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“Come to Vinland with me.”
Thorfinn’s voice roused him from his drowsiness, and Askeladd blinked lazily toward the ceiling. Dim twilight filtered through the window they’d left open, hoping to catch the warmth of spring; though Askeladd, bare-chested as he was, still felt cold.
He looked at the brat, perched on top of his lap, still fully clothed, mouthing at the ugly scar on his chest. The one Canute gave him and the one that should have killed him, years ago. It healed wrong and twisted, red and puffy and angry, and it hurt still when he moved too fast or breathed too deeply.
Thorfinn had said the words against his skin, not raising his head from the task of memorizing Askeladd’s worst and last scar with his lips. He kissed it softly, sometimes wetting the rough scar tissue with his tongue. He could spend hours at it if Askeladd felt indulgent enough to let him.
At the lack of response, Thorfinn finally stopped and raised his head to gaze at him. He looked good—mouth glistening, eyes bright, face kind. Nothing like the murderous brat who had followed him for years, hoping to kill him one day. Askeladd studied the face of the man his boy had become in his absence: the new scar on his cheek, the smooth brow, eyes so much like Thors'.
“What brought this on?” Askeladd asked, bringing a hand to the boy’s hair. It was clean—soft and silky between his fingers.
Thorfinn shook him off. “Hands on the bed.”
Of course. That was one of the rules. Thorfinn could touch him, but he couldn’t be touched in return.
Askeladd sighed, letting his hand fall back onto the furs. Thorfinn settled back into his lap. They were both half-hard against their breeches, as they always were when they did this, but neither drew attention to it.
“You don’t want to?” Thorfinn's gaze was piercing as he traced the scar with his fingers, choosing touch over lips. Despite how much he'd changed, his intensity toward Askeladd remained eerily similar to the way he'd once sought his death.
He rolled his eyes. “Don’t get clever with me. Why are you suddenly asking me that?”
Thorfinn tilted his head, his eyes fixed on Askeladd’s face. A hand moved up his chest and stroked a nipple slowly. Askeladd repressed a shiver.
“I want you to come with me,” he said as if it was that simple. Stupid boy.
“Seriously?” Askeladd huffed a laugh, the skin around his scar tightening uncomfortably. “Are you sure you want a man like me soiling your perfect world?”
Thorfinn twisted the nipple, but Askeladd merely arched an eyebrow, mocking him.
“Everyone is welcome in Vinland,” the boy said, a little petulantly. “As long as you leave violence in your past.”
They had had this conversation many times before, in many different ways. Askeladd argued that violence could never be left behind, that it followed mankind wherever they went. Thorfinn always argued back, insisting that this mindset was what kept them from achieving a better world.
They never agreed.
“A man like me can’t leave violence behind,” Askeladd replied, because it was the truth. “You’re barking up the wrong tree, kid.”
He was no longer a kid, and he dug his nails into the flesh of his chest, as if to remind him that.
“I think you could,” was Thorfinn’s answer. “If you had the right motivation.”
Not taking his eyes from Askeladd’s face, he lowered his head and took the nipple he had been fondling into his mouth, licking around it in circles before suckling it lightly. Askeladd’s hands clenched against the furs.
He laughed, a little breathless. “Is that your plan? To seduce me into pacifism?”
Thorfinn released the nipple and glanced at him through his eyelashes. “Is it working?”
Askeladd hummed as if considering. “I think you’d have to do better than that.”
“I can do better,” said Thorfinn, for he had never faced a challenge without meeting it with determination. He got up from his lap, kneeled at his side on the bed, and opened Askeladd’s breaches with ease, taking out his cock—half-hard after an afternoon of enduring Thorfinn’s eerily sweet ministrations. The boy took him in his hand, pumping him into full hardness before surrounding him with his lips.
Askeladd clenched his teeth. Thorfinn was hot and wet around him, his tongue making circles around the head. He kissed the tip slowly before taking him into his mouth. He was good at this. He hadn’t been, at first. But, as always, he’d followed Askeladd’s commands until he’d learned to do it on his own.
Thorfinn took him deeper, and Askeladd closed his eyes, trying to last. His hands, still on the furs, itched with the need to touch. He wanted to take Thorfinn’s head between his hands and fuck his mouth until he was spent, as he used to do with whores in his youth. He yearned to sink his hands into his boy’s hair and pet him and tell him how good he was, how proud he was of him.
But he knew the rules. The rules they had established at the beginning to ensure this were nothing more than—
A nose touched his hip when Thorfinn took him fully inside his mouth and groaned, his throat rumbling around Askeladd’s cock. He’s better than any woman I’ve ever had, Askeladd thought, feeling a little delirious, and then he came.
His orgasms were always silent, but his body liked to make a lot of fuss. He trembled through it, clenching his lip with his teeth, whiteness flashing behind his closed eyelids. When he opened them again, Thorfinn was licking his lips, red and swollen, watching him like a hawk. Carefully, he put the spent cock inside Askeladd’s breeches again, and climbed back on top of him, as if he belonged there.
He was fully hard now—the shape of his cock clearly visible through the fabric, but he didn’t seem to care. He looked flushed and a little breathless, and Askeladd hurt with the need to touch him.
“Better?” Thorfinn asked, a small smile playing on those devious lips that now tasted like him.
“Better,” he said. Thorfinn’s eyes darkened at the praise. “Want me to return the favor?”
He gestured to Thorfinn’s obvious problem, but the stubborn brat shook his head.
“I want you to come to Vinland with me.”
Askeladd sighed. “You know I can’t do that.” He had already sworn his life to Canute; he couldn’t leave his post as the King’s most trusted advisor.
Thorfinn frowned before lowering his head and mouthing at Askeladd’s scar again, this time adding some teeth. Not enough to hurt him, but just enough to make him feel it. He muttered something against his skin, too low for him to catch.
“What was that?”
Thorfinn muttered again, rubbing his nose against his chest, and Askeladd hit him on the head.
“Speak clearly, brat.”
Thorfinn glowered at him. “Hands on the bed, baldy.”
Askeladd hit him again, just to be annoying. Thorfinn growled, deep in his chest, before grabbing his wrist and pinning it to his side. Askeladd let him.
“Hands. On. The. Bed.” He ordered with a scowl. Cute.
“Or what?” Askeladd dared, smirking. “You gonna spank me, boy?”
Thorfinn made a thoughtful face, as if considering, before Askeladd hit him again with his free hand.
“Ouch! Askeladd! Stop that!”
“You’re a nuisance,” Askeladd complained. “I should be the one spanking you.”
Thorfinn made another thoughtful face, and Askeladd took advantage of his distraction to hit him a third time. They tussled on the bed: Thorfinn trying to pin Askeladd’s free hand, and Askeladd making it as difficult as possible without getting up.
Finally, Thorfinn managed to stop him, sinking their linked hands into the furs of the bed. He panted on top of him, face flushed, hair a mess. Askeladd looked down at the boy’s crotch. Still hard, huh.
“You are the nuisance,” Thorfinn said.
“You had to learn your worst traits from someone.”
Thorfinn stared at him. “Is that why you won’t come with me?”
Askeladd sucked in a breath. “Thorfinn—no. You know I’m sworn to the King. I can’t just go wherever I please.”
Thorfinn pressed his lips together, looking away from him. He did that rarely, Askeladd realized, as if he were afraid that Askeladd would disappear again if he took his eyes off him. Thorfinn muttered something under his breath, and Askeladd rolled his eyes so hard it hurt.
“I swear to the All-Father if you don’t start speaking clearly—”
“You always choose him over me.”
Askeladd stared at him, speechless. Thorfinn refused to meet his gaze after such an absurd revelation, instead watching the sunset through the open window with a frown.
“He's my King,” Askeladd finally said, when the sun had almost set, its faint light casting strange shadows across the room.
Thorfinn turned his gaze from the window and looked at him, his face hidden in the new darkness.
“And what am I to you, Askeladd?” He asked, voice soft.
“Thorfinn,” he warned.
“You must know,” the boy said. “You’re smart. You must know what you are to me.”
“Thorfinn,” he repeated. “You don't want this from me.”
“I want everything from you.”
Askeladd was glad for the dark—the flush that took over his face was sudden and obvious, unbecoming of a man his age. His hands felt sweaty against Thorfinn’s, and his heart beat too loudly in his chest.
He needed to make sense of this conversation before it got even more out of hand. Fast.
“I killed your father.”
“I know.”
“I turned you into a weapon.”
“I know.”
“I used you without caring if you lived or died.”
“I know.”
“I serve the man who sold you into slavery.”
“I know.”
He had expected some emotional reaction to his cold logic. Surely, Thorfinn would snap out of whatever this was once he remembered who he was in bed with. But the boy remained firm and stoic, unmoving atop him, warm against the growing chill of the night.
Panic seized him. He couldn't let the boy do this to himself. Askeladd had already ruined his life in too many ways. The boy was blind when it came to him—always choosing the worst possible option if it meant keeping Askeladd to himself. Askeladd had to do right by him, for once in his life. He had been too selfish to refuse Thorfinn’s touch, his presence in his bed. But one thing was indulging in a harmless affair, and another thing was—
“Thorfinn.” He swallowed. The name felt heavy in his mouth. “I’m the worst thing that's ever happened to you.”
“I know, Askeladd,” his boy said, tender in the darkness. “I still love you.”
When Thorfinn bent down to kiss him, Askeladd kissed him back.