"Uniforms always seem fancy until you've actually been in the army and seen every jackass in your crew running around in the same one," Jedao laughs. The cloth of the uniform is has a silky-smooth feel from the nanite-based metamaterial.
"Anyway, I don't suppose it will last long." Jedao recreates the room from before, with the only tweak being a few water bottles on various tables. Which doesn't fit the aesthetic, but he doesn't care.
It's a sensible addition, though Astarion has no idea how hydrating any
water this place creates might actually be. Surely if this strange room
could create food and drink, they'd have no use for the kitchens.
"Oh, you think you'll be stripping off? Presumptuous," he teases. "I think
we talked about using the cuffs, this time. If that's something you'd
enjoy?"
Astarion plainly is teasing; that's easy enough to see, so Jedao doesn't flinch, even though it's tender spot. Easy enough to focus more pleasant things.
"It is something I enjoy. Very much, if you also enjoy having me in them."
He's not unaware of the double entendre, but he does pass it by with no particular emphasis.
Jedao puts the cane in his hand and then the flogger on the table, which is something in the vein of a very gentle hint, which Jedao assumes will be easy enough to pick up on if Astarion wants the guidance, and easy to ignore if he doesn't. Jedao hasn't brought anything he doesn't love, but the cane is a particular delight.
It's a mean, lovely thing, handmade out of whippy, well-treated bamboo and a sturdy leather-wrapped handle. He unhitches the bullwhip from his belt and sets its coils carefully beside the flogger as well.
"I like best when I get to stop thinking," Jedao admits. "Any one of these can get me there, so. You know, have fun with it."
He'd had half a mind to ask if they could swap, if he could be the one exposed and bound, but Jedao is making his own needs clear enough and he's not sure that such an exchange would grant him the catharsis he's looking for. This? This very well might. He weighs the cane in his hand, giving his forearm a couple of light taps to get a sense of it.
"Anything more to discuss? Any...further diversions from our first evening together?"
Jedao has learned to enjoy the other side of it more than he expected to, when he first started taking turns with Norton, but Astarion is right that it isn't what he needs right now. And with Astarion, he'd want to be very, very careful - careful requiring a degree of candor he isn't sure Astarion is ready for. But Astarion has surprised him before.
"Same rules about my neck and face. I don't have, like...human organs, so anywhere else is fine, but the nerve responses are the same on the surface."
Jedao is...98% sure Astarion can't give him kidney or liver damage when he doesn't have kidneys or a liver. And even if he can, it'll heal in a day.
"I still like hearing you, but it's okay if it isn't constant, it's just - nice. And, hm. The uniform doesn't show stains."
Astarion can make him bleed as much as he likes.
"But I know my blood is - odd, so. No need to feel obligated. You can probably go longest without bleeding me with the flogger, if that's a concern."
He leans back against the saltire, and instead of buttons, runs his fingers along nanite-controlled magnetic seems; the shimmery black fabric seems to part under his fingers like water; it falls to the floor in broad panels, fluttering faintly, until Jedao is bare to the waist.
"Shall I do the cuffs myself, or...?"
He can, after all; they both have a their own versions of telekinesis.
"I'd like to do it," he decides, moving closer to the saltire. "Just make
yourself comfortable in position, and I'll secure you. And I'm not in the
least bit concerned about the oddity of your blood."
He carefully skims a hand down his upper arm.
"...Do you want to bleed?"
There's a difference between 'it's fine if it happens' and 'I am actively
seeking this out'.
Jedao drapes himself against the smooth, sturdy wood of the cross, eyes. fluttering shut for a moment as he drinks in the soft touch, the careful question.
Not in the least bit concerned, Astarion said, he reminds himself.
"I do want it," he murmurs, eyes still closed. It's easier to admit that way. It's easier to admit a lot of things, that way. "I'd have brought knives if I wasn't worried about pushing you too far with how greedy I am. I'm very worried you'll do something you don't enjoy if I say I want it too loudly. I know you've already said you wouldn't. But that's the fear that lives in my heart, and it has a terrible tendency to come home."
He makes the truth of it, as much as he possibly can, his own preoccupation, his own vulnerability.
Astarion reaches up to secure the first padded cuff around his wrist, and
then sidesteps to deal with the other. He's careful about it, slipping a
fingertip under the leather each time to ensure there's enough room to stop
his hands going numb but not so much that he could slip free.
The talk of knives gets him a shaky little laugh.
"...You're going to be the death of me, darling. Putting such glittering
jewels on the table and saying you're afraid I might take them. Gods
below."
Something in him relaxes as soon as the cuffs are secure; it ripples through his whole back. He opens his eyes again, although Astarion moves in and out of his field of view. His voice is a soft, low murmur, almost as if he's speaking to the vaulted space instead of just Astarion.
"I am afraid of adding anything at all to your store of sorrows," Jedao says softly. "Of being endured or, or even - humored. I would like very much to know which of the glittering pieces of me are jewels, and which are jagged glass, before I go pushing any into your hands. So. That's why the table."
Astarion presses his chest to Jedao's back, resting his hands on his bare waist. Breathing his words against one ear.
"Speaking of what's in my hands, I wouldn't feel any particular need to tell you I have a dagger on my person right now if I didn't rather like the idea of using it."
"Nothing special," he chuckles, stroking a hand through Jedao's hair. "I
just happen to have a blade on me at all times. But, let's start with
the cane, shall we? We can check in on how hard you're thinking in a
while."
Jedao yelps at the bright trail of pain that scores across his back. Norton and Hakkai are cheekier and sneakier about it respectively, working up to the real thrashing more gradually, turning really mean in sudden and playful moments.
But Astarion just gives it to him, sharp and brutal, and right now that's everything he wants.
That sharp cry of pain hits him like a mouthful of blood, heady and decadent, and he knows immediately that this was the right decision. This is what he wants, right now - to feel in control, empowered.
"That's perfect, pet-"
And it's clear enough that Jedao doesn't want or expect the slightest bit of mercy. He brings the cane down again and again, drawing bright lines horizontally across his ass and thighs and back - then changes the angle, slashing across them, bringing up little sharp welts where the strokes meet.
Jedao hisses and yowls and gasps, twitches and thrashes in the restraints, never quite sure if he's arching away from the strikes or into them. His body stops being an ill-fitting reminder of Jedao One, stops being the gruesome crux of his unbelonging, oozing and inhuman under the skin, but too crippled as a moth to fly away. His body stops being anything except a canvas for pain, a place where he feels whatever Astarion makes him feel, a shuddering chalice of fire. He's hard by the second stroke; soon Jedao sinks into the steadily mounting pain, fierce and relentless, the same way he might slip into a scalding bath.
It's a level of agony he could easily ignore if he had to, if he had to work through it, fight through it - but he doesn't have to. He doesn't have to do anything but yield to it, let it pull apart all the precarious chunks of him that he normally has to hold constantly together. All the things he's worried about, all his little bitter miseries and self-loathing failures and intractable conundrums just - drown, slowly, and go quiet in the steady patter of fresh pain washing over him.
Then Astarion starts criss-crossing the strokes, bringing up fresh vortices of pain, like knots in woodgrain, like scattered stars. Jedao sinks deeper into it, almost melting into the cross, hands flexing and clenching uselessly as he shudders and ripples and moans.
The first time they had done this, Astarion had briefly wondered about the possibility that he wouldn't enjoy it. He knows himself well enough to be aware that he gets a kick out of hurting others, but - well - he'd wondered if things like 'consent' and 'boundaries' might make it less fun. When his targets were interested in rougher play, it left him cold.
But he'd been wrong last time and he's certain of it now. The way Jedao's body moves, the way his whole affect changes, the sounds he makes in the throes of pain - it's nothing short of delicious. However strange his blood, he can drink in his suffering like wine. Feel his nerves sing with arousal.
He steps to one side. Jedao has told him that he can't do him harm in the way he could a human or similar, and it's hard not to take that as an invitation. His sides, the skin over his ribs and kidneys, the spots he'd usually avoid - he's no gentler with the cane, bringing it down with the same merciless strokes.
Jedao shouts for it, shocked even though he shouldn't be. Hakkai knows full well Jedao can walk off bullet wounds, but he's still careful about not wanting to damage him. It doesn't feel worse, but it feels different, the harshness of the strike over his ribs, with the bone so close to the skin, like his flesh is being hammered out like foil.
Something - something human, something older than he is, Jedao One's old assassin's instincts in his brain, feels the strike over the vulnerable flesh of his kidneys and immediately crows an alarm. That's not just pain but danger. He needs to curl up, or lash out, he needs to protect that, says the part of his brain that used to bother taking cover in a firefight.
No, I don't, Jedao tells it. No I don't. I can take it. I can take anything.
But knowing it is not the same as feeling it; the queasy roller-coaster thrill of vulnerability is a shocking sensation, a sense of helplessness that bondage alone has never given him, a new sideways dimension of pain, like numbers opening up into the imaginary plane. He likes it - he's pretty sure he likes it - but it is - well. Complex. He doesn't have enough air in his lungs to laugh at his own very stupid math joke.
"Oh fuck," he wheezes instead, squeezes his hands tight on nothing. "Stars, fuck -" he's being beaten, not just indulged, and he gulps down huge breaths of air he doesn't actually need.
Astarion pauses, and his fingertips trail lightly over a patch of skin he hasn't ruined. The timbre of his voice has - changed, and he's not sure if it's a change for better or worse or neither.
Jedao shivers at the tiny touch, pants softly, tries to get his bearings enough to put the feeling into words. Without an influx of new strikes, the existing blanket of welts draping his back from shoulders to knees makes itself vividly known, a warm, grounding, surrounding throb.
"Not bad, but - more intense? Good-scary." Or scary-good, or - "Not too much, but, close to it, maybe? I think you couldn't get to too much on my back, but maybe you could, there, if you - stayed on it for awhile."
"We can't have that," he murmurs. "After all, if you're thinking about
whether it's more than you can take, you're thinking."
Which is a step away from the intentions of this whole affair. He squeezes
Jedao's waist, deliberately putting pressure on a few marks, then touches
the waistband of his trousers.
"I'm going to move down. Through your clothes, or without them?"
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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"Anyway, I don't suppose it will last long." Jedao recreates the room from before, with the only tweak being a few water bottles on various tables. Which doesn't fit the aesthetic, but he doesn't care.
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It's a sensible addition, though Astarion has no idea how hydrating any water this place creates might actually be. Surely if this strange room could create food and drink, they'd have no use for the kitchens.
"Oh, you think you'll be stripping off? Presumptuous," he teases. "I think we talked about using the cuffs, this time. If that's something you'd enjoy?"
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"It is something I enjoy. Very much, if you also enjoy having me in them."
He's not unaware of the double entendre, but he does pass it by with no particular emphasis.
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"I would. Just as much as I'll enjoy watching you undress, in fact."
He reaches out with a beckoning hand for the new implements Jedao has brought along.
"Some favourites, you said?"
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It's a mean, lovely thing, handmade out of whippy, well-treated bamboo and a sturdy leather-wrapped handle. He unhitches the bullwhip from his belt and sets its coils carefully beside the flogger as well.
"I like best when I get to stop thinking," Jedao admits. "Any one of these can get me there, so. You know, have fun with it."
He allows himself to give Astarion a cheeky wink.
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"Oh, I will."
He'd had half a mind to ask if they could swap, if he could be the one exposed and bound, but Jedao is making his own needs clear enough and he's not sure that such an exchange would grant him the catharsis he's looking for. This? This very well might. He weighs the cane in his hand, giving his forearm a couple of light taps to get a sense of it.
"Anything more to discuss? Any...further diversions from our first evening together?"
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"Same rules about my neck and face. I don't have, like...human organs, so anywhere else is fine, but the nerve responses are the same on the surface."
Jedao is...98% sure Astarion can't give him kidney or liver damage when he doesn't have kidneys or a liver. And even if he can, it'll heal in a day.
"I still like hearing you, but it's okay if it isn't constant, it's just - nice. And, hm. The uniform doesn't show stains."
Astarion can make him bleed as much as he likes.
"But I know my blood is - odd, so. No need to feel obligated. You can probably go longest without bleeding me with the flogger, if that's a concern."
He leans back against the saltire, and instead of buttons, runs his fingers along nanite-controlled magnetic seems; the shimmery black fabric seems to part under his fingers like water; it falls to the floor in broad panels, fluttering faintly, until Jedao is bare to the waist.
"Shall I do the cuffs myself, or...?"
He can, after all; they both have a their own versions of telekinesis.
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"I'd like to do it," he decides, moving closer to the saltire. "Just make yourself comfortable in position, and I'll secure you. And I'm not in the least bit concerned about the oddity of your blood."
He carefully skims a hand down his upper arm.
"...Do you want to bleed?"
There's a difference between 'it's fine if it happens' and 'I am actively seeking this out'.
Re: Spam
Not in the least bit concerned, Astarion said, he reminds himself.
"I do want it," he murmurs, eyes still closed. It's easier to admit that way. It's easier to admit a lot of things, that way. "I'd have brought knives if I wasn't worried about pushing you too far with how greedy I am. I'm very worried you'll do something you don't enjoy if I say I want it too loudly. I know you've already said you wouldn't. But that's the fear that lives in my heart, and it has a terrible tendency to come home."
He makes the truth of it, as much as he possibly can, his own preoccupation, his own vulnerability.
Re: Spam
Astarion reaches up to secure the first padded cuff around his wrist, and then sidesteps to deal with the other. He's careful about it, slipping a fingertip under the leather each time to ensure there's enough room to stop his hands going numb but not so much that he could slip free.
The talk of knives gets him a shaky little laugh.
"...You're going to be the death of me, darling. Putting such glittering jewels on the table and saying you're afraid I might take them. Gods below."
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"I am afraid of adding anything at all to your store of sorrows," Jedao says softly. "Of being endured or, or even - humored. I would like very much to know which of the glittering pieces of me are jewels, and which are jagged glass, before I go pushing any into your hands. So. That's why the table."
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Astarion presses his chest to Jedao's back, resting his hands on his bare waist. Breathing his words against one ear.
"Speaking of what's in my hands, I wouldn't feel any particular need to tell you I have a dagger on my person right now if I didn't rather like the idea of using it."
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"And to think, you told me you weren't equipped to bring something," Jedao teases, voice warm and breathy.
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"Nothing special," he chuckles, stroking a hand through Jedao's hair. "I just happen to have a blade on me at all times. But, let's start with the cane, shall we? We can check in on how hard you're thinking in a while."
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"I feel spoiled already," Jedao murmurs, in assent.
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"How marvellously appropriate - so do I," Astarion murmurs, then takes a step away.
The first blow comes about three and a half breaths later, as hard as he can make it, right across the small of Jedao's back.
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But Astarion just gives it to him, sharp and brutal, and right now that's everything he wants.
"Fuck! Oh fuck, please yes -"
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That sharp cry of pain hits him like a mouthful of blood, heady and decadent, and he knows immediately that this was the right decision. This is what he wants, right now - to feel in control, empowered.
"That's perfect, pet-"
And it's clear enough that Jedao doesn't want or expect the slightest bit of mercy. He brings the cane down again and again, drawing bright lines horizontally across his ass and thighs and back - then changes the angle, slashing across them, bringing up little sharp welts where the strokes meet.
Re: Spam
It's a level of agony he could easily ignore if he had to, if he had to work through it, fight through it - but he doesn't have to. He doesn't have to do anything but yield to it, let it pull apart all the precarious chunks of him that he normally has to hold constantly together. All the things he's worried about, all his little bitter miseries and self-loathing failures and intractable conundrums just - drown, slowly, and go quiet in the steady patter of fresh pain washing over him.
Then Astarion starts criss-crossing the strokes, bringing up fresh vortices of pain, like knots in woodgrain, like scattered stars. Jedao sinks deeper into it, almost melting into the cross, hands flexing and clenching uselessly as he shudders and ripples and moans.
Re: Spam
The first time they had done this, Astarion had briefly wondered about the possibility that he wouldn't enjoy it. He knows himself well enough to be aware that he gets a kick out of hurting others, but - well - he'd wondered if things like 'consent' and 'boundaries' might make it less fun. When his targets were interested in rougher play, it left him cold.
But he'd been wrong last time and he's certain of it now. The way Jedao's body moves, the way his whole affect changes, the sounds he makes in the throes of pain - it's nothing short of delicious. However strange his blood, he can drink in his suffering like wine. Feel his nerves sing with arousal.
He steps to one side. Jedao has told him that he can't do him harm in the way he could a human or similar, and it's hard not to take that as an invitation. His sides, the skin over his ribs and kidneys, the spots he'd usually avoid - he's no gentler with the cane, bringing it down with the same merciless strokes.
Re: Spam
Something - something human, something older than he is, Jedao One's old assassin's instincts in his brain, feels the strike over the vulnerable flesh of his kidneys and immediately crows an alarm. That's not just pain but danger. He needs to curl up, or lash out, he needs to protect that, says the part of his brain that used to bother taking cover in a firefight.
No, I don't, Jedao tells it. No I don't. I can take it. I can take anything.
But knowing it is not the same as feeling it; the queasy roller-coaster thrill of vulnerability is a shocking sensation, a sense of helplessness that bondage alone has never given him, a new sideways dimension of pain, like numbers opening up into the imaginary plane. He likes it - he's pretty sure he likes it - but it is - well. Complex. He doesn't have enough air in his lungs to laugh at his own very stupid math joke.
"Oh fuck," he wheezes instead, squeezes his hands tight on nothing. "Stars, fuck -" he's being beaten, not just indulged, and he gulps down huge breaths of air he doesn't actually need.
Re: Spam
Astarion pauses, and his fingertips trail lightly over a patch of skin he hasn't ruined. The timbre of his voice has - changed, and he's not sure if it's a change for better or worse or neither.
"Too much?" he asks, softly.
Re: Spam
"Not bad, but - more intense? Good-scary." Or scary-good, or - "Not too much, but, close to it, maybe? I think you couldn't get to too much on my back, but maybe you could, there, if you - stayed on it for awhile."
Re: Spam
"We can't have that," he murmurs. "After all, if you're thinking about whether it's more than you can take, you're thinking."
Which is a step away from the intentions of this whole affair. He squeezes Jedao's waist, deliberately putting pressure on a few marks, then touches the waistband of his trousers.
"I'm going to move down. Through your clothes, or without them?"
Re: Spam
Thinking. Question. Butt.
"...choices hard," Jedao manages, strangled.
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