Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Ajaw resides in a wristband.

That’s the truth.

Ajaw also has a body made of phlogiston. That’s another truth. He has a personality, a history, and plots for the world beyond human imagination. He has a contract with his human partner, Saurian Hunter Kinich, that involves some rather gory details and small print that will not be explained. Those are, yet again, truths, all of them.

However, what most people don’t know is that Kinich and Ajaw also share an unmistakable bond.

No, this is not referring to their contract, or even to the tense and rather odd friendship, or ‘partnership’ as they insist it is supposed to be. No, what it refers to is the intrinsic bond between someone who owns a body and someone who is meant to take over that body in the future: there is a mental bond, of the sorts where they are constantly aware of each other’s presence, of their locations and, if needed, of their thoughts.

Ajaw and Kinich reside in each other’s minds, in corners dedicated exclusively to them, and that’s where they will remain until death do them apart. At times, it is uncomfortable. Most of the time, it is useful. Always, it is just a truth.

This has many side effects. They can communicate in their minds, though both of them admit that it is unnerving and only used for emergencies. Their actions when fighting together are fluid and seamless, result of months of practice in their tandem attacks and Ajaw loaning his phlogiston for Kinich to control, partly. If needed, both of them can ‘tug’ at each other to slightly control their movements, mostly done by Kinich when he notices that Ajaw is about to do something that will cause him, or them, second-hand damage.

Of course, not all bonds are flawless: their mental link also means that, at times, wires get crossed and they will end up in each other’s body.

It is rare. One morning, Kinich woke up to see himself asleep on their hammock and listening to Ajaw’s loud screeching to try and wake him up. He was able to ‘speak’ to Ajaw through his mind to tell him he was still alive and to not do anything stupid, and could control the limbs so long as Ajaw wasn’t trying to do the exact opposite. Kinich’s body remained asleep while they were fighting for control with each other and arguing about what to do for lunch since neither of them felt comfortable cooking like this.

They spent that day with Kinich learning how Ajaw’s phlogiston body worked, just in case of an emergency, and nothing else. By the next morning, they were back to normal, but some weeks after the same happened, except it was the other way around.

With Ajaw in Kinich’s body, a dangerous situation any way one looked, they spent almost the entire day just refusing to move, one because he feared what the other would do, the other because his actions were impeded every time he tried to do anything. They did experiment with trying to make Ajaw’s usual body manifest, but they didn’t manage it: it remained asleep, just like Kinich the time before.

It happens at times. Sometimes, one will have more control of one side, others, one will just be able to sense things. However, one thing that remains is that, while sight and hearing are shared, touch, taste and smell are not.

Ajaw complains endlessly. His phlogiston body can’t quite enjoy things the same way as he did in the past, and he has repeatedly said he forgot what things truly tasted like beyond the dull, dull sensations he currently has. They aren’t gone, they are just limited to the point that at times he feels like he doesn’t exist, like the world isn’t real and that he is still in his sealed slumber, resigned to endless boredom.

But that’s Ajaw, and the other one is Kinich, and they both make do with what they have. One wants more than is offered, the other one has simply stopped desiring anything or looking forward to what comes next outside of his commissions, and they make do. Bodies and minds melded as they are at times, they have gotten quite used to one another in the past few years of partnership.

Wires get crossed at times. That’s just another truth.

However, what has never happened is for one to be locked out of the body.

And that’s what happened today, thankfully a day they had scheduled for rest (Ajaw-mandated rest: ‘the body will break, servant, humans are delicate’), because right now their situation is… not the best, for one, and simply amazing to the other.

This is today, a first of its kind: Kinich, locked out, with Ajaw holding full control of their currently-not-really-shared body. There isn’t even a mental connection between them, right now: no matter how much Kinich yells at Ajaw from his own mind, the ancient Dragon shows no sign of having heard him.

It is unnerving. It is dangerous. It is stuff of nightmares—

And yet, it isn’t. It is… not quite what Kinich thought it would be. For one, he thought he would have to spend more energy trying to keep Ajaw from using his body to commit atrocities, some sort of mental reins he could grasp at even if his voice went unheard, but Ajaw… isn’t doing much at all.

Nothing at all, in fact.

Ajaw, in Kinich’s body, simply lays on their hammock, gently swaying left and right as he focuses on adding more knots to the massive web he has been working on for some months, maybe a year, now. It usually hangs as a tapestry on their wall and Ajaw adds to it without taking it from its hooks, but today he has the whole thing carefully arranged around himself, the hammock and the whole room, a gigantic spiral of knots and braids that seems to have no end.

A story, he calls it at times. A collection of poems, riddles or jokes, some others. A tale of old times, or a tale for future generations; the purpose behind the web changes whenever Kinich asks, and it isn’t like he can read the thing, as it is an art from Ajaw’s time. Only facts matter when it comes to it: it exists, it belongs to Ajaw and hangs from hooks on their wall, it is endless.

It is, honestly, a little ridiculous. Their house isn’t even big enough for a full kitchen, it wasn’t big enough for two in the past and is barely big enough for the one-and-a-half that currently reside in it, and yet there are always new things piling up in the corners and walls, courtesy of Ajaw (and, rarely, Kinich saying ‘just a little more’). Ancient artefacts and little mementoes Ajaw claimed as his own, the worst of Kinich’s handiwork hidden somewhere below the pile of furs and textiles, of curiously-shaped rocks and ancient technology some people would pay an arm and a leg to have in their hands.

All of it is part of Ajaw’s hoard, yet one thing he never does is cover up the wall. One wall only, its one window boarded as it served no purpose, but it is a whole wall. Their house has an entire wall dedicated to the knot web Ajaw religiously works at without explanation, and if Kinich moves even a single of its strands the ancient Dragon will be worse than usual. A whole wall.

(At times, Kinich wants to take it down, not because of any reason anyone else would think it is, but because it means permanence. Be it a story, a collection of writings, a tale of old or whatever Ajaw is writing, it is solid and tangible proof that Ajaw and Kinich are here to stay, in this house, because there is no way Ajaw will leave it unfinished after so long of working at it, and what Ajaw decides, Kinich will follow. Or not follow.

The fact that it hangs from their wall means the wall belongs to it just as it belongs to the wall, and that it isn’t moving anytime soon. They can’t take the khipu and leave. They can’t take the wall and leave, either. They are both stuck here and belong to this house, just as Ajaw and Kinich are stuck in this house and to each other, away from people but reachable with some effort, together forever no matter what both of them say.

It means permanence, and Kinich fears does not know how to feel about it.)

Kinich has been watching Ajaw —or rather, watching his own hands, controlled by Ajaw, from his eyes— all afternoon, since they woke up from their nap around midday, and he has spent most of the time working on his knots. At first he gloated, laughing loudly at his ‘servant’s’ humiliating situation, but he calmed down once he realized Kinich ‘couldn’t’ respond, or rather he was unable to hear the responses.

Then, he marvelled for a while at having full control of the body, and Kinich felt he was intruding when he felt the sheer relief and longing Ajaw felt when he was able to feel skin instead of the bits of existence shaped as little cubes —Ajaw calls them ’pixels’, whatever that means— that make up his usual body. Something of a bittersweet anguish when eating some berries, a choking nostalgia at feeling water running down the hands or a candle’s fire warming the palms, a familiar sort of ache when wrapping a soft alpaca ruana around the body or burying the fingers in a bunch of pompoms.

Familiar longing for something long forgotten, something Kinich can’t ever be able to understand past what Ajaw transmits to him.

It is a pity this instance is an accident, and it is also a pity Ajaw is the way he is. If he was more agreeable, maybe Kinich would let him take over his body every once in a while, but he isn’t, and these occasions always come and go without either of them understanding why or how. Unnerving, dangerous, stuff of nightmares, but awfully pleasant, being allowed to let go and simply float in his mind while Ajaw does things only Ajaw can understand.

An uneasy peace, he would say. A brief moment of respite. He will think about the price for it later, when he isn’t busy doing nothing.

After getting used to the body and the sensations, something that took a long while, Ajaw ate the leftovers from yesterday’s dinner, the choking and painful emotion flooding him once more. Then, he unhooked the masterpiece from the wall, arranged it around himself and began working on it. Fortunately, they have quite a lot of yarn and thread in their house precisely for this reason, so Kinich will still have clothes tomorrow morning, but at the pace Ajaw is going he might have to go collect some more.

Soon. Some day. Right now he is… relaxing. Ajaw is silent, Kinich is not at risk of dying for now, he can revel in uneventful boredom for a bit.

Kinich doesn’t know what time it is when Ajaw lets the hands rest, and it seems Ajaw doesn’t know either. He steps out of his trance-like state with slow blinks, hands going through the motions of tying knots, even though there is no thread in his hands, for a few more seconds before he notices he is lacking in some light. He spits out some words that could be a curse in an ancient language as he lights up the lamps, dimly as the sun isn’t completely gone yet, avoiding his hoard with practised motions from too many times sharing a body with Kinich.

“Kinich?” The voice echoes in both Kinich’s in the physical world and Ajaw’s inside the mind, an uncanny duality that is awfully, terribly harmonic, as if they were meant to be together. Guess they are, they will be, in the future.

‘Yeah?’ Kinich rises out of his own trance-like state of noticing everything yet paying mind to nothing, but his words go unheard as they have for the past hours. He knocks on Ajaw’s thoughts, but that also goes ignored.

“Not yet, uh…”

‘No, I’m still here,’ but it is pointless, as Ajaw can’t hear him.

He continues watching through the eyes as Ajaw picks up his handiwork and hangs it back on its hooks, clicking the tongue at having to use the same hooks for the parts he added today. Guess Kinich will have to go get some more tomorrow, and then Ajaw will nitpick about their positioning for hours on end until they both get tired and go to sleep, only to start the same scene the day after until Ajaw gives up and lets Kinich pick where they go.

Who can understand this ancient Dragon? No one, no one can, no one does. Maybe, in a time long past, no one could, and that’s why he was cursed with unexistence within a small, inconsequential wristband that Kinich would give up his life to keep intact.

Ajaw goes from the main room to the barely-a-kitchen, steals some fruit Kinich was saving for later today, then rummages through the hoard in the other, smaller, far too small room (it used to be Kinich’s, now it is just a storage room, for Ajaw) to pick up the ‘mirror’ and a box of ‘things for the body’— which probably means he is going to be a vain bastard with a body that isn’t his yet.

Ajaw loves collecting things, really. If he sees some shiny jewellery he likes, he will ask Kinich to buy it ‘for when the body changes ownership’. If he sees a collection of ridiculously expensive hair beads, he will nag until Kinich buys it for him, often at full price or more because people don’t like Kinich, or Ajaw, and they like the combination of the two even less. Feathery hair extensions, rings, earrings, necklaces; Ajaw sees something, to the box it goes, and now they have more than one of those boxes of accessories Kinich will never get to wear.

Not that he wants to wear them, either way.

Ajaw hums happily to himself, unaware of Kinich’s long-suffering sigh, as he unrolls the ‘mirror’: between the two stone cylinders comes out a sheet of silver-like liquid that shimmers iridescent for a few seconds before it settles into something semi-solid, as tall as Kinich sitting down. It is one of those things they dug out from some ruins at the Dragon’s insistence, one of those things some people would pay an arm and a leg for, and yet here it is, being used for its intended purpose instead of being in a museum.

It is, indeed, a ‘mirror’. That it ripples when Kinich touches it and bursts like a bubble once it is rolled up again doesn’t mean it isn’t a ‘mirror’.

Ajaw is a vain bastard, though. He continues humming, cheerful and filled with joy and another darker, intense emotion, as he swaps Kinich’s accessories to his liking. He braids some beads into the hair, then undoes it and redoes it in another style. He changes the earrings and hums thoughtfully before deciding that no, that’s not quite right, and changes them again. He adds a necklace, swaps it for a choker, trailing the fingers lightly down the neck in a way that sends shudders down Kinich’s spine.

All the while, he nods at his choices and agrees with himself. All the while, Kinich complains about the colour choices, the gaudiness of some of Ajaw’s picks, at some arrangements that clash horribly with their aesthetic, though he doesn’t really care much. At least Ajaw seems to agree with his complaints, as he discards the more ridiculous things just as fast as he puts them on.

The natural light is completely gone once Ajaw is satisfied with the body’s looks, the dim light of the lamps casting the room into an eerie mood that is, actually, perfectly normal in their house. The ‘mirror’ also has some light to it and Ajaw leans closer to inspect himself. He lightly touches the side of the eyes, muttering about eyeliner, before he goes on to pick an outfit.

“You have terrible taste, servant,” he says as he rummages through what little clothes Kinich owns, all in the same shades because there is no point in buying clothes when they will just get ruined by their line of work.

‘Your picks are in the other room,’ Kinich replies, completely done with this game of dress-up he has unwillingly found himself in. Ajaw doesn’t hear him, of course, but he remembers his picks are indeed in the other room and goes on with his quest, gleeful as he has never been before.

“What you need is a mantle. A long one, maybe on one shoulder, maybe in the front, but what colours could it be…”

‘That sounds awfully impractical, no.’

“Like this one, yeah, this one will do nicely,” Ajaw says as he picks one of the most expensive pieces of clothing they own, made of the finest wool and dyed in the purest of pigments, the work of who knows how many hours at the loom with all the intricate designs it has. Kinich almost bled out a few times for it, but Ajaw wouldn’t take a no for an answer.

See, that thing. It’s meant mostly for women. Married women, in fact. Wealthy married women, which neither of them are. Sure, men can wear them as well, but it is rarer and the colours aren’t quite as acceptable, to be worn by a man —though both Kinich and Ajaw love them. Rumours went wild for a while when Kinich signed the reservation, because of course Ajaw wanted everyone to know what they were getting.

Ajaw always does everything very publicly and loudly, especially when it comes to staking his claim on Kinich’s life choices. It has been so for years, it will continue to be so, no one cares except for the gossip mongers and the people who hate them, but those people will always find reasons to hate them, so it is whatever.

Now Ajaw is staking his claim on Kinich in yet another way, and Kinich isn’t sure he minds it too much. Mildly annoying, sure, but if it keeps Ajaw away from sharp tools, steep cliffs or vicious Saurians while wearing Kinich’s body, then it is a sacrifice he is willing to make. So long as he is Ajaw’s entertainment, Ajaw can’t go around causing trouble or committing atrocities or making certain age-peers trip off ledges.

Ajaw finishes his job quickly enough for him, the nitpicking sovereign himself, and drags the body and a blanket back to the ‘mirror’. The final product is not as bad as Kinich thought it would be: it has a balance of Ajaw’s preferred neon-bright colours and enough black to not hurt Kinich’s sensibilities, and it looks… nice. Not practical at all, with all the loose fabrics of traditional Natlani wear, but at least it won’t make the body trip while walking.

The ridiculously expensive mantle isn’t worn the traditional way, though, but rather the way of Ancient Natlan —not as old as Ajaw, but old enough. Kinich has only heard of it from that one historian obsessed with taking Ajaw away. The choker is also an ancient thing, though it is supposed to be worn looser than Ajaw put it on… Yeah, Kinich isn’t going to think too much about it.

The wristband is still in its place of honour, where it will remain until the body itself dies and further beyond. Even Ajaw doesn’t dare touch it.

“When did you pierce your ears, anyway,” Ajaw continues the monologue he has been going on for a while now, criticizing Kinich’s and also all of Natlan’s choices in fashion. It is all ‘too modern’, he says, never mind that everything in ‘Natlani’ history is ‘too modern’ for him. “There is space for one more, right? We should add a new one, hm…”

‘Over my dead body,’ though in this case, it is quite literally that. Besides, he is a Scion, he is pretty sure he was born with his ears pierced.

“Maybe we will ask later, once you come back.”

‘I’m still here.’

Ajaw sits in front of the ‘mirror’, leaning on the wall with his legs criss-crossed, and watches the reflection for some time. Kinich can see the body clearly despite the dim lighting: average height, average build, average in every way, now dolled up for Ajaw’s viewing pleasure. It should feel uncomfortable, really, but by now Kinich has gotten used to Ajaw inspecting every inch of the body for marks that should not be there or anything else, so it is just mildly unnerving, to be seeing his own reflection when he knows he isn’t the one in charge of the body.

“Servant,” Ajaw calls out finally as he puts the blanket to the side, bundled up like a pillow. “Are you still not back?”

‘I have never been gone,’ he replies, but his voice goes unheard once more.

“Well, then, if you aren’t here…”

‘No, I am—‘

His breath hitches a bit when he sees, when he feels what Ajaw does then. The hands trail slowly, almost like a caress, from his thighs to his hips to his chest, and the clasp holding the second top layer of the clothing the Dragon painstakingly chose comes open without protest. The layer, a loose thing that would be see-through were it not for the skin-tight, impractically thin shirt underneath, drops down the shoulders, Ajaw’s —or well, the body’s nails dragging down from the neck down to the chest.

“This is your last chance, Kinich.”

‘What are you doing—‘

No, Ajaw doesn’t stop what he is doing. The hands —his hands, traitorous and offensive things that they are— gently touch the nipples through the thin fabric, sending a jolt down Kinich’s back inside their mind. He can feel the touch as if he was physical, suddenly acutely aware of how Ajaw looks at the reflection in the ‘mirror’: a heated gaze far more intense than Kinich could ever do, half-lidded eyes and eyes that glow in an inhuman manner.

No, wait—

He would like to bite his lip at the sound that comes from his mouth when Ajaw rubs at their chest, but he can’t, because he doesn’t have a body, and yet he can feel everything. Everything, from his own breathing growing heavier in the physical world, to Ajaw pinching and twisting their nipples between two fingers with a small gasp of relief and pleasure.

“Hah, how are you this sensitive?” He leaves one hand to toy with their chest as the other goes lower, practically ripping the sash from its place in his hurry. Kinich tries and tries to get his hands to cooperate, to come back under his control, but all he manages to do is lean closer into the body, the sensations stronger than before. “You are already like this, I have done nothing yet…”

Kinich turns his head away, tries to not look at the reflection through the eyes that he can’t control, but not even his mind will help him this time. He is hypnotized by the way Ajaw looks at them, at him, as he touches their half-erect length for the first time —something of speechless devotion, of pure longing, far too uncomfortable for Kinich to see. It is embarrassing, that the body is reacting so quickly, with so little stimulation, yet the wetness in their finger is still there, warm and damning and it feels so good.

He doesn’t recognize his own voice when Ajaw speaks, dark and somehow looming over the body that is a hundred times smaller than the depictions of Ajaw they have found, dwarfing Kinich like a predator at hunt. He doesn’t recognize his own voice in their mind from the sounds he makes, feelings heightened even though he isn’t physically present, every touch too hot and with a hint of desperation. Ajaw touches them without looking away from the ‘mirror’, assaulting every inch of the body with his caresses as he strokes them to full hardness, slow as if wanting to savour everything.

“Serva— No, Kinich.” Ajaw leans heavily against the wall, their whole weight dropping as he relaxes without taking their eyes away from the reflection. Their back arches unconsciously with a low moan as their thumb presses on the head, smearing precum around it before stroking down and up once more, torturously slow. “You know, we— Hmm, I have always wanted to do this, to you, to this body, just like this—“

The hand cups their balls gently, two fingers pressing down somewhere below and between them, and Kinich yelps and tries to get away; not that it works, of course, he isn’t in control of the body and all he can do is take what Ajaw gives him. Ajaw himself simply reacts by letting their head loll on their shoulder with a sigh, the other hand sliding under the shirt to touch the skin underneath. The heated touch of the hand, warmer than it should be, on the side of their waist makes Kinich and the body shiver with unexplainable pleasure.

‘Aja— ah…! Ha— hand, stop—‘

There, here, everywhere. He is learning new things about his body at this age, and all because of Ajaw, or maybe it is because it is Ajaw doing this that he feels his head going hazy, thoughts muddled, voice broken. Ajaw doesn’t let him process what he is feeling either, simply continuing his exploration upwards, the skin-tight shirt rolling up until it is doing anything but covering their torso.

“I watch you a lot, see, it is all I can do.” Fingers return to their chest, thumbing a sensitive nub with a light gasp, circling it almost delicately, dragging a nail on top of it, all the while slowly stroking their length —slightly faster, still far too slow, it isn’t enough, Kinich’s life is a race against time at all times and this isn’t enough. “Humans are interesting creatures, so easy to arouse. It is ah— annoying to see others watching you like— hnn, like that.

“The worst part is, you don’t even no— notice them, all you see is what you want to see, and— hah, that at least keeps me at ease.”

No one has ever looked at Kinich in any way that isn’t with thinly veiled scorn, outright hatred or jealousy, except for the few friends he has. And, well, their Archon, Xilonen and Iansan, but they are allies against that future that comes and something else altogether. Ajaw must be seeing things, lots of things that make no sense, but Kinich can’t even protest as he is too busy trying to keep his mouth from betraying himself.

“But they still look, and I, I want to rip out their eyes for looking… Yet it doesn’t— matter. They don’t matter, hm? You belong to me, just to me, in all ways, ah’right…?”

The hand speeds up and Kinich feels it, feels it all, feels the body come closer to their climax, feels his own mind blanking out from what he usually doesn’t indulge in, and—

Ajaw stops.

Kinich whines. He doesn’t know any longer if he should fight back, his attempts to retrieve control of the hands stopped sometime earlier and he didn’t try again. The protests that fell from his lips have gone quiet, replaced with incomprehensible desire.

“In all ways that matter, Kinich: my servant, my body, my possession,” the last words come out in an inhuman growl, far too rough for a human throat to produce, far too low to even be heard by anyone not Ajaw or Kinich, who share a body, who share a mind space, who share everything they have. From their house to their knowledge, everything belongs to one another, and Kinich has understood this for years.

He belongs to Ajaw, just as Ajaw belongs to him, terrible attitude and everything he carries along.

“But well, you can’t even hear me, can you?”

‘I can hear I canIcanIcanhear You—‘

Kinich crumples on himself as Ajaw, unusually composed, begins again with his slow, slow, painfully slow strokes, his tenderly rough exploration of Kinich’s skin, tracing tattoos and scars that have been there for ages, others that are new, all that now belong to Ajaw, marks of possession that can’t be anything else. The hand wraps around their throat, pressing down slightly, and it brings a jolt of unexpected something that makes Kinich let out a breathless moan even though he isn’t even the one being choked.

“Your body is so responsive… It annoys me, a lot? It bothered, hm, me, that someone else could get to it before I did, that someone else could hear you breathless like this, but now—“ Slow, dark, possessive; Kinich doesn’t know if his voice is even speaking the same language he speaks on the daily, the sounds both sibilant and rough, harsh yet smooth and not fitting of their voice at all, and especially not Ajaw’s voice.

Not that he is paying much attention.

Kinich’s mind fades into a bright haze of pleasure, but Ajaw doesn’t let them come. He stops right at the edge, still speaking as if this didn’t affect him though his breathing is heavy and wet and sharp, still trailing their nails down their body and leaving thin lines behind, the reflection hiding nothing yet Kinich can’t see it at all.

All he knows is that he needs, he wants, he needs Ajaw, yet Ajaw keeps what he needs right out of reach.

And again.

And again.

How long Ajaw spends teasing the body, Kinich can’t tell. All he can tell is that he is slowly going crazy from overstimulation, his voice in their mind growing louder, whining and pleading for release that refuses to come, that isn’t permitted by the one who longs to control him completely. He stops listening to Ajaw’s voice, stops paying attention to everything except the overwhelming pleasure, to the touch that continues in a never-ending loop, to everything and nothing and the world as it moves around them.

He doesn’t recognize his own voice when Ajaw speaks, filth dropping from his lips as he narrates everything he is doing in words Kinich has no right to understand for he was born in the wrong era. He doesn’t recognize his own voice in their mind from the sounds he makes, feelings heightened even though he isn’t in his body, every touch too hot and desperate and holding him like heavy shackles. He doesn’t recognize himself, he doesn’t know himself, all he knows is that he is lost in the throes of pleasure only one can bring him.

He doesn’t know how long it has been.

He doesn’t particularly care.

“—nich,” Ajaw’s voice whispers, his voice, not Kinich’s voice yet far too low to be Ajaw, a rumble of a whisper inside their mind that could make mountains shake and cliffs break in half, and Kinich has just enough sense to hone into the sound from where he has lost himself. “Kinich, Kinich, mine, mine, mine—“

In the physical world, Kinich’s voice hitches and breaks as Ajaw continues stroking himself, themselves, still slow, still careful, now almost silent except for the small sounds he makes that are infinitely more composed than Kinich’s voice inside their mind space. He seeks, he experiments, he finds what the best spots are and what makes the body react the most and does it again, and again with pinpoint accuracy. A small tendril of phlogiston, a tiny hand, has long since manifested from the wristband, slithering into the body’s mouth to rub at their tongue, just a bit more before it trails down their neck, past the bright red collarbone, towards the chest. His back arches away from the wall at the wet touch on the sensitive nubs —curious organs, those, he didn’t expect them to be so cute—, at the sight in front of him, at everything Kinich is at his hands, broken and breathless.

Would he be like this, too, if it was Ajaw doing it all with each in their own bodies? Would he be allowed to do this once more, making a mess of Kinich with claws and a long tongue, with his real body that would destroy their house with a simple swipe? Would Kinich fear him, once he sees his true self, not the small body of phlogiston he wears for the comfort of not crushing the real world, but his own real body made to rule over truth? Would Kinich bow at his feet, or maybe lay spread atop the bed they never use, writhing and begging and grasping at the bedsheets in desperation the way he was made, born to do?

Kinich belongs to Ajaw, and Ajaw belongs to Kinich. Everything of Kinich belongs to him, his distant gaze, his thoughts that never focus on anything but survival, his annoying fawning and cooing over Saurians that are not Ajaw, his hands covered in blood both human and not, his whimpers and cries that slip through the mental barrier that is no longer there and become louder in their mind; just everything he is.

Kinich belongs to Ajaw, and Ajaw somehow found somewhere to belong to, as well, centuries and millennia after he was born from a thought and a wish and a desire to exist.

‘Aja—‘ Kinich’s voice rings inside their mind before he gasps out, a high sound he would never be caught making in the physical world. Ajaw bites on their lip hard enough to draw blood, not at the pleasure of pinching at Kinich’s nipples with the bit of his pixelated ‘Saurian’ body or at his wandering hands or his slow strokes, but at the wreck of a voice his partner can have, at the weak call of his name, at a noise meant for him and him alone.

One thing is for sure, their neighbours will never know what Kinich sounds like in the midst of pleasure, pleasure only Ajaw can give him. Saurians will look in from their window later, the children of Dragonkind and humans will continue desiring Kinich despite their aversion, but they will never know what it is to claim him, to ruin him, to become a single entity under the dim lights of their home and before tales of a better past and a hopeful present.

They will not know. They must never know.

Ajaw has won in a competition no one else knew they were participating in, and for that he will gloat forever, but for now all he wants is for Kinich to give him all his attention. With a thought, he grasps at Kinich’s sobbing self and tugs him forward, moving aside to allow his human to take back part of his body. The action is sudden, an almost painful jerk of the mind that transfers to the body and makes them tip sideways, falling on the carefully arranged blanket still within sight of the ‘mirror’.

Kinich immediately closes their eyes and burrows their face into the blanket, sinking their teeth in it to keep their voice in check; Ajaw will have none of that and twists their head to face the reflection, locking eyes with an absolutely debauched Kinich who is still dolled-up to his preference. Drool dribbles down their mouth, their skin is practically glowing red —and green, the effects of the Nightsoul’s Blessing seeping from beneath reality and making everything more intense, senses sharpened to the point of pain (possibly offending the Wayob too, but does Ajaw care?)—, and there are bruise and scratch marks wherever Ajaw got too rough earlier on.

“Look, look at yourself,” Ajaw growls out in their mind, tightening the fingers he still has control of around the base of their length, making Kinich whine in the back of his throat and bite harder onto the blanket. “Can anyone else make you like this, Kinich. Can anyone else touch you at all?”

Kinich lets out an unintelligible warbled sound that doesn’t please Ajaw at all, attempting to hide their face again —Ajaw didn’t allow that before, he doesn’t allow it now. He considers retrieving the hand he gave back to Kinich’s control, currently grasping at the blanket with all his strength, but it is rather pleasant, feeling it tremble in pleasure like all of Kinich’s body. Oddly satisfying. Instead, he uses the tiny arm of phlogiston to push Kinich’s quivering legs apart, holding one up as it is too weak to stay in place, letting the kilt fall open to reveal everything their change of position had covered once again.

“Look. Watch. Take everything in and give it back to me.”

Kinich takes one look at himself and sobs something out, something that may be a plea, may be just senseless sounds, but that Ajaw knows is his name. He knows, because they are connected, and every small thought Kinich manages past the haze in his mind is simply that.

Simply Ajaw.

‘Ajaw—‘

“I’m here, Kinich.”

‘Ah— Ajaw…!’

“It’s me, it’s only me, it’s always me—“

Like a mantra, like a prayer from the devout, like a call in the tryst of passion; beautiful, enthralling, utterly exasperating, that’s what Kinich is, at the moment and always and forever, and Ajaw owns him just as much as Kinich owns him back, and even more.

“Come, Kinich. Come for me.”

His voice in their mind is enough. Ajaw makes sure to muffle the scream that falls from Kinich’s lips as they come, because that is a sound that is meant just for him.

Just like everything else.

They come back slowly from the haze of pleasure and the high of climax, Kinich slower than Ajaw. Their limbs tremble, half of their body is numb, their minds still joined in a confusing meld of what belongs to one belongs to the other yet not quite at the same time. Memories that were and that are not, rest on the surface of their world, bright and blazing like the Element that shapes their homeland.

Kinich is Ajaw is Kinich. Kinich is Pyro and Fire and the lands that were once not-Natlan and a source of phlogiston and flowing lava, Kinich is from old and older times, Kinich feels the walls and the shackles of a seal of centuries and millennia close around his limbs. Kinich watches the boy reach for him with undeserving hands and cautious movements, Kinich reaches back with a single word that echoes on the strings of truth and life, and yet the thoughts behind that word add dozens and hundreds of clauses to its meaning and their contract.

Deal (you are mine).

Kinich watches the boy grow into a man, grow from undeserving baggage of a meat suit kept fresh for later to the precious existence that will one day be kept safe within a body willingly given, until death of the soul do them apart. He watches and angers in his partner’s stead, feels what the other has hidden away, and lives and enjoys the world as he had never done from his high throne.

(Ajaw is a child and lives injustice, watches the worst that humankind has to offer, survives in silence and loneliness while gathering strength; only the strong survive long enough to live, but is it truly life when all is for the sake of seeing another morning? Ajaw is a boy barely of age in the present time, still a babe in the olden ones, and he throws himself into danger time and time again, fighting beasts and people with single-minded dedication.

Ajaw is a boy at the edge of death who has seen too much suffering and makes a deal under threat, a threat not for him but for the world itself, and ties himself forever to one he comes to tolerate and care for and cherish, a single companion for life in his lonely existence. A single companion that drags him out with annoyances and teasing words, a companion that accepts commissions he would never look at before, that leads him on wild and wilder adventures for gold and treasure and danger.

Ajaw is a man at the edge of death and survives, and survives, and survives once more, and somehow in all that he builds a home where he can live the life that seemed so far away when he was a child, a life where at least one of those he meets will always return home.

Deal, he said, without much care for himself back then, yet the word now holds weight he will never say.

Deal, for you and you alone.)

Kinich surges from the memories and feelings that are not his with a shudder —he has already forgotten what he saw, but the experiences remain right below the surface. He feels Ajaw, still in a corner of their mind, still in possession of part of the body though finally slipping away, and he sighs. With weak arms, he tries to sit up, but he needs his partner’s support to actually manage it.

It hasn’t been that long since his mind blanked out, though he still doesn't know the time: he raises his arm slightly to check the time on Ajaw’s wristband, then breathes out heavily when Ajaw steals control of the hand once more. He doesn’t even try to resist when Ajaw raises their soiled hand (still wet, fresh; maybe a few minutes then?) to their lips, licking their palm and fingers clean as he enjoys what little control of the body he still has to embarrass his human. Then, as an afterthought, he nips at their wrist and sucks a purple bruise onto the skin, right at the edge of what the wristband covers.

Kinich just watches this all with bleary eyes, leaning on the wall full of exhaustion, the excitement of the past… unknown length of time draining him of the energy he usually has reserved for dealing with Ajaw’s antics. While the feeling of another being sharing his skin is awfully familiar, the taste of himself on his tongue is something new that he isn’t sure he likes much, and the dull ache of oversensitiveness is already getting uncomfortable. Tired, he feels around for the blanket but hesitates at throwing it over himself.

He is still sweaty, still dirty, and Ajaw doesn’t seem to want to help him with this at all.

“Oi,” he calls out, his voice coming out hoarse. Ajaw slips further beyond the body’s reach and Kinich can almost hear the click of a lock going back to its place when the Dragon is back where he belongs.

‘Aha?’ Ajaw also sounds tired, disguising a yawn behind a series of pings as he fiddles with something in the wristband that still won’t display the time. After everything he said and did, he is hiding, like a coward. Kinich tries to shake his arm to dislodge him from wherever he is, but his body feels like lead and his head is still recovering from earlier.

“At lea—“ He tries to move his legs, make an attempt to get up, but all he manages is falling atop his (dirty) clothes with a huff. “At least, help me up.”

‘Ugh…’

Ajaw manifests in his tiny body built of cubes upon cubes, the usual colours looking washed out even when they glow in the dark. They both look at his tiny cube hands, then at each other, and sigh in tandem. Kinich tries to wave his hand as his usual sign of permission, but it doesn’t work, so he nods his head a little before letting his head fall back on the wall.

His body sags further as some of his phlogiston and Elemental energy drain away, supplying Ajaw with what little he has so they can at least get to bed. Ajaw grows bigger, into a new appearance, half the barely-physical humanoid form that ‘takes far too much effort to maintain’ and half one of his ‘easier’ draconic forms. It is an odd mix, far too humane for a Dragon yet too inhumane for a human, an uncanny beauty that simply screams ‘fake’.

Kinich can feel the scales and claws on his skin as Ajaw, hunched over, tries to figure out how to pick him up, muttering all the while, until finally he decides on a bridal carry, bundling Kinich up in the blanket carefully so as to not dirty it. Onto the hammock Kinich goes, far closer and more familiar than the bed they need to get rid of with great prejudice and exchange for another one —something they keep delaying because it is never the right time to destroy reminders of worse days—, and then Ajaw does something good for once in his life and begins wiping down Kinich’s weak body.

Oversensitiveness is still an issue, and so are scales and claws. Kinich winces at each rough brush of them on his skin, and Ajaw doesn’t bother apologizing as they both know they are small, insignificant mistakes. Usually, Ajaw is well aware of his own strength, in his different bodies, but this one is new and unusual in both shape and composition —not as solid as it could be without being able to drain phlogiston from everywhere, yet not as unstable as the more ‘costly’ forms that differ too much from his true nature.

It hurts, it will probably leave bruises, Kinich can’t say he truly minds past the pain. Maybe he doesn’t even mind the pain, it isn’t important. He dozes off, letting his mind drift to try and process what happened earlier, but Ajaw’s hands on him keep him from fully falling asleep.

It is still calming, being like this. It is calming, so long as it is Ajaw.

Tomorrow, they will go back to their usual, but for today he will just lay here.

Some time later, while he is only half-aware, the damp towel disappears from Ajaw’s hands. Some time later, while he is only half-aware, clawed hands begin to carefully massage his tired limbs. Some time later, while he is only half-aware, Ajaw starts muttering again, but Kinich is comfortably being not-aware enough to understand what he is saying.

Eventually Ajaw gets distracted, frustration seeping from their bond into Kinich, bringing along an uneasy feeling and dull pain that drags him back to awareness. The time is still unknown and they really should talk about what happened, but at least he feels mostly clean, and almost naked. The only pieces of clothing from the previous dress-up game that didn’t end up on the floor were the mantle (thank the Archon) and the shirt that is still bunched up at his armpits.

He isn’t cold at all, though. In fact, he is a little too warm?

Still, Kinich needs clothes and he needs to know what got Ajaw into a mood, so he opens his eyes, blinking rapidly at the brightness of Ajaw’s phlogiston-filled body. He tries to sit up, though that’s pointless on the hammock, and opens his mouth to ask Ajaw what’s going on, but when he looks at Ajaw his breath catches in his throat.

Ajaw burns.

Now, Ajaw always glows, it is part of what makes up his body in the physical world. He glows enough to be used as help when looking for their keys in their satchel, but not enough to be used as actual light. It is a dim glow, green and yellow and red as everything that is Ajaw, just dim enough to not be annoying but bright enough to give comfort.

Now, however, he burns. The Dragon is wreathed in flames, in pure Pyro with traces of Dendro that he stole from Kinich— though he isn’t aflame, not really. It is like he is under the Nightsoul’s Blessing, except Ajaw would never accept such a thing, so it cannot be. Geometric lines run down his arms and torso, up his face and tracing little squares into his horns, and he burns.

A pinprick of pain comes from Kinich’s leg and he tilts his head to see, just enough to not have Ajaw out of eyesight: the Dragon trails a claw up Kinich’s bare thigh, leaving behind a thin line of blood that pools sluggishly before it dribbles down, eyes glowing in that dangerous, predatory way from before. From the knee and up, Kinich’s leg is a bloody piece of artwork made of squares folding on themselves, of sharp angles and triangles, and it hurts. Ajaw’s other hand is wrapped around his wrist, the right one that previously had a gaudy bracelet yet is now bare, holding him in place even though he can’t move at all.

He feels like a tiny animal, like back when he was young and everything was terrifying, like he is about to be eaten, and—

“Ajaw…?” His voice is still hoarse and will remain so for some time, but it is enough to draw Ajaw of his trance— or well, mostly out of his trance, turning his smouldering eyes on Kinich in a way that makes him tremble in either fear or anticipation or thrill, he doesn’t quite know.

(He can’t differentiate between any of those in a better state of mind, of course he can’t do it now either.)

He doesn’t get a reply, but he does get almost tip off the hammock when Ajaw throws most of his inhumanely tall body on top of Kinich. He chokes on a denial when claws dig into his leg and wrist, so hard he is sure it will leave worse scars than the lines Ajaw already drew on him; he whimpers at the fangs scraping at his throat like a threat, at the scales rubbing at his sensitive skin, at their chests pressed together as if they were meant to be —bodies slotting together perfectly. A little strength comes back to his limbs, pure instinct and adrenaline making him grab Ajaw’s horns, his hands burning at the touch, weak and insincere protests in his lips as he tries to pull him away before— before—

Before what?

A low rumble of unknown words runs through his body and ends on his neck, words pressed into his skin through lips and tongue and fangs digging only deep enough to cause pain yet not enough to draw blood. He has no strength to fight back, no voice to cry out for Ajaw to stop, but he is also not quite sure he needs either of those, not now, maybe not ever.

Despite the dull ache, the blood and the fear, he feels oddly safe. Comfortable. Warm. Cocooned in the vague knowledge that Ajaw will not hurt him beyond repair, at least not now, maybe another time.

He struggles to move and can barely manage, but he ends up wrapping his arms loosely around Ajaw’s neck, tipping his head back and baring his throat for Ajaw to do as he pleases. There is a short burst of smug satisfaction and fluffy love and joy flooding their link before it is gone, overpowered by darker and less controllable feelings.

The frustration comes stronger now, the unknown words turning into growls like some sort of beast hiding in the dark of the night, and phlogiston floods the air as Ajaw’s body begins fading away. The unstable form can’t deal with whatever Ajaw wants and is giving up, and yet he still refuses to let go of Kinich even as his touch sears a brand into his partner’s skin, as he feels like he is burning alive. It all gives way to something else, something like elation tinted with sadness, a painful desire for more that can’t be fulfilled, not the way things are now and not in the future either, some nostalgia for what has never come to be.

Ajaw presses his lips to Kinich’s in one last, desperate and lingering kiss before he lets go, fading back into the wristband as the phlogiston disperses around the room, slowly fading as if it was never there, leaving Kinich’s arms holding nothing when there was someone there not a second ago.

Kinich is cold.

He has never felt colder before.

‘Ajaw,’ he calls out, to no response. Slowly, carefully, he turns his body to the side and curls up with his left arm held close to his chest, the only remnant of warmth for the moment. ‘Ajaw, Ajaw…’

He is dead tired but he can’t fall asleep, not when he is lacking someone who has been at his side for years now. His body aches and the shallow scratches on his leg sting, but he feels numb. The link remains quiet no matter how much he pokes at it. The cold doesn’t fade even after he wraps the mantle and blanket around himself.

The silence… is unbearable.

He hasn’t been alone in his own head in a long time.

It isn’t something he desires anymore.

The sun comes out without a hint of presence inside the seal. The wristband beeps around then, a reminder to buy chocolate and fruit, probably set by Ajaw when Kinich wasn’t looking. Kinich remains curled up on the hammock, calling for Ajaw in his head and out loud.

He doesn’t know how long it has been.

He is terrified worried.

Finally, after what feels like days and weeks and years, the wristband glows, quiet pings coming from it like a slow heartbeat. Small cubes begin forming in front of Kinich and he cups his hands around them to pull them towards himself. Smaller than usual, Ajaw’s body comes to be in complete silence, his form huddling close to Kinich’s chest and heart as if he could dig himself a niche in him, an Ajaw-shaped hole that can’t ever be filled by anyone else.

‘What happened,’ Kinich whispers inside their mind, as outwardly he presses whispers of Ajaw’s name into his partner’s body, small not-kisses peppered everywhere he can reach.

“I… overdid it.” Ajaw replies in their mind as well, tiny hands clutching at Kinich’s skin, leaving indents of sharp phlogiston-warm touch behind. “Went too far. Seal said no.”

‘Why did you do that,’ he asks, even though he knows the answer deep inside, an answer he isn’t sure he wants to hear.

He lived a life of no attachments to others until Ajaw tore a path into his heart, loud and insufferable and still more tolerable than most people Kinich has met. Disagreeable, yes, but Kinich doesn’t know what he would do without Ajaw anymore. There were never supposed to be feelings in this contract.

“I tried, no— I wanted, hm…—“

Kinich can read behind those words well enough, and he brings Ajaw impossibly close, bowing his own head to press his lips against the Dragon’s forehead —Ajaw is smaller than usual, so it is a little difficult and he ends up kissing what could count as a snout. He can feel the frustration seeping through their bond once more, dark and gloomy and aching with a new emotion that he can recognize as arousal. Dissatisfied and utterly disappointed.

He won’t admit that he feels the same. Not to Ajaw, at least not right now.

It is… irritating, that he isn’t good enough. Kinich knows, he understands, very well at that, that he isn’t strong enough to provide the phlogiston or whatever other unspecified substance Ajaw needs to become fully corporeal, not at the moment: the tools his partner becomes or manifests when helping Kinich, and the body he wears in the day-to-day, are small enough to be physical, but even then he is borrowing from the environment and Kinich’s Dendro Energy. Even the small, draconic, ‘not even a tenth of Our true self, We can raze your country to the ground!’ form that he manifests when they fight together is made by phlogiston, supported by all of Kinich’s Energy and the phlogiston-rich environment of Natlan.

Apart from those forms he regularly takes, others are harder. Draconic shapes are slightly easier, as the world remembers what Ajaw was supposed to look like and what his body’s structure was, but they are limited by their own size: Ajaw’s true self is enormous, greater than life (or so he says), but there’s never enough ‘room’ for him to fit. His smaller forms are often caricatures, made of ‘pixels’ and, most of the time, just fodder for laughter between the two of them: if he isn’t draining Natlani animal- and plant life, and Kinich, Ajaw can’t become corporeal past the size he usually is and, if he tries, he ends up looking like he was put in front of a distorting mirror.

He once asked Ajaw how big he used to be. He didn’t get an answer apart from a huff and a vague side-eye to the ever-present lands of Celestia. He once asked Ajaw if he ever tried looking human, and Ajaw admitted that there weren’t many humans, back then, and that he always saw them as inferior beings, as if they were ants. Besides, those he met weren’t precisely suitable models to base himself off.

(“My perfect body is you,” he had said, pointing sharply before going back to eating his small banquet of fruit.)

Humanoid forms, for Ajaw, are a nightmare. He not only has to fit himself into a mould he isn’t used to, he also has to build himself working organs if he doesn’t want his form to collapse. As the world doesn’t remember Ajaw-as-human, there is also no support from the world as there is when he is in draconic forms, which makes them costly to maintain, needing far more phlogiston and Energy than Natlan and Kinich can supply on their own. They are unstable, made of lack of knowledge and interest, usually end up deformed in some way or another, and tend to collapse into heat and flames much as he did before.

(The only exception is when Ajaw takes on Kinich’s form, because he knows how Kinich works from sharing a mind and a body at times, but even then he makes mistakes. Kinich doesn’t quite enjoy seeing himself with horns or fangs, a feral look to him that reminds him of worse days, so Ajaw doesn’t do it often.)

Kinich knows that he will never see Ajaw’s true, physical form, not while he lives, and he has come to terms with it. He has also come to terms with the fact that he will never be able to walk side-by-side with a human Ajaw in a crowd without endangering the population.

Now he has to come to terms with the idea that he might never be able to kiss hold Ajaw without burning unless it is with this small form that fits inside his cupped hands, and that hurts. It hurts, because that means he is weak, not strong enough to supply what Ajaw needs.

(He wouldn’t mind dying to the heat, but that death would also mean willingly leaving Ajaw alone, and that would be unforgivable.)

Quiet, he listens to Ajaw’s endless mumbling, both out loud and in their mind, as he strokes his companion’s head with a thumb. Ajaw has lost all composure, a myriad of apologies and curses whispered and yelled in their mind, for leaving Kinich alone, for letting him get cold, for not following through with what they could have, for the limitations imposed on him, for leaving Kinich alone and cold and wanting and not even being able to give him a proper farewell kiss instead of that mockery of a lip lock that is not enough and will never be—

Kinich wonders what a ‘perfect’ kiss would be for Ajaw. In this form? In his true form? In a humanoid one? Without thinking much of it, he presses his lips to what serves as Ajaw’s mouth, silencing him and getting a squeak in response. Tiny ‘pixelated’ hands hold his face in place by his cheeks, never mind that Kinich has no intention of getting away, and Ajaw leans closer, head tilted as if he wanted to deepen the kiss but being unable to do so.

It doesn’t feel like much. It doesn’t feel like anything at all. It is Ajaw, and that alone makes a spark of something glow bright in the back of Kinich’s mind, where their thoughts meld together seamlessly when they are in full synchronicity, but it lacks too much to feel like a real kiss.

A mockery of a lip lock, indeed.

“Maybe another time,” he says, curling up around Ajaw and trying to ignore the disappointment and dissatisfaction that blooms in both of their minds. Now that Ajaw is back, the exhaustion he felt before has doubled and he can feel his eyelids growing heavier. “We can go outside. Find a field of Embercore flowers, or an Everflame Seed… Do… something…”

“…Never took you for an exhibitionist,” Ajaw responds as he cuddles closer, settling himself comfortably in the crook of Kinich’s neck, warm and cosy. He tugs the blanket higher to cover both their bodies, disappearing under the fabric.

“Hm… For you… might be.”

Kinich isn’t truly aware of what he is saying, already half asleep, and he doesn’t hear Ajaw’s disbelieving hiss. He also doesn’t feel the dark, feral possessiveness seeping into their bond, nor hear the deafening, victorious roar in the back of his head as gigantic claws close around his delicate human soul. He doesn’t really notice ‘pixel’ teeth sinking into his collarbone either, not sharp enough to do much else than leave an indent behind, or them heading for his throat to mark the most visible spot possible, right on top of the Wayob’s blessing.

What he does notice is Ajaw’s voice muttering once more, the same words over and over again:

“Mine, K’iinich, my Ah K'in, mine,” over and over again, in the tongue he speaks and another, ancient one he has no right to know.

“Hm… Yours…” He mumbles as he falls asleep, hoping somewhere in his mind that they can talk about all this later when they are more coherent. Unconsciously, he speaks an ancient word and an even more ancient name: “K’uhul Ajaw, mine…”

The Saurian Hunter and the Divine Lord stake their claim on each other once more, as they will continue doing for days to come and until a contract comes to be fulfilled. One belongs to another, and another belongs to one, just as it should be.

Contracts, after all, go both ways.