#priory au

[amnesia-yourself]

“Your majesty.”

Kara, clad in armor, takes the hand Lena offers and brings it to her lips. The title is unnecessary now that they're alone, but Kara likes to say it. Lena is beauty and power and splendor, and she chose Kara to be hers.

“Hello, darling.” They fall into step as they walk down the castle walls and towards the Queen Tower. “I trust you had a pleasant day?”

“As always.” Kara is not thinking of the lavish food or her stimulating conversation with Nia when she answers, but rather of waking up beside Lena and watching her rise with the sun. “And you?”

“Lord Jack arrived ahead of the Mentish party and stole me off for a walk in the gardens. The plumerias are blooming beautifully.”

Kara could never hide her tension, even with most of her body hidden under armor.

“Oh, stop it,” Lena says exasperatedly. “My heart belongs only to you.”

“Mine too,” Kara says. “Jack’s as well, I reckon.”

Lena rolls her gorgeous eyes. Somehow Kara finds her most beautiful when she is haughty and indignant. “I will not entertain this conversation again. You are sillier than any man I’ve ever met.”

Kara pushes her lower lip out. In her armor, one hand always ready on her sheathed sword, she is sure she looks ridiculous, but as Lena’s wife she must be primed to protect her at all times, even while they’re bickering in between tasks.

Lena taps her once on her chestplate to show that she is only teasing, sweeping past her in an elegant flurry of fabric, the perfect waves of her black hair swaying with each step. Kara hurries to catch up and offers her hand to help Lena up the Privy Stairs.

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[themuseoftheviolets]

why am i thinking about a marauders priory au as if that would be in any way shape or form easy and feesable

[believerindaydreams]

"We can't be falling apart like this," Wallace says, staring out the rose-tinted glass.

Tuco lets himself fall into one of the dusty pews, cushioned by purple plush that squeaks when he hits it. "You never thought anything would happen here, eh?"

"Damn straight," Wallace says, allowing the profanity to hang in the air.

There's an edge there from years back, jagged anger like the knives the butcher's son had brought with him. Blondie had always thought it had gone away, rejected in favor of prayers and honeycomb and meek admiration for young Father Paul; Tuco's never believed that. A sheath, not a plowshare.

"I really wouldn't do anything to Angel Eyes," Tuco warns. "I mean, if half of what he says is true, he has more to lose than we do by making a fuss."

Wallace nods in agreement, slaps the fist of one heavy hand against the opposing palm. "But of all places to ask sanctuary...why here? Why us?"

"Why anyone? He came looking for safety, he found it...so far, all that's changed is that we know. Maybe it'll keep on like this."

"Father Paul should know." Wallace is pacing now, mouth twisted and hard. "You came to me first- why?"

"Because...well, there's the Christian thing to do. And then maybe there's something else. And I don't go to my brother to discuss the something else, you know."

"I thought that's what you had Blondie for."

Tuco tuts. "Blondie's gone romantic on me. You can guess where he is now, rutting and listening to stories laced with blood- he's found a Galahad to love. All wrapped up in danger with none of the guilt! Wallace, if we're going to think this through sanely we'll have to do it ourselves."

"Maybe that's giving me too much credit." Wallace stops at last, gripping the back of the pew with a tightly knotted grip. "There's only ever one thing that concerns me, and you could hardly call that sane."

Here it comes; Tuco rises, rubs small hands under Wallace's rough brown linen. "You know I want what's best for him too."

"Not like I do," Wallace's voice is grating in self abasement, even as he starts to reciprocate, a shoulder grasp uncommonly like a headlock. "Not the way I would..."

"Of course not," Tuco agrees, and sinks teeth into sweat-salted flesh.

Wallace's cries are subdued, held back even in this solitary chapel; he's never let himself go all the way and Tuco's glad of that, considering. Not like Blondie's mellowed constancy, even less like Angel's acutely sensitive manner, it's still more frightening to him than the nebulous warnings about these assassin pursuers...

After all, that's hearsay. The way Wallace's nails rake across his skin, the way he throws his small weight against the other's immobility, the way Wallace wrestles him down in turn, this is all very evident and real.

They haven't harangued like this for a long time- not troubled enough, not needy enough- it's pleasure born of fear. Nakedness flavoured by the threat of discovery. If any softly-devout brother should happen on them here, stripped down to lewdness.

To be seen in the act of wasting holy oils, their sweet incense rubbed against arms and thighs and cocks. Anointing each other in the stuff that Pablo has so patiently blessed, they'd be hard put to it explaining a divinity unsanctioned by the church. Tuco chuckles warmly at the thought as their movements quicken in eagerness, worry slipping away from him with action.

It's not like fucking Blondie, whose opinion on topping and bottoming is as changeable and unpredictable as weather. Neither he nor Wallace will give an inch in their mingling, so mutual jerk-off it is; his hands clenched firmly around the warm supple swelling of the other's desire, holding back from flinching at the equally sure grasp on his own. Makes it a competition, a little contest to spice the encounter- which one of them can pull most provoking and sure, which one of them will lose focus in a mutual stare to fall back in ecstasy, weak with the priory's hallowed woods to support them-

"That solved exactly nothing," Wallace admits in the afterglow.

"Dios," Tuco says, because this is one of those times he can expect to be indulged for Spanish.

[believerindaydreams]

(Priory au)

"What do you mean, you've never had a bubble bath?"

"Exactly what I said." Angel dips one toe into the steaming water, his weight balanced with considerable elegance; Blondie, Tuco can't help suspecting, would have fallen over in that pose.

It's strange and it isn't. Been so long since he was learning someone's body this way for the first time, precious and new- and muddy, of course. That sinkhole besides the chicken coops is going to need mending one of these days.

On the plus side, rescuing their resident angel from two inch deep squelching had obviously turned to some good.

"What flavour scent, eh? Blondie favors lemon verbena, I keep getting pots of violet stuff from Pablo- says he never knows what to give me-"

"....you mean Father Paul? He doesn't look much like you."

"We-lll, he's older, you know? Takes more after mama than I do, too- and he doesn't like jam, which is ridiculous around here but what are you going to do? What a penance though...hey, there's some pink stuff."

Blondie would laugh, say he's babbling the way he does when he gets flustered. Blondie would be right.

"Given the choice, let's stick to lemon."

There's such a delicious crispness in the way Angel says it, as if they talked of princes and principalities instead of salts; the voice tingles down his spine, deliciously. He pours in the fizzing little globes, watches them melt away.

Angel picks at a new box of soap with a thumbnail, pensive. "Seems a shame to sully it, with all our muck."

"Our?"

"You are joining me, aren't you?"

"Sure," Tuco says, as though no other possibility had occurred to him; and wonders why this should feel more intimate than sex.

[believerindaydreams]

"Tuco Ramirez," Angel Eyes says, rolling it around on his tongue like some kind of prayer.

He likes to hear it said like that. Only Blondie does sometimes, and that's under considerably different circumstances than this nondescript Italian restaurant.

"And you...how do I call you, man with no name?"

Angel doesn't move, hardly twitches, but there's a nice kind of amusement in his expression. "Angel Eyes is fine."

Tuco frowns a bit, accepting the plate of salad. "Yes, but....what, you want me to call across a room like that? 'Hey, Angel!'?"

"It'll do just fine." He nods a polite way at the waiter who's brought his soup; at least it seems polite to Tuco, but the fellow scurries off in a kind of panic. Funny, that.

"So was this all you had in mind for me? Take me out for breadsticks and inquire after my Christian name?"

"Of course not. I'm in love-" that slipped out easy as anything. "And I wanted you to know it, that's all."

"Hmm."

"....my brother could tell you, I'm a very impulsive person," Tuco says, a little apologetically. "I hadn't thought through what happens next."

"Bad idea," Angel says impertuably, spooning up onion soup with delicate regard for his mustache. "Look at us. You're a priest-"

"A brother. I never took those kinds of vows."

"-and I am not, but there is no way that I would be remotely good for you in any way, shape or form."

"...I might be tired of things that are good for me."

He gets a bark of laughter for his pains; Angel looks almost as surprised as he feels. "More to it than that."

"I won't know unless you tell me." How bad can it be...well, bad perhaps, but he's in adoration, he could forgive anything. The mere way that Angel wipes up a last splash of cheese with his spoon makes him feel unaccountably warm and delightful, infatuated with small details.

"I might be all sorts of things that are bad for small handsome Tucos-"

It takes Angel aback, to be kicked under the table. Almost as much as he is.

"Hey. Hey, no soft soap. You say no, I'll take that, but then you say that and don't make it out to be some kind of- of patronizing innocence-"

He stops short for breath, fork in the air. Angel gazes at the blunt prongs instead of him, very intently.

"Bill," he says, not that loudly, but it attracts their terrorized waiter like a flash.

"In the middle of a meal? They do this lovely thing with eggplants-"

"I won't talk about this in public," Angel snaps, finally harsh; and the worrisome thing is it doesn't put him off at all.

*******

They don't go back to the monastery, as he's assumed they'd do- instead Angel just keeps on going, further west than he's ever been before. There's not much in this direction, trees and more trees, and maybe he ought to start to worry.

He doesn't know anything about Angel after all, not really, and even if he was crazy enough not to mind being kidnapped, it'll be getting dark soon. Blondie will worry.

"Do you need to be somewhere?"

"Nowhere far enough away for me to hide," Angel mutters; and the sheer sadness of it makes him shut up again.

After an hour of quiet he runs out of patience, goes to sleep; and wakes up when they make a particularly sharp turn towards a quarry. Trees still, but mostly windswept and dead.

"Get out of the car."

He slips out obediently. Does up the denim jacket, wishes he had something a little thicker- if he'd known Angel liked outdoorsing, he's have borrowed something off Blondie.

That's not really what this is about. His heart's thumping like it maybe never has in his life, waiting for the payoff.

It's not much of a cliff that Angel finds, but twenty feet up, hard stones at the bottom. It'd do.

"I didn't bring my gun for this," Angel says. "But we can safely assume I'd beat you in a fight, I think."

Tuco's not totally sure about that- bored Brother Wallace needed somebody to help him practice martial arts by correspondence, and Angel's sort of weedy- but he doubts saying that would help any.

Or saying anything. He kneels down at the precipice, looks thoughtfully down at the drop.

"Now look...did Rose put you up to this? Was there a bribe?"

"No. Who's Rose?"

"Somebody else, then," and he can't see Angel laying hands on his back but he feels them, the slight cushion afforded by those ever present gloves. "An intermediary. You couldn't be a plant, with that brother of yours, but the right kind of approach- and I suppose you were the most corruptable, weren't you?"

"Tonto del culo!" He scrambles around, finds himself looking up with Angel's boot planted on his gut. "What's wrong with you, huh? You come into my monastery with the flair of the devil himself, I fall head over heels for it, and you think so little of yourself, that I couldn't love you without a reason? Fuck your reasons! You draw me on like snowstorms that kill, but they're beautiful, I don't need a better reason than that!"

Angel frowns, hard.

Then, rather slowly, takes away his boot and sits down besides him. His dark eyes are wider a little, in the near dusk.

"...you've met Susan."

"Sure. Sure I have."

Angel bows his head. "I hired the best assassin I could find to do murders for me, and it worked alright for a while but we're pretty sure Rose caught on, and she's telling me to give it up and get into the family business already...I don't know what to do. Am I going too fast?"

"Uh."

"That's about how I feel about it," Angel says, collapsing in his lap like some particularly elegant pieta.

Tuco strokes his head, contemplating just how much he would have died for this just half an hour ago. Now that actually dying seems on the line, well...

It must be the mischievous spirit Pablo always rebukes him for, that says it's still worth it.

[believerindaydreams]

"What's wrong with you?" Wallace is in good spirits, tending two searing steaks on his cast iron pan with diligent care. He sounds a little less sardonic than he might, usually.

"My heart is broken into so many tiny pieces, you'd need a magnifying glass to sweep them up. Why, how's it with you?"

A chuckle by way of reply. "Not so bad as you, my friend."

He doesn't really like the way Wallace calls him that, a declamation of ownership, but it's a true enough thing to say- and besides, to say such a thing to a man so lonely wouldn't be the least charitable. Anyway, today is not the time-

"Would it have anything to do with our illuminator's lady friend?"

"I must be getting soft in my dotage," Tuco retorts, fetching a knife. Two nice hunks of sourdough to mop up the juices, that'll do nicely. "To be so obvious about it!"

(Honestly, how and when? Just because his love is printed on all his dreams in the biggest of types, doesn't mean he thought to be utterly transparent.)

"No, well....I saw where Blondie's eyes were going also." Wallace shoves a spoon under the steak, flips it over in a splatter of grease. "And during Mass, no less."

He splutters off the edge of a reply; no use incriminating himself more. "I wouldn't...that is to say, I'd rather not say."

Something like loftiness enters the monk's expression, which Tuco can't help feeling doesn't suit. "There are certain advantages to keeping one's relations purely on the spiritual level."

"...mmm."

"But a word of reassurance. I spoke with her this morning, and she says she has definite business to attend to, so won't outstay the week. Joseph's moral fibre should doubtless hold out for that little time."

Worse and worse. If Blondie wanted the austere Susan, well...he can't quite see it himself, but then he has no choice.

The thought that's bothering him, after all, is the way Angel Eyes had smiled upon the night of her arrival. Vivacious, dressed to the nines, with an exceptional hat and a heart's ease that had looked so fine on him! The very way he'd spooned out marmalade ("Shall I open a fresh jar?" "If you would-" they'd sounded so impossibly elegant).

He slumps across the table, and eyes the hot steaks being placed upon it with something like indifference.

"If your appetite's gone, you really are a lost cause."

"....perhaps not that bad," Tuco admits; seizes a fork with a desperate attempt at enthusiasm. "It's just- what can I do, Wallace? Watch helplessly?"

"Then make a move tonight, you dolt. You do often enough as it is."

Good, solid, practical advice, just like its progenitor. "That's...worth thinking about."

He pops a piece of perfectly done steak into his mouth, and feels better.

[believerindaydreams]

"What if we fuck up?"

"What if we don't," Tuco asks, sticking his tongue out a little- the jam van isn't the most reliable beast, needs a little coaxing to get started. "What if nobody notices and we just keep him, out of trouble, and nobody gets hurt?"

Blondie watches him closely, relaxes a little when the engine finally catches and they start trundling down the gravel path. "Won't be as easy as picking up car tips from me, come on."

"Sure, sure. What is it we're getting, extra cheesecloth?"

"And cheese while we're at it- might as well know that now, so you don't have to look all plaintive when we go in-"

"I wouldn't have to if Pablo would trust me with the money sometimes."

"I think he worries it'd be invested wisely and not too well."

[believerindaydreams]

How then, to catch a sinner?

First thought is that robes won't do for this, not at all, and it wrenches at his heart a little to dig out the clothes from the bottom of the cedar chest- old patched things, not good enough to give away. The dry, ironic voice that laughs when he doesn't dare to suggests he show up on Angel's doorstep in the altogether, showing off his goods for all they're worth; but there's risk and then there's foolhardiness. Hard enough that he stands to have his heart broken.

Eventually he settles on an old dress shirt of Blondie's, taken in a bit, and tidy black pants and a denim jacket that can pass for quaint, once reinforced with the cannibalized remnants of some old jeans. The sewing he does during rosary hour, counting syllables by stitches. A double knot for every finished decade.

That part takes three weeks. He's not in a hurry.

Gifts seem out of the question- frivolous, or else too expensive; and yet without his entirely understanding it things accumulate under his narrow cot. An interesting-looking knife, wooden handle and a curved blade. The jar of bath salts some jam-seeker had donated, same scent as a candle he remembers noticing in the evening air. A small box of chocolates Wallace smuggles in for him, sacrosanct and unopened. Even if Angel never sees them, their presence is a comfort.

Wine, of course. His nerve probably won't stand a confession without it- the possibility of error, ambiguity. A bottle goes missing from the stores frequently enough here. Pablo turns a blind eye.

"I want love," he says to himself in the mirror, trimming a slightly neglected mustache to a pleasantly honed edge. "Eh, Ramirez? The Hail Mary play for you, throwing yourself out there and hoping- we'll see how it goes, amigo."

Something in him that's turning to the old words again, rolling off the tongue with strange quickness. Angel's Latin is as good as anyone's, maybe even a little better than his brother truth be told- but it's not a language to woo in.

(Is that the word, for what he's doing now? Probably: and the contentment is spliced so close with desire he can't find the end.)

It buoys him, a steadying constant to flicker through every morn and eve, safely to sleep and eager to rise. Here in the garden is where Angel laughed once, robust and earnest. There on the ruined stone wall he found a paper once, a hasty sketch with none of the style of the sacred illuminations, and three times the joy. Blondie chasing a chicken: a few rough lines enough to encapsulate the priest.

They are all small patient joys; and he adores them to the heart.