Hi! Never wrote an ask to someone before so I hope I'm doing this right... If you'd like, for kissing prompt, 32 or 17, krexie? Pretty please?
Don’t worry, you did perfectly re: requesting via an ask, and I’m honored to be your first ask.
17. Tucking their hands beneath the other person’s shirt, just to watch them break the kiss and gasp in surprise at the sensation of cold/warm hands on their skin.
from 50 Types of Kisses - Writing Prompts
I actually did something similar a year ago, in my not-at-all-Wizards compliant fic A Touch of Cold, which is a sequel to my fic Destiny's Pawn. This fic is gonna be an alternate point of view for A Touch of Cold.
CW: past mind control
AO3 (If you have an account, let me know and I’ll gift this to you)
FFN
Winter had been Mordred’s favorite season once. He had adored snow and the way it had covered Camelot in a beautiful white blanket. He had liked the way his breath would come out as puffs of fog, a type of magic that wizardry couldn’t quite mimic.
It isn’t his favorite season, not anymore. Maybe it’s the fact that winters in Southern California only bring harsh and bitter winds, pouring rain, and on rare occasion hail, but never snow. He’s heard from coworkers who have family from out-of-state that even though it doesn’t snow in SoCal, it’s colder here than in areas with snow. Snow is an insulator, no matter if you’re in a sixth century semi-magical castle or a twenty-first century office building. It keeps away the worst of the cold.
Except for Douxie, the worst of the cold may not even be the external cold, but rather the cold’s horrible connotation. Every time Merlin had controlled Mordred with his magic, Mordred had felt cold and numbness flooding through his body. Worse, being cold is Douxie’s most common PTSD trigger, one that even well into adulthood would drag him back to being a teenager with no choice but to do Merlin’s bidding. At least he now knows it’s a trigger, though. In his freshman year of high school, the first winter Douxie had experienced since Camlann, he had nearly destroyed his friendships because he hadn’t realized just how bad of a mental state the constant cold had put him in.
He is so thankful that Byqvist, his therapist, had survived Gunmar’s massacre of the Janus Order. He is so thankful that Strickler had reached out to Byqvist after seeing how much Jim, Douxie, and Claire had been struggling to find a therapist who actually knew how to work with victims of mind control and possession. He is so thankful that Byqvist had been willing to oblige Strickler’s request.
Douxie sighs as he parks his car in front of the house he shares with his husband. The heater is so nice in the car, and there’s a Papa Skull song playing on the radio. If he exits the car, he’s going to have neither of those things.
The song stops playing, giving way to an ad break. He sighs and turns off the engine. Time to brave the cold and all the horrors that it brings.
He walks as quickly as possible, squinting as the wind bites and batters his face and whips about his bangs. When he gets to the porch, he drops his keys and chooses to just use magic to pick up his keys and unlock the door.
Behind the door is a face that has always brought Mordred joy.
No, it hasn’t. That’s a lie and he can’t lie around Krel, whose face has brought forth other emotions. Anguish and despair upon first realizing that Krel is his soulmate, frustration whenever Krel steals the blankets (especially when he is sleeping in the form that doesn’t even feel temperature as extremely as humans do), and so many more emotions that are all worth having married Krel for.
“How was work?” Krel asks as Mordred hangs up his coat.
“Alright, though I think Gregory’s mad at me again.”
“Isn’t he always?”
“True.” Last week, it was because Douxie had fixed the printer in under ten minutes after Gregory had spent over an hour on it. And Douxie hadn’t even used magic on that fix, except pointing that out had made Gregory even more angry. “How was your day?”
“I should have made the final multiple choice. Then, I could just use campus’s scantron reader.”
“Don’t you hate using that thing? And multiple choice tests in general?” After all, every single time Krel had designed a multiple-choice test, he complained about how it told him absolutely nothing about his students aside from their guessing habits.
“But then I wouldn’t have to deal with undergrad tests.”
“Have you been grading the 225 final all day?”
“No, I caught up with the last of the homework for 476. But other than that, it’s just been 225. I didn’t expect so many of them to finish it.”
Mordred raises an eyebrow. While he trusts his husband, Douxie’s least favorite professors in college didn’t grade homework until after the exam. Hopefully Krel had at least gave his students the answer key to their homework before the final exam. Plus, what cruelty was Krel inflicting on his students, making a test too long to finish?
“I was going to curve it anyways,” Krel continues. “Given the time limit I thought they’d take their time on some problems and leave the others blank, not rush on everything.”
Krel takes a step towards Douxie. Krel then leans his head so he can kiss Mordred. Douxie wraps his arms around Krel’s waist.
There are many things that Douxie loves about Krel’s human form. It was the first of Krel’s forms that Douxie had seen, and therefore the first form he had started crushing on. It also radiates heat instead of light. Mordred sneaks his hands underneath the hem of Krel’s shirt.
Krel yelps and pulls away. What a pity; that wasn’t the reaction Mordred had been hoping for.
“Do you,” Krel starts, then refrases.“Your hand is too cold.”
Hand. Singular.
“It can’t be that cold,” Douxie says as he moves to twist the amulet to change his prosthetic from a gauntlet to a glove. His eyes widen. “Oh. Cold. Very cold.”
Biting, burning cold. He very quickly changes it into a glove, and then stuffs the glove in his pocket. He certainly won’t be using that to stim any time soon.
“Is that my sock?” Krel asks.
“I need to run a load of laundry, so I improvised,” Douxie answers. To be fair, he doesn’t often use socks; they don’t fit properly. “I’m going to go run it before I forget; you have any darks for me to throw in?”
