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A shared drink after a good day’s hunting has become like tradition for them, Aymeric realizes one evening as he sits beside Estinien by the fire, passing a bottle that only Estinien thought to bring back and forth between them. They patrol, take care of a few problems be they dragon or a more mundane breed of beast, and then they return to camp and share a bottle of wine while one or the other of them (usually Estinien, who has a surprising knack for rural fare) cooks a simple meal over their little fire.
He hasn’t thought on it much, but given what little he does know of Estinien, that the man deigns to get drunk with him at all, even this pre-drunk, this warm-blooded and pleasantly fuzzy cousin of drunk, belies the fact that somehow, Aymeric has won Estinien’s trust.
“You stalk the field well for someone raised with his food pre-chewed and offered on a silver spoon,” Estinien says once their bellies are full and they’re sitting shoulder to shoulder, warmed by the fire. Aymeric near chokes on wine and his laughter, ramming the Dragoon with his shoulder in indignation.
“Pre-chewed!? I was raised by minor nobility, not without teeth!”
Estinien gives him a wryly amused look out of the corner of his eye, but his lips at the rim of the bottle he’s just been handed curve up in a rare half-smile. Usually when he’s entertained by something, but no less rare. It warms something in Aymeric far more than the fire or the drink ever could. A rare thing, that fragile trust.
“But I will graciously accept the compliment, however,” Aymeric allows with a growing smile of his own. Estinien moves like one of the wild things they hunt, like he was born into the hunt. He knows it cannot possibly be so, that Estinien once must have had a mother, a father, a life unlike this one, perhaps, but whatever is the truth, it is something that is so closely guarded that even Aymeric, the only one he’s ever seen Estinien actually open up in any way to, still cannot see past the fog of mystery. However awkward, it is a compliment. And better yet, a rare, near playful Estinien.
Aymeric can say that the wanting that comes with it is not unusual. He’s wanted many people before, but denied himself out of duty if he’s not being strictly honest with himself, and plain fear if he is. Estinign’s not the only one who finds trust hard -- Aymeric’s just better at hiding that fact about himself. And yet.. He finds that the usually quiet, often objectionable Dragoon makes him want to open up. Find a safe haven in Estinien, every bit as much as he wants to make a safe haven in himself in return. Aymeric, for all he knows, may well be Estinien’s only friend, so it falls to him to at least be a good friend. He wants to, at that.
“‘twas an observation, I don’t care if you accept it or not,” Estinien says, grousing, after a moment, that glimpse within closed off again, but the warmth behind the door is no less palpable for it being closed. It’s a.. strange, thrilling thing, knowing that tucked carefully away like something precious to be guarded, there is a man who cares quite deeply.
And yet, Estinien is looking at him. Has been looking at him, in fact, for the past few handfuls of seconds, like he’s trying to judge something about Aymeric. Usually, people trying to determine something about him make Aymeric’s blood run cold, and yet.. Estinien’s gaze is not calculating so much as it is thoughtful. Curious, even.
“For what it’s worth,” Aymeric says before his brain can stop his mouth from making him out to be a fool, his body following, leaning into the warmth, “It is high praise. I have never seen a man move like you do, and I full anticipate I may never see another. You are..” There are a myriad of words he could use that are perhaps less loaded. Fierce. A terror. Peerless. The one that trips off his clumsy tongue is “Beautiful.”
If Estinien will forgive him his indiscretion, Aymeric is more than willing to pretend he does not see the way the tips of Estinien’s ears go red. He looks for a moment like a rabbit caught in a snare, a man at war with himself, and yet he remains. Steadfast as ever, he remains.
The first contact is a bold yet tentative brush of lips, and Aymeric will never quite be certain who initiates it. One moment they're still passing back and forth the bottle of warming mulled wine, the next Estinien is staring at him, and Aymeric is looking at the glossy sheen of wetness on Estinien's lower lip. He can taste the wine when they kiss, at first soft, barely a brush, but then quickly braver, bodies turning to slot together more neatly, heads inclining to fit one another's edges.
Estinien's mouth on his is sublime, hungry and hot, and if he's a little clumsy with desire and inexperience, well, Aymeric is clumsy in the exact same manner. His hands grasp at Estinien's waist where they're tucked together, and Estinien's fingers slide against the fine line of his jaw, thumbing the tender flesh below his ear. His blood full burns with his mounting desire, aching in the pit of his belly.
They break with a rough gasp for air, Estinien pushing Aymeric gently backward in a way that makes him for a moment terribly anxious that he's erred in some way, done something that has upset Estinien, who until a moment ago had been giving every indication that he was a willing and active participant who was very eager to get his tongue into Aymeric's mouth.
"Listen," Estinien says, and Aymeric can't find the words. Could he know? Had he heard the rumours of the vicomte de Borel's adopted child? Quieter, perhaps, than of the scandal of Aymeric's parentage, one even more vehemently concealed, but.. well, accidents happen. "Before.. I need-- Oh, sod it. Come on. Let us not freeze to the ground out here.”
He’s moving away and Aymeric nearly makes a little whining noise before he realizes what Estinien is at, pushing up from the ground to duck into their tent where they’ll be sheltered from the elements and from any prying eyes both. He’s not sure what Estinien wants to say, but all Aymeric can feel right now is the blood roaring in his ears, the way his heart pounds and he nearly trips over his own feet as he follows. Fury have mercy on him, he’d follow the man to the ends of the world, much less a tent only a few scant fulms away.
Once they’re there, Estinien kisses him again, as if making sure that nothing has changed in the seconds between then and now, and sheds his surcoat leaving him clad only in his shirt and some form of undershirt that strikes Aymeric as oddly familiar. He allows Estinien to move, fearing that if he himself moves, he’ll shatter this moment and whatever it is Estinien has to say while he pulls off his shirt.
Face angled carefully away, expression dark with some kind of ill expectation, Estinien unhooks the laces of the garment and peels it away from his skin, shivering in the cool air. Aymeric is greeted with an unexpected but not at all unwelcome sight. Blue eyes trace the soft, rising curves of Estinien’s chest before flicking back up to the man’s face, still refusing to behold in turn.
Aymeric’s lips part in surprise-- or is it perhaps comprehension? Another layer of Estinien’s mystery peeled back, exposing the truths that inform the dragoon’s actions. He has to bite back a laugh lest he shatter the fragile trust that Estinien has placed into his hands here, because of all the secrets that Estinien could unveil to him, how could he have anticipated that it would be one that he himself shared? When he was worrying after Estinien knowing his own past, the nature of his own body, Estinien himself was concealing the same exact secret? Of course-- The actuality of it is unspoken. Aymeric feels that they are the same, and yet he cannot allow himself to presume such perilous facts about Estinien's identity lest he risk offending an already prickly Dragoon.
“How should I..?” He trails off, uncertain how to phrase the question on his tongue in a manner that allows his closest friend any privacy he might wish for himself.
“As you always have,” Estinien says, the rough edge of his voice softened by a vulnerability that makes Aymeric surprisingly angry. There are a great many things that Estinien might feel rightly vulnerable about, but not this. Never this. Not with him.
“Of course,” His reply is smooth, his natural affinity to lead taking a comfortable fore in the face of his friend’s discomfort, “And how ought I--”
“The same.”
The clarification is enough that Aymeric can see that his understanding of Estinien has shifted no more than it would otherwise have done had he finally witnessed the man naked. He cannot help but feel a little guilty that he is unfazed due to his own experience where Estinien is cautious, and he should clear the air between them in that regard, but Estinien’s status as the most handsome man Aymeric has ever beheld is only cemented by his nudity, and he is powerless to resist the urge to touch. He cannot help but touch, cannot help but marvel as he spreads his fingers across the fine ridges of Estinien’s ribs. Aymeric himself is not as devout as some of his peers, but it is a difficult task to behold the man before him and not see a loving divine hand carving him from fine stone.
Estinien is not thinking about anything of the sort.
“Seven swiving hells, Aymeric! ” He all but yelps, jumping out of the archer’s grasp like a cat mishandled, “Your hands are gods-damned freezing!”
The moment, heavy with cautious emotion, is broken all at once by Aymeric’s rising laughter and the baleful stare he’s granted in return.
But oh, he’s beautiful like this, glaring and pouting, the rosy skin of his nipples growing taut in the cold air. The tent hasn’t been warmed by their presence enough to forestall it yet, so when Aymeric rolls them into the furs and pulls the thick wool over them both, Estinien goes only with some grumbling that’s quickly quieted by Aymeric’s mouth.
Estinien is right, though, as the dragoon’s hands are also bloody freezing where they push up under the loose linen of Aymeric’s shirt. He settles on to Estinien, legs tangling together and pressed close at hip and belly and chest to kiss again and again, and he’s comforted that their hands seem to speak more of the awkwardness of new lovers than the quickly diminishing uncertainty.
Even so.
“You, my friend, are sublime,” Aymeric praises, boyish smile lighting his eyes as he pulls back momentarily to simply observe Estinien before fitting that plush mouth of his underneath Estinien’s jaw and dragging downwards.
“Oh, fuck off,” Estinien grumbles, but it’s good-natured, and Aymeric will count it as a win as he puffs laughter down the length of his best friend’s throat and kisses the raised ridge of his collarbone. Aymeric anticipates the way Estinien stiffens when his lips reach the soft swell of his chest and drag over tender skin, but when he chances a glance upwards, expecting to see the dragoon looking away once more, he finds instead that Estinien is watching him, eyes hooded and darkening with want.
“Good?” He murmurs into the stiff peak of Estinien’s nipple, just to be sure.
“Stop fishing for compliments,” Estinien grants in return, but bows upwards on the edge of a moan when Aymeric’s tongue circles the stiffening flesh, drawing it into his mouth. “ Fuck .” He says again, and Aymeric likes the way it sounds from his mouth.
In the end, it’s Estinien’s hands that get impatient. Aymeric could happily worship every ilm of the man with his mouth from now until, presumably, a dragon burnt their little tent to a crisp, but the more he teases, the more irate Estinien becomes, until he’s hauling Aymeric up to kiss him again, rough and hungry.
“For fuck’s sake,” The dragoon snaps, though not unkindly, lifting his hips just enough to fumble open the laces and drag them down his hips. “Touch me, or bugger off and let me do it myself.” The thought isn’t an unpleasant one, not in the least, to see how Estinien works himself when he’s alone and needing a quick release, but Aymeric wants nothing more than to touch Estinien and, if the way Estinien’s hips lift as his fingertips skim over the plane of his belly are any indication, Aymeric’s hands are warm enough now that Estinien wants very much to be touched.
Aymeric isn’t anticipating how wet Estinien is already, his clit thick and stiff and slick under his fingers as he rubs two down over it to wring a grunt out of his now-lover. He can’t deny that it makes his own cock pulse in return, though Estinien cannot feel it, the simple knowing that he caused this, that Estinien is every bit as worked up as he is and they have only one another to blame.
He likes it though. Likes feeling Estinien sliding between his fingers, likes feeling Estinien lift his hips, likes hearing Estinien groan and feel the bite of strong fingertips digging into his shoulder. He likes twisting onto his side and slotting his mouth against Estinien’s jaw and rutting his hips against Estinien’s, likes breaking contact only to impatiently shove Estinien’s breeches further down, over his ankles and off so he can push Estinien’s knees open, pet Estinien’s thigh with damp fingers, so he can tease his fingertips at the scalding hot opening of Estinien’s cunt as he works back up to stroking him all over again.
Aymeric cannot bear the thought plucking at the back of his mind, however, that he is not being forthright with Estinien. That he, fully clothed as he is, has his best friend on the back foot, and it’s this thought that prompts him to break the contact between them, sitting up astride Estinien’s narrow hips and gazing down at the dragoon’s confused expression, kiss-bitten lips sulky.
“Estinien,” He says softly, stroking his fingertips down Estinien’s sternum just for the simple joy of touching him, “I fear I have not been honest with you. I would correct that.”
Confusion turns to concern, Estinien’s brow furrowing and he sits up, enough that Aymeric is now sitting in his lap as deft fingers unlace his shirt and shake it open, plucking it free of his breeches and pulling it off over his head. There, in the dimmer light of the tent, Aymeric is bared as Estinien was before him, though where Estinien’s chest rises in a soft curve, Aymeric counts himself fortunate enough to have fixed that particular problem, marked only by thick, pale scars cupping the underside of each pectoral.
Estinien’s eyes go wide as saucers in shock, and he is for once speechless by force rather than choice, fingertips almost shaky where they reach out and find contact with the warmth of Aymeric’s skin. The thicker scars are numb, but Estinien’s thumb quickly sweeps upwards towards a dark nipple, prompting a shiver of sensation that makes Aymeric groan softly. The reverence with which Estinien touches him is a mirror to Aymeric’s own, but all he can do is fist his fingers into the furs beneath them and allow Estinien to process whatever thoughts are cycling through his head.
Estinien does as Estinien always does when he isn’t certain how to proceed and resorts to rougher things, crushing their mouths together in shock and desire and what feels like the strangest, wildest relief. Unburdened of his guilt, Aymeric can only eagerly concur.
“Sneaky bastard,” Estinien mutters into his mouth once they tumble back downwards, hands roving. He hisses when Aymeric pinches his nipple, groans when strong fingers cup his breast in one hand and squeeze. They fight for a moment when they come to the same idea, working in tandem to struggle unlacing and shedding Aymeric’s breeches and smalls until they’re both finally, mercifully bare before one another. Estinien’s hands are clumsy but eager in their exploration, squeezing Aymeric’s hips and palming the soft, dark curls at his groin before following it downwards to brush painfully softly over his clit.
“Halone’s buggering halls,” Estinien says bluntly, looking down between them and then back up at Aymeric in a way that makes the archer’s ears burn with embarrassment and a strange self-satisfaction. Aymeric is.. a respectable size, certainly, clit standing proudly out from his body in a way that demands to be touched, easily as big as Estinien’s thumb when he presses it alongside and makes Aymeric cover his face and laugh sheepishly in spite of himself. He has the benefit of a loving family who were only too happy to scour their land for the best in chirurgeons when their adoptive child declared very early that he was, in fact, their adoptive son, but that doesn’t seem like a story for when Estinien’s working the tender skin of his prick back and forth with a fiercely aroused hunger.
“Up,” Estinien hisses at him like a wild animal, a thing possessed, hands moving away from Aymeric to grab at his hips, “Up, get up here, up--” Aymeric, flustered and bewildered, can do nothing but comply, allowing Estinien’s hunger to carry him upwards until he’s kneeling astride Estinien’s chest, until Estinien’s hands are like claws on his ass and he’s dragging Aymeric forward to fit his mouth around Aymeric’s cock with clumsy desperation and to moan like he’s been gutted.
Aymeric does no better. He’s only imagined this, and could never have prepared in his filthiest daydreams how hot Estinien’s mouth would be, how he’d suck him hard and greedy, lash his tongue down through Aymeric’s folds to taste his cunt and moan with a heat bordering on feverish. Aymeric can feel himself throbbing, the rough push of Estinien’s chin against him making him shiver, back bowing forwards until all he can do is curl over his lover’s head, paw helplessly at his hair with one hand, the other pressing knuckles into his teeth to stifle his whines as he ruts his hips into Estinien’s mouth.
Estinien brings him off embarrassingly quickly and scratches welts into his thighs when Aymeric grinds hard into him, neither of them quite able to breathe while the archer fucks his orgasm onto Estinien’s tongue. When they break, Estinien is gasping for air, eyes foggy with arousal and lips red and wet with spit and slick in a way that makes it truly impossible for Aymeric to do anything but move his quaking legs back down to fit against Estinien and lick the taste of himself out of his lover’s mouth.
“Aymeric,” Estinien says, hoarse and on the edge of a whine. When Aymeric touches Estinien all over again, if he was wet before, by now he’s soaked , slick from his pulsing cock right to his ass. Aymeric cannot help the little exhale of need that leaves him, nor the desire that refuses to abate even in the wake of his orgasm. “Fuck me, damn you.”
With a request like that, how can he possibly refuse? Aymeric’s only too happy to mouth at the splotchy color in Estinien’s cheeks, at the delicate line of his ear, kissing the tip as he pushes his fingers, first one and then another, into the heat of his cunt. The way Estinien groans and squirms and pushes down, opens up for him perfectly and with nothing other than searing pleasure speaks volumes -- That Estinien has done this before, that Aymeric’s fingers are by no means the first thing that has breached the man, despite the fact that Aymeric is certain that this is Estinien’s first time as it is his own. Which leaves only the thought of Estinien himself, fingers working greedily between his thighs, chasing his own climax with the dragoon’s usual demanding intensity.
It's different with Estinien than with himself, naturally, the angle different, a little awkward in its newness. Estinien seems to have no complaints by any means, hiking one of his knees up with a hand and tossing his head back against the furs. Aymeric works him inexpertly but no less enthusiastically, the sounds of his fingers pumping wetly into his closest friend's cunt downright obscene with their loudness, the rawness of it igniting that throbbing ache between his thighs all over again.
He wants to tell Estinien he's beautiful like this, that he's beautiful all the time, but Aymeric can't help but feel that it wouldn't be beyond the Dragoon to put an end to the moment and storm off at the barest hint of Aymeric's much-derided sentiment despite their earlier playful words. Instead, he curls around Estinien from the side, works him harder, deeper, and sucks a dark, quickly mottling bruise into the fragile ivory skin of Estinien's breast.
"You--" Estinien chokes on a shuddering moan at the bloom of warmth left in the wake of Aymeric's mouth. Gathers himself. Tries again for whatever he wants to say. "You gonna put that cock of yours to use, or what?"
Aymeric's brain grinds to a screeching halt, blue eyes widening almost comically. For a second, he has a mind to be offended, (surely Estinien has not forgotten already?), but it is quickly forgotten when the rough pad of a forefinger and thumb grasp his clit, jerking him off slowly.
"Hmm," Estinien says, eyes darkening with a thoughtful, calculating sort of arousal, near wicked and full gorgeous,"I think it will work."
"Nothing ventured," Aymeric agrees weakly, like every ounce of blood in his body hasn't gone straight to his cunt at the idea of fucking Estinien the way he desperately wants to. His fingers slide free with a wet sound, and he can't help himself from bringing them up to his mouth. Estinien's tasted him, it's only fair. Aymeric grasps the Dragoon behind the knees and pushes them up towards his chest, exposing him in his entirety, and mercifully, Estinien takes over holding them without even being asked. His eyes are gleaming, patient but clearly desperate to feel it, and Aymeric himself feels shaky with how much he wants it too.
He's never entertained the thought. Figured it was a lost cause, really, given the limitations of his anatomy, but he's lean enough that his cock stands proudly a few ilms from the dark curls of his mound, made a little thicker still from Estinien's earlier sucking at it. Aymeric holds his breath while he looks down between them, lining himself up with Estinien's cunt before grinding slowly into him. It's awkward, takes him a second to catch, but there's a definite shift-slide- push and then a soaking heat enveloping his cock in a way that makes both men gasp loudly and shiver.
It's not deep. Aymeric isn't going to be winning any awards for rearranging Estinien's organs, but merciful Fury, there's something desperately, achingly potent in the feeling of fucking Estinien like this. The knowledge that it's him within the man, that the both of them can feel every twitch, every pulse. And the feeling, gods of all, Aymeric could never have imagined this feeling. It compares not at all to a loose fist held steady while his hips work, wishing for something he hasn't been given.
It is, in a word, sublime. Enough that he can do nothing but remain still and pant wetly, eyes meeting Estinien's and seeing his own sentiment echoed back-- raw, vulnerable need, pure in the animal nature of it.
"Move," Estinien whispers hoarsely, meeting Aymeric's gaze. He's possibly the only one who knows what this means to Aymeric. The only one who could. Aymeric is powerless to do aught but obey, though he fears he may well combust on the spot at the feeling of his over-sensitive clit sliding against Estinien's walls. He pulls out and buries himself into the man anew, drawing another shivery moan from the both of them. Estinien can feel it, if the way his hips twitch to meet him is any indication. It seems depth is not an issue in the face of how obscenely arousing the whole endeavour is.
"Fuck me, come on, Aymeric," The Dragoon is recovering if he's got enough wits to goad and demand, and that's no good at all. He'll grant him this, though, and do as he's bidden, because if finding his climax on Estinien's tongue was ecstasy, finding it in his cunt will be nothing less than ruinous. His hips impact the man's arse with the next thrust, grinding his cock into Estinien in a way that makes Aymeric groan but Estinien shout with surprise, grasping hold of his shoulders.
Aymeric fucks him. With quick, sharp little stabs of his hips he fucks Estinien, by now feverishly chasing that feeling of sinking into him again and again, and Estinien's hips rise to meet him, shift to angle him deeper, as deep as he can get, and Estinien snarls and shudders like Aymeric imagined he would. He claws at Aymeric's shoulders like Aymeric imagined he would, and pants hotly in his ear, and groans and arches his spine and with a shout Estinien's coming, the cry announcing it but the proof in the way his body tenses and a hot gush floods Aymeric's cock.
That , he hadn't imagined. Hadn't imagined how bloody arousing it would be either, and even though Aymeric slips out, rutting his clit through Estinien's folds and forcing another wet spurt from him, the sensation and knowledge that he did that is more than enough to bring him off in spectacular fashion, moaning helplessly and grinding out the waves of their joint climax together.
The furs beneath them are soaked with Estinien's spend, the both of them slick and sliding together with helpless overstimulation, gasped little whines being pressed into one another's mouths as they come slowly down, falling still laid against one another. Estinien will deny it, Aymeric is certain, but the way the Dragoon's thighs move to warmly bracket his hips, the way strong fingers thread through Aymeric's damp hair and hold him there, pressed together.. it feels for a perilous moment a little more than mere friendship.