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Kirei doesn’t know why Gilgamesh really sticks around for all of these years, but he supposes, despite both of their deceitful and distrustful natures, they’ve developed a sort of companionable trust toward one another. He doesn’t know why Gilgamesh stays, but he trusts that he will.
A part of it might be because of Saber. No doubt she’ll be participating in the next Holy Grail War, and Gilgamesh seems strangely fixated on her. “No one but me is allowed to love her in her ruin,” he says, and every time Kirei has to turn away as not to laugh, because Gilgamesh has no idea what love really is.
Gilgamesh “loves” Saber the way a thief loves gold. Of course, he would never compare Gilgamesh to a thief to his face. But their mindsets—the entitlement, the sense of possessiveness borne from a prideful desire to demonstrate his power through owning—are the same.
Or perhaps it would be more apt to compare him to the dragons of the old Western legends, those obsessed with treasure, hoarding it but never using it, only keeping it so that no one else can. It’s an appropriate metaphor, because medieval kings were always known for slaying dragons, were they not?
No, no matter what he says, Gilgamesh doesn’t love. He covets, but love is something else entirely—not borne of possession, but of degradation. It’s a humbling emotion that goes against every instinct in his body. Kirei knows because he swears to never feel such an emotion again. Not that he thinks he’s even capable of it, anymore.
The only times he hears the word anymore are every so often, when, on a whim, Gilgamesh will approach him while he’s sitting at his desk and he’ll climb on top of him, straddling his lap with arms wrapped around his shoulders, and he’ll say “Make love to me,” and then they’ll both laugh because it’s the most ridiculous euphemism for fucking they’ve ever heard of.
What he feels toward Gilgamesh isn’t anything close to love or even affection, but fucking him is the only thing that can bring him pleasure besides causing others suffering. Which is ironic, because he’s certainly not causing Gilgamesh to suffer—but maybe, in some abstract way, he is. There is a fine line between the climax of pleasure and pain, and wasn’t it called la petite mort, after all? He watches a part of themselves die every time, every time their bodies tense up and shake with the power of their sweet release.
He thinks Gilgamesh can see it too, this ethereal suffering, because afterward, when their sweat-slicked bodies are tangled together in silence and Kirei can hear nothing but the blood beginning to circulate through his dead body once more, Gilgamesh grins and his eyes remind Kirei of the serpent who tricked humanity into their downfall.
“How far you’ve come, Kotomine Kirei,” Gilgamesh’s grinning lips say to him one night. “To think when we met, you had never known pleasure in your life. Now I’d say you’re even fit to bring pleasure to a king.”
Kirei turns to him and sees glittering crimson eyes in the penumbral darkness framed by locks of tussled golden hair, usually so immaculate. His expression is that of a sated demon after consuming a particularly pious soul.
“Would you, now?” Kirei answers with a smile. “I’m honored that you would go as far as to say that, Gilgamesh.”
They both know that he doesn’t mean these things, that honor means absolutely nothing to him. But Gilgamesh is satisfied with the knowledge that Kirei even pretends to care, because he knows it’s what Gilgamesh wants to hear.
So his grin doesn’t falter as he says, “Of course, you still have much to learn, but we have time for practice.” And then he hooks one long leg over Kirei’s bare waist as though to insinuate that they have time at the present for such practice.
Kirei hums low in his throat and his eyes travel down the expanse of Gilgamesh’s naked body, from his chest and abdomen to the infinitesimal curve of his hips over his ass. He wants to bury himself in him, but he still has the stamina of a human, after all, and he’s not ready to go again just yet.
So instead he reaches a hand between their bodies and grabs Gilgamesh’s cock, because even if it’s too soon for proper sex again he knows Gilgamesh will demand to be pleasured immediately anyway. Not that he minds. As he moves his hand slowly up and down, he revels in the way that Gilgamesh’s eyes flutter shut and the soft breaths that escape his lips.
Although he’s not being directly stimulated himself, he enjoys this, and he’s not sure if it’s because of a sense of power or lust or both. Certainly the feeling of power would be misplaced; although Gilgamesh looks vulnerable in this state, they both know that if Kirei were to try to hurt him in any way, he’d find a sword impaled in his throat before he could so much as draw a drop of blood.
Not that Kirei would try to hurt Gilgamesh. He has no problem with hurting people, and even takes pleasure in it most of the time, but Gilgamesh is useful to him. More than that, he’s entertaining. Even if his usefulness were to run its course, he doesn’t think he’d take pleasure in causing him harm. They’ve developed a kind of kinship that would make Kirei feel as though he were destroying an important part of himself.
A hand closes around his wrist. He looks up from his ministrations to see red eyes and blown-wide pupils looking at him with amusement. “You seem distracted,” Gilgamesh comments. “Am I boring you?”
His tone makes it very obvious that he doesn’t care if Kirei is bored and would like him to continue jerking him off properly. Kirei smiles. “Of course not. I was just thinking.”
“Oh?” Gilgamesh curls his body closer, smooths his thumb along the expanse of Kirei’s wrist. “About what?”
Kirei searches for a way to explain his thoughts without offending the King of Heroes in any way. “I was wondering... how long any of this will last.”
“That’s it?” Gilgamesh scoffs. “Until the next Holy Grail War, of course.”
“I know that. However, sometimes I can’t help but wonder what will happen then.”
They will win, of course, he doesn’t doubt that. But after they win, what will they do? Neither of them wants the Grail for any real reason. Gilgamesh wanted to own it for the sake of owning it, as he wants to own Saber. Now he wants to accompany Kirei through his journey of self-discovery. And this journey will lead Kirei to—what? Using the Grail to destroy another city? Is that all he wants?
No—there must be more that he wants. But what is it? Will the Grail know, or will its acquisition destroy him as it did Kiritsugu?
Gilgamesh looks at him like he understands all of this, and he probably does. He always somehow knows what Kirei is thinking, how his mind works. “I have faith in you, Kirei,” he says, and his tone sounds mocking but Kirei understands the sincere sentiment behind the words. “You will find what it is you desire from the Grail. And I will be here to witness it.”
“And that is why you are prepared to stay with me all this time, is it?” Kirei tightens his hand again, reminding Gilgamesh of what he was doing before he was stopped.
Gilgamesh removes his hand from Kirei’s wrist, a clear sign to continue, and his eyes spark with mischievous delight. “That is the main reason, but not the only one.”
The innuendo in his words is not lost to Kirei. He understands that Gilgamesh is not in the mood to continue this line of talk, any longer, so he takes it upon himself to shut them both up. Removing his hand, he shifts his body downward, moving his lips against Gilgamesh’s stomach and trailing a slick, hot line down to his half-hard cock.
As he engulfs it in his mouth, he hears Gilgamesh’s breath hitch and feels strangely delicate hands curl into the hair at the nape of his neck. He feels amused, but also exhilarated—of all the common sins of man, he understands this one the most.
He moves his head up and down, slowly, humming against the sensitive flesh. Gilgamesh lets out a quiet gasp, his hips arching into his touch. Kirei continues his slow pace, tauntingly, because he knows it will anger Gilgamesh and he can’t help but tease him, if only a little.
Sure enough he hears a low growl and Gilgamesh tightens his grip on his hair, tugging demandingly. He says nothing because he knows that Kirei knows exactly what he wants from him; he only warns, with a twist of his fingers and a curl of his lip, not to try his patience.
Although he doesn’t think Gilgamesh would make due on any threat against him for such a minor offense, he nevertheless acquiesces, gripping Gilgamesh’s hips firmly in his hands and quickening his pace, bobbing his head back and forth steadily. His tongue finds all of the most sensitive parts of the heated flesh, lapping at the underside and swirling up around the tip.
He’d never done anything like this before meeting Gilgamesh, being a man of God—he sneers at the term now even in his thoughts, there never was a title more devoid of meaning—but he caught on quickly to the ways in which to maximize pleasure in any and all sexual activities.
He can tell he is successful at this because Gilgamesh makes a strangled noise and bucks his hips, almost involuntarily, into his mouth. Kirei has to pull back abruptly to avoid choking, but his lips curl into a self-satisfied smile.
Without saying a word, he resumes his task diligently. One of his hands creeps slowly from Gilgamesh’s hip down to his ass and he presses a finger against the entrance there, which is still slick from the preparation of their last round. He feels the twinge of Gilgamesh’s muscles as he tenses in surprise, but he doesn’t make any objection.
Kirei presses his finger inside, then begins to thrust it languidly, in time with the smooth motions of his bobbing head. Gilgamesh makes a breathy noise and arches, trying to press into both sources of pleasure simultaneously. Kirei glances up at him curiously, his mouth still occupied by the now-stark erection, and sees that Gilgamesh has his eyes closed, an exalted look on his flushed face.
If his mouth weren’t full, Kirei would be tempted to laugh, thinking how this is the only time Gilgamesh doesn’t appear to be brimming with self-righteousness. He doesn’t look like the King of Heroes, but rather a man giving in to carnal desire. And maybe that’s what Kirei finds so attractive about these kinds of intimate acts; everyone’s sin is identical.
He tastes the saltiness of pre-come on his tongue so he speeds up, adding another finger and thrusting emphatically, driving in to the spot that he knows makes Gilgamesh feel the most pleasure. Simultaneously he sucks around the slick erection, hollowing out his cheeks. Gilgamesh’s body spasms and after a few more thrusts he makes an incredibly erotic noise and comes forcefully into Kirei’s mouth and Kirei tastes and feels the otherworldly ecstasy of death on his tongue and swallows it all down greedily.
Gilgamesh goes so limp under his hands that he thinks with a moment of morbid fascination that he really does look dead, if not for the erratic movement of his chest as he breathes. Kirei slides his head back, releasing Gilgamesh’s now-flaccid cock, and pulls his fingers out. He feels dirty in the most exhilarating kind of way, the kind that goes straight to his own cock, which now feels as though it may be ready for more attention soon.
He doesn’t think this is going to happen, though, because Gilgamesh looks comfortably sated, his eyes still closed as though he’s already fallen asleep.
Gilgamesh cracks one eye open to look at him and smiles, and the expression is devoid of most of its usual smugness. “Not bad,” he comments.
Kirei laughs quietly and settles back down beside him on the bed, on his back, his eyes trained to the ceiling. He hardly ever sleeps anymore, but it’s late and there’s nothing else that needs doing right now.
“I was going to devour more souls tomorrow for mana,” Gilgamesh remarks lightly into the silence. “But it doesn’t seem I need any more mana now.”
Kirei feels crimson eyes bearing into him pointedly and he smiles, all teeth. “Of course, it’s never really a necessity. But it wouldn’t hurt.”
He turns and meets a matching grin and he thinks that if he ever did love another again, it would have to be this putrid soul before him, for he could never meet another person that so closely shared his own rotten idea of morality, his decadence, his disdain of the deities above that caused man to hurt and kill and die on terms that were not their own.
“Come with me,” Gilgamesh suggests. “I’m sure it will be entertaining, at the least.”
Yes, Kirei thinks, and he knows Gilgamesh is talking about his journey into the city tomorrow, to drain the powerful essence of human beings and harness it as his own, to destroy just for the sake of destruction, but he knows that he’d answer yes all the same, no matter what the question, so long as it came from this man as horrifying and enthralling as the Devil himself. Yes, he thinks. For now, at least, where else would he go?