Chapters: 4/6
Fandom: Kingdom Come: Deliverance (Video Games)
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: Erik/Ištván Tóth, Radzig Kobyla/Ištván Tóth, Henry's Mother/Radzig Kobyla
Characters: Erik (Kingdom Come: Deliverance), Ištván Tóth, Henry (Kingdom Come: Deliverance), Radzig Kobyla
Additional Tags: Modern AU, well I say modern it’s London in 1991, past istzig relationship, radzig kobyla manages to be a deadbeat ex situationship, two people who are disgustingly in love with one another, Daddy Kink, there’s so much daddy kink in this and it’s both sexual and affectionate, erik is kind of a trophy housewife, kind of romcom like I guess, Erik is a big dumb idiot in love, ištván is a lawyer, erik is an ex-con, Romantic shenanigans where Erik tries to follow 1960s dating advice from a pamphlet, second chance at romance??, Cruising, roleplaying as strangers (briefly), handjobs, Very jealous Erik, edging / teasing kind of, Implied 24/7 d/s dynamics but it’s pretty light, PrisonVerse, the jana/radzig is past and implied and not written really, old man titty sucking, Dry Humping, Erik’s mummy issues daddy issues and general everything in the world issues
Summary:
“D’you ever have any regrets?”
“Oh,” Ištván says, flippantly. “Many.”
Now with Chapter 4! An unexpected guest arrives, and causes a truly Freudian slip.
Ištván takes Erik to a swanky cocktail bar where Erik finds his friend Black Barty working the bar. It’s quiet so they get chatting, and Barty is obviously interested in both of them. After they leave - without making concrete plans - Ištván asks Erik if he’d like to take it up.
Based on extrasluttyoliveoil's Daddy is the new Black & @yakuuzapalooza 's to me (that languished for his sake), the background premise is that 1990s sleazy lawyer Ištván Tóth, feeling guilty about having manoevred his shitty ex Radzig Kobyla's son into prison, decides he wants to take on a charity case to get out of prison. Erik has the hottest mug shot, and here we are.
You should probably read those two first.
Despite his attachment, Erik was very glad Ištván had forbidden him to wear his trainers.
The bar was open and airy, mostly glass and chrome, with a bar selection so vast it required ladders to reach the top shelf. The mostly male staff wore neat gray waistcoats that emphasised the width of their uniformly superb shoulders, and the clientele… Erik might have slung some goey their way but they’d never have come to his council estate. The glasses in their hands were the size of his head and everyone was in suits, not a pair of jeans or trainers to be seen.
Ištván smiled and nodded at punters he knew, taking obvious pleasure at hobnobbing with the crowd and showing off his boy, who -
“...my client, Erik Wolff. Erik, this is Dr Klara Nebak, Chief Executive of…”
Client? Did this fucking stranger need to know he’d just come out of chokey? She seemed friendly enough though, and it wasn’t until Istvan ushered him through the crowd that he realised he’d stopped breathing for a minute. They arrived at the bar and Erik leaned in to Ištván, catching a lovely whiff of his cologne which briefly stopped Erik in his tracks.
“Why did you tell her that I was a client?” he hissed, somewhat desperately.
Ištván looked up at him and smiled, his crow’s feet crinkling warmly like a soft blanket. “My clients are important people. More to the point, they are very wealthy people. These …” he jerked his head towards the crowd, “they know that. Being my client suggests you are a person of some importance.” Looking from side to side, he brought his lips up to Erik’s ear. “And, with all due respect, I do not think these people would buy the charade of you being my son.”
Erik’s anxiety was building to a dull scream when he recognised the bartender, to his surprise and delight.
“Barty!”
Barty looked at him blandly, then did a double take. “Wolff? You look well.”
Erik looked down at himself. He… guessed so? The months since meeting Ištván had been the happiest of his life (if not the only happy time of his life) and being given free access to a gym and good food had filled him right out. “Thanks?”
Ištván was looking at the bartender with great interest. Did he think Erik and Barty were…? “Ištván , this is Black Barty,” he said, remembering (wrongly) some nonsense about introducing the older person to the younger one. “Bart, this is Ištván. He’s my…” Fuck.
Ištván smiled and failed to elaborate. “It’s wonderful to meet you, Bart. I’m assuming you and Erik were colleagues, yes?” Did he really have to take so long pressing his gold credit card into Barty’s hand?
Barty smiled, almost definitely taking too long to take the card out of Ištván's hand. Erik remembered Ištván's advice about counting to ten and moved in a little closer. “We were at The University, yes,” said Bart, discreetly not adding the “of Crime” part.
“Have you been working here since you got - er…” Fuck. Erik was genuinely happy to see Barty, why was this so fucked? Thankfully Barty jumped in for him. “I had some people who owed me some favours, and some people I owed favours, and between them all, I now make Harvey Wallbangers for a living.” He smiled resignedly. “Not what I expected to do with my education, but then I’m not the only failed Masters student here either.”
A queue started to form and Barty waved apologetically, efficiently taking and making orders for cocktails that looked like Godzilla serum. Ištván had acquired them some uncomplicated sweet goop in glasses the size of astronaut helmets, and Erik was glad for the hiding place. Lurking behind his tiny beloved provided limited shelter.
Ištván’s colleagues seemed mostly like wankers, and Erik was grateful that Ištván didn’t really try to pull him into any conversation. Something something Iraq something something Bush blah blah Visegrád rhubarb rhubarb Ireland. At least the music they were playing wasn’t bad. He should ask Barty what it was.
He wasn’t immune to the comments he overheard in passing - “rent boy”, he heard one old cunt whisper to another when he thought Erik couldn’t hear, jokes on him, I’m not paying any rent - but he definitely didn’t mind looming threateningly over drinkers he perceived weren’t treating Pišta with the right amount of respect. Only one, Mr Justice Ulrich, was honest enough to come out and say “and this must be your attack dog” while looking up at Erik and drooling a little. Ištván looked uncharacteristically lost for words - how fucking dare - but glowed with pride when Erik just said “not f’hire, sorry” and went back to his comically huge glass of wine.
Eventually the crowd fucked off to their plays or orchestras or whatever the fuck rich cunts did with their evening, only a few little clusters of pissheads in the corners like cobwebs. Istvan perched Erik at the end of the bar and ordered a giant pile of olives and a Sex on the Beach (“I’m just testing your friend”). Erik declined the offer of an elaborate cocktail in favour of the white wine he’d been on all evening, and wasn’t exactly sure how he felt about the olives.
“What was your Masters in?” inquired Ištván politely, sucking the flesh off an olive and beginning a pile of pips. Bartosch looked sharply at him. “Will you laugh if I say Law?”
“Not in the slightest,” hiding a smile behind dainty chewing. “What aspect of my beloved profession was your speciality?”
Erik really disliked how Ištván was looking at Barty. He couldn’t even put his finger on why - didn’t he want his lover to like his friends? Especially since he hardly had any friends.
“My thesis was about the impact of the Special Powers Act on democratic policing in -“
“Stop right there! If you keep talking politics I’ll have you killed-”
“Hey this music is really good, what is it?”
Barty heaved a sigh of relief. “Betty Davis. Like the old movie star but black and not dead.”
Ištván burst into a fit of giggles, tearing Erik between falling in love with his beautiful eyes all over again and being gutted that it wasn’t him making Daddy laugh like that. “You’re awful. I like that in a man.” As if he could feel Erik’s increasing tension, Ištván grabbed his thigh under the bar and squeezed reassuringly.
“At least you’re not still on that metal shite,” said Erik, reprising an ongoing argument from chokey. “For your information, that metal shite is melodically sophisticated and conceptually challenging.” Bart glanced around the bar. “A bit of Sepultura would do this audience a world of good.”
“It’d clear the place right out,” jabbed Erik, and turned to see Istvan beaming at him adoringly. He wasn’t sure what he’d done to earn this, but he wanted more of it.
“Right, whereas Fear of a Black Planet would have them up and dancing.” Bart was grinning as he said it though. Ištván shook his head sadly. “The young people, they don’t appreciate the classics. Dusty Springfield crossed the colour line so you whelps can quibble about who yells the loudest.” Barty immediately protested “Excuse me!” while Erik crossed over with “It’s time to get you to bed, Daddy,” which got him another one of those beaming smiles. “Is it now?”
Bart coughed loudly. “I hate to interrupt this blossoming romance, but I should close up,” he said, exaggeratedly wiping the already-clean bar. Giggling, Erik helped a mildly-shickered Ištván off the bar stool, clutching him in his arms when he staggered.
Handing over lockup duties to a colleague, Barty pulled on his leather jacket and grabbed a bag with a motorcycle helmet visible through the partially opened zipper. “It was wonderful to see you again, Erik.” He leaned in - up, though only a little - and placed a soft, chaste kiss on Erik’s cheek, so fast it was gone before he could react. Then he was kissing Ištván European style on both cheeks and Ištván was returning the kisses with what seemed to Erik like way too much interest, but maybe that’s how they did it in Hungary? (one… two… three…) “I’ve got a very decent pad in Islington. You gents should drop in for a sandwich.” The way Bart was smiling - no, worse, the way Istvan was smiling back was giving Erik the reddest of mist, so he wrapped one arm about Istvan’s shoulders and pulled him in to kiss his temple, which required a bit of a curtsey but made the point. “Sounds grand. I better get his Lordship home before he does himself an injury.” His Lordship beamed up at him and allowed himself to be pulled into the late-model Jag he’d given Erik as a combination half-anniversary present and tax dodge.
They drove home in silence and Erik made them tea, the ritual acting as a counting exercise in itself - 1, boil the water, 2, lay out cups (one, two), 3, add sugar (none for Ištván, three for Erik), 4, add tea to teapot (one for Ištván, one for Erik, one for the pot), 5, add boiled water at exactly 89 degrees celcius, 6. steep for exactly five minutes, 7, pour into cups, 8, add milk (a wee drappie for Ištván, half the cup for Erik). He was calmer, but not objectively calm, as he carried the tea to the modular lounge Istvan was now occupying.
He handed Ištván his cup (gold) and sat down with his own (silver), snuggling into Ištván’s side like a tired Weimaraner. It took all of his energy not to crawl into Pista’s lap and bat away the book his lover was reading, a big fat spy novel so heavy you could kill a man with it. He tried reading it himself, but the letters blurred into a wall of grey - really, he preferred the comic books Ištván bought him, though he suspected Istvan did this to pretend Daddy wasn’t addicted to the latest Batman run.
The tea made Erik a little dozy (definitely not the litres of sweet white piss he’d drunk at the bar) and he was zoning out, Ištván's fingers caressing the short hair over his ears, when his lover raised his head, pressed a light kiss to Erik’s temple, and asked quietly “What did you think of Bartosch’s offer?”
“What offer?”
“To host us at his place.” Erik couldn’t see Ištván’s face but he was very definitely smiling.
“Uh, yeah, he’s a sound bloke. As long as he doesn’t want me to do any of that bullshit with all the forks.”
Ištván bit back a chuckle. “Unless he has a very specific fetish, I think he just wants to sleep with us.”
Erik sat bolt upright, suddenly very very awake. So he had been flirting with Bart! “Why?!”
“Because you are beautiful, and you deserve to be worshipped like a god.” Ištván put his fingers on Erik’s chin and raised his face to look deeply into his eyes. “Because you deserve pleasure like no other, and because I want to give everything to my boy.”
Erik wasn’t hearing it. “You are everything. I don’t want anything but you.”
“Really? You never think about what it would be like to be stuffed like a toad-in-the-hole? Hands caressing every inch of your skin while all your orifices are stuffed to bursting?” Pista’s eyes crinkled in that way he had when he was about to do something very wicked, and the thought did make Erik briefly gape a little, but -
“You give me all of that. Am I not enough for you?”
“Yes, but - “ And then Istvan abruptly stopped talking, his eyes focused on someone not there, a sneering RP accent -
Prude.
My ex had no problem with it.
Really, you’re so … straight.
Grow up.
He gripped Erik’s jaw tightly. “Do you feel loved?”
“I -“
No.
Ištván said he loved Erik, all the time, and Erik had no reason not to believe him. But Ištván was a mature, successful, educated man, and he was just some piece of shit. Erik tried to say something but all that would come out was a choked wheeze.
“Erik.” Ištván caressed his face, running a thumb over his eyebrow. “You have been utterly betrayed by people you should have been able to trust. Used by people who didn’t appreciate you. Underestimated by fools.” Erik responded only with distressed grunting. “Erik. Listen to me. Do you think I am a charitable man?”
“Errrr… no.”
“Do you think I pity you?”
“.... little bit, yeah.”
Ištván shook his face like he’d eaten a battery. “Put such thoughts out of your mind, Erik. I like to have the best of everything, and you are the best of anything.” He lifted Erik’s face to force him to make eye contact, as if glaring into his eyes would convey the fundamental truth of Erik’s worth.
Erik jerked his face away, the compliment burning him. “You haven’t had the best of boyfriends,” he snapped, make it stop, make it stop…
“I do now.”
“Maybe you'd prefer Bart. He’s more like you - been to uni an’ all -OW!” Erik rubbed his face where Ištván had very suddenly slapped him.
“For fuck’s sake, Bart is a literal Lord. The fact that he’s piss poor doesn’t change the fact that he’s had every fucking educational advantage, whereas you, my darling,” kissing his reddened cheek, “you’ve come so far, no title, no connections… You’re the one who’s like me, not him.”
Erik pulled away. “Please don’t make me share you.”
“Well… I rather thought it was me sharing you. But your loyalty is everything to me.” Ištván pulled Erik to him and the boy finally submitted, swayed by soft chestnut hair and laughing hazel eyes.
Okay so since shade prisons are super canon now I gotta rework my stuff a bit since for the Prisonverse all the prisons had fallen out of use. This is still the case for most places that isn’t run by gaolers. The result remains roughly the same however, things just happen in a different order.
the Shade is defeated and the gods are left to start dragon society.
some of the first prisons and gaols pop up, they do not house dragons yet as they are relatively fledgling species and are watched closely by the gods.
dragons begin to become corrupted and somewhen later Izhuri is born to an arcane clan focusing on curing shadetaint (she was probably not originally a skydancer).
the construction of the prison begin in proper and dragons are growing more corrupted and more powerful individuals are showing signs of corruption, one such dragon is Craushol who becomes the first Whisperer.
The rest of the Whisperers emerge and Craushol is captured and imprisoned in the Fortress of Ends where he remains.
Izhuri finds the gate-maker, a powerful magical artifact that allows travel between the greysphere (a formerly unknown dimension) and the proper world.
attempts are made to imprison the rest whisperers and eventually they are all subdued. During the attempt to capture Izhuri her body is badly damaged and as petty revenge she activates the gate-maker and messes with its’ innate magic causing a huge magical explosion.
Izhuri is stuck bodyless in the greysphere and the rest of the whisperers are chained and sleeping, however their connection to Izhuri and the Shade allows some of them to project their minds into the greysphere.
from the greysphere Izhuri manages to convince Akadh to attempt and escape as the magic holding him is less effective due to his immortality and with Izhuri’s help he does manage to escape... mostly.
after what happened to Akadh the rest of the whisperers are not keen on escape and those who are only dreaming manage to find ways to influence the world through whispers and dreams.
Izhuri takes it a step further and manages to project her mind into lesser shades.
using this ability Izhuri forces herself into the minds of several lesser shades that are now imprisoned in a gaol. From there she tries to influence her guards to let her out. This is pretty close to the current time of the game.
there is one gaoler who seems more receptive to her manipulation, young and somewhat of an outsider Izhuri eventually manages to taint him through her borrowed body.
the goaler Vanargand releases her from the ice, all of her bodies and for a brief minute they all move under her will until Izhuri picks one (the skydancer she currently masquerades as).
Izhuri sets out to release the rest of her kin, Vanargand follows her since there is no way that his brethren won’t kill him on sight. They start with the Flymouth, the only prison that Izhuri knows the exact location of.
if we're honest with ourselves we know Erik is way more self assured than the woobie we torture in our fics, but projection is free
truth nuke. mainly because he is so assured of his position in istvan’s life (he’s completely confident that pista will save him in kcd1 and cannot be swayed from that). however as you say projection is free and you have spurred me on to yap abt my prisonverse erik under the cut / why he’s so woobie in it in the first place so, thank you LOL
my prisonverse erik is just coming off the back of a lifetime of not being enough for anyone — or at least that’s how he interprets it. he’s never been in a relationship, he has a very fractured relationship with his mother who he both idolises and demonises, feels like a failure for his grandmother, and has an incredibly insecure attachment style.
he struggles so much with his self-esteem when it comes to his own intelligence and worth as a human being. he’s pretty body confident and in my fic we find him in a place where he’s really putting most of his stock in his body and its appearance, he spends the majority of his free time when istvan’s at work at the gym working on his physique. he’s not really interested in making friends or having a life outside of istvan / their dynamic which is really not healthy but. hey, whatever works!!
compared to canon isterik he has a lot more reason to fear being replaced (he feels intellectually inferior, he’s worried his appearance will someday become unsatisfying, that istvan will get bored of their dynamic/stop seeing him as a passion project of sorts) and they are less of one another’s entire world as they are in canon simply because they’re not as surrounded by death, so more people stick around I guess
he really struggles to self-regulate and so his insecure attachment really shows through so much…
anyway thank you for reading this if you have!! I’m just yapping because I was thinking abt his poor little brain so much today while writing ch4😩
Fun fact: In the Prisonverse shades are kinda bad at working together despite essentially having the same end goal (depends on how corrupted they are). Like Cvires deliberately withholding information from Sabaneta (not like she can’t just take it), Odi repeatedly trying to kill Sabaneta, Sabaneta telling Akadh it was a great idea to try and escape his prison, the Quaril’s systematic killing of other non-Quaril shades in the Sea of Thousand Currents and many other examples.
Like the Shade may be a singular being with a singular purpose, but one of the traits it provokes in a host is selfishness, so no surprise.
My entry of Odi and Kamiti for the Karyukai Masquerade by @mantisrising. Odi is not wearing as shirt, but don’t worry he has pants on. Kamiti is wearing a lowkey costume and a shirt. Too bad Odi wont listen to reason regarding his clothes and appearance.
At least he is not as bad as Sabaneta who just morphed her face into something vaguely resembling a mask.
“Where did you learn to dance?” Kamiti asks surprised as Odi offers him a hand up.
“I was- I can’t remember”, the Wraith says. His tone is neutral, but Kamiti is quick to grab his hand and draw him towards the other dancers. Nothing good comes of Odi reminiscing on his broken memories.
To Kamiti’s surprise Odi guides him through the movement fluently and patiently, an air of pleasure around him. The dance is unlike anything Kamiti has seen preformed, but that might just be because he has only seen a few before he was taken to the Flymouth.
As a gab in the dancers open up they spot Sabenta sitting by the side, Kamiti’s eyes briefly meet her... pitch black slits. There is someone sitting by her, chatting. Sabaneta turns her attention from the dancing pair -- they are still watched, always watched -- to look at her companion.
Odi growls deep in his throat, which is luckily drowned out by the music.
“Behave or you will regret my dear”, Kamiti lightly warns, “Sabaneta can fight her own battles. A stranger is as likely to do any harm to her as a I am to you.”
Odi turns his head towards Kamiti, and places his mask’s grotesque mouth against the top of Kamiti’s mask in an odd kiss.
“I want her dead”.
Kamiti is not sure he means the stranger.
Hey @bramblemoorcoven that is your Regin that Sabsab is talking to? :D
