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Joshua tugs on Clive’s hand, pulling him toward the water. It isn’t urgent. Nothing is urgent out here. They have nowhere to be, nothing to do. It’s just them and the river and the sun glinting off the surface. But every moment with Clive manages to feel urgent. Stolen.
They wade into the water fully clothed. Their trousers need the cleansing river as much as their bodies. Perhaps the swift water will wash away what they’ve already done, what they plan to do.
Joshua wades in to his waist before he turns around. Even with Clive’s hand in his, it’s still a thrill to find him there, right behind Joshua, following him.
He’s here. He’s still here.
Joshua’s heart rattles around his chest. It’s a fire stirring to life. All those years apart withered it down to coals, but having Clive here before him now – it reignites the flame, makes his whole body more alive, more real.
“The water is cold,” Joshua says.
It isn’t. Not with his whole body ablaze. But the admission draws Clive a step closer. The water sweeps past them, dragging them sideways, gurgling between them.
Joshua attempts to close the distance a little more, but the bottom of the river is slick with riverstones and the current is strong and Joshua wobbles. He catches himself against Clive’s chest, and Clive grabs his wrists. It seems like an instinct. It’s quick and precise, like how he uses his sword, and it stabilizes Joshua instantly.
He isn’t sure he wants to be steady right now. Joshua presses harder against the firm chest under his hands. Would squeezing be too much? But then, what does it matter when all of this is too much, when all of this is something that should never happen? They’ve already gone too far, and now Joshua is gripping Clive’s chest, reveling in the firmness under his palms, tentatively curling his fingers.
Absorbed in his discovery, he forgets to look up. When he finally does, he finds Clive watching him, his throat bobbing as he remembers to close his mouth and swallows hard.
He likes it.
There’s no way Joshua is moving his hands now. A raging akashic couldn’t pry them off. He moves his thumbs, rubbing over the buttery leather covering Clive’s chest.
He doesn’t mean to do it, but he must stumble over a nipple. Clive flinches, heat washing into his face. He’s still holding Joshua’s wrists, but doesn’t actually move him away.
Only moments ago, this went the other way. Clive spoiled Joshua, combed through his hair like he did when they were kids. Except it somehow became more, so much more, became something they leapt into this river to avoid naming.
The water can’t wash away what they need.
It’s in every labored breath. It’s in the heat dancing along Clive’s cheekbones. It’s in the way his eyes have blown out and become dark, endless pits.
“Can I touch you?” Joshua says, hardly louder than the river.
“You shouldn’t.”
“I didn’t ask if I should.”
Clive doesn’t respond, and Joshua slides his hands toward the laces restricting his shirt. Joshua picks at them and the leather peels open. He moves slowly, watching Clive’s face, waiting for him to stop him, but Clive isn’t even holding his wrists anymore. He’s letting Joshua explore as he pleases, even when he slips his hands inside Clive’s leather shirt.
Clive’s hand flies to Joshua’s hip the moment Joshua’s hands are inside his shirt. It’s as though Clive has held back that hand for years, for their entire lives. Fingers curl tightly against Joshua’s hip, a desperate, clutching grasp. He yanks Joshua forward, their hips meeting with a thud.
Joshua gasps. He can feel him. He can feel Clive through the leather of his pants, and Clive must feel him too. There’s nothing left separating or shielding them, not with Clive’s hand on Joshua’s hip and Joshua’s hands grabbing handfuls of bare chest.
Clive grips Joshua’s chin with his free hand. He tilts Joshua’s head, forcing his back to arch.
“I can’t stop wanting to touch you,” Clive says.
Joshua chews his bottom lip to hold in a giddy grin. “Good.”
“Gods, please don’t look at me that way.”
“Why not?” Joshua makes a point of continuing to worry his lip. Clive’s eyes are glued to his mouth. His fingers dig in at Joshua’s hip.
“Because it makes me need you too much.”
Clive sweeps down, taking Joshua’s lip for his own, tugging it between his teeth as their lips mash together. Joshua can’t hide his groan with Clive prying his mouth open with tongue and teeth. Nor is he really trying. Clive’s kiss is a lightning bolt streaking through his body. It’s the first breath of air he’s tasted in eighteen years. It’s pure, cleansing fire, scorching through Joshua like the Phoenix’s own flames remaking him from the soul outward.
He pries his hands out of Clive’s shirt to throw his arms around his neck. Joshua tangles his fingers in Clive’s hair and yanks him closer, abandoning himself to this forbidden kiss, this kiss that cannot, should not ever happen. Clive’s free hand sweeps down the curl of Joshua’s back, landing at the base of his spine. He presses, and something tingles deep inside Joshua, something he’s never dared to name, something he’s never dared to see.
Clive pulls his mouth free, but only so he can dive at Joshua’s neck. Joshua gasps at the first hard suck, throwing his head back to expose more of his throat to Clive’s attention.
“You’re everything,” Clive says between licking and sucking on the delicate skin. “Joshua, you are everything.”
“Clive, don’t stop doing that. Please, don’t stop doing that.”
Joshua can’t bring himself to care about the wrongness of this, about the risk, about affronting gods who have mostly seen fit to keep them apart. There is nothing left but Clive’s mouth on his throat, Clive’s taste lingering on his lips, Clive’s strong hands on his body.
Clive hauls Joshua up, and Joshua throws his legs around Clive’s waist. Clive wades laboriously through the river, back toward the shore. Between Joshua’s weight and the drag of the water, he doesn’t quite make it, but he gets close enough that when he sets Joshua down, he can lay atop him without either of them drowning. Not that they wouldn’t drown for this. Drown or burn or shatter. It doesn’t matter now.
Joshua props himself up on his arms. The river laps at them as they lay in the shallows, the water splashing over them. It covers up their legs, their hips, the place where they meet. But their heads and chests are out of the water, and Joshua can stare right into Clive’s eyes as he grinds his hips down against Joshua’s.
Joshua gasps. The sound leaps from his throat, leaves his mouth wide and yearning. Even through the water, that brush of contact is everything he’s ever wanted, everything he’s never known he’s needed.
Clive does it again, his bigger body swaying against Joshua’s, his hard cock pressing down against Joshua’s as they rub together. That’s his brother’s cock. Oh gods. It’s his brother’s cock grinding against his, and it feels so good Joshua throws his head back and lets his eyes slam shut.
He works his hips up next time Clive moves, rocking with him, meeting him along the way so the friction of their bodies intensifies with each thrust.
“Fuck,” Clive snarls.
His arms cage Joshua in on either side. His hair tickles Joshua’s throat. He must be hanging his head, as delirious with pleasure as Joshua himself.
And still, it’s not enough.
The water. The way they have to hold themselves up. It’s getting in the way, and Joshua cannot stand another gods damned second of something being in the way of this.
He forces himself to scoot backward. Clive jerks his head up, fear flashing across his face until Joshua bites at his lip. Then Clive follows after him, Joshua crawling backward, Clive pursuing, until they reach the true shoreline.
Joshua falls back, not caring about the rock under him. He spreads his legs around Clive, who perches over him. Water drips off of Clive. For a beat, he stares down at Joshua beneath him, wonder written across his face. Wonder and perhaps just a drop of uncertainty.
Joshua reaches up for him, unwilling to let this slip away. He guides Clive to his mouth, guides Clive’s whole body down until his larger frame is lying atop Joshua’s. His weight is wonderful, so warm and tangible and real. And when Joshua shifts his hips, Clive leaps to respond.
Joshua sucks in a startled breath the first time their hips rock against each other. It’s so much more like this. He can feel the hard, needy outline of Clive’s whole cock this way. He jerks his hips up at it, wanting it, craving it, trying to feel every single bit of Clive through the frustrating leather of his pants. He grabs at Clive’s hair, turning his head this way and that in his desperation to somehow kiss him harder and deeper, but soon they aren’t kissing so much as panting into each other’s mouths, moaning down each other’s throats.
Gods, if they had time to get rid of this barrier of clothing between them. But after so long, there’s time for nothing but the need coursing through them hotter than Ifrit’s own flames. They could burn this whole forest down with the heat of their desire, scorch the river into a dry husk.
It feels like madness. It tastes like insanity. And Joshua can’t get close enough.
“More,” he pleads.
Clive rumbles, a sound that shivers through Joshua’s whole body. His head falls to Joshua’s shoulder as his hips thrust even harder.
Joshua lets his voice burst free. He arches his body into Clive’s frantic thrusting, searching for him through their clothes. His hands trail down, finding Clive’s ass, gripping it hard to yank Clive against him.
“Fuck,” Clive groans, low and deep and tattered. “Joshua, fuck.”
“Yeah,” Joshua gasps. “Yes, yes, please. More.”
Clive crushes Joshua against his chest and jerks his hips with abandon. It grinds him down against Joshua’s aching cock, teases Joshua with a cruel, agonizing, sweet pressure. Joshua’s breath catches in his chest as his body tenses, his balls pulling up tight and close.
“Clive,” he pants. “I’m going to…”
Can he say it? Even now? Regardless, Clive groans, nearly growls, like a predator possessive over his kill.
That sound is all that Joshua needs, but Clive goes further, his teeth digging in at Joshua’s collar bone, like he’s holding on and claiming Joshua’s pleasure.
And then nothing matters. Nothing in the world matters except Clive’s body against his and the pleasure Clive fucks against him with every filthy jerk of his hips.
“Clive, you’re making me … making me come.”
The sound Clive emits is a low, feral rumble, and it shakes free the last of Joshua’s control. His whole body jerks up at Clive. Warmth rushes out of his body, a fire emptying out of his soul. It leaves him depleted, empty to his core, blissfully devoid of anything but the humming ecstasy swimming through his heavy limbs.
Clive is panting atop him, still holding him close. They lie on the shore trying to catch their breath, chests puffing against each other. They’re soaked and hot, the river lapping at their feet, stones digging into Joshua’s back. Joshua didn’t even notice the discomfort of the rocks, too lost in the whirlwind of what was unfolding, but the world is creeping back in like ink staining a page.
“Clive,” he says.
Clive instantly pushes himself up. “I’m sorry. Did I hurt you?”
Joshua can’t help laughing at him. He cradles Clive’s stubbled face. “You were wonderful. You were…” He swipes a thumb over Clive’s lips. “Everything.”
Clive goes very still, growing quiet in a way Joshua recognizes from when they were kids. It was Clive stuttering over what to say, left at a loss. Joshua did that to him. Left him speechless.
In truth, Joshua doesn’t know what to say either. So he guides Clive back to his mouth, kissing him softly and slowly, like they have all the time in the world.
Like this will never end.