Chapter Text
“So, you’re what my mother sent to me.”
Phainon kneels before the sneering crown prince of Castrum Kremnos wearing little more than a loin cloth and a slave torc, burning with humiliation and shame so much greater than he expected. He expected to be stripped down, expected to be put on display, but this is so much worse.
It’s not only Mydeimos, it’s his cadre of servants all studying him with feral intensity. Half of them weigh him for how dangerous he might be to their master—and if they knew the truth, they’d probably kill him outright—and the rest leer at him with barely disguised lust. But that’s his lot in life, now, to be stared at and wanted by the slavering masses, his master the only barrier between what they want and his body.
Mydeimos slides his roughly callused palm along Phainon’s jaw, a light caress, only to sink his fist into Phainon’s hair and yank back his head. Phainon grunts with surprise more than pain, his neck arching. For a brief, fleeing moment, his eyes meet Mydeimos’s, and he reflects that the crown prince of Castrum Kremnos is a very attractive man. A mane of red-blonde hair, cold and cutting golden eyes, the well-crafted body of a Titan marked by red tattoos. Beauty aside, his face is a cruel mask of indifference, and Phainon cannot help but hate himself and his new master all the same.
Mydeimos’s fingers tighten in Phainon’s hair. With his other hand, he grabs at Phainon’s jaw, forcing it open, forcing his fingers into Phainon’s mouth.
Deeper shame burns through him, a mortification that everyone in the room is watching this humiliation.
“Good teeth,” Mydeimos says with a studied ennui, as if this is a complete waste of his time. As if Phainon is a waste of his itme.
Phainon is a waste of his time, which makes all of this worse.
Closing his eyes, Phainon fights the instinct to bite Mydeimos’s fingers to chase them out of his mouth. Thankfully, in that same moment, those fingers withdraw, but Phainon has no opportunity to relax.
Mydeimos yanks his head to one side and then the other, wrenching his neck painfully. He tolerates the abuse wordlessly, knowing it could be so much worse.
“Well formed,” Mydeimos continues. At his sides, Phainon curls his hands into fists. The tenor in the room changes all at once, a sudden violent tension vibrating in the air. He couldn’t do anything if he really wanted to, but he forces himself to relax, to loosen his fists, and Mydeimos laughs low and cruel. “You couldn’t hurt me even if you tried.”
That’s not entirely true. Phainon could do considerable damage to the prince’s body with very little effort, but that effort would be for nothing. If rumor is to be believed, the crown prince of Castrum Kremnos is immortal.
Mydeimos drags his wet fingers down Phainon’s neck, over the slave torc, lower. His thumb pulls across one of Phainon’s nipples, and Phainon swallows thickly. He chose this. He has to remember that he chose to be here—sort of. Though he was given options, there wasn’t much to choose. This or death, and he can’t die yet.
“My prince,” someone says from behind Phainon as Mydeimos’s hand creeps lower and Mydeimos leans even closer to Phainon. If not for the iron grip on his hair, Phainon would turn his face and bite whatever part of Mydeimos is closest. But that would guarantee his death. No one assaults the crown prince of Castrum Kremnos and survives.
“Do you chasten me, Hephaestion?” Mydeimos asks mildly, dashing all Phainon’s hopes that this is about to end.
There’s an awkward pause. “No, my prince,” the same man, Hephaestion, says.
Instead of continuing to grope Phainon’s body in front of his entire household, Mydeimos releases Phainon’s hair and steps back. Phainon doesn’t give him the satisfaction of sagging. He remains upright, shoulders stiff and back straight, and meets Mydeimos’s cold eyes.
The scuffle of feet behind him. “Show some respect,” another voice snaps, but Mydeimos forestalls whoever it is with a wave of his hand.
“It’s not as if he won’t see considerably more of me,” Mydeimos says, clearly amused. “Let him look me in the eyes.”
“And give him ideas above his station?” That’s the same voice as earlier, belonging to Hephaestion. Another well-built man, though lankier than either Phainon or Mydeimos, steps around Phainon’s body. He approaches Mydeimos without so much as looking at Phainon, taking Mydeimos by the elbow with an intimate touch.
They know each other well. Very well. Perhaps too well, by Phainon’s estimation.
He hates this. Hates being thrown into the prince’s court with no idea who’s who and no comprehension of the myriad relationships. There is a hierarchy here, but he understands it only in the loosest, vaguest way.
Hephaestion and Mydeimos turn away, the former speaking urgently to the latter, who seems utterly unconcerned.
“Hephaestion,” Mydeimos says, censorious.
The man keeps speaking, too low for Phainon to make out anything he’s saying.
“Hephaestion, enough,” Mydeimos says, turning aside. His attention returns to Phainon as Hephaestion looks on, clearly furious, and Phainon catalogues him as quickly as possible.
Tall, lanky, muscled but not a warrior the way Mydeimos clearly is. Dangerous eyes that soften when they turn toward Mydeimos. A problem for a bed slave. A rival. Hephaestion will almost certainly be an inconvenience, whether he’s a jilted past lover or a hopeful future one. Great. This is just what Phainon needs. Even more complications in an already complicated situation.
“My lady mother has seen fit to be generous,” Mydeimos is saying, “and offered me the gift of a new bed slave.”
It’s one thing to think the words himself but quite another to hear the crown prince speak them aloud. Phainon suppresses a shudder.
“I find I’d like to put him through his paces,” Mydeimos continues.
Phainon’s stomach turns. No matter how handsome Mydeimos is, this is—he doesn’t want this. And the snickering of the household around him doesn’t help, only makes his shame and disgust intensify. At them, at Mydeimos. At himself.
He chose this. He reminds himself again that he chose this knowing what it would entail, that he can handle anything Mydeimos demands of him. Even that. Especially that.
“Mydei,” Hephaestion begins.
“Out,” Mydeimos says.
“My prince,” another voice says, and Phainon glances to the side to see an older man in a guard’s uniform stepping forward, bronze breastplate shining. The servants filter out, but this man and a few others remain, all of them finely dressed. Friends, perhaps. Or valued retainers, the sons of important courtiers.
That Hephaestion has the bearing of a nobleman’s son, and that other man, there, just to Phainon’s left looks like some kind of scholar. Another holds a lyre. Companions or perhaps his somatophylakes. Whoever they are, they’re close enough that they feel comfortable gainsaying him.
“I don’t need to hear it from you, too, Krateros,” Mydeimos says, and there’s a touch of humor in his voice, a touch of humanity. Phainon hates that. “Out, all of you.” Now, he sounds like a bored heir again, one who wants to play with a new toy. Phainon grinds his teeth together. “I want to play with my gift.”
Disgusting. He’s hated the prince of Castrum Kremnos for years, but he’d always imagined a noble, honorable rival in him, not this spoiled princeling.
“It that wise?” Krateros asks.
“Enough,” Mydeimos snaps. “Get out, all of you.”
They do, though slowly and with obvious reluctance, until Phainon, still kneeling on the cold marble floor, is alone with Mydeimos.
“Now, then,” Mydeimos says.
This is the moment that Phainon has waited for. He lunges, propelling himself forward. He grabs the blade at Mydeimos’s sided before the other man can react, unsheathes it, and drives it into Mydeimos’s belly.
Rumor has it that Mydeimos is immortal, but rumor is rarely reality.
Mydeimos grunts, and then sighs heavily, wearily. “I see we’re doing this,” Mydeimos says. And to Phainon’s shock, Mydeimos steps into the blade, pushing it deeper into his belly. He takes two steps closer to Phainon, wrapping his hands around Phainon’s own. Golden blood drips from his belly onto the floor, puddling around their feet. “Let us go over a few ground rules.” Mydeimos sounds unconcerned as he removes Phainon’s hands from the hilt. “First, you can try to kill me as often as you want, but you won’t be successful.” With the blade removed from Phainon’s hands, Mydeimos steps back and pulls it from his guts with another quiet grunt, one that sounds more uncomfortable than pained—as if he’s used to this sort of thing.
Maybe he is. Maybe all of his bed slaves have tried to kill him.
Phainon swallows, recoiling, not quite sure what to do with himself anymore. The rumors must be true, there’s no other explanation. He can’t die here, not yet, but he’s just attacked the crown prince of Castrum Kremnos, and he—
“I’d prefer you not do that again. It’s messy and more of an inconvenience than anything else.” Mydeimos tosses the sword aside and reaches for the nearby table, heavy laden with fruits and cheeses. He removes a cloth from it and presses the cloth to his side. “Second, if you want to survive long enough to report back to your mistress—”
Phainon’s heart pounds.
“—then you shouldn’t try that again. I can clean up the mess you just made, but if Krateros or my friends think you’ve attacked me, I won’t be able to stop them from killing you.” He sounds disaffected as he drops another cloth to the floor and mops up the blood with his toes.
Golden blood. Mydeimos truly is a Chrysos Heir, one of those chosen few who can bear a Titan’s coreflame, who can embody a Titan’s power, a veritable god walking on Amphoreus’s soil. No wonder he’s immortal. Not all of them are, of course, but all of them bear a unique curse. Immortality is clearly Mydeimos’s.
“Third, I won’t lay a hand on you unless you ask for it.” That jolts Phainon back to the present, and he recoils. Mydeimos scoffs. “You don’t have to believe me.” Phainon doesn’t. “But I won’t. I’m not interested in unwilling partners. Forcing someone holds no pleasure for me.” Mydeimos pulls the cloth away from his belly, examining the wound in it. Already, the blood has stopped flowing and skin knits back together. It’s an unnerving sight. “I suppose I ought to thank you for not disemboweling me,” he says blithely. “That hurts much more and takes considerably longer to heal from. I wouldn’t have been able to protect you from the consequences of that, either.” Mydeimos sighs, bending to pick up the dirty cloth on the floor, and he throws both into a nearby brazier.
The flames flicker gold as they consume the cloths.
“Now, then,” Mydeimos says. “Do you have any questions?”
Too many, but none of them seem particularly salient. Well. Perhaps one. “You’re not going to kill me?” he asks.
Mydeimos snorts. “If I killed everyone who tried to kill me in this palace, there’d be no one left. And I’d rather know who my mother’s spy is than have to guess.” Phainon’s lips twist in a frown, which pulls a laugh out of Mydeimos. It’s a surprisingly pleasant sound. “Did she think I wouldn’t figure it out immediately?”
“She… expected it to take a little more time,” Phainon hedges.
“Of course she did. Her underhanded tactics are expected at this point, even if they lack honor.” Mydeimos makes a dismissive gesture. “Regardless, when you report to her, you will tell her that we’re sleeping together.”
“I’m not her only spy,” Phainon says carefully. “I’m not sure she’ll believe me.”
Mydeimos’s expression is utterly unimpressed. “That’s why we will act as though we are.”
Phainon stares at him. “You just said—”
“I said we will act as if we’re fucking.” He steps toward Phainon, and Phainon holds his ground, refusing to back up. “I also said I won’t force you. These two things aren’t mutually exclusive.” His lips twisted in a sardonic, pitying sort of smile. “My mother usually picks cleverer agents.”
Flushing with frustrated heat, Phainon crosses his arms—and becomes keenly aware of how little he’s wearing once more. A scrap of fabric between his legs, whereas Mydeimos is resplendent in his royal regalia. “That sounds too underhanded for a Kremnoan,” he says, wielding the words like a knife.
Mydeimos’s smile is sharp as he shrugs. “What’s your name again?”
“Phainon of—” Phainon cuts himself off, looking away. It doesn’t matter where he’s from. Not anymore. “Phainon.”
“Phainon of Nowhere,” Mydeimos says, and those words disembowel Phainon, cutting into his belly and slicing clean across it. “Come to bed with me. We have a show to put on.”
A frisson of heat runs through Phainon, one that shames and frustrates him. “I can lie to your mother—”
“Speak better of her,” Mydeimos says, leading Phainon through the suite of rooms.
“I can lie to the queen well enough,” Phainon corrects himself, bristling, staring at Mydeimos’s back as though the secret to his immortality is contained somewhere in his spine. “We don’t have to put on any acts.”
“I don’t care whether or not my mother believes you,” Mydeimos replies. “It’s not her I’m worried about convincing.”
His court. If they suspect for an instant that Phainon isn’t performing his duties as Mydeimos’s pet bed slave, they’ll almost certainly take matters into heir own hands. “Why do you care?”
Mydeimos hums. “I wonder,” is all he says, stopping beside his bed. It’s a broad thing, large enough to fit several people, or perhaps only two, considering the breadth of Mydeimos’s form. Sitting on the edge of his bed, he pulls at the laces of his sandals, kicking them aside. “Strip.”
Phainon bristles. “I thought you weren’t—”
“I’m not,” Mydeimos says. “But if anyone discovers us, we must make this look real.” Annoyance and disdain drip from his lips.
“Surely no one will enter now that you’ve dismissed them.”
Mydeimos scoffs. “Spoken like a man who has never lived in a palace.”
“We can’t all be princes.”
Mydeimos’s expression shutters. “No, we can’t.” He strips off his chiton, leaving himself naked, and Phainon has to turn away lest he betray himself. Mydeimos is too well built, too handsome, with a thick cock heavy between his legs, and Phainon, well. It’s been a long time since Phainon laid with someone, and Mydeimos is exactly the kind of man he prefers. Even if he won’t prefer how Mydeimos will certainly want it.
Grimacing, he strips off his loin cloth. He casts it aside and steps around the bed before lowering himself onto his belly across it. Resting his forehead against his forearms, he waits.
“What are you doing?”
Phainon turns his head toward Mydeimos, a little bewildered. “Letting you…” He makes a vague gesture with one hand. “Mount me?”
The look on Mydeimos’s face is unreadable. Some combination of annoyed, frustrated, and—and maybe amused? Charmed? Phainon can’t quite figure it out. “Roll over,” Mydeimos says.
Phainon has never been particularly ashamed of his body, but rolling to his back in front of Mydeimos is—well. It’s not shameful, and he’s not ashamed, but he’s not aroused enough to lose all his sense of propriety. The bigger problem, though, is that he is aroused. A little. Only a very little. Mydeimos is, unfortunately, just his type.
“Would you prefer to see my face then?” Phainon asks blithely.
Rolling his eyes, Mydeimos leans over Phainon’s body, bending low until their mouths are a mere breath apart. “Not particularly, Phainon of Nowhere.”
That kills some of whatever weird erection Phainon’s trying to fight, but only some, which is perhaps more miserable than if it killed all of his arousal. And maybe he does feel some shame when he lifts his chin, half expecting a kiss from Mydeimos—only because of their proximity, of course.
Mydeimos scoffs. “Down, puppy. I don’t fuck my mother’s spies.”
“Why not?” Phainon asks, forcing himself to give Mydeimos a challenging smile. He supposes that one of Gorgo’s spies would be cocky and aggressive with the prince, supposes someone in Gorgo’s employ would bite back. Gorgo, from what he understands of her, which is little, does not employ cowards.
Snorting, Mydeimos straddles Phainon, and Phainon inhales. “Because I’m not stupid,” Mydeimos says, settling his ass mere inches from Phainon’s half hard, traitorous dick. “Because that always leads to trouble, and I’m not interested in tangling with my mother.” Callused fingers brush over Phainon’s chest, and a frisson of pleasure jolts through him. His cock twitches as Mydeimos flattens his palm against Phainon’s sternum. “How good an actor are you?”
All things considered, Phainon has started to consider himself a very good actor, thanks very much. “I’m a spy, aren’t I?” he asks, another challenge.
Laughing, Mydeimos lowers his head between his shoulder blades. “Then put your hands on my hips and pretend to work.”
Fuck. Fuck, Phainon isn’t that good an actor. That is, he knows what he’s doing, he knows how to pretend like he’s fucking the prince of Castrum Kremnos, but he doesn’t think his dick is going to survive this unscathed, and that’s horrifically embarrassing. That’s mortifying, actually, that he might grind himself against the curve of Mydeimos’s ass and Mydeimos might find him hard and wanting.
“What if this isn’t how I’d fuck you?” he asks, but he places his hands on Mydeimos’s hips. Mydeimos isn’t sitting so far back that Phainon’s cock will graze his ass, but he’s sitting far enough forward for Phainon to see that he isn’t interested at all. Mydeimos is a soft weight against Phainon’s belly, and that really does kill his erection. Thank all the Titans.
Mydeimos leans forward. “Then how would you fuck me?” he asks in reply.
And there goes Phainon’s cock, roaring back to life. He’s almost fully hard as he pulls down on Mydeimos’s hips, grinding Mydeimos against his belly as if they’re actually fucking, and he lifts one leg, the one closest to the door, to hide the fact that he’s not actually inside the prince—just in case anyone’s looking. And someone might be. Given how Mydeimos keeps talking, someone probably is. Phainon’s cock gets just that much harder.
“Maybe I’d put you on your hands and knees,” he says.
Mydeimos arches an eyebrow. “Maybe?”
“Or maybe on your back, legs spread across my lap.” He urges Mydeimos to rock forward and back, urges his hips to move, and tries not to pay any attention to the way Mydeimos’s cock is flushing and filling. “With your wrists pinned above your head.”
Mydeimos makes a sound that could be a grunt of surprise—or some kind of startled little moan—and that sound goes straight to Phainon’s dick. It shouldn’t. None of this should be anything close to arousing, but Mydeimos really is Phainon’s type, and apparently would prefer to take what Phainon would prefer to give, and that’s really doing something for him. It’s really doing something for him.
“Do you truly think you could restrain me?” Mydeimos asks, but he’s panting.
“Yes,” Phainon says, throwing a cocksure grin up at Mydeimos, who presses harder against Phainon’s sternum. Who moves faster. “Yes, I think I could. I think you’d let me.” He’s not usually this bold with a partner, not usually this aggressive. It’s not that he can’t be or that he doesn’t like to be but usually he’s with people who take a weird attitude toward him, and usually he isn’t particularly inspired.
Unfortunately for him, Mydeimos is inspiring.
“I think you might want me to,” Phainon continues, gripping Mydeimos’s hips harder and dragging him over his stomach.
Heat flares in Mydeimos’s eyes, which has to be a very bad thing. Phainon doesn’t really want to be a bed slave, but maybe it wouldn’t be so bad being Mydeimos’s bed slave. Maybe he could tolerate it, if it meant pinning the man above him to the bed and fucking him hard and deep to the point of tears, to tear down the arrogant prince and reduce him to a whining wreck.
“I think you talk too much,” Mydeimos says.
Phainon throws a grin at him, cocky and just as arrogant. He’s no prince, but he won’t let this one lessen him. “Do something about it, then, Your Highness.”
Mydeimos shudders, throws his head back, and moans as his hips go still, as he grinds himself down into Phainon’s stomach.
If that’s not the hottest thing Phainon has ever seen, has ever heard, and it’s fake. It’s Mydeimos pretending. It’s fake. Phainon wants to make it real. He yanks Mydeimos down harder and arches against him, dragging the tip of his now hard cock along the curve of Mydeimos’s ass, and feigns a moan of his own.
They both go still, but they’re both panting. Phainon can’t look at Mydeimos except from the corner of his eyes, and Mydeimos seems unwilling to look at him, too. Phainon has had his share of awkward moments, but this one is definitely the most awkward, is definitely worse than any other.
Swallowing, he drops his hands from Mydeimos’s hips. “So,” he says.
“Be silent,” Mydeimos hisses. “We are pleasantly exhausted, aren’t we?”
Phainon frowns. Everyone he’s ever fucked has wanted to talk to him after sex. “I guess,” he says.
Abruptly, Mydeimos swings off Phainon’s hips, and Phainon isn’t particularly surprised to see that the prince is more than half hard. That was weird, sure, but it was hot, too, and it’s a little relieving to see that Mydeimos was equally as affected as Phainon.
Mydeimos leaves his things on the floor as he takes himself and the tightest, firmest ass Phainon has ever seen across the room toward an archway Phainon hadn’t noticed earlier. To be fair, he hadn’t noticed most of the room earlier. He’d been a little worried, a little preoccupied, by how everything was supposed to go.
Propping himself up, Phainon watches Mydeimos approach the arch. “What now?” Phainon asks.
Mydeimos pauses in the archway. “Now?” He glances over his shoulder. “I am going to take a bath.”
That sounds nice, actually. “And what am I supposed to do?” Phainon asks, growing increasingly unsure of himself.
Mydeimos shrugs. “How am I supposed to know?”
Sitting, Phainon rakes a hand through his hair. “Well, what have your other—”
“I’ve never had another bed slave,” Mydeimos snaps, and he steps through the archway.
Phainon drops his hand to his lap, staring at his palms and his own half-hard cock. That, he supposes, could have gone much worse.