Work Text:
Viktor had lost his parents at a young age, and spent a large part of his childhood living in an orphanage. Luckily for him however, Silco, the king and ruler of the kingdom of Zaun, had seen promise in his curious mind and intelligent eyes when he had visited the orphanage. Silco had taken Viktor under his wing, and he was taken off the streets and the orphanage that had been his home for as long as he could remember, and instead brought into the relative abundant luxury of the royal castle. Silco had no heirs of his own, ruling the kingdom without a queen at his side, and Viktor effectively became the prince heir overnight.
It was there, in the castle, that Viktor met Jayce; the son of the castle’s blacksmith and a happy-go-lucky kid with a dark mop of hair on the top of his head, round cheeks and buck teeth. They became fast friends, sharing a passion and unquenchable thirst for knowledge. Viktor had been taught to how to read by Silco, and Jayce had always dreamed of being able to study like Viktor was doing now, but his family wasn’t well off enough to afford sending him away to learn. So, Viktor brought his books every time they met, and together they grew up side by side, with their noses buried in Viktor’s books.
Viktor had been a sickly child ever since birth, and that didn’t change too much as he grew older. He was definitely faring much better under Silco’s protection than he would have growing up on the streets, and the tinctures and concoctions created by the royal apothecary, an unpleasant and secretive man named Reveck, allowed him to live a somewhat healthy life. What bothered him the most was his right leg, and as he grew into a slim, gangly teenager, he was using a cane and a supportive leg brace. Viktor, having been a year or two older than Jayce (they weren’t sure of the exact number since Viktor wasn’t sure when his actual birthday was) started growing first. Once Jayce started growing however, he quickly became tall and broad, with wide shoulders and a muscular back - a body shaped by his work at the anvil. His round jaw turned square and his baby fat disappeared to reveal an almost ridiculously handsome face. Still, he kept a sort of boyish charm to him, the gap between his front teeth making his wide smile all too endearing. And his hands, always covered in soot from the fires of the forge, grew almost impossibly large, easily wrapping fully around one of Viktor’s slim shoulders.
Viktor vividly remember waking up in the middle of the night one time in his teens, heart pounding in his chest, having dreamed of Jayce’s intelligent hazel eyes and those large, warm hands exploring his body. Before Viktor had fully cleared the haze of sleep from his mind, he found one of his hands wandering to the spot between his legs, finding how he was hard from the dream. A while later, after having brought himself to completion at the thought of his best friend, he had a sudden, but very clear, realization.
He was in love with his best friend.
And he wasn’t sure what to do with that information.
Jayce caught the attention of Vander, who was the man in charge of the royal knights, and Silco’s right hand man. Vander was a massive man, and one of Silco’s most trusted advisors. Jayce stood out in a crowd, even as a teenager, and he was hand picked to start training as a knight. Years passed, and Jayce turned out to be quite proficient in the ways of combat. Viktor’s and Jayce’s friendship stayed as strong as ever, and so did Viktor’s feelings. They were always there in the background, a simmering, a longing, and something he so badly wanted that it made his bones ache with something more than the pains he were accustomed to.
Powder, his adoptive younger sister, also rescued off the streets by Silco, would tease him endlessly over his crush. Not that he had ever told her, but Powder, as intelligent as they come, had a knack for figuring things out.
“So, did you confess yet? Did you kiss him yet?” she would ask, kicking her feet in the air. Viktor would roll his eyes and scoff, and Powder would disappear in a flash of bright blue hair and a hysterical, happy giggle. And Viktor would try to keep his attention on his books, but always found himself looking over towards the spot where the squires were training, watching Jayce from afar.
Another year passed, and Jayce was finally a knight, the same year he turned twenty years of age. He had been hand picked by Silco (with some gentle influence by Viktor) to be Viktor’s personal guard. One day shortly after Jayce had been appointed that position, they were out in the royal garden. Viktor was sitting on a bench in the shade of a large tree in the corner of the garden, surrounded on all sides by high castle walls. Jayce was standing off to the side, looking incredibly handsome in his knight’s armor and the dark green livery of the kingdom of Zaun.
“Jayce, stop posturing and come join me.” Viktor squinted up at his best friend he rested his elbow on his knee and his chin in his palm.
Jayce, who had been busy looking off in to the distance, turned his attention to Viktor. “I’m not posturing! I’m being knightly! Protecting you!” He straightened, puffing out his chest and smiling widely. The dimples in his cheeks made Viktor’s heart flutter.
Viktor rolled his eyes and scoffed lightly, but the smile that tugged at his lips were unmistakable. “You are posturing, and we both know it.” He made a sweeping gesture with his free hand towards the book that lay open in his lap. “There’s nothing to protect me from here.” He made another sweeping gesture with his hand, this time at the general direction of the garden.
Jayce opened his mouth as if to protest, but when Viktor raised a questioning eyebrow, he just laughed. “Okay, okay. You’re right.” He threw up his hands in defeat and moved to sit next to Viktor on the bench. He leaned in closer to look down at the book in Viktor’s lap, putting himself very much into Viktor’s personal space, making his pulse quicken. “What are we reading?”
Jayce had always been like that, ever since they’d been children. He had always been very physical, liked to sit close together, liked hugs and touching shoulders and placing his hand on Viktor’s lower back. And Viktor liked it too, very much so. He wanted Jayce even closer, that was for sure. The problem was just that it seemed that Jayce didn’t realise what he was doing. He didn’t realise how handsome he was, or how smart he was, and he most definitely didn’t seem to realise how Viktor couldn’t stop staring at his mouth.
“Viktor? Are you okay?” Jayce looked up from the book, their faces mere inches apart, and Viktor could feel his cheeks heat up.
“Mm-hmm,” Viktor hummed in agreement, scrambling to try to get his mind and mouth to cooperate enough to formulate words. “Yes, I am doing quite well.” He cleared his throat. “I was just… distracted.”
“Distracted?” Jayce’s eyebrow, the one with a cut through it, caused by an accident by the forge when he had been a child, rose towards his hair line. “By what?”
Viktor pondered his response for a while, before finally deciding to be truthful “You.”’
Both of Jayce’s eyebrows rose high on his forehead at that. “Me? What did I do?”
A very large part of Viktor wanted to take Jayce by the livery and shake some sense into him, to look him very deep in his eyes and tell him the whole truth. He would tell him how the whole of him was distracting, every single moment they were together, and how Viktor had trouble of thinking of much else than kissing him.
Viktor’s eyes widened in sudden realization. He was over twenty years old, and what was stopping him? If he wanted to kiss Jayce, why shouldn’t he? Who would tell him that is was wrong? Silco, whose own relationship with Vander was something that went way beyond what would be considered just the king and his right hand man? Hardly. And if it was something Viktor tried to live by, it was to not ask for permission all the time.
So, with a sudden surge of boldness going through him, Viktor leaned in to close the distance between them. It was only a quick peck to Jayce’s lips before he pulled back again, searching Jayce’s face. The knight’s eyes had gone wide with surprise, and they stared at each other in silence for a long moment before Viktor finally spoke again.
“I like you, Jayce.” His voice wavered slightly with nerves, despite his efforts of trying to remain calm. It was exceedingly difficult, since his heart was threatening to burst out of his chest with the way it was hammering against the inside of his ribcage.
Jayce blinked at him rapidly, as if he was having trouble processing what Viktor was saying. He opened his mouth, and closed it, and then opened it again, looking worryingly like a fish on dry land.
“You can say something now, you know.” Viktor tried to joke in an effort to break the tension, but his stomach had started to sink all the same.
That seemed to take Jayce out of his stunned silence, because he lifted a hand to rub it over his forehead.
“Viktor, I… I don’t know what to say.” His voice was low, muttered.
A crushing weight was suddenly placed on Viktor’s chest, and it became hard to breathe. His blood was rushing in his ears, and he desperately wished he could take the kiss back. Wind back time a bit, like the great magicians in some of the books they had read together growing up, and that had made Jayce’s handsome face light up with excitement.
“It’s quite alright.” Viktor averted his eyes and looked off into the distance, his gaze catching on a bird sitting on the castle wall. “A miscalculation on my part. Forget all about it.”
“Forget?” Jayce sounded genuinely baffled.
Viktor swallowed against the lump in his throat and gave a quick, firm nod, his eyes still focused on the bird in the distance. He very badly wished he was that bird right now, so he could take flight and escape this mortifying situation. “Mmm. Forget about this whole thing.”
“I don’t want to forget.” Jayce’s words made Viktor look back at him, and there was a vulnerable, yet hopeful look in his eyes when their gazes met. “Viktor, I have… I have wanted this for such a long time, but I could never bring myself to gather up the courage to do what you just did.”
It was Viktor’s time to just blink in confusion. When he didn’t immediately respond, Jayce reached out to put his large, warm hands on Viktor’s shoulders, holding him gently. “I was too scared to act on my feelings, because I wasn’t sure you felt the same. And now, with me being your knight, I was sure that it was too late.”
“What do you mean?” Viktor squinted, trying to figure out what the other man meant. “Why would it be too late?”
Jayce squeezed Viktor’s shoulders lightly, and something melancholic came over his facial features. “Because of our different positions in life. A knight is hardly fitting to be the partner of the future king.” He sighed. “And even less so the blacksmith’s son.”
Viktor shook his head at that. “No. Stop. I won’t hear it.” He tightened his hold on Jayce’s livery, the deep green fabric bunching in his fist. “If I’m really to be the king one day, it should be up to me to decide who my partner is.” He held Jayce’s gaze, defiant. “And I have decided a long time ago. Before you became my knight, when you were still just the blacksmith’s son. I have never asked for permission to be who I am, and I am not planning to start now.”
And Jayce, beautiful and stunning Jayce, smiled at that. Wide and bright, and one of those large hands found the back of Viktor’s neck.
“You are brilliant, Viktor. Did anyone ever tell you that?”
Viktor smirked a little at that. “Once or twice, but you are welcome to keep saying it.”
Jayce laughed at that, his breath tickling Viktor’s lips before he leaned in to press their lips together for their second ever kiss, and they both felt like they were flying.
/
A few more years passed, and their relationship blossomed, however in secret. It was common knowledge that that they had a deep bond, the prince and his knight, but no one apart from their closest family knew the true extent of their relationship.
The year of Jayce’s twenty-fifth birthday, a war broke out with Noxus, a powerful neighboring kingdom. Jayce was adamant about going away to defend Zaun, seeing it as his duty as the prince’s knight. Viktor tried to argue, to get him to stay, but he knew his partner like the back of his own hand - once he had an idea, he was like a dog with a bone, and he wouldn’t let it go. It was one of the qualities that Viktor deeply admired about the man, and he couldn’t help but feeling that kind of admiration even when it meant that Jayce would be doing something that he disagreed with.
The night before Jayce left with the most of the rest of the royal guard, they spent pressed closed together in Viktor’s bed. They spent hours losing themselves in each other, leaving both of them gasping with pleasure. Once daybreak finally came, they had barely slept, and instead lay awake in the tangled sheets, limbs intertwined.
Viktor spent the next few weeks with worry gnawing at him. He could barely manage to eat and sleep, and spent as much time as possible burying himself in his studies and research in an effort to pass the time. It didn’t feel right without Jayce by his side though, his constant companion for years and years.
One day, Powder suddenly burst into Viktor’s study, her eyes wide and wild. “Come quick! It’s Jayce!”
At first, Viktor’s hopes soared. He was back, already?
The near-panicked look on Powder’s face quickly turned that hope into dread.
Viktor grabbed his cane and hurried down the corridors of the castle with a speed previously unheard of.
/
When Jayce woke up, his vision was blurry. It looked a bit like a map where the ink had smudged and bled out across the parchment, and he had trouble figuring out what he was looking at. He blinked in an effort to make things clearer, but when it made no difference, he closed his eyes again.
Muffled voices could be heard from an adjacent room, and Jayce couldn’t quite make out the words. He could, however, recognize Viktor’s voice - that specific cadence that he loved so much, and he suddenly knew everything was going to be alright. He drew in a deep breath through his nose and made a motion to sit, but as soon as he tried to shift his legs around, he was immediately hit with a sharp, near-excruciating pain that emanated from his left leg. He lay back down on the bed and willed himself to relax, suddenly feeling how heavy and tired the rest of his body was.
He closed his eyes again, and memories from what had happened came flooding back. He groaned and reached up to rub his hand over his eyes before pressing the heel of his hand into the space between his eyebrows, fighting back a splitting headache.
“Jayce?”
Jayce took his hand away and turned his head. At the door stood Viktor, eyes wide.
“Hey there, Vik,” Jayce croaked, sounding like he’d been punched in the throat.
Viktor gasped, and a moment later he had rushed over to stand right next to Jayce’s bed. He leaned down and put his hands on either side of Jayce’s face before closing the last little bit of distance between them press their lips together in a kiss. It was desperate and messy, and Jayce could feel it in his bones. He tried to arch up into the kiss, but pain once again shot through his leg and up through the rest of his body, causing him to groan into Viktor’s mouth.
Viktor immediately pulled back, a deep crease of concern visible between his thick eyebrows. “You are in pain. I will call on Reveck immediately for more pain medication.”
Jayce shook his head and reached out to wrap his hand around Viktor’s slim wrist, holding him in place. “No, please. Stay. That can wait. It’s not too bad.”
Viktor chewed on the inside of his cheek as he mulled over Jayce’s words, and eventually gave a short nod. He kept one hand pressed against Jayce’s cheek as he sat down in a chair that was standing right next to the bed.
“What happened?” Viktor asked softly.
Jayce cleared his throat and screwed his eyes shut before answering. “I didn’t even see proper combat. It was rainy, and slippery, and my horse fell. I ended up underneath it somehow, and I think my leg got crushed, and then… I can’t remember much else.”
Viktor pressed his mouth into a thin line as he listened to Jayce speak. “You were unconscious when they brought you back. You must have passed out from the pain.” He brushed his thumb across Jayce’s cheekbone. “Thank God you are alive. You have been unconscious for a few days.”
“What about my leg? Could they save it?”
Viktor gave Jayce a very serious look in response to the question, and Jayce suddenly became very aware of how exhausted Viktor looked, with deep, dark hollows around his eyes. He looked like he hadn’t slept for days, and the worry was etched into his facial features. Guilt gnawed inside of Jayce at the sight.
“For now,” was Viktor’s carefully worded response. To stop himself from spiraling, Jayce tugged on the other man’s wrist, wanting him closer.
“I never meant to worry you. I’m sorry.” Jayce’s voice sounded small to his own ears, filled with regret.
Viktor shook his head lightly before answering. “It doesn’t matter, Jayce. You are alive. That’s all that matters. I don’t want you do ever leave my side again.”
“I shouldn’t have left. I should have stayed.”
Viktor leaned in to kiss him again, the intense desperation replaced by a slow, intimate meshing of lips and tongue. When they broke apart, Viktor rested his forehead against Jayce’s.
“I belong here, with you.” Jayce whispered, meaning the words with every fiber of his being. “I see that now.”
“And I with you,” Viktor whispered back before kissing him again.
There were many things that were uncertain. The war with Noxus was still looming on the horizon, but as long as they had each other, they would be okay.