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"Quick, this way!"
Despite his shorter stature, Essek was far more light-footed than his human counterpart, vanishing into the darkness of a side alley before Caleb had even processed his whispered words. Caleb dashed around the corner behind him, skidding to a halt before he could crash into the still figure of the drow before him.
"Why-" Caleb started, before the words died in his throat.
The side alley was little more than 20 or 30 feet deep before it ended abrubtly at the back door of a building. Essek started at his voice and jerked back into motion, moving forward to the doorway and jostling the handle. Caleb peered back the way they had run, listening intently down the road, but it was clear from the torchlight beginning to shine on the pavement that their pursuers were not far behind. A glance the other direction showed a wide, open side street, unpopulated by other pedestrians. No cover that way, either.
He looked back into their aborted alley detour to see Essek glance his direction as well, shaking his head.
"Locked, and I haven't the needed spell ready to open it," he confirmed. "Even if we knew what was on the other side."
Caleb pulled a hand through his hair, frustrated, knocking most of it loose from its ponytail. "Probably worse than what's behind us, anyway," he muttered.
"Knowing our luck, yes."
Caleb glanced back up at his disguised companion. Between the altered features and practiced, composed mask, he could almost miss the panic creeping into Essek's eyes. Almost.
He stepped closer, thoughts whirling for a way out as he moved to comfort his friend.
Think. Think. No spells to change our disguises, no hiding place, and no way to outrun the verdammt Assembly henchmen around the corner.
Caleb's hand came up of its own volition, coming to rest on Essek's shoulder. "We will get out of this," he said firmly, as the other's eyes darted behind him for signs of their pursuers.
"I'm sorry to have dragged you into this mess as well. It was a silly risk, for what little information we got," Essek sighed.
He shook his head. "I'm sure Beauregard will put it to good use in her investigation nonetheless."
"If we ever manage to get it to her, which is looking less likely by the second."
They both tensed as the sound of shouted orders and running boots grew suddenly louder behind them, their pursuers turning the nearest corner. Caleb squeezed Essek's shoulder again, with no idea left of what else to do but provide some semblance of comfort as he took in Essek's frightened face. His eyes dropped to his lips, and he had a passing, poorly-timed wish.
His eyes widened as one last idea occurred to him. He squeezed the shoulder under his hand again and gave Essek a gentle shake.
"Essek..." There was not enough time to explain. "Distraction - play along."
Caleb released his shoulder to push against Essek's chest, backing him up against the wall of the building behind them and bracing his hand on the other side of his head, trapping him.
"What-?"
Essek's question was cut off as he leaned in to press their mouths together forcefully, and Caleb felt him go utterly still. An awkward beat passed, before light from pursuing torches came round the corner and illuminated the pair. Suddenly, Essek's arms wrapped around his back and he pressed back up into the kiss, one hand moving up his spine to pull out the ponytail and bury into his hair. In spite of the panic thumping through his veins, Caleb felt a small sound escape his throat as Essek tugged and sent a shiver of sparks down his spine.
"Hey, you there!" a voice called behind them. Caleb fought the instinct to freeze, pressing further up against his counterpart instead and giving an exaggerated moan. He winced internally at the sound.
"Ugh, leave 'em," another, deeper voice jumped in. "There's always a couple o' those types in these alleys. The others must have gotten farther ahead than we thought - hurry up!"
This order was followed by several grumbles and a single wolf whistle, and the footsteps moved farther on, eventually plunging the two into darkness once more.
Caleb pulled away immediately, breathing hard and glancing over his shoulder. He listened intently, and hearing no signs of the guards turning back towards them, stepped fully away.
"All clear?" came the slightly strangled question from in front of him. Essek's expression was hard to read, eyes still wide as Caleb looked back at him.
"Ja, so it would seem." He swallowed awkwardly, and stepped back to put another foot of space between them. "Shall we...put some distance between us?"
Essek's eyes flicked down into the gap between himself and Caleb. "And the guards?" he finished, "That seems prudent."
"Also," Caleb muttered, breaking eye contact once more to focus on the issue at hand - running like hell. "Gehen wir."
The rest of the night was a blur, even stamped as it was into Caleb's memory. There was running, another (proper) alleyway, and chalk in his hand as he scribbled teleportation runes as fast as his tired hands could go. His fingers were shaking, for some reason. Through his concentration, he distantly heard Essek Sending to Beauregard, warning her that they were coming to the Soul momentarily, and could a room be available for them. He looked up again at the final chalk stroke to catch Essek's eye, offered a nod, and then they were stumbling across condensed swathes of space to land in Beau's unimpressed glare.
"Be nice to give someone more than 5 minutes warning before you drop on their doorstep at 2AM," she grumbled, turning immediately to walk out of the teleportation chamber. "And they say I'm rude."
Caleb and Essek trudged after her, the exhaustion after the adrenaline rush of the chase finally catching up to them. Beau glanced back over her shoulder after a moment, giving each wizard a once over as they stepped out into the main hallway. "You both okay?"
"We are unharmed. Thank you for taking us in so unexpectedly," Essek answered.
"Yeah, well, what are friends for and all that. You too, Caleb?"
He nodded, though Beau had already turned away again to guide them down another hallway. "Ja, well enough. A bit of a close call, but I believe the Assembly remains none the wiser of our presence."
"Great. Tell me about it tomorrow. For now, this is you," she gestured to the door they were approaching, "and let's all get some fucking sleep."
Both wizards murmured their thanks, and Beau gave them each a friendly - though still forceful - pat on the shoulder as she passed back the way they had come towards her own quarters. Caleb caught Essek's eye briefly as they both turned to the door, before he coughed and looked away. He reached out and tugged the door open, looking pointedly inside and away from his companion. "After you, friend," he offered as casually as he could manage, and Essek drifted past him inside.
Fortunately, any further awkwardness was delayed for the night. Exhaustion had crept quickly up on them both, and without another word Essek shed his cloak and his magical disguise, curling into the cot set into one side of the little room. From its match on the opposite wall, Caleb watched Essek's shoulders rise and fall as he took several deep breaths, settling into a trance. He tugged off his boots and coat, tucked his book holsters under his pillow, and laid down to stare at the ceiling until sleep took him.
Caleb groaned as light filtered into his consciousness, the soreness in his muscles immediately registering complaints after the chase of the evening prior. He wasn't quite as used to running for his life these days, now that the Nein were spread across the continent and his old teacher locked away.
He squinted, opening his eyes, and heard the low murmur of voices in the hallway outside the chamber door. Glancing around, there was no sign of Essek.
Caleb's heart sank, already - again- regretting his choice of distraction the prior evening. In the moment, it had seemed worth it to take his chances and steal at least one kiss before they were, perhaps, captured and taken away from each other by the Assembly. But now, all he could recall was the way Essek had frozen in his arms, utterly unresponsive until the threat of death was upon them. Caleb sat up and pressed his face into his hands, wishing he could wipe the feeling from his brain through his eyelids.
"Ah, good morning, Caleb."
He glanced up to see Essek closing the door behind him, expression softening as they made eye contact.
"Did you sleep well?" he asked.
His sleep had been deep and mercifully dreamless. "Ja, well. And you?"
Essek nodded. "Well also, thank you. I've just spoken to Beauregard about some breakfast. I hope it's alright with you that I requested it to come here - somehow I'm not quite feeling ready for another city venture this morning."
Caleb huffed a laugh in spite of himself. "A good idea," he agreed.
A moment of silence settled over the pair, not quite the awkward heaviness of the night before, but still weighted with uncertainty. Apologies and excuses danced through Caleb's mind, and he sighed before opening his mouth to begin.
"I hope I did not - " he started.
"I was wondering - " began Essek at the same moment, and they both fell silent again.
Essek watched him for a moment, before tentatively lifting a hand for him to continue. "Please," he said, "go ahead, Caleb."
"Ahh..." Caleb began again, "I simply wanted to apologize, if I made you uncomfortable, before. I know I crossed a line." He glanced away, "Perhaps several lines."
"I see."
Essek's shadow moved closer, though his feet drifted a few inches above the ground in old habit. Caleb watched it creep across the ground, until two boots touched down on the ground in his view, and he looked up.
A soft smile, barely more than a tilt of one side of his mouth, was on Essek's face. "And here I was about to thank you. Your quick and clever thinking saved us both last night, as it so often has."
Caleb grappled for words for a moment, still sleep-addled and fully braced for rejection.
"I did not... make you terribly uncomfortable, then?" he ventured after a beat.
Essek shook his head. "No, I was merely startled. Perhaps a bit panicked, given the circumstances." He let out a self-conscious, breathy laugh. "It's a little embarrassing to admit, but I didn't realize at all what you were trying to do for the first several moments. It's been... quite some time since I was in such a position."
The position of being kissed, Caleb's brain helpful supplied. He swallowed. "I'm glad to hear it, then. I know you are not as fond of physical contact at the best of times."
"Jester has been working on me," Essek chuckled. "It is true that touch has been largely foreign to me until recently, but I don't think you'll break me with a simple kiss," he said, then his eyes widened and he pursed his lips, as though he hadn't meant to say that last word aloud.
A kiss. It hung in the air between them, somehow more real now that it had been spoken than in all the hours they been dancing around it.
After a moment, Essek cleared his throat and backed away a step.
"Well, in any case, it was a very effective distraction, and I am grateful to you for pulling us out of another tight spot." He coughed, looking down and adding, "Perhaps something to... keep in mind for the future."
Caleb... was confused. "You may usually be in disguise, but still, I do hope you won't be going about kissing random strangers on the street when you're in a sticky situation."
Essek's eyes widened in true alarm. "No, certainly not! I meant... that... we... should keep it in mind," he finished lamely, looking away again into the corner of the room and shoulders hunching in on himself.
Was? They should... keep it in mind? Specifically, Essek and Caleb, should keep in mind the idea of kissing, in case of future need for distraction?
What in Exandria did that mean? What was he supposed to think of a statement like that, his heart pounding as it was, his gaze constantly drifting back to Essek's mouth and the memory of what it had felt like pressed against his?
"I don't think I'll be able to keep it out of my mind," he whispered, and Essek's head whipped back to him.
Scheiße, he'd said that out loud. For all his freshly-rested magic, there was nothing he could do to pull those words back out of the air. A beat passed in silence, and another.
"I feel that... there is something being left unsaid?" Essek queried, as though he hadn't quite heard, though there was no possibility it had slipped past his keen elven hearing. His eyes were fixed on Caleb's face, but his tone was hesitant, even fragile. Caleb was pinned under his gaze. He swallowed again.
"I- Ja. I apologize. To be honest, I find myself wishing I had not... kissed you," he stumbled over the word again. Something passed across Essek's face, a shadow or a wince, quicker than Caleb could identify it, and he let out a quiet "...ah."
"- in such a circumstance. Under such duress," Caleb finished. The time had long since come to be honest about this, and so he now pushed forward. "It was not how I had imagined it."
He could almost see Essek repeat his words, processing, something like disbelief in his eyes. "Imagined it?" he echoed, "Have you done so often?"
A humorless laugh escaped Caleb's lips, then he sighed. "Often enough," he replied. He closed his eyes, waiting for Essek to realize what he was really saying.
"Tell me," came the quiet reply.
His eyes flew open to stare at Essek, reeling again at the turns of this conversation. "Was?" he breathed.
Essek's eyes were full of intensity as he looked back. "Tell me, Caleb Widogast," he repeated, "what you imagined."
"I..."
He hesitated, but his mind's eye traced eagerly back to the moments he'd slipped into daydreaming, when he should have been present with his friends, with the Nein at one of their gatherings, or when he should have been studying. He didn't know what he was doing now, but he remembered those thoughts as vividly as if his imaginings had truly happened.
"Ich habe...." he slipped, and shook his head to start again. "I imagined taking you dancing with the Nein.
"Coaxing you onto your feet instead of your float, pulling you around the floor to see if my dances were anything like the Dynasty's, and if not, how quickly your sharp mind might pick up the movements. We would dance something lighthearted and fast, but then the music would slow. We would stay, and settle closer. I imagined the feel of you in my arms until there was nothing left between us but a breath."
He was breathing harder now, the rush of his thoughts leaving his heart pounding as though he was still being chased by Crownsguard. Essek had drifted closer across the room, floating again, maybe unconsciously, and Caleb inhaled, rushing on again before he could respond.
"I imagined the two of us at our studies, in my home, you on one side of the table and I on the other. However interesting my reading might be, you are always moreso," he gulped, accidentally slipping into the present tense. "Try I as I might, I could not focus on the words, and my eyes would drift up to you again, and again, until you looked up as well.
"You would smile," that little honest smile, the one that always seemed to take him by surprise, that looked like he wasn't sure he was doing it right, "and I would be helpless to do anything but lean into your gravity, and..."
"Kiss me."
Caleb's breath shuddered out of him as Essek completed the thought and pulled him back to the uncertain present. He slumped forward, resting his head in his hands.
"Ja," he said.
"Nein," Essek quipped back at him, and yet again Caleb could only look up in surprise. Essek's eyes were alight with something new, and he looked like he was fighting down a smile.
"You misunderstand, Caleb. I was not finishing your sentence, I was asking."
Essek reached out a hand towards him, and Caleb took it, though his mind couldn't seem to keep up. He was pulled gently in until Essek could reach down and claim his other hand, clasping them both between their chests and closing the distance that had been there since last night.
He wasn't sure he'd ever been able to see the violet of Essek's eyes so clearly, or the tips of his fangs in the delighted smile that was winning its way across his face. Caleb hesitated, caught up in these tiny observations that even his keen mind had failed to evoke in his imagination.
"Please, kiss me," Essek whispered again, and so he did.
He reclaimed a hand and reached up to touch Essek's face, fingers sliding over his cheek and grounding himself in this moment. Then he leaned in and pressed their lips together, a feather-light brush of contact that made his breath catch, and then more firmly, and he felt Essek's free hand wind its way around his waist to hold him close.
Caleb felt the tension wound tight in his chest uncoil as they breathed together, parting slightly and leaning in again. They stayed like that for many moments, taking their time, tenderly exploring with lips and tongue. Eventually he unlinked their hands between them, not releasing this kiss, and wrapped his arm around Essek's back to pull him tight up against his chest. Essek relaxed into his embrace, and for the second time in as many days, Caleb felt his hand trace up his neck to touch his now loosed hair. He wound his fingers into the waves and gripped lightly, nails scraping gently against Caleb's scalp, and Caleb felt a small sound escape his throat, which might have been a sigh if his mouth weren't so otherwise preoccupied.
Essek smiled against him, apparently pleased with the reaction, and... mein Gott, had he been imagining this as well? Wondering if Caleb's reactions last night were genuine, wanting to draw them out again? Belatedly, he felt the point of a fang in the other's smile - only a moment's warning before Essek nipped sharply on Caleb's lower lip. He gasped, and Essek pulled away laughing.
He looked Caleb over from where he was held close in his arms, still wearing a warm, delighted smile on his face.
"I never truly thought I would get to have this. It is so much better than I imagined. But I was right," he said, smile turning teasing, "it remains a very good distraction."
Caleb couldn't disagree.