Chapter Text
Wylan Van Eck, despite what people seemed to assume, was not a virgin. True, he blushed at the drop of a hat and had limited life experience in the areas of violence and crime. But he had experience in bed, thanks to a suggestible young mathematics tutor with pretty eyes and Wylan’s own impulsive need to feel good about something, anything in his shitty life. Since he had already known everything about numbers that Anders, who had only been a first year university student, could teach him, the two of them had undertaken to learn other skills together. It had been freeing and mutually satisfying, right up until his father had walked in on a “study session” and fired Anders. The next tutor had been an old woman, and Wylan had given up on 'extracurricular activities' and resigned himself to learning calculus instead.
So when Wylan had promised Jesper a down payment, he had fairly specific and detailed ideas of what that would entail and assumed that Jesper did as well. He certainly had plenty of time to think about it, while they brought his mother back to Ketterdam, sent Alys and her many trunks of possessions off to the country house, and met with seemingly countless lawyers over his father’s court proceedings. Jesper had been beside him through all of it, solid as a rock. He'd stepped into the role of private secretary with such efficiency that no one even thought to ask who he was or why he was the one handling the documents. Ghezen, that man was a gift he didn’t deserve. The very first night they weren’t too emotionally exhausted to do more than trade messy kisses and nestle together, he was going to take him apart.
So one of those nights, as Jesper curled his lanky body around Wylan’s from behind and their conversation drifted sleepily from topic to topic, Wylan found his mind drifting to sex again and went ahead and asked him.
"Hey, Jes, which role do you prefer in bed?"
He was met with a sudden awkward silence. Maybe he should have led up to that a little? Oops.
“Jes?” He turned around in Jesper’s arms and found him looking suddenly self conscious.
“About that…” Jesper reached back and rubbed at his neck uncomfortably. “I mean…”
“If you don’t want to do that, that’s all right,” he said quickly. “We can just… not, if you'd rather.” Wylan fussed with the pillowcase to keep from having to look Jesper in the face. He had assumed that was where this relationship was headed, but now he doubted himself. Was he pushing for too much too quickly? Had he read Jesper’s signals wrong?
“No!” Jesper blurted out. “I want to. A lot. So much.” He looked slightly panicked. “I just, um… “ He mumbled a string of syllables that Wylan could not make out.
“Sorry?”
Jesper cleared his throat and tried again. “I’m not quite as experienced as I act like I am.”
Wylan blinked, taken aback. “… Jesper Fahey, are you telling me you’re a virgin?”
“I’ve done things!” Jesper said defensively, which Wylan decided was definitely a yes. He gently cupped Jesper’s face and kissed him, firm and reassuring, until he had stopped sputtering.
“You know I don’t care, right?” he whispered, not moving away so that their lips almost touched with each word. “I’m just surprised. You’re so… you.”
Jesper sighed and kissed Wylan lightly, then rolled over to stare at the ceiling. “I like boys, and I like girls, and I like to flirt. It’s easy for people to assume I’m sleeping with all the people I flirt with and honestly, sometimes I encourage them. It’s fun to imagine what it would be like to just … try all those things.”
Wylan waited, listening curiously. Jesper continued.
“But when it’s someone you don’t have real feelings for… how do people do that so easily? I’ve kissed a lot of people before. But the kiss I shared with you was the first one where I actually felt like--” he seemed to be struggling with his words-- “More than just I wouldn’t mind it going further. Like I needed more.”
“Why me?” Wylan asked, feeling baffled and ridiculously lucky. Jesper smiled at him, looking fond.
“You didn’t kiss me because you wanted a kiss. You kissed me because you wanted me. And suddenly it all made sense, all those people in novels who want to tear each other’s clothes off without even bothering to find a bed first.”
“I made you want to tear my clothes off, huh?” Wylan asked, smiling.
“Yes. That is what I’m supposed to want, isn’t it?” Jesper asked, looking flustered.
“I’m not quite vain enough to think anyone’s supposed to want to tear my clothes off. Besides, I don’t care what you think you’re supposed to want, I care what you do want.” Wylan reassured him, touching his face softly. “If you want me… that just makes me incredibly lucky.”
“We’ll just figure it out together,” Jesper promised him with a very dirty smirk.
Now it was Wylan’s turn to clear his throat. “About ‘figuring it out together’... I'm not actually a virgin.”
Jesper leaned closer. “Oh, really? When did this happen?”
Wylan felt his cheeks heat, because of course they did. “I, uh, kind of seduced one of my tutors last year. Never saw him again after my father found out, of course, but by the time he found out, we’d already…”
“You mean that rumor was true?” Jesper all but crowed, and Wylan elbowed him.
“Stop it! I was sixteen and very unhappy and he had these lovely green eyes, okay?”
"No, trust me, I am nothing but impressed. So now it's my turn to ask you. Which role do you like best?" He wiggled his eyebrows.
"Both," Wylan said with another blush. "They’re, uh, good in different ways.”
Jesper curled back up to him and pressed a kiss to his neck. “Say more.”
Wylan felt the flush creeping down his neck and his heart rate quickening. “I think I’d rather help you find out for yourself one of these nights.”
_
The next day, the two of them took the afternoon to go through the valuables in the attic and see what might be worth using to redecorate the house. Jan Van Eck’s taste had been both pretentious and ugly. When Marya had “died,” he’d stored all her paintings, doilies, and knick knacks in boxes and replaced them with horrible, expensive ‘conversation pieces.’ They’d given them to Kaz to fence on the black market, except for a particular set of dessert plates painted with prayers to Ghezen. His father had liked to have the table set with them and tell Wylan that he could have a slice of cake when he could actually read them. He'd spent a satisfying morning on the docks last week throwing them as high as he could for Jesper to shoot midair.
Now, they were sorting the contents of some boxes from the very back of the attic, finding things he’d had no idea they even owned. It was like getting presents, sort of... presents chosen by someone who had never met you and assumed you needed candlesticks and gravy boats. Wylan allowed himself to get distracted watching Jesper with his coat off and his sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His mind wandered back to the day before.
“So when you said the other day that you’d done things…”
“Is this because I was dusting those candlesticks a minute ago?” Jesper asked, raising an eyebrow.
“... Maybe.”
“You’re so easy,” he teased with a grin.
“Your hands are a menace to society,” Wylan countered. “Answer the question.”
“Yes, merchling, I’ve given handjobs before, and not just to a candlestick.” Jesper stalked lazily over to Wylan and ran his hands down his arms. “Are you asking for a demonstration?”
“Jesper!” He scowled, flustered. “I was trying to have an important conversation.”
Gray eyes sparkled at him. Jesper pressed a playful kiss to his lips and lightly squeezed his arms before letting go of him and returning to the crate of old curtains he was rummaging through.
“Does it worry you that much?” Jesper asked. “That I haven’t done everything? The only thing I was nervous about was the part where I had to tell you.” He held up something rustly and black. “Are these mourning drapings? I thought people rented these. How many family members was your father planning to take out that he actually invested in his own ?”
Wylan threw a feather duster at Jesper’s head. (Jesper caught it effortlessly.) “Most families of our status have their own. Quit mentioning my father when I’m trying to talk about sex.”
“Right, sorry.” Jesper put the black crepe and the duster down and sat on an old armchair, dangling one leg over the arm because he was incapable of sitting like a normal human. “It's funny, you know. Back home I wouldn't be considered a virgin, though I certainly was when I left. It's a very Kerch idea that sex has to involve someone being penetrated to count and not just two people doing sexual things together."
"If you'd be more comfortable just-" Wylan started to say.
"I know, darling." Jesper gave him one of those smiles that made Wylan's heart ache with how much he loved him. "I don't intend to do anything I don't want to. Honestly, I'd probably be a lot more experienced if I was less stubborn about letting other people push me into things I didn't feel ready for."
"Good," Wylan said fiercely.
In a way, he realized Jesper would be his first as well. When he was with Jesper, Wylan would not be running from anything or trying to forget. He would be running to something. To some one, someone who made him feel like he was more than just desirable. Who made him feel like a whole man.
"I want to try more with you," Jesper told him, eyes meeting his again. "I want everything."
Suddenly the drafty attic felt far too warm and Wylan had to tug at his collar and readjust the fit of his pants.
"I wish you'd warn me before you said things like that," he muttered. "Damn it, Jesper."
"So you're saying it's not just my hands but my mouth that's a menace to society?" Jesper teased, because he was a horrible, horrible man. Wylan groaned, crossed the attic, and grabbed Jesper's tie to pull him up into a hungry kiss. He felt more than heard the deep moan that resonated in Jesper's throat. Jesper melted into the kiss, his hands coming up to thread through Wylan's curls. The gentle tug of his grip and the heat of his mouth made Wylan’s heart ache in the best way. It still filled him with such joy and disbelief, the idea that he could have this to keep.
Greedy, Wylan let his teeth graze and felt Jesper gasp and respond in kind, nipping at his lower lip. He trailed kisses down the line of Jesper’s jaw, tugged at his earlobe with gentle lips. His skin was warm and smelled like almond soap and pepper, and Wylan never wanted to take his mouth off of him.
“Do you have any idea--” Jesper breathed as Wylan kissed and nibbled down his neck-- “all the things I want you to do to me, Wy? It started with your mouth. I’d keep, ohhh, finding myself looking at it. And I’d feel this little tug in my chest. But it’s so-- so much more now.” Wylan pulled back for a moment, breathing hard, and met Jesper’s eyes with his own, and even in the dim light through the attic window he could see his pupils dilate. “I can’t stop thinking about it,” Jesper confessed. “I look at your mouth and I want it all over me. I see those gorgeous musician’s fingers and I think of how they’d feel on my skin. I watch the way you move and imagine how we’d move together.”
"I want to give you everything," Wylan swore. "Everything you want. I'm yours."
"You're the most precious thing I've ever had, then,” Jesper said. His tone of voice was light, but his eyes were serious. “I'll have to take good care of you."
Wylan felt as if those words touched an empty, starved place inside him, filling the void with a happiness and arousal so intense it was painful.
"Not nearly as good care as I'm going to take of you," he said fervently, then pushed Jesper back into the chair and dropped to his knees. He paused with his hands at the fastenings of Jesper’s pants. “Can I?”
Jesper’s mouth opened but no words came out. He nodded, looking surprised but aroused, and Wylan unfastened his pants and guided out the hot, velvety length of him. Jesper had already been semi erect, and Wylan watched his cock swell and thicken as he gave it a few slow, firm strokes. He would have liked it no matter what, because it was Jesper’s, but,
"You have such a gorgeous cock," he murmured, and it was true. He brushed a feather-light kiss over the tip, hearing Jesper’s breath stutter. Then he took the head in his mouth, curling his tongue around it. Jespers head fell back and he made a broken sound. Wylan shifted his grip, pulling back the loose skin, and took it in his mouth in earnest. He began to move his head, savoring the taste, the weight on his tongue, the way it twitched and throbbed for him. Jesper's hands threaded into Wylans hair, not urging or guiding so much as holding on for dear life. Every movement of Wylans mouth tore a helpless sound from him. It was intoxicatingly hot, hearing what he could do to him.
Wylan tried to use his hands, his tongue, the suction of his mouth, to say everything he did not have words for, lavishing him with all the tenderness he could. Jesper was so beautifully responsive, arching and breathlessly cursing, trying so hard to keep his hips still and failing utterly. Wylan had done this before but was far from an expert at it; Jesper made him feel like a prodigy. He reached down and fumbled his own erection free, letting himself moan messily around Jesper’s cock as he thrust into his own fist.
Jesper’s thighs were starting to spasm. Wylan took him as deep as he could, prompting a sound that was almost a sob as Jesper’s cock nudged the back of his throat.
“I’m-- Wylan, I--” Jesper stammered, and Wylan made an encouraging noise and did not slow down. “Oh Saints,” he choked out before his orgasm seemed to punch out the breath from his lungs.
Wylan felt more than tasted it, a surge of heat in his throat that he swallowed greedily as Jesper bowed over him, whispering fragments of words that were so garbled that they could have been Zemeni or Kerch or something else altogether. Jesper’s hands cradled his head, stroked his hair, as Wylan gently sucked him through his climax and then held him for a long moment in the soft heat of his mouth as little aftershocks shuddered through him.
When he finally leaned back, Jesper was shaking, a deep flush on his skin, a film of sweat on his forehead that glinted in the light through the attic window. His clothes were askew, his softening cock still slick with Wylan’s spit. He was beautiful, so beautiful. Wylan’s hand moved feverishly as he felt the urgency of his climax nearing. Their eyes met, and Jesper’s pupils were still totally blown out.
“Oh, sweetheart,” Jesper said quietly, and reached out to touch Wylan’s face with a still-trembling hand. His fingers stroked his cheek.
Wylan’s lips parted in a silent cry and he came in a series of harsh, wordless shudders. Jesper’s eyes held his all through it, full of too many emotions to name. Both men just breathed raggedly and looked at each other for a long minute. Then Jesper lowered himself to the floor, pulled a handkerchief from his pocket, and tenderly wiped the mess from Wylan’s mouth, hand, wrist, and softening cock. Then he pulled Wylan close and kissed him, and kissed him, and kissed him.