Work Text:
Shang Qinghua was annotating a condition in a draft proposal for peace with a major eastern tundra chieftain when he felt the air thrum. The inkwell on his desk rattled, and he felt magic thrum through the air like ozone before lighting. Without looking up from the document, Shang Qinghua stilled the inkwell as the telltale chime of a portal opening rang out, soon followed by the heavy footsteps of Mobei-jun stepping into the study.
Shang Qinghua squinted in the weak study light. The characters on the parchment seemed to swim on the page like guppies, but he didn’t want to put on his glasses; it felt like an admission of defeat. Had his eyes always been this bad, or was his new pregnancy affecting his eyesight somehow? He should list out all the weird bullshit about pregnancy he added to the world sooner rather than later. “There is a door. I know I’ve pointed it out before. It’s a really nice door, too. All fancy.”
Mobei-jun didn’t respond. Shang Qinghua looked up and blinked, eyes bleary in the study’s rather weak lighting – so he didn’t feel like turning on every single light, sue him – and saw Mobei-jun wearing night robes.
Was it that late? The incense sticks had burned out some time ago, but he had been about to light another before he got distracted.
Acid rose in his throat. He’d been so, so careful to not disturb Mobei-jun with any potential annoyance from Shang Qinghua’s state. He did not mention his feet or legs aching, even though they inexplicably did, or his cravings for foods so rare and strange no way to find them without some sort of character-building epic quest. His libido was, frankly, out of control, sparking raging horniness at the drop of a hat, for no real reason at the most inconvenient times. He’d already been considering contingencies if his sleep pattern changed and he would need a new bedroom so as to avoid disturbing Mobei-jun.
And, already, his careful plan to avoid displeasing the king was spoiled by his simple inability to keep track of time.
Mobei-jun still stared down at him, gaze level and piercing, emotions unreadable. There was a cloth bundle in his hands.
Now that Shang Qinghua’s attention had been pulled from the documents, aches throughout his body loudly made themselves known. Maybe it really was time to sleep. He stood up, some excuse on the tip of his tongue, but his back twinged particularly sharply, and he staggered.
Shang Qinghua was hardly about to topple to the floor, but Mobei-jun moved with the speed of a panther anyway, catching him and pulling him against his chest. Something warm fell over his shoulder: the cloth bundle in Mobei-jun’s hands had been one of Shang Qinghua’s sleeping robes, made of thick, pale fur, for when winter evenings became dangerously cold for anyone not an ice demon. He loved wearing it even when it wasn’t glacial; it was very soft.
In his typical brusque manner, the demon said, “It’s late. Come to bed.”
“It’s not that late.” Shang Qinghua objected. It was a weak rebuttal, made weaker by his own body, leaning heavily against Mobei-jun’s own. His eyelids drifted shut. Mobei-jun was much nicer than a desk. Not as pointy. Not as hard. Usually.
But Shang Qinghua still felt compelled to work. He wasn’t too far into his pregnancy, but he was already beginning to show in the slight softening and rounding in his midsection. How much else would change, and how soon? How much would he reasonably be able to get done before he couldn’t fit behind his desk anymore? No, he should build up as much goodwill as he could. Show how skilled and useful he still was, could do the same work as before and wouldn’t ask for anything new. He wasn’t needy. He couldn’t seem needy.
He should get back to work. Shang Qinghua felt his body rise. Good he was standing up –
Oh, no, wait. Mobei-jun had lifted him in a bridal carry. Whoops.
Shang Qinghua kept a small bed/cot in his study for late nights or early mornings when he was especially busy. It didn’t get much use anymore – Mobei-jun was like a spoiled cat, and he was insistent about certain routines, Shang Qinghua joining him in bed being among the Most Important to him. Still, it was kept clean by palace staff, so when Mobei-jun laid him down on it, the surface wasn’t rumpled or coated in dust.
Shang Qinghua yawned. He was fairly surprised that Mobei-jun hadn’t just warped him away to their shared bedroom. His surprise was redoubled when he opened his eyes to see the king staring at him with the same inscrutable look as before.
He wasn’t speaking. Well, fine, Shang Qinghua could go first. He smiled. “I’m fine, my king. Just a bit more work and I’ll join you.”
The robe though, lined with leopard skin and suffused with his king’s scent, was definitely welcome, though. Shang Qinghua shifted, pulling it tighter around his shoulders. He moved his legs a bit and, oh.
Shit.
Well, there was one of the inconveniences of his changing body again. Something about his tiredness, or the smell of the robe, or Mobei-jun’s hand, gently resting on his knee, had his body accelerating from ‘nearly comatose’ to ‘dangerously horny’ in 3.5.
Shang Qinghua choked out a nervous laugh. “Actually, it might be a bit longer. But don’t worry! After this is done, I’ll –“
“Shang Qinghua,” Mobei-jun interrupted. “What is ailing you? Is it the child?”
Against his better judgment, Shang Qinghua moved, just a bit, rubbing his thighs together. He was already wet, and a familiar burn was kindling in his groin. “No. well, yes. Well, sort of?”
Shang Qinghua enjoyed sex - enjoyed sex with his husband quite a bit, in fact. His husband enjoyed it too. Hence the child. Maybe it wouldn’t be too out of the ordinary to address it now?
Shang Qinghua glanced away, biting at his lip. Without consciously meaning to, he rubbed his thighs together again. It was a slight movement, but still enough to send a pang of emptiness through him. Heat prickled across Shang Qinghua’s face and down his back.
Unfortunately – or maybe, fortunately – Mobei-jun was sharp. The demon’s pupils dilated, and his nostrils flared as he looked from Shang Qinghua’s face down his body and up again. Shang Qinghua suddenly couldn’t tear attention away from Mobei-jun’s chest, visible through his open robe. Why was watching him just breathe suddenly the horniest thing he’d ever seen?
His thoughts spun and spun, speeding through possibilities and consequences and the best ways to seem ‘normal’ with lightning speed. Then, blessedly, his horniness levels finally increased just enough to override the parts of his brain still preoccupied with ‘decorum’ and ‘shame’.
Face burning, Shang Qinghua leaned back on the cot and let his legs spread. “I – so I had – could you –“
Mobei-jun was on him before Shang Qinghua could finish his flailing justification. Mobei-jun kissed him as if he were dying of thirst and Shang Qinghua was an oasis; he licked and nipped at Shang Qinghua’s mouth with rough tongue and careful fangs. Shang Qinghua wrapped his arms around Mobei-jun’s neck and kissed back just as fiercely, moaning from deep in his chest.
Shang Qinghua could feel higher brain functions frying by the second. Mobei-jun climbed over him, just barely fitting on the cot, and when he pressed his body against Shang Qinghua’s, uttering a sound between a moan and a snarl, Shang Qinghua hissed as if he were in pain.
Shang Qinghua clawed at Mobei-jun’s shoulder, hard enough to leave long red welts. “Please – I need your fingers, I need you, please - ”
He was barely coherent, but, blessedly, his husband was a quick thinker. Shang Qinghua’s clothes were gone in a few slashes of the king’s claws, and then he was on his knees, slowly running his wide, wet tongue up Shang Qinghua’s cunt.
Shang Qinghua bit into his palm to muffle a truly unholy sound. With his uncalibrated libido had also come a haywire sensitivity; the hot wetness of Mobei-jun’s breath as he took Shang Qinghua’s dick into his mouth, the tickle of saliva trickling down his thigh and mixing with his own slick, the barest brush of Mobei-jun’s calloused thumb against his folds – claws thankfully retracted – all catalyzed Shang Qinghua’s simmering arousal into a supernova. The searing pleasure in his core crested, and he came with a near-scream, back arched and head thrown back into the cot.
It was good – so, so, so good – but over far too quickly. When Shang Qinghua blinked back into awareness, chest heaving with deep breaths, he still burned as if he’d never been tended to at all. He swallowed. “Again.”
And Mobei-jun obeyed. Again, and again, and again, he tended to his lover, and Shang Qinghua drank deeply of his beloved’s affections. He indulged, kissing and biting at his lover while shamelessly fucking himself on the broad fingers that always knew how to pierce him so perfectly.
Finally – after so many orgasms he lost count – Shang Qinghua was sated. He lay sweaty on his disheveled clothes, panting hard as the consequences of his physical excursions finally made themselves known in the form of an aching back and an unholy amount of chafing.
Mobei-jun moved up beside him and laid a hand across his midsection. A thumb traced over the barely visible swell. “You are both all right?”
Shang Qinghua coughed out a weak laugh. “I mean, can’t say anything about junior, but I’m all good now. Sorry about, uh. All that.”
Mobei-jun pulled Shang Qinghua snuggly against him. Shang Qinghua sighed and closed his eyes, listening to Mobei-jun's steady, strong heartbeat against his cheek. He felt Mobei-jun’s hardness against his thigh, but he never once brought up his own desires during Shang Qinghua’s hedonistic mental break. He nuzzled into his lover’s neck and traced the muscles on his back. “I can take care of you, too. Just give me like, a minute. Two minutes.”
Mobei-jun pressed his nose into Shang Qinghua’s hair and breathed deeply, scenting him. He’d been doing that more often, even before they learned of Shang Qinghua’s pregnancy. “Not important. Why didn’t you come find me?”
And there was a long, boring story that would answer that a story Shang Qinghua had rather successfully avoided thinking about until just then. Some of his earliest memories were his parents arguing and complaining about each other to him as if he was a co-worker and not their child. In particular, he remembered his father often telling him, usually while his mother was clearly within earshot, about how no one liked a needy woman, how wives who asked for too much were better off thrown away.
Mobei-jun could not necessarily be called kind or benevolent – but he’d never said or implied anything like what Shang Qinghua’s father used to.
Shang Qinghua was needy. But maybe that could be okay.
He closed his eyes. “Let’s say – hypothetically – I get, sort of, worked up again?”
“Then I will relieve you,” Mobei-jun answered.
“And if I’m hungry for stupid things? Or my body hurts for no reason?”
“You will eat whatever you wish. And I will tend to you, or have your physicians aid you if I cannot.” Mobei-jun spoke like it was a straightforward, boring rote fact, like describing the moon or the seasons. “Shang Qinghua, you are my consort. Everything in this kingdom is yours. I am yours.”
Shang Qinghua’s face burned as he pressed even closer to his lover. “And if I want you in me again? Right now?”
“Then you shall have me.” Mobei-jun shuffled backward and quickly pulled off his pants, their front marred by a large wet patch on the tent of his smallclothes. “I will provide whatever you need. Gladly.”
Shang Qinghua heard him, and understood, but it was only weeks later, as he was eating sliced tundra persimmons, succulently juicy, while Mobei-jun kneeled before him and dutifully massaged the soreness out of his calves, that he suddenly felt it.
Mobei-jun frowned, reaching up to caress Shang Qinghua’s suddenly damp cheek. Before his king could worry, Shang Qinghua fell forward and hugged him around the neck. Mobei-jun embraced him, and Shang Qinghua basked in the love that warmed him like a hearth, like home.