Chapter Text
Fulgrim was good with people in ways Guilliman wasn’t. He respected that about his brother. Even if Fulgrim’s advice sometimes sounded strange to his tastes, he acknowledged that the differences in their experiences and talents was why he was asking him things in the first place.
‘I suppose I can try. I’ll need to do more research until I’m sure how to properly approach this, but I am giving your suggestions due consideration, by all means.’
Fulgrim smiled, pleased Guilliman valued his advice and with something else, something Guilliman had seen before but had not identified to his satisfaction. ‘We can do some research right now.’
Fulgrim ran a hand over Guilliman’s scalp and through his short hair. He wondered if he should do the same back. He wondered what Fulgrim’s hair felt like. There was a lot of it, so it should be possible to really get the texture of it.
He wanted to learn from someone with more expertise than he possessed, after all. He needed practical experience to go with theoretical knowledge. He also shivered and wasn’t sure why his body had done that. He wasn’t cold.
‘Thank you, brother, I’d like that.’
*
‘Are you indicating you want to have intercourse with me?’
Russ laughed loudly and unabashedly. ‘Yes, Roboute, I was delicately insinuating I want to fuck you.’ He laughed again and waved him away to reach for more mead. What he was implying now was that Guilliman was free to brush it off too as Russ being Russ and flirting as easily as he breathed, or they could fight a duel while Russ laughed at his brother indignation.
‘Okay.’
Russ almost dropped his drink, catching it again from the edge of his fingertips. ‘What?’
‘We should have sex.’
‘What brought this on? I thought you had so much stick up your ass you couldn’t--’
‘If everyone could stop saying that... I really don’t mind. Fulgrim said I should mention this if I want to correct various misunderstandings some of our brothers have about me.’ He didn’t want to be the cold and starchy one. He really did value his relationships with his brothers, but he didn’t know how to properly express this and, as a result, it had rarely gotten across before. He couldn’t imagine most of his brothers would be interested in him that way, but if they wanted to, he really didn’t mind.
The Wolf King grinned wider. ‘You want to, or you just feel obligated?’ he asked to test the water further. His eyes were dark with a certain eagerness, but Guilliman could still recognise the coiled strength of his restraint under his façades of savagery.
‘It’s not bad.’ A light flush coloured his cheeks. Well, it wasn’t. Sex was meant to feel good or the human race wouldn’t exist in the numbers it did. Even knowing that, it was still a bit embarrassing to remember some of the sounds Fulgrim had rung out of him before they’d finished.
Russ stalked towards as graceful as his movements were predatory. ‘Fuck you’re hot when you look like that.’ His breath was warm on Guilliman’s face and his furs stank. He was in his personal space, but also pointedly not closing the gap. ‘I’ll make it good for you. Will you come to my bed and take all I can give you?’
Guilliman began to nod, but never finished as Russ slammed into him and pressed him up again the wall behind him with their mouths already locked together. He wasted no further time getting a knee between his legs and grinding against him. Guilliman gave in to the intensity of it and submitted to his brother’s passions with an ease that surprised him as Russ proved exactly as good as his word.
*
‘I thought we could practice.’
‘What gave you the impression I wanted to do that?’
‘I apologise. I am beginning to think I misinterpreted Russ a lot, or he was joking with me.’
The Lion nodded. Russ was like that. Everyone knew it. ‘What exactly did he say?’
Guilliman looked embarrassed but dutifully repeated back Russ’ exact words down to his accent and inflections. ‘“You should give Lion the same advice. He makes you look sociable, but underneath he definitely wants you to bone him.”’ Well, Russ had said a number of other things as well, but they had been a good bit more explicit and beside the point.
‘But you found this reasonable enough to consider that the suggestion was something other than Russ being himself.’
‘I have been told showing physical affection is useful in interpersonal communication and relationships, and thus far the hypothesis has been supported.’
‘I did not intend to be unbrotherly.’ In a rare moment of candour, Lion added, ‘If only more people would explain things outright instead of hinting and assuming everyone knows the social conventions they take for granted.’
‘It’s not required. It’s more a nicety. I’ll think nothing of it if you don’t want to.’
‘No, it would only be sensible to practice, preferably with someone who... could be rational about it.’ Lion put one hand on Guilliman’s arm, but his gaze was directed at a point a couple centimetres past his right shoulder.
‘We can work through it then. I don’t consider myself an expert on the subject. Just tell me what you like as we go along.’ Guilliman reached out to give his brother’s bicep a friendly squeeze.
‘I will.’ Lion still wouldn’t look at his directly, sneaking glances through his eyelashes, and held perfectly, rigidly still as Guilliman brushed a hand over his long hair lightly and brought their foreheads together.
He kissed him gently and the Lion responded clumsily but with some curiosity at the least. He hoped he could do this right, and started to work through all the tricks he’d picked up from Russ and Fulgrim.
*
Dorn hissed and Guilliman stopped what he was doing immediately. ‘Sorry, was that bad?’
Dorn made a few choked mumbles before answering coherently. ‘No.’
‘If it hurt, you can just tell me, Rogal, so I won’t do it again.’ They were only doing this because Dorn trusted him, and Guilliman wanted to make sure he knew he thought of Dorn as a friend and valued that friendship. That was a trust he wanted to live up to.
‘No! I mean, I didn’t mind. You can do that again.’
Guilliman frowned but he tentatively nibbled at Dorn’s shoulder again. Dorn made a frustrated noise and what might have been a curse muffled by the pillow. ‘Damn it, Roboute, I’m not ticklish. Stop teasing.’
Experimentally, Guilliman bit harder, feeling muscle dent under his teeth through the skin and the solid scrape of bone under that. Dorn groaned and bucked under him, undoubtedly in pleasure.
He was surprised, but information could not be denied, only properly filed. In his experience, for example, Russ was much less gentle than Fulgrim, but his force had been as enjoyable as the protracted, soft touches in its own way. He was already aware that while there were some overall similarities common to the neural wiring of most humans, each person was a unique puzzle to discover where and how to touch to the best effect.
Carefully he tightened his grip on Dorn’s hip, and he squirmed to get more. ‘Harder,’ he ground out quietly, half instruction, half reluctant admission.
Guilliman still felt unsure he was understanding exactly what Dorn wanted, and even less so why he would be unwilling to tell him. Regardless, he was going to find out what he could. If he liked a firmer grip he could really feel and concentrate on more than light, teasing touches, he could just say so. He worried about pushing too far and hurting his brother, but he could intensify it slowly and watch his brother’s reactions.
He leaned up to kiss Dorn’s brow while adjusting his position across his back so he could put more force behind his movements. ‘Tell me when to stop.’
*
Vulkan didn’t snore exactly, but he was never perfectly silent or perfectly still even in sleep. He rolled around to take up the entire bed, he muttered things in his sleep, so all in all, Guilliman wasn’t sure if his brother leaning across him and whispering ‘Roboute’ in his ear was awake or not.
‘Yes?’ he whispered back, trying to be quiet enough to not wake Vulkan if he were still asleep.
Vulkan didn’t reply, just hugged him tighter. Guilliman didn’t try to loosen his grip and edge away. It was nice to be held like this, a continuity of connection that he liked. Usually he would embrace someone briefly when it was appropriate in social settings, then awkwardly move away. There was something to be said for the open affection of Vulkan’s hugs, though he suspected he would be too stiff to pull it off himself.
Vulkan was warm against his back and with the friction from his restlessness, they were definitely going to have to go again soon. Guilliman couldn’t think of a single good reason against that, his body still sighing contentedly at him from the last time and interested again as well.
‘Roboute?’ he said again, but this time there was the faint luminosity of his eyes opening. ‘You’re still here?’
‘Of course I am.’
‘I dreamed... No, it’s nothing. I’m glad you’re here,’ Vulkan said into his neck, his hands moving down around his chest to his stomach.
‘Me too.’ Guilliman pressed back against him and was glad they were here, doing this, and he could return his brother’s regard. Vulkan kissed across the line of his shoulder and he sighed and was sure he was being understood.
*
‘It is magnificent, brother,’ Guilliman reassured his brother as he examined the fine clockwork. ‘Of course I’ll find it a fitting repository. The tallest tower of the Temple of Correction back on Macragge perhaps, or the Halls of Justice on Calth.’
‘It’s nothing useful.’ Perturabo waved off his own work. ‘Most of the gears are too delicate to be repurposed for anything useful on a battlefield, but melting so little metal back down would be a waste of time. Tell me what planet you plan to put it on before the end of the campaign so I can make the proper adjustment to the celestial clock.’
Guilliman hated to seem ungrateful or insincere, but Perturabo was as difficult to get through to as ever, like he’d already decided what Guilliman’s reaction was going to be and any deviation from the script was artifice or flattery leading up to something. Guilliman wasn’t good at being effusive anyway. He said what he meant as best he could because he wanted to communicate it.
‘You don’t have to leave already,’ he said instead. ‘I’d like to spend more time with you before we go our separate ways again.’
‘Fine,’ Perturabo answered after a few moment’s consideration, unwilling to be so rude outright as to refuse his hospitality, but he sat as unmoving in his chair like a statue of marble.
Lacking any further help from him, Guilliman searched for other topics of conversation. ‘Is your deployment going well?’
‘I would have outlined any delays in the tactical briefing.’
Guilliman sighed silently to himself and tried to keep it from showing on his face. One more try. He didn’t think of the Lord of Iron as a very physical person, but maybe he was like Guilliman himself in that people thought that way about him much more than he actually minded it.
‘I apologise if this makes you uncomfortable,’ he warned in advance, ‘I feel I’m not communicating well and would like to rectify that.’ Then he slowly hugged Perturabo.
It was awkward, not least because of Perturabo’s complete lack of response, but he forced himself to complete this piece of social interaction. He hoped Perturabo wasn’t too offended, but he’d deal with the consequences, even if his devastating temper flared to life.
‘What are...?’ Perturabo finally said, with obvious complete confusion rather than anger. ‘Why did you do that?’
Well, that hadn’t gone as badly as it could have, but his original goal of communication had not been achieved. ‘You’re my brother. I have been told, and my research certainly supports, that physical affection can be useful in expressing this.’
‘Affection?’
Guilliman wondered if the problem was he wasn’t being obvious enough, so he removed an arm to cup Perturabo’s cheek and lean in to kiss him lightly.
When Perturabo finally broke his stillness, he moved so quickly even Guilliman had difficulty reacting, his subconscious barely having time to brace himself for a blow that didn’t come. Perturabo kissed him desperately, mashing their lips together with hard pressure and his hands dug bruisingly into Guilliman’s shoulders.
Perturabo finally pulled back and looked embarrassed for a moment before starting to close off again, only Guilliman’s grip on him keeping him from backing further away. ‘That was what you meant to...’
‘Yes,’ Guilliman cut him off before he got any further. His brother’s response had been positive, he certainly didn’t want to experience miscommunication now. ‘I meant to do that too. If you’d like to go back to my private chambers with me, maybe we could do more of that. If you want to.’
‘Why?’ Perturabo finally asked, a formless plea that seemed directed at life in general as much as this in particular.
Guilliman wasn’t sure how to answer, wasn’t sure exactly what was being asked or how to respond to it. He wasn’t sure exactly why yet, but it felt wrong that his brother had to ask in such a tone. ‘We’re brothers. We should get along and enjoy each other’s company. I’d like to hear more about the clockwork automata your Legion is building, but I felt unable to make my interest in your company obvious enough and wanted to clear up that misconception.’
Perturabo made a strange, pained expression, like his face was receiving a signal it didn’t know how to interpret and the muscles were twisting in strange ways as it failed. Before Guilliman could work through that, Perturabo kissed him again. ‘Maybe we could try that.’
He kissed him back, and took Perturabo’s hand to lead him to bed. Perturabo’s fingers interlaced with his and gripped tightly.
*
Guilliman had never had sex with someone who hated him before, and honestly he could have lived without the experience. He wasn’t sure if it was better or worse than sparring, or the fighting that pretended to be sparring but wasn’t really. At least no one was likely to die, and with Angron that was the best you could say.
‘How does it feel for a high-rider like you to be getting the spit and polish fucked out of you by someone like me?’ Angron may have literally spit in his hair at that, or he was just drooling out of the corner of his mouth as he often did.
Painful, was the answer. Angron’s hands dug into his hips and made his bones creak as he pounded into him. He wasn’t fighting it, though. He hadn’t been for a while, since he’d decided a battle between them was only going to escalate and escalate. Angron could not be defused, but Guilliman didn’t have to give him more targets than just how much his existing seemed to offend.
He wasn’t sorry he hadn’t grown up on a horrible deathworld somewhere, and couldn’t do anything to change his past and his luck anymore than anyone else could. He wasn’t sorry he was competent, and was capable of having his life in order and successfully accomplishing his goals. He couldn’t do anything about pitying Angron either, even if he hated Guilliman for it, and he couldn’t love him like a brother, even if he felt like he should. He couldn’t be someone other than who he was, or make Angron anyone different than he was, so he would take the rough treatment.
He didn’t deserve it. It didn’t matter. This was about the inherent unfairness of life.
‘I’m not your enemy. Stop projecting onto me.’
Angron hit him in the back of the head and he felt bones in his skull creak between the fist and Angron’s cot. ‘You don’t give me orders.’
‘No one does, not even you,’ he replied sharply.
To his surprise, instead of hitting him again, Angron started to laugh. ‘That was funny. You should joke more.’ He slapped his hand on Guilliman’s shoulder almost fondly.
‘I don’t get complimented on my humour very often.’
Angron laughed again and resumed his thrusts into him no less violently, but after he’d finished with a grunt of exertion, he collapsed across Guilliman’s back and stayed there. He nuzzled at the nape of his neck, but didn’t bite, more like a friendly dog than anything.
He could feel his enhanced biology already working to numb the pain and repair him, and stretched as best he could with his brother’s weight on him and rolled over. Angron kissed him sloppily, which was more of a concession than he’d expected.
‘Feeling defiled about now, or do you like slumming?’
‘No. You’re my brother. That matters to me even if it doesn’t to you.’
Angron chuckled bitterly, but kept Guilliman pinned under him rather than pushing him away or any other act of violence. He rubbed his body against him a few more times before closing his eyes. Only when his facial muscles stopped twitching in tics and spasms did Guilliman count him as asleep.
He ran a hand over Angron’s scalp and around the metallic dreadlocks erupting from it, stroking his brother’s head softly. He really had no idea what to do about anything.
*
Sanguinius’ kisses were sweet and lingering as he leaned over and the hands on his shoulders eased the tension out of his muscles. Guilliman relaxed and let his brother work over him. He would have liked to touch back, but it was too much trouble to reach around unless he wanted to move his head out of Sanguinius’ lap, and he didn’t. It was good. It was comfortable.
Sanguinius found a particularly tight knot and Guilliman groaned low in his throat. ‘Was that a good sound or a bad one?’
‘A good one. You’re... very good at this.’
‘My shoulders are always lugging around all this extra weight,’ he said with a casual gesture at his massive wings. ‘I’m glad to have a chance to put the skills I’ve picked up to someone else’s use.’
‘I appreciate it.’
‘I was worried I’d come on too strong.’
‘No.’ Never. ‘I was always...’ Trust you. Need you. Love you. ‘Value your aid. I’m glad you offered.’
‘You should ask, if you need something.’
‘I’m not very good at that. I don’t want to ask too much for personal reasons.’
‘I can’t speak for anyone else, but your personal reasons are important to me, brother.’
Guilliman didn’t know what to say to that, not a single word he could wrap around what he meant. Sanguinius was too achingly, angelically beautiful and too selflessly kind. Giving up, he levered himself up on one elbow and put his arms around Sanguinius’ waist and his head against his shoulder.
Sanguinius smiled and pulled him up further into another kiss, this one heated, with tongue and hints of sharp teeth. Guilliman kissed back, surprised but pleasantly, as he was every time he was reminded how much passion lurked beneath the angel’s calm exterior. His lips were bleeding, but he loved the taste of it just then, the colour on his brother’s pale mouth. He drew Sanguinius in as he was pushed onto his back again and his brother moved over to straddle him. Maybe people were right when they called him cold, but he wanted to bask in that ardour and let it burn him.
*
True to his taciturn nature, Corax was almost silent even with Guilliman’s mouth around him, but the jerking movements of his hips told him what he liked so he could adjust his technique. His pale knuckles didn’t show how hard they were clenched, but the tension in the sheets indicated it was tightly.
His reactions were hard to see, but that made it more gratifying somehow to catch each one he did. He tried something new with his tongue and smiled as he got Corax to moan aloud.
‘Wait,’ he said a few moments later, so quietly Guilliman almost thought he’d imagined it.
He pulled away, hoping he hadn’t done anything wrong. He couldn’t see any sign of discomfort or brooding bitterness in Corax at the moment, but he was hard to read. ‘Is there a problem? Should I stop?’
‘No, it’s... I wanted to return the favour.’
Guilliman was unsure how he meant to go about that at the moment, but Corax already had a plan. He pushed Guilliman back onto his side to give himself room and crawled across the bed to lie parallel to him. Guilliman gasped at the kiss on his inner thigh.
‘Do you mind?’
‘No.’ This hadn’t occurred to him before, but it really was very convenient. ‘Good idea.’
He ran his lips down Corax’s length again and could hear him gasp before taking Guilliman in his mouth. He was really going to have to revise his opinion of the Raven Guard’s unpredictable need to change up a situation, but it was rather difficult to concentrate on abstract thought just then when he was seeing stars. Corax made a muffled pleased noise as well, and Guilliman let everything else go to focus on the feel and smell and taste of him.
*
Guilliman didn’t want to make Mortarion uncomfortable, but not knowing things always worried at him like a loose tooth. He knew randomly asking personal questions was rude, he should be embarrassed to do it, but he did want to know. All details were important.
‘You’re staring.’
‘My apologies. I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.’ What was the proper protocol to observe? You weren’t supposed to stare, you weren’t supposed to look pointedly away. Were you supposed to pretend to be blind, like you’d somehow not noticed the scars? On the other hand, he didn’t think Mortarion liked it when people hid things or lied.
‘It’s not important.’ Mortarion reached for his hood again and Guilliman’s hearts sank. He respected his brother’s skill and his stubborn drive and vitality. ‘Nothing you need to force yourself to look at.’
‘They’re interesting,’ Guilliman answered honestly, though he suspected he should be changing the topic.
‘How so? As a morbid reminder we primarchs can be injured.’
‘We all have scars.’ Not like that admittedly. Guilliman wasn’t Magnus, he had some control of his wild curiosity and preferred to put things to practical applications, but he liked knowing things. Information was victory. ‘I wondered what chemicals they were from, if they can be synthesized. How deep they went, if the lower layers of tissues are repairing with new cellular generations, or if they’re hypertrophic neoplasms.’
He told himself to stop. Mortarion had an interest in biology, he knew. He probably knew a lot about it. Still. It wasn’t Guilliman’s business really. Lots of people didn’t want to talk about things, or even write them down, and didn’t want anyone to know too much about them for some reason.
‘They itch,’ Mortarion admitted finally. He moved his hands back down, with his cowl staying about his neck as well.
‘Huh,’ he replied stupidly.
Mortarion eyed him. ‘If you’re curious, you can touch.’
They felt... rough in some places, too smooth in others. He could feel knots of damaged or dead tissue under the surface, fibrous mounds of keloids where they’d healed particularly badly. ‘Is this uncomfortable?’
‘They’re old. Most of the nerve near the surface are long dead.’
‘How far down do they go?’ he asked, before it occurred to him that question hadn’t come out the way he’d meant it. ‘Never mind, that was out of line.’
‘Over seventy-eight per cent of my skin.’ Mortarion fingered a thin scar on Guilliman’s arm from an eldar shuriken going straight through his armour. ‘Yours are healed better.’
‘I didn’t experience such a shock to my system all at once.’ Or so he’d heard. ‘Do you have tactile sensations anywhere?’
‘Roboute, are you hitting on me?’
‘What?’
‘If you were Russ, I’d know you were, but from you I can’t be sure if you’re flirting badly or you have no idea what you’re doing.’
His throat was dry. ‘Do you want me to be?’
Mortarion tilted his head to the side. ‘Are you really interested, or have you really been spending too much time around Russ to pick up his speech pattern?’
‘I want to, if you want me to.’ It was... shallow but gratifying to make one of his brothers feel good. His curiosity was only a small matter, particularly when it was without specific purpose, but carnal encounters were real and immediate and meant something. Guilliman didn’t know what romance felt like, but he still cared. He wanted to connect with others and for them to enjoy each other.
‘People don’t touch me often.’
‘Just tell me if you don’t like something.’ Cupping Mortarion’s face seemed pointless when he had few sensory nerves, so Guilliman leaned in for a kiss, weighing how he should try to balance getting his brother to feel him without getting too rough. He did learn there was nothing wrong with the inside of his mouth, so they could stay with that for as long as he needed to figure the rest out.
*
‘Are you angry?’ Curze made it sound like a threat, like he wants an excuse to lash out, though Guilliman hadn’t heard of him going out of his way to attack anyone stronger than he was. To push their buttons, sure, to make them uncomfortable, to make them feel dirty and worry that they were not too different from their brother and the things he thought about himself.
‘Not angry, just surprised. It is not usually done socially to jump at someone and kiss them out of nowhere.’ Guilliman’s defence against him was easy. Truth. And the first of all truths was that he did not hate himself, unlike the self-loathing so many of his brothers carried around.
Curze’s eyes darted, not staying on Guilliman’s face for long but continually coming back to it, never quite meeting his eyes. ‘Fulgrim said I should.’
Saying Fulgrim gossiped with everyone regardless of the appropriateness was like saying space was big. ‘I don’t mind. I simply would have expected a more circumspect proposition since we don’t know each other very well, but that’s my own cultural biases speaking.’
‘Fine. Let’s fuck then.’ Curze went in for another kiss. He wasn’t very good at it, but he bit at Guilliman’s lips enthusiastically to make up for it.
Guilliman put an arm around Curze’s waist and ran the other through his hair. It was dirty with grease and what was certainly dried blood. He couldn’t bring himself to pull it, so he kept carding it through his fingers until Curze backed off to breathe on his own. Curze looked more confused than anything, agitated to not have aggression to meet his own.
‘Slow down. I don’t know what you like yet, Konrad.’
‘Use me however you want, just do it already. Give me what I want, or I’ll take it from you while you bleed.’
He didn’t think they were communicating well, so he tried another kiss. He held Curze’s head in both hands and did his best to be gentle, but firm enough to feel. Curze tried to kiss back, but Guilliman kept going exactly as he had set out despite the clawed nails clawing into his back under his shirt.
Curze looked dazed afterwards and rubbed himself against him. ‘I knew you wanted to fuck me.’
‘Am I supposed to be embarrassed by that? Don’t you want me to?’ Guilliman stroked his hair and back more, soothingly, before gripping the hem of his shirt. ‘May I?’
Curze nodded, barely looking at him at all, but he sighed softly when Guilliman pulled his shirt over his head and touched his bare chest carefully.
‘Tell me if you want something or you don’t like anything,’ he instructed as he slowly explored his brother’s body between soft kisses.
‘Mm,’ Curze muttered unintelligibly. He’d have to be careful then if Curze wasn’t going to tell him things clearly. He didn’t know how Curze usually saw sex, but he wanted to make it good for him, wanted to do this right, to give him something he enjoyed, something warm and good.
‘Okay?’ he asked again with a hand on his stomach above his waistband. Curze didn’t say anything, just kissed him roughly, so he waited, rubbing circles across the ridges of his abdominal muscles.
‘Okay,’ Curze whispered finally. Guilliman slowly moved downward and Curze whimpered as he ground against the hand stroking him. Guilliman kissed him again, softly, and his brother clung to him and let him.
*
He had thought he had long since purged such weaknesses from himself. He wasn’t Angron. He would never lash out at another person just because he was angry. He might do what he had to, but he would never enjoy hurting anyone.
Then there was Lorgar. No one else was better at making Guilliman someone other than the person he wanted to be. He made Guilliman frustrated and equally feel petty for his frustrations. So they were different. He was very different from a lot of his brothers. He should pity Lorgar for his weaknesses and failures, try to help him, find a way to not constantly make everything worse. He wanted to love his brother. He wanted his brother not to hate him. He wanted his brother not to think he was hated or looked down on and he wanted it to be entirely true. He wanted to understand him, to make it work, but however often Lorgar looked at him bright-eyed and eager to please, his mood shifted in a moment to an offended child having a temper-tantrum.
Some part of him wanted to hold Lorgar in place, make him stay still like a slide under a microauspex, and didn’t care he was leaving bruises on his bronze skin to do it.
He was sure he wouldn’t be doing this if Lorgar were pushing him away or fighting him. He had to believe that. But he wasn’t. He was moaning and crying out for every scrap of Guilliman’s attention.
He shouldn’t do this. Not while he was angry. He shouldn’t fuck Lorgar because he wanted to hurt him. He was absolutely certain Lorgar had riled him up on purpose too. Lorgar wanted all his beliefs about him confirmed and now he wouldn’t shut up about how beautiful Guilliman looked when he was showing actual human emotion, and Guilliman had no idea what he was supposed to do. He was angry at Lorgar and at himself and couldn’t even decide if it would somehow be okay if he wanted to bend his brother over his knee and discipline him until he shaped up if it were from cold logic instead of passion.
Lorgar keened and clenched around him. They were sweaty and sticky and half out of their minds with desire. It was Lorgar’s game, not his. He hated it.
All he could do was not forget how he wanted things to be. To trace the shapes of Lorgar’s tattoos with his tongue, the symbols meaningless to him and bitter as pith with heavy metals. To kiss the bruises he’d left on his shoulders and hips, and his soft lips. To hold onto him afterwards until he had himself under control and could try again, as if he could erase an angry hatefuck with tender love-making.
Lorgar whimpered in his arms and leaned into his motions and begged for more, and maybe it was alright, and Guilliman could hope, but he couldn’t trust that it was enough or that it would last.
*
Ferrus leaned over, grinning over his victory in the training cages, and kissed Guilliman hard. He was surprised, but he kissed back enthusiastically with his blood still burning from the fight.
Ferrus’ smile widened. ‘Fulgrim said I should try that. I wouldn’t have thought you’d lighten up that much.’
‘Am I boring to fight with?’ he joked. The banter was easiest when it was with him.
‘Controlled, predictable, maybe,’ Ferrus teased back. He was stoic, but his humours were sharp, quick. His force was as passionate as it was implacable. He took too many risks, didn’t consolidate what he had gained as well, but he did find the occasional opportunity an Ultramarine would have missed.
Or so Guilliman justified the thunderhammer to the ribs he’d just taken. He wasn’t angry over the loss. There were always new things to learn from Ferrus. He respected his brother and valued his friendship above all others.
‘Yet you decided to try anyway.’ Whatever you could say about the Iron Hands’ hatred of flesh, it was simple to calculate from the tension in Ferrus and his temper exactly how long it had been since last he’d seen Fulgrim, and everyone knew what they got up to.
‘Fulgrim had a lot to say on the subject.’ Ferrus fit their bodies together easily, and Guilliman groaned at the motion against him. ‘And Russ said you were seducing everyone and building a harem.’
‘Fulgrim exaggerated.’ Russ did not justify an response. They should find a bed, but he couldn’t bring himself to mind if they were going to do it right here. He could stand something to hold onto to brace himself against Ferrus pushing against him, but he’d just have to move with it. That was surprisingly hot to think. It sounded right, the way things should be with him.
‘I don’t know. I’m enjoying it already.’ Ferrus already had one of his silver hands under his shirt. He’d never appreciated before how they felt--warm and supple almost like flesh, but smoother. The other hand was impatiently slipping under the waist of his fatigue trousers, and he couldn’t help but cry out at that. ‘Stick-up-his-ass Roboute Guilliman making sounds like that, and I’m not even fucking you yet. I’m looking forward to making you scream.’
Guilliman was restrained; it was just how he was as a person, not as a result of concerted effort, even during sex. Ferrus against him made him want to lose all that composure just like he promised. His brother always brought out the best in him.
The door wasn’t locked, but hopefully their sons had enough respect and discretion not to intrude on their primarchs sparring privately, no matter what they heard out of there. Hopefully.
*
They were kissing and licking into each other’s mouths and Guilliman wanted to stay that way, but there was too much to do. ‘The rats are coming in through the lower windows. We’ll have to jump from tree to tree out.’ He was on the roof of the Fortress of Hera (except it was obviously a tyrant’s palace from Three-Thirteen he’d once seen, but he knew it was the Fortress of Hera). ‘There’s Magnus,’ he saw out of the corner of his eye. ‘Where are the Land Raiders? We have to get to the zoo before the fleet leaves without us.’ Then he needed to find a bed. Yes, very much.
Magnus actually smirked.
‘Why was that funny?’
‘When you wake up, I’m sure you’ll understand.’
‘I’m asleep?’ He wasn’t prone to lucid dreaming, or remembering much of anything of his dreams. Possibly he could permutate the dream-stuff however he wanted, but he wasn’t sure how. ‘Did you mean to wake me?’ he asked, not that he was awake yet.
Magnus didn’t answer directly, which made him suspect his brother hadn’t intended to be noticed. ‘You were being loud. You can’t help it, having a primarch-sized soul.’
He hadn’t been that distressed, just the usual way it was in dreams where things seemed very important all of a sudden and obvious solutions didn’t occur to you. The most lingering thing was... Oh.
‘Yes, that. Who were you even kissing?’ Magnus asked with unashamed curiosity.
‘I don’t remember,’ he said honestly. He didn’t think highly of dreams. They were slippery things, random nerve firings, phantoms where he did things he wouldn’t have in real life, not meaningful and not made to be remembered.
He could hear his pulse loudly. The ache in his blood. As soon as he woke up he’d have to deal with that with his hand.
‘I could do something about that for you.’
‘I... would not mind that.’ Anything that made the prickling annoyance under his skin go away quickly would be fine.
His eyes opened. He had never known the confused, half-awake state others spoke about. He was awake. His mind was working properly in awake ways.
His erection was demanding attention, but before Guilliman could decide everything that had happened had been a strange dream, he felt a touch of fingers on his lower back. No, a touch like fingers. It was the nerves in his spine being stimulated directly, not his skin itself--the shapes were slightly wrong, and he knew that much of his own neural architecture.
‘I’m sorry I won’t be able to return the favour,’ he said, feeling stupid to be looking in the vague direction Magnus was considering the number of ships between them.
+I don’t mind. I can hear backlash anyway.+
Oh, right, being ‘loud’. But there wasn’t time to contemplate that further before he felt presence and intrusion against his head, then raw, overwhelming pleasure ran up his spine and erupted behind his eyes and there was nothing else.
*
Guilliman tried to do as Jaghatai had asked him. The stars were more clearly visible than they would have been on an industrialised world with more light pollution or a more obstructive atmosphere. Not as clear as in void with no atmosphere in the way, but the view was more panoramic than any ship would bother with.
‘Okay.’
Jaghatai’s lips quirked slightly beside him on the scratchy wool blanket spread out over the ground. ‘It’s been two minutes.’
Guilliman suppressed a sigh. He did have more than enough material stored in his head to keep from becoming bored, but he resisted distracting himself with most of it and concentrated on the stars above him.
He could extrapolate from the visible constellations to star charts he’d memorised, though of course there were too many stars, nebulas, and galaxies in the visible universe for even a being such as he to know every one of them individually. The hardest part was balancing brightness and distance as well as position. Distance meant time, which meant knowing not just where things were now, but where they had been dozens or hundreds or thousands or millions of years ago. Some of those stars were already dead, and only because of faster-than-light travel could he know that.
‘We really are inconsequential, short-lived sparks.’
Jaghatai indulged him with a chuckle. ‘Roboute, you think too much, and about the most circumscribed things.’
He didn’t pout, because he didn’t do that. ‘I was making an attempt at existential awe.’
‘What were you really thinking about?’
Among other things? ‘The complete impracticality of interstellar travel at sub-light speeds, even as a long-term backup plan.’
The Khan laughed and rolled closer. The wind whistled. Guilliman wasn’t troubled by it, but the night air was cold on his bare skin (low humidity, low atmospheric insulation, large day/night temperature variation). His brother’s body heat almost burned.
Guilliman rolled to face him. Jaghatai’s gaze followed his movement. His eyes gleamed with something feral, or maybe it was a trick of the light.
Their lips met, and Guilliman gave himself again to the speed and hunger of the Khan’s passion.
*
Despite what some of his brothers thought, he did not have to be right all the time. He just usually was.
It wasn’t that he hated covert tactics in every way, shape, and form. He saw the proper role of his sons as being symbols, hence how they announced themselves with heraldry--symbols of victory on the battlefield, symbols of an Imperium that planets should want to join as being better than their previous organisational structure. He understood the importance of some covert intelligence work.
Information was victory. Having it could mean the difference between a bloody and bloodless compliance, a protracted war and a quick, decisive strike. Spies were as useful as diplomats. He even understood there were circumstances assassination was the best option. If a fight killing millions could be prevented by assassinating a few leaders, was the latter terrible because it was cold-blooded murder, while the former permissible because of martial honour? Roboute Guilliman was no so hypocritical or stiff-necked as that.
His problem was with how the Alpha Legion did things. They kept secrets for the sake of being mysterious. They lied to people who would have helped them even if they’d known the truth, just to muddy the waters. They didn’t keep faith with their own followers, and abandoned those who were no longer useful, or rewarded good and loyal service by purging all who knew too much whenever it suited them. They had no accountability, and no one knew what they were doing to reign them in if they someday forgot where the line was, if they’d ever known. That all was what offended Guilliman.
Another day. Another argument.
‘Can’t we try to get along, brother?’ Alpharius drawled.
It’s not my fault, he wanted to say, but he also didn’t want to be petty. He didn’t, he had to admit, know very well how to make people less wrong without resentment. ‘Is there a subject you think we agree on?’
Alpharius moved closer, and Guilliman felt the prickle of combat hormones at the aggressive gesture. Did he want to spar? Guilliman would wipe the floor with him. He must have something up his sleeve if he wanted to try.
Standing too close, Alpharius put a hand on his chest and leaned up to whisper in his ear, ‘We could be friendly. I’ve heard from everyone that you’re a slut under all the polish.’
The thing about Alpharius was he always had an ulterior motive. Something. Somehow. Even when he pretended to he wanted to be your friend and get along. Especially then.
Guilliman didn’t know what he was getting at. His mind didn’t work like that, all secrets and lies and underneath-the-underneath. What do you want from me? he wanted to ask, and he wanted to be able to believe any answer he got.
All he knew was the next time he’d seen his brother, all the bruises were gone like they’d never been, beyond what made sense even for a primarch’s healing, and the faint lingering scent of sex and sweat too, and it was so utterly like nothing had ever happened less than an hour earlier that he almost doubted his own mind.
*
Guilliman did not have to be in charge all the time. That was not one of his obsessions. He just usually was. He was good at things, good at most things, better at them than anyone else, and if he could do them right faster and better than anyone else could, it was his responsibility to do them and be the one to organise everyone else to do everything he couldn’t in person. He had no problem recognising the skills of others or respecting their greater skill or insight in a certain area. The track record of the Ultramarines simply showed why such moments were rare.
Horus was a better warlord. He was more charismatic, more ambitious, more driven. Guilliman was slower, more predictable, more interested in consolidating what he’d conquered than conquering. Guilliman genuinely did not resent his brother’s appointment to Warmaster.
And if Horus was uncomfortable with his new authority, needed to assert it just to prove he had it, then Guilliman didn’t mind that either. He tried not to show his thoughts, his brother would find them condescending, but there it was. There was too much mutual admiration between them, too much perceptions of jealousy even if it wasn’t there.
So he didn’t mind if Horus wanted him kneeling before his command-throne giving him a blowjob while he watched the countdown for the assault on a new world thick with insectoid xenos.
Horus ran a hand through Guilliman’s hair. He tried to hide it, but it was obvious most of his attention was taken up by his brother. Guilliman wouldn’t deny he liked this too, liked Lupercal’s being drawn in by him and unable to concentrate on anything else, and the way his harsh breathing echoed around the otherwise empty chamber. He wasn’t needy for approval or lacking in self-confidence, but it was satisfying.
‘Roboute,’ Horus moaned, his fingers tightening on the back of Guilliman’s neck. Guilliman obediently sucked harder, and made his brother shake and thrust his hips sharply.
Horus rarely had to give orders exactly--he made people want to do what happened to coincide with what he wanted from them, and Guilliman had been all too willing to get on his knees for him. There was no conflict between them, their bonds of friendship and brotherhood were strong, and everything was just fine.
*
Alone in his sanctum, Guilliman allowed himself to relax an almost imperceptible tad and twiddled his stylus. He was comfortable here, comfortable in his own skin. He was comfortable with the hum of his mind, how it processed data and saw patterns and drew conclusions. Guilliman wrote a great deal. He did not merely desire to understand things, he was a primarch, insight came naturally to him, but to communicate his knowledge to others in a properly laid out fashion so that they could understand as well.
He set his stylus to his dataslate and wrote ‘Preliminary Findings on the Uses of Sexual Intercourse as a Means of Facilitating Social Interaction’.