Lestat clutches a hold of Louis' hands, stabilising as well as a prevention from simply launching himself into his arms. A tight little smile for this observation, while drawing Louis' hands in close against him.
"You would imagine after a February spent getting fucked in all directions by a death god and his disciples, it would not seem so outlandish to parley with his enemy."
Not that, he thinks, Louis seemed to love his dealings with her—but call it a starting point.
Not that Louis can claim a clear head. One faction has been fucking with Lestat. The other has been veiled to him. He would prefer to lift the veil than extend a hand to the entity that has unleashed this curse on Lestat
Louis reels him in, one step then another. Tugging him closer.
"I don't trust her," won't come as a shock. "Do you?"
His vision blurs, and so the timing is well and good, stepping in close to wind his arms around Louis' waist, draw them both together close. Here, cheek at Louis' shoulder, he gives a small shake of his head.
"No," at a murmur. "But, well. I don't think she lies for the fun of it."
Not a word out of her mouth, others would suggest. A part of Lestat can't quite agree, that the Duchess is only one thing.
"And what if she isn't? And she has these abilities to help in return of favours? What if those that have been here longest trust her for a reason?"
Measuring out these answers. This collection of opinion on the creature in the castle.
Louis' palm smooths circles across Lestat's back.
"I think she puts strings all over anything she likes."
That's what Louis has gleaned, picked up the familiar trade of good favor from someone more powerful. Always a catch. Always a price to pay. Always a hook to dangle from.
Louis is quiet for a moment. Thinking. Touching Lestat.
And then: "If you think it's a solution, I ain't gonna argue with you. But I don't want her killing you."
Before protest, Louis offers: "Let me do it. If she's asking for it, let me."
To be sure it's done right. To guarantee he would be in the room, able to intercede where Louis might otherwise have to only hear second hand.
Lestat lifts his head, a little toss to get hair out of his face as he considers Louis'. The loop of his embrace doesn't loosen, but they are good at having conversations nearly nose to nose.
"Très romantique," a whispered little joke, before he noses in to kiss Louis' mouth, just briefly. He is cool to the touch. "Okay. I will let you."
If he were less inclined to do anything Louis asks of him, he might resist. Would not wish this particular kind of trauma on them both, again, because of his foolish mistake. But then, what has doing any of this alone gotten him?
"I am thinking still. She has of course now threatened by roommate with sexual slavery, so."
So.
"And, you know, Zlatka requires total victory before she will lift a pretty finger."
Louis is asking to be in the room. To remain, to observe, relate it all when Lestat returns. (To ensure he returns.)
He nudges their noses together. Shrugs a shoulder, "Then we give her one."
They've already killed Reaver once. They can do it again, along with the rest of her ilk. Kill all those who have done them harm, scorch the earth after them.
Lestat entwines them tighter, a fond hum leaving him as they stand together in the middle of the room as if slow dancing to a song only they can hear. Louis, who makes things sound so easy, who gets things done, arranges everything just so.
"If everyone else isn't violently opposed to the idea of her winning," he points out. "I will need to ensure Gwenaëlle is not fucked over if we get our way."
Rescues, deals to broker, he doesn't know. One impossible thing after another.
"I don't care what she does. We ain't gonna be here."
And neither is Wrench, if Louis has his way. He will take Lestat and he will take Wrench, and they will go. This village can continue on as they leave it, with it's rituals and demands and its chilly overlord in her castle.
His fingers tease at the ends of Lestat's hair, draw nonsense patterns across Lestat's back. Thinking.
"I wanna make sure you get what you need from her," softly. This before anything else.
It feels like a steep cost, and getting steeper. But this remains true. They are two each other the most important thing. The only entity involved with the power to make things happen is also the only one who needs something.
The corners of his eyes crinkle, and Lestat says, "Do you think it will still be storming, when we appear again in New Orleans? Like no time has passed."
The promise that matters most. The thing Lestat promised once too.
"And we will not have to make do with what has been given. We'll go anywhere we want. Down the street, across the ocean." Coaxing Louis, and coaxing himself as well. Away from fraught conversations, the various messes, the arguments. And isn't it nice, that coming to Louis should be the peaceful thing?
It hasn't always been that way, for them. "Sheet music, cassettes, radio. The movie theatre. Cars, traffic, sirens. A world larger than a teacup and its tempest."
Louis had wandered all over the world with Armand. He wants that again, with Lestat.
He slides hands up his back, cups his face. Lestat, still. Lestat, human. Lestat, with his monster clawing out from beneath the skin. Louis' heart knows him. Their hearts recognize each other anywhere.
A soft kiss, first to his mouth, and then his cheek, his temple, his forehead. See how he is not afraid. See how they can have this still.
It's calming to imagine these outcomes—to let himself do it, after going through the motions of carving out a sustainable existence in this place. Lestat has spoken before to Louis about his thoughts about breeding his dogs, his plans that would have spanned months. Longer. It had been—
Well. Helpful. And now it is all uncertain again, so he must think of the way the river smells after a big storm, the way the city breathes in those grey hours before the sun rises. And Louis, with him.
And, as he is kissed, the clutch of certainty and anxiety both that he does not want to take the monster back with him.
This admission as his fingers run up and down Lestat's back. Yes, Louis spoke to her. Yes, Louis managed to avoid interjecting in Lestat's conversation, baring his teeth, warning her away.
"She's slippery," Louis admits. Nothing they haven't already discussed, nothing Lestat doesn't already know. "But we know that. We ain't walking into it blind, dealing with her."
And powers beyond comprehension. But doubting feels like chasing one's own tail. Of course they doubt. It would be easy to distrust oneself into complete paralysis.
Lestat tugs Louis' weight into him a little, or makes the attempt. Up to Louis if he wishes to be swayed.
"Lie down with me," he invites. "Tell me what was said."
An appealing request. Louis is still carrying tension from the entire conversation, all that had been said, all that it might mean for their future, but Lestat pulls and Louis sways into him easy. Noses in close, brushes a kiss to the corner of his mouth.
"Yeah, okay," He agrees. "Come on."
The bed is still small, but they fit. They tangle close. Louis coaxes him close, gets fingers in his hair, toying with the loose locks.
"I made some requests of my own," he admits. "While you were working on her."
Yes, this is where he wants to be. Maybe if they had one of their parlours like the old days, they might strike dignified postures on lovely upholstery, but they don't, so they don't. Like this, they can enjoy the way they fit together, so well practiced at it now that when Lestat lays with another, he can note every difference. But then, he never quite lays like this with anyone else.
He settles his knuckles into the dip of Louis' spine, watching him in close proximity.
"Oh?" he says. "A carriage and four horses, to take us back to America?"
"Nah," Louis answers. "Though maybe I gotta go back and ask about a carrier for all your dogs."
And then what will they do with all those dogs back in New Orleans, in the middle of a hurricane? Louis spent a lot of money on that hotel room, but he can't imagine it won't be remarked upon to return with a soggy vampire and a pack of dogs.
They'll figure it out.
Quietly, Louis tells him, "I asked her to let us take someone back with us."
But then, how beyond, when he knows so immediately who Louis means?
Lestat is still, quiet, a subtle tension creeping back into his expression, the way a guard comes up against the inevitability of hurt feelings more to prevent them escaping containment than the other way around. No withdrawal, settled into close and comfortable, but his hand curls a little tighter there at Louis' back.
They're so close that Louis can feel it as the tension pulls through Lestat's body.
His fingers lift, cup Lestat's jaw. Runs a thumb along his cheek. Soothing. Staying there, close. Eyes moving over Lestat's face, observing the play of expression there.
It's a relief, maybe, that Lestat guesses so quickly. They know each other still. They are transparent to each other. In this moment, Louis feels like it will make this easier. Hopes Lestat will understand.
"I don't wanna leave him here," Louis explains. "I can't do it."
His eyes flicker as Louis touches his face, like a ripple. Soothing, yes, steadying (a reminder, us, a greater force), but in danger of encouraging more vulnerable feelings to the surface.
They have never been good with thirds. They have been at their happiest with thirds.
Lestat tips his head against the mattress, letting his gaze wander off Louis' eyes. Nose, lips, the dip of his shirt, the low light curling off one high cheekbone. A nameless, anxious feeling, growing through him like rapid weeds, tangling through rib cage, reaching for his heart.
"He is so lonely," he murmurs, quiet, a whisper. "And believes himself so doomed. We spoke a little. Maybe you heard."
He doesn't quite remember when they started speaking privately, but he is sure some of it wasn't.
Tacit admission that Louis had been listening to it all. All those conversations, seeking Lestat's voice among the flurry of responses. They'd argued about it before. Louis had tried to keep hi distance.
Failed. Again.
His fingers span Lestat's face. Cup his cheek. Fingers curl at the hinge of his jaw.
"You ain't gotta tell me about it."
Tenuous, difficult terrain. He wants Lestat to have his privacy. To respect what it is that passes between him and Wrench.
But he wants to know everything. He wants to know everything.
It is nice that Louis listens. It is nice that he wants to know more, Lestat suspects, permission to keep it to himself aside.
He continues, "He was glad I had you and a place to go home to. He spoke of how he had nothing such as that, really. I argued the point a little, but not too much. Not when he was so far away." Lestat feels at his most convincing when he is close, when he has all methods of persuasion at his disposal.
And he did want to persuade. "So I made him promise me to teach me some of his signing," comes with a hint of a fond, amused little smile. "I remember I knew something like it in our dream."
Not touching the thing Louis has spoken of yet. Too hot and bright to behold too quickly.
But it's one thing to save a mortal they're fond of. Louis says he has been meaning to ask, to learn a language. It makes him think—well. It makes him think a rush of several things, like dogs let loose from captivity to run wild, and he must take a breath even if he can feel his eyes grow glossy, blurry.
Oh, if only it was Lestat telling Louis he wanted to rescue Wrench, and Louis speaking cautious questions and managing his feelings.
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"You would imagine after a February spent getting fucked in all directions by a death god and his disciples, it would not seem so outlandish to parley with his enemy."
Not that, he thinks, Louis seemed to love his dealings with her—but call it a starting point.
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Not that Louis can claim a clear head. One faction has been fucking with Lestat. The other has been veiled to him. He would prefer to lift the veil than extend a hand to the entity that has unleashed this curse on Lestat
Louis reels him in, one step then another. Tugging him closer.
"I don't trust her," won't come as a shock. "Do you?"
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"No," at a murmur. "But, well. I don't think she lies for the fun of it."
Not a word out of her mouth, others would suggest. A part of Lestat can't quite agree, that the Duchess is only one thing.
"And what if she isn't? And she has these abilities to help in return of favours? What if those that have been here longest trust her for a reason?"
no subject
Louis' palm smooths circles across Lestat's back.
"I think she puts strings all over anything she likes."
That's what Louis has gleaned, picked up the familiar trade of good favor from someone more powerful. Always a catch. Always a price to pay. Always a hook to dangle from.
Louis is quiet for a moment. Thinking. Touching Lestat.
And then: "If you think it's a solution, I ain't gonna argue with you. But I don't want her killing you."
Before protest, Louis offers: "Let me do it. If she's asking for it, let me."
To be sure it's done right. To guarantee he would be in the room, able to intercede where Louis might otherwise have to only hear second hand.
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"Très romantique," a whispered little joke, before he noses in to kiss Louis' mouth, just briefly. He is cool to the touch. "Okay. I will let you."
If he were less inclined to do anything Louis asks of him, he might resist. Would not wish this particular kind of trauma on them both, again, because of his foolish mistake. But then, what has doing any of this alone gotten him?
"I am thinking still. She has of course now threatened by roommate with sexual slavery, so."
So.
"And, you know, Zlatka requires total victory before she will lift a pretty finger."
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But it would be agony to stay away too.
Louis is asking to be in the room. To remain, to observe, relate it all when Lestat returns. (To ensure he returns.)
He nudges their noses together. Shrugs a shoulder, "Then we give her one."
They've already killed Reaver once. They can do it again, along with the rest of her ilk. Kill all those who have done them harm, scorch the earth after them.
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"If everyone else isn't violently opposed to the idea of her winning," he points out. "I will need to ensure Gwenaëlle is not fucked over if we get our way."
Rescues, deals to broker, he doesn't know. One impossible thing after another.
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And neither is Wrench, if Louis has his way. He will take Lestat and he will take Wrench, and they will go. This village can continue on as they leave it, with it's rituals and demands and its chilly overlord in her castle.
His fingers tease at the ends of Lestat's hair, draw nonsense patterns across Lestat's back. Thinking.
"I wanna make sure you get what you need from her," softly. This before anything else.
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It feels like a steep cost, and getting steeper. But this remains true. They are two each other the most important thing. The only entity involved with the power to make things happen is also the only one who needs something.
The corners of his eyes crinkle, and Lestat says, "Do you think it will still be storming, when we appear again in New Orleans? Like no time has passed."
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Picking up where they left off, no interruption. Just this time spent away, an interlude. A dream they both wake from at the same time.
Louis turns his head, kisses Lestat's temple.
"I made you some promises here. I'll keep 'em, even if I gotta do it when we get back."
A house, for them both. A life together.
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The promise that matters most. The thing Lestat promised once too.
"And we will not have to make do with what has been given. We'll go anywhere we want. Down the street, across the ocean." Coaxing Louis, and coaxing himself as well. Away from fraught conversations, the various messes, the arguments. And isn't it nice, that coming to Louis should be the peaceful thing?
It hasn't always been that way, for them. "Sheet music, cassettes, radio. The movie theatre. Cars, traffic, sirens. A world larger than a teacup and its tempest."
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Louis had wandered all over the world with Armand. He wants that again, with Lestat.
He slides hands up his back, cups his face. Lestat, still. Lestat, human. Lestat, with his monster clawing out from beneath the skin. Louis' heart knows him. Their hearts recognize each other anywhere.
A soft kiss, first to his mouth, and then his cheek, his temple, his forehead. See how he is not afraid. See how they can have this still.
"We gonna get ourselves out."
A promise.
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Well. Helpful. And now it is all uncertain again, so he must think of the way the river smells after a big storm, the way the city breathes in those grey hours before the sun rises. And Louis, with him.
And, as he is kissed, the clutch of certainty and anxiety both that he does not want to take the monster back with him.
"Did you speak to her?"
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This admission as his fingers run up and down Lestat's back. Yes, Louis spoke to her. Yes, Louis managed to avoid interjecting in Lestat's conversation, baring his teeth, warning her away.
"She's slippery," Louis admits. Nothing they haven't already discussed, nothing Lestat doesn't already know. "But we know that. We ain't walking into it blind, dealing with her."
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And powers beyond comprehension. But doubting feels like chasing one's own tail. Of course they doubt. It would be easy to distrust oneself into complete paralysis.
Lestat tugs Louis' weight into him a little, or makes the attempt. Up to Louis if he wishes to be swayed.
"Lie down with me," he invites. "Tell me what was said."
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"Yeah, okay," He agrees. "Come on."
The bed is still small, but they fit. They tangle close. Louis coaxes him close, gets fingers in his hair, toying with the loose locks.
"I made some requests of my own," he admits. "While you were working on her."
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He settles his knuckles into the dip of Louis' spine, watching him in close proximity.
"Oh?" he says. "A carriage and four horses, to take us back to America?"
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And then what will they do with all those dogs back in New Orleans, in the middle of a hurricane? Louis spent a lot of money on that hotel room, but he can't imagine it won't be remarked upon to return with a soggy vampire and a pack of dogs.
They'll figure it out.
Quietly, Louis tells him, "I asked her to let us take someone back with us."
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But then, how beyond, when he knows so immediately who Louis means?
Lestat is still, quiet, a subtle tension creeping back into his expression, the way a guard comes up against the inevitability of hurt feelings more to prevent them escaping containment than the other way around. No withdrawal, settled into close and comfortable, but his hand curls a little tighter there at Louis' back.
"Wrench," he says.
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His fingers lift, cup Lestat's jaw. Runs a thumb along his cheek. Soothing. Staying there, close. Eyes moving over Lestat's face, observing the play of expression there.
It's a relief, maybe, that Lestat guesses so quickly. They know each other still. They are transparent to each other. In this moment, Louis feels like it will make this easier. Hopes Lestat will understand.
"I don't wanna leave him here," Louis explains. "I can't do it."
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They have never been good with thirds. They have been at their happiest with thirds.
Lestat tips his head against the mattress, letting his gaze wander off Louis' eyes. Nose, lips, the dip of his shirt, the low light curling off one high cheekbone. A nameless, anxious feeling, growing through him like rapid weeds, tangling through rib cage, reaching for his heart.
"He is so lonely," he murmurs, quiet, a whisper. "And believes himself so doomed. We spoke a little. Maybe you heard."
He doesn't quite remember when they started speaking privately, but he is sure some of it wasn't.
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Tacit admission that Louis had been listening to it all. All those conversations, seeking Lestat's voice among the flurry of responses. They'd argued about it before. Louis had tried to keep hi distance.
Failed. Again.
His fingers span Lestat's face. Cup his cheek. Fingers curl at the hinge of his jaw.
"You ain't gotta tell me about it."
Tenuous, difficult terrain. He wants Lestat to have his privacy. To respect what it is that passes between him and Wrench.
But he wants to know everything. He wants to know everything.
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He continues, "He was glad I had you and a place to go home to. He spoke of how he had nothing such as that, really. I argued the point a little, but not too much. Not when he was so far away." Lestat feels at his most convincing when he is close, when he has all methods of persuasion at his disposal.
And he did want to persuade. "So I made him promise me to teach me some of his signing," comes with a hint of a fond, amused little smile. "I remember I knew something like it in our dream."
Not touching the thing Louis has spoken of yet. Too hot and bright to behold too quickly.
cw suicide ideation, etc.
Would the medium through which they spoke make a difference? Was Louis better with his hands than he had been otherwise?
Claudia had taken to it all easy. Louis had needed decades. Decades after her to accomplish what Claudia had taught herself in a handful of years.
Memories of her have been close since the dream. Closer since he spoke to Wrench, made his offer.
"He ain't gonna last if he stays here."
And maybe Louis speaks from experience. From certainty that he would have been ash several times over had it not been for Lestat, or for Claudia.
For Armand.
Louis can't back away from that truth.
If he'd been alone, he would have died. He would have walked into the sun, without anyone present to stop him.
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But it's one thing to save a mortal they're fond of. Louis says he has been meaning to ask, to learn a language. It makes him think—well. It makes him think a rush of several things, like dogs let loose from captivity to run wild, and he must take a breath even if he can feel his eyes grow glossy, blurry.
Oh, if only it was Lestat telling Louis he wanted to rescue Wrench, and Louis speaking cautious questions and managing his feelings.
"You've spoken to him?"
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