned in his direction as he keeps his eye on him, approaching inch by inch. There's a flicker of pink as his tongue darts out over his mouth and teeth. "Describe them," he says quietly, voice a low husk. This turn of events is... setting off some sort of reaction in him, eager and electric. Dimitri has never had to really focus on long term planning before, never had reason to as executioner... So all he can think of is in the immediate present, of getting confirmation and seeing where that leads him.
--
"What, the statues?" Claude suspects that isn't what Dimitri's asking at all, but he's checking for more than just confirmation. The way Dimitri is moving, the way his voice sounds, is pounding in his chest and pooling in his gut in a hot, breathless way, and he thinks he'd like to hear Dimitri say exactly what he means out loud.
--
It wouldn't be an encounter with Claude if there wasn't some obtuse teasing. Dimitri's eye narrows slightly and, if Claude is really looking for more of him at his most predatory, then he certainly gets it in the form of the low growl that rolls out of the Intseh. It carries in his words when he speaks next. "You know not that." He roams a little closer, gaze still transfixed perfectly on Claude. "The thoughts you've had of me... I want to hear them."
--
Now it's Claude's turn to lick his lips. His eyes are as riveted on Dimitri as Dimitri's eye is on him. It's definitely not hard to call up the kind of thoughts he's had about Dimitri like this; he's having more of them right now. "A lot of them have to do with how big you are," he murmurs. "How you could hold me down and do just about anything you wanted to me." He smirks a little. "I've even thought about how you crept up on me that one day and touched my neck...how you could've choked me. That should be scary, but...something about it's kind of hot, too." His gaze flicks down to Dimitri's hands. "I've thought about what you could do with your claws...and your teeth."
His eyes go back up to Dimitri's, and his grin is accompanied by a knowing, sly look. "I could go on."
--
There's something about Claude's voice like this, the way he can't stop looking at him, that has that heat curling up in Dimitri's gut again. He's never particularly cared how he looked to other people, although he'd long accepted being a monster himself, but now.... Watching Claude watch him.... His tail flicks sharply behind him as he listens to him describe so much in the same vein as the dream he'd had only a few hours prior, almost as if they'd truly been sharing their thoughts.
They're both equal distance from the bars, now, and that's enough for Dimitri to reach forward, claws grazing along the ground and then along Claude's leg. "I want to," he says, still low and rough with a desire that's more than quickly growing, both emotionally and, well.... "I could. You're so easy to pin..." His claws dig in just slightly, a point, or rather a series of ones.
--
Claude shifts closer to the bars, closer to Dimitri, his interest obvious now. "If only the damn bars weren't in the way, right?" he murmurs. He'd already had plenty of reasons to want to get Dimitri out of his cage before, but right now one reason feels like the most pressing. He reaches out through the bars in turn, to run light fingers along the curve of Dimitri's jaw.
"Also, I'm not that easy to pin...except maybe by people I want to pin me." He grins. "That might be another story."
--
Their touches have all been so one-sided before, often Dimitri solidifying their places in reality. Having Claude reach out and touch him, now.... Those fingers so fleeting against his jaw... Dimitri's eyelid flutters, even as he turns his face against Claude's hand. There's the briefest bit of softness as his mouth brushes against skin, quickly replaced by the points of his teeth dragging along his fingers. "Other people aren't me," he growls, fangs digging in just slightly at the same time that his hand shifts higher to press a clawed thumb into the inside of Claude's thigh.
It's as much a statement of Dimitri's own confidence when it comes to the physical as much as it is of their relationship to one another, changing and shifting even as it may be .
--
"That's kind of the point, yes." Claude shivers a little at those teeth against his hand, even as his hand falls from Dimitri's jaw to trail fingers down his chest. They run languidly down his sternum to his stomach, then lower, fingertips dragging through fur.
--
Underneath Claude's fingertips, Dimitri's muscles tense and shiver under such a soft touch. It's here that he almost seems to flounder. After all, the things he knows he wants to do- his claws against Claude's body, his teeth at his throat, touching him so completely- those things are literally barred from him. Being rough is easy. He knows how to do that. Yet reciprocating so gently is... unknown to him. His fingers begin to knead into Claude's thigh, no doubt liable to leave scratches and bruises when morning comes.
But he certainly doesn't stop the trailing of those fingers, even when they reach his pants... and the bulge pressing out against them. Dimitri just watches him, breath low and hot.
--
Claude finally breaks Dimitri's gaze as he looks down at what he's doing, hand cupping that bulge in Dimitri's pants...and god, it's kind of embarrassing and slutty but unbelievably enticing to note how big that bulge is. Nice to know the reality is living up to any of his fantasies in that area... "You know," he murmurs, even as he slowly rubs his palm over Dimitri's erection through the material of his pants, "I've gotten to know some Intseh over the years....but none so well that I have any idea what you look like down here." His eyes flick back up to Dimitri's face. "I haven't even known exactly what to fantasize about..."
--
Finally being touched- and in such a different manner than he's ever bothered to touch himself- draws out a long low growl of a moan from the bit of Dimitri's stomach. There's a purpose to the roll of Claude's palm that he's never bothered to use on himself. Realizing there might be a use for that pleasure, that it can be good...
His own hand readjusts, going from Claude's thigh to his waist where he can roughly tug him all the closer. "I could say the same about you," he rumbles. It's not as though he's had a chance to get to know anyone like this. Or, really, at all.
--
Claude grins. "Well, I've never been able to resist satisfying my curiosity." He's all but pressed against the bars now. His hand leaves off of Dimitri - no doubt a loss that will be complained about - but only to reach up and tug, pointedly, on the waistband of his pants. Encouraging Dimitri to get them at least somewhat out of his way.
"Don't forget, though," he murmurs, voice low. "As much as I'd love hearing all the sounds you want to make...as much as I'd love dragging sounds out of you...we can't be loud. Either of us. Especially if it's the kind of sounds that the guards haven't heard you make before."
--
The low growl Dimitri makes says without words that he's not particularly happy- both from Claude's hand leaving him and the idea of having to stay quiet. "Do you ever make noise?" he asks accusingly, even as he lets go of him to tug at his own pants in hasty frustration. There are probably better ways to take his pants off, and he'll probably have to undo them properly anyway so that he can put them on again... But impatience wins against sense sometimes. His tail has to wiggle out a little bit through the hole in his pants, or else they can't quite get down to where they need to for the next catch to be passed.
Whatever Claude has imagined Dimitri to have, exactly, well... Now he has to real thing to compare to: the flushed color standing out sharply against his pale fur, pointed length thick ... and made slightly thicker near the base, although Dimitri isn't fully aroused just yet.
--
Claude's breath catches; it's distinctly non-human in ways he hadn't quite predicted, and that really shouldn't turn him on more but somehow it does. Maybe the church is right about him...although he thinks this thought without any particular regret. There's no moral purity that could be worth passing this up, at least not in Claude's opinion.
"Wouldn't you rather find out for yourself?" he asks sweetly in response to Dimitri's question, even as he shakes off the inaction of admiration in order to reach out and run his fingers up along the shaft of Dimitri's cock. Gods, it feels so much hotter than the rest of him...probably because he can feel Dimitri's bare skin here, unimpeded by fur.
--
Teasing, teasing, teasing- always teasing, whether with his words as he challenges Dimitri even after having just now warned him on the importance of quiet, or his fingers as he glides them against burning hot skin. Dimitri presses his forehead against the bars while his free hand digs into one, a rumble of a noise shaking through him. Every hot breath can be felt now, sending those dark curls fluttering. Still, Claude made the challenge. He won't back down.
That's why the hand at his waist moves upwards, claws dragging against and catching various bits of Claude's clothing until he can scrape them against the side of his neck and along his jaw. Not for the first time, Dimitri finds him so delicate... and it feels good to remind himself of that as his fingers go into those soft curls and twist.
--
Claude makes a low sound in his throat that's only partially pain at his hair being pulled. Honestly, there's something hot about it, and not just the roughness of it being suggestive; the pain itself seems to have an intoxicating quality. There's a promise of pleasure to contrast it almost baked into the sensation, like salt used to enhance the sweetness of a dessert.
But Claude doesn't want to get too distracted from what he's doing. They have a decent amount of time yet, he just got here, but this is definitely something he doesn't want either of them to have to cut short. Besides, after weeks of dwelling on fantasies of sex with Dimitri, how can he resist exploiting this opportunity for all it's worth? Even if he could hold back and go slow, Claude doubts he'd have the discipline to do it...this time, anyway.
So after exploring Dimitri's length with his fingertips, getting a feel for him...he wraps his hand around Dimitri's length and moves his hand, slowly. It's dry, for now, so he can't afford to go too fast or too rough yet; maybe once he's worked Dimitri up enough, gotten enough pre-come out of him to slick his hand. (He hopes Dimitri's biology mimics a human's in that regard.)
--
Faintly, Dimitri had thought that would be the reaction, considering how worked up Claude had gotten at the idea of what his fangs and claws could do. It hadn't been particularly focused a thought, but it had been somewhere in the back of his mind. Before he can explore this more, however, those calloused palms wrap around him, and a full body shudder wracks Dimitri's body. His claws graze along Claude's scalp as his fingers tighten their grip so slightly. The rest of his body seems to know what to do, however, hips jerking into Claude's hand.
The good news is that Claude doesn't have to work particularly hard to coax something from Dimitri's cock. All too soon, it seems, and he's dripping that translucent liquid out from the tip, down onto Claude's hand. The slowly growing knot at the base of his cock might indicate some of the reasoning for that, on a biology level... Better to slide in and anchor one's self if the passage is nice and wet. But that's only if he's paying any mind to such fun little biology lessons, and not the way Dimitri experimentally dips his hand lower again to curl his fingers around Claude's neck.
--
Oh, heaven help him.
Claude hadn't quite processed that Dimitri's cock has a knot until it starts expanding as he strokes him, and once he realizes it he feels as though the knowledge may straight up kill him. He can't not think about it - about how it would feel to have Dimitri fuck him with that, what it would be like, if it could even fit. (Claude doesn't know the answer to any of those questions, but his eagerness to find out is downright embarrassing.)
He wants to tell Dimitri what he's thinking - he's sure it'd work Dimitri up like nothing else, telling him that he's thinking about having that cock inside him, about being fucking knotted by him(gods the church really was right about him, he wishes he had some kind of shame because he feels like this is the sort of thing one ought to feel shame about). But...he can't, can he? It'd be cruel. Dimitri's stuck in that cage. Claude's going to have him out of there eventually, but getting him worked up over something Claude can't make happen in a timely fashion, over something that's straight up impossible right now...that's exactly the kind of thing Dimitri doesn't want. The kind of thing that's hurt Dimitri in the past. So he's forced to bite his tongue - almost literally - as he stares at Dimitri's knot, trying to think of some way to tell Dimitri how appealing he finds it without teasing him with something he can't have.
He's so preoccupied that it doesn't occur to him that the fixed attention may say something on its own. Of course, his hand is working even as he thinks, more readily as it becomes slicker and is able to stroke Dimitri without any risk of hurting him, so the Intseh may not be in any state to notice anything.
--
Frankly, Dimitri does get extremely close to not noticing just what's ensnared Claude's attention so much. Feeling this level of attention, this sort of pleasure, has thrown all his senses off. All he can focus on is that hand along his arousal, slick and working ever faster to the point that he's rocking his hips against it. The entire time, his hand at Claude's neck keeps the man's head angled just enough for Dimitri to drink in his expression: the flush that's darkened already dark skin, the way those lips are parted and slick, that brilliant gaze focused completely on him. It's an attractive sight even ignoring what's happening down at his cock... which means that the two only enhance one another, his claws pricking into and releasing from Claude's neck in quiet rhythm.
But such focus on Claude's face means he eventually does realize that something in particular has grasped his attention, and Dimitri takes a gulp of air so that he can pull his attention down to see what exactly has got it. The good news for Claude is that he doesn't realize what he's actually thinking. Instead... Dimitri's gaze flicks towards Claude's own pants, a faint curiosity remembering to rear its head. It occurs to him, then, that if he has the opportunity....
Claude may want to pay attention to where Dimitri's hands are going now. One stays at his neck, claws still twitching against skin with every stroke of Dimitri's cock... but the other goes to his pants, now, Dimitri's hand considerably larger than Claude's as it roughly presses up between his legs.
--
Claude's so wrapped up in his own head that his gasp when Dimitri's hand presses against him through his pants as almost as much surprise as arousal. It feels like fire is coursing through his veins now, and his free hand grips the bars to brace himself as he rolls his hips into Dimitri's hand. "Oh, fuck," he breathes.
He slows his stroking briefly, if only so he can slide his hand all the way down Dimitri's length, slick palm smoothing over that swelling knot. A brief thought occurs to him, out of nowhere - how much is Dimitri likely to come? Is it...a lot? Claude doesn't have a lot of experience with knotted dicks(in point of fact, he has zero), but it seems like logically the knot might be to seal in...a lot of semen. How much of a mess are they going to have on their hands here? And can Claude - who has to walk back to his room, through a monastery that might not have totally empty halls, keep his clothes respectably clean?
That doesn't stop him from testing what happens if he squeezes that knot a bit before sliding his hand up the rest of Dimitri's cock, though. His curiosity is going to get him killed one of these days, he swears.
--
It's such a little thing, that gasp. It's soft, feather light, hardly a noise at all... Yet the sound of it out of always confident and controlled Claude ignites a hunger in him that no food could ever satisfy, and there's no stopping the way his fingers twitch tighter into his neck to the point of actually scraping across his skin, leaving deep red marks. Fortunately for Claude, the hand between his legs is a bit more controlled. No claws, only the grinding from the heel of his palm right into the firm arousal he can feel there. It's not the most expert movement... but at this stage, Dimitri still might be able to get away with it. Anything to try and draw out more of those noises from Claude's lips.
Of course... that's when Claude isn't doing the very same to him first. New as it may be, Dimitri has been adjusting to the pleasure of those fingers stroking him, enough that he almost doesn't think too hard when they drift even further downwards. Not until they squeeze down, however, and the sudden burst of pleasure is an electric spark to his entire spine. He jolts sharply against Claude's hand, forehead digging against the bars while his face contorts in a look of almost violent pleasure. He actually snarls, low and deep, lip curling across the white of his fangs.
In Claude's grip, there's an even hotter pulse from his cock, a giveaway even without Dimitri trying to rut further into his fingers.
--
Claude makes another sound, low in his throat, that's almost a groan. Even he couldn't say for sure what it's in response to - those claws on his neck, the hand rubbing roughly against him through his pants(he'd better pull himself out of them soon, he notes absently, or he's going to come in his pants like an awkward teenager), or that delicious reaction he gets out of Dimitri when he squeezes his knot. Probably all of those things combined, if he's honest with himself...and he's one of the few people he doesn't often lie to.
"Damn, you're so hot like this," he murmurs, voice breathless and hungry in a way Dimitri's never heard it before. "You'd wreck me if you could really get your claws on me, wouldn't you? And I'd love it..." He's stroking Dimitri still, slower than before now - but what he's lost in speed he's made up for by being thorough, hand stroking all the way from knot to tip instead of just the more slender part of the shaft. Worse(or better), he gives the knot a squeeze every time he strokes upwards, incorporating it into the rhythm. He's clearly not trying to drag this out.
--
Dimitri has wanted very few things, for a very long time, now. Peace, quiet, a satisfyingly violent end to his life- those were the only things he let himself want. With Claude's inclusion into his life again, the occasional food has also edged itself into its subconsciousness, despite him trying to temper his own expectations for the future when such visits will inevitably end.
Yet now, right now, hearing him like this, seeing him like this-
"I want you." Three words that come from deep in him, from the back of his throat to the pit of his arousal. Deeper still, maybe, although that's territory that's far harder for Dimitri to currently understand than this. His hand shifts, claws meant to keep Claude right in face even as the Intseh squirms against the bars. The other hand moves as well, threatening to dig into Claude's pants and tear them right off. "Claude- it's-" There's no language he really has, has ever learned, to signify he's approaching his end in quick order now... although it's probably easy to tell with Claude's hand on his dick.
--
Claude makes another breathless, heated little sound in his throat; he doesn't think anything has ever sounded hotter than those three words from Dimitri do. Even through his pants, Dimitri might feel how they go straight to Claude's cock.
Fortunately for them both, Claude knows full well what Dimitri is trying to say - and would be able to pick up on the cues even if he didn't say anything. Getting Dimitri off has kind of become his goal here, after all; of course he ought to expect it happening imminently. He tips the head of Dimitri's cock slightly back towards Dimitri himself; fur, he reasons, will be easier to clean off than Claude's clothes, even if Claude has to spend several minutes of their precious time fetching him water to clean himself up with.
"Show me what you look like when you're coming for me," he breathes, hand sliding down to Dimitri's knot again and giving it a rougher squeeze than he's yet dared before dragging his fingers back up the shaft again - tight, like he's trying to pull the orgasm out of him. He's watching Dimitri with an almost feverish intensity burning in those emerald eyes.
--
Both of them are lucky that this is Dimitri's first proper experience. It's the foreign pleasure more than anything that strangles his snarles, reins back the moans he wants to make, or else, well... The sounds he'd make when his arousal hits its absolute peak would be far from quiet.
It's hard to think, hard to speak, hard to do anything but grip the bars of his cage so tightly that the metal seems to make a soft whine of complaint itself, and Claude is lucky that Dimitri repositioned his other hand as claws tear through his pants. His orgasm splatters against his fur, a thick and heavy mess that's enough to drip back down onto Claude's hand, hotter in the immediate aftermath, at least for the time being. And then, in direct contrast to the simple shot of a human... It doesn't... stop. Claude was right. A knot is, in fact, meant to lock in quite a bit of semen. If there's any good news, it's that the initial orgasm is the only thing to shoot it out with so much strength. The rest is much more... low pressure, although part of that may be how Claude has used gravity against it, hitting more Dimitri's hips when it manages to get that far at all. The rest, well... The rest is something Claude will find coating his fingers and the rest of Dimitri's cock quite steadily.
Dimitri himself hardly seems to notice the mess. Hardly surprising, considering its his first good orgasm in... ever. He slumps against the bars, hair mussed up where it clings to metal, and his heavy breathing comes in slow steady pants, occasionally broken by a shudder as he works through his orgasm.
...It may take some minutes.
--
Claude is, in keeping with his other reactions so far, much more turned on by this than he should be. In the cold light of practicality, it may occur to him to wonder just how comfortable it'll be if Dimitri knots him and pumps that much into him; right now, when he's painfully turned on, all he can think of is how hot it is, and how much he wants it. The potentially uncomfortable consequences don't even cross his mind.
It's hard to tell if it's wickedness or consideration that keeps Claude working Dimitri's cock - albeit at a slightly slower pace - as Dimitri just keeps coming. His hand becomes a lost cause almost immediately, so having accepted that, he resolves to help Dimitri ride out his climax until it's completely over. He may have a sore wrist by the end of it, but this is absolutely worth it.
"I didn't know there would be so much," he murmurs, eyes flicking up to Dimitri's face. He's not entirely sure Dimitri's going to be able to process anything he says right now, but he feels like he should say something. "I guess you wouldn't know if all Intseh come like this, so maybe I'll just take this as confirmation that I'm just that good."
--
If there's any good news for the future state of Claude's ass and all that's connected to it, it's that the amount of come seems to quietly but steadily decrease on its own. Still coming, mind, but less and less as the second pass on. Even for all that Intsehli are generally a lot more sturdy than their human counterparts, they still have their own limits, after all. And who knows... Maybe Claude's own hand is helping speed up the process.
Dimitri definitely can't give any answers. All he can do is slowly recover, even as his hips grind closer to Claude's hand with another shudder. It's hard to pull his mind together when he's still being touched like this... And Claude will get to witness the shift from twisted in pleasure to something a lot more... quiet. Almost relaxed, even when Dimitri's brow winds together in response to a particular movement of Claude's hand. It's the most at ease the Intseh has ever looked outside of being asleep, the kind of pleasant blank headed space that comes with something near an afterglow.
Eventually, he seems to recover enough to blink a few times out of it, and his mind manages to remember that he's still holding onto Claude. Refocusing on him, his hand reaches up to start tugging loose at Claude's pants. "You..."
--
Claude shivers; he's still very obviously hard. "Looking to return the favor?" he asks lightly. "I'm not going to complain..." Granted, with one of his hands positively coated, he can't help much in getting his pants unfastened, and he'd prefer it if Dimitri doesn't rip them any more than they already are. Hopefully the Intseh can manage.
It's only when Dimitri's cock seems to have stopped pulsing entirely that Claude finally relinquishes his hold on Dimitri, casually flicking some of the excess come off his hand. There's enough that it actually splatters somewhat onto the dusty ground when he does.
--
That's rather a lot to ask of someone who's really only recently stopped accidentally destroying wax paper. Still, Dimitri seems to have a slightly better grasp of things now that he's no longer in the throes of his own pleasure. He's by no means gentle as he pries his claws from Claude's neck to undo his pants, by at least they're still... mostly... in tact.
With his own dick now well known, Dimitri is curious to see just what he has to compare to, and pauses as he frees Claude's own, ears flicking slightly. This is just as different for him as it is for Claude, after all.
--
"It's...not as impressive as yours, I know." Claude laughs self-consciously. Granted, Dimitri's a monster and a lot of his size is just proportional, but still...after seeing Dimitri, after all that, Claude can't help but feel like his own climax is going to be an anticlimax.
--
"Does it matter?" In contrast, Dimitri hardly cares at all what the size difference between them is, so long as he can pin Claude in place one way or the other. Not completely to his satisfaction... but right now even a grip is more than enough. He displays that adequately enough as he sinks his fingers around Claude's neck again to pull him upwards, forcefully tilting the other's head up until he's looking at nothing but Dimitri. The bars are too close together for him to even think of getting his head through, and it's a close call honestly even with just the more muzzle like structure of an Intseh... But Dimitri presses all the same, pulling Claude close enough until he can drag his tongue hotly along the curve of his neck. "I want you. All of you."
It hadn't escaped him how Claude has reacted to hearing that the first time, after all.
While Claude is distracted by his mouth and claws, Dimitri gets back to the point, folding his fingers carefully folding around that arousal. Even as foreign territory as this might be, he still knows enough to mind where he puts his claws. It's by far not an experienced grip... But it will certainly be different, with the soft fur and pads of his hands enveloping Claude.
--
It's different from anything Claude's ever felt, and he shudders even as his hips rock into Dimitri's touch. Dimitri's tongue is a rough, hot swipe against his skin, and the words are a jolt of heat directly to his gut. (It's more than just that, there's flattery and even feelings involved in hearing Dimitri say that - in Dimitri bothering to go so far as to actually reassure Claude that he wants him, at Dimitri emphasizing that it's Claude himself that he wants more than he wants any specific physical part of him. But right now, so close to his orgasm, those parts are too tangled in the pleasure he's feeling to fully process; they'll get properly digested later.)
And he really is close, so much so that it hurts. His hips are seeking that friction because it's really all he needs; as soon as Dimitri actually starts moving his hand properly, Claude's going to be finished.
--
If it's friction he wants, even Dimitri can do that much. His eye narrows at the way Claude squirms in his grip, directly to his hand, and he mimics the way that Claude had touched him- long strokes from base to tip, pad grinding against the hot skin he has a hold of. It really is a surprise at how quickly Claude comes in his hand, the mess joining the white already sticking to Dimitri's fur to begin with, and he keeps Claude in place as he drinks in every little bit of his reaction.
He still doesn't let him down, even then.
--
Claude groans Dimitri's name as he finally climaxes, turning his head to press his mouth against the arm still holding onto the bars to muffle himself as Dimitri strokes him through it. He's breathing hard as he comes down again - which happens much faster than it does for Dimitri, the Intseh will note - but doesn't make any immediate move to pull away. Not that he could.
"Fuck," he murmurs with something like breathless amusement, turning his head so that he can speak clearly again. "That was...incredible. And probably insane to do, under the circumstances, although as long as we can avoid getting caught I'd still do it as many times as we could get away with..." He grins at Dimitri. "I can't even imagine what the church would have to say if they caught me at this, though."
--
"Sin and blasphemy, likely," Dimitri says in the kind of bored tone of someone who's heard the words tossed around so much for worthless reasons that they, in turn, have ceased to have any worth to him. With Claude now more into it, Dimitri carefully lowers him back with something almost approaching reluctance and removes his fingers from around his neck. (Claude will have some fun trying to figure out excuses for those marks.) His other hand is a bit messy now as well, although it doesn't hold a candle to what he's done to Claude's own. A slight shake doesn't get nearly as much of it off, either, and he stares blankly down at it for a moment in thought... before raising it up to his mouth for a quick lick.
He's going to have to clean his fur one way or another, isn't he?
Even as he does that, however, he glances quietly up over at Claude. Now that he's seen his impulse through and the arousal is fading... Another quiet feeling is ebbing through, and he doesn't know what to make of it.
--
Claude can't help grinning as Dimitri tastes him on his fingers. Holding the Intseh's gaze, Claude raises his own dirtied hand to his mouth and, rather deliberately, sucks one fingertip clean while Dimitri watches.
Unintentional eroticism is incredibly charming from Dimitri, but Claude's a fan of intentional, carefully executed flirtation when it comes to the things he does.
Still, there's no way he's cleaning his entire hand that way. There's so damn much of it that it'd quickly become more gross for him than erotic. Luckily there's a water pump in the courtyard. Claude tucks himself back into his pants with his free hand, then gets to his feet. "I'm gonna go clean up with some water. Should I bring you some to wash up with yourself?"
--
Oh.
Well. There's definitely something to be said for experience and purpose when it comes to some things, and Dimitri is quickly learning that when it comes to the sexual as he watches Claude's lips wipe away all traces of him from one finger.
He's only snapped out of it when Claude starts to get up, and he blinks a few times. "I suppose that is an option..." Even with how much Claude spoils him with his visits, it's still easy for him to forget that little things such as this are within his reach and he doesn't have to rely on his own methods for getting clean and such. While Claude goes to get the water, Dimitri takes the time to just shuck out of his pants entirely. Better to be thorough if he's getting a chance like this. And... it helps keep his mind occupied now as well, still puzzling over how things are now undeniably different between the two of them.
--
Claude returns a minute or two later, both hands now clean and carrying a small bucket full of water. He sets it down just outside the cage - there's no way to get it through the bars - within easy reach of Dimitri. He'll put it back (and rinse it out, just to make sure there's no evidence) when Dimitri's finished with it. Then he sits down again, eyes warm as he watches Dimitri.
"Not really how I expected my visit to go tonight...not that I'm complaining, mind you."
--
"...Thank you." The water definitely makes his job easier, although it's strange to clean himself when often he's just dunked into water to be rid of the blood after executions. Still, he doesn't tally with it. It's not as if he's doing it for fun. Once he's clean as he can make himself, even where things got sticky beneath the waste, Dimitri shakes his hands free.
It hasn't escaped him that the food is still right where he left it, not that far from where he and Claude touched one another. Dimitri settles himself near it again, glancing back over at Claude almost uncertainly as he does so. "...It was not something I intended to do." Then again, Dimitri did a lot of things he hadn't exactly planned to do. That's nothing new, in some ways, although this particular result certainly is. Now he sort of wants to go to sleep, but his hunger, as always, leads his decisions tonight.
...But not entirely. As they sit there together, Dimitri making his way through an egg, the Intseh keeps glancing up at Claude- the exact opposite of how their night had started. Yet it doesn't take long for a decision to be made, and he cuts through the honey cake roughly in half. He's not starting with dessert. Rather... Putting his half on the majority of the wax paper, he tugs more of it free to nudge over to the bars. It's an awkward, almost shy move... and, for once, more than the gentle touches in their early meetings, more than the sharp bursts of mocking laughter from that very afternoon, Claude might be able to see more of the boy he'd first met so many years ago. The same one who'd been able to smile at him so easily, who'd reached out to him from the bars of his room, who'd wanted to make sure that Claude had honey candy to savor on his own as well so that the two of them could be happy together.
Claude has always known, had faith, that Dimitri is still himself beneath everything the Church has warped him to be... but for right now, in the comfortable afterglow and more comfortable food, it might be a little easier to see that through the cracks.
--
Claude smiles at the gesture, and this one reaches his eyes in a way that many of those quick, easy smirks never do. He doesn't make any protests that he doesn't need any treats, that he can go get his own if he wants them; instead, he accepts Dimitri's generosity, taking his half of the cake and taking a deeply contented bite.
More than ever, he's convinced of two things: one, that his plan to free Dimitri is absolutely necessary; and two, that the larger plan of giving Dimitri the good life he wants him to have, the good life Dimitri deserves, is going to work. Dimitri - the real Dimitri, the one capable of the full spectrum of emotions, who can be happy and shy and normal - was never destroyed. Just buried. And the defensive layers over him are capable of being removed.
"I'm glad you did," he says, taking another bite. Then he grins. They don't have time for a too in-depth discussion of feelings or ramifications tonight, and there's a lot of things that can't be said yet while Dimitri is still at the church's mercy, so Claude opts to change the subject - and he has the perfect topic to jump to. One that's plenty fun to talk about on its own. "By the way...how much did you get of that whole incident with Carnius earlier? I know it wasn't in Intsehli, so I thought you might've missed some of the nuances, and I'd hate for you not to be able to enjoy the full extent of it. I don't mind offering a translated version..."
--
New emotions are difficult. Taking pleasure at the expense of people he hates isn't. Dimitri perks up a little bit at the reminder of the afternoon, pausing where he's about to stuff a smoked pepper into his mouth. "You humiliated him," Dimitri says, eye narrowing in clear pleasure that's partially from the memory and partially as he takes in the pepper and all its cheesy glory. He pauses, savoring both with a few flicks of his tail, before looking to Claude again. "Deer were mentioned, but I am not sure how."
--
Claude grins - smug, confident, relaxed - and launches into a proper retelling of exactly what he said, now in a language Dimitri knows well. He's able to repeat much of what he said word for word, letting Dimitri in on the nuance, on how he trapped Carnius with humiliating lies that the man had to pretend were true because Claude framed the actual truth as even more mortifying. How Claude had encouraged the boy to be respectful to even things that can't speak, and even more so to things that can. How Claude all but called Carnius incompetent to his face, and stupid too, and got away with it by couching it in careful words and diplomacy and potentially innocent misunderstandings.
--
Claude's clever tongue has always been a point of note, from the way he so easily weaves Intsehli on his tongue to how even Dimitri has been able to tell he's a wordsmith in his native language. That's always been a sort of vague distant understanding, however. Now, there's another word Dimitri can think of that suits the handsome man before him, and that's storyteller.
Dimitri had actually been there when Claude had dragged Carnius through the mud, yet he feels as though he's experiencing all of it anew as it's described to him in detail. He's not been good at holding back emotion or action for a long time... and hearing Claude talk, of course it's impossible for him to fight back the vindicitve grin that spreads over his face. It's hard to eat as the other weaves his tale, because it feels as though he's always on the verge of snickering, if not laughing.
It's... been a long time since he's felt he could laugh like this for anything, even if it's more than a little spiteful this way.
By the time Claude finishes, Dimitri has curled up slightly on his side, still picking through his food with clear satisfaction. The night feels too good; he doesn't know what to do with it. "He deserves that and a bit more," he says around an egg, tongue flicking out to make sure no bits are left on his mouth. "I've never liked him. He'd be missing an arm if not for how I'm restrained."
--
Claude chuckles. "Just don't get yourself in too much trouble, all right? The last thing I want is to show up here some night and they've moved you to a more secure cage, or they decide you're too much trouble and get a new executioner." Claude's eyes darken for a moment. "If we can't improve your situation in any other way...then at least I want to be able to keep having this."
Mostly, he's saying this to encourage Dimitri to behave himself for the next week. Claude thinks he can get his plan to break Dimitri out finalized by then, with his nose to the grindstone; he's certainly more motivated than ever, and he wasn't lacking in that area before. And while he could always improvise...it'd be better if Dimitri doesn't do anything that'd change their plans before Claude comes for him.
He rises, reluctantly, to his feet, grabbing the handle of the bucket so he can take it with him as he leaves. "I'll visit again tomorrow night, but that'll be the last night I can come for a little while. Have to take another trip outside the monastery. I've been cooling my heels here for too long, really." He smiles at Dimitri. "But I promise to bring you a better treat than any you've had yet once I come back."
--
At least... He wants to keep having this. Dimitri's gaze goes a bit distant as he looks out to the rest of the courtyard- the same sight that he's seen hundreds and hundreds of nights before, empty and dark and miserable. Distantly, he thinks of the more philosophical tangents he's gone on occasionally with Claude. More specifically, when he'd been so firmly wanting to do nothing but be entrenched in his steady misery because at least he'd grown numb to that instead of small bits of happiness making it worse.
He's feeling a little bit of that now. Everything is so- warm, soft, that he loathes the idea of returning to the same miserable food from the same hateful people in the same painful life. He wants to hold onto this. To Claude. That he can't, not really, is...
His claws curl in slightly against his palms. "They've kept me alive thus far," he says quietly, "and I can't promise anything." Dimitri's tail sweeps across the ground, already feeling restless. "...But I shall be here."
--
Claude smiles at that, another soft look that makes his eyes warm. He steps closer to the bars, not away from them. "Come here a sec."
--
"I was lead to believe that you were taking your leave." Still, Dimitri pushes himself up slightly, at least enough to move around what's left of the food and to the bars.
--
"I am. There's just something I want to do first." And Claude reaches through the bars, hooking a hand around the back of Dimitri's neck and pulling him close enough to press to the bars, head pressed against them and face between them. Then he leans in and kisses Dimitri, as best he can given the situational limitations.
It's neither long nor particularly deep, and then Claude pulls away, grinning, eyes sparkling. "I'll see you tomorrow, Dimitri."
And then he turns and saunters over to the pump, dumping the dirty water down the drain (and then rinsing the bucket out just to be safe) before finally leaving the courtyard. He's got some patchwork to do on his pants.
--
Claude's tongue really is too clever. Even after all they've done tonight, something as simple as a kiss leaves Dimitri off balance and staring in confusion. One would think it's the other way around.... but no. After all, a lot can happen that results in sex. But a kiss? That seems....
Good job, Claude, you've left him even more confused about his emotions than before.
At least the next night isn't so strange, and in fact might almost seem more in line with how their nights with one another usually pass, with the only notable difference besides a few awkward glances being that Dimitri tries to learn some of the English Claude had used to tear Carnius into next year. There's some minor inquiring on where, exactly, Claude is going- a change from the beginning where Dimitri seemed to ask about the outside world with more than enough reluctance for an army.
He still doesn't promise anything. But he does wait.