[AU][C][M] Festivities

He wanted more, he was curious.

Was sex special to him until he became a slave? Or was there more to it?

"Sure," he said.

He didn't know why he was asking him how he would like his hair. However the slave styled his hair it seemed gorgeous. He would love to reach his hand out and run his fingers through it. Very few people in Alden had hair that dark and glossy. Browns and bonds with a pasty complexion were common.

The reply had Fleck smiling before he turned his attention down to his hair.

He worked with nimble fingers, separating his hair into quarters, and braiding each of those quarters quickly and efficiently, then braiding the four braids together.

Then he sank beneath the water, and emerged, wiping water from his eyes.

"It'll wave come morning, when it dries."

Richard sipped on his wine and watched with fascination as he braided his hair with quickly and with efficiency.

He had seen his sister with her hair braided similarly before. Rather than to add a wave to it, it was to tame it. Stop the hair frizzing like a wild mane around her.

Curly hair wasn't common in Alden. But it was on the tiny island his grandmother was from, between Alden and the kingdom across the sea.

"Is it not uncomfortable?"

It sure looked it. Long heavy hair pulled into a number of braids that tugged on his scalp.

"No, my Prince. I've had long hair since I was a boy. I've grown used to the weight."

He'd lived with his hair long, and ever growing longer, since he was at his fathers knees. He hadn't cut it in a long while. He'd had the time to get used to its weight.

He relaxed back against the bath wall again.

Richard hummed, and ran his fingers through his damp curls. it wasn't popular for men to grow their hair past their shoulders in Alden. His hair was only so long because his curls hid the length.

Light headed, he turned, arms folded on the side with his head rested on them. His knees curled under him on the seat.

He stared a little longer at the braids. Then the relaxed expression on the slaves face. The rise and fall of his chest, rippling the water.

"Have you never wanted to cut it?"

"Only a few times."

He could remember the exact times he had wanted to cut his hair. When fists curled in it, yanked sharply, dragging him back against cocks and fingers. He didn't mind the act, but those people had been so rough. There was only so much he could take before it became painful.

"I like the length, though I shouldn't think to let it grow too much longer." Mid-thigh was long enough. He'd give it another inch to grow before cutting it off at the hip.

Dick hummed.

"Your hair is gorgeous."

It was the first compliment he had openly given the slave - that wasn't about the earlier wrestling match or as an act in front of the Queen.

Sure, the slave must know Dick found him attractive. He had managed on numerous occasions get him hard - or at least half way there. Or leave him a breathless. Or make his skin glow.

He took another long sip of his wine.

A smile bloomed on his face.

"I've been told its my best feature." He ran his fingertips over the long braid gently.

"My ass also gets that compliment," he murmured almost thoughtfully. His lightheadedness was lending to a loose tongue. And that was what he would blame in the future if he thought back on the moment he turned intense eyes onto the Prince and asked: "which do you prefer?"

"Your eyes," he said without a best.

It was cliché, he knew. Many men and woman used that body feature in Alden. It was safe.

But for the slave, it was true. They were so warm and inviting and intense. It lit a fire in him.

"You have nice shoulders too. And arms."

He liked larger men.

The wine was hitting him hard and he felt giddy. He smiled at the slave, head still on his arms.

"You've named half of my body, yet neither of the options you were given."

He was bold, cheered on by strong wine and steamy lightheadedness as he glided forwards in the water.

His hand found the Prince's hair, fingers pushing through it, drawing it away from his ear. His lips found the shell of that delicate ear, running over it slowly. 

"Would you rather pull my hair," he murmured in a croon, "or fuck my ass?"

They weren't, he thought hazily, watching as the other man glided towards him.

The finger curling his hair back behind his ear caused a shiver to run up his spine. His breathing stopped as lips were brought to the shell of his ear. His stomach dip and clenched.

"I-" he couldn't answer it. Words stuck in the back of his throat.

"Or both?" he crooned in the same tone.

The hand that wasn't in Richard's hair trailed sensually down an arm, just teasing lightly at his skin.

"Does the Prince pull a man's hair when he rides him?"

He wanted that. He wanted his Master to desire him. No, no. Richard already desired him. That was plain to see. He wanted the man to give up propriety for him. He wanted his Prince to fuck him and use him for what he was for.

His heart pounded aginst his ribs. The teasing hand on his skin made hiss fingers twitch.

He wanted him so, so bad. Even more so in his drunk state. There was an ache for him.

"But you're a slave."

The slave said so enough times already. That he had been stripped of his personhood. The old life discarded behind him. Nothing more than a body to fuck.

What type of man was that?

If Richard had wished for a negative reaction, he should have chosen better words.

He hummed, agreeing with the words, his lips vibrating slightly against the Prince's ear.

"I've been made for your pleasure. Made for you to fuck." His lips puckered, pressed a kiss to his earlobe, then lower, against the sensitive patch of skin just behind it.

He chewed on his lip, inhaling unsteadily as kisses were placed against the lobe and the sensitive patch of skin.

Dizzily, he brought his head up.

He was caught between wanting this so bad, and that it went against everything he was taught. The slave just so readily agreed. He didn't get it, he didn't understand it.

"Do you say that to everyone?"

"No."

The answer was true, but not because he held a token extra fondness for Richard. He didn't have to tell people, usually, because they were so eager to indulge in his body.

He was made for bodily pleasure, yet the only person that didn't want his body was the one person that he had been given to. Permanently. He knew it was a possibility that the Prince wouldn't want his body. It was likely a calculated variable of the Queen, to try and do more to humiliate him.

Nothing was more humiliating than an attractive pleasure slave being turned down by their own Master.

But he was starting to take offence now.

Yes, Alden had high standards about sex, but Richard liked his body. Richard got hard at the sight of him, fucked him with his eyes. He was his so what was the harm in them laying together?

He drew the Prince's earlobe into his mouth, giving it a wet suck, as his fingers trailed over pale skin again.

His eyes slid close as the lips wrapped around the earlobe. He let out of a short breath. The constant feeling of fingers running up and down his arm, leaving a tingling trail, was maddening.

He was hot. His head spun. He lifted and turned so his lips crashed against the slaves heatedly. Both hands below the surface of the water to grab at his hips. He could feel the lines the lead lower with his thumb.

As quickly as the heat flared it burned out.

"No," he said firmly, pushing himself back. He would have stumbled if they weren't in the bath.

The heat of damp lips against his own was almost blissful. 

This was what he'd been wanting. For the Prince to finally step up and use him.

His hands ran up Richard's arms when the Prince's hands found his hips, and he pressed closer, teeth capturing the Prince's lower lip and giving it a small tug.

That move, which was supposed to be sexy, backfired spectacularly when the Prince pulled back sharply. The lip split under the sharp teeth, and he tasted blood with absolute horror. He took one step back, then another, and soon he was pressed back against the other side of the bath.

He bowed his head deeply, feeling a cold fear and a small tremble set into him. If they weren't in the water, he would have prostrated himself.

Richard panted, body flushed. Looking up, he was glad for the large and sudden space the slave brought between them.

He felt something drip down his chin. Lifting a hand, he wiped it and pale fingers came way red. He was bleeding. The slave caused him to bleed.

Only then it stung.

He hissed, the hand pressed down on his lip, eyes trailed back up to the slave. The large tanned body was pressed against the wall and his head bowed low. Suddenly he didn't look so large.

He slid back down into the curve in the wall. Bringing his hand away again, he found that the blood now seeped between his finger. The sweet taste of wine on his tongue had been interrupted by the copper taste of blood.

"Get me a cloth."

"Yes, my Prince." His voice was meek.

Fleck was quick and silent as he retrieved a cloth from the log table that everything else had been set up on, and moved back into the bath.

He could feel his shaking as he approached the bleeding Prince, and he felt nausea roll his stomach.

"Please," he murmured, voice so low that Dick would just be able to hear the whisper, as he offered up the cloth. He didn't dare attempt to touch the man right now. "Please accept my deepest apologies, my Prince."

Dick pluck the cloth from the slave. It was a fresh cloth, dry to soak up the blood. He pressed it against his lip and sighed.

Blue eyes rolled back down to the slave. The was a tremble in his muscles. Why was he trembling?

Then he realised. He was trembling because he was scared.

That hurt. What did the slave think he was going to do? Treat him like the rest of the Ecrutez royal family?

"It's okay," he finally said. "It's happened before."

His eyes twitched up, meeting the Prince's just for a moment before dropping again.

That moment was enough, though, for Richard to see just how terrified the man was. This wasn't some small fear, of a servant that had done wrong.

He was a slave. He was a slave that had been tormented and tortured for years. And he had just injured his Master, a Prince.


Emilio would see this. Katalin would see this. They'd have him for this. They'd both been waiting for so long to find something that they could pick on. He'd been so careful to not give them any ammunition. He'd been so good.


And in just a few days he would have been shipped to another country, away from them and their torment. Their biggest, most painful move in this twisted game between them would have torn him apart, but been his salvation.

But that wasn't going to come.

He wouldn't live past tomorrow.

His assurance seemed to hardly have any effect on the slave at all.

The drunkness didn't subside and he wasn't the best when it came to people, let alone a slaved who looked like they were about to be whipped for eternity.

Bringing the cloth off his face, unlike his drunkness, the bleeding subsided. It would still be swollen and bruised in the morning.

He leant his head back on the edge of the pool. His head spun.

"I'm not going to have you whipped or anything."

He attempted a smile for the Prince's benefit.

"Without offence, sir? It isn't you I'm worried about," he murmured into the hot air between them.

He blinked again, and tried to force back the shaking in his limbs.

It was going to happen. He wasn't going to let his last few hours be completely miserable with fear. He wouldn't give them the satisfaction.

"The steam is beginning to get to you, my Prince. Perhaps it's time we retire to your chambers."

A line was drawn between his brows.

So he was worried about the Royal family? Why would this sex crazed kingdom worry about a split lip? Surely they get them - and worst - all the time?

He had kissed the slave and he suddenly pulled back - something went wrong in between. Yes, he was shocked and a little pissed at first. More at himself and the events that lead up to it.

But it happens. He didn;t see why the Royal family will penalise him for it.

(He hazily thought back to this afternoon. Then brushed it away.)

He hummed at the slave's suggestion, dabbing his lip again. There was less blood this time when he pulled away.

"You're right."

Lifting his head, he drained the tiny bit of wine that was left then made to move.

He had to steady himself on the table once out the bath. His weight leant on its edge.

"My robe, please."