Chapter Text
“Are you alright?”
The voice behind him, soft spoken and deep, was still like an icepick to his skull. Lyon does not react, as any gratuitous motion would bring more pain. He breathes out, as loud as he dares, lips scarcely moving,
“Leave me be.”
He ceases talking. He breathes, the motion of the simple spoken command already triggering another shuddering wave of throbbing, nauseating agony from his forehead. His jaw is slack. It does not help much.
Blessedly, the figure behind him listens. Quietly, they walk away.
It is silent again.
The pain still does not cease.
His mouth fills with spit and he fights the urge to drool it out. His skull twinges, hot and furious and tight. His neck feels wrung, his back spasming, and he prays, fitfully, that perhaps this time the agony will last but one night only.
He is dimly aware of time passing. It crawls, hazy and sudoric, the throb of his blood in his forehead a timepiece that beats too loud, too slow. He stands. He can do precious little else.
His mitre was removed, of course, though it helped little. The pressure of his eyepatch bites at him, pressing on his empty socket too hard and not hard enough. Not for the first time he wonders if digging his fingers into the socket itself would alleviate or exacerbate his suffering.
He is no stranger to pain, but the unique agony of a megrim is different from the ache of a bruise or the sting of torn flesh. It offers no fast and done distraction, no bright clarifying light through the feverish haze of a vision, no– it saps him, gripping him like a vice and squeezing the energy from his very bones.
Lua sent or not, he resents them.
He will, perhaps, fortify himself enough to crawl back to his bedchambers soon. But not now. The thought of moving again sends another wave of spit to his mouth.
So he breathes. He aches. He stays standing still bent over the table, waiting for the pain to cease or the energy to do something about it.
He hears steps approaching before either happens.
Even Roathe, contemptible devil he is, knows to leave him well enough alone when he is so afflicted. The fact that he can hear the steps at all leaves the identity of the figure not much of a mystery.
Lua preserve him. He’s not certain if he will be able to be kind under the circumstances.
“I have medication, for these,” comes the knife-sound of the Drifter’s voice. Lyon’s closed eye does not open. His eyebrow crawls with little involuntary spasms.
“I get them, too. And if you don’t want it, I can… help you back to your room, if you would like.”
He rankles at the notion that he needs aid. Feels the words ringing hollow with false pretense, cloying sympathy that turns his stomach.
But. The medication… his throat bobs, jaw slack.
“Do not try to move me,” he breathes out.
“But. I am not opposed to trying this… medicine.”
The drifter shuffles closer, his bizarre clothing rustling, scraping like sandpaper in his skull. He watches through his cracked eye as a small leathery pouch is placed on the table next to him, and from within another case is retrieved, this one smooth resin. The drifter produces a small pressed pill, which he places on the tablecloth in front of him.
“Do not chew it or swallow it whole. Place it under your tongue and let it dissolve. You may swallow the spit you produce. It will taste of mint.”
Simple. He appreciates the detailed instructions and warnings, including the flavor. He places it in his mouth, nestled under his tongue as instructed, and waits.
“It will take time. Within one hour, though the speed depends on the person.”
Chalky, minty spit coats his mouth. He swallows, feeling the pill bubble under his tongue. And so he waits.
The drifter remains nearby, silent and unmoving. He does not talk, and he does not touch. He’s reluctant to admit he appreciates the companionship, but he is doubly glad for his silence.
Time passes. The medication dissolves. His skull still feels besieged.
He feels the waves in his blood, climbing his spine, crawling towards his forehead. His jaw twitches. His eye pounds, the halo of false light dancing in his vision, images blurring like they are not at rest. Agony, and then a moment of reprieve before repeating, over and over.
Lyon swallows. The filmy remainder of the medication lingers in his mouth. The motion triggers another rushing wave up his neck, through his jaw, to his skull, and he resigns himself for another blinding, skull splitting kick.
The feeling shivers up his face and breaks like a wave upon the shore. Agony still comes, but softer. Less like a brick to the head, more like a punch. Painful, but not as severe as before.
His jaw works slightly. The movement should be like knives in his temples, lancing to the center of his brain, but…
There is a dull echo, softer each time, the sensation trying to trigger but not getting enough momentum. The megrim is fading. Put out like water on hot coals. Steaming, but still- dying.
“Lua’s light…”
Relief fills him. It fills the space the pain once flowed, tingling through his skull and down his face in hot washes. A single hot tear leaks from his eye, staining the tablecloth dark where it lands.
“Feeling better, I take it?”
Lyon does not startle, but it is a close thing. He forgot the drifter was still there.
“Yes,” he whispers, his back relaxing a touch. The feeling continues to break over his crown, soft feather brushes of pain, but an acceptable kind. A manageable kind.
“It is… miraculous,” he continues, voice stronger.
“It is medicine, actually,” the drifter replies, voice teasing.
“A miracle of medicine, then,” he compromises. And it truly is. The affliction that would lay him out for hours or days at a time, vanquished in the time it takes to prepare afternoon tea. It is the very thing he prays for in the throes of agony.
He blinks. An answer to his prayers. A miracle.
The pill, or the one who brought it to him?
He looks at the drifter. Studies him, his expression. No malice in his eyes. No pity. Just… care. Concern. It is… strange, to him, to see eyes like this from anyone but Marie. Novel. But perhaps not terrible.
The drifter peers back down at him, his mismatched eyes glowing dully in the low light of the crypt. He moves himself closer to the table, sidling up to his good side.
“You can keep these here, if you like,” he starts, voice still quiet even though there is no longer a need to consider his hearing. Lyon frowns.
“Non, no-”
“I insist,” the drifter interrupts. “I have more. I am not going to run out by giving you some. Please, Lyon,” he continues, pressing the strange pillcase into his hand.
He smiles, softly. “Don’t suffer needlessly.”
Lyon’s fist closes around the pillcase slowly. He maintains eye contact with the drifter. Tyren. Slowly, he tucks it into the pouch at his waist.
He lets the silence linger, not quite certain how to respond. Thanking him, surely. But. The words. They wait in his throat, but do not come out.
Luckily, the other man breaks the moment first.
“The medication should stop the pain and last about one day. Do not take more than one a day, no matter how bad the pain, and do not take it until the pain starts, no matter how clear the warning signs are of an oncoming one.”
Lyon nods. Good. This is important, easy to remember. He commits it to memory.
“Anything else that I may need to know, Tyren?”
The man flushes, though why he cannot say. Perhaps the use of his given name? He does not know his surname, if he has one at all. He should ask, he thinks.
“Well. There is. One more thing.”
He clears his throat before starting again.
“It does not put you to sleep, but it may make you drowsy. And you will still have some symptoms. I recommend resting after taking it, and–”
Tyren pauses. Fidgets slightly, like a child at service who wants to play outside. He gives him a moment of grace to say what he needs.
“And to soothe any remaining pain, massage therapy is usually… effective.”
Tyren rushes to continue before he can form a single thought.
“And if you do not want me to do this, I understand, but I implore you to consider. It helps. A lot, in my experience. So I would hate for you to miss out. On the treatment! Because it is so effective.”
Lyon tries to keep himself impassive. It’s not quite working.
“And you would be massaging… what? And for what purpose?”
Tyren flushes again, color dusting his cheeks. “The muscles of your face, neck, jaw… the upper back possibly, but the entire spine is worth working in my opinion.”
“You are aware of the state of my back, yes?”
He smiles at that. “Yes, Lyon, I have eyes. And I can see the tension in it, along with everything else. Releasing that tension will help prevent the buildup of stress that causes migraines.”
It all sounds so… farcical. And yet.
And yet... If it could lessen the chance of a megrim…
“The amount and areas I do would be at your discretion, of course, and I can show you what I would be doing on, uh.” He pauses, grimacing, considering his options. “Roathe, I guess. So you might understand what I would do before I do it, if that would help.”
The thought of his hands on that loathsome man fills him with an ugly, unidentifiable emotion. Envy? Disgust? Spite? It is wholly unbecoming of him. Deeply shameful.
However, it solidifies his decision.
“No.”
Tyren closes his eyes. “I understand.”
“You will not be performing this on Roathe. You may try with me. If I find it agreeable, I will let Marie observe so that she may aid me as well, if you are not opposed.”
Tyren’s face splits with a wide grin. His joy is equal parts alarming and infectious. Lyon does not quite grin, but his mouth does twitch at the corners.
“Well, then,” he declares, voice bright. “Where would you have me?”
He does not seem to notice the double entendre. Lyon gracefully also chooses not to comment. He’s about to make it worse, after all.
“My quarters, please. Tyren.”
Lyon pushes back the feeling of wrongness at having someone besides himself in his room. It is not large, or ostentatious, with a simple wooden bedframe and wardrobe for his clothing. There are few decorations. A rug, a table. There is a single chair.
It is more than enough. It feels incredibly lacking with another viewing it.
Tyren is polite enough not to comment on anything, from the lack of personal affects to the state of undress he was in. His pellegrina and cinture had been removed, leaving him in his simple pants and his eyepatch.
He sits on the edge of his bed with his hands folded in his lap, the bleached white sheets crinkling under his weight. Tyren stands before him, eyeing the chair, the bed, the walls- finally back to his face and no lower. Lyon locks eyes with the other man, curious.
“How should we begin?”
Tyren grabs the chairback. “May I-?”
Lyon nods. He moves the chair closer, seating himself in front of Lyon so they could be face to face. He places a container of some sort on the table- though the priest could not tell you its contents, it looked innocent enough.
Tyren turns, facing him again, face serious. “Lyon. Thank you for letting me help you. I would like to go over some eventualities.”
Lyon inclines his head. “As you wish.”
“May I start by asking a sensitive question?”
“You may, but I might not answer.”
“That’s fair. Would I be wrong in assuming that you are not often touched by others?”
Not the most delicate soul, Tyren. “... You would not be wrong in that assumption, no.”
He nods, eyebrows furrowed. “Your nerves are not used to touch. Due to this, the sensation may at first be… strange. You may react strongly to this and…”
He trails off, eyes flickering to the floor and back to him. “It is. Embarrassing, potentially, but… it is normal for the reaction to this to be involuntary sounds. I would never judge you for making them, nor make fun of you. I want you to know that ahead of time.”
How kind. He appreciates the concern, though he does not believe this will be as challenging as he is making it seem.
“I do not cry out under the pain of my own hand. I do not see how this will be any more arduous.”
Tyren’s eyes shoot away, looking to the simple luminary carving hanging above the bed. “You say this, but it is different when you are not in control.”
He scoffs quietly. “We shall see.”
Tyren shakes his head before he looks to his face again. “May I ask another?”
Lyon nods.
“Would you be comfortable taking your eyepatch off? If not, I am happy to work around it. It is your choice.”
Lyon pauses. Considers it. Reaches for the strap beneath his hair, peels the leather from his face. He places it on the table next to the container Tyren placed earlier.
Moving this way exposes the healed wound from his self harm to Tyren. As he is blind in this empty socket, he cannot see his face as the mangled scar tissue comes to light.
As he turns back to look the man in the face with his remaining eye, he expects pity. Disgust. Revulsion.
He sees nothing of the sort on Tyren’s face. He is looking at his empty eye socket with consideration. With understanding. It almost infuriates him before his eye settles on the faded scar over the void-traveler’s mismatched silver eye.
Lyon stifles his temper. He would know the pain of losing an eye. Even if it did come back later. And was not lost under the same circumstances.
A bizarre man. So similar. So incredibly, impossibly foreign.
“The last thing,” Tyren begins, reaching for the container he brought and twisting the lid off, “is this. Lotion. Would you be alright if I use this while doing the massage? It lessens the skin-on-skin friction.”
Within is white cream with no strong scent. Marie uses something similar, when those upstairs are able to procure it for her, though hers usually smells of rosewater or orange blossom.
“I have no issues with this,” he replies. Tyren nods, applying a small amount to his hands and rubbing them together.
“Then would you mind if I began? If anything is too much, or you do not like it, tell me to stop and I will immediately.”
“I place myself in your capable hands,” he finds himself replying.
Tyren blinks at him. He blinks back, not certain what next he should do.
“I… will start with your face and neck, then,” he states, lifting his hands towards Lyon’s head.
His first touch is feather-light. The tips of his fingers brush along his hairline, over his temples and his jaw, up to his eyebrows. The pads of his thumbs press lightly in the corners of his eyes, brush the orbits of his skull and under the bones of his cheek. His neck is next, the planes of it stroked lightly before his hands return again to his head.
Tyren hums. “I see,” he says, like his skin is a puzzle he just found the template for.
His fingers press harder now. Still light, but with pressure. Into his temples. His cheek. Down his neck. Around his eye, and carefully into the ruined muscle of the damaged one.
His skin tingles. He is not used to the feeling, blood rushing, lymph flowing, skin warming under his touch. It is… nice.
He allows himself the confession. It is nice.
Tyren’s fingers card through his hair and he shivers. He breathes through his nose, surprised.
Before he can process the feeling they continue, pushing into pressure points at the back of his head, fingernails scraping lightly through his nape, frisson building in his skull as they massage.
Hot fingers knuckle into tight muscle along his ears, his jaw, his temples. They continue, pulling lightly at the roots of his hair and lifting his scalp, a delicious, fully body pleasure melting down his neck-
“hhah.”
What was that??
His eye flies open in shock. He hadn’t realised he closed it. His mouth- he. The sound. Was that… noise, truly from him? His neck flushes in embarrassment.
His eye darts to Tyren’s face. The other man is not reacting, his eyes focused on where his fingers were pressing at his scalp. He was unmoved. Unbothered. Like the bawdy sound he made was not even worth mentioning.
He had said that, though. Before. That due to his lack of casual touch, that he may cry out. And that he would not pass judgement on him should it happen. And Lyon had. in his arrogance. brushed off his expertise.
Lyon is suddenly very glad for the other man’s foresight. That Tyren was able to anticipate this and warn him, so Lyon would not demand him to stop at the… unseemly side effect, for the sake of decorum.
He very much wants the massage to continue.
He relaxes. Tyren’s hands work into his scalp, his neck, the muscles of his cheek. The wonderful thrill of pleasure washes down his body as he continues, the pressure of his hands increasing. His muscles are pinched and driven against the grain, along their lines, rolled under deft fingers until they throb with the sting of pain and the rush of invigorated blood.
It is exquisite. He allows his lips to part, for his breath to pant out in little cries as sore spots are found and bullied until they release their agony. It is different, when he is not in control. He rather likes it, the surprise of an unknown sensation. Of hands on his body.
He moans as Tyren’s hands pinch his trapezius on both sides and rolls. It is involuntary. His face flushes, but. Tyren said it was fine.
Tyren’s hands are still on his shoulders. “Would you mind if I take a look at the muscles of your chest for a moment? I believe you have a serratus issue.”
“Ah, yes, of course,” he breathes, leaning back a touch to allow him access. His thighs fall open to allow him closer. Tyren turns abruptly, busying himself with the lotion for a moment before carefully sidling between his open legs and touching his chest.
He repeats the process here, palms working the cream into his skin, fingers gliding along his pectorals, his arms, his abdomen, identifying the problems before digging in harder.
Lyon’s breath stutters as Tyren’s hands coast along his waist. His fingers dig in and slide up his side, pushing a line of muscle against the grain, pain blooming as a problem makes itself known.
He moans, low and deep, as both of Tyren’s hands move to work the knot. It feels like pressure on a healing bruise- deep, throbbing, excruciating. His leg twitches reflexively, bumping into Tyren’s, little cries falling unbidden from his mouth when his knuckles press in harshly. It is acutely painful. It is deliciously satisfying to feel it be worked until it dissipates.
A sigh hisses through his teeth as he smoothes his hands soothingly over the recovering muscle. Pleasure rolls up from the spot, warm and tingly, joining the rest that flowed through his body.
“Well. I believe that. Uh. Does it for the front,” Tyren states, clearing his throat, hot fingers moving back to the side of Lyon’s neck.
“Would you mind if I started on your back after this? You would need to lay on the bed. Face down,” he explains, eyes focused on the juncture of his shoulder he was working.
“Yes, I- Please,” Lyon begs, thighs shifting. Tyren scoots back, standing and turning towards the table where his lotion rested, allowing Lyon to rise from the bed and stretch.
Lyon realizes two things as he stands.
One: that the residual pain of his megrim has completely faded. Tyren’s hands have successfully flushed all traces of it from his system.
Two: that he was desperately, noticeably hard.
Panic lances his heart. His cock was tenting the fabric of his pants along the crease of his thigh where it lay, shamefully hard from the attention he was receiving. Gods above, he was depraved. Quickly, while Tyren’s back is still turned, he lowers himself facedown onto his bed, praying desperately to Lua that due to his focus that Tyren has somehow not noticed. *
Carefully, he flexes his thighs, willing himself to calm down. It cannot be seen now, and he will simply ignore it. As Tyren has been ignoring his… noises. He breathes deeply, fortifying himself. This will be fine. He will be fine.
Tyren’s hands once again lavish his body with the lotion, hands light, palms pressing to his skin. He shivers.
This may not be fine.
His fingers palpate and examine the wretched state of his back, coasting along the deepset scars from years of self inflicted pain, the metallic knobs of his spine, the strange smooth plates above his waist. He hums, thoughtful. His fingers run along the fusion of his skin and the foreign material, the dark angry scar of the serum.
“Did you favor this leg, before?” Tyren asks, the back of his hand tapping on the muscle of his left thigh.
Lyon perhaps shouldn’t be amazed that he could know this from his simple examination. He finds that he is anyway. “Yes, but not since my… transformation,” he states, voice muffled by his sheets.
Tyren nods, humming.
“You carry tension in that side more,” he explains, his hands beginning to press deeper into the planes of his upper back. “I know I began this for your migraines, but… In the future,” He continues, palms pushing his shoulders in a wonderful pinching roll, "There are philosophies of health that speak of holding tension in the body. How an issue in the leg might manifest as a problem in the hip or neck, and so on. That the body is connected in ways that may not seem obvious.”
Lyon hums, mouth a little slack. Fascinating.
“And I am not saying that this will cure you- this is just to help you relax, so that they may not trigger as often. But. I can tell you have a lot of tension in your hips and lower back. Would you be alright if I helped you get rid of it?”
Lyon would happily let Tyren flay him alive at this point. He would do anything, anything at all to keep his hot hands on his skin, pressing the pain and worry out of his body touch by heated touch.
“Of course, Tyren,” he says, eye closed.
He wasn’t aware of what he was about to cause. How could he?
Tyren’s hands move down his back, stretching and pressing the skin-steel along the lines where it hardens, the tensions there stinging and releasing under his thumbs. He breathes, an edge of sound as his hands travel lower, manipulating the semisolid plaques along his lower back. Makes a noise as he presses down, rolling the still flexible surface.
They continue down, gently aligning with the cinch of his waist, on the hem of his pants, his warm hands pressing to the sides of his hips lightly and-
His nerves alight all at once, and his breath punches out of him in a wavering “Hhouuu,” as Tyren does… Something.
His brain seems to be playing catchup, mind not able to understand the input his nerves are sending him. His skin feels alight, sizzling with some supernova of sensation too big to put into words. Tyren’s hands grip and push deep into his muscles, into the tough flexible meat of his transformed hips and legs, and his body sings.
His breath catches, throat moving as he moans, head dropping to the covers. His fists clench and release, shivering with the intensity of the feeling. His hips writhe involuntarily as Tyren’s thumbs catch on some hot tight cord of muscle and drag through them, fibre spreading and shooting furious blinding sparks up his spine.
If his brain wasn’t half a minute in the past, he might have been ashamed of the noises he was making. His mouth hung open, breath timed to the movements of Tyren’s hands, licentious cries forced from the bottom of his throat at every wave of sensation that spiralled up his back.
Tyren’s hands work mercilessly, pushing through the agonizingly tight tissue and then smoothing over it in broad, calming strokes, moving up the planes of his ruined back and back down to his deformed hips. His eye waters, hips twitching, cock grinding into the mattress below him.
It is pain. It is pleasure. It is both, and neither, rolling into something his mind can barely process, nerves burning and skin prickling, his body moving under some primal instinct triggered by the overwhelming sensation.
There is nothing- nothing- in his life that has ever felt like this.
“Lua, preserve-vah, ah,” he whines, abandoning the prayer and pitching his voice, thrusting again as his hips are pushed into the mattress.
Base needs create base responses. His cock, throbbing and trapped, demands relief as well. His overtaxed mind, his overstimulated body– He was not functioning as a rational man. He was like an animal. And like an animal, he rutted, desperate for the release any way that he could get it.
Tyren’s hands once again grip deeply into his waist and he groans, feeling a tension in his skull. His body thrums. His throat works as he pants out little cries.
He needs- he needs-
Lyon clenches his thighs and humps the bed again, grinding his leaking cock into it, Tyren’s hands hot and solid on his back, bearing down on him, pressing him tight–
His hips snap, and with a guttural, breathy moan he comes, surrendering to the hot throb of pleasure. His body echoes the feeling in every worked over muscle, limbs tingling and relaxed.
Gods above.
Pleasure rattles around his body, spreading and rebounding through every nerve, growing softer and softer until it melts into a peaceful hum.
He lays there for a moment, utterly still. Relaxed. At peace, like he has not felt in decades.
“Ah. Um. Did you- no, ah. Hm.”
Tyren’s voice peels him raw as he realizes what has happened. His eye snaps open. Tyren’s hands are still on his waist, unmoving.
“Do you- should I,” he starts again, voice wavering. Lyon is abashed, stricken with a sudden overwhelming need to hide. To be alone.
But on his slick skin, Tyren’s hands burn like a brand. He feels the touch, the grip, and wants–
No.
His throat constricts. He cannot- this is-
Shame floods him, hot and itchy. He burns with it.
“Get out,” he breathes, voice like gravel.
Tyren’s hands fly from his skin. He misses their heat, the pressure, immediately. He hates himself for it.
“Lyon, I-”
"Fiche-moi la paix,*” he chokes out, skin still echoing with his touch.
He pushes himself up on his infested forearms. His hair clings messily to his face, his single eye wide and wild, skin flushed in uneven splotches.
“Leave me! Out!”
The drifter jerks backwards like his words are lashing his skin. He collides with the chair, knocking it over. He catches himself before he can trip over it, sending one last look over his shoulder. His eyes are wide. Alarmed. His face was flushed, arms pinwheeling as he all but throws himself out of the room.
He can hear his heavy footfalls fading as he flies down the hallway, and then silence.
His arms push him up as he rises to a kneel in the center of his bed.
Lyon is alone again.
His chest heaves as he tries to calm his breathing. His heart squeezes, stomach roiling. He buries his face in his hands.
Humiliating. Utterly humiliating. Mortifying. He is- his behavior was disgusting, uncontrolled, vulgar, profane-
“So.”
A salacious voice invades his ears. Roathe leans against his doorframe, his pose the picture of carefully curated casual interest. Lyon glares at him over his shoulder through his unkempt hair.
“The priest and the usurper. I was not aware you two had this kind of arrangement. Is this new? Shall I alert the sister?”
“There is nothing between us,” he grits out. Eye averted. Ashamed.
“Oh my. I thought men of the cloth were above such casual dalliances. How enlightening! Every day in this tomb I learn something new.”
Roathe’s tail flicks, eyes glinting with a sadistic light. “Was a good time had by all, or just by you?”
Lyon’s jaw ticks. He is aware of the state of himself: skin slick and oiled, hair disheveled, pants wet and uncomfortable from his inadvertent release. He is unaware of the state of the drifter.
He has thoughts, yes. Hopes. Vain ones. Sinful, unbecoming ones. But nothing he knows for certain.
His answer is silence.
“Hmm. How embarrassing,” the devil drawls, sounding like the cat that got the canary and the cream. He turns as if he’s about to walk away, looking over his shoulder at Lyon.
“The usurper may still be in the sanctum. Perhaps I can find him, see if he is, shall we say, frustrated? In need of a helping hand? Or tail, if he feels adventurous,” he crows, teeth flashing.
Lyon’s stomach burns, jealous though he holds no right to be. “You will do no such thing.”
The fingers of Roathe’s clawed hand tap against the wooden doorframe, one after another. He laughs, a callous sound that echoes in his empty room.
“You do not command me, priest.”
He leaves, tail swishing behind him as he, too, travels the hall back to the crypt.
Once again, the only sound is of his breathing. His only companion is the lotion Tyren abandoned in his haste to leave.
Slowly, he lowers himself back down upon his soiled bedding. His thoughts are spiraling, ugly things. Tomorrow, when he has clarity and distance from his embarrassing actions, he will beseech Marie to talk to Tyren for him, to help him beg for forgiveness for his untowards actions.
But for now, worked over and expended as he is, he falls into a blessedly dreamless sleep.