Chapter 312: Reaching.

Chapter 312: Chapter 312: Reaching.

From the first moment he laid eyes on him, Loac knew he wanted to fuck Khobi Frost.

​It’s not like that’s ever been a big secret or anything; Loac wants to fuck a lot of people and a lot of people want to fuck him and he’s never felt the need to kept up pretenses otherwise.

It had been a real shame when Khobi had made it clear from the get go that he wasn’t interested, but that had been his loss; Loac’s always had enough people that want him that he doesn’t make a habit of concerning himself with those who don’t.

​He doesn’t chase.

​(He’s never needed to. Never wanted to.)

​And yet .

​And yet inexplicably, wherever Khobi Frost goes, Loac’s gaze can’t help but follow.

​How can he not? He’s incredible.

Gods , the way he fights is incredible , and the heat he feels in his blood when they cross blades is addictive and makes him burn in a way that he hasn’t burned for anything in the longest time.

​Looking back, maybe that’s the real reason why he showed up to training that day, and what had led him back.

At the time he’d just wanted to test him and that iron resolve of his; to see not just whether that win back then had been some cheap fluke, but if he truly meant what he said to him on that day.

But looking back, maybe by that time he’d just spent so long chasing the memories of heat like that that he needed to feel it again; to know that it hadn’t just been a dream.

​(Deep down, he’d known that there was nothing cheap about what Khobi had shown him)

​(Or about the promise he’d made.)

​I’ll take you on anytime .

​So far, he’s been true to his word. And while in the beginning, he’d only been there for Khobi, and only until he proved to him –and himself –once and for all, that he was just the same as all the rest; that eventually he too would fall before him and turn away, and Loac would be left to return to ashes, aching to feel something, anything ; left with nothing but the fading memories of something that had brought him joy, that day never came.

​(It still hasn’t.)

​(At some point, he had started hoping it would never come.)

​And at some point, things started being different .

​The soldiers stopped staring; stopped shying away when he passed them by.

They started cheering when he won, and started heckling him when he didn’t; just like they did for Rogard, and Khobi, and the rest of them. And then, before he knew what was happening, he was sitting with them.

Eating in company instead of alone.

​(Loac hadn’t realised how much he’d missed that; how much he’d wanted a hand to be extended out to him until Rogard had.)

​And he’d told Rogard to his face that he’d changed, but he knows that he’s not the same as he was, either.

Because since when does he run laps ? Since when does he do drills , or spar with soldiers who shouldn’t be worth his time? Shit, he hasn’t run through the hallways like he did that day since he was a kid , and up until that point it was the most fun he’d had in years.

And winning had felt good, obviously it had, but Khobi’s reaction to him winning was even better.

There’s just something about the way that he barks and bites so often and easily that makes Loac want to bait him; to push him just to feel the heat when he pushes back.

And recently that urge to needle him –to turn him red and make him bite and make him look only at him –has started to get a little out of hand; coming so fierce and insistent that it’s more compulsion than conscious thought.

​Even now, even after all these weeks and all the times they’ve met on the battlefield; no matter how many times he faces him, that little itch that had flared up and under his skin the first time he’d fallen to him simply refuses to die.

Something about Khobi and the way heat gathers to him like a storm builds on a humid summer day only stokes it, and when he unleashes it upon him with those endless fires burning red and wild in his eyes he is so absolutely captivating that Loac can’t bring himself to look away.

Because when he peers into those red depths he sees the expanse of the wilderness opening before him; hears thunder echoing off the mountains and sees lightning split the sky, and feels the thrill of something dangerous lurking in the darkness beyond, and as it always has, it calls to him.

And as he always has been, he is instinctively, intrinsically drawn to answer its call.

​(And why wouldn’t he want to fuck that?)

​But he’s come to find that Khobi’s heat isn’t just there when he fights; it’s in everything he does, and for some reason even when it’s not at its hottest or its most blinding the pull it has on him remains fierce and insistent.

And even away from their swords and the heat of battle, that pull lingers; calling him to Khobi and charging the air between them with a heavy tension, like static aching to spark.

​It’s times like that that it feels impossible that Khobi doesn’t feel it, too.

​(Gods, he’d wanted it to spark.)

​(But he doesn’t chase.)

​(If someone doesn’t want him, there’ll always be someone else who does.)

It’s getting worse, too. Had been, steadily, day by day, then something had happened that made him really start to wonder if maybe Khobi did .

​It was the tossing that had woken him, and at first he’d thought it was a nightmare; he’d been sweating so badly –hands clenched so tight in the sheets –that that had seemed the obvious explanation, and Loac had briefly wondered if he should wake him.

But he’d caught himself before he even started reaching.