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The sound of breaking glass roused Enthir from his slumber, and he lifted his head from the pillow, instantly alert. You didn’t get to become an elf who knows how to get things by being a heavy sleeper. He pushed back the covers and slunk out of bed, the cold making his bare chest and arms prickle.
His window was definitely broken; cold air was blowing in, and there was glass glittering on the floor in the starlight. A large metal hook had sailed through the window, and caught on the ledge. Enthir sighed. Wonderful. He went and threw a robe over his shoulders, not bothering to do it up; if he wanted to visit in the early hours of the morning, then he could deal with him in his nightclothes.
It would be a good ten minutes before his visitor arrived, and for all ten of them Enthir was very tempted to saw through the rope attached to the grappling hook. Very tempted. But it probably wasn’t a good idea; Brynjolf would find out eventually for one. So he sat, and waited, and worked out what his story would be when he asked for a new window. Again.
Eventually he heard the shuffling of feet on stone, and the rope creaking and the sounds of heavy breathing.
“Oof.” Gloved hands joined the hook, and then the rest of the thief followed, tumbling rather ungracefully into the room and lying on Enthir’s floor, panting. “You!” Dyce said, pointing up at Enthir accusingly.
“This is my bedroom, who else would it be?”
Dyce held up his hand, “Gimme a minute to catch my breath.”
Enthir took the opportunity to unburden himself of his feelings, “Why by all of Oblivion do you insist on coming in the window? Yeah, yeah you’re not a mage, but you’re the Dragonborn. They’ll let you in if you’d just ask.”
“It’s the principle of the thing.” Enthir recognised that mulish frown, even upside down.
“Then could you at least wait until I leave the College? If you bothered to send word that you were coming, I could arrange to have cash on hand-”
“Yes about that.” Dyce rolled over and lithely got to his feet. “I’ve got a bone to pick with you, Enthir. About those soul gems.”
Enthir couldn’t stop himself smirking, “I trust they were satisfactory.”
“They were in no way satisfactory!” Dyce was in his face now, although he didn’t lay a hand on him. “Grand soul gems, with common souls inside, sold at the price - above the price even - of grand soul gems with grand souls inside. Sound familiar?”
Enthir had to hope everyone else was a heavy sleeper because Dyce was not keeping his voice down, and he suspected asking him to would have the opposite effect. Still, he didn’t appreciate being crowded like this and he got to his feet.
“You’re no mage, as you’ve said so many times, and here you are making baseless accusations.”
“I know how to recharge my blades, Enthir,” Dyce growled. “You’re just lucky I’m not going to test them out on you.”
“Oh, grow up,” Enthir said. “Your theatrics might impress the whelps in Riften’s sewers, but I’ve been at this business a lot longer than you, boy. You didn’t come here to stain your blades, so don’t even try it.”
They glared at each other, eyeball to eyeball. Enthir could feel Dyce’s breath on his cheek, and the cold that still clung to this clothes and hair. He smelled like pine; hadn’t even stopped to shake the snow off in the inn before scaling the College walls. Enthir considered himself far too wise to be out adventuring, but damn if something about Dyce didn’t stir his blood for the open road anyway. It was unnerving.
“You’re right of course.” Dyce stepped away, and Enthir released a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding. “I’m not here for revenge, I’m here for my money, since ultimately that is what you’ve cost me. I’ve even worked it out for you, although I’m sure you’ll want to go over my figures.” He fished a slip of paper, covered in pencil scrawlings, from inside his jacket and handed it to Enthir. The paper was warm. And the number at the bottom of it was ridiculous.
“Hell no! I’m not paying that.”
“Shall I take this to Brynjolf?”
Enthir snorted, “Go on. I’d love to see that; tell the whole guild you got swindled.”
“So you admit it!”
“I admit nothing.”
They seemed to be at an impasse.
Dyce stalked around his room for a while, while Enthir folded his arms and leant against the table.
“You know the way I hear it,” he said. “It’s not just coin you deal in. You have no idea how drunk I had to get Nelacar before he told me how he got his hands on Azura’s Star, and even then I didn’t get details.”
Dyce let out a bark of laughter, “He actually told you? What, are you offering sell yourself to me to clear the debt? Sorry, Nelacar was one of those rare and delicate flowers; both an Altmer and lacking a stick up his arse. You qualify as neither.”
“Are you saying I should tie up Ancano and present him to you arse-first?”
“You know I’m almost tempted to say yes just to watch you try,” Dyce smirked. “But I only stick my dick where it’s welcome.”
Enthir had nothing clever to say to that and it wasn’t a mental image he appreciated. “I just want to go back to bed; I have a lot of window repair work to do in the morning.”
“Then pay me my money.”
“No. I don’t owe you anything. Get the hell out.” Enthir doubted he had the strength to physically throw Dyce back out the window he’d arrived from but he was definitely tempted.
Dyce ignored him, drifting around the room with a deeply unimpressed expression. “All right, fine. Good night.”
“Wait, what? Really?” Something wasn’t right here.
Dyce was already crossing the room to the window while Enthir’s gaze swept the shelves he’d been standing in front of.
“Hey! You pinched my gems!”
Dyce was grinning like a maniac and Enthir realised if he’d wanted him to notice. And now he was making a break for it. Enthir didn’t think; he acted. He leaped at the Breton, and gratifyingly, he got him, even as Dyce tried to leap out of the way. The Bosmer wasn’t as soft as most mages, and he tackled Dyce to the ground, and they both hit the rug with a thump.
Dyce was wriggling like an eel, trying to get away, and Enthir tried to remember all the dirty tricks he’d picked up in his youth, looking for a nerve to pinch while keeping his weight on Dyce’s feet so he couldn’t kick him off.
“You don’t steal from the Guild!” Enthir grunted, trying to drag himself up Dyce’s body, hooking his hands over his belt.
“Ha! Who told you?” Dyce said, trying to prise his fingers away. Dyce tried to roll him, and Enthir resisted and they grunted and scuffled, and Dyce yanked at Enthir’s mohawk and Enthir found his face pressed against Dyce’s crotch briefly before he hauled himself up further and tried to find where Dyce had hidden the gems, while keeping the man pinned.
Enthir was at a disadvantage; he’d been a scrappy fighter once, but Dyce clearly still was, and he was wearing his armour, as much as Enthir would have liked to sink his teeth into that skin, it was out of reach, whereas his robe was coming off as he pushed himself out of it.
“Dammit, dammit, dammit!” Enthir tried to get his belt off; if nothing else he was unlikely to leave without it, and they rolled, this time away from the broken glass and up against the bookshelf. Enthir tried to use his momentum to hurl Dyce into it, and ended up with the Breton on top of him and his side pressed against the shelves.
A couple of books tumbled down and landed on Dyce, which served him right.
“This is childish!” Enthir said.
“You started it.” Dyce was trying to pin him between his legs and Enthir objected violently, trying to buck him off. Dyce gasped.
They paused to glare at each other, breathing hard. Breathing wasn’t all that was hard, Enthir realised, and there wasn’t much his nightclothes were going to do to hide it. Not with him, he thought. It had really been too long.
“Fuck,” Dyce said more softly, his gaze darkening.
“Fuck you,” Enthir enunciated clearly. This man was so irritating. He rolled back the other way, and Dyce didn’t resist, letting Enthir pin him in turn. “What do you think this is?” Enthir asked.
“Feels like a hard-on to me,” Dyce said. “I could be wrong, of course.”
Enthir drew his hand back and slapped him across the face. And then he bent down and sank his teeth into Dyce’s bottom lip. The ‘uhngh’ sound that Dyce made when he did so seemed to bypass his ears and go right to his cock. Dyce nipped him back, and then they were wrestling again, this time with the thief’s armour. If Enthir didn’t get it off right now he was going to break something, and Dyce seemed equally enthused by the idea.
Enthir slapped Dyce’s hands away when the clothes finally came unbuckled and unbuttoned, and their cocks were pressed together. Dyce didn’t argue, lying supine while Enthir wrapped his hand around them both. And then he turned his head and ran his lips along one of Enthir’s ears.
That bastard. Enthir gritted his teeth around the moan that threatened to escape, but he didn’t think his silence had Dyce fooled, because he kept doing it until Enthir raised his head out of reach.
One of Dyce’s cheeks was reddened, and his lower lip was swollen, threatening to bleed. He was smiling, and Enthir started moving his hand. He was going to enjoy watching the cocky Breton come undone, and just plain come. So he stroked them, slowly at first, and then faster, and then more slowly again, in a pattern he could anticipate but that left Dyce breathless and frustrated and trying to set the pace with his hips. A pointless gesture; Enthir was in charge of this.
At least, he thought he was. Dyce was watching him, not making any effort to stifle his whimpers when Enthir changed the pace on him yet again, showing his neck, scraping his lips with his teeth and generally being entirely too distracting for someone not supposed to be doing anything.
Dyce picked his moment. Enthir slowed down again, to let his approaching orgasm receed, and Dyce reached up and yanked his head down so he could put his mouth against Enthir’s ear. He rasped, his voice low and rough and desperate, “You got me so fucking hard you gorgeous fucking mage I could just fuck you all damn day and I’d make you come over and over, and I’d fuck you in the town square, and I’d call your name when you made me come so loudly that everyone in the whole province would know what an amazing lay you are...Enthir.” He breathed the last word, his lips just touching Enthir’s ear.
Enthir bucked, and again, and realised he didn’t want to stop, and Dyce squeezed his arse, urging him forward as his fingers were pressed against the thief’s stomach and they were thrusting against each other desperately.
“You,” oh Divines, he was coming, “Bastard!” Enthir roared as he came, and he could feel Dyce coming too, a great heat and mess and he was laughing damn him.
But he couldn’t quite bring himself to be sorry.
“Give me,” Enthir panted. “My gems back.” He rolled off Dyce and wrapped himself in his robe. “You understand?” He turned back to see Dyce cleaning himself up with Enthir’s discarded sleeping shorts.
“Yeah, yeah.” Dyce tossed Enthir a handful of gems and Enthir went over his shelves making sure nothing else was missing while Dyce got dressed. “I’ll let you off this time, cause you’re so handsome and all. Don’t do this again.”
“You’ve got a funny way of expressing your displeasure,” Enthir pointed out.
Dyce shrugged, stepped up onto the windowsill and let himself down the way he’d arrived. Enthir waited for the signal before unhooking the grappling iron. He still didn’t like him.