Work Text:
When Soleum thinks of his mother, he thinks of her sitting in her chair in front of the window. He thinks of the quiet way she would brush her hair and tie it back. He thinks of the way she would use her reflection in the glass to make sure not a strand was stray, before carefully pulling the hood of her dark red cloak up.
It would throw her face into shadow, but Soleum never missed the way her lips would curve up in a smile as she turned to look at him.
She would hold out her hand and it would be all the permission Soleum needed to run across the room and into her waiting arms. He would bury his face against her cloak, taking in the comforting smell of woodsmoke.
“Only blood,” she always whispered as she brushed Soleum’s bangs away from his forehead, her fingers always lingering on his face.
The words meant that she would be gone, arms laden with gifts from the village, as she walked off into the forest. It was a space he’d always been warned away from.
There’s a creature that haunts through the trees and it will pick its teeth with your bones.
When his mother talked of their shared blood, he knew that he had nothing to fear, despite the elders' attempts to make him weary of the woods. He trusted her stories above theirs. He trusted her hands on his face as she leaned down to kiss him on the forehead and told him she would be back before bed. That she would be okay.
There was always a book left open on her desk and it was a promise of continuation. It was a promise that whatever was in the woods wouldn’t hurt her, just like it wouldn’t hurt him when it was his turn to take her spot.
“Go find your father,” she would say, still smiling, and Soleum listened like he always did. He would press his hands up to the spot she’d kissed and storm through the house to find his father.
Tradition was the way he begged to be picked up so he could kiss his father like his mother had done for him, laughing all the while.
Tradition was the way his mother stepped out the door and bore the weight of the village in her arms as she picked up their offerings, and followed the overgrown path into the woods.
“You have to go.”
The words are firm, unconcerned for Soleum’s grief.
He looks towards the elders of the village, in the way they’re watching him without a shred of sympathy in their hard eyes. They’re more concerned for the village as a whole, he understands, instead of holding concern for the way Soleum’s aching for the familiar hold of his mother.
“Go?” Soleum asks, his voice cracking from disuse. He swallows, reaching up a hand to rub as his dry eyes as he pushes himself to his feet. “Into the woods?”
“Yes,” someone says, but Soleum’s head is throbbing too hard to sort out who’s speaking. The elders feel less like individual people and more like a single united being. Daunting as they stand there in a semi-circle in front of Soleum.
A bitter part of him wants to tell them to find someone else, to take their offerings themselves. A glance down to the freshly turned soil and he knows better. His mother wouldn’t want him to be bitter.
“Of course,” Soleum says instead of the sharp words sitting on the tip of his tongue. He doesn’t look towards the elders, knowing that if he took in their faces, he might break apart into anger. “When do you want me to go?”
“Before nightfall, we can’t have any more delays.”
Can’t have any more delays. Said as if Soleum’s mother hadn’t been sick. Said as if he hadn’t needed to bury her.
“Of course,” Soleum says again, as if the words don’t grate like glass in his throat.
When Soleum steps into the forest, it’s quiet around him.
There isn’t the sound of birds, or small animals. Nothing but the sound of his heart beat thundering in his own chest and his breath sawing in and out.
He knows that he’s being watched as he steps into the path worn down by his mother’s steps, and her father’s before her. They expect him to flee, to turn back around and run back home. As much as anger at the way he’s been pushed to step into the forest makes him want to, he doesn’t think he could face his mother’s disappointment that he let it win.
Soleum steps in deeper.
His arms are weighted with a quilt and a lamb. Both are gifts of time and devotion.
He rubs the yarn of the quilt between his fingers as he walks, eyes firmly set ahead. It’s soft between his fingertips, grounding as he continues forward, past unfamiliar trees.
As a child, he hadn’t been afraid, not when his mother whispered so many promises to him. Here, standing amongst the silent forest, Soleum feels all of his muscles go tense. It would be so easy to get lost, to get turned around, he thinks. The trees all blur together in a sameness that makes him wonder if maybe he has.
His mother was supposed to guide him, to make sure he knew where he was supposed to go. As he continues forward, footsteps unsure, he wishes she had. He wishes he had had time to take her hand and let her lead him. He wishes she was with him right now, when he feels anxiety crawling up his throat.
Closing his eyes, Soleum stops, arms aching with how heavy the lamb and the quilt are getting. Heavier with each step, heavier with each acknowledgement that he should never have had to do this first trip alone.
Something chimes, tinkling in the breeze and Soleum looks up sharply.
Soleum takes a step forward, and then another, following the soft sound. It’s gentle, barely noticeable over the wind, but it’s the only noise amongst the trees and it pulls him forward. Forward, until he’s standing at the base of a tree and looking up at a small wind chime strung amongst the branches.
The flash of red hanging from the chime is familiar and Soleum wonders if he stretched his hand up to it, would it be the soft material of his mother’s robes.
The sight of it makes his eyes sting and his throat go tight. He hadn’t cried when they buried her. He hadn’t cried when the elders had told him he needed to leave her side to complete this task.
Here, amongst the trees and looking up at the wind chimes only she could have left, Soleum’s tears well up and over. It should feel like drowning, the way he can’t suck in a deep breath, how his knees lock up tight so that he doesn’t collapse down to the dirt.
The bell rings, with the wind singing a song, and it feels a lot like it’s mourning too.
Soleum barely knows he’s trembling, until a chill crawls up his spine. Instincts telling him something is wrong, something is different.
He turns and he struggles to inhale as he sees two eyes glowing in the shadows of the trees. He remembers his mothers stories, and remembers her tales of the wolf that lives in the woods. The beast that protects them.
It prowls forward and Soleum’s lungs go tight at the sight of it. It makes him feel small, standing there shaking as it steps out from between the trees. It makes the herding dogs in the village seem diminutive, nothing more than toys to how massive the wolf is.
“I’m sorry,” Soleum chokes out, past the sadness and anger. Past the fear. “She’s gone.”
The wolf lowers its muzzle down, golden eyes watching Soleum so carefully. It exhales, a sharp growl of a breath, but makes no move forward.
“These are for you,” Soleum stumbles forward, before going to his knees. He sets the quilt and the lamb down, eyes on the dark red yarn. As dark as blood. He pulls his hands away and curls them in his lap, uncaring that he must look like a mess with tears running down his face. The bell chimes again and Soleum tries not to sob. He reaches up to scrub at his face, “Sorry, I’ll leave. Can I stay for a moment though?”
The wolf sits, making no move forward and Soleum shudders. It could so easily lurch forward and tear out Soleum’s throat, but instead it watches him silently. It lowers itself further, down to its belly, and rests its face on its front paws. It makes no move forward, and Soleum chokes at the quiet acceptance.
He looks away from its gold gold eyes, and up to the wind chime spinning in the soft breeze.
“She would be sorry she couldn’t come herself.”
The wolf huffs and Soleum falls quiet.
Only blood, Soleum’s mother used to say.
Walking through the trees, his feet aching in the snow, Soleum wonders if maybe it was a falsehood.
His robes, just as red as his mothers, trails behind him, wiping away his footprints as he makes his way deeper into the forest. It’s damp, against the back of his legs, and he shivers as he traces a now familiar path.
“Jay!” Soleum calls, voice raw in his throat.
Only blood, his mother had used to say like a promise. The way the elders had talked about his bloodline made him feel dizzy with dread. As if Soleum’s life was for them to decide how it played out.
It feels like a death sentence. You can’t escape, you can’t leave. You’re ours.
Soleum’s breath catches in his throat and he whines at the way he can’t breathe.
A snarl and Soleum’s bowled down into the snow, a wet cold nose nudging against his cheek, startling Soleum enough to finally inhale.
He sputters, fingers curling into the snow, even as his hands sting with it.
A heavy paw falls to his shoulder, pushing Soleum down into the snow until he finally, finally, settles. Trembling in the snow, Soleum falls still, the wolf above him holding him in place with his weight, until Soleum gives a tiny little nod. “Please, I’m okay.”
Jay lifts himself back up, teeth grabbing onto the hood of Soleum’s robe and pulling him up with him. It makes Soleum go breathless for a moment, the way it goes tight around his neck, but Jay lets go quickly enough to nudge Soleum back up to his feet.
“They want me to marry, to have a child,” Soleum chokes and wraps his arms around Jay’s neck. Jay’s fur is damp under Soleum’s hands, and he buries his face in against it, inhaling the woodsy smell of his fur. In his arms, Jay growls, the sound rumbling up and making Soleum shiver at the way the vibrations settle in his own chest.
There’s a secret though, that even the elders don’t know about the beast that they give offerings to to keep them safe.
Bones crack and shift, and Soleum trembles as the weight in his arms changes, as it folds in on itself into something smaller. Hands find his face, pulling him away enough that Jay can get him to meet his gaze and even like this, his eyes are still so gold. “You’re not theirs.”
Tradition was bringing the beast in the forest gifts. Whatever the village had that they could offer in trade for protection.
Soleum had thought it was from other beasts that lurked in the shadows, things with sharp teeth and claws. He had thought they needed protection from something they couldn’t protect one another from. Maybe the beast itself, the ones they met to trade. Protection from him.
Running through the forest, the sound of a wind chime in the distance, Soleum knows that that wasn’t the case.
The tradition was meant to live with each other in peace, but it changed into something wrapped in fear.
That fear, that tradition… it kept everyone in the village. It kept them from leaving. It kept them continuing in the same monotony of the lives they were told would be all they could live.
Soleum runs, as fast as he can, ignoring the rocks digging into the soft pads of his feet and breathes.
His blood isn’t special, he’s learned. His family was just chosen for a role and they’ve played it out as long as they could. Soleum wonders if his mother knew, but didn’t break the cycle because of her love for Soleum’s father. Soleum wonders if she knew and that’s why she hung that wind chime, why she promised it was only blood.
Nothing special, nothing exceptional.
Anyone could have stepped into the forests and gone to meet Jay. He wouldn’t have hurt them, not if they came in peace.
A crash in the underbrush off to his side and Soleum veers off, sprinting away from the barely maintained path.
His cloak catches on twigs and branches as he runs, but Soleum doesn’t slow, just runs as fast and as hard as he can. His bags are tucked in under a tree, far enough into the forest that no one will see them, that no one will know that he isn’t just asleep in a far too quiet house.
Soleum runs, breath catching on a laugh, before he’s bowled over into the dirt.
His hands scrape against the ground, but for how he falls, he doesn’t hit the ground hard.
Jay's cold nose brushes across Soleum's cheek and he turns his face in to press against Jay's dark fur.
Jay's weight is a heavy thing, pushing Soleum down into the ground. It has Soleum scrambling at his cloak with desperate fingers, pulling it free of the clasp and letting it fall away to the ground around them.
The huff of noise Jay makes is loud and Soleum stretches underneath him, sinking into the feel of Jay's fur brushing against his bare skin.
A growl and Jay smacks one of his paws against Soleum's shoulder, pressing him down into the ground on his belly. It pulls a laugh from Soleum's chest, the way he can almost hear Jay's commentary on how he's already naked, how he's obviously wanting.
Soleum's thrumming with the possibilities of leaving, of choosing what he wants and this is it. "Jay—"
Whatever Soleum was about to say gets lost as Jay's tongue curls over the curve of his jaw.
It's a gentle way of saying that Jay knows, that he understands.
It's all the gentleness he's given, before Jay cracks his jaw wide and grabs Soleum by the back of his neck.
The beast could kill him like this, could squeeze its jaw closed around the back of Soleum’s neck and break him. Jay won’t though, even as his teeth break skin and blood rolls down the line of Soleum’s throat.
All it does is have Soleum sagging in Jay's hold and trembling with expectation.
Soleum can feel Jay’s muscles bunch beneath his fur, can feel them contract as he presses himself down along Soleum’s back. He pushes Soleum down, paws bracketing Soleum on either side and making him feel so small underneath Jay. The weight of him is overwhelming and Soleum digs his toes into the ground to push up against Jay at the feeling rising in his chest.
Around his neck, Jay’s jaw tightens, before he quickly relaxes again, but it pulls a loud whine up from Soleum’s throat. It’s intoxicating, the way Jay holds him in place, keeps him there. It’s so different from the fear of being kept in place that he’s been living with, because this… this is what Soleum wants.
Something hot and thick brushes up against the back of Soleum’s thigh and he gasps at the slick slide of it against his skin. It should make his stomach roil with disgust, but Jay’s breath caresses over his skin through the hold of his jaws and Soleum trusts him. He doesn’t care that this was never the space he was meant to fill when the elders sent him out. This was his own choice.
Jay’s cock pushes against him and Soleum moans out a pathetic sound. He’s big and Soleum regrets the quick way he’d worked himself open on his own fingers. It doesn’t feel like enough.
Despite the stories, Jay is gentle as he nudges his cock against Soleum, smearing precome over him. It mixes with the oil Soleum had worked himself open with, leaking down his thighs in what he knows will be a mess to clean up. Jay waits and it isn’t until Soleum squirms back against him, whispering a pathetic “please”, that Jay slowly sinks into him.
The pain of the stretch has Soleum gasping, his voice thin. It’s almost too much, but fuck, Soleum wants. Jay stills though and Soleum trembles at the time he gives him to adjust. Jay stills and it’s every little sway of Soleum’s hips that has Jay’s cock pressing a little bit deeper.
Soleum doesn’t know what he expected, but he doesn’t think even knowing could have prepared him for the ache of how full he feels as Jay sinks in further. Jay’s fur is warm and his teeth are sharp, but all Soleum can think about is the heat of his cock.
The first few rocks of Jay pressing into him are shallow, until Soleum nods his head and gasps out something that could maybe be a, “More.”
It makes his head spin, with too much, not enough.
He’s never been touched like this, outside of the way Jay had sunk down between his legs, all too human, and brought him to an orgasm on his tongue.
Having Jay fill him so fully, when all Soleum’s ever had have been his own fingers, make him wonder if this would be all he would ever crave.
Jay’s fucks into him, burying himself deep, and Soleum whines. He finally uncurls his fingers from his cloak and reaches behind him, grasping for any part of Jay he can reach. He tangles Jay’s fur between his fingers and moans out a pathetic sound at the way he feels something more as Jay shallowly rocks into him.
Saliva drips down Soleum’s collarbone and he gasps into the cloak, face pressed hard into the ground. “Please, I want it.”
He knows what he’s asking for, had been warned by Jay, but even so, the way Jay rocks a little harder into him has Soleum’s toes curling.
Jay’s knot stretches him further, stretches him until Soleum goes silent with the pain of it. Still he doesn’t ask for Jay to stop, just shakes apart under the weight of Jay splitting him open on his cock.
Jay sinks into him and Soleum screams at the way he continues to rock into him, until Soleum’s spilling onto the red fabric of his cloak below them. He clenches down hard around Jay and that’s enough to have Jay twitching inside of him. Jay fills him and Soleum goes boneless underneath him.
They lay there, still, until Soleum pats at Jay with a tired whine. A gentle shift that has Jay pulling at where his cock is pressed into Soleum, that has him sniffling pathetically.
It's eased by Jay's laughter rumbling against Soleum's back, all too human. Skin against skin, Soleum turns his face to try and look up at Jay, admiring the shine of his eyes.
Jay smiles lazily, reaching down between them to prod his fingers against where his cock is still sitting in Soleum, even as he softens. "This was a surprise."
"Good I hope?" Soleum murmurs, soaking in the warmth of Jay laying across him.
"What were you running from?"
"Not running from," Soleum smiles and reaches for one of Jay's hands. He pulls it up, close enough that his breath gusts hot over Jay's skin. "Running towards."
Jay's fingers curl, his fingertips brushing over Soleum's lips. "Changing traditions?"
Soleum nods, recognizing that Jay understands him with an intimacy few have taken the time to learn. "Changing traditions."