Work Text:
Two weeks ago, a member of the estate’s staff lunged at the commissioner with a dagger in her hands, aiming for his throat.
Two weeks ago, Ayato stood over the body of a woman he once considered a close friend and a loyal member of the clan, watching as his assassin clawed at his feet with her neck sliced wide open by her own weapon. Delicate fingers wrapped around his ankles, burning the feeling of sharp nails digging into his skin as she drowned in her own blood.
Two weeks ago, Kamisato Ayato was not a killer.
Two weeks ago, he could have died in her place. Bleeding out on the floor of his office, clutching his throat, mouth too full of blood to call for help. His sister would have lost her brother just months after losing her father.
Two weeks worth of paperwork piling up on his desk like the heavy burdens weighing on his shoulders. Arms too weak to do any work, hands that tremble far too much to even hold a pen, fingers that remember the shape of a blade with needless familiarity, fingernails bitten down until his teeth catch on his skin.
Fourteen sleepless nights spent staring at Thoma’s slumbering form, forcing himself to stay awake and watch for any knives hidden at the side of their bed. He doesn’t know when Thoma will turn on him too, doesn’t know what it would take—he’s never thought of it before. He’s never had to. He’s never wanted to.
If he sleeps with his back turned to him, he is afraid of waking to a knife buried in it. If he sleeps facing him, he is afraid of waiting for a dagger to sink into the side of his neck.
He doesn’t sleep at all, spending his nights staring at Thoma’s back, looking at him as if he’s going to kill him one day. Then his gaze flickers over to his darling sister in the mornings, delicate hands swinging a blade elegantly in the snow, and wonders if those same hands will grow into those of a killer another day.
His stomach churns and he feels poison on his lips when he steps into his office. He’s had it cleaned. Twice. And yet he swears he smells blood when there is a bouquet of flowers on his desk, a cracked vase spilling droplets of water onto the wooden surface. He uses whatever spare funds he has left for a new desk—one that isn’t scarred by knives and doesn’t smell like decay.
Thoma had brought an apple when he came by with more documents from the shrine. Ayato eyes the plate of cut fruit in front of him, and wants to vomit. Unable to shake off how Thoma had turned his back to him as he began to prepare it with a small knife, only to leave and return with a plate of sliced apples—no knife in sight.
He tosses the fruit away, and feels guilty, and wasteful—and safer, this way.
Ayato moves the desk further forwards to cover the slight discoloration on the floor. Something is there, crawling under his skin.
He remembers it clearly—Thoma scrubbing the floors and walls clean in silence, removing the blood stained paintings without having to ask. All while he crumbled onto his knees, weeping helplessly into his bloodied palms, struggling to breathe and clear his mind of her last words, smearing red onto his cheeks and through his hair.
He remembers Thoma prying his hands away from his face, cupping his cheeks. The cool feeling of a wet cloth pressed into the skin underneath his tired eyes, washing away tear tracks and blood stains with unsteady hands. Thoma never said a word, jaw clenched tightly like he’s about to cry—but he furiously blinks back his tears, too focused on cleaning the blood from Ayato’s face.
He remembers Thoma spending longer on his hands, scraping skin out from underneath his fingernails and untangling long strands of hair from between his fingers.
The soft kiss to his forehead then lips, the whispered instruction to rest, the promise Thoma made to take care of everything.
He remembers his head falling to the side, eyes following the trail of blood splatters on the floor leading towards the door. He never saw the body once Thoma came to kneel in front of him, holding him so gently, so tenderly , he’s almost able to forget that he’s drenched in death.
He wondered what Thoma had done with it. He wonders what he had made him do.
Two weeks ago, he would have never known.