straysinspace | Some meme threads

Merlin hasn't been the king of the Dusk Court for a long while but Marco has has been busy taking his new position to the kingdoms wide and far, acting as his long arm in both the Dawn court and now with humans. He could have been exploring the world still, continuing with his own studies or doing pretty much anything more interesting than this, participating in endless dinner parties and negotiations. Family first, said his father, only if you can spare the time, said his cousin and of course, he yielded in the end. Who else would make sure that Merlin's influence was spread exactly like his cousin wanted? Very few would.

He's quick to agree to whatever excursion the diplomat suggests, anything but yet another boring meeting in a stuffy room with a million bureaucrats. It took some serious investigation to know how to dress for this little adventure, however. But he hasn't been trained by the iron fist of his father for nothing. He and his trusted man - a childhood friend really, but no one needs to know that, Orion is both his bodyguard and someone who will keep Marco in line - are dressed in something that could be of this world but appeases the sensibilities of the Dusk court, fitting for an outside excursion and sturdy enough that if something happens, they'll be adequately protected. Marco wears a long-ish coat in light grey, the hood is wide enough to cover his shoulders and the sleeves drape over his fingertips. His pants are tight but covered to mid tight with the hem of his grey sweater and almost up to his knee with soft boots. He looks small and slender beside Orion who towers over him with a head and then some, dressed in dark colours to contrast him. He's made sure to hung some spells before heading out but other than that, he wears no other protection, just the spiraling circle of his family crest on his sleeve and a few pearls woven into his pale hair.

They come to a halt by the diplomat and Marco inclines his head respectfully, even as his eyes keep shifting to the side to the man standing near the diplomat. There's recognition and yet, nothing definite that he can pin down. How is there another elf in the human courts that he doesn't know about? Obviously something has failed about his investigation...

He muddles his way through the proper greetings, through all the right words and signs of respect that he's been taught but Orion has to nudge him a few times to the back because he has paused just to stare at the other elf, whiffs of something spicy and sweet in the air. It feels like... resisting an addiction, that tight knot at the bottom of your stomach, spreading like hunger from his gut.

Finally they're through the pleasantries. It could have been a year except they only stood there for a couple of minutes as Marco rattled through his piece and the diplomat his own.

"Shall we then?" he asks automatically shifts a little closer to that scent as they start to move... orange is it?

Kai shifts automatically away from the strangers. He doesn't like that attention from anyone, and he tells himself that his skin is crawling as he catches the scent of something his body tries to insist he needs.

The diplomats all seem to be planning on standing around, useless, Kai thinks, and only to be expected, until the elfin one asks about it and tries to move closer to Kai. Kai takes the excuse and steps quickly forward, to try to put some distance between them as he starts to lead.

"Only danger in the first part of this is the possibility of a bird crapping on you." Kai's Singlish is unaccented, without the usual smoothness of the elfin.

The human diplomat's mouth opens and he looks askance as his visitors, mortified at the possibility of offending them. That makes Kai relax a little - at least this is incompetence rather than him being set up.

Marco lets out a surprised laughter at the crudeness of the comment coming from their ... guide? He's going to think this person is their guide.

"Seems unfortunately uneventful," he says with a small smile directed at the diplomat. Thank anything holy for small mercies, perhaps this day isn't going to be as boring as he thought.

"I don't think I caught your name," he says next, falling in step behind their guide, pausing only for a moment as his eyes squeeze shut tightly and his whole body tenses up as that damn scent pretty much invades every sense he has. (How is that possible, you probably shouldn't ask him.) He's never been prone to addiction and a simple scent shouldn't give him this strong a reaction to it. But now he's very certain of its source, and it gives his gut another knot to worry over. He's not dull enough to ignore the significance of it.

By the time the human diplomat catches him on the trail, he is already moving, smoothly padding along in that trail of the scent leaves behind. Oranges, spice, something warm and lovely, makes him think of tea and cozy night with a book by the fire. A bead of sweat appears on his brow and he absentmindedly wipes it away, noting that his gaze has been measuring the back of the man walking in front of him. What is he? A bird or a fish? Usually it should be easy to tell, Sidhe or unSidhe? But there is no distinct hint one way or another. Marco is tempted to say the latter because something that this man reminds him of... But his hair is very dark, isn't it? Is it dyed perhaps?

"Don't worry, the running in terror from a fire-breathing dragon is scheduled after the warm-up walk." Kai feels clear-headed in an unfamiliar sort of way, and it's enough to encounter the rising sense of dread coming from close contact with the unsidhe.

And that damn smell, like mountaintops covered in fresh snow. Kai figures that if he's close enough to smell that they're definitely too close, and he fixes the man with a firm frown.

"Kai Gracen." It's a human sort of name, first and last, no mention of clan, or court. Kai doesn't ask Marco's back in return, tells himself he doesn't care. He needs to avoid all the elfin after all, not just this one.

He's a mystery, isn't he? Marco has forgotten the diplomat who is struggling to keep up with the brisk pace they're keeping. Orion keeps the man company though, bless him. Marco will thank him later when he's not feeling quite as dizzy and spellbound as he is right now.

"I see, and you are responsible for these... high points of entertainment, Kai?" he asks, voice quiet enough that it doesn't carry back to the diplomat. If he weren't feeling like a wild thing right now, he wouldn't have called the other man simply by his first name either. It's far too familiar, and yet... There it is.

"I'm Marco," he continues, not offering his clan name, not his court, not anything else. It's not an insult, but a genuine, unthinking offering of intimacy. A warm smile given to a frown.

"You seem like a curious bird in an unusual habitat," he ventures on, something trembling in his words, a preconceived notion of something exciting. A relief that's yawning before him, a whole lifetime of surrender to something that was meant to be, in a single action that seems to glimmer just out of his reach.

In some ways, Kai feels like he knows the elfin pretty damn well. In other ways his understanding is about as well-developed as a humans. He has the general impression that they're stuck up, creatures of ritual and formality.

But Marco isn't reacting the way he'd expect. Not that Kai really likes this better, or at least he tells himself that.

"A..." Kai makes a show of raising his eyebrows, and he does slow a little before this gets absurd, or it seems like he's running. No need to trigger predator instincts, he thinks with a snort. "I suppose the same could currently be said of you, your lordship." His voice is tight, the title mocking rather than respectful.

Marco manages to catch up with him as he slows his progress. A thing he doesn't seem to mind at all. Instead his smile is a bright thing, warm and sunny, completely rehearsed and yet, this time genuine.

"Marco is just fine," he says quietly. He doesn't like being called lord or being bowed down to if he can help it. Here, there's no option like that. He has a function and a duty to perform. But he doubts Kai has very little to do with that duty outside of this little leg trip to see the eagles.

"And yes, you could and you may," he continues with a shake of his head. "More so than you probably realise. You've been away for a while, haven't you?"

He ignores those mocking tones, for now. Even if it hits him a lot deeper than it should.

"No," Kai says. He scans the horizon so he doesn't have to look at Marco, doesn't have to see that bright smile or come up with a response to it. It's complicated, but he's sure the elf is only being polite, pushing for a political advantage wherever he can see one.

"There is no away." Because going away implies that there could be a return, and Kai's feelings on that are a resounding hell no.

He looks at the sky for some sort of salvation, and spots an eagle flying high, too far away to be easily visible but at least it exists. "There," he says, "That's what you're here to see."

"Am I?" Marco inquires, his brows arching curiously. He has a feeling he's here to see a completely different bird. But he he obediently directs his gaze at the sky and regards the eagle for a moment, hands in his pockets, calm and quiet.

"A wild thing, such a fascination," he remarks in his native language, a hint of amusement in his light tone.

Now that they're standing still, his eyes resting on the eagle souring above them, he has a moment to listen to that voice inside him that he hasn't felt this clearly ever before. And yet it is a familiar voice, one that has been with him since early childhood. Now that sound is a familiar one, he's just never heard it aloud before. The voice is now angry instead of scared, instead of pained, instead of tired and desperate.

His gaze is drawn down to the source of it, inevitably, studying Kai's profile.

Marco is a contradiction, a man of great many skills that have a possibility to cut cruelly, a weapon created in unimaginable pressure and honed into a diamond. But while he knows how to apply all his edges to inspire fear just as much as he inspires loyalty, there is a reason why he falls in line when his cousin calls. Merlin is not a usual kind of king. He came to power by an accident. He's young and idealistic, meant to rule as a puppet but surprisingly capable of cutting those strings that are meant to bind him. Marco supports him not because they share a name or because they share a past, but because he respects Merlin. He'll go against his father if he has to.

Now, all that comes a stark comparison as he realises that fate had different ideas in store for him.

"You look very familiar," he says at length finally, smiling warmly.

Kai shudders at the sound of those unsidhe words, the way they crawl along his spine. There's no hiding his reaction, whether or not Kai would have chosen to.

It takes him a moment to register the rest of what Marco said, to get over the sudden surge of something that Kai refuses to acknowledge. The elves are difficult and manipulative, that's what he needs to be prepared for.

"I get used to humans having problems telling us apart, didn't expect it of your lordship," Kai says. He keeps his gaze focused ahead of him. Crap. He's going to need to be extra careful except that careful doesn't exactly keep him safe. Careful would have been pretending he was some kind of mute outcast.

Kai picks up his pace again. Maybe he can't outrun Marco, but he's going to make an attempt of it.

That shudder doesn't go unnoticed. Even if Marco would like to ignore it. He feels it, right on his spine, every disturbing twist of it, rattling through his bones. Great. He's picking up pieces even if Kai obviously wants to tell him nothing at all. He's still learning bits and pieces about the man simply because he can't not.

He sighs as they move again, at a quicker pace this time. He follows, quietly for a while, letting his thoughts swallow him. Soon, he's a little winded and the other two are falling farther behind but he keeps up with Kai's pace, maybe out of spite, maybe simply because he feels he can't... not.

He also can tell that recognising Kai as someone specific isn't a good idea, so he abandons that line of thinking. For now. Instead he ventures a conversational gambit that is much easier for all parties involved: "You like to be out here?"

They're nearing the area where there is a possibility of danger, some coyotes and wolves that feel more comfortable than they should this close to civilization. But then, the same could be said for the eagles, and the diplomats have made far too many efforts to keep them roosting nearby.

Kai slows down, supposes he needs to keep an eye on all of them. This really is a pain in the ass.

He fights his usual instinct to reflexively growl at the question, because even he can recognize it as a change in topic, one that benefits him. "It's alright for a paycheck. I prefer when there's not anything trying to eat me." But at least the wildlife is relatively easy to keep away from.

He's probably not slowing down for Marco's account. He doubts that very much at least. There is an obvious disgust that he can feel loitering in the air between them and he knows it doesn't originate from him.

"Are you often in situations where something tries to eat you?" he asks mildly as he catches up with Kai now that they're walking a little slower, the scent of the man pulling him in without him even noticing that he's taking strides to walk a little closer.

The disgust at least is easy to wrap around Kai as a sort of protection against the urge to look longer at the unsidhe, at the way Kai has to fight from letting him drift close.

"Yeah, pretty regularly," Kai says, wrapping up that devil-may-care for long enough to shoot Marco a rogue-ish smile that doesn't mean anything. "I imagine you think you're above all that."

Marco is well aware he has a type, one that looks very good in leather and often wears that devil-may-care attitude as a uniform. He is, should be, too old to stoop for cheap shots like this, but...

"Oh, I definitely am not above being eaten, handsome," he says with a small smile like the moon, amused and perhaps a little teasing but distant enough not to make the flirt incredibly intrusive.

It's true, he avoids putting himself in situations where he'd have to rely on his ability to wield weapons. But magic is quite as effective for him, though and doing his cousin's work has put him in a lot of danger lately, whether he's in court or on the field.

"I'm not stranger to danger, though."

"Pity I have a policy of not sleeping with anyone who knows my name," Kai says, because he has a tiny bit of diplomatic sense, and telling their visitor that he won't sleep with the elf does seem more on the excessively rude side of things. It would also sound more like a challenge, he thinks. It also reminds Kai he needs to ignore the loud clamor of his body, the ache to breathe in the smell of the unisdhe.

"Your idea of danger a visit to the uncivilized part of town?" By that Kai means the humans, but he also means himself. He's making fun of the elfin sense of superiority while also putting himself on the other side of it.

"Gosh, ruined my chances right away, did I?" Marco asks with a teasing air of humour. He takes a note, though, because that was a very clear rejection, even if he hadn't exactly meant it as a come-on to start with.

Hilariously, as little as Kai seems to think of him, expecting arrogance and heightened sense of superiority, he seems eager to broadcast those same things back at Marco by ruling him as something or another without really knowing. It's definitely nothing new, however. Marco is used to it. He plays with those expectations whenever it is convenient for him. He wasn't born to high status, his father made him work for it, which means that he still doesn't think of himself as a noble born.

He gives a soft chuckle at the dig and lets his face tilt up, looking at the eagle searing across the sky. "Seems like you've neatly categorised me already. Perhaps I will get a chance to prove you wrong eventually."

Kai really hopes that he never sees the unsidhe again, because right now that's starting to be all he can think of, the scent of fresh-fallen snow and some kind of flower. He's slowed down, and that means Marco is right there, next to him and it would be so easier to let him draw a little closer.

"I'm sure you've got better things to do, my lordship." He hopes like hell this man forgets Kai as soon as this little visit is over.

Marco walks side by side with him, hands in his pockets mostly because he's afraid if he lets go of the fabric he's been pinching for a while, he's going to touch this man and that would be a mistake.

"Do I?" he asks, brows arching as he looks at Kai from the corner of his eye. They're of similar height, and walking almost shoulder to shoulder, it's hard not to feel like the tangy scent of orange and spice that waffles around him is anything but intoxicating. Marco wants to rub his nose against this man, just inhale him...

Kai is pretty sure that most elfin don't have this sort of effect on him, the way his skin hums with the need to be closer. Kai's got plenty of reasons to keep that distance between them, though, reasons that he keeps reminding himself of.

"I think Ambassador Hinton probably had aims in taking you out here." Aims that weren't having his security do...whatever Kai and Marco were doing. "And we should stay close together here."

Some meme threads

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