It was absolutely disgusting.

Moon’s eyes narrowed as he surveyed the camp, far below him, tapping on his scythe with a finger. He was poised as a hawk, claws digging into a gnarl of branches far above, slathered in shadow and fury.

His stare flicked between points of interest: the small pseudo-huts carved into the tree’s roots, the little banners flapping in the wind, the residents milling between each other’s homes, carrying baskets of linens or berries. Some paused to chat. 

He watched, in particular interest, as one leaned forwards to kiss another, and their hand ghosted over the other’s stomach, and they smiled in a distant way. 

To the untrained eye, these were the people of Chi. They lived, they drank of the great trees, they bred, they died. The endless life cycle of mortals, who came and went as insects, and implored their Fragments like needy children. 

To the untrained eye, the only uncertainty was the locale. Most villages and cities found themselves formed high in the crests of the mighty trees, nestled into the upper bark, far from the caustic deluge of the rancid ocean of broken universes at Chi’s bottom. 

After all, the smell alone - that of raw acidic magic and death, mixed together in profane ways - was more than enough to turn away the bravest settlers. And the presence of their Fragments - no, particularly, the presence of Eolith - far above sealed the incentive. 

Of course, the taste of magic was of no concern for a mage commune. 

His tailtip flicked. Every sense, trained into him, screamed one thing: launch off of his perch, land like a feral beast in the town square. Screech out some speech that their sins against Chi could be forgiven, if they gave up their obscene magery. Expect hatred and vitriol in return, per usual. 

And then, without hesitation, bring blade to each and every one of their throats and rip them open, pour their magic into gemstones and chalices, and return back to Eolith, offering the -

-No. Eolith wasn’t here right now. 

His tail flicked again, and he rubbed at his eyes.

Take... take the gemstones, and go into the center of Eolith’s tree, and store them alongside the rest of the collection of unstable magic, in the great catacombs. That was his duty now. 

And the compulsion to fulfill it throbbed in the back of his brain, a constant itch, a constant presence. It took the shape - as it often did - of Eolith’s expectant expression, looking down at him in a mixture of curiosity and mild irritation. It said, plainly, why aren’t you doing your work?

But he had a good excuse this time. 

Moon’s eyes snapped, almost forcefully, to a darkened crevice higher in the roots. There, a shadow moved - almost a trick of the light, and he had to rub the exhaustion out of his face again before refocusing. 

He could see the shape there, though no one in the commune noticed. No one looked up as Sun peered down at them in disinterest and distaste. He scanned the village, and Moon watched him note points of escape, defense, and attack. 

This would be simple for him. A simple task - to clear out a den of mages. Sun could do such a thing with his eyes blindfolded and hands tied behind his back. It was easy, expected, simple... but it wasn’t something Moon asked of him often.

No. There was an ulterior motive here. One he didn’t want to think about until he saw it.

As if he knew he’d see it. 

But he knew he would, at the same time. It was a guarantee. Some sickly part of him hoped that they’d skip over that moment and he could keep pretending it wasn’t real.

Despite this being... what, the twelfth time? And without fail, it....

He watched, stomach churning, as Sun’s hand lowered to the ground. 

It was a slow, aching, desperate kind of horror consuming him. It pleaded and pulled on his shoulder, begged him to look away. But he couldn’t. He just couldn’t. 

So he stared, eyes boring into Sun’s arm as a jolt of sinful, corrupting, impure magic traveled down it. It hooked into the protective wards that the commune had crafted, and untangled them with the ease of a well-practiced mage. 

It was like he was torturing himself. Like every time, he’d walk away shaking his head, conjuring excuse after excuse. As if Eolith’s own word didn’t stand against Sun’s? As if he couldn’t trust his own eyes. 

Maybe he couldn’t. He yawned, and his tail flicked, and he swallowed the second one that billowed, trying to reorient his mind onto Sun.

Because he kept giving Sun chances. Kept giving him ways out. Kept giving him tries to prove that he wasn’t - wasn’t - that it wasn’t true. That the evidence Eolith had dropped on Moon’s lap wasn’t real. That what he’d seen, every time he sent Sun to clear a mage commune, wasn’t real. 

Did it even matter? He sat there, buried in evidence, buried in Sun’s flagrant disregard for the most holy of Eolith’s laws, the law keeping their Timeline teetering on the side of stability. And yet, he never made a move - never lifted a finger to stop Sun, never breathed a word of admonishment, never brought his scythe to the other’s neck. 

So did it even matter, if he kept lying to himself? Would he ever actually... punish Sun? Kill Sun? 

It had been so easy when Eolith found out about Isodose’s mage sympathy. It had been so easy when the Deepfrost commune had bombed the Cathedral Tree in Isodose’s name, claiming him as their patron. That friendship had been severed in a millisecond, and he’d moved as Eolith’s sword in an instant. 

The only reason Isodose didn’t die in his sleep, throat slit open, was that he’d already had the sense to run. His bed was long cold, and his window thrown open. 

And Moon had felt only betrayed rage.

So why? Why, when Eolith brought him into their private space in the center of the Cathedral Tree, between the humming-throbbing core and the thick bark, with a distant and paranoid expression on his face, had Moon not moved? Why had he not obeyed? 

The wards, freshly broken, could not alert their creators as Sun crept into the camp. He moved as a shadow, slinking under the cover of darkness, in the long umbras of sunset. 

This, too, wasn’t it? This, too, was magery. A few quiet spells could certainly obscure Sun in this way, no? It would be easy, wouldn’t it? It would explain how so few could notice him, even when he stood there, nearly clear as day - eyes meeting Moon’s, beaming smirk stark in whatever corner he waited in. Visible only to whoever he wanted to be. Visible only to Moon. 

Why did it make him feel special? Why did it make his chest feel warm? Why did it make the tips of his fingers tingle? 

Sun lingered near the entrance of one of the huts. His expression was intrigued, but bored - unchallenged. Just another commune to him. The wards hadn’t even been difficult. He itched for a challenge. 

Why did he want to give that to Sun? 

The glint of the knife as Sun pulled it from a pocket caught the sunset, and it sparkled in Moon’s eyes, almost harsh. Its colors melded with the yellows in Sun’s fur, with the washed-out browns of the root, with the smears of paint on the hut. 

His head was spinning, lightly, gently, dipping into those colors, into messy summer afternoons, into laying with his head in Sun’s lap and feeling the heat on his cheek from the window, the smell of the dust floating past. 

Why did it make his chest ache? 

Eolith was there, staring down at him from the back of his mind. He didn’t pull, didn’t demand. His presence was enough for anxiety to rush into Moon, into obedient eager placation. How can I serve you? How can I be for you?

And still, still, it pulled away, pulled like a rope hard until he was laying in the mud of the memory of screaming in Eolith’s face. Of screaming no, one loud short note, face contorted in misunderstood anger and clenched hands. The way his chest heaved, then, barely able to grasp at the air. 

The realization, sensation of his mind snapping in half - of every directive he’d trained himself on suddenly contending with a new enemy, sizing each other up from across the room, whispering behind playing cards, tossing bets onto the table, the gamble of his loyalty and his self. Two mighty, powerful giants, their brawl far above him, clashing and turning the dirt into sand and the sky into red. He stared, small, waiting for commands.

Who would win? Who would he choose? He’d looked at himself in the mirror, and he didn’t know when he changed, but he looked different and the same at once, like two pictures superimposed, one safely familiar and one wide-eyed frightening. He’d touched the glass, but it was just inert glass, worn and old from age. And he’d thought to himself, I need to get this replaced, and he turned away from his vacant expression. 

Sun’s knife tasted blood. 

It was quick. He was quick. He moved like a snake, gold stabbed right into the throats mage-by-mage. Five fell before the realization reached the village, and some screamed, and some scattered, and some conjured magicks and energies. 

But, as they turned to their attacker, their bravery became nothing. Their faces paled, their jaws softened, their blood sprayed against Sun’s clothes, and he moved to the next. 

He smiled, but there was no sadistic glee in it. It was only the natural rest of his face, the natural expression he wore. This was, after all, just Moon’s orders. Work to fulfill. If he’d up in that branch and Moon down in the village, it would mean something else. But it didn’t.

Sun leapt onto the roof of a hut like a cat, bounded off of it to cut off a runner’s escape. 

The mothers and fathers, the children and the halo’d. All one and the same, faces overtop of each other’s, expressions frozen. Just more mortals. Just more mortals. 

And in their blurry faces, he could see vestiges of Eolith’s orders. He could see a thousand lives, locked in resigned and shocked horror as he descended upon them, the blade of the Cathedral, outstretched to snuff out the lives of sinners. They were all the same and different at once, everything coming to a close in the identical way, every path there unique. 

His head swam, did laps in the liminal spaces between then and now, between his knife clutched in his hand and the way Sun tore after escapees. He watched as some teleported, and some stood their ground, and a pathetic few dove off the side of the rickety platform and took their chances with the ocean below. 

Moon could smell that ocean, too. He remembered hurtling down, arms and legs scrambling like an animal, tears ripped from his face and floating above him almost like angels as he fell, mind uncomprehending. He’d had no sense of mind to realize that his death had been imminent, the only thoughts begging him to find purchase and grip. 

And they had, locked onto the anchor tossed from the platform, and the line cracked taunt only a dozen feet above the highest swells of the ocean, and he’d looked down for the first time and saw the faces in it congealing, the magic crashing and battling, the hands reaching up to him for salvation and rescue, the broken universes torn up and mixed together into amalgamation. 

And he’d looked up, terrified and afraid, and saw Eolith’s face, smeared in equal tears and panic, as if he hadn’t been the one to shove Moon, as if he hadn’t almost killed him, as if he hadn’t, as if he hadn’t-

Sun didn’t care for the ones that fell. Their fate closed with the ocean; they were one with it now, one and the same. They’d be chewed up into its thick curdling, their identity pulled apart by a thousand identities looking for themselves, their magic joining the rest of the pained cacophony, everything and nothing at once, pain eternal, life eternal.

The whole reason they’d banned magic was down there, in the depths of that water. It wasn’t even really water, not really. 

It was hell. 

And he could still see Eolith’s face, staring down at him, breathless. The anchor, tossed at the last second. The ocean’s hand almost on his tail. The sound of the winch as Eolith turned the crank, and it clicked and clicked as Moon lifted, and neither of them spoke when he collapsed back onto the platform, crying and wet, curled in the fetal position, unmoving for long hours. 

And when Eolith had retreated, slunk away, Moon had laid there until he told himself to shut up and stand up. And he’d stood and he thought of Eolith’s orders, the thing he’d screamed at, the thing he refused. And he told himself: go fulfill it. And the Eolith in his mind ordered: go fulfill it.

And he’d went back into his bedroom and curled up, still smeared and dirty, and held his knees to his chest and stared at a wall, and missed Sun’s entering and Sun’s greeting and amused little hum and sound of concern and then sound of fear and hands ghosting over him and lighting on him and pulling him out of that stupor.

And he’d looked up at Sun’s face with new understanding, with fresh comprehension. At the face of a mage. At the face of a selfish, disgusting, sinful mage, who placed their comfort and preference over the life of Chi itself, the Timeline he’d dedicated himself to, that he gave up everything inside of himself for. 

At the face of the man Eolith ordered him to kill. 

And it would’ve been so easy to take his knife, and plunge it into Sun’s ribs, dig it in. Let passion consume him, in-out stab over and over, screaming and crying. How could you do this to me? How could you do this to us? How could you be so selfish? How could you betray every ounce of trust I’d given you?

Don’t you know how much I need you?

Sun emerged from a hut, dragging a robed figure behind him. They were screaming something, kept trying to conjure magic, but Sun’s knife was in their back, out of their reach, and it fizzled out. He tossed them forwards, smirking, and bent over to be face-to-face. 

Moon’s ears swiveled, and caught Sun’s cool and calm, “Where did they teleport to, hm?”

And the cadance of his voice swirled in his stomach, and then lower, and he reached to wrap his arm around his waist, fingers digging in. 

The mage shouted, but their voice was distant and empty, and Moon couldn’t catch the words. But he stared, desperate, at the way the corners of Sun’s mouth quirked, and the shake of Sun’s head as he straightened. 

Sun grasped the mage by the front of their robes, hefted them up. He tilted his head and spoke in a low tone, “Well, I’m afraid you’ll have to beg mercy from our Stellar Moon. Perhaps he can wrench that location from you?”

The mage’s face paled further. They weren’t writhing - they knew it was useless, with the dagger in them, with Sun’s grip on them. 

But they did startle when Moon landed, with a loud thud, beside the duo.

“Sun,” he said, standing up straight, his voice carrying authority. It wavered, but only slightly.

The mage’s body scrunched and tense, as if he’d not notice them if they compressed themself into a tiny ball. The fear on their face dripped out of them, melding with the colors of everything, just another stroke of paint. 

But Moon watched, instead, as Sun’s ears swiveled, as his eyes widened, as elation broke over his face. His expression was still half-lidded, overly confident, and disgustingly smug, but he dropped the mage - completely disinterested in them now - and turned towards Moon with his favored smirk. 

“Moony!” said with dripping affection, enough that Moon’s lips curled into a snarl. Sun didn’t pay it mind, instead approaching with wide arms. “Ahaha, so this is a test. I should’ve guessed as much.”

“It wasn’t- wait-” Moon stepped back, dodging the hug. Sun rerouted, ducking with him, and his arms linked around Moon’s back and he was scooped regardless, expression indignant.

Sun flashed him that knowing smirk. “Oh, I know you don’t mind a bit of blood.”

“This isn’t the time. They’re not secured.” he nodded at the mage, still cowering, reaching for the dagger. It was good an excuse as any. 

They twisted, Sun’s leg coming down hard on the mage’s hand. Their bones shattered, crunching under the weight and power, and Moon sucked in a hard breath. 

I’m not a sadist, he told himself. I just like the way he’s still holding-

Eolith’s frown widened in his mind, and his voice caught itself. 

“Secure enough for now,” Sun said, digging his heel in. “I lost a handful, they’ve gone off to some other commune. We’ll be taking this one back.”

His arms were strong. Where Moon was lithe and thin, primed to bolt like a raptor, Sun was stronger and grounded. His arms, thick but not bulging, were tucked around Moon’s body, one supporting his thighs, the other around his shoulders to force him close. Both hands splayed against him, a spot of warmth.

It was half of why he was better at this. Better at killing. But Eolith had looked at Moon, and he’d tied Moon to his will, and that was everything he was, and that was fine. 

Moon opened his mouth, but no words emerged. He swallowed, suddenly uncertain, suddenly head spinning again. 

Sun wasn’t terrified. Did he even consider the possibility that Moon had seen him use magic? He’d never floated the idea, never seemed aware that Moon could’ve. 

Was he so certain in his ability to keep it a secret? Or did he think that Moon wouldn’t betray him? Or did he think that Moon wouldn’t care?

Sun stared at him, keen interest-concern on his face, unwilling to look worried but clearly aware that something was wrong. His grip never faltered, but Moon’s brain did - as the picture of Sun’s became blurry and unfocused, smeared with the rest of the colors of everything.

He wasn’t really sure if this was real or not yet. His head was light, airy. It played snippets of his memories, back-to-back, threading together a story that made no sense, images and sensations familiar and distant. He could still feel Sun’s hands squeezing him, and he blinked, but the world was still just smears and sensations.

“-not well,” he heard, as if down in a lake, and he looked up, and could barely hear Sun through the water’s surface. “-you been-?”

Eolith’s presence bore down on him, a suffocating weight, the weight of everything. His disappointment. His anger, reserved for everyone except Moon. His tears, streaked down his face, as he broke down in Moon’s arms, and for a brief second, the illusion of their ever-powerful leader shattered. 

But the Eolith in his mind picked up the pieces and fitted them together again, click-click like a jigsaw puzzle, and he looked at it, and everything was okay except the picture was splattered and warped.

I saw you, he wanted to scream, saw you cast magic, you don’t even know how much I how hard I’ve how how how how, and his brain skipped over and over and couldn’t comprehend. 

Why was he sick? Why was he sick in his head? He’d been thinking so clearly earlier. He’d been thinking about all of this earlier. Why couldn’t he think now?

It made him useless. He couldn’t fulfill his purpose if he couldn’t think. But what if that purpose was, was taking the knife, and pushing it into Sun?

And why did that make his heartrate spike? And why did that make his heart choke and drown? And everything was just colors, intangible colors, unreal colors, moving around like little paintings, everything and nothing at once. 

And he’d spent so long fantasizing, and pretending, and not really getting it. And he didn’t even really know what that meant, but he kind of understood how it felt, and it was uncomfortable and a pit in his chest. 

Why couldn’t he speak or hear or think? Why wasn’t anything corporeal? Where even was he?

He reached out, arms outstretched for wherever he thought Sun’s face was. Even now, even when he was in a deluge of uncomprehension, all he could do was reach for Sun. Was it ever any question that he would’ve screamed at Eolith? That there was a line that he wouldn’t cross?

That there was something he wanted, all for himself?

And he - the edges of his vision blurred, blackened. He fell backwards for a second, but Sun’s hold was resolute, and it was warm, and comfortable, and he just wanted to-

-He blinked up at the ceiling. 

It was white, mottled, stippled. Otherwise nondescript. 

It took several more seconds to realize he was breathing. And that he knew that ceiling. If he twisted his head up, he could see the familiar headboard.

He looked down to his hands. The edges of him still looked fuzzy, but-

“You’re awake.” Sun said, on the bed beside him. 

He turned. “What?”

“You’re awake.” Sun’s smile was gone. 

One knee was tucked against his chest, both arms resting on it. The other was hanging off the bed, tapping against the side, going knock-knock-knock. It stilled after Moon glanced to it.

Moon reached up to hold his head. It still ached, like the dreary dredges of a fading migraine. Memories were uncertain, blurred. He could recall the branch, the smell of the ocean, the scream of it, the-

Sun grabbed him by the jaw forcibly, pulled their heads level. He wasn’t glaring - yet - but his face was pulled into laserfocus. “Where have you been going at night?”

Moon shifted, tried to pull away. There was no give in Sun’s grasp. “Let go of-”

“Don’t change the subject, Moony. Answer.”

Caught. He narrowed his eyes into slits at Sun, who didn’t react. His brain still hurt, but he conjured up, “Patrols.”

Sun raised an eyebrow. 

“Doing my job,” he said, reaching to actually slap Sun’s hand. “Following leads on mages. I don’t have to justify to y-”

“Moony,” Sun said, chiding, and pulled Moon’s head into the bed hard. 

His cheek hit the soft pillow, but Sun’s fingers didn’t release until the blanket was manipulated back over him. He laid there, almost limp, allowing it as the memories of - the commune - returned to him, in sheepish bits and pieces. 

Sun finally loosened, hand moving to instead pet down Moon’s small body over the blanket. He laid there as the hand returned in several long strokes, and something in his chest twisted. 

“Sun,” he started, voice cracking.

“Quiet.” Sun’s stroke became firmer. “You know I’ll be here while you sleep. Watching over you the entire while. You don’t need me to remind you.”

He could say things so definitively. In the back of Moon’s mind, it reminded him of Eolith, of the way Eolith commanded him. Sun’s muzzle would scrunch in disgust at the comparison. 

Eolith.

“No.” he tried to sit up, but Sun simply moved a leg over his back to pin him back down. “I need to-”

“Need to what, hm? I’ve interred the mage ringleader already. Just for you.” Sun flashed a smile.

“I need to fucking talk to you.”

“Then talk, but make it brief.”

Moon stared up at him. I saw you, his mind supplied, but his body didn’t react. I saw you cast. I saw you cast the last dozen times, and the dozen times before that. I know what you are. I know what you’re doing.

You know what you’re doing. You know the choices you made. Eolith knows. Eolith wants you dead. Eolith knows. 

How can you be so calm, so casual? How can you stare at him, eyes lidded, smirk over your face, leg draped over, one hand dangerously close to your hips? There’s a hit on your life and you don’t even know you’re staring at the assassin.

The would-be assassin. The maybe assassin. The assassin that almost died for that ‘no’. The assassin whose chest thumped, staring, uncomprehending, sleep-deprived.

Yeah. That was the excuse, wasn’t it? He was just sleep-deprived. What was he going to gain by telling Sun that he knew?

It would ruin whatever they had. Whatever between them. It would. Sun wouldn’t trust him to not backstab, to not betray. He’d be looking over his shoulder at Moon, and everything else in his life would flip upside down. 

It was a terrible secret. It was eating him from the inside out. But he was willing to take that so long as the last ground underneath him was stable. As long as he could cling to Sun while the world crumpled. 

Who else would care that he hadn’t been sleeping? They’d scoff and think that he couldn’t hold a candle to Eolith’s leadership. 

Who else would scoop him up in that warm hug and carry him all the way back to the Cathedral Tree while he was unconscious? They’d raise an eyebrow and wonder if he was suited for this position.

Who else would love him in this way?

Who else did he even think he could love?

He stared at Sun. Sun stared back, waiting, patient. Patience he gave only to Moon. Love he gave only to Moon. Their special little connection, their special little language. 

The way he didn’t care when Moon’s teeth sunk into him. The way he didn’t care when Sun’s hand slipped up his thigh at the office. The way his body fit against Sun’s.

The way he’d screamed at Eolith. 

No. No, I won’t kill Sun. 

I’ll do anything else. I’ll kill anyone else for you. I’ll kill the mothers, the fathers, the children you’ve ordered me to. I’ll hold vigil every night, carry out your orders with the dutiful ferocity of a zealot. I’ll massacre the children you need killed. I’ll hunt the mages you want dead. I’ll be your tool, your weapon, your moon.

But I won’t kill Sun.

His head throbbed, and he let it drop back onto the pillow. Sun let out a warm purr, a deep purr.

“Shut the fuck up,” Moon said, though his chest pounded. “Fucking. Smug bitch.”

“Go on,” Sun said, amused, relaxing against the headboard. “If that’s what you wanted to talk about?”

He’d been worried. It was strange to think about the words “worry” and “Sun” next to each other. He was always unbothered, always in control.

Until it came to Moon. 

He couldn’t break this. He didn’t want to. He wanted everything to be the same forever, wanted to crystallize this moment in amber, wanted to preserve it. 

He didn’t know what was going to happen when Eolith returned. He imagined himself waiting, like a beaten puppy, at the door. 

What would he do, if Eolith opened that door and had poison under his arm, and said - kill Sun, or I kill you? Kill Sun, or I decry you? Kill Sun, or I hate you, you who are my sword?

Maybe, said a small voice in him, maybe it was better that Eolith was gone. Because Sun was in good spirits, and it was just him and Sun, and that felt right in his heart, warm and right. And there was no Eolith to enrage Sun, and no Eolith to order Moon to kill him. 

It was just them. The way they were supposed to be. Supposed to be? He wanted to be this. He wanted?

He wanted. 

Sun’s hand caressed his hair and cheek. 

He’d never know how close Moon had come to death for his sake. He never needed to know. 

“You’ll enjoy this little holiday,” Sun said. “Ah, don’t fret. I’ve made arrangements. You don’t have a choice in the matter, but it is only a day.”

Tell him. Tell him. Tell him. Tell him how much you gave up for him. Tell him how much he means to you. Tell him that he’s the only person who’ve ever loved. Tell him. Tell him. Tell him!

Even if he’s a mage! Even if he values himself over Chi! Even if he’s selfish and smug and controlling and horrible! Even if you never had a choice in the matter!

Tell him this is everything you’ve ever wanted! Tell him that you love him! 

Moon opened his mouth.

“Hm?” Sun tilted his head. 

Tell him. Tell him, he thought, and tears welled up instead. Tell him. Say you want him. Say you want this.

You want something. Say it. You can say it. Say it.

Say it. Say it. Say it. Say it. Say it. Say it. SAY IT.  SAY IT.  SAY IT. 

Sun brushed the beginnings of tears away, uncharacteristically gentle. His face still couldn’t mimic concern, but his brow had furrowed. 

“Fuck off,” Moon said, “don’t fucking look at me like that.”

Sun smirked. “Ah, but I want to.”

I love you, he imagined himself saying. I want you. I need you. I want you. I need you. I WANT you. 

I want. I want something. I want, fucking, something, anything. I want. I want. I want. Me. Me, a person. Wants. Wants something. Wants you. Wants you. 

The worst part was that he’d understand the gravity of those words. He knew Moon that well. He’d understand, wholly and utterly, what they meant.

I want you. Even though you’re a mage. Even though you’re manipulative. You’re everything I want. I don’t care what other people think. I don’t care how I’m supposed to be. 

I want you with every fiber of my being. 

You are my world. I am your Moon. 

Sun’s expression softened. Knowingly so. Moon bristled. Sun leaned forwards, so close Moon could taste his breath. 

“Moony,” he said, in a smooth voice. “You think I can’t read you? Can’t read this?”

His hand traced over the contours of Moon’s body lovingly. It was a hard word to think, “lovingly”. 

But how else to describe it? How else to describe the way Sun’s hands cupped at his curves, slipped into his divots? The way Sun’s hands traced the edges of his clothing, traced the creases in his worn palms? The way Sun’s eyes looked over him, undressed him, regarded him, then flicked up to Moon’s face conspiratorially?

He was wanted. He was loved. 

Sun shifted onto the bed, one hand on Moon’s back, the other tracing down his side. He kicked at Sun instinctually, and the blow collided with Sun’s stomach and he hacked for a second - but his hands were not deterred, and Moon only squirmed as he was straddled. 

“Don’t fret. I’ll help you sleep.” Sun leaned down, to speak right into Moon’s ear. “I know what you need.”

And he did. He did know. Because Moon couldn’t say it, but the words were there, stuck in his throat, stuck in his mind. I love you. I want you. And they were stuck, but Sun saw them anyways. And Sun understood.

Maybe he would work up the courage to confront him later. To point into Sun’s chest and roar about his magery, his desecration of Chi. The way he shit on everything Eolith and Moon had been working for. 

And how mad it drove Moon, mad in such a good way, that someone didn’t care, that someone wanted him anyways, that someone cared to see past Eolith’s use and see something there and hold onto it.

He didn’t even know what that something inside of him was. Who was he? Who was he, really? What was there that Sun gripped onto so fiercely? 

Did it matter? Did he have to know? Did he have to understand? Or did he just have to moan softly as Sun’s hand touched him, worked the stress out of him, knew him better than he knew himself? 

He wanted this. He wanted Sun. He wanted. He wanted. He wanted something. He wanted. 

It didn’t matter. It didn’t matter Sun was a mage. 

He arched his back into Sun’s touch, half-aware, half-not. His brain drifted, pivoted back towards exhaustion. Sun knew him so well. Too well. So well. 

And he collapsed into sleep, in that warm bed, under those strong hands, into a nest of blankets and the warmth of the Sun.