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The house is mostly dark and quiet, just like always. Soft light glows in the living room windows, curtains drawn tight across them. Reinhardt knocks at the door and waits, but he doesn’t have to wait long before it creaks open, wide eyes peering at him from the shadows of the entryway.
“Siebren,” he says, smiling broadly, and Siebren smiles back. It’s tentative. Hesitant. Siebren can’t look at him long before his gaze drifts to the floor, even after almost a year of weekly visits. Reinhardt reaches out, slipping his fingers under Siebren’s chin and gently guiding his face up again. “Missed you,” he says, and Siebren flushes and steps back to let him inside.
He’s barefoot, wearing dark leggings with a strap looped over his heel and a soft, oversized sweater. His standard fare, Reinhardt has discovered, now that Siebren’s gotten more comfortable around him. It took ages for him to be able to meet his eyes, let alone wear something other than business casual clothes to meet Reinhardt in his own home. They’ve come a long way.
There’s a long way to go, but Reinhardt is getting there, little by little.
There are papers scattered haphazardly across his coffee table along with two different tablets and a laptop open with the charger plugged in, cord snaking off behind the couch. He’s brought his work home with him again— he’s cringing even before Reinhardt says anything, scratching at the back of his head with one hand and gesturing with the other.
“I know, I know, just— I’m getting close to finishing this, and I can’t keep staying at the lab when the day shift gets there, I’m always underfoot.”
Reinhardt doesn’t point out that he has an office there he could be using instead, or that he’s spending all his free time looking at data and lost in his research. He touches Siebren’s face again, waits until he looks at him.
“As long as you’re getting rest, yes?” The guilty look on his face tell Reinhardt he isn’t, but he doesn’t push. Siebren looks anxious enough already, and Reinhardt knows why, but bringing it up will make things worse if he’s not ready to talk about it yet. Reinhardt cups his cheek with a soft sigh. “You’ll get some sleep after you finish work tonight, then?”
Siebren nods without looking at him, and Reinhardt lets his hand fall, heading over to the couch and sitting down. It’s not unusual for Siebren to hesitate before joining Reinhardt, but he isn’t normally wringing his hands and fidgeting in place quite so badly. Reinhardt waits; gives him the time and silence he needs to put his words together in the careful way he likes, until they taste right in his mouth.
“Have you come to a decision about… what we discussed last week?”
Reinhardt opens his arms and gestures for Siebren to come closer. He breathes out like he’s been holding air in his lungs for hours and crosses to room, crawling into Reinhardt’s lap with a rough exhale. Siebren straddles his thighs, and tucks his face into Reinhardt’s throat, arms pressed between them as Reinhardt rubs a palm up and down his back.
Siebren isn’t small— there is a lot of him, but not so much that Reinhardt can’t make him feel that way if he tries. Reinhardt holds him close, lets him hide in the curve of his shoulder.
He isn’t small, but parts of him are delicate, and people haven’t been as careful with him as they should. Siebren needs a soft touch, a steady hand. Reinhardt is doing his best.
He’s been coming to Siebren’s once a week for just over eleven months now, feeding him like clockwork. First from his wrist, polite and perfunctory. Then from his forearm, lingering there, as though Reinhardt was stoking a hunger in him instead of soothing it.
Then Siebren was in his lap, mouthing at Reinhardt’s throat before sinking his teeth in, clinging like he was scared he’d get away. Three months ago Reinhardt had taken his face in both hands and kissed him, his own blood still sharp on Siebren’s tongue. Siebren had gone absolutely liquid against him, whining into his mouth and opening for him, eager and docile all at once.
Now it’s their routine; Siebren crawls into Reinhardt’s lap and feeds, and then they kiss for a while, Reinhardt’s hands moving up and down his back. Over his biceps, and his thighs, massaging at the exposed arches of his feet. When they break apart he curls up in Reinhardt’s arms, settling there like he’d be content to never move again until finally dragging himself up to get ready for work.
Reinhardt wants more— wants to take Siebren apart, and put him back together. Wants to head out into the wilderness at night and let him talk about the stars for hours. Wants to fall asleep next to him, and wake up next to him. To take care of him when he won’t take care of himself.
Wants to be turned so they’d have all the time in the world together.
Siebren is too skittish for all that. Reinhardt has to let him set the pace, let him move forward on his own terms.
Last week he’d asked if Reinhardt would drop his other clients and feed him exclusively. The Blood Apron policies dictate that single client donors can be asked to donate up to five times a week, but no vampire needed that much blood, save newborns or vampires who’d suffered some kind of trauma. Young vampires regrowing an amputated limb, or recovering revenants pulled out of the ground after being buried for centuries, emaciated and feral.
Siebren certainly doesn’t need to feed that often. It isn’t about the blood.
It’s about having Reinhardt to himself.
Little by little. One step at a time.
Reinhardt had made the decision as soon as Siebren had asked, but he wanted to get things squared away with his supervisors first, make sure his other clients were assigned new donors. Now everything is taken care of, and Siebren can call Reinhardt any night of the week, and he’ll come running. Not that Reinhardt wouldn’t do that anyway, but the knowledge that Reinhardt would give him anything would make Siebren nervous instead setting him at ease.
He circles an arm around Siebren’s waist, and rubs at the back of his neck with his free hand. Noses into his temple. Squeezes him tight.
“I’m all yours, Siebren.”
Siebren shudders, turning his face into Reinhardt’s throat, fingers clawed now where they’re clutching at his clothes. He looks lovely like this, eyes black and teeth sharp, but Reinhardt hasn’t told him yet. He’ll get to it soon enough.
“Thank you,” Siebren says, lips moving against Reinhardt’s skin, toes curled and muscles tense.
“Anything you need,” Reinhardt replies, tilting his head to expose his throat more. “Go ahead, Liebling.”
Siebren presses his mouth to Reinhardt’s pulse once, then bites down, teeth sinking in slowly, carefully. He leaves them buried there for a moment, jaw flexing, then pulls back to drink. He’s never used his thrall— Reinhardt’s not entirely sure he knows how— but it’s still dizzying to feel Siebren feeding from him, breathing hard and grasping, neatly swallowing every last drop.
Reinhardt keeps his hands moving, touching Siebren everywhere he can reach as he takes his fill. He laps at the wound long after the blood has stopped flowing.
When he finally stops Reinhardt coaxes his face up and kisses him. Harder than usual, hungrier, pressing into the heat of Siebren’s mouth, arms tight around his waist. It would hurt if he were anyone else, but Siebren isn’t human.
People haven’t always been as careful with him as they should, but they haven’t been as rough as they should, either.
After a long while Reinhardt pulls back, mouth sore from Siebren’s fangs scraping, lips swollen with his kisses. Siebren’s eyes are still black, and Reinhardt runs a thumb underneath one with a smile.
“Beautiful,” he says, just to watch Siebren flush and hide his face again. He does, and Reinhardt laughs, soft and fond. “No, come here. Kiss me again.”
It takes a moment, but he slots his mouth against Reinhardt’s again, gets lost in it for a while.
Siebren has been in love with the stars for six hundred years, and Reinhardt for a few months.
Reinhardt doesn’t know much about the night sky, but Siebren will teach him.