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The heavy metal door swings shut on Dankovsky’s heels, and he blinks as the stairwell comes into focus. Ahead of him on the stairs, Burakh nearly trips and his hand, when he reaches out to steady himself, leaves streaks of blood on the stone wall.
Dankovsky clucks his tongue, mostly out of habit, and Burakh shoots him a sullen look over one shoulder.
They got the argument out of the way on the walk over. Since Burakh didn’t have any defense beyond it’s fine, it was a decisive win for Dankovsky who, quite frankly, is in need of a victory, no matter how small.
There’s no point in commenting on Burakh’s miserable living situation—obviously there’s nothing positive to say, and he already knows that anything else won’t exactly be taken well—so he waits silently as Burakh moves around his amateur laboratory, collecting a bowl of water and clean bandages.
“Is this taking too long?” Burakh asks, obviously ironically. When Dankovsky just stares at him, he adds, “You’re tapping your foot.”
Dankovsky grinds the toe of his boot to the floor and says, “Let’s see it, then.”
He peels off his gloves and tucks them into a pocket. Burakh stares like he’s just done something shockingly indecent. When his brow isn’t furrowed his face looks softer, and younger.
“Your arm, Burakh?” Dankovsky prompts. Burakh drags his eyes up to his face and Dankovsky swallows convulsively.
The wound in question, the whole reason they’re doing this song and dance, is on the outside of Burakh’s upper arm; his attempt to block a blow from a knife was only partially successful, leaving him with a long gash that bleeds profusely.
So the first, unfortunate, step requires Burakh to remove his upper layers. Under his stained butcher’s smock he wears a wool sweater and undershirt, all of which reek of sweat, blood, and other, less savoury, bodily fluids. Under these layers his body is healthy, if pale.
He sits on the stone table, arm twisted out from his body, to allow Dankovsky better access. The light isn’t all that great, but at the very least they have clean water and privacy.
Dankovsky washes out the wound and wraps bandages around Burakh’s arm, noting the breadth of his arm, the solid muscle, and making absolutely no inferences based on that observation. Burakh is still, eyes half-lidded, his only motion that of his breath moving through his body.
“You’re unusually quiet,” he says, as Dankovsky fumbles to secure the bandage in place.
“What would you like to discuss? The weather? Or perhaps how the people of this town, who you are working so hard to save, repay that work by assaulting you in the street?” Dankovsky hears his own voice go pitchy and knows he’s already far too worked up.
It doesn’t help that Burakh’s response is to exhale sharply through his nose, mouth twitching out of its habitual frown and into something resembling a smile.
“Don’t laugh,” Dankovsky orders.
“Wouldn’t dream of it, oynon.”
“And don’t say that I’m fussing. Abundans cautela non nocet. Without proper care this wound will fester, and then where would this blasted town be?”
Dankovsky jumps at a touch to the outside of his thigh; Burakh’s hand drags up to his hip, leaving a trail of heat in its wake. His eyes shoot to Burakh’s face, who watches him, the ghost of a smile still lingering on his lips.
“In the capable hands of the fancy capital doctor,” Burakh murmurs, “a terrible fate indeed.”
“What? Just—” The ends of the bandage slip from Dankovsky’s fingers and he curses. “Just hold still.”
“Yes, ekhe.” Dankovsky doesn’t need to speak the language to recognize sarcasm. Burakh’s hand covers Dankovsky’s hip, his thumb digging into the soft flesh just above the bone.
It is abruptly, shockingly obvious how close they are to one another. Dankovsky can smell Burakh’s sweat, and the mud of the steppe ground into his pants, can hear his deep breaths. The proximity of his body is almost overpowering—he seems so solid, so real, in a way very little in this horrid town does.
Dankovsky at last manages to knot the bandages, tightening them with a harsh yank. “There, now as for painkillers—”
Burakh takes one of Dankovsky’s hands in his own. Burakh’s hand is large, rough, warm, and he holds Dankovsky gently, his grip almost cradling him. Dankovsky freezes with his mouth hanging open, like a complete imbecile, staring down at his hand in Burakh’s like it’s never happened before.
Slowly, telegraphing the movement as if to give Dankovsky a chance to pull away when in fact it only makes him preemptively shudder, Burakh brings Dankovsky’s palm to his mouth.
“Your hands are as shaky as ever, oynon,” he says, his lips brushing Dankovsky’s skin and sending a hot prickling sensation up his arm.
“I’m not—shaking.”
“Sure you are.” Burakh’s eyes flick up to meet Dankovsky’s. “Nervous?”
A flash of red overtakes Dankovsky’s vision for an instant as his chest constricts around his straining lungs. He misses his chance to say anything at all to stop this crashing train.
Burakh takes his thumb into his mouth. Daniil, unfortunately, gasps rather wetly.
His tongue swirls around the tip, his cheeks hollow as he sucks, and his lips form a tight seal that drags slowly upwards. His eyes are lidded and he hums, as if he likes the taste. With a faint pop, he pulls free then moves on to Daniil’s forefinger.
It’s…It’s absurd, it’s obscene. The damp heat of Burakh’s mouth, the vulgar sound of him working over each finger in turn. By the time he gets to Daniil’s smallest finger, Daniil is panting like a dog.
Burakh lets the digit drop slowly from his mouth and raises his head. His lips are flushed and wet from all this carrying on, his eyes dark. Daniil is horribly certain he’s staring at Burakh like he’s the only fresh water he’s seen in days, but he can't quite get his face under control.
With a savage grin, Burakh loops his arms around Daniil and drags him inelegantly up into his lap.
“I knew it,” Burakh whispers, triumph making his voice rasp. Daniil wants to demand what, exactly, he thinks he knew but the world is pulsing around him, inside him, and he can’t remember how to work his mouth.
Burakh has the placket of Daniil’s trousers unfastened in what seems the blink of an eye, then takes his own fingers into his mouth. Daniil watches his tongue move, aghast, as each stroke seems to strike him directly in the gut.
Then Burakh slips his hand down the front of Daniil’s trousers, and he cries out like a goddamn virgin at that first touch.
He feels Burakh’s face against his jaw, the softness of his lips, the scrape of his stubble, the heat of his breath, but most of his attention is absorbed by Burakh’s hand working him over.
His touch is gentle, but persistent, his spit enough to smooth the way until he discovers how wet Daniil is and presses a finger inside. Daniil almost bites through his tongue as Burakh groans. The friction of Burakh moving inside him sends crackling pops of pleasure cascading up his spine.
Heat pulls tight in Daniil’s belly as his lungs strain harder and harder to draw air. Burakh moves against him, inside him, rather clumsily given that his hand is wedged into Daniil’s trousers in a way that must be hell on his wrist—but finesse doesn’t much matter, since Daniil is rutting into the meat of his palm like a bitch in heat.
He can’t get enough air, his heart thunders in his chest and in his ears. The world starts to go hazy, out of focus. Burakh moves impossibly slow beneath him, his mouth shapes words Daniil can’t hear.
It occurs to him that he’s once more let things get completely out of hand.
And then his heart gives out. Again.
Look, it’s not a matter of stubbornness. If anyone’s stubborn, it’s that bull-headed Artemy Burakh. It’s a matter of pride, understand? This just isn’t the kind of thing he can let stand.
Unfortunately, this is also a knot he can’t slice through cleanly. Or rather, he hasn’t been able to yet. Has the need for a victory, no matter how small, already been mentioned?
The facts are these: Burakh is in his miserable little cellar, with a shallow but significant knife wound, in need of water and painkillers and some minor doctoring, all of which Dankovsky is in no position to refuse, given his oath. And which he’s in fact happy to offer, given their collaboration thus far.
Maybe it’s the blood loss, or maybe it’s just that Dankovsky represents the nearest warm body who apparently hasn’t tried to stab him all week, but Burakh is…milder than usual. Warm, even. Approachable.
And in all honesty, Dankovsky can’t claim to be in much better shape, considering how far his standards have so plainly been lowered. Extenuating circumstances and all.
No matter. Dankovsky will prove that it is well within his own capabilities to have casual sex with Burakh, without succumbing to a massive heart attack.
Even if he has to die to do so.
Even if he has to die several times.
Dankovsky stumbles down the stairs after Burakh, his whole arm tingling with the sense-memory of Burakh fellating his fingers like a harlot, and vows to keep his gloves on from here out.
Burakh watches him move around the room, collecting the necessary supplies, with an intensity that makes the hair rise on the back of Dankovsky’s neck. It’s the kind of stare that he can feel even when he’s turned away, like the prick of a knife between his shoulder blades.
He comes to an eventual halt by the stone table, and has to resist the urge to cross his arms. Retreating to his brisk, doctoring voice, he says, “Alright, strip.”
Burakh looks at him for a moment longer, through those ridiculous pale eyelashes of his, then does as he’s told.
It’s maddening that after all the days Dankovsky has spent examining the dying in the hospital—touching them occasionally, to turn their arms, or brush their hair off their necks—during which he felt only a dull misery, now he can’t get through a simple patch-up job without losing his head.
To be fair, unlike the sick with their rashes and boils and rheumy eyes, Burakh is halfway decent to look at. His shoulders are broad and he carries a generous layer of fat over muscle. His hands are something of an object of fascination to Dankovsky, as is quickly becoming the line of hair that runs down the curve of his belly and dives past the waistband of his trousers.
This is all to say that by the time the bandage is in place and Burakh touches his hip, Daniil is already stiff.
Burakh looks at him with those big cow eyes, his mouth dropped open for his quickening breath, and Daniil feels as if he’s been dipped in boiling water.
“Oynon,” he says, his voice low and shockingly hoarse and Daniil grabs him through his trousers.
Clearly it’s time for a different approach, if he wants to get through the next half hour alive. Of course, he’d prefer to go about this in a more elegant way, but under the circumstances, and given the company, the direct route is probably advisable. And in any case, Burakh is already half-hard.
Daniil is transfixed for a time by the sensation of Burakh’s cock throbbing as it hardens in his grip, and spends an unfortunately prolonged period pawing at him in silence.
Then he says, “I’m going to suck you.”
Burakh unleashes a stream of incomprehensible Steppe, in the kind of cadence that suggests blasphemy, or prayer. He closes his eyes for a moment, then opens them and stares into Daniil’s face. He nods.
Alright, so not exactly the kind of breathless enthusiasm Daniil was maybe looking for, but that’s fine. He kicks over an apple box to kneel on, putting his face more or less level with Burakh’s groin as he shifts towards the very edge of the table and pushes his trousers down.
Burakh takes himself in hand and gives his cock two loose, unhurried pulls. Daniil’s face is close enough that he feels himself go a little cross-eyed watching. Heat pools in his belly as Burakh’s cock fattens before him.
“You’re very, ah, well proportioned.” Burakh’s hand stills. When Daniil looks up, it’s to discover a strange look on his face. “What? Surely I’m not the first to tell you so.”
Burakh’s mouth jerks to one side. “Not in so many words.”
“Well, forgive me for being accurate. Now, if you don’t mind, I’ll take things from here.”
He wraps his hand around the base of Burakh cock, who gets his own out of the way quickly enough, moving to grip the edge of the table instead. Daniil pumps him briskly, getting a sense for the heft of his cock, the circumference.
His chest tightens as his heart rate picks up, but well within his usual range—he won’t be losing his head over this. He pulls spit into his mouth, then leans forward and mouths at the head of Burakh’s cock.
He tastes salt as he tongues at the silky skin, lets his teeth just graze the bottom ridge of the crown. Burakh inhales deeply. Daniil takes more of him into his mouth.
It’s been a while since he’s done this last, and his jaw is so tight that it begins to ache near instantaneously. Well, just another reason to get this over with quickly.
He starts to work over Burakh in earnest, bobbing his head, licking the underside of his cock, pushing the tip up to rub along the roof of his mouth. What his mouth can’t accommodate, he pumps with his hand, slick with the overflow of saliva that escapes the seal of his lips.
He’s just beginning to find a comfortable rhythm when Burakh touches him.
More specifically, he runs both hands through his hair, then gently cups the back of his head.
Abruptly, Daniil is aware of the sound of Burakh’s breath, thick and laboured, aware of the way his thighs spread apart, straining at his pants, aware of his soft, bitten off, “Ah—”
His heart starts to pound. Daniil slides his hand from the base of Burakh’s cock down to fondle his balls and pushes forward, forcing himself to take more of him. When the head of Burakh’s cock begins to press into his throat Burakh’s hips twitch and he curses.
It’s dizzyingly obvious how much Burakh is enjoying this, and how much he’s trying to hold back—Daniil can see his muscles tense in his stomach and his thighs, can feel how badly he wants to thrust into his throat. Imagine that, Daniil letting himself be used, reduced to nothing but a warm hole.
“Oh, oynon—” Burakh groans, picking up where Daniil’s horribly wanton moan ends. “Oh, fuck.”
Burakh’s body trembles, but he continues to cradle Daniil’s head, fingers tensing reflexively before he forces them to relax, nails scraping lightly against his scalp.
How much would it take to make him lose control? Surely not much more, Daniil just needs to push himself a little further. Pain shoots through his jaw, lances into his eyes. He’s getting sloppy, drooling a little, making an awful, wet noise every time he bobs his head, forcing himself to take Burakh deeper.
Burakh groans so low Daniil can feel it, humming in his teeth, and it goads him further. He forgoes finesse in favour of speed and depth, half-choking himself on Burakh’s cock with every bob of his head. His reward is Burakh’s increasingly desperate gasps, his pained groans.
Belatedly, Daniil realizes that he’s no longer able to breathe.
He pulls off, wheezing for air, and through his tunnelling vision sees Burakh’s face—his dark eyes, his look of intense focus and aching hunger—and his hands go convulsively to his chest.
Uselessly, he wheezes, “Shit—wait—”
And he’s back at the top of the stairs
Burakh is already a few steps ahead, but he pauses, shoulders pinching together, then whips around to stare up at Daniil. His mouth opens, as if he’s about to speak, but he only inhales deeply.
One of Daniil’s hands is gripping the front of his waistcoat, while he steadies himself against the wall with the other, but when Burakh looks at him he forces himself to straighten.
“What?” he snaps. Burakh closes his mouth, stares at him for a beat, then shakes his head and continues down the stairs. After a couple steadying breaths, Dankovsky follows.
Aftershocks rolls through his body and he feels a pull of heat low in his belly. Death, apparently, isn’t quite enough to shake the sense-memory of choking on Burakh’s cock.
He bites down on his cheek. So running straight at the problem has clearly proven not to be the solution. Time to try a different approach.
He will leave this room with his life and, more importantly, his dignity intact.
Off go Burakh’s upper layers, and Dankovsky curls his hands into fists to stop himself from grabbing parts of him at random. He feels a phantom ache in his jaw and remembers, unbidden, the taste of him.
He shakes his head to clear it, and focuses instead on dealing with Burakh’s wound. He cleans it thoroughly, wraps it in bandage—quickly, now, with so much practice—and ties it off in a neat little knot.
Burakh watches him silently, breathing so deeply his whole body sways with it. His nipples are hard—what, like Daniil’s not allowed to notice?—pulled into tight points that are actually very difficult not to stare at. Is he sensitive there? He’s got enough weight and muscle that he could fill Daniil’s hands, overfill them, even.
Burakh’s mouth drops open and he says, “Oynon” in a voice almost unrecognizable, it comes out so rasping and low.
Dankovsky tears his eyes away from Burakh’s areolas and makes eye contact for a split second before he feels a hot flush burst across his face and looks away. Burakh’s hands land on his waist, the lightest possible pressure through his clothes, and it feels like his entire body throbs in response.
Burakh looks nearly drunk, his eyes dark and his mouth slack. Dankovsky certainly feels intoxicated.
Clinging to his self-restraint, he steps back and says, “Look, Burakh, you’re a reasonably attractive man, I won’t pretend I haven’t noticed. But circumstances being as they are, we simply must stay on task.”
The look on Burakh’s face is interesting. After a pause, he says, “Why do you speak as if you’re turning me down, when I haven’t yet proposed?”
A flash of red shoots across Dankovsky’s vision. “Proposed?”
He tries to make it sound withering, but his voice catches oddly in his throat.
Burakh slides off the table and goes down onto his knees. Being as large a man as he is, this doesn’t quite create the kind of difference in height that Dankovsky might prefer. “Propose that you take off all these stuffy clothes and let me taste you.”
The words land like a hot stone in Daniil’s belly, and he can only gawp at him, managing, after a moment, “Surely not all of them?”
Burakh presses his face to his navel and Daniil clenches down. He can see Burakh’s shoulders lift as he breathes in deeply, then he looks up at Daniil with eyes blown dark. “I’ve been able to smell how aroused you are ever since we came in here.”
“Fucking—mother of heaven.”
Burakh digs his nose into the crease of Daniil’s thigh. “Is that a yes?”
It feels like he’s just been socked in the stomach, so it’s actually rather impressive that Daniil doesn’t whimper but manages to say, weakly, “It’s not a no.”
Burakh sets to undressing Daniil, with only a little assistance. It turns out that a surgeon’s steady hands make much faster work of the small buttons of his waistcoat and the fastenings of his trousers than Daniil’s ever did. Burakh gets distracted from his alleged goal of total nudity, however, once Daniil’s trousers are around his ankles.
Instead he starts rooting around in Daniil’s undergarments with his nose, inhaling deeply. It makes Daniil feel like he’s on fire, and he’s reasonably certain it’s not even meant to be seductive. Rather, it has all the instinct and grace of a bloodhound, and yet it makes Daniil ache worse than anything ever has.
Burakh groans. “The way you smell.”
“P-pond scum, wasn’t it?” Daniil manages, then jumps at Burakh’s harsh exhale, a shock of cool air right where he’s hot and damp.
“No, it’s…fuck.” Burakh goes back to attacking Daniil’s clothes, who stumbles backwards, trying to get his trousers off over his boots. He manages with one leg, kicks a bucket, the loud clang scraping his raw nerves, then his back hits the wall.
Burakh gets his underclothes out of the way in a manner that may involve tearing some seams, then in a no-nonsense kind of way lifts one of Daniil’s legs and hooks it over his shoulder. Before Daniil can really appreciate the vulnerability of this position, Burakh is on him.
He starts by licking Daniil all over with long strokes of his tongue. It could’ve felt sloppy and amateurish, but the actual impression it gives is that of a gourmand sampling every element of a dish before tucking in. He keeps swallowing convulsively, his panting breath cooling Daniil’s skin before his tongue lashes heat back into it.
Some sort of unfortunate, choking noise escapes Daniil just before Burakh wraps his lips around him and sucks.
“Holy—” Daniil’s hips come off the wall and Burakh moans in a way that seems all too self-congratulatory. He presses forwards, Daniil’s foot leaves the ground momentarily, then starts moving his tongue in such a way that Daniil can practically feel his brain beginning to leak from his ears.
In the final act of his remaining sanity, Daniil rips off a glove, shoves it into his mouth, and bites down. Burakh has his whole mouth on him, the hot muscle of his tongue flicking, licking, moving in unpredictable patterns that send electric shocks up Daniil’s spine to explode whatever remains of his brain.
His orgasm breaks over him in a sudden, hot, rippling pulse, his resulting string of curses only somewhat muffled by his mouthful of leather. Burakh continues to lap at him like a man starved—which the evidence seems to indicate is a real possibility, only Daniil is certain the nutritional content of cum is negligible at best.
Unbelievably, it seems Burakh intends to make him come a second time. Even more unbelievably, Daniil’s body seems inclined to let him.
He’s trembling so badly he’s half-convinced he’d fold like a house of cards if Burakh weren’t keeping him pinned with his ridiculous shoulders. A hot coil twists tighter and tighter in his navel, his muscles spasming as Burakh sucks him with single-minded devotion.
His heart thunders in his chest, filling his ears with the roar of his blood. His chest swells, pain splinters in his left arm. A red haze falls over his eyes. When was the last time he inhaled?
Burakh breaks away with a wet gasp and Daniil’s hips thrust uselessly into nothing. He might be saying something, but Daniil can’t hear it. Fuck, but he was so close, he almost—he’s going to—
“Are you alright, oynon?”
Dankovsky, standing at the top of the stairs with his forehead pressed to the cool stone wall, only groans.
“Here’s what’s going to happen,” Daniil says, his voice a little strained. He’s got both hands on Burakh’s chest. Sensitive may not be the right word, but Burakh has certainly not protested against his nipples being pinched and pulled. “You are not to touch. I am going to pleasure myself and you will simply watch. Understood?”
Burakh shoots him a look Daniil’s not equipped to parse, occupied as he is watching the flesh of Burakh’s chest bulge between his fingers. “Of course you’d be weird about this, oynon.”
“There is nothing weird about a man who knows his preferences,” Daniil says, with all the dignity he can muster.
Burakh grunts. That may have more to do with the way Daniil’s flicking his nipple up and down with his thumb than with what Daniil’s actually said. “Shudkher. Fine.”
It takes Daniil another moment to release Burakh, and another still to step away. It’s just…his chest is mottled red from Daniil’s groping hands, his nipples are dark and swollen, and there are twin dots of colour high in his cheeks, his expression slack. He looks so lewd.
And hungry. That look is back, not quite so deadly as when Daniil had Burakh’s cock down his throat, but a shade or two lighter. Something intent, and hungry, like a tiger stalking its prey.
Daniil backs up until his shoulders hit the wall and then, dropping his gaze to Burakh’s abused chest, grinds the meat of his palm between his legs. He’s hit first by a rush of relief, but quick on its heels is a pulsing ache for more.
With hands that tremble only slightly, nothing that you could describe as shaky, Daniil unfastens his trousers, then bites off one of his gloves. Burakh makes a noise, not quite speech, and when Daniil glances up he’s leaning forward, hands gripping the edge of the table.
Daniil shoves his bare hand down his pants.
It’s familiar ground; given a handful of seconds he’s got the pads of two fingers circling the swollen head of his cock, pushing his hips up and legs apart to give himself room to maneuver.
“You’re not going to undress?” Burakh asks, hoarsely. Daniil shoots him a look and his brows pinch together. “Come on, oynon. Give me something.”
Glaring, Daniil unfastens his cravat with his free hand and rips it off. He means to say something sarcastic like, there, happy? but Burakh is staring at his exposed throat like he might start drooling any second, and the words fail to manifest.
Daniil swallows, thickly. Burakh wets his lips.
“You smell incredible, oynon. I can tell how wet your cunt is.” The matter-of-fact way Burakh delivers this filth makes the bottom drop out of Daniil’s stomach. He bites his lip but a godawful noise still escapes him. Evidently encouraged, Burakh continues, “You’d taste even better.”
“Fuh—” Daniil swallows convulsively. “Fuck.”
“I want to suck you.” Burakh’s voice is rough and mortifyingly sincere. “I’d make it good, make you come.”
“You would,” Daniil says, dazed and stupid. Burakh makes a strained noise and jerks forwards, as if about to close the distance between them. But then he visibly collects himself and sits back, white-knuckling the edge of the table.
Heat pulses in Daniil’s navel and his hips jerk unconsciously, thrusting into his own hand. Burakh restraining himself, following his orders, makes Daniil feel borderline insane.
“As much as you want.” Burakh inhales deeply through his open mouth. “Until you can’t anymore.”
Daniil gawps at him. He’s hardly moving his hand anymore, just the pressure and Burakh’s voice are enough to wind him up, to make his blood pound loudly in his ears. Despite the very real threat it poses to his life, Daniil want to hear more. Every crude word makes his cock throb as if it’s tied to Burakh’s lips by an invisible string. He barely stops himself from slurring out, stupidly, and then what?
But it’s as if Burakh hears it anyway, because he says, “Then when you’re—you’re fucked out, relaxed. For once. Then you’ll suck me.”
Daniil makes a high, strangled sound.
“Don’t worry.” Burakh’s eyes are lidded, dark. “I’ll do all the work. You’ll just need to take it.”
His hand moves between his legs, and he palms himself through his trousers with a low groan. Whatever he says next, Daniil can’t make sense of the words over the ringing in his ears.
The look on Burakh’s face, so nakedly hungry, the rough way he touches himself—Daniil nearly bites right through his tongue. He wants more, wants to see Burakh take his well-proportioned cock out, wants to watch him touch himself, wants to let him do whatever he wants to him—
A frantic buzzing fills his ears. Pain spikes in his chest.
“God—
—dammit!”
It seems no matter his approach, no matter his intentions, no matter how little clothing is removed—it always ends the same way.
And what have you learned? he asks himself, in the same way he might speak to Little. First, that through a trick of circumstances perpetuated by the loop itself, it is impossible to avoid having sex with Burakh. Second, any erotic interaction with Burakh sets his mania off worse than a chat with a Doghead. Third, he is going to die, permanently, in this wretched cellar.
Maybe he’s getting a little bit punchy from all the ruined orgasms and brushes with death. Under normal circumstances, he’s perfectly capable of a roll in the sheets without suffering extreme consequences—just ask Andrey! Or rather, don’t. Who knows what stories he’d tell.
Clearly, the circumstances are against him. The town gets in his head, destabilizes his mood. If mania is the problem, he simply needs to guard against it.
At the top of the stairs, Dankovsky empties his pockets of all the depressants he has, then empties all of them down his throat.
In an instant the world loses all its sharp edges, dulled to a lifeless grey. He creeps down the steps, each one taking greater effort to reach, and by the time he’s at the bottom he can’t recall why he’s even there.
Burakh stands in front of him with his hands on his hips, his voice a muffled echo that doesn’t reach Daniil. Blood drips slowly from his elbow—that's right, he’s wounded…
Daniil is guided into the room, lets Burakh push him to sit on the stone table. That’s the wrong way around, Burakh is the one who needs treatment, who needs Daniil to bandage that arm…
But what’s the use? Even if Daniil did patch him up what’s to stop it from all coming undone in short order? They’re all doomed, each and every one of them in this cursed town, he might as well—
Something is thrust into his hands and Daniil grasps it automatically. After a moment’s observation, it turns out to be a mug full of dark liquid, hot enough to warm his hands. Another pair of hands cup his and lift the mug gently towards his face, urging him wordlessly to sip.
The drink is coffee, hot and bitter as all else without any sugar to soften the blow. The taste, the heat of it in his mouth and down his throat, bring the world a little into focus.
Burakh watches him closely, eyes flicking between Daniil’s. When Daniil pulls the mug from his lips, Burakh releases him, then turns away. Dully, Daniil wonders why he even bothers, but before he can get swept away by the undertow of his thoughts Burakh turns back around and puts his fingers on Daniil’s mouth.
A shock of arousal sharpens the world around him. Stupefied, Daniil parts his lips and lets Burakh push something into his mouth. Something small, and soft, and sweet—a raisin?
“You need the sugar, oynon,” Burakh says, with a brisk gentleness that, in Daniil’s compromised state, proves utterly disarming. He allows Burakh to feed him two more raisins before he regains the clarity of mind to bat his hand away.
The numbness of apathy burns away under mortification. He sips the coffee to hide his expression, only to grimace at the taste.
Burakh says, “Alright?”
Dankovsky thinks, I should’ve just shot myself.
Too late for it now. With a sigh, he sets aside the mug and says aloud, “Let me see your arm.”
He does a quick patch-up job from his perch on the table. Burakh strips to the waist and turns where Dankovsky pushes him, holds still as Dankovsky wraps the bandages around his bicep. It’s not his best work, but it’s enough to staunch the bleeding.
Finished, he clears his throat. “I should—apologize. It’s just, it’s this town, sometimes I—”
“You don’t have to explain, oynon.” Burakh turns to face him fully. “It’s like a pendulum, isn’t it, your mood? From one extreme to another.”
Dankovsky blinks, taken aback. “What makes you say that?”
“I’ve been watching you.” He says it in such a matter-of-fact way, like it isn’t a somewhat insane sentiment.
Burakh is watching him now, watching him intently—not like he’s worried, but as if he’s content to do just that. Like he’ll stare as long as Dankovsky will let him.
Dankovsky surges forward and kisses him.
A dramatically stupid move, obviously, but he’s already humiliated himself beyond measure—hand-fed raisins! like a parakeet!—that he might as well lay down and die in the hole he’s dug.
Burakh’s mouth is soft and hot, and he doesn’t hesitate; immediately, he kisses him back.
The tip of his tongue flicks at the corner of Daniil’s mouth, then slips in. His tongue moves in a hot, slow glide—Daniil thinks again of a gourmand—then he pulls away, changes the angle and does it again, better.
Shivers roll through Daniil’s body. He’s got both arms wrapped around Burakh like some sort of sentient barnacle, scrabbling for a grip in the short strands of his hair, digging his nails into the flesh of his shoulder.
Burakh kisses like he sucks cock—which isn’t a particularly grounding thought. He kisses hungrily, but attentive to how Daniil responds, with a kind of all-consuming focus that makes Daniil want to do deranged things, like bite him.
Daniil bites Burakh’s lip. His responding moan is so low and long Daniil feels it vibrate in his very bones.
Burakh’s hands are on his hips, pulling him to the edge of the table, forcing his legs apart so that their bodies can meet. Heat radiates off his bare chest, blazing even through all Daniil’s layers. He cups the back of Daniil’s head with one hand, angling him just-so, while the other runs down his back, pulling him even closer.
Daniil knows he’s losing his head, making stupid, awful noises and licking into Burakh’s mouth greedily. He’s not even thinking about all the ways Burakh has touched him, fucked him, he’s only thinking about how impossibly good it feels to be kissed by him.
And Burakh seems in no rush to take things further, to whisper filthy words in his ear, or grind between his legs, or peel off his clothes and make him come in his mouth. He seems plenty pleased just to kiss.
Every swipe of Burakh’s tongue sends a jolt straight to Daniil’s cock. He can feel how wet and sticky he is, his pulse hammering between his legs. Deliriously, he thinks he could come just like this.
Then Burakh’s hands are cupping his face, kissing him so sweetly, and Daniil is all of a sudden uncomfortably close to doing something unfathomably horrific like melt in his arms.
This time when oblivion sinks its claws into him, it’s something of a mercy.
A new personal low: kissed to death. The mortification sobers him up, a little, as he watches Burakh move down the steps, the fabric of his smock pulling at his shoulders. So maybe Dankovsky finds Burakh…fascinating. Sexually fascinating, if there is such a thing.
He’s acutely aware that he’s running out of time. Well, there’s one approach he hasn’t tried yet—short of turning tail and making a run for it, which this may still very well come to. One last attempt, then. He rolls back his shoulders and smooths a hand down the front of his waistcoat. Ad victoriam.
Dankovsky wraps up Burakh’s arm without molesting him, a minor victory all its own, then hovers a moment longer, standing indecently close. Burakh instantly takes the bait and grips the front of his coat. Gently, mind, and with only two fingers, bracketing a button hole midway down his front.
When Dankovsky looks into Burakh’s face, he feels an unfortunate flush break across his own.
“You’re thinking very loudly, oynon.” There’s a wry lift to Burakh’s voice. Dankovsky squints at him, he doesn’t mean that literally, does he? No, he’s only being mocked.
As crisply as he can manage, Dankovsky says, “Understand, Burakh, that while, yes, I am attracted to you, to act upon an impulse to…indulge at this time will—well, my heart will give out.”
In a tone of voice Dankovsky is completely unequipped to deal with, Burakh says, “So you have a weak heart after all, oynon.”
“Don’t.”
Burakh shrugs. “We’ll take it slow.”
Indignantly, Dankovsky says, “I am not talking about a simple case of nerves.”
“I understand.” Burakh takes his hand, presses his mouth to his knuckles. “Our lines run close, I can keep an eye on you.”
Dankovsky is overcome by a brief bout of undignified spluttering, then rallies. “And when my heart rate spikes you’ll, what? Rub me down with twyre?”
Burakh bites his knuckle, gently, but the flash of teeth against dark leather still makes Dankovsky shudder. Burakh’s eyes crease smugly. “We take a break, or you’ll drink an herbal mixture. I have some handy.”
“You can’t be serious.” Burakh just looks at him. Some unholy feeling starts bubbling in Dankovsky’s chest. He says, “You are serious.” And then, hesitating only slightly, “You’re certain it’s worth the effort?”
Burakh looks at him for a long moment, as if he’s really considering the question. The appraisal makes Dankovsky antsy and, well, yes a little hard. At some point in the near future he’s going to have to figure out exactly what it is that’s suddenly so arousing about eye contact, of all things.
Then Burakh slides off the table and steps around Dankovsky. Stuck standing there like a dolt, he watches Burakh retrieve a slim bottle from the cupboard and set it down on the stone table. Then he cups Dankovsky’s face in his hands and ducks just slightly to close the distance.
First touch is chaste, a soft glide of lips that makes Daniil feel unaccountably off-balance. Burakh peppers him light kisses, then sets his bottom lip gently between his teeth, and it’s only when Daniil makes an explosive and entirely unconscious noise of frustration that Burakh opens his mouth to him.
Daniil drives into him but Burakh is no pushover and meets him steadily, kissing him in a shamelessly thorough manner. He also kisses like he has the lung capacity of a whale; by the time he breaks away Daniil is dizzy from a lack of oxygen.
Burakh looks at him and says, “I’m certain.”
Daniil’s heart is pounding already, his breath coming in short gasps. He hooks a hand around Burakh’s neck and crushes their mouths together, if only to wipe that intolerably smug look off his face.
It’s wet and messy and shockingly good. Burakh makes short little noises that turn into outright moans as Daniil fucks his tongue into him. He presses in close and Daniil’s arms go around him, nails digging into bare flesh.
Burakh fumbles with Daniil’s pin for a moment, and then his cravat comes unspooled, baring his sweat-damp skin. Burakh ducks and buries his face in the side of Daniil’s neck, his mouth open for his heaving breath.
Daniil’s pressed to the edge of the table as Burakh’s weight bears down on him, his foot slides forwards between Burakh’s, then their hips are locked together. He can feel the heat of Burakh’s erection and his hips hitch, chasing the sensation.
He’s so hard, from so little. Daniil rubs against him with his whole body and sparks of pleasure shoot up his spine. He can feel Burakh’s teeth against his carotid artery and a wretched little moan escapes him.
Abruptly, Burakh pulls away. The air that rushes to take his place might as well come from the arctic, it feels that cold. Spluttering, Daniil says, “I am not so delicate that—”
“Not you. Me.” Burakh is flushed, his pupils dilated, his breathing elevated.
Daniil says, “Unfasten your pants.”
He starts to peel off his own coat, while Burakh, ignoring his order, goes for his waistcoat. “You wear too many layers, oynon.”
“Not. True.” Daniil grits out as he shrugs out of his tight-fitted coat and yanks off his gloves. Burakh pushes his waistcoat off over his shoulders and starts on his shirt fastenings. Daniil slaps his hands away. “Take your cock out.”
In a tone Daniil can only read as condescending, Burakh says, “Breathe, oynon.”
“I’m breathing just fine,” Daniil snaps.
“Hmm.”
Glaring, Daniil pointedly inhales deep through his nose, then out through his mouth. Annoyingly, he does feel a little better.
To vent his frustration, he grabs Burakh and spins them so that Burakh’s the one pressed against the table. With a shove, he pushes Burakh onto it and follows him up, not caring how stupid he looks doing it.
Burakh goes where he’s prodded, turning so he can lay properly on the table and keeping his hands out of the way while Daniil gets settled in his lap. Once he’s in place, Burakh goes back to attacking his shirt.
Daniil allows it, if only because Burakh really is making quick work of the buttons. Beneath, he’s wearing a vest, the linen so thin that his nipples are visible through it. The instant they come into view, Burakh abandons the buttons to cup his chest instead.
His hands are large and so gentle. A shiver rolls through Daniil at that first touch, then Burakh starts rubbing his nipples and he makes an awful noise low in his throat. Christ, but it feels good.
It feels so good, in fact, that Daniil loses his head and starts humping Burakh with abandon.
“Oh, fuck.” Burakh groans as his hips jerk helplessly beneath Daniil’s weight. His head drops back onto the stone as his back bows, pushing up to meet the press of Daniil’s hips.
Was Burakh always this…enthusiastic? Maybe Daniil didn’t notice through the haze of mania, or because heart attacks have proven to be very distracting, but right now Burakh is squirming beneath him like he’s desperate for it. Like he’s losing his mind, too.
Despite this, he manages to once again put an abrupt halt to proceedings, this time by grabbing Daniil’s hips and lifting him into the air. Daniil makes a noise of unbridled frustration.
“Not in my pants,” Burakh says, breathlessly.
“As I said before—” Daniil begins, caustically.
“Don’t you ever shut up?” Burakh retorts, but his voice comes out strangely weak. He’s released Daniil to get his hands between them in any case, ripping at the fastenings of his pants.
Daniil elects to ignore this last remark, because Burakh is, at last, taking his cock out. He’s hard and flushed a deep, almost purple red. Just looking is enough to summon the memory of it in his mouth; the weight on his tongue, the ache in his jaw. The way Burakh had trembled, ceded control to him.
“Stop—” Burakh cuts himself off with a sharp inhale as he wraps a hand around the base of his cock and squeezes tight. Daniil can barely hear him over the pounding of his heart.
Burakh puts a hand on the back of Daniil’s neck and pulls him down into a sloppy, open-mouthed kiss. Daniil falls into it greedily, drinking down the soft noises Burakh makes.
Both of Burakh’s hands slide down to Daniil’s hips, holding him forcefully in place. Daniil squirms, weak little puffs of air escaping him as tries to twist free. His heartbeat thunders in his ears, he tastes iron—did he bite Burakh without realizing?
This time, when Burakh pushes him away, Daniil doesn’t complain. The bottle of herbal mix is on its side, but still on the table, and he snatches it up, breaks the seal, and swallows it in two gulps.
After a couple breaths, his mind clears a little. He takes the opportunity to crawl off the table and remove his trousers. There’s no dignified way to go about pulling them off over his boots, but he tries to keep the hopping to a minimum.
Daniil shoots Burakh a look over his shoulder. “Was that a laugh?”
Solemnly, Burakh says, “I would never, oynon.”
When Daniil peels his underclothes off, Burakh makes a ragged, punched-out sound. So that’s them even, then.
Naked from waist to ankle, he climbs back onto Burakh, centers himself over his cock and grinds down. He slides his sex along the shaft and the pressure, just the touch of friction to his own cock, makes him tremble.
Burakh grips his thighs, then his hips, as if to steady him. A stream of Steppe pours from his mouth, ending with a low, punched-out moan.
“God,” Daniil chokes out, his heartbeat throbbing in every inch of his body. “Look at you.”
Burakh is splayed beneath him like a sacrifice on the stone slab, back arched and chest pressed towards him, as if begging for the knife. His stare is dark and hungry and endless. He’s devastating.
Daniil bends to kiss him, pushing his tongue into his slack mouth. He circles his hips to rub his prick against the glans of Burakh’s cock, pleasure burning hot in the pit of his belly.
He feels it when Burakh comes, the way his stomach tenses and then his cock, pressed flush against him, kicks. Daniil keeps circling for a few moments longer, until Burakh makes a noise suspiciously close to a whimper.
Admittedly, it’s gratifying that Burakh finished first, and largely as a side effect of Daniil chasing his own pleasure. It restores a little of his own dignity, which, given the endless day he’s had, is sorely needed.
Burakh’s chest heaves as he catches his breath. He looks good like this, soft and hazy. Neither of them make any move to wipe away the fluid streaked impressively high up his torso.
Then Burakh pulls Daniil up onto his knees and gets his hand between them. The angle isn’t great, but the faintest brush against his cock is enough to make Daniil sag forwards, his knees sliding apart on the stone.
Burakh cranes up and takes one of Daniil’s nipples into his mouth. The shock of it, even through his vest, strikes him hard; his hips hitch, his breath catches.
There’s a hot, sharp feeling in the pit of his belly, like a fist clenched tight. He’s overheating and every beat of his racing heart seems to make him tremble. His ribs contract around his straining lungs as pain splinters through his chest.
“Fuck—” Daniil wheezes. “Wait—”
Burakh’s head drops back onto the slab, his hand still busily working him over. Daniil’s body is buzzing, his thighs shaking so badly he can’t barely keep himself upright. He’s so close, he knows he’s close, the muscles of his navel and thighs clench in anticipation. Burakh slides his free hand up his front and rests it at the base of Daniil’s throat.
His mouth moves, but Daniil can’t hear the words. Likely telling him to breathe, as if it were that easy. Then Burakh squeezes his throat, compressing his airway, and Daniil comes so hard he feels like he’s turned inside out.
He can’t be held responsible for whatever noises or wretched things he says while he’s experiencing the kind of orgasm quacks think can cure a woman’s mental illness, but that doesn’t mean he won’t be mortified when it’s over.
Burakh seems to, quite politely, pretend like he can’t hear him; he works him gently through the aftershocks, then slides out from beneath him and fetches another herbal remedy that, after demonstrating some deep breathing, he pours down Daniil’s throat.
Daniil absolutely needs a dose of calomel, but it feels like every bit of tension in his body has been obliterated, and he simply collapses instead. The stone slab doesn’t even feel all that uncomfortable, the state he’s in.
The state he’s in being, of course, victory. At last. It feels good, if a bit damp.
Burakh stands over him, a look on his face Daniil absolutely refuses to categorize. There are flakes of drying semen dashed up his torso, and sweat shining in the dip between his pectorals. He’s tucked himself back into his trousers, but left them unfastened so Daniil can see where the trail of hair down his belly meets the damp curls between his legs.
A pulse of desire hits Daniil so hard it might as well be a fist to his belly. Christ. He wants another round.
Now Burakh’s looking at him like he knows what he’s thinking—maybe he can smell it, and why is that an arousing thought?
Daniil clears his throat. “Any chance…?”
For a split second, he thinks Burakh’s going to give in but then he shakes his head. “Tell you what, oynon. We get through this alive and you can fuck me however you like.”
Well, that’s sobering. Now that he’s managed to survive this hour, the reality of their situation starts to trickle back in. All he still has left to do, the threads to chase into tomorrow and yesterday—wait. What was that?
“However I’d like?” Daniil peers up into Burakh’s face.
Something Daniil never noticed before, in his manic haze: Burakh’s ears turn bright red when he blushes. “That’s what I said.”
“Well.” Daniil is struck dumb by the fact that, even after all the things he’s already done to Burakh, the list of things he’d like to do to him is growing rapidly. “That’s a stimulating thought.”
Burakh looks genuinely pained. “Please, oynon. Put your pants back on.”
And that, Daniil decides, counts as a victory too.