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Things they don’t tell you about when you first turn into a dragon: everything is so much more. To be fair to them, Wriothesley is pretty sure he’s the only human to actually turn into a dragon, and the dragons that do still exist probably don’t have any basis for comparison. So, he doesn’t blame Neuvillette for the pounding headaches he gets because everything is just too much, and he has a new appreciation for candlelight and cloudy, rainy days. He also has a new understanding of and appreciation for Neuvillette’s obsession with his clothes, even when Neuvillette isn’t in heat.
“That’s my shirt,” Neuvillette says wryly.
Wriothesley, in the middle of struggling into the shirt in question, freezes. He blinks at Neuvillette, eyes owl wide. “It was on my side of the wardrobe,” he says.
“Yes.” Neuvillette’s lips quirk. “I’ve noticed you prefer wearing shirts that have my scent on them, so I’ve started placing some of mine near yours.”
“Oh.” Wriothesley drops his arms, letting the shirt slide into his hands. “Huh.” He frowns, clenching his fingers in the fabric, not quite willing to give the shirt up. It’s been like this, too, since his change. His need to be surrounded by Neuvillette’s scent is chronic. “Am I that obvious?”
“That you find my scent restful?” Neuvillette asks, crossing the room to gently loosen Wriothesley’s fingers. When he has reclaimed his shirt, he presses his palm to Wriothesley’s cheek. “It is no different for me, but I am far more accustomed to these instincts than you are. You were restless before. This has helped.”
Wriothesley chuffs, more dragon than human, and grins. “Thank you for knowing me better than I know myself.”
“Yes, well.” Neuvillette shakes out the shirt and picks at one shoulder. “We may need to label my shirts so you don’t make this mistake again.” He holds up the shirt, separating a torn seam with a dramatic sigh. “The first of what I can only assume will be many casualties.”
“We can fix it,” Wriothesley offers.
Neuvillette lifts a brow.
“I can fix it,” Wriothesley amends. “I’ll stitch it up this weekend.” He turns back to the wardrobe, fishing out a shirt that’s actually his, and he brings it to his face to inhale Neuvillette’s comforting scent. Paper and ink and romaritime flowers, a mask for Wriothesley’s leather and engine grease. “Fuck, you smell good.” He breathes out the words, taking another deep breath with his face buried in the shirt.
Neuvillette touches the small of his back. “I’ve had another thought.”
Wriothesley glances at him with a quirked brow.
Turning away, Neuvillette digs through the nearby dresser, removing from it a carefully folded square of fabric. White and lacy, much like one of his jabots. “I wore this yesterday.” His fingers flutter over his throat. “So it will carry my scent even more strongly. You might wear it as a pocket square.”
Wriothesley does up his buttons as he follows after Neuvillette. Once he’s finished, he takes the folded jabot from Neuvillette’s fingers and sticks it in the little pocket over his chest, where it fits neatly. “Perfect,” he says, bending to kiss Neuvillette’s lips. Slow, gentle. Hunger stirs low in his belly, desire spreading through him. Everything is more, and the touch of his mouth to Neuvillette’s is enticing silk on silk.
But it’s six-thirty in the morning, the children will be up soon to demand breakfast, and they both have to get to work. There’s no time for sex, even quick sex, which just sets Wriothesley on edge.
He presses his face into the crook of Neuvillette’s neck. “We need a vacation,” he mutters.
Neuvillette runs his fingers through Wriothesley’s hair, his claws dragging over Wriothesley’s scalp, sending shivers down his spine. “Perhaps in a few months. You will survive the Fortress, beloved.”
Groaning, Wriothesley withdraws from Neuvillette. “If the smells don’t kill me.”
So, yeah, everything is so much more. His obsession with Neuvillette’s scent, the overwhelming scents of the Court itself, the sounds, the sights. Bright sunlight stabs into his eyes, and he chokes on the smells wafting through the air: perfume and coffee, cologne and freshly baked bread. It’s enough to drive a man to the end of his wits, and just pressing Neuvillette’s jabot to his nose and mouth isn’t enough.
While his commute has been getting worse and worse, sure, it’s never been this bad. He’s craved Neuvillette’s scent, but he’s never needed it like this—and he holds the jabot to his nose as he breathes shallowly through his mouth, trying desperately to avoid smelling too much. But he can’t, and he’s starting to spiral, and he knows it. Irritation prickles down his spine, tension runs through all his limbs, frustration pulls his lips back from teeth that are suddenly fangs, and while everyone knows he’s a dragon, while everyone assumes he’s the Hydro Dragon Sovereign, he doesn’t need them to see him transform in the middle of the fucking street.
He moves without thinking, shouldering his way through morning commuters, walking almost blindly. Instinct drives him forward, and he picks up his pace. His feet pound against the pavement. The aquabus. He just needs to get to the aquabus. The Navia line is breezy and open, and the fresh air will clear his head if he can just fucking get there.
He finds himself throwing open a door and stepping into a shop instead.
The shop is quiet, dimly lit, cozy. The walls curve around him in a way that’s protective instead of claustrophobic, and he exhales heavily. When he breathes in again, hundreds of scents hit his nose, none of them offensive. Bergamot, honeysuckle, lemon, chamomile. Leaf Some for Tea is both the best tea shop in the Court and his favorite, and he’s avoided the place in the weeks following his transformation out of fear of hating the smell of it.
Now, slowly, he lowers Neuvillette’s jabot from his nose, inhales deeply, and finds—well. Not peace, that’s for sure. All his interest sharpens on the tea shop around him. With shocking ease, he separates out all the different individual flavors of tea and identifies the ones he doesn’t already have. And he needs them. Suddenly, viscerally, with almost the same drive that he needed Neuvillette during his rut, he needs these teas.
Not a minute later, he’s grabbed a shopping basket and filled it with five different tins. He stares at his new collection, a little baffled by his behavior, and then catches another new scent. Vanilla and almond. Without thought, he crosses the shop to find the tea in question, mindlessly putting it in his basket along with the others.
More. He needs more. There have to be more teas here he hasn’t had before, and he finds them with a single-minded intensity.
“That will be eight thousand mora,” the proprietor says, shaking Wriothesley out of his daze.
He blinks rapidly, staring down at the teas on the counter, and then lifts a baffled gaze to said proprietor’s own. Armand, who Wriothesley knows quite well, smiles back at him.
“I know you’ll appreciate the vanilla almond blend especially, Your Grace,” Armand says cheerfully.
Bewildered and far too embarrassed not to complete the purchase, Wriothesley says, “Can you charge my account?”
“Of course, Your Grace. And I must say, I am quite pleased you still mean to frequent us.”
Wriothesley continues to stare, still not quite on the right footing. “Er,” he says, stupidly.
“What with the revelation of who you are,” Armande says. “Surely, there are better tea shops in Fontaine.”
More expensive ones, certainly. Wriothesley forces a friendly laugh, shaking himself. “Come on, Armand,” he says, trying to find his usual, friendly demeanor beneath a sudden wave of need. Not for Neuvillette, which wouldn’t be unusual, but for the fucking tea. Armand is still bagging it, and Wriothesley’s fingers twitch with the desire to tear that bag from Armand’s hands and run out of the shop. “No one’s better than you.”
“Well, I’m honored by your continued patronage,” Armand says, passing the bagged tea to Wriothesley.
It takes all of Wriothesley’s self-control not to grab the bag, open it, and quite literally count up all the tins inside it. “No better place in all the Court,” he assures Armand. With a wave, he departs the tea shop, staring at the bag in his hand. “What the fuck?” he mutters to himself.
He arrives at Meropide within the hour and goes right to his office, clutching his tea at his side instead of against his chest, because he’s not a fucking lunatic. But people keep looking at him, and Wriothesley is absolutely convinced that they’re looking at his tea in particular. They want it, which is fair of them. He bought the best tea in Armand’s shop. Understandable that he’s surrounded by greedy, avaricious monsters who want to take from him.
The tea needs to be protected. Immediately.
So, when he gets to his office, he goes right to his tea cupboard which, he’s appalled to realize, doesn’t have a lock on it. Short-sighted of him. Extremely short-sighted of him. He’ll need to modify the cupboard immediately, but that would mean leaving his tea unguarded, and his walk to his office proved that’s a dangerous thing to do. Everyone in the Fortress wants his tea.
His tea.
He growls softly, running his tongue over the sharp points of his fangs.
That shocks him back to himself. He shakes himself once, firmly, seizing control of his form. Staying human isn’t particularly troublesome for him, but once he starts to slip forms, shifting back is a real pain in the ass. He wrestles with his body for a good handful of minutes, sweating through the exertion of not sprouting a godsdamn tail and tearing his pants.
When he’s finally got himself under control, he opens the bag of tea. Opens the cupboard. Surveys the landscape before him, and with a long, deep breath realizes that everything is in the wrong place.
Alright. He’ll rearrange the cupboard by scent and then, when he’s done, he’ll go to the Production Zone, find Jurieu or Lourvine, and get some locks to install.
Three hours later, he’s still sitting in front of the tea cupboard. He’s rearranged his teas three times, now, and none of the configurations have been right. His teas deserve better than this dinged wood with its peeling paint, and he has half a mind to go down to the Production Zone and make a new cabinet entirely. He’s never done any kind of woodworking, doesn’t even know if they have wooden boards large enough to make a cabinet, but he can’t imagine it’s too complicated. Just drill some hinges onto a box and glue the box to some drawers.
There’s a knock on his office door.
Snarling, Wriothesley whips around. Fangs drag across his lips. Black claws sprout from his fingertips. He has barely enough time to stop the godsdamn tail from growing out the base of his spine before the door opens and Sigewinne pokes her head in.
“Your Grace,” she says, singsong and bright. Her scent, antiseptic and lye, hits him a second later, and his stomach heaves. “Your Grace, did you forget your weekly checkup?”
He grabs for Neuvillette’s jabot, pressing it to his face and breathing deeply. “No,” he says through the fabric. Since he completed his transformation into a dragon, Sigewinne has insisted he stop by the infirmary for checkups. She pokes and prods, makes sure his elemental energies aren’t slipping out of alignment, asks him some questions about his mental health, and then sends him on his way. “No, I was just on my way.” He drops the fabric and leans over the railing, looking down at Sigewinne.
She stands in the foyer below with her fists on her hips. With his enhanced sight, her scowl is extremely clear. “Then why are you over an hour late?” she demands.
Well, fuck.
He glances at the clock, realizes he doesn’t remember what time he was supposed to see her anyway, and turns back to her with a shrug. “Got caught up in a few things,” he says.
She starts for the stairs, and his blood pressure skyrockets. If she comes up here, she’ll see his tea collection, and she’ll want it for herself, and then he’ll have to kill her, which isn’t really something he wants to do. But he’s shaken by how easy it is to imagine, and he stumbles away from the railing.
“Don’t come up here,” he says, pressing Neuvillette’s jabot to his face again, breathing in his scent, seeking some desperate clarity that he can’t find. “Something—Something’s not right.”
Sigewinne’s feet pause on the steps. “If something’s wrong, I should definitely come up.”
He snarls, well aware that he’s losing his mind and completely at a loss to stop it. “Sigewinne, I will rip you to pieces if you come up the rest of those stairs, and I’d really rather not do that.”
There’s a beat of silence. “I’d also really rather you not do that,” Sigewinne says. Her feet hit against the stairs again, but in retreat this time. “What’s going on, Your Grace?”
Snarling again, he starts to pace in front of his collection of tea. “I don’t know.” He rakes his fingers through his hair. “It’s got to do with my tea collection, though.”
“Your tea collection?” She asks, baffled.
“Everyone wants it,” he snaps back. “I saw all the guards looking at the tea I bought earlier. They want to take it from me, but it’s mine.”
“Oh. Oooh.” She giggles, which strikes him as unfair, but he’s too pissed about how everyone wants his tea to say something about it. “Why don’t you ask Monsieur Neuvillette to come by?”
Neuvillette? He can’t possibly summon Neuvillette, but just the thought is enough to open the floodgates of their mating bond. Wriothesley’s anxiety sparks along it, Electro and urgent, and Neuvillette’s mental presence washes over him, cool like a mountain lake. Comforting. There’s a psychic weight against his own mind, a reassurance, and he groans. Neuvillette is absolutely on his way, but Wriothesley is in no shape to see him. His den is a mess. He’s a mess.
“He’s on his way,” he grumbles.
“I’ll meet him at the entrance,” Sigewinne says cheerfully, and she ducks out his door, leaving him thinking that she’s some kind of traitor, but his brain is too fuzzy to nail that thought down.
He stares at the mess of tea tins all over the floor and his desk. Right. He can fix all this by the time Neuvillette gets here.
But by the time Neuvillette arrives, Wriothesley has moved all the tea tins to the floor, surrounding himself with the bounty of his riches, sitting in the midst of them. In the intervening hour or so it’s taken for Neuvillette to arrive, he’s counted the tins twice, created a detailed inventory by scent and weight, and is now breathing in the heady aroma of one green tea.
Neuvillette, standing at the top of the stairs, presses a hand to his mouth.
“Don’t say a fucking thing,” Wriothesley says, forcing himself to lower the tin of green tea.
“No,” Neuvillette says from behind his hand, his eyes bright. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“What’s going on?” Wriothesley asks with a groan, gesturing to the sea of tins. “I keep trying to put them away, but then I count them again. And when Sigewinne came to check on me earlier, I was ready to tear her apart if she got too close. I was ready to tear everyone apart. Neuvillette, this is—”
“Hoarding,” Neuvillette says, lowering his hand. He approaches slowly, holding his hands out and to the sides, as if to make it clear that he’s unarmed—or that he won’t take Wriothesley’s tea from him.
But Neuvillette is his mate, so that’s ridiculous. What’s Wriothesley’s is also Neuvillette’s.
“Hoarding? I’m—I’m hoarding tea?”
Neuvillette reaches Wriothesley and kneels slowly. Wriothesley reaches out to help him down. “You are,” Neuvillette replies. “It is a behavior that was more common for me in my adolescence.”
Wriothesley presses his face into his hands. “Am I going through dragon puberty?” When Neuvillette hesitates to respond, he mutters an extremely creative curse into his hands.
“I don’t believe either of us have the anatomy for that,” Neuvillette replies, clearly amused, which is both irritating and relieving. If Neuvillette thinks this is funny, it can’t be that bad.
Dropping his hands, Wriothesley looks up at him. “I’m going through dragon puberty.”
“You’re learning how to deal with instincts that have only just manifested for you,” Neuvillette says gently. “Right now, they’re overwhelming. You’ll learn to manage them.”
“I’ve never seen you hoard anything.”
Neuvillette flushes. “I’ll remind you that not so long ago, you gave me what I assumed were courting gifts. You may recall that I had those with me in my nest during my heat.”
Wriothesley scratches his chin. “Huh.” He sweeps his hand over his teas. “I’m not bringing these into our bed.”
It’s amusing how obvious Neuvillette’s relief is. “No. But you will want to protect what you view as your own, as much with your hoard of tea as with our family.” Neuvillette reaches out, brushing his fingers along Wriothesley’s cheek, and Wriothesley turns into the caress. “What do you need to do to ensure your collection is safe?”
“Locks for the cupboard,” Wriothesley says immediately, closing his eyes and focusing on the body-warm silk pressed to his cheek. “Jurieu and Lourvine will have what I need. If you—If you can stay here and make sure no one tries to steal anything—” He growls as he speaks. “—I can grab what I need.”
“I would be honored to watch over your hoard in your absence.”
Those words are some kind of magic. Wriothesley exhales a tremendous amount of tension. “Alright,” he says. “Alright, I’ll be right back. Don’t… Don’t let anyone in the office.”
“Of course not.”
The day’s a wash, but by the end of it, Wriothesley has a cupboard with locks on the doors to protect his tea, and he’s sprawled on the couch with Neuvillette draped over him, purring contentedly. He rubs his hands up and down Neuvillette’s back, breathing in the comforting scents of his mate and his tea.
“Better?” Neuvillette asks.
Wriothesley rumbles an agreement. “I feel like an idiot,” he admits.
“Why?” Neuvillette cranes his head back, and Wriothesley peers down at him.
“Who hoards tea? Aren’t dragons supposed to hoard interesting things like mora?”
Chuckling, Neuvillette nuzzles into Wriothesley’s shoulder. “In my youth, when I first came to Fontaine, I had many hoards. Hats, fine glassware, spoons.”
Wriothesley lifts a brow. “Spoons?”
“Spoons.” Neuvillette waves a dismissive hand. “My current hoard is romance novels.”
“Huh,” Wriothesley says, realizing how much sense that makes. Neuvillette has a ridiculous number of romance novels piled on every shelf in their house.
“Eventually, your need to hoard will wane, and you’ll be able to let it go, too, should you wish to,” Neuvillette continues. “I continue because I find it soothing.”
Nodding absently, Wriothesley stares at the ceiling. “I just don’t want to feel like I have to sleep here tonight to keep all that tea safe.”
“I will make it much more worth your while to come home,” Neuvillette purrs.
Wriothesley laughs. “As if our little terrorists will let us have the time for that.” He rests one hand on Neuvillette’s hip, resisting the urge to pull Neuvillette onto him. And then he goes still, horrified. “Oh.”
“Oh?”
“The kids. They’re—They’re going to hoard, too, won’t they?”
Neuvillette sighs heavily. “I’m afraid they will.”
“We need a bigger house,” Wriothesley says.
“I’m afraid we do,” Neuvillette agrees.
And so they purchase a larger house, partially in anticipation for their children’s hoards, but also so that Neuvillette can fill a small library with his books and so that Wriothesley has a personal pantry for all his teas.