Work Text:
The array of candles flickers alive, thin strings of smoke dancing and twisting into the air at the far corners of Atsumu's vision. The sorcerer clenches his palm around the leathery edges of the book tucked in his chest, consumed yellowing pages turning golden in the dim light, and goes over the lines again.
A single fingertip traces the paper, following the black ink stretching into the same runes he reproduced in flawless detail on the white floor. The characters are limpid, meticulous in the way Atsumu’s always been at all kinds of summoning spells, though he's not above checking again if a single tilted scribble hidden by the dark of the drawn curtains might mark the difference between a simple conjuration and a demonic presence in his living room.
He eventually brings a hand to his collarbone, fingers wrapping around the cold stone hanging from his neck, and only as the electric sensation travels across his flesh does he part his lips to speak out evenly.
"Claves invenire."
The circle of candles still at once, perfectly motionless for no more than one suspenseful instant as the lines on the floor turn a blinding red, and a single flash of light emerges from the center before disappearing in a blink, leaving Atsumu alone in the frozen silence of his—
"Seriously? Keys?"
A curse leaves his mouth with violent urge at the sound of the voice, the spellbook on the verge of slipping out of his grip and onto the unsuspecting candles still twirling at his feet.
"For fuck's sake, Sunarin," Atsumu hisses as he turns to the figure to his left and nearly jumps in the air at just how close Suna is, trademark unbothered face idly hovering Atsumu's shoulder.
"What's with the look?" Suna muses, painfully coy, retreating a step back with a sleazy drag of his feet. His lips turn up lazily, conceding one single flash of white sharp fangs. "I don't bite."
Atsumu's scoff is reflexive, almost instinctive as he shuts the book closed, running a foot across the floor to break the conjuring circle in a swift motion. "Yes you do."
He snaps his fingers cleanly, the candles dying at once under the whirling wave of magic, and Suna snorts under his breath, glancing at him from the corner of subtle, intentive olive green eyes— the sort that always get Atsumu squirming more than he’s ever cared to admit. "Only if you want me to."
Atsumu’s hands twitch unthinkingly, a knee-jerk reaction to the quiet shudder that runs down his spine as he forces a dangerous, thin train of thought to the back of his skull. Somewhere in the corner of his left eye, Suna leans down to grasp the forgotten item on the floor.
"So," the fairy mouths off casually, "Care to explain why you manifested your own house keys?"
Atsumu stops to consider his options. Suna’s feet, socked in stupidly mismatched yellows because he refuses to wear them properly. His chin, barely tilted his way to mask the beginning of a smirk as sharp as his teeth. The two pearl-white horns escaping the top of his head, barely the length of a finger, slightly arched up in a way that has no business looking so taunting, as if aware Atsumu is staring.
"I lost ‘em again," he grumbles out eventually. "'Samu can’t find out. He'd kill me."
Suna doesn't seem to care or be curious about why he would rather waste expensive magic equipment than admit his failure to his brother, and Atsumu is almost— almost —tempted to feel thankful. The fae just raises a thin, inky eyebrow, more line than stroke. "How did you even get in without the keys?"
"The bathroom window." Atsumu slides the curtains open, and he’d rather not contemplate what people would think of Atsumu Miya, esteemed member of the Osaka Wizard Council, breaking into his own house from the open window of the bathroom that he'd forgotten to close in the first place.
That's more or less when it hits him.
"Wait," he turns back to Suna, lightning quick. "How did you get in?"
Unruffled, the fae just leans on the living room table Atsumu’d pushed against the wall like he owns it, spider-like fingers fidgeting with the brass keys like they're one of those weird crystal knives he’s always got on him, and the grin is subtle but sharp nonetheless.
"The bathroom window," he shrugs like it’s nothing, and Atsumu frankly wishes he was still sixteen and running on teenage angst alone just so he would have the sliver of an excuse for throwing a tantrum in public.
Well, not that Suna has ever been a public affair per se. He might as well live here by now.
"You filthy fairy," Atsumu seethes, unsheathing an accusing finger. "You parasyte. You and your stupid little horns—"
Suna draws a high, dramatic gasp, the amused glint in his gaze revealing just how much of it is more for the theatrics than for any offense at all. "How dare you," he drawls, free hand travelling up to graze at the base of his right horn. "You know I'm self-conscious about them."
Atsumu doesn’t hold back his grimace, and can only hope Suna decides to leave before Osamu comes home from the Magick Market, because he isn't sure he can bear any more of that are you sure yer not together? Then why’s he always here? Then why do you cuddle on the sofa? That’s not even yer sofa, I bought it with my money from the bakery— And why does he steal yer jackets every time you go out— And yer always freezing when you get home— And every time you go up against the League of Fairies it's always Sunarin this, Sunarin that, did’ja see that last enchantment, Sunarin, Sunarin—
"Sunarin," Atsumu accuses, and if he sounds mildly murderous, it's on the Osamu in his head. "Give me the keys."
And that is, very easily and very patently, the wrong thing to say.
"Mmh," Suna clicks his tongue slowly, poised, a grin in his eyes that doesn't travel to impassive lips. His back arches in a sinuous motion and the keys tinkle mockingly as he dangles them in front of his eyes. "Nah, I don't think I will."
There's this extraordinary sort of psychomancy Suna practises that no other fairy folk can quite master. He likes to call it something like activating Atsumu's fight or fight instinct.
So actually, if Atsumu dives forward to snatch the keys from his hands, it's really not his fault at all.
And if he fails as Suna raises his stupidly long arm higher, well, maybe that one's his fault, but there's no way he's giving up halfway.
The muscles of his back strain from the effort as he struggles to trap Suna's wrists with his other arm, hexing a thousand times over whatever fae gods dictated it was fair to grant Suna Rintarou one hundred ninety-one centimeters of flesh. He reaches higher, and higher, and pinches Suna in the side though he's never been ticklish at all, and tramples on his feet a bit, enough for his fingers to brush the cool surface of the keys—before his ankle gives in and he tilts sideways, grazing the very tip of Suna's horn.
Suna yelps, Atsumu yelps, and before he knows it he's retreating too fast and Suna's quick reflexes are all that's saving him from tumbling backwards to the floor, his hands sinking into the fabrics of Atsumu's loose shirt to pull him back against his torso.
It's silent for the span of a second. It's none of the long, burning silences that hover them sometimes, charged with the distant vague feeling of waiting for something that never comes. Atsumu still wishes it wasn’t enough for him to become all too aware of just how close they are, of the soft puffs of breath against his cheek, of every warm inch of skin that's pressed against him where he’s slotted between his legs, or the gentle flush on Suna's ears.
And still, he can't stop thinking about the pad of his finger, brushing so easily against—
The thing is, it's not that Atsumu has a problem with Suna's horns. It's just, he's always been a bit wary, maybe, extra careful when he jokingly slaps the back of Suna's stupid empty skull or nuzzles his face in the nape of his neck; an only partially unconscious attempt to respect the intangible lines they’d never bothered to trace between them. He’d thought he was subtle, but perhaps he hadn't been, with the knowing way Suna is looking at him, and now he wonders if maybe, just maybe, he’s crossed a crease that he shouldn’t—if they’re finally tethering on the edge of the proverbial bridge between messing around and something Atsumu has been refusing to dwell on.
"It's okay," Suna croaks out, and Atsumu can't find the heart to call him out for it. "You can touch them, you know. I mean," he clears his throat. "If you want."
"Yer the one who screamed," Atsumu breathes out softly. "Idiot."
"I thought you'd prickled yourself," Suna rolls his eyes. "The tip is sharp, you know!"
"How the hell would I know? It's not like I've ever touched yer horns."
"Why not?" Suna bites back so quickly Atsumu starts. "You let me lay on your lap, but you won't play with my hair. You steal my t-shirts but you never stay the night. You buy me coffee but you won't hold my hand, and my contact name on your phone is still Suna parenthesis uni —"
"Wait," the blurb catches in Atsumu's throat as something inside his chest stumbles and drops. "You want to hold hands?"
"Atsumu," Suna speaks slowly, lids sinking in that wary way Atsumu has never liked.
"Oh my god," Atsumu exhales. "You want to hold hands."
"I can hold more than just your hands."
Atsumu's protesting huff does nothing to deter the fairy, who smirks sideways, lips twisting as Atsumu burns a further shade of red.
"You could say," Suna's speaks slow, never leaving Atsumu's eyes as if he knows he has his insides bursting into flames, his hand rising to his own head to pat right in-between the two protundencies. “... I'm a little horny.”
Atsumu is going to extinguish him.
"I don't wanna know for how long you've been dyin' to use that line—"
"We got ourselves quite a thorny situation—"
"I swear to Circe —"
"I like you so much," Suna's palm splays against his side, sounding only a little bit breathless, and some tiny, lost, fiercely short-circuiting synapse in Atsumu’s brain interrupts its neurotransmission to do a goddamn somersault. "And I'm tired of sneaking through windows so your brother doesn't know we're cuddling in your room. Go on a date with me?"
There's something in Atsumu's stomach turning over itself. It's worse than that time Osamu accidentally hexed him while practicing concealing enchantments, or that other time he voluntarily hexed him after a brawl in Advanced Potions class, or that time he got a spell wrong as he teleported home and he'd ended up seeing purple for three days.
It's worse, so much worse, but all of it pales in the face of is the way he can see Suna force himself to hold his gaze, expectant, despite visibly itching to look away.
Suna, who lets him nap on his shoulder without saying a word. Suna, dry lips parting and closing, unsettling fangs digging pointedly and stubbornly into his lower lip as if to cage in the hesitance. Taunting, mean, quietly patient Suna, who's gotten tired of their walking all over each other ever since the first day of class, Suna, who's finally offering the bait where Atsumu has been constantly failing to, and Atsumu really wants to bite.
Or get bitten. Jury’s still out on that one.
"I," he struggles around the words, "Pick you up at six?"
Suna blinks so slow it feels dragged out, a bit like he wasn't quite expecting that it'd be this easy, like the first time he'd said he was thirsty and Atsumu'd conjured a carton of orange juice out of thin air.
(He'd adapted quickly after that, pouting his way into getting Atsumu to materialize all of his vain little wishes at all kinds of inopportune times. Suna's always been a quick learner.
Atsumu likes him so much.)
"Sure," Suna visibly swallows, hands falling off Atsumu's hips, starting awkwardly when the keys he's still holding hit the table with a clatter. "Well, huh, these—"
"Keep them," Atsumu steps back to give him space, and fighting the smile off his face has never been so hard. "You're here all the time anyways."
And Suna laughs, a wide, awkward, sincere laugh that paints his cheeks sunset pink, and Atsumu knows quite a number of magic tricks, but he’s starting to think that this right here might as well be his forever favourite.