Nothing Ventured (Valence Family)

[Dervish]

I should probably have been looking for a job, but those park benches were starting to look mighty cozy after a fourth night getting acquainted with them. I'd done something like this for most of five years now. What was a few more days?

What was a lifetime, of more of the same?

I'd spent the last five years being mostly jobless, too. Maybe my job interview skills had suffered a bit. But it was proof I didn't need to hold down a job to survive. I couldn't be the only Were who'd come back to a healthy dose of cold shoulder. What was more, I could survive better than most. My essential diet didn't call for any blood to be spilled, or any bodies to hide.

(Incidentally, park rangers don't like it when they find shrubs and trees with huge bites taken out of them in the morning. Consult your local authorities to find out when they're not looking.)

It wasn't really a bad life, come to think of it. The solitary outcast. A free man, sleeping under the stars, making the blanket of the western skies his home.

That sounded like a song. I was writing songs now. This couldn't be good.

I sauntered through the middle of nowhere, admiring the scenery as the optimistic thoughts continued to flow. I was following a dirt road, fresh air and open fields to either side. My stomach took note of the overgrown shrubbery, immediately turning my thoughts to the last time I'd had a good meal.

My blank stare rested on the unclaimed buffet for several long minutes, until I reached the conclusion that I didn't remember anymore. And all around me was... well, it wasn't like anyone could see me... no, I definitely wasn't starting to drool...

I turned my back to the nearer field, shut my eyes and took a step backward to rest my weight against the waist-high wooden fence that separated grass from road. I inhaled - a deep, calming breath of morning air rich with the scent of dew and perfectly edible vegetation that I wasn't going to touch no matter how hard my inner herbivorous reptile kept pushing at me to take a bite. I felt the rising sun on my skin, its gentle touch warming my blood. I heard the comfortable silence, louder and more melodious than any voice. Leaned back more... decided this wasn't such a bad day... wondered if it was really too early to get my hopes up...

Old timber gave way, and my ample frame hit the grass.

I lay there for a moment, eyes half-open and focused on a point somewhere near the sun. If I listened carefully, I could almost hear the cackling.

I resolutely ignored my belly as I picked myself up again and kept walking.

* * * * * * * * * *

The house was a broad, old-fashioned homestead, two stories high with multiple rooms on both floors. Not too far from civilization, but distant enough that people wouldn't go out of their way to come here. Well-kept, neat, with one of those sensible cars parked in front. Not that I could ever see myself living somewhere like it, but a little window shopping never hurt anybody.

I tried to take a guess at how close I could get without trespassing. Whomever lived in the house might have already seen the giant tramp lurking half inside the shadow of the tree. Maybe they were calling the authorities already. Better yet, maybe they were loading their shotguns.

There was another building, slightly apart from the main house but connected by a single corridor. A round, stone affair, with thin wisps of smoke trailing from the stout chimney. I thought I could see a red glow through the open windows, the odd flare of jumping sparks - but not even a squeak from what looked like a blacksmith's forge and by all rights should have clanked like one.

Good place to live. Lucky owners. Better not pollute it any further.

I turned to go and gave an impressively twitchy double-take.

I glanced at the forge again. There it still was.

I pinched myself, just in case. I didn't jerk out of my vivid hallucination to find myself in the middle of the desert. None of it went away.

The large wooden sign on one wall of the forge read "WILL HIRE WERES" in bold, hand-painted letters.

I was two steps away from the door before common sense kicked in, reminding me that if something seemed too good to be true, it probably was. I was right out of one hell, just beginning to find my way around a new one. I'd been wrestling with a society made of the same old shit it had always been, with no way forward in sight for a good half a week now of going store to store, crossing one job after another off the ragged-looking newspaper I'd discarded just last night.

Only half a week of being welcomed back into the status quo with a friendly helping of frigid shoulder, and then in a moment of aimless bumbling around, I just happened to stumble on... this?

I backed away a few yards to study the house again, looking for telltale signs of caramel frosting on the walls and ham bones dangling from strings. My stomach very helpfully chose to growl again.

I looked at the sign again. "WILL HIRE WERES" beamed invitingly back at me.

Maybe the "forge" was where all the cooking happened. I hadn't had a proper meal for a few days now, but I wouldn't need much fattening up before I was ready to be hired on a skewer and spit-roasted to perfection in that giant oven.

With its next growl, my stomach argued that it still wasn't seeing the point.

Come to think of it, neither was I.

I wasn't ready to switch to a diet of pure grass. I didn't feel quite hopeless enough to make a name for myself as an urban legend about a dinosaur that haunted parks and ate plants. Stealing a shopping cart and signing up for hobo classes didn't appeal enough to my pride. Get a job it was.

Shadows flickered over my form, picking dirt and stray grass out of my clothes. A few black strands caught on the fabric, weaving into red-glowing symbols. The ripe smell slowly faded from my body as the cleansing runes got to work.

I held them in place and waited for the air to clear.

It took me a few minutes after letting them fade before I mustered the courage to ring the doorbell.

[Roman Valence]

The hammer slammed down. Air cracked. Metal struck metal, and red sparks hopped up angrily - though he didn't see it, and he didn't feel it. Thick gloves and the tools in hand protected him from the latter - a blindfold around his eyes protected him from the former. A thick protective apron finished the padding, tied around his waist in absence of a shirt, but left the lower half of working khakis dark and smudged.

The hammer lifted up, and a round bicep bulged as it readied itself. His torso expanded as air was pulled in through his nose, filling his lungs for just a second before his body went crunch. Tightened muscles felled his arm down onto the waiting piece of red hot metal. The noise resonated sharply, almost painfully to his too-good ears, but he'd learnd how to endure it long ago.

Strength fought against steel, and the work of several careful hours backed by love and a master's well-trained son finally saw the finished piece put into a vat of water to cool. The liquid body hissed angrily at the forceful intrusion in its careful equilibrium, and he waited for several long moments. Steam rose up like a newborn cloud, and just before it was done, he felt a twitch in his mind.

His head turned to face the door of the blacksmith, and stretched beyond it to an approaching presence. The doorbell rung - the only way noise of an outside origin could get through the sound-proofed walls of the work place. Yet it was only alerting him to what he already knew: simply ... that they had a visitor.

The latest Valence labor was set gently aside, before the dirty trappings of his profession were taken off, setting down gloves and apron upon the nearby table. Little bother was taken to the sweat that had collected across his overheated form, if he was only going to get distracted for a moment.

Without further thought, he opened the door, and put on his best, welcoming "Don't mind me, it's stuck that way" grin of confident, lewd mischief.

"G'day, mate," he beamed happily, a foreign accent thick on his vowels. "Can Ai help you?"

[Dervish]

Footsteps echoed from inside the house. I stood up a little straighter and tried to think like an optimist as the door opened.

I found myself face to face with a perfect set of pearly whites, aligned into the most cheerful grin I'd encountered in ages. The blonde man didn't look like he could have been more than half my age. Scruffy all over, drenched in sweat, skin slightly red and completely bare from the waist up to show off a toned abdomen with a full eight-pack. Young and alive, and too drunk on both facts to give a single fuck.

Lucky guy.

Then I realized there was a thick cloth wrapped around his head, breaking up the perfection by keeping his eyes well-insulated from the world. I also realized there was probably a very good, vision-impaired reason for that blindfold, and my little surge of envy congealed into guilt.

"G'day, mate," he said, his voice shaded with a familiar, carefree drawl. "Can Ai help you?"

I responded with the most eloquent choking noise I could force through my tightened throat. Ten seconds later, I realized my lower jaw was still flapping loosely in a non-existent breeze. Five seconds after that, I remembered how to close it.

I blinked at last. "What?"

[Roman Valence]

Roman's grin kept up its pessimism-defying force as he waited, blindfolded head turned slightly down, aimed several inches below him- average human height - to face whoever was at his door. The knowledge that he'd surprised people into silence like this before had never dissuaded him from doing it again, and it was moments like these - choking, flabbergasted silence - that kept a mischievous heart doing it again and again.

It was like fishing. Sometimes, the fish aren't biting and you go about your day leaving impishness underfed. Other times, the fish bite and leave a blushing, overheated wreck of a self-conscious modesty the likes of some Arcadian nobles. Then you laugh for days.

The figure in front of him, whose lines were ragged, broad and unkempt like a fuzzy photograph, probably wasn't going to be either.

Seconds passed in silence, the forger's head leaning forward as if to coax some kind of sound out. Split second of worry dragged out a slightly more concerned, "Are ya alraight, mate? Ya sound -"

"What?" the bass voice finally managed, resonating out from a large chest cavity and spreading out from a body equally large, equally oversized. A mental eye went down once, before his eye level rose up to where the head should be in front of him. The forger was on the upper scale of the human height spectrum himself, and encounters on an even playing field like this were a rarity themselves.

Yet to hear the stupor of a fully (over)grown man, brought down to monosyllabic statements of confusion, was more than enough to bring out a single-syllable statement of his own.

"Ha," he quietly barked a small laugh, shaking his head as if that would clear some disorienting mist in the air.

There was no such mist. It probably wouldn't have any effect.

"Ai asked," he started again, drawing his words out and leaning into them, as if bringing his head another inch closer would better project the simple message. "If Ai, could help you."

The forger leaned against one side of the doorframe, corded arms crossing against his chest and pinning the muscle inside his flesh.

"Ya rang," he leaned his head in again, talking about the doorbell and the only one in a mile who could have pressed the interruptive noisemaker. With another thought, he quickly added in, "Clap once if yer mute, twaice if ya need a doctah."

[Dervish]

He laughed. One short, sharp syllable. "Ha."

I twitched.

"Ai asked," he said, "If Ai could help you." He leaned against the doorframe with continued nonchalant ease, and folded his arms over his chest to show off his complete lack of fat, the photogenic bastard. My stomach clenched, pulling some of my gut in to hide.

Almost photogenic, his blindfold reminded me, driving another tiny little stab into my conscience. I relaxed my belly, guiltily safe in the knowledge that he couldn't give a rat's ass about how much better he looked.

"Ya rang," the explanation continued. "Clap once if yer mute, twaice if ya need a doctah." And then he grinned more, as both of us realized he'd caught me off guard and hit me with a wisecrack in the space of half a minute.

I scowled. My inner wiseass, bristling at the challenge, shoved common sense aside and grabbed the controls, shaking me out of my stupor. I lifted my hands and clapped three times.

So there.

Then my brain finally caught up, and I realized I'd just tried to out-wiseass the most promising employer I'd found to date. Mental flailing ensued for a few panicked moments before my mouth finally decided to do something intelligent.

"The sign - you're hiring Weres," I stammered, demonstrating my ability to read. "Any chance - think I could start work today?"

[Roman Valence]

Three claps, unasked for, implied something besides a physical inability to speak or the need for medical attention - or it could have implied both at the same time, for entirely different reasons. A good sense of humor replied with a small, appreciative laugh, abdomen pulling in for the expulsion of air, cheeks somehow managing to pull even more with perpetual mirth barely kept in check.

"Alraight. Ai desehved that," he replied, cheerily cocking his head off to one side. "But that still doesn't answeh the question."

"The sign - you're hiring Weres," the bass gravel of a voice all-man came out again, with more than a single word this time.

The desire to interject with "So he can talk!" was wisely stomped out by less playful, more empathetic impulses. "Fuzzy, ragged appearance" plus "were looking for work" was a connection he'd put together before - a connection usually associated with depression, despair, and a sense of helplessness brought on by the social climes.

"Any chance," the ragged figured dared to hope, "Think I could start work today?"

Initial wording was vital, so as better to not shatter the windowpane of optimism his visitor was looking through now.

"Sorry," was a mood-killing way to start, so he didn't say that.

"Ai don't handle the hiahs myself," the forger said with a smile still brimming on his features - this time, not for himself, but for the other. "But my mom will be home lateh, before naight, and she can help you then."

If the blindfold wasn't in the way of his eyes, they probably wouldn't be visible anyway.

"You can wait around, if ya want," Roman offered with that same unbridled tone, hedging a bet that 'unkempt' also meant 'underfed.' "Ai was about to eat something maiself. Would ya laike somethin to eat? You can tell me all about yerself over lunch."

Mischief snuck in anyway, despite his attempts to hedge it back.

"Ai get to hear more of your voice, and you get a free meal. Sound naice?"

He should have been winking.

[Dervish]

"Ai don't handle the hiahs myself," the blonde replied. "But my mom will be home latah, before naight, and she can help you then."

My shoulders had already slumped forward, anticipating defeat, before I pushed through my pessimism and got around to processing the actual words. That hadn't been a no. It left me with a full afternoon to wait, and there still wasn't much of a chance any self-respecting mother would let a giant reptilian monster thug hang out within a mile of her kid from eight to five, but...

"You can wait around, if ya want," he said. "Ai was about to eat something maiself. Would ya laike somethin' to eat? You can tell me all about yerself over lunch."

What?

"Ai get to hear more of your voice, and you get a free meal. Sound naice?" If it was at all possible, I saw his grin get wider.

I hesitated. Well-honed police instincts studied his expression through morose-tinted lenses and translated his gleaming smile. All the better to garnish you with, my dear.

"I..." Was hungry. Didn't believe free meals existed. Had learned to look gift horses in the mouth and up the ass for ticking time bombs. Was absolutely sick of hammering my forehead into the wall of a society burned hard by weres, without any progress. Would owe him for that meal, one way or another, and I didn't like oweing people.

The last time I owed someone, I killed him before I had the chance to pay him back.

I thought about the past few hours, spent wrestling with ravenous herbivorous instincts that just didn't understand why I wasn't making like the animal they knew I was, and letting them out to frolic in a giant meal of natural vegetation.

I... could last a while more. I'd dealt with worse hunger. I'd lived through worse.

"I -"

My stomach, that traitor, picked that moment to assert itself by growling like a den of lions.

"- could use a bite." My mouth, that other traitor, agreed.

[Roman Valence]

The new were stayed quiet again for a moment - but a moment was enough to tickle at nerves made for teasing. He had to try hard not to let mischief bring out any more incorrigible giggling at this latest victory, for the sake of a potentially depressed guest.

There's a fine line between injuring a person's pride and good humor. Laughing at a person's lack of speech tiptoed along it.

"I..." he was trailing off again, once more having lost his facility for words to tiny mind-invading wolfbat terrorists, experts in the field of flabbergastery and masters of the tease, hard trained in combat situations with many a hardened wit. 

Guerilla tactics - sneaking in while his guard was down, then planting the bomb before he could mount a defense - seemed always effective at bringing word craft to it's knees. Sometimes, it even brought more than just words down too.

Case in point: 

"I -" he stuttered again, quietly, his own pack of little ragged were-men trying to clean up after the bombs had brought the great building down and left them standing small among the ruins. 

The tiny wolfbats giggled incessantly. 

The large one just continued to smirk, as the rest of his guest's body answered for him with a miniature avalanche, self-contained to a firm paunch.

"- could use a bite," he finally finished.

Neck, chest, or arm? he wondered.  

Victory shines the same, even when you cover it with a blindfold. The tiny wolfbats mounted their flag. 

"Alraight then, mate," the forger replied all-too-happily, another joke already riding on the coat tails of the last one. 

"We've got a few things bout the house," he thumbed in the direction of the major building, letting his own thoughts follow to a freezer of meat. "Also have mai wallet. So, how about it: do ya wanna eat in, or do ya wanna eat out, mate?"

[Dervish]

"Alraight then, mate." Unseen, unseeing eyes twinkled from the other side of the blindfold. I almost wanted to smile back at him, even if he wouldn't notice, but the universe gave a violent lurch and threatened to crack in half at the thought. Or maybe that was still my stomach making another demand.

"We've got a few things about the house." He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, indicating the house in question. "Also have mai wallet. So, how about it: do ya wanna eat in, or do ya wanna eat out, mate?"

I thought about it. What would make a worse impression on the mother of a grown son with a disability that kept him at home?

Come home and find him emptying the fridge to feed a ravenous drifter thug who may or may not have threatened him into it at knuckle sandwich-point?

Get word from her friends that one of them saw him downtown, emptying a restaurant's pantry to feed the sort of ravenous thug-sized hoodlum-shaped guy she warned him not to hang out with?

It was still too early to trust my luck. It was always too early to trust my luck. The best I could do was weigh my worst-case scenarios and try to steer in the direction of the smaller disaster.

My stomach made a hopeful, impatient noise. For once, my appetite agreed with my logic.

"I'd rather not head back out to town," I said. "Mind if we keep it here?"

[Roman Valence]

The young forger's mind went rampant with thoughts he really shouldn't have been having - and he only half cared. His visitor's state didn't stop him from grinning anymore than it stopped the joke from coming, but he managed to avoid making another and scaring off a perfectly good adult male from his meal. If that last line of thought was vague and had a double meaning, it was of course completely accidental and nothing secret was meant behind it.

"Course Ai don't maind," the forger said cheerfully. "No hard feelings there, mate."

Except there are, he thought, remembering that with a gratuitous amount of euphemism, hard feelings didn't just mean bad feelings. Roman, of course, loved a gratuitous amount of euphemism.

Motioning for the guest to follow, Roman turned back inside of the forge, dark and musty and lit only by the flames and coals used for metal work, now idling down without constant attention.

"Kindly close the doors aftah you," he called back, already heading to the second door that led to the main house - thick, metal doors designed to keep a fire at bay, just in case something in the forge got out of hand.

He left it open behind him for the guest to enter the narrow passage, before opening the door into the kitchen area - a very large, elaborate kitchen area, with two thick lines of dark wooden cupboards that seemed large enough to feed a small restaurant on their own, separated by marble countertops that defied any knife to make a scratch. An oversized fridge and freezer, just nearby, only further alluded to great dinners and hearty breakfasts. Roman's large feet padded gently on the patterned tile floor, heading toward the middle and motioning for the rest.

"Here's the grub. What would you laike to eat?"

A small sense of modesty tapped it's knuckles at the door to his self awareness.

"Oh. Hope you don't maind," he started, leaning back against the island countertop. Forger's hands ran down the length of his well-structured arms, from shoulder to wrist, one after the other, slicking down some of the dampness still there. "Ai was just finishing up a bit of work and all, so Ai'm a bit dirty -"

All the taime, his own conscience interrupted and copped to blatant reality, even if he wasn't about to admit that to a guest. Elbows took the opportunity to tuck behind him, and hands rested on the edge of the counter pressing at his lower back, alternately letting the pumped musculature under his warm flesh clench and then release halfway in the relaxed pose. His head cocked to the right as he asked, too innocently, "Ai don't need a shirt, do Ai, mate?"

[Dervish]

"Course Ai don't maind. No hard feelings there, mate." Far too many teeth gleamed back at me, as if they were caging a torrent of wisecracks. I noted the slight tingle that zipped along my spine and filed it away for future reference. He turned and retreated, and I followed.

And then I was indoors again, for only the latest of countless times during my eventful first week back in Alexandria, but for probably the first time since a relative eternity of pessimism, I couldn't sense the shadow of imminent disaster looming overhead.

Maybe I was finally too exhausted to notice.

Narrow corridors yawned out wide, opening into a kitchen fit for a giant. I made a half-hearted bid to entertain thoughts of someone grinding my bones to make their bread, but my inner cynic rolled over with a grumble and told me to let it die in peace.

Other instincts guided my gaze to the monster fridge in the corner.

The freaking thing was taller than me. I swear. Swear to god. Taller than me, and fatter than me, and I wouldn't have been surprised if it was bigger on the inside too.

Oh, and there was a giant freezer right next to it. Forget dealing with my noisy stomach, the two could probably feed a whole army of other livestock.

"Here's the grub," the blonde announced, loud enough to drown out the latest bass cheer that echoed from my belly like a rockslide. "What would you laike to eat?"

I took a few steps closer to the fridge and watched it tower several inches above me. "Marry me," I breathed.

"- Just finishing up a bit of work and all, so Ai'm a bit dirty -" he continued speaking.

"What?" It took a hefty amount of willpower to peel myself away from the fridge and turn to face him, but I managed in the end. I was in time to catch him lean back against the marble counter, seemingly oblivious to the way his half-flexed biceps gleamed in the light from the window as they helped to hold him up.

"Ai don't need a shirt, do Ai, mate?"

Four pairs of muscles, neatly lined up along his abdomen and chiseled to sweaty, glowing perfection, clenched and released slightly with each breath he took. That perpetual grin continued to shine out at me, all too innocent in the lopsided perfection achieved by the slight tilt of his head.

All animals, humans included, are gifted with instincts that can be grouped into four basic categories, known as the four F's.

There's Fighting, which Weres get an overdose of. See: The Were War.

The next one is Fleeing, which Weres don't have enough of. More than a few someones in the previous week had quite openly compared Weres to rabid animals, and they'd have been right - an out-of-control Were, one that's lost itself to the animal, is far more likely to take a bite out of anything that moves than it is to turn tail and run.

Then there's Feeding, which as my stomach kept reminding me, I hadn't done properly for more than a week now.

And we come to the last F: Reproduction. Which, in a small percentage of most species, is confused with simple fucking.

My brain's wired differently. It's not something I've given much thought to, what with the more pressing concerns in my life.

All of which is a long and convoluted way of saying that my mouth was hanging open (again), I was about to start drooling for at least two reasons, and I was having a tremendous amount of difficulty shaking the mental image of the blonde supermodel dancing on top of the marble counter.

And according to my brain, no; he didn't need a shirt. Or pants. And those boxer briefs were looking rather too tight for no. Stop. Desist. Bad dinosaur. Down. Sit. Stay.

Of all the times for my other head to... rear its head...

At least he couldn't see me staring. And why wasn't that a comforting thought?

"N-no." I gulped, and tried again. "No. You don't need. A shirt." I turned back to admire the fridge. "Not if you feel... more comfortable. Without it."

Oliver Surridge, you are bad. You are a bad, bad man.

[Roman Valence]

Oh look: Ai got anothah baite, his mental voice preened, ego once more feeding off of the reactions mischief could garner. He wondered how much the person in front of him was blushing, and how warm his skin was right now. He'd only need to touch him once to find out, but it'd be alright. He was used to getting burned.

Fishin fer responses laike these should be a sport. Fishin for fish is a sport aftah all. They keep records and everythin. Maybe Ai could keep some, laike

Specie: Were.
Size: Biggun.
Rating: …

He gave a soft whistle - not a playful one, but just a sound - to get a another, better 'look' at the beast.

Mmmm … an 8 … Could be a naine or ten, if he cleaned up.

Thoughts of hot water streaming down the big piece of were meat in the room made the other were's mouth water as well. He swallowed it, but didn't swallow his mischief down as he wondered how much more he could push things without being a jerk.

"Well, thanks, mate," the wolfbat gave a little more appreciation out loud, stretching his arms out to the side, above his head and then behind him. He shook his fingers a bit out to the side, before he started walking over to the fridge. "Truth be told, Ai laike having mai clothes off, yeah. Yer a were."

The fridge door opened wide, and Roman leaned partially against it, leaving the inside of the door and all its contents on display for the other to enjoy.

"You know what it's laike. You laike havin yer clothes off too, dontcha, mate?"

If he was leaving himself on display for the other to enjoy too, well that was completely accidental and totally not part of some naughty plot of his.

[Dervish]

"Well, thanks, mate." I couldn't see him move, but well-polished marble tossed late morning sunlight around the room, helpfully casting his shadow on the fridge door as he struck a pose like only a supermodel could. "Truth be told, Ai laike having mai clothes off, yeah. Yer a were."

The aspiring supermodel stepped back into view and pulled the fridge open. It was bigger on the inside. He stayed well within my field of vision, conspicuous without the appearance of effort, and his carefree posture only drew attention to more muscles I hadn't noticed before. I resisted the urge to adjust my jeans. They felt smaller on the inside.

The universe hates me. It loves me. It hates me. It loves me.

"You know what it's laike. You laike havin yer clothes off too, dontcha, mate?"

I choked on nothing. Gaped at him. Goggled at the aspiring nudist in all his impossibly perfect glory, then stopped after a few seconds when I realized that was rude, then went right back to staring wide-eyed when I realized he couldn't see it anyway.

That charming, innocent boy-next-door grin remained perfectly, insouciantly in place, as if he hadn't just hammered my brain right into the gutter with that wrecking ball of a line.

I summoned all my wisdom and made the intelligent decision to preserve my silence, and with it, the shredded remains of my dignity.

"Yeah," my mouth disagreed.

Traitor!

"I - I mean - I - " I peeled my eyes away from him with a savage mental effort and pointed my gaze into the depths of the fridge. Looking good. Well-stocked. Bigger on the inside. Bottom drawer full of vegetables. Eggs on the door shelf above a row of condiments including but not limited to olive oil, honey, chocolate sauce, whipped cream...

"Yeah," my mouth cheerfully went on, never one to miss a chance as my mind flailed to escape the gutter. "But not in public," I added, desperately grabbing at the steering wheel. Five times four is twenty-eight. Six times five is thirty-two. "Or indoors. In front of people I don't know."

"Or people I do know. If they don't approve of that kind of thing."

Seven times eight. Whipped cream. Oh god.

"It's... not polite." Look at the blonde supermodel. No, don't look at the blonde supermodel. Don't think about whipped cream. Fuck.

I cleared my throat, very noisily, and turned away from all the distractions, finding solace in the kitchen window and the nice, G-rated view of the backyard that lay beyond.

"So, uh..." I said, to drown out the lingering evil thoughts in my head, "I don't think we've been introduced... much..." I coughed. "Does... does my savior in this hour have a name?"

[Roman Valence]

Sheepish stuttering really shouldn't have been so much fun to listen to, but it was. The smith's body started with a small rumble, and slowly built up to a barely bottled chuckle, and by the time his guest was talking about approval and politeness, it was a face-burning laugh of glee, mirthful and hearty. Holding on tight to the fridge door, he laughed and he laughed with abandon, and so did the devil on his left shoulder, and so did the devil on right shoulder.

He didn't know where the angel that was supposed to be on his shoulder was. The two devils had probably ganged up on it, tied it up, and left it to struggle helplessly somewhere indecent. It could also have just run away - very, very fast - when his hormones had flared up too much and he had crossed all sorts of lines of propriety - like right now.

His abdomen was clenching tightly in with his breath as he finally got his giggles under control, and his free hand idly rubbed at the wall of sculpted muscles before resting at his waist.

"Ai don't know about yer savior's name," he started with a grin far too wide and a tone still managing to be soft and playful, "But mai name is Roman … Roman Valence."

His right hand let go of the fridge door, and he offered it to the empty black in front of him.

"Ya gonna tell me yours, mate?" he asked, looking so very much like he was going to give the older man a wink right through the blindfold, reality be damned.

[Dervish]

He snickered.

I turned and looked back in time to catch him in the ending stage of a silent laughing fit. He evidently couldn't be bothered to feel any shame for it, but I more than made up for the deficit as that familiar heated tingle rose up to my cheeks and spread beneath the skin. It did a great job of utterly quenching that other flame blazing through me from the pants up. No, wait. It didn't.

"Ai don't know about yer savior's name," he said, helpfully steering the subject further into safety, "But mai name is Roman… Roman Valence."

Roman Valence.

As names go, that one was decent...

"Ya gonna tell me yours, mate?" He waited, one arm extended to offer a handshake.

"...Dervish."

Huh. That was odd.

Dervish. The wrecking ball with a nasty temper who liked to break everything, especially fragile buildings and alleged criminals. That nickname had been in much more frequent circulation before my self-made disaster had uprooted me and sent me packing off to the special island prison down under for naughty weremonsters who kill people. Then I'd gone by that name, for the few who cared to hear it back on Damian's Isle. I couldn't have spoken it, or heard it called, more than once or twice in a few months.

For the whole of the last few weeks, I'd been Oliver Surridge again. It had been all official procedures and formal interviews, papers and real names in case someone had to send something to a bank account I didn't have, or look up my past to see what misdeeds the law could hold against me.

Each time, I'd introduced myself as Oliver Surridge, without a pause before or a second thought after. I'd never thought to use my callsign, or even remembered the damn thing or the whole long and grimy history behind it.

What's in a name, anyway? A nose by any other name would still smell.

"My name's Dervish." I crossed the distance between us and took his hand in mine, matched his grip with my own. "Officially, I'm supposed to be Oliver Surridge. But my name's Dervish."

"It's... uh... nice, meeting you. Roman." I tried to sound like I meant it.

That didn't turn out to be half as hard as I thought.

[Roman Valence]

"… Dervish," he said.

There was something about the way he said it - oddly, reluctantly, like it just wasn't normal - that caused the wolf in human clothing to tilt his head to the left in subtle curiosity.

The name brought up images, connotations, of men who danced with death and destruction, tornadoes of activity and motion. It made him think of living whirlwinds, powerful and dangerous and self-perpetuating desert storms of rubble-inducing carnage. Then he applied the name to a person, and crammed all that energy, force and danger into a single being - layers of skin barely able to contain it all.

His mouth watered behind the reckless grin on his face.

"My name's Dervish," he declared, a bit more confidently about it, and then a big hand finally took his own. Squeezing it, practically absorbing it into his mind, he focused entirely on it. The proportions were all large, just like his own, but where Roman owed it to work at a forge, the name 'Dervish' made him think more of dusting rocks and breaking bones in his spare time.

He squeezed tight, ramping up the intensity gradually, but the older were kept up with him - the kind of grip that could break a few fingers on someone less tough.

The were a good match that way.

"Dervish," the young man repeated, and found he needed to swallow after saying it.

"Officially, I'm supposed to be Oliver Surridge," the figure noted in what sounded a sort of off-hand, not important way. "But my name's Dervish."

Hmm. Ollie, he thought to himself, letting it sink in before deciding Dervish sounds much better.

"It's… uh… nice, meeting you. Roman," the more mature one added.

The more immature one, however, was reaching his left hand forward - almost as if he meant to clasp Dervish's hand in both of his. He didn't. The fingers of his free hand wrapped tightly around Dervish's forearm instead, and squeezed with the same tightness of their shared grip. Shirt fabric intervened just a little, but it was raw muscle that his left hand held to.

"Hmm," the blindfolded forger said once, still an air of confident coyness about himself as his hand went further up along the limb, squeezing at one more place along the forearm, and then struggling to get his fingers over the powerhouse biceps that he could have sworn had been replaced with iron.

Roman liked playing with iron. It's why he chose his father's profession.

"It's naice meeting you, too, mate," he said, brimming with a whole series of jokes and bad thoughts all tempting to break through the oft-unused vocal filter. After several testing squeezes, he just left his hand on the upper arm and let his thumb rub over the brawny mound of a cannon, covering fabric rustling for the motion.

The desire to rip the sleeve off - he controlled that one at least.

"It's not every day Ai get to meet a brick wall," he continued as the exploring hand was tugged away from temptation, and gave a final squeeze to Dervish's shoulder instead. "Course, Ai've known a lot of brick walls, and ya seem built a little bettah than them."

A playful jab from his left hand impacted against his guest's right pectoral, and the sound was an all solid thump, making him wonder if his joke was really that far off.

"Ya use mortah or concrete?" the tease came quickly, Roman's hands regretfully being pulled back by his long lost sense of decency, and crossed over his chest before they got any naughtier.

[Dervish]

His left hand came up as well, injecting a more personal, sincere touch into the contact - a gesture I'd recognized, but didn't remember being on the receiving end of. I looked back up into his face - still grinning - and down at our hands - he seemed to be holding a few degrees tighter than the average firm, welcoming sort of handshake -

The other hand came in, missed its mark completely, landed its grip on my forearm and squeezed through the shirt.

"Hmm." It went even further the wrong way, still holding tight as the hand explored the length of my arm, barely pausing to navigate the bend of my elbow. "It's naice meeting ya too, mate." It stopped, nestled around my bicep with the thumb still shifting back and forth over the mound.

I went very, very still. Fight and Flight tussled for control of my short-circuited instincts while my pulse shot through the roof. I looked up into his radiant smile, wondering what he was doing to make himself so kissable instead of punchable, and eventually settled for simply freezing in place. That's how it works, right? When you don't want a predator to spot you in the wild, you go completely still, hold your breath, and try to think happy thoughts so they won't smell your lust. Uh, fear. Right?

"It's not every day Ai get to meet a brick wall," Roman said, delivering a final squeeze to my right shoulder before his hand retreated. "Course, Ai've known a lot of brick walls, and ya seem built a little bettah than them."

Yeah, butter me up before no don't think about butter. Don't. Think.

His fist darted back at me, a quick strike with hardly any force behind it, and my chest easily deflected the blow. "Ya use mortah or concrete?"

Both hands pulled back at last, safely folding over his chest now that the damage was done.

I broke the silence with another demonstration of my impressive vocabulary. It would have been even more impressive if I hadn't been communicating in choking noises.

The wiseass inside my head sat back to watch all the internal circuits puke sparks and smoke for a very long while, only intervening when he was completely sure I didn't have a scrap of pride left to stand on. "Just - just vegetables."

[Roman Valence]

The forger replied with another hearty laugh, and he tapped the fridge again after releasing prey from his grip - the better to continue playing with his food before he ate it. 

"Nevah touch the stuff if Ai can help it," Roman grinned back loud and proud, practically boasting of his distaste for plant life. "Hate 'em. Gimme a big juicey hunk of meat anyday."

The blindfold once more masked what should have been a wink. 

"Ai'm a big fan of meat," he continued it like it was perfectly normal conversation and not one more example of entendre slamming into the dirty parts of the other's mind. "Really laike gettin a piece in my mouth and suckin on it for awhaile, to get at all the juices. That's when it's best, in mai opinion. When it's ... juicy."

He licked his lips at the thought of "juiciness" as his imagination ran in two different directions, and decided someone had to start somewhere. Plate in hand, he led the charge into the food warehouse they called a freezer. The still slightly sweaty smith half leaned into the freezer, cold air passing over damp skin, the musculature of his back stretching away from Dervish's direction - and pushing out a pair of rock hard runner's glutes. Completely accidentally. 

A single bead of sweat trickled down near his spine and disappeared into the fabric of tight, light teal underwear peeking over the waistband of his belted khakis.  

"Course, ya know what they say about a guy who eats his veggies," Roman said as he turned around with three frozen steaks on a plate.

He let just "what they say" unsaid, fishing for more of that delicious meat wiggling on the line. 

"This'll do fer me," he then clarified by lifting the plate up an inch, still grinning as shamelessly and effortlessly as always. "Bettah grab what ya want already. Ai can take care of the cookin."

[Dervish]

My wit hadn't gone completely rusty from five years of self-imposed solitary confinement, his next gust of laughter told me.

"Nevah touch the stuff if Ai can help it." In his grin, still cheeky and self-aware and shameless, I thought his teeth looked a little sharp for a human. "Hate 'em. Gimme a big juicy hunk of meat anyday."

Yeah, come to think of it... that accent, so familiar but much less optimistic-sounding in that island down under. Liked having his clothes off. Thought I'd identify because I was a were. Family apparently sympathetic toward (other?) weres. Liked big juicy hunks of meat.

Cough. Shudder. Twitch.

"Ai'm a big fan of meat." His sightless stare remained fixed on the biggest piece of herbivore-derived meat in the room, never caring for an instant about the blood and heat rushing to its face. "Really laike gettin' a piece in my mouth and suckin' on it for awhaile, to get at all the juices. That's when it's best, in mai opinion. When it's ... juicy."

I summoned all my wisdom and made the intelligent decision to preserve my silence, and with it, the surviving microscopic iotae of my dignity.

Losing the ability to articulate anything more than a stutter made that decision so much easier, if somewhat less intelligent or decision-like.

Plate in hand, he turned around to peer into the fridge and bent over, presenting me with another good view of his back and a little more below, where trousers had slipped half an inch too low and boxers winked at me from their refuge.

I saw.

Everything.

"Course, ya know what they say about a guy who eats his veggies," he said, and turned around with a full plate. "This'll do fer me. Bettah grab what ya want already. Ai can take care of the cookin'."

Bewilderment presented itself as a distraction from the rapidly growing problem between my legs, and I dove right at it without another thought. "Won't you have trouble cooking if you can't..." Common courtesy arrived late to the party as I continued to look him in the blindfold. "I mean... well... you're - uh..." I swallowed, and continued digging. "You're... blindfolded... you might have trouble... seeing - "

I coughed, and shuffled past him with a plate of my own at the ready.

"So, uh..." I said, as I selected the smallest-looking steaks in the fridge. "What do they say, anyway? About... people who eat vegetables?"

[Roman Valence]

Roman felt the confusion before he heard it in the were's voice - the kind of confusion he got all the time. It was also the kind he really shouldn't have enjoyed either, in the same way that he really shouldn't have enjoyed teasing his new acquaintance. That he did could only mean one thing.

Roman was a bad young man.

Roman was a very bad, bad young man.

"Won't you have trouble cooking if you can't..." Dervish started, and was unable to finish thanks to their good old friend, Tact. The smith moved a little closer, physical pressure exerted as much from proximity as from the force of his features, which still hadn't changed an inch from before.

"Can't ... turn on the heat?" he 'finished' for him, teasing him with what they both knew he could do just fine, thanks.

Roman was a very bad, bad young man, and he needed to be punished. With whips. And handcuffs. And leather. Later.

"I mean... well... you're - uh..."

The naughty one heard his guest swallow all the way from four feet off.

"You're... blindfolded... you might have trouble... seeing - "

Roman leaned in closer, acting the confused one himself.

Couldn't be more fun if I gave him a shovel...

Dervish gave a throat-clearing cough, presumably to remove the obstruction caused by ... stating the obvious, and quickly tried to change the topic.

"So, uh..." the meaty guest started, getting some more meat for himself. "What do they say, anyway? About... people who eat vegetables?"

The devils on his shoulders cracked their lips even wider.

"They're ... poor huntahs," Roman said the least dirty of two answers, and the blindfolded one deftly reached for Dervish's plate with his free hand. Gripping it, feeling gravity's gentle tug, he noted distinctly that it weighed half as much as his own plate.

For the first time, he gave a frown. The devils showed a little more empathy with their sagging horns and droopy wings.

"Ya know you can have more -" a lightbulb went on, and brought a smile with it. "Oh. Yer probably saving room fer othah stuff. Fair enough."

"Pull out some potatoes, and Ai can roast those, too," the young forger said as he took their respective platters of frozen meat over toward what looked like an indoor firepit. Logs, only partially burnt, stood ready to sacrifice themselves for the preparation of their food.

"Or whatevah else ya'd laike to eat," he added louder, placing the frozen steaks on the grill.

[Dervish]

In the ominous silence and the ever-widening smile, I heard the malevolent cackling of a thousand different innuendoes.

"They're..."

I braced myself for another barrage of hot blood to rush to my cheeks.

"Poor huntahs."

...oh.

I ended up blushing anyway, as he reached for my plate - and his smile faded as he hefted it and weighed it in his hand.

I shuffled a foot and tried not to look that hungry.

"Ya know you can have more -" the smile flashed back. "Oh. Yer probably saving room fer othah stuff. Fair enough."

"Yeah," I agreed. "Other stuff... saving room... that works. I was - doing that..."

He was already walking off with the plates, too far out of earshot to catch my mumbled words. "Pull out some potatoes, and Ai can roast those, too. Or whatevah else ya'd laike to eat."

I returned to the fridge, took note of the well-stocked vegetable drawer at the bottom, and joined Roman at the stove with a modest armload of leafy greens mixed with potatoes.

"I'll just get these washed," I said as I set them down. "And... peeled, and I'll... uh. Yeah. You mind if I make salads for both of us? I don't really... know any recipes..."

And when my internal monster got ravenous enough, it wasn't interested in waiting for me to finish burning the shrubbery to charcoal before digging in...

"Anyway," I placed a bowl in the sink and turned the faucet on. "You don't... pardon me for saying so, but... you don't sound local..."

[Roman Valence]

"I'll just get these washed... And... peeled, and I'll... uh," the underfed behemoth rambled on, the tone and size in such contrast as to be adorable somehow. The forger made sure to keep his face turned away from him as he listened, and smirked, and tried not to imagine his guest in slightly more cartoonic form.

He failed. And didn't care.

"Yeah. You mind if I make salads for both of us?" the herbivore asked of the carnivore, earning a look of small skepticism from the latter. "I don't really... know any recipes..."

His abdomen quaked with a muted chuckle, shaking his head as he slowly bent over the firepit.

"Ya can make one if ya want, mate, but Ai just told ya Ai don't do veggies," Roman reminded him as he reached to the bottom of the logs, to set light to tinder. The muscles of his back stretched out with the motion, corded and rippling. The waistline of his shorts fell down another inch or two. He'd pull them up in a minute.

He shifted from one foot to another, as the fire caught on in several places. A further psychic nudge would get it blazing soon enough, so he drew back to stand up straight again - making a point of feeling each vertebrae lining one on top the other. Shoulders rolled back for a moment, forcing the toned musculature to dance again, before arms got in on the stretch too.

His flesh still felt a little heavy and sluggish, from the work already put in, but that was normal. He knew that between his blood and a good meal, that would be fixed soon enough regardless.

"Anyway," the guest started, the sound accompanied by the rush of water from the faucet, "You don't... pardon me for saying so, but... you don't sound local..."

Roman smiled in the direction of the firepit first, feeling the heat ramp up against his front, along torso and arms, hearing the crackle of tinder and wood catching the growing flames. He grabbed the slabs of meat, and began to toss them onto the grill above the flames.

"Ai don't?" he teased, turning his head slightly as he asked. "Is it something Ai said?"

Trademark mirth rolled out of his body again.

"We've lived here a year now. Ai suppose Ai still have a bit of an accent, mate," he acknowledged more honestly, turning around to 'face' his guest once more. His hands took up places on the stone edge to support him as he leaned slightly back, letting the heat loosen up his back and arms.

"Dad does, too. Mom lived a long time elsewhere, so she can drop and pick up hers, piece a cake. Ai've been trying ta get bettah, but, ya know, Ai lived my whole laife on St. Damien's before then."

[Dervish]

I found myself turning to watch Roman. Because people are supposed to face each other when they're talking.

It's just good manners.

He was bent over the firepit at the time, busily tending to our lunch, completely unaware that his shorts were slipping.

I watched in sympathetic horror for a long moment as he shifted his weight from one foot to the other, as the motion rippled through the lean flesh of his back, as it travelled lower down and I quickly turned away so I wouldn't accidentally catch him in his moment of indignity.

"Anyway," I placed a bowl in the sink and began drowning the vegetables in a torrent of noise and cold, clean water. "You don't... pardon me for saying so, but... you don't sound local..."

"Ai don't?" I felt his teeth shine upon me again. I didn't hear the joke over the louder sound - double explosion of wood smoke and sizzling meat that had started to cram itself up my nose. "Is it something Ai said?"

"Yeah, you sounded like - " I stopped, muted again for several reasons as suppressed laughter made his body dance. "Oh."

"We've lived here a year now," he explained. "Ai suppose Ai still have a bit of an accent, mate." He turned his back on the fire. He turned his front on me. His pants had found a new hold, one very short inch lower than before.

It wasn't fair how that extra inch of bare skin told volumes more about what it didn't hide. It just wasn't.

"Dad does, too."

"Uh huh."

"Mom lived a long time elsewhere, so she can drop and pick up hers, piece a cake."

I tried to say something intelligent again, but stopped myself in time. Maybe this whole wisdom thing wasn't so difficult after all.

"Ai've been trying ta get bettah, but, ya know, Ai lived my whole laife on St. Damian's before then."

"You've - I -" I shut up and forced the new information to percolate into my brain through the blockage caused by a pair of low-hanging shorts and what they failed to obscure.

"I just got back from Damian's Isle. As you might have guessed." Courtesy dictated that I keep facing Roman, never mind the healthy four-alarm scarlet tone running through my skin. "Spent five years there, mostly outside the towns. We probably didn't run into each other. I'd have remembered."

The little itch at the back of my mind told me I should have remembered. That I was forgetting something that I should have noticed every time I stepped back into civilization...

"It's... good to know, that I'm not alone." Pretending I hadn't just spouted a winning entry for Biggest Cliche Ever, Sentimental division, I turned to the sink again and shuffled the vegetables around the bowl.

"Helps adjust. To being able to sleep with both eyes shut again." Stop talking. Just stop talking.

"Except I don't remember doing that since I found out the full moon turns me into a giant animal."

On second thought, just keep talking. Everybody wants to hear about your personal neuroses.

I tilted the bowl to drain the water back out. "Uh... I think your pants slipped a bit there. Might wanna... pull them back up..."

[Roman Valence]

The carnivorous were's lips twisted up in a small, massive victory over the walking prey beast.

"Oy," he started, putting his hands on the edge of his low-riding shorts, "Ya think they're too fah down?"

The weight of his hands pushed them down by another inch, to add another thousand pounds of pressure on the inner fortitude of his so very modest observer. With the latest inch of unclothed flesh, the short hairs down his front flowed into a mass of shaggier hair.

Fingertips traced through the hairs as they followed the edge of his shorts, from the center out to the sides - touching his skin and circling around the hips to his lower back. Then the fingers snuck in the back of the cloth, his chest sticking slightly out, getting ready to pull them back up.

It would be a terrible time for his hands to be cuffed together or something.

"They don't feel that fah down," he said, trying to keep the incorrigible naughtiness that he felt outside of his chiming voice.

Behind the blindfold, solidified mischief should have been making his eyes sparkle. Instead, a toothy grin did it for him as he drawled out, "Ai'm tryin to distract ya. Is it workin, mate?"

His body rolled with another small laugh, clearly as high on the situation as he could be. If he could share some of that naturally with his guest - his guest, to whom life had clearly not been as kind - then so much the better.

"But ya know, we maight have met," he said as he finally tugged his shorts back up to more respectable levels. "Ai spent a summah or two out in the wilds, with mai mates. Course, Ai was tallah and covahed in black fur then… Werewolf an' all. Decided Ai laiked sleepin indoors bettah myself."

[Dervish]

He grinned.

He grinned more.

In the immortal words of that genius crime-solving dogfolk with the speech impediment, ruh roh.

"Oy." Both his hands went to the rescue, diving to retrieve his shorts and his modesty. "Ya think they're too fah down?"

If I had to spell it out for him, so be it.

"Yeah, they're a bit on the low... side... urk..."

An adult. I needed an adult. A responsible adult. I dragged my gaze to the window. No responsible adults looking in, waiting to come to the rescue. Especially no parents.

"They don't feel that fah down," he unprotested.

At the sound of his voice, my attention reflexively snapped back to his alarmingly low-cut shorts. To check. I soon arrived at the conclusion that he had it going on, all over his everywhere. Exhibit A: chiseled skin, still visible through a thickened coating of light blonde scruff. Exhibit B: straightened arms that managed to still look like they were flexing. Exhibit C: uh... everything. Everywhere.

My line of sight dropped even lower, to my own jeans. They were getting really, incredibly uncomfortably tight.

"Ai'm tryin' to distract ya," he explained. "Is it workin', mate?"

"Urk," I answered in with my most heartfelt, expressive and passionate strangled throat-noise.

No, I wasn't distracted, the noise said. I was most certainly not distracted. I was very, very intently focused on the... topic. The low-hanging topic that had gotten even lower, and not the inferno dancing under my skin or the gleaming sunlight playing a different tune across all those different textures of... distraction...

"But ya know, we maight have met..."

We wouldn't have. I'd definitely have remembered.

"Ai spent a summah or two out in the wilds, with mai mates. Course, Ai was tallah and covahed in black fur then… werewolf an' all. Decided Ai laiked sleepin indoors bettah myself."

My brain helpfully painted a picture of him, a foot tallah and covahed in black fur. No. Still not distracted. Not distracted at all. His pants were definitely still way too low and showing too much. Even though he'd tugged them back up in the middle of his speech. I could still see it. I could still see everything. Still not distracted from seeing it. I needed a responsibly pair of shorts. Help. Someone stop me.

"I like doing it indoors too," I agreed, before the awkward silence could build further.

Oh shit.

"It's... uh..." say something say something say something... "It's more... conducive. Sleeping indoors. I mean it's more - restful. Having a wolf over your head. Roof. Did I say roof? Uh, ceiling." I tugged at the frayed collar of my shirt. "I really don't think we met. Or you didn't eat me. Didn't meet me."

Fuck.

"I'd have... remembered," I finished helplessly.

"Uh... so I... like sleeping indoors."

Another frantic glance at the window. Still no responsible adults in sight.

"The weather's pretty good today."

[Roman Valence]

There should have been laws against things like this, the wolf thought as his body rumbled more and more with the laughter he was trying so hard to suppress. If not laws, then at least some kind of rule, determined by a group of incorrigible hot-blooded youths such as himself to limit themselves in the face of abundant prey. Roman hadn't had this much fun teasing someone in a long time. It'd be a shame if he chased him away by accident.

Maybe it'd be more what they'd call guidelines, than actual rules…

Roman was still giggling about it under his breath as he moved to close in on the grill again, letting the smell of warm meat fill his nostrils to offset the allure of … warm meat. He was getting too eager for it, he knew. Deep breaths are supposed to be good for calming oneself, but perhaps breathing deeper had been a bad choice. The present air content only furthered the carnivorous need for a hunk between his teeth.

The blacksmith shot his guest a grin that was trying so hard just to be a smile.

"Yup. Looking pretty good today," Roman agreed.

Do it~ one of the devils on his shoulders appeared in smoke on his left side, prodding him into further embracing the dark side.

Come on, do it! Do it do it do it!~

The opportunity was there. He only had a few seconds to grab it, or else the conversation would change and he'd have lost forever whatever expression he might have gotten out of the saur.

And forever was just too long a time to regret not being naughty.

He flicked the devil off his shoulder, and crossed his arms over his chest again as he waited by the heat of the grill.

"Weathah seems fine, too," the joke was clarified, and then expounded upon in such a way to please his shoulder devils. "Not rainin at least, so Ai don't have to worry about getting soaked. Wouldn't be too terrible, but ya know how it is. Rathah not be dripping wet with my clothes plastahed to my skin, cause then Ai'd have to strip naked and towel off and deal with the wet stuff before - well, it's just bettah it's not raining."

[Dervish]

I held my breath and waited.

It's a rule of survival, one used by countless herbivores and every panicking deer in its final, headlight-filled moments. Don't move. Don't budge an inch. Movement attracts carnivores. Stay right where you are and let the stillness turn you into just another piece of furniture. A simple law of biology in action. One I'd appealed to only minutes ago. Couldn't hurt to try again.

The laws of the universe were obviously hard at work today, because they were all making a monumental effort to ignore the fuck out of my desperate pleas for help.

I dared to watch out of the corner of an eye. He was doing that thing with his teeth again.

His jaws moved.

"Yup. Looking pretty good today."

I was too paralyzed to flinch. Thank biology for small favors.

I let out the breath I'd been holding. Come to think of it, the weather honestly did look nice. It hadn't rained on me during the night, the sky was a healthy-looking shade of blue, and... um... the sun was shining? It was getting rather warm inside the kitchen. But the weather was nice. I gazed out the window to check. Still looking alright.

"Weathah seems fine, too," Roman agreed. "Not rainin' at least, so Ai don't have to worry about getting soaked. Wouldn't be too terrible, but ya know how it is."

"And how," I said, diving headlong into the false security without a further thought.

"Rathah not be dripping wet with my clothes plastahed to my skin, cause then Ai'd have to strip naked and towel off and deal with the wet stuff before - well, it's just bettah it's not raining."

"Oh."

The kitchen was getting far too hot for anyone's good. Maybe we needed a few windows open so the heat could climb out. I mean, so the five-alarm blushing were-hobo could escape.

"I - I - I," I stuttered, in the interest of keeping the conversation going. So that things wouldn't turn awkward.

Ha. Ha ha.

"I can - I can imagine."

And then I discovered that I could, in fact, imagine.

Oh god. I imagined. Everything.

Examine young perspiring scantily clad blonde. Subtract remaining clothes. It was that simple.

"Sometimes it's better that way. When it rains."

Open mouth, change foot.

"Though not because of that. I meant - well - you know. Yeah. The sun isn't shining when it rains. So it isn't as hot. Because it's raining. So the sun's not shining."

And then the clouds opened and a Voice cackled in sadistic glee while the whole world pointed and laughed.

"It's... well... sometimes it's just better - it's just better having a wolf - having a roof over your head," I concluded in triumph. My gaze darted over the furniture, desperately seeking the nearest convenient hole in reality for me to jump in and disappear.

No holes in reality. Oh, well. Time to change the subject again. It was bound to work eventually.

"So, uh, is the meat done yet?"

"...I mean, do the steaks sound grilled enough?"

"- look grilled. I meant look. Could you have a look and... see... metaphorically, not with - I mean -"

"...I'm hungry."

"I'll just stop talking."

[Roman Valence]

"I can - I can imagine."

Against his control, Roman felt his eyebrows going further up along his forehead, as far as they could go. They stayed that way several seconds, before his face automatically shifted back into classic mischief territory.

Dervish's expression agreed with what he was saying. He could imagine. He could imagine, and Roman's expression told him right back that he knew he could imagine. Body language is so very telling that way - and God, did Roman love speaking this language.

"Sometimes it's better that way. When it rains," Dervish tried to press on, to regain his lost ground and stave off the beast from pouncing on him in his weakness.

It totally didn't work.

"Ai was just thinkin that, too, mate," the reply came out on its own accord. And then he still couldn't stop himself as he added, "Bein naked and wet does have its advantages. It's very fun advantages." 

"Though not because of that," Dervish responded, clearly ready to lose the war at any moment. Roman could have sworn he heard the man's heart skip a beat in there. "I meant - well - you know. Yeah. The sun isn't shining when it rains. So it isn't as hot."

Something was getting hot.

"Because it's raining. So the sun's not shining."

Something like steak.

"It's... well... sometimes it's just better - it's just better having a wolf - having a roof over your head," he said, in mock victory. Funny, then, that the herbivore was looking for an escape route from the werewolf's presence. Victors don't normally need escape routes.

Roman knew. He felt victorious. A lot.

"So, uh, is the meat done yet?" the weresaur grasped at straws.

"Yeah, Ai think the meat is just about ready," the wolf in human's lack of clothing answered while distinctly looking directly at the big-bodied herbivore. He faked a wink with his cheek, and ran a hand down his own firm stomach. "Almost ready, for you to get filled up on this here hard, juicy steak... Two or three loads of steak, if you're really eagah for it."

Watch the prey for any sudden moves.

"And of course, Ai'm ready, too," he continued as he turned to the grill, bending a bit over again to draw out each piece one at a time - shifting his weight from one foot to the other, causing his dense musculature to ripple in Dervish's direction. He was definitely not trying to further tempt the weresaur with desires for his virile, young bod.

"Ai've said it before. Ai'll say it again. Ai'm a big fan of meat. Can't wait for it to fill me up eithah," he said as he turned slowly around, platters of food in each hand. 

The lupine predator stalked closer, lining up with his target. The plates acted as weights, putting just enough pressure on his limbs to make corded arms - so used to hammering away at hard objects for hours - stand in rigid definition again.

"But ... Ya know, Ai'd be remiss, if Ai didn't offah..." he said more coyly, a predator at the door. He got within a foot or two of his guest, and stretched a bit to either side to set down the plates of food on the counter behind him - one on Dervish's left, and one on Dervish's right. Then his hands stayed there, on the counter, blocking off prey's escape with dense muscle. "Cause if ya hadn't noticed, we've got a pretty big wolf here. … I mean roof."

He meant both. Of course he did. Double entendres were fun.

Ai am going to Hell.

"Ai don't even use all my bed that much. So if ya wanted, you could sleep here. In my bed. With a wolf above your head. Ai don't maind. It could be fun."

His open mouthed smile felt hungry and moist.

"I mean roof."

[Dervish]

Roman wasn't just facing my direction. I knew with a soul-chilling surety, visual impairment be damned; something in the way he held himself told me the werewolf was looking straight at me like a hungry wolf eyeing a large, juicy piece of -

"Yeah, Ai think the meat is just about ready."

Guess I shouldn't have let slip that I was a herbivore. Next time, I was going to have to try something more subtle than metaphorically drenching myself in a metaphorical steak sauce of information that all but reeked of juicy, plant-stuffed reptilian cow plus one horn.

I'm good at hindsight like that.

"Almost ready, for you to get filled up on this here hard, juicy steak..."

Clearly, he wasn't done talking.

"Two or three loads of steak, if you're really eagah for it." Roman's hand ran over the solid flesh of his own stomach, graceful, idle, motion in a room gone still yet again to reel in my attention. My eyes tracked its path, scouting for imperfection and finding none.

Clearly, he was flirting with me.

I'm good at noticing the obvious like that.

"And of course, Ai'm ready, too." He turned, depriving me of the view of his front in exchange for one of his back. He bent over the grill, seeming to lose interest in live prey to favor an easier target.

I wrenched my vision free and bolted for the nearest exit. Except that I remained mesmerized, feet rooted to the spot, valiantly clinging to my sorry excuse for camouflage until it was too late to run.

"But..." He turned, both arms carrying plates loaded with bait, and stalked back for the kill. "Ya know, Ai'd be remiss, if Ai didn't offah..."

"Meep." I beat a hasty retreat, ending two seconds later when I met the counter at my back and found myself out of room to shuffle away.

His arms reached out to set the plates down, one to either side of me. They didn't leave.

"Cause if ya hadn't noticed, we've got a pretty big wolf here. Ai mean roof."

I swallowed. My mouth felt extremely dry.

"Uh..." I gulped again, wide eyes scanning my personal space, travelling from one sinew-laden arm to the other. "I..."

"Ai don't even use all my bed that much. So if ya wanted, you could sleep here. In my bed. With a wolf above your head. Ai don't maind. It could be fun."

"Uh..."

"Ai mean roof."

I leaned away from his toothy grin, to give both of us more room to breathe. I took a breath. I tasted more than one kind of sizzling meat in the air.

I fidgeted a bit more. My hands found a comfortable pit stop, gripping the polished marble counter to keep themselves off the blonde metalsmith's polished marble abdomen.

"Maybe... maybe if we..." Crackling stone provided a welcome distraction, as my death grip slowly turned the countertop to powder. "Shouldn't you - aren't you - I - I think -"

Another thunderclap resonated from my belly, echoing around the vast, empty cavern.

The universe isn't always out to get me. Sometimes it tosses me a small break.

"Let's talk about this after lunch," I rehearsed in my head.

"Let's talk about this over lunch," my mouth helpfully supplied.

Traitor! Traitor!

[Roman Valence]

Roman started to lean in. The predator in him wanted to close the distance, just a little bit further, to take advantage of wounded, solitary prey. His mouth was watering for it. He was close enough, he could practically feel the heat coming off of the big mostly herbivorous beast almost in his grasp.

It wouldn't be hard, to grab him, and squeeze him, and drain him, and big guys always make the -

He swallowed hard to interrupt that line of thought, and found he needed to close his mouth to do so. The very, very carnivorous youth wondered, in retrospect, how long his mouth had been grinning while open, and how many "sharper than human" pearly whites he'd flashed at him.

Just long enough, he hoped.

Even if the rest of him had other priorities, his stomach heartily agreed with Dervish's suggestion, and the brain soon followed, thinking that a small break might do them both some good.

"Well then," Roman replied, taking a moment to wet his lips. "Let's … eat up."

The smith leaned a bit closer in, cutting the gap out of the air between them, making like he was about to do something that required physical contact … but then shifted to his guest's side. He took his own plate, heavy with the steak, and sauntered over to the drawer for a fork and knife - a very large, sharp knife, that looked about as good at cutting cooked flesh as other things.

Casting a 'glance' in Dervish' direction, he then added in that, "You can get whatevah you want here."

And just in case Dervish took that the wrong way, he pointed with the knife at the drawer full of silverware, the same look of mischief on his face as before.

"I mean them..."

"… too."