Archive of Our Own

Phainon knows he can come across as—touchy, playful, energetic. Tribios had even once described his energy as if he were shot out of their cannon; explosive and gleefully devastating. He isn’t unaware of how he comes across to others. At times he’s even grateful for it. There’s a joyfulness to him, a puckishness that people tend to notice and pick up on before his designation, a softening to the dual-edged blade of Chrysos Heir and alpha; a blunting of the teeth that makes people more open to him, more willing to trust. 

Perhaps it’s selfish to want to be seen as something less inclined to harm despite the old stories and warnings that parents tell their children. That alphas are more prone to inclinations of Nikador’s blessings of strife and war and violence regardless of their home turf. The aspersions and assumptions are worse for others he knows. Whispered discussion on the streets of Okhema about those brutish Kremnoans. Even the omegas are ruthless aren’t they? as they give wary glances this way and that. 

The Chrysos Heirs as a whole are a two sided coin of hope and fear entwined to the Holy City. An endless journey to continue the prophecy, their decreed duty, Era Nova even as a pocket of people they’re supposed to protect and look out for schemes in secret or slander in contemptuous tones. A small selection of people, certainly, and yet to recognize it as people look at him sets a heavy slant to his shoulders, a chaining weight that links down the seabed of his spine. 

There’s still so much of himself left to carve away until the people can trust him, believe in him, need him. A blank canvas in which they can paint what they desire of him. Phainon can shed as many skins as needed to take on their wishes for this world. A tiring thing, surely, and yet he feels nothing but resoluteness in achieving it. 

And still, despite his efforts to be what others need him to be, there are some things Phainon finds he cannot shed himself of. Desire, selfishness, want. A gnawing hunger deep in his soul, an impropriety that sets drool in the back of his mouth, an improperness to him that is showcased to the world around him; teeth bared, appetite unabated despite the way he scarfs down scraps taken with greedy hands, a magpie plucking up stolen, rotten shards of whatever he can sneak away for indulgence. He’s not prone to this—this lavisciousness, this unshackling of his muzzle, the knife tip of his tucked away claws. 

If it were spread around—a mismatched collection of things that catch his interest or his desire, it might be easier to subdue, to hold close to his chest and ignore one thing in favor of another. To trade off his interest week to week, month to month, day to day.

Instead this animal desire, this rapacious circling, this ugly, unrepentant, unwavering want to sink his hands and teeth into flesh so deeply it either settles heavy and sated in his belly, or destroys any chance of a separation from him, only ever rears its head around one person.

Insatiable, slavering, a human reduced to instincts. 

Even now it catches his attention—a whiff in his nose, sharp, sweet, almost woody; autumn in the nose despite the harsh glare of the Dawn Device overhead. An instinctual round of his head, mouth curling into a smile as his gaze settles heavy, seeking, on a splotch of wheatfield hair amongst the marble cradle of Marmoreal Market, the throngs of people blending into the background. Attention catching even before Mydei’s body has even fully come into view, the vibrant wound of his garb a secondary indicator of his approach in comparison to the scent of him.

Phainon inhales deep, chest expanding, his fingers flexing at his side. He wants to hold that breath as long as he can, letting the softer notes of Mydei’s scent linger in his nose. Keeps it until he feels the burn of it in his lungs, almost dizzy with it.

Phainon feels like a starved animal when he looks at Mydeimos. Can’t even properly explain the how or the why, only the reality of it. There’s a bite to him that Mydei brings out of him, a snark, a glut, visceral and animal; a soft violence wrecking havoc within his body. 

“You actually came,” if it’s breathy no one has to know it’s from holding air for too long in his chest. The bite of laughter that escapes him after Mydei scoffs under his breath is loud, a bark of noise as he takes the opportunity to curl his arm around the other man’s shoulder, anchoring him as close as Mydei will allow when there’s a warning dig of metal into his ribs. “C’mon,” Phainon wheedles, relishing in the proximity. “You don’t have to look so dour my friend—you look as if you’re preparing yourself for war.” 

Which. Admittedly — they are in the grand scheme of things. The Flame-Chase Journey is a war of attrition one could argue with the prophecy and the numerous lives and things lost in the pursuit of it.

If the moment where any different Phainon might have been more careful in his choice of words, in his teasing, but with Mydei it doesn’t matter. An honest bluntness is often more well received with the man over grand exaggerations Phainon has come to find. 

“It’s you,” Mydei returns with the slant of his gaze piercing upwards as Phainon smiles, a play at guilelessness. His arms are folded tight in front of his chest, a stalwart stone unphased by Phainon’s bearing. It’s nice how steady he stands. How Phainon can feel the heat of him through the fabric of his trench coat. Phainon tilts his head just a little to feel the brush of Mydei’s hair against his cheek under the guise of consideration. Mydei’s voice is a low, gruff rumble as it always is when he continues: “There’s nothing specific I can do to prepare myself for whatever nonsense you think up, Deliverer. It’s a futile effort to try and understand the way your mind works unless I want to end up with a headache.”

Phainon huffs and a part of him — the part of him that has absolutely zero survival instincts and unfortunately crops of very often — wants to nip playfully at the swell of Mydei’s cheek like they’re children. His mouth is full to the brim with mirth, words coated thick with his toying. “My, my who would have thought the great crown prince would be such a sore loser? You always try so hard to hurt my feelings when you lose, Mydei.” 

“Hah,” His laughter has his mouth curving, a rough kind of fondness to his tone if Phainon wants to be indulgent. “You say that as if you don’t keep crawling back day after day to get yourself thrown into the dirt. If you can take a beating then surely your feelings will survive just as well.” 

“Still,” Phainon starts, rocking on his heels as he leans more of his weight into Mydei’s shoulder, privately delighted he hasn’t been shoved away yet. When they spar, the space between them really didn’t matter; it was an—allowance of a kind. The threads of Mnestia or the hand of Zagreus granting an opportunity. Skin to skin, bare hands being allowed to touch as much as he dared under the truth of playing violence. “The way you’re acting one could say you’re nervous, or, oh,” he stops, a glee shining in his teeth, eyes twinkling as he squeezes Mydei’s shoulder, fingers a curving vice, divoting the muscle above Mydei’s band, wishing the imprint, the prick of his nails would stay as if he were crushing peach skin. “Perhaps—are you scared?” 

The snarl that rips from Mydei’s throat is followed by a painful dig of an elbow into his chest, a wheeze leaving Phainon’s lungs as he nearly doubles over. “Of you?” Mydei says a kindling of heat to it that stokes a fire in Phainon’s body, an enjoyment of struggle. It wets his teeth, tongue heavy in his mouth as he snatches at the metaphorical chain of his restraint with scrabbling hands, pushes the desire to snap back with teeth until he gets viciously won recognition, submission, down, down, down until that beast is wrangled once more beneath the shore. 

“You’re worthy of battle, but fear?” Mydei continues, the claw tip of his gauntlets curled in the fabric of Phainon’s coat to bridge the gap of the infinitesimal space between them, irritation making his scent spike in a way that makes Phainon want to bury his nose in his throat. “The likes of you aren't enough to be credited with the creation of fear in Kremnoan. You’re not a symbol of terror, Deliverer—set your sights higher if you’re going to dream.”

He says it like it’s easy, as if Phainon isn’t scrabbling with calloused hands and a wavering heart day after day to fulfill other’s dreams. See you tomorrow! is one such dream that reverberates in his head like a death-knell at the words. It tightens his throat for a moment, a dryness to his mouth before he processes the rest of Mydei’s words. Feels the soothing balm of—set your sights higher settle over him with the same heat of the golden baths, the claws of Mydei’s gauntlets ease away from his coat to instead drag over the back of his neck, scruff at the back of his hair in the kind of encouraging touch Mydeimos is comfortable giving. Tough love is how Tribbie had tried to describe it to him so long ago when he first met the other man. 

A roughness to him, certainly, but nothing cruel, nothing meant to hurt for the sake of it. Mydei is blunt, a bit awkward, reserved when interacting with new things or people, but at the heart of him—at least, now—Phainon doesn’t think malicious has ever fit. At least, outside of battle. 

Phainon can feel the lingering echo of fingers against the back of his scalp long after Mydei’s hand retreats to once more sit as a stalwart wall in front of his chest even as his gaze stays unflinching, almost boring into Phainon’s skin as if he wants to rip him open, spear pierced through his chest to pin him in place. Always so put together, a languidness to his posture that makes Phainon feel—stuck, entranced, a deer staring at the notch of an arrow. 

He swallows. Takes a moment to will his heart to calm the maelstrom in his chest as he rights himself once more to his full height, a childish kind of enjoyment as he tracks the way Mydei has to tilt his head just the slightest bit to keep eye contact. 

It takes—longer for Phainon to get his composure back in verbal form, his laugh a little stilted, a little high as he shakes his head in an attempt to physically whisk the distracting thoughts welling in his head. “What a thing to say.” is what tumbles out first, so honest in its breathless bewilderment at the things Mydei supposedly sees in him that it makes Phainon feel as if his insides are encased in glass for his viewing pleasure. “All the same — it seems you really are committed to fulfilling our last round's bet, then?” 

Mydei huffs, gaze finally cutting away to pierce itself through the crowd. “The absurd request of the loser doing as the winner wishes for the day? A blow to my pride but I am a man of my word.” 

Phainon rolls his eyes, a fondness buzzing beneath his skin. The feeling had worried him at first, an utterly foolish and deluded idea that it was the oncoming of hives in Mydei’s presence. 

“Absurd request?” He returns, a mischievous twitch to his mouth as he moves to stand in front of the other man. “That’s not quite how I remember you seeing it yesterday. Weren’t you the one laughing and saying I would be the one to regret offering such a thing? I could even smell it on you—” He takes a step closer, eager, head ducking to tuck his nose close to the curve of Mydei’s chin, mirth thick in his mouth as he weaves out of the way of the swipe to his head, a headiness overtaking him at his stolen away indulgence—”your confidence, the surety that that you’d add another win to your belt,” he thinks his voice is breathy, but Phainon is confident he could convince the other alpha it’s from the fact he’s keeping a steady pace walking backwards as Mydei stalks forward with a tight pinch to his shoulders, a rare sprinkling of pink dusting his features; embarrassment. “That you’d have me doing whatever you’d like for the day.” 

(Terrible thing, that. Mydei wouldn’t even need to win such a bet. If he asked Phainon to burn for ten days and ten nights he’d do so gladly, without question.

It’s something he has to keep under lock and key lest his desires slip through his cracks, uproarious and feverish, a ferity to his lack of limits that would make others weary. Unfitting of the hero people need him to be, want him to be. An animal walking around in human skin. Teeth primed and ready; a staving beast at the door, choosing between meat and feed, mongrel or pet. 

He wishes, privately, he was better at navigating what it is he needs to be for others. Just as privately, enviously, he wonders if Mydei ever has to tackle such worries of his own. If with enough time Mydei’s unwavering ability to stay true to himself will rub off on him regardless of the consequences.)

Mydei’s eyes narrow, a pin point, a flatness to his mouth that makes something clench in Phainon’s stomach, a chill licking down his spine, hair raising, sweat sliding the line of his back. He comes to a stop and Phainon has to squash the irrational disappointment of having their chase, his opportunity to reverse it all, snuffed. “What,” Mydei starts, tone a clipped gruffness as he searches for a hint of something—anything that Phainon has made careful effort to keep hidden away. “Are you planning?” 

Phainon smiles, hands going up, palms out and up. “Nothing, really, and yet you’re looking at me like I’m no better than a swindler. At this rate you really are trying to hurt my feelings.” 

There are a lot of things that swirl though his mind even as he says it. Of asking if he could just—pull Mydei into one of the numerous hidden alleys of the market and bask in him, drench themselves in each other’s scent outside of their spars, if he could sink his teeth into the soft skin of Mydei’s shoulder, what it would feel like if Mydei took of his gauntlet for just—just a moment and let Phainon see how different they were; wonders if he tore into the skin of Mydei’s chest he could fit his heart between his teeth.

Has to remind himself—you do not devour that which rips your heart with joy. It’s. Unnatural. Supposedly. His desire for Mydei. An alpha. Feels the push for his submission like a high as it wars with the instinctual need to put a threat to himself down. Feels a flicker of heat beneath his skin that burns sweet anytime he gets the other man’s attention in ways fawning from others doesn’t. 

Something else wrong with him. Unfixable unlike the rest, a selfish preference when compared to all the things Phainon is willing to shed and discard in pursuit of the people. An otherwise blank canvas aside from one speck, one measly blemish. Surely something that can be overlooked, left unanalyzed, inscrutable. 

 A quiet acceptance so long as Phainon offers all that he can. Close friends the historians of Amphoreus might write of him, of them. Phainon will take it. Anything at all. 

After a moment of continued staring Phainon lets out an exaggerated sigh, a huff of air through his nose full of exasperated fondness. “Fine, fine,” he relents. “I do have a request to make of you, but later. I really did just invite you out to the market to look around for a while. You hardly ever come out to the market unless it’s for groceries or forcing me to pay Kyros.”

“Forcing you?” The rumble of it is disbelieving, as one of Mydei’s brows arch, but his shoulders have eased, a return to their equilibrium. “As far as I remember it was not I that offered my coin pouch first in the pursuit of a fight.” His smile turns sharp, a hint of teeth at the edge as he drags his gaze down Phainon’s form in a familiar judgement, a playful mockery and Phainon feels a heat crawl up the back of his neck, less embarrassment more…thirsting, eager; Mydei clearly saw reason to keep coming back, after all. “Nor,” he continues, “Was I the first to lose it in that pursuit. Who was it you were saying was a sore loser just a moment ago, Deliverer?” 

It’s a silly thing, perhaps even terribly juvenile of him, but Phainon can privately, only ever to himself, admit he enjoys his losses. The Crown Prince of Kremnos, relying on his pocket, allowing himself to be dined and provided for by another alpha, a farm boy, a nobody. Mydei probably doesn’t see it that way—would, in fact, probably throw him through a building if he picked up on Phainon’s thoughts he’s sure. 

He can’t help it though. Phainon wants, horribly, desperately, even. It’s a facade—his nonchalance and teasing, a protective film over the noisy buzzing of his insides, a muffler to his thundering heart. It’s courting even if Phainon is the only one that knows.

Phainon hums. “Mean.” he says, but it comes out warm, more laughter spilling from him. “You’ll enjoy this though—I’m certain of it! You were reluctant about the baths and yet now you go all the time.”

Mydei looks at him, expression flat. “You drag me out of bed.” 

“Yes,” Phainon agrees without any shame or withholding, a smugness blooming across his face. “But we both know if you really didn’t want to join me you wouldn’t let me do it.” 

“Hah,” Mydei breathes, eyes closing as he shakes his head. “Stubborn.” There’s a lot packed into that one word. A warmth to it just as there is a real exasperation, an irritation; an annoyance he can’t let himself be without.

It sets a simmer in Phainon’s stomach, his smile full of teeth. A feast of his own making. His hands are kept politely behind his back as he waits for the inevitable relent Mydei will grace him with. If he lets them hang by his sides, or Titans’ above if Phainon lets himself touch the other man he fears Mydei will really kill him if he gives into the urge to cradle Mydei’s face between his palms and press a fleeting kiss to the crease in his brow. 

They’re not mates, or courting, or—or anything, really, that warrants the allowances Phainon takes. 

He’s a thief at the heart of it. Blessed by Zagreus with his coveting hands.

“Fine,” Mydei says, a blunt word, but it makes Phainon beam. “A day,” Mydei continues, and there’s a ravenous hunger that starts to claw itself into Phainon’s belly. So much time. “You can drag me about wherever for a day.”

“No takebacks?” If it’s eager, hunting, butcher-edged, no one has to be any the wiser that it’s from Phainon’s own desperate need for this to be a vow, something Mydeimos will not allow himself to break. There’s a shackle straining in the back of his mind. 

Phainon can only wonder if he looks like a slobbering, deranged beast, a poor play at containment with the way Mydei pauses at the question, mouth a smooth line as he looks at Phainon. “How childish,” Mydei says but there’s a bit of laughter to it, a soft curve to his eyes. He’s pretty like that, when he lets himself soften for Phainon. “I never run from my vows, Deliverer. I would expect the same from you.” 

“It’s a date then,” it’s breathy when it slips out, a giddiness that suffuses through him so thoroughly that when a tinge of red curls over Mydei’s features along with a scowl Phainon just takes it in with a grin.

“Scoundrel,” Mydei says and it may be the only Kremnoan word Phainon knows at this point, but the way it doesn’t come out as heated as usual, a little mumble, scent puffing in a way that makes Phainon feel dizzy with victory has it all feel like less of an insult and more like a pet name.

 He can’t resist the opportunity. Dipping down just the slightest bit, Phainon puts them nose to nose, words dripping with mirth, thick as ambrosia. “Ah, but I’m your scoundrel, aren’t I, Mydeimos?” It’s almost cooing.  

There’s a brilliant red slinking its way across Mydei’s skin, his mouth pinched into a scowl so fierce Phainon thinks the other alpha is biting back the urge to snap his teeth at him. It’d be hot if he did. A real close up of his teeth to see how Phainon’s compare.

“You—” it’s a strangled word from Mydei’s throat that just makes Phainon grin wider, elated when Mydei lunges, a hand coming up to grab at him and toss him away. Barehanded he meets the burning chill of Mydei’s gauntlet, squeezes his fingers around his fist tight and pulls as he sidesteps Mydei’s weight and spins on his heel to take advantage of Mydei’s stumble, the flex of his hand, to slot their fingers together before he tugs the other man after him and into the market. His laughter pitched high and loud. 

There’s something particularly wonderful about knowing this man. Mydeimos the Undying is comically easy to rile up in a way you want him to once he lets you in. Phainon’s hand will ache later from the impact and the indents from Mydei’s gauntlet will stain his palm for days, but Phainon doesn’t care.

“Don’t get mad, Mydeimos,” Phainon says, a teasing lilt to the words as he looks back and sees what’s now more of a pout than a scowl. “You said so yourself—I could drag you wherever I wanted for a day.”

“I hope you trip and fall into a ditch.” Mydei hisses, fingers squeezing against Phainon’s palm so tightly it feels like he wants to cut him open, but it does little to dissuade Phainon from noticing the blush spreading to his ears. With a harsh exhale he steps up his pace to fall into step next to Phainon. “I am not going to follow after you.” 

“I hardly expected you to.” Phainon laughs. “Equals in everything are we not?”

“Unfortunately.” Mydei huffs. It makes Phainon’s heart throb in his chest as if Nikador has speared him through. He wants more, will always want more, a gluttonous monstrosity that has to sit on the precipice of starvation because it’s all Phainon can allow. 

“So mean,” Phainon says, barely a mumble even as his mouth curls into a self-satisfied smile. Mydei’s hand is cold against his own, but the rest of him is so warm. 

Their shoulders bump as they walk together, Phainon is careful to take smaller steps so they stay at pace. The market is always busy, loud, filled with price calling and bartering. The spike of Mydei’s nerves is sharp in his nose, burning with its acridity so close. He half expects the other alpha to shake free of his grip as they make their way amongst the throng, but delightedly Mydei just keeps his head hefted high, a punishing hold to his grip to compensate once people start looking at them in curiosity.

They’re often a spectacle to the masses of Okhema with their antics and bets, this too is probably only seen as more of their regular if, inane, behavior.

“Don’t look so sour,” Phainon cajoles, swinging their hands, voice pitching high enough to catch the attention of people around them. “Surely the Courtyard will find a solution to whatever it is that those followers of Phagousa concocted that make me feel ill if I’m far from another heir quickly!” All of it said with a chipper smile. 

“You have to be the dumbest man I know,” Mydei tells him, sincere and solemn. “You look far too happy to be malaise.” 

Yet Phainon starts to hear the hums of consideration around them, a sympathetic poor thing, it really isn’t easy going out to the other city-states is it? The casual acceptance of anything can happen to a Chrysos Heir, no matter how far fetched, because they believe in him.

“That’s because I’m just a happy guy, Mydei.” Phainon says, looking ahead once he’s successfully pulled attention away from the other man. “You should try it sometimes—or, actually, don’t. You might accidentally kill a few people with the sight.” 

“Ah,” Mydei says, and Phainon hums in question. “Okhemans truly have weak constitutions if a smile puts fear in their hearts.” 

“What?” 

Phainon drags his gaze down Mydei’s form in appreciation—look, he’s not going to turn down a free opportunity—focusing a bit more than usual on his face. Soft, pretty, long lashes, no blemishes or scars, hair that falls in an almost sleepy curl around his features. A man so handsome he has people stopping to stare even now as they walk, and especially so during their visits to the baths; a lethal combination of looks and physique. Death is certainly a likely occurrence through a sudden nosebleed or cardiac arrest but fear is…a new one. 

“I’m not one of those fake antiques you spend ridiculous amounts of money on to look at, Deliverer.” 

“Oh, no, definitely not.” Phainon agrees easily as he leads Mydei past the clothing stalls and weapon hawkers—nothing of interest there, not really. Chartonus is the only person he’d trust for items of that nature; besides, it’s quieter where they’re headed anyway—and enters the journeyman’s and cutler’s corner. “I get to look at you for free whenever I want after all.” 

There’s a twitch to Mydei’s hand, a sourness to his smell, tone turning clipped as he turns his head away. “Stop playing around, Deliverer, I never took you for someone to have a fondness for dalli—”

He hears the warning before the actual stumble, the misstep; the sharp inhale from Mydei’s nose, the scratch of his solleret against the ground, the sudden swing of his body forward, an arm outstretched to catch at one of the stall poles. 

Phainon’s shift in response is quicker. Mydei’s weight is solid against his front, skin warm and the fabric of his himation soft against Phainon’s bare hand where he’s hooked it around his thighs to heft Mydei up. There’s a chill sinking itself into the flesh of his shoulder from where Mydei is trying to rip open a home for his fingers even as he steadies himself, but Phainon ignores it in favor of looking up and searing the indignant blush on Mydei’s skin into his brain. 

He’s pretty. Wide-eyed like this, mouth a little slack in disbelief. Phainon can just see the edges of his canines. There’s a fleeting desire to lower Mydei down just a smidge to lick into his mouth, but Phainon shakes it out of mind — he’s only got the one life after all and while it would be a good way to go out, alas, it can’t be his real end. There’s too much on the line for fantasies like that. 

“Now I know you’re undying and all Mydei, but even you would have to agree that being taken out through head trauma in the agora is a bit…silly, no?” Phainon teases teeth on full display with his smile as he makes sure to do a little twirl with Mydei in his arms, knowing he’ll regret it when he looks at the claw marks on his shoulder in the mirror tomorrow. They won’t be there for a reason he wants. “I didn’t think we went so hard yesterday that your balance would be so unsteady if you stopped paying attention to where you’re going.”

Mydei would never ask him, and Phainon knows better than to push his teasing (and his luck) too far to include: All it would take is a word and I’d keep carrying you, but he’d do it all the same. Mydei doesn’t come near the heaviest thing Phainon’s had to lug around, and he sits so nicely in his hold—it feels a little bit like he’s showing off the thing that means the most to him to the world. A private showcasing of his innermost thoughts.

“Scoundrel,” it’s low, rumbling, a warning as Phainon processes the hks that falls from Mydei’s mouth. There’s a warmth to Mydei’s body that’s a tad concerning, thrumming, as if he’s sat in the hot baths for hours on end, fingers squeezing tight at his shoulder, body wiggling against the vice of his grip. Phainon lets out a weak chuckle, a small, yes, Mydei? even as he looks up and feels something swoop in his gut with the ferocity of one of Mydei’s punches at the glare pinned on him. Ah, maybe for the rest of the day he should stop teasing for just a bit? “I suggest you stop playing around and put me down.” 

“You’ll still join me though, won’t you?” Phainon asks, very distinctly not immediately putting Mydei down.

There’s a twitch to Mydei’s brow. His eyes close and his brows pinch together. His sigh sinks heavy down through his body, an anchor finding home in the seabed of Phainon’s arms. “Annoying,” he mutters. Phainon wants to reach a hand up and trace a finger around the curve of his still red ear. Another sigh, a grumbled thing, almost a groan like Mydei is in disbelief of himself for—something. His own acquiesce, maybe. 

“Fine.” Mydei says after a moment, a bite to the word that Phainon can’t quite place. “Get on with whatever you have planned, Deliverer instead of dragging this out.” 

Honestly, while Phainon does miss the heat of him when he sets the other man down — as well as the. oddly, grounding chill of the gauntlet he held in his hand — when he gives it thought after Mydei puts a bit of space between them, he can’t figure out why Mydei even stayed so still. Allowed himself to be held instead of bringing his fist down upon Phainon’s head the way Talanton’s scale falls upon the corrupt. He’s done it before, in warning when Phainon pushes too far, when he’s done with the teasing and the jokes and the proximity. 

And yet. He let it happen, let it linger. Maybe he’s just used to it now, like how Phainon drags him to the baths, or always calls for him for fights, has his wallet tucked in the inner fold of his clothing for the days he has to pay for dinner.

It means—something. Phainon can’t ascribe a word or a phrase to it, can’t let the warmth that suffuses through him grow into an inferno for something that could be little more than someone growing used to his presence. Can’t let his thoughts get ahead of him, not when he’s taken so many liberties already. 

“I’m sorry,” Phainon says in lieu of anything else that would bare him vulnerable and open to Mydei’s scrutiny. 

“No you’re not.” Mydei says in return, shoulders rolling as he turns back out toward the market a slow come down from his—irritation, annoyance, overwhelm; a dismissal only to his own overload. He hasn’t put so much distance between them that Phainon couldn’t curl his fingers around the curve of his bicep, or into the swash of his fabric if he wanted to. It’s not a full rejection of Phainon’s antics, only a warning, prickly. “You’re never sorry about anything you do. That’s what makes you such a hassle.” A little quieter, not as rough.

“I really do think you’ll enjoy today.” Phainon pushes, eager, always eager; to please, to covet, to earn.

Mydei snorts, his head shaking in a move that Phainon has learned is fond disbelief over dismissal or disagreement. “Stop talking my ear off then and play guide. You’re good at that at least, aren’t you?”

“Probably.” Phainon says with a lopsided grin as he eases a step closer until he’s back in Mydei’s orbit, their steps even. “You’d be my first customer so make sure to rate me fairly, Mydei.” A turn on his heel for the theatrics, a fall into their usual routine as he extends an arm out toward this district of the market. “We’ve got cutlers, we’ve got journeymen, and I spy a knife set with your name on it.” 

“Fool.” Mydei says his mouth curling at the edge. Phainon doesn’t miss the way his gaze skates out across the craftsmens’ wares, settles on some of the woodworkers and their cutting boards, the cutlers and their sets, the leatherworkers and their bags or rolls. “But,” he amends after a moment as his interest gets the better of him and starts moving, “This isn’t the worst place you’ve dragged me.” 

Phainon has thought of it before, of taking him here. A proffer of a gift for Mydei’s hobby over the dinner they always have after a spar. It feels more — personal. More befitting of a courting gesture than food as is. Mydei is gruff and a bit taciturn, and sometimes, only sometimes he tries to poison Phainon’s food when he’s mad at him, but this place is a fitting gesture all the same.

“Told you, you’d like it!” Phainon laughs out trailing at Mydei’s side as they coast along the stalls. “Still, I’m surprised that even with your limited visits to the market that you haven’t swung by just to look.”

“Not worth it.” Mydei says his fingers ghosting over a lain out knife roll, nails catching at one of the open pockets. Occasionally they all dine together after missions or discussions, but the kitchen is borrowed, a space within the Palace. Very few of them have hosted at their own abodes or temporary homes. 

Mydei has—something. Old instruments, well loved, well-maintained, mementos of a time before, from people before; his self-constructed family. He uses them for every meal they have together as a group, carried carefully in his hands or in a basket that Tribio’s proffers whenever they go to retrieve him for any festivities. 

Behind the table—the stall owner attending someone else for a moment, distracted if only for a moment—Phainon catches the welling stink of nerves, apprehension, a keen burn in his nose as Mydei keeps looking down at the roll. “Do you want it?” There’s an ebb to the scent, a placation that makes his mouth want to curl. He knows there are still — tensions. One could say, between the people of Okhema and the Detachment. Phainon just. hadn’t always been so cognizant of it. 

“No.” Mydei says, blunt as unformed steel as he turns on his heel, arms once more going to cross in front of his chest and starts heading off to another stall. 

“Too bad.” Phainon hums out digging his wallet free from his coat. “I do.” 

There’s a snort from his companion, something muttered under his breath that Phainon can’t quite catch. Probably an insult of some kind, or a comment about his spending habits. Even if he’d heard it in full it’d be water off his back. 

Fitting the sling over his shoulders Phainon hurries after him, picking out the tartness of pomegranates with ease among all the people. It’s just a gift for later to leave at Mydei’s own abode when they’re done for the day and Mydei has to go through his rounds of groceries for the day. It’s the whole reason he brought the other man here—the craftsmen’s quarter circles back around to the regular market. 

There’s the smell of leather and wax in his nose, the burn of well used metal and its shavings, the fragrant whiff of wood, earthy and sweet. It had been overwhelming to the senses when he first arrived, but now it’s just his life. Sometimes he catches the hint of wheat sheaf in his nose and gets drawn into the past, but it’s far and between now. 

Okhema is more prone to finery than agriculture, but he’s grateful for it. He’s less likely to get caught in his own memories like this. 

“So,” Phainon starts, the newly acquired bag shifting against his back when leans over Mydei’s shoulder to take in what he’s looking at. An assortment of different cutting boards. Some glass—decorative, really, the damage to a good knife is egregious, and the noise it makes is like being in the midst of battle. Really, the only wonderful thing about them is using it to knead dough.—some shaped and cut like pumpkins or fish, another with a honeycomb inlay, others still are stumps or abnormal shapes. “What’re you thinking?” 

“About why you keep following me. Surely there are other places for you to look at on your own—like a new collar, or your own spices.” 

For a brief moment the thought of a matching leather band across Mydei’s throat crosses his mind. Thick, loose enough to curl his fingers under, a buckle on the back. Something that would require a bit of help to put on. Phainon swallows, his gaze flicking to the base of Mydei’s neck, his teeth itching. He inhales, flexes his fingers.

“Nah,” he says, edging closer, chin brushing at the slant of Mydei’s shoulder to look at the various boards. “It’s easier to just take all the extras you bring with you when you cook. And,” he adds, a smug tint to it that makes Mydei roll his eyes. “I’m having fun watching you look around. I come here all the time. It's more interesting trailing you.” 

“Is it?” Mydei asks, something considering in the tone. One of his hands ghosts over the grain of the wood, though with the protective metal around his fingers Phainon doesn’t know what he’s feeling, what he’s looking for. 

Part of him wants to reach out and curl his fingers in the flesh of Mydei’s arm to hold it still while the other hand slips off the gauntlet, trace his nails against the skin, feel the curve of the tips of his fingers, see if his nails are seashell pink, if the blush that crawls from his cheeks to his ears and down his neck trails so far that it dusts his knuckles, his fingers.

It’d be easy in this moment with Mydei so distracted with the items before him, fingers lazily grazing over certain designs, his singular focus on something lost to Phainon. It might get him a hit to the head, or a snarl that works its way through his bones, but sometimes that whole, survival-instincts-thing everyone’s supposed to have gives up on him in the face of his more impulsive desires.

His finger twitches at his side. Now that Phainon thinks about it he’s really only seen Mydei’s bare hands in the baths or during meals. Private and arguably intimate affairs, but never really alone or personal. It’d be nice to work the metal off his forearms and see how they compare. If his hand is the same size, if his immortality makes his skin perpetually soft—if he’s ever developed callouses. Wonders if they’d have a drag against his teeth, his tongue—

“—in return you’ll be making yourself useful.” Phainon only blinks out of his reverie when he feels something heavy get shoved into his chest, hands fumbling to hold on to it as he looks down boggle-eyed at the cutting board now in his arms. He looks up, blinks once-twice in confusion as Mydei huffs and shakes his head. 

“You’re carrying everything today for being so annoying.” Mydei says, which. Sure, whatever, Phainon was just thinking about nipping at his fingers, there’s really not much he wouldn’t do. “Now come on, I’m done looking around here, we’re getting groceries.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be going where I want you to?” Phainon asks with a huffing laugh.

“Perhaps, but you said yourself, it's more interesting to follow me.” Mydei says a curl to his mouth that feels as if it’s mocking him as he looks at Phainon out of the corner of his eye. “Or are you going to use up that request of yours and end this whole thing to get me to do what you want, Deliverer?”

“You really make it sound like you expect the worst out of me, Mydei.”

Which. He is. Kinda. Sorta. Only a little bit, and Phainon swears when the time comes it really won’t be as bad as Mydei seems to think it’ll be. Well—hopefully. He doesn’t really have a reference for how Mydei will react to him. Or if he’ll get ahead of himself.

“On occasion.” Mydei huffs out with a warmth that makes his scent change, a private swirl of enjoyment. He understands Mydei better than most, he thinks, but the times he can smell it on the man Phainon is left off-foot in his curiosity of it. “Today isn’t such a day though. As you said—I will be enjoying myself as you carry everything.”

Phainon snorts. “I feel like you’re trying to punish me for something.”

Mydei’s mouth is filled with mirth, scent still swirling warm, his mouth a crooked hook at the edge. “On occasion. Now keep up and join me or run home to wait for me.” 

“What?” It's a belated question, his feet sealing themselves to the cobblestone floor of the marketplace as Phainon watches the other alpha weave between the other market-goers, avoiding swinging baskets or hands, chatter bellowing in his ears as the words swing about in his head on repeat. Run home to wait for me.

It feels like, like—an invitation of a sort. One that Phainon knows he can’t latch on to because if he does he won’t let it go until his fingers are torn and bloody, nails dug in so deep they’ll leave trenches if he’s ripped free. A bloody banquet, sinew and muscle cut beneath the nail to pick out with his teeth, mouth stained red as pomegranate juice with blood and marrow he’d suck out from the wound. Esurient. Dog-hunger. An altar in the making between his teeth, not a scrap left behind because that’s love—to devour in enormity, entirety, no offal gone to waste. 

He breaths in, deep, nose saturated with the thrum of the people and their sweat, their clothing, their perfumes. Mouth opens just slightly to pant, breath heated, as he lets Mydei fall away from his sight to inhale like a man that’s just resurfaced from the sea after a turbulent rocking of the waves. 

It’s a bit terrifying when Phainon has to realize how much of his current world orbits around this man. 

Mydei smells like autumn, when everything looks most beautiful when it’s dying; russets and tangerines the shade of gold, a citrusy spice, a floral spritz, parchment of baked earth, softer, softer, beneath the death that seems to wallow with autumnal coming is the sweet-tart-wine of pomegranates, the saccharine sour of the arils, further still mixed in that wine of fruit that makes Phainon’s mouth water is the mild, creamy tint of milk. Sweet, a delicacy.

The other alpha could travel to the other ends of the world and Phainon could dog at his heels with his nose alone. There’s nowhere Mydei could go that Phainon could not and would not follow with a damning determination; he wants with the world-swallowing brame of an eclipse, the sundering sun that scorches in summer. 

Keep up he said first, and that—that is an invitation Phainon will take. A chase, a hunt, a playful cornering through the market as he slides through the people of Okhema with a singular focus. There’s a thundering in his chest, a drumming sound in his head, a driving force as he pursues.

The journeymen’s quarter loops back around to the regular market, greenery and dyes, fresh fruits and cheeses, the wafting aroma of wines and teas. This is the place Mydei visits weekly, the place that Phainon knows all of his local haunts. A given, really, considering Phainon introduced him to half of them. 

There are pockets of new scents that cling to Mydei’s form as he gets closer, trailing behind enough to snatch up the little bagged or stored goodies Mydei leaves behind for him to carry as familiar shop keepers laugh under their breath at his laden arms. This too is a familiar sight to many Okhemans. Phainon has had to carry the other man’s groceries several times over at this point due to prior bets.

It’s a cacophony of scents on his person as Phainon looks around for another hint of wheat hair. Sesame and honey, flour, the tang of salt olive oil, the grassy plume of fresh spinach and dill, the burn of onions and garlic, and possibly like feta. He’s not sure what Mydei will be making, only certain that at some point in the day he will. 

Sometimes it’s dropped off at his own home during the Parting Hour as a little gift at his door, or when Mydei wants to play a game—on the window edge of his home. Other days it’s brought to their spars as a come down snack or pre-fight enjoyment. Rarer he brings it along to the Garden when he feeds the chimeras and shares whatever he’s made with the Heirs around. Not as personal, then, but still enjoyable.

Phainon likes it best when he makes something specific for whoever joins him on a mission. It’s a private thing, then, no requirement to share. Sometimes it’s simple like pasteli to enjoy on the job for a burst of energy and sweetness, something to raise the spirits. 

(Privately, never to be said aloud, Phainon wonders if one day he’ll ever get to taste wedding rice. If he’ll be the one making it, if he’ll have to enjoy it at someone else’s wedding or courting event instead of his own.)

 Other times it’s more involved meals. Spanokopita, moussaka, pastitsio, sometimes lucky cookies for the fun of it. 

They’re done now, though. The din of the market is fading as Phainon trails after Mydei, his hair a beacon when his nose is so stuffed with other things. It’s to the residential district now, a quieter affair as Action Hour starts to encroach. His palms grow sweaty.

He’s done this before—plenty of times, even! He feels like a schoolboy, steps getting a little wobbly the closer they get, heart in a lurch. It’s just. Wait for me at home. Might’ve been a joke, probably was in all honesty. But. Home. 

In a way Mydei is the closest thing he has as a reminder. The Heirs are—present, involved in his life, friendly and understanding, but they don’t evoke a nostalgia in him that threatens to send him to his knees. The wheat fields, the pomegranate trees, the setting sun a vibrant red over the water. An open wound. 

He wants Aedes Elysia to—to return from his memories. Wants it all back in a way that would frighten people. Mydei isn’t a stand-in, not really, but he helps Phainon remember, and sometimes, only sometimes, he thinks if he had to find or make another home that it would have to have the other man in it if he were going to be truly happy. A selfish thing, a childish thing, and yet. 

There’s sweat dripping down the line of his spine as Phainon trails and trails and trails until his feet are clinking against the stone of Mydei’s stoop and he’s staring up at the curve of the doorway. His palms are so sweaty.

“You kept up then.” Mydei says the door already unlocked and waiting patiently at the entrance. Phainon can almost trick himself into thinking there’s a korythale hanging from the top of the doorway instead of one of the wreaths the children of Okhema create and share with their neighbors.

“Always.” Phainon says, but his laugh is a little stilted, his nerves starting to bubble as he shifts the groceries in his arms. “You couldn’t shake me off even if you really wanted to.”

“No.” Mydei agrees. “You’re like a tick.” 

For some reason the agreement makes him giddy, a lurch to his heart that feels painful. He bites at the inside of his cheek just to ground himself. Licks at his dry lips. “So…gonna let me in today or just leave me outside?” 

Mydei just hums, head tilting in a genuine kind of consideration that makes Phainon’s stomach clench in a way he’s very deliberately not going to give any thought to. He really is like a stray dog. There’s no verbal reply, only a turn on Mydei’s heel and the door being edged open wider. 

He’s been here before. Only a few times, really, but he has to stop the shudder that wants to work its way through him at entering a space suffused in Mydei’s scent, his sweat, his general living.

“You remember where everything goes right?” There are fingers, blunted, round and—oh, they’re off. Phainon blinks, spine ramrod straight as he flicks his gaze about until he settles on glinted gold on a side table—curling at the strap of the knife bag to ease it over his head and place it on the table.

“Mmhm.” A hum is all he can manage. The various items are balanced precariously on the top of the board as Phainon hurries into the kitchen.

His hands continue to shake even as he starts up on this new task. Habits, nearly, with the amount of times he’d been allowed in to help put things away. Mydei has a structure to things that people don’t really consider or know unless they, well, know him.

“You’re quiet.” It’s followed by a huff of amusement as Phainon feels eyes on his back as he moves around in Mydei’s kitchen. It makes a searing line nip at the back of his neck, a nervous twitch to his hands, mouth still dry. 

“I’m just—working.” Is what Phainon settles on. Not a lie considering he is, but it feels like a safe answer even as he catches the way Mydei prowls around to the other side of the counter, gaze lidded, almost bored, and eyebrow cocked, a considering, working? It makes Phainon release a huff of his own, a bit of nervous heat to it. “You realize that now you look like you’re the one plotting something, right?”

“So you were plotting something?” It’s a drawl, a peek of teeth over the top of Mydei’s bottom lip, amused, the lazy circling of a big cat.

“No.” It’s instant, then just as quickly followed by: “Stop putting words in my mouth. I really did just want you to have fun.”

“Nothing else then?” Phainon’s fingers twitch against the edge of the cabinet, mouth watering at the hint of something reticent—almost disappointed, wanting if he wanted to be bold. He blinks doe-eyed at Mydei as he watches the curl of his mouth, the words forming between his lips the way a vulture watches a calf left by its lonesome. “I thought you said you had a request earlier, must’ve been mistaken.”

“No—” it’s a bark of a word, and Phainon clears his throat, heat budding beneath his skin. His hands are hidden at his sides as he flexes the muscles in an attempt to ground himself. “No,” he tries again, a little calmer, maybe a little delirious in thinking Mydei has leaned a little further across the counter. He swallows. “That’s—that’s different. I figured I’d ask when we’re done here.” Then, belatedly, fumbling: ”Outside, I mean.”  

Seems safer, honestly. Phainon thinks Mydei would try to kill him a second time over if they broke anything in his house. 

“Okay.” Mydei says, slow, deliberate. He looks around the kitchen to where Phainon has set the board by his hoard of fruits and counter safe vegetables, to where he’s set all the spices against the back wall organized as Mydei always has them, then back to Phainon to pin him in place. “I’d say we’re done here.”

“Okay?” It’s so terribly high when it escapes him. Phainon feels like a school boy.

“Yeah.” There’s no preamble to it,  just a steady deep drawl as Mydei straightens from his lounging. “Are you coming or not? Let’s get this over with.”

There’s no shame in admitting that Phainon curses under his breath after he nearly trips over a chair leg in his haste to follow the other man back outside.

It’s the same streets Phainon has walked more times than he can count, but right now as he stands on the stoop with the other man there’s a nervous curl in his gut, a heat to the back of his neck that feels feverish, the sickly fester of an open wound, as if he’s committed a vivisection upon himself instead of just—standing. 

Mydei is leaned against the wall by the door, arms crossed in front of his chest as he looks at Phainon with open amusement. A languid confidence in the face of Phainon’s own buzzing nerves and sweat-slick hands. “Your request.” Mydei prompts still as stone and just as unbudging. 

Phainon clears his throat. “Ah, well,” he waffles, scratching at his cheek, gaze turned away, focusing haphazardly instead on a neighbor's window, their flowers unfurling brightly toward the Dawn Device. He feels once more like a stray puppy, lost and its feet too big for its body. “I just, I want to scent you. Like—” companions do, like mates do, like sometimes-friends-but-totally-more-than-friends—”packmates do on occasion.” There’s heat blossoming across his cheeks and Phainon can’t lift his head from where he’s now looking at the floor. 

Packmates. He wants to strangle himself. He sounds—juvenile. The mortification infused blush gets hotter on his skin the longer Phainon stands in returning silence. His palms are so sweaty he’s pretty sure it would slip right off a door knob, or that any swing he made with his greatsword would send the weapon flying. 

Titans above he could have said anything else—friend, even, or just that it’s, it’s a common practice among Okhemans, or if he were using his brain at all, something people in Aedes Elysia did. 

A bark of laughter has his head snapping up as Mydei shifts away from the wall to step closer to him, hair brushing at Phainon’s skin. “Fine.” Mydei says, and reality snaps back with the force of a hit to the face as Phainon has to clamp down the immediate urge to bury his face into Mydei’s neck. He inhales sharply instead, a wavering, really? it’s okay? that has Mydei rolling his eyes, tilting his neck to the side as if to prove a point. “Get it over with before I change my mind, Deliverer.” 

His hands are still shaking when he settles one against the soft sloping curve of Mydei’s cheek, thumb rubbing once-twice at the space below Mydei’s eye, the other carefully lifting his side braid to bring up to his lips. Mydei smells sweet this close, a soft sigh escaping him as Phainon rests their foreheads together, eyes closed out of selfish fear for what he’ll see if he faces the other man. The hand holding the braid moves to cradle the curve of Mydei’s head, hair twisting between his fingers soft as silk. It fills him, his nose, his mouth, his very skin as Phainon drinks him in as if it were a bottle of ambrosia before him instead of a man. 

Mydei is still under his hands, but he can feel the taut of his muscle, the clench in his jaw, the flutter of his lashes. The internal war of allowing something with sharp teeth so close despite knowing it won’t hurt you. Mydei’s breath is a warm puff against his cheek as Phainon slots them closer, folded arms meeting the flat of his chest as a last barricade as he drags his nose across Mydei’s skin, the path of his cheek, a low, pleased rumble escaping him unbidden when he gets to the notch of his ear. Down, down, down, the expanse of his neck. He thinks his knees buckle a little, a lowering of his being to nudge at the bottom of Mydei’s jaw. 

Phainon’s eyes flutter open, mind hazy with the tartness of pomegranates and milk, the quiet acquiesce he’s being allowed, vision being filled with a halo of wheatfields and a pink sunset that ghosts over Mydei’s cheeks. There’s a hand against his chest when he inhales again, drool pooling in the back of his mouth. He licks his lips, feels a shudder beneath his hands when he fists his fingers in Mydei’s hair to keep him still and steady before he presses a brief kiss to the divet of Mydei’s shoulder, licks a hot, wet strip along the line of his neck, uncaring of the warning rumble as he nibbles at the skin. He thinks Mydei’s blood would fall in a thick rush with how quickly he regenerates from his deaths, it would stain his teeth gold, tongue bathed in the sacramental wine of the body. 

Drunk with the proximity, from the thought, Phainon buries his nose into his skin, teeth sinking deep, deep, deeper still until he feels the first prick of blissful blessing before he’s wrenched away, an animal noise wresting from his breast, the warm pierce of fingers digging into his skin before there’s the whistle of air in his ears, the crunch of his body against a hard surface, head spinning from the vertigo. 

Mydeimos throws him through a wall. It is, perhaps, in hindsight, not entirely out of nowhere Phainon comes to realize as the stars swirling above his head start to slow in pace but pinpointing what is for a different him to deal with later. Preferably a non-concussed version of him. 

At the moment he’s more focused on willing into existence someone, quite literally anyone, running off to get a healer from the Courtyard so he doesn’t pass out from blood loss with a concussion. That’s not a good thing to do, he's pretty sure. Hyacine had gotten rather huffy with him when he’d mentioned that sometimes despite any aches and pains he’d just…kind of sleep them off. Unfortunately Phainon is pretty sure that aside from the new knowledge knot on the backside of his head he’s got a broken, well, not everything but certainly a lot.

His chest is making a weird wheezing noise when he exhales. Not a great sign. Being thrown through several layers of rock and marble will do that to a person. 

Worth it though. So, so, so worth it. He definitely went too far, considering he’s ended up on in a heap on the floor with a bleeding head and at least one fucked up lung, but Phainon knows himself well enough that given the chance for a do-over he’d make the same decision.

His head is still spinning when he registers the clunk of Mydei’s feet against the debris, still gets a hint of flustered embarrassment in his noise, the floral tones of his scent spiced with his incense, and all Phainon can think is smile, blood in his teeth. Mydei is hot even when he looks like he wants to kill Phainon. 

“Sorry,” He says, not meaning it in the slightest, the delirious laughter bubbling out of him making his chest ache, a dot of black entering his vision.

“No you’re not.” Mydei tells him as he drops down to a knee to fist his hand in the collar of Phainon’s shirt to heft him up, nose to nose. He looks pretty. There’s a thin line of gold flowing down from his shoulder and along the curve of his chest, down into the depths of his robes where Phainon can’t see. 

“I’m not.” Phainon agrees just as easily, adrenaline and endorphins making him bravely stupid. He did get what he wanted at the end of the day, and he definitely did get ahead of himself, but there are always consequences for them, and always sacrifices to make to get them. He’s just leaving that aftermath for a non-concussed version of himself to deal with. 

There’s a huff, still fond, still warm despite the aggravation he can hear in it, the inferno of feelings swirling in his head as Phainon huffs at the air, Mydei’s scent and open feast for him to enjoy despite everything. “You know what you are? You’re an idiot.” It’s a ragged thing, a hot puff of air against his mouth, as Mydei bites at his chin until Phainon yelps pitifully in his hand, a whine at the unfairness of it all. Settles into a contented animal rumble when Mydei licks at the mess, skin glistening gold from the lips down, a hand attempting to grasp weakly at Mydei’s shoulder despite the ugly noise it makes as he moves to drag him just slightly, until there’s blood on his mouth, until Phainon can lick into Mydei’s own with the delirious achievement of a victorious man. 

“Annoying,” Mydei hisses, but his other hand comes up to smooth hair out of Phainon’s eyes. “Ask next time and I’ll say yes.”

Phainon will want to shout from the rooftops tomorrow that the handsomest man in Amphoreus kissed him, and maybe someone will believe him, but for now he’s got to deal with several broken bones and what he’s pretty sure is a piece of someone’s broken off roof digging into his ass as Mydei physically drags him away for treatment. 

So worth it, Titans above.