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They were the same colour as coffee, and Lucanis Dellamorte was addicted. Not the deep, bitter black like the coffee he drank, but with a splash of cream to take the edge off. Rounder, gentler on the palate, yet still incredibly rich and deep. Like coffee, this began as an indulgence and turned into a need. Something he sought out multiple times a day to keep himself functioning properly. He wasn’t entirely sure when this addiction began, but at the end of the day, he didn’t particularly care.
“Luca~nis,” came a singsong call in a pleasantly accented voice. The deep timbre was rough and luxurious in the same way velvet was.
Focus expanding to include the entire face of the man who called his name, Lucanis arched one black brow. “Hm?”
“Do I have something on my face?” Rhodes ‘Rook’ Thorne asked, tilting his head slightly. “Between my teeth? In my moustache!” He scrubbed his hand over the mentioned facial hair, disturbing the carefully styled tips. “Maybe my beard?” The hand moved down to the short, pointed beard, brushing over it vigorously.
“What?” Lucanis set his coffee cup down on the saucer with a soft click.
“You were staring, so I assumed I had food—” He gestured vaguely at his face.
Leaning back in his chair, Lucanis folded his arms over his chest. “You had breakfast with Harding and Taash. They would have told you.”
“Or,” Rook said, waggling his finger at Lucanis, “they would have left me looking ridiculous so they could laugh at me.”
The corner of Lucanis’ mouth twitched. “You don’t have anything on your face,” he reassured the man, reaching out to twist one messy tip of his moustache.
Rook leaned forward, bracing one arm on the corner of the heavy wooden dining table. He arched one dark, straight brow and smirked. It gave him a roguish air that was completely at odds with his soft, gentle, and oftentimes silly personality. But then again, that was at odds with his brutality in battle…
“Then why, pray tell, are you staring at me? With a dreamy, far-off expression on your face, no less.” The smirk turned into a teasing grin. “It couldn’t possibly be because I’m so devilishly handsome.”
It was Lucanis’ turn to smirk as he mimicked Rook’s posture. With their chairs facing each other at an angle, only the corner of the table between them, the rest of the kitchen seemed to melt away. His gaze quickly darted over Rook’s face, taking in the details with his trained assassin’s eye. He did this so often, the man’s appearance was fully committed to memory, but Lucanis would never tire of looking. From his deep plum-coloured hair that was always perfectly styled in a knot and side-braids, the underside shorn close to the skin, to the prominent claw mark scars on the right side of his face. His full lips set between the neatly groomed moustache and beard. The spray of dots across the bridge of his nose and cheeks.
“Perhaps Spite was trying to count your freckles again,” he said.
Rook’s eyes sparkled with amusement. “Remind me: how far did he get last time before he got distracted?”
Clicking his tongue, Lucanis gave the other man a teasingly disappointed shake of his head. “Got distracted? No, no. You distracted him. With kisses.”
“Are you sure? That doesn’t sound like me.” The grin on his face was wide and bright. Lopsided. Cheeky,
Lucanis couldn’t help the smile that tilted his mouth. “Ah. Well, I must have mistaken you for some other handsome Grey Warden.”
“Couldn’t be Davrin! We look nothing alike. I don’t have pointy ears.”
At this, Lucanis laughed.
Rook’s expression softened, his coffee-brown eyes warm with affection.
Sure the emotion was mirrored in his own gaze, Lucanis reached out to caress the side of Rook’s face. He brushed his fingers over the scars that ended near the corner of his eye, thankful that whatever creature that left those behind missed the eye itself.
Rook leaned into Lucanis’ palm, practically purring.
Keeping his hand in place, Lucanis rose from his seat and rounded the corner of the table. He stepped between Rook’s knees and took the man’s face between his palms. Gently tilting Rook’s head back, Lucanis bent down to capture his lips in a soft, tender kiss. He felt Spite stirring inside him and had to tell the demon this was meant to be a quiet moment.
“Who’s distracting who with kisses now?” Rook teased with a quirk of his brow as he snaked his arms around Lucanis’ hips. He tilted his chin up to give the Crow a better angle.
Spite was having a tantrum in the back of his mind as Lucanis stroked the hair on the sides of Rook’s face that connected to his beard. They exchanged gentle, languid kisses even as Rook’s nimble fingers started working on the crow-head buttons of Lucanis’ waistcoat.
Lucanis groaned both in pleasure and loss as Rook’s hot mouth moved from his lips to his throat. The man’s teeth scraped against his skin, prompting another moan. He tipped his head down to nibble on Rook’s ear—a recent discovery on Lucanis’ part, but it made Rook melt—and realized he had been divested of his waistcoat, and his shirt was hanging open.
Rook splayed his hands over Lucanis’ chest and looked up to meet his eyes. “Your heart feels like it’s going to break free.”
“Not even the most adrenaline-fueled contracts can make it race as you do, mi amor,” Lucanis whispered.
Rook stared up at Lucanis, brows raised. He blinked, soft and slow, a prelude to the flurry of motion that occurred soon after. Standing abruptly, Rook sent his chair tumbling backward with a bang. Hooking his hands behind Lucanis’ thighs, Rook hoisted him onto the table, making the flatware clatter alarmingly.
Flat on his back, stunned and a bit breathless, Lucanis met Rook’s molten gaze with wide-eyed surprise. “Speed like that could put Spite to shame.”
“Let me try it on Rook!” Phantom purple and black wings erupted from Lucanis’ back, spreading out across the tabletop.
“My turn first,” Rook answered the demonic growl, his voice rough as he leaned over Lucanis. He covered the other man’s body with his own, pressing their hips together and making his desire evident.
As Rook kissed him, rough and passionate, Lucanis wrapped his arms around the man’s back, grabbing fistfuls of his quilted overshirt. Lips, tongues, and teeth marked and devoured, leaving trails of tingling fire.
When Rook pulled back, his fingers sliding through the dark hair on Lucanis’ chest and abdomen, his breathing was rough and his gaze fogged. “I think I figured out why you were staring at me,” he said before bending over Lucanis once more.
“Oh? And what is your conclusion?” the Crow asked breathlessly as Rook kissed a trail from the hollow of his throat to his navel, inch by excruciating inch.
“It was an invitation to throw you onto the table like this and partake in a very pleasant afternoon,” came Rook’s gruff reply as he fumbled with Lucanis’ belt buckle.
“I hardly need to be so subtle.”
“In private, no, but this is a communal space. Very bold of you.” Rook grinned, slowly pulling the belt free and dropping it to the floor. He straightened up and let his gaze rove over his partner’s body. Those coffee-coloured eyes that Lucanis so adored darkened to molten chocolate, and the heat stole the Crow’s breath.
“The Lighthouse is empty today,” he managed to say.
Rook peppered Lucanis’ chest with more short kisses. “Maybe so, but you’ll think of this at every meal.”
Lucanis already thought about Rook, about this with every cup of coffee he drank. All because of those damned eyes.
With a growl that was part him, part Spite, Lucanis hauled Rook back up his body to capture his teasing mouth with his own. He hooked his legs around the man’s hips and held him fast.
“Then you’d best make it worth remembering, yes?” he whispered in Rook’s sensitive ear. The man shivered.
“Rook has too many clothes!”
Lucanis huffed out a sigh as Rook snorted against his shoulder. The man nipped at the bare skin before standing up straight to remove a few layers of his untouched clothing. As he did, he held eye contact with Lucanis, and his lips tilted in a smirk. Each item hit the floor until Rook stood between Lucanis’ thighs, dressed only in breeches that were looking much too snug, and his boots.
“Much better,” Lucanis purred, matching Rook’s expression.
“I think more can still come off,” replied Rook, once again pressing his hips to Lucanis’.
“Agreed.” Licking his lips, Lucanis pushed himself up onto his elbows and reached out to drag his fingers over the griffin tattoo on Rook’s left arm.
“You’re staring again,” Rook teased as they held one another’s heated gaze.
“As are you,” Lucanis pointed out, his voice husky to his ears.
Rook shrugged, toying with the clasp of Lucanis’ trousers and making him twitch. “I like what I see.”
“As do I.”
It was a shame to let a cup of coffee go cold, but Lucanis left that cup forgotten happily. The heat and arousal in Rook’s rich brown eyes were more than worth it. Even if this pleasure, this affection wasn’t his reward, Lucanis wouldn’t be able to help himself now that he let himself want this man.
As the couple drowned in one another’s pleasure, Lucanis knew he would be lost in Rook’s coffee-coloured eyes again before too long. And Rook would find his own addiction in the deep umber of Lucanis’ stares.