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It’s unclear, looking back on it, where he and Jace started to blur the line between partners and lovers, between friends and far more. He suspects, in hindsight, it was a gradual thing. Like death, creeping up on them and stealing them away before they were any the wiser. It might have been the first day they met. It’s cheesy, but he really does believe, from experience, in love at first sight. Maybe it was that for them.
Regardless of how quickly it happened, he remembers the night it all came to a head. When the waters rose, and the dam broke, and there was no going back. It’s hazy in his memory, a little faded by time and alcohol. Still, he knows like the rote steps of a dance, how it happened. It went sort of like this:
Cain was, for sure, drunk.
Maybe a little closer to tipsy, but enough to make his head buzz regardless. The Wandering Tree Inn was alive with knights and commoners alike. Young boys rubbed elbows with high-up girls slumming it in the streets, barkeeps and barmaids yelled at each other, and music flew around instead of tankards. Amid all the chaos, no one noticed a pair of dark-clothed mischievous knights stumbling their way to a secluded table at the far back of the tavern.
Cain fell back into one of the chairs with a hard thump, bursting into laughter again for no particular reason. He heard a scuffle of fabric and a matching thump from in front of him, looking up to see Jace grinning at him. His golden hair was in disarray, save for the small braids Cain had put in it earlier, and the torchlight glinted off his skin and piercings like fire. He was, actually, remarkably sober compared to his usual behaviour at the taverns, more so drunk on joy instead of alcohol. The sight was head-spinning to witness.
“ Shhh ,” Jace hissed, no animosity behind it.
Cain smirked back at him, opening his mouth to do exactly the opposite. Jace glowered playfully at him, then reached across the table in one smooth movement, placing two fingers over Cain’s lips in a shushing gesture. Cain barely fought back the urge to bite down on them.
“Come on, bastard. Don’t let the others hear you.”
His smirk transformed into a grin and he batted Jace’s hand away. “Why not?”
He swore that the alcohol-induced flush on Jace’s cheeks deepened, but maybe that was just him imagining things. It could well be wishful thinking.
(Echena above, he hoped despite everything it wasn’t.)
“They’ll talk,” Jace whispered back, still with a conspiratorial smile on his face. He looked beautiful. Beautiful, and alive, and far too much for Cain’s inebriated state of mind. “And then I’ll be so embarrassed.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Oh, don’t tell me little old me can make the great Jace, self-proclaimed ‘most pursued knight in Northcliff’, blush. Pinch me, I must be dreaming.”
“Asshole,” Jace snorted, leaning over the table and drumming an idle rhythm onto Cain’s arm. He didn’t quite reach down to grab Cain’s hand, but Cain wished he would. “If I had my way, you’d be doing more than that, and I don’t feel like sharing with the rest of this damn tavern.”
Cain swallowed at that, feeling some of the playfulness in his veins slow, turning into something molten and very dangerous. Sure, he and Jace hit on each other often. It was natural. They were both flirts, both good-looking, closer than anything. He was no stranger to compliments or backhanded jokes or idle teasing from Jace, but this felt… genuine. Odd. Like the drinks had loosened Jace’s tongue, and he really wasn’t sure what to do with that.
…Well, he knew what he wanted to do with that. He just didn’t feel allowed to.
“Careful, Jace,” he said lightly, and dared to gently trail his fingers along the length of Jace’s arm in return. “I’ll start to think you really mean these things.”
There was a moment of silence, an absence even of Jace’s breaths amid the clamour of the tavern. Cain looked up, and Jace was staring directly at him, and for a moment there was nothing else in the world except the two of them.
In that distant, isolated haze, Jace bit at his lip, his smile wavering. His hand came up and covered Cain’s. The world held its breath too.
Cain found he couldn’t move, pinned to the spot as if he’d been shot by his own arrows.
“I do mean them,” Jace said, very quietly, and the world caved in on itself like a landslide.
One beat. Two.
Cain licked his lips absentmindedly, finding his mouth had suddenly gone terribly dry. Jace still hadn’t stopped looking at him. This felt, he imagined, like being struck by lightning. Everything was numb and on fire all at once. There were no words to say in the face of such a sudden, raw admission.
A stuttered breath in. It came out in a shaking sigh.
He was, for what might’ve been the first time in his life, utterly dumbstruck.
It took another long moment for him to find even a sound in response. A simple, trembling, “Oh.”
Jace seemed to take the response as negative, drawing away, his smile falling altogether. “I— look, maybe I’m making things a little too emotional here. Blame the ale, you know? I’m an emotional drunk.” He gave an entirely unconvincing laugh, twisting his hands around each other. “Let’s just go back to being stupid and forget this all happened, okay?”
This was… well. This was it. Now or never.
Cain knew he shouldn’t. He was a traitor, and Jace was… Jace, and this would make everything worse if he fell into Jace’s bed or even more. It would doom them beyond the point of no return.
But Jace looked so fragile, about to shatter.
And Cain, damn himself, wanted.
So he forced words past his dry lips and stubborn tongue. “No. Let’s not.”
Jace froze. Another standstill went by.
“Tell me,” Cain pushed, and he was the one who reached over this time, taking Jace’s callused hands in his. “Tell me the things you want. I want to know. I want…”
I want you.
Jace’s lips parted, moved soundlessly, and then he choked out an answer. “Want what?”
He stood on the cliff’s edge. He stood, looking down at the end, and—
He jumped.
“You.”
“Oh, gods,” Jace breathed, all the tension seeping out of his shoulders at once, and then he was standing and pulling Cain up with him partially onto the table, and they were kissing.
It was a brief thing, messy and desperate and Jace’s hand gripped his hair tight enough to hurt. Cain yanked at his collar, putting one knee up on the table, and shivered as Jace pressed another kiss to his cheek, his jaw, the side of his neck. He tilted his head to the left, baring his neck to Jace’s touch, and felt like the world was spinning around him.
“What happened to not wanting to share?” he asked breathily, feeling Jace jolt.
Jace’s lips moved against his neck. “I’ll be honest, bubba, I forgot we were in the tavern.”
Cain snorted. “Well, clearly our first move here is finding somewhere else.”
Jace pulled back and nodded, his cheerful demeanour returning in full force as he let go of Cain’s hair (much to Cain’s disappointment) and grabbed his hand instead. The table creaked rather alarmingly as Cain jumped off it, but Cain simply resolved that it wasn’t his problem and moved on. He had more pressing conquests to deal with and conquests were currently staring very impatiently at him.
“Shall we?” Cain asked with a sly look, leaning up to kiss Jace’s sharp jawline just because he could. “Though I can’t imagine the sight of someone with an Order tattoo sneaking off with his dark-clothed companion won’t raise some questions in the street. Assuming you want to go back to our quarters?”
“No better place,” Jace replied, nuzzling his head gently against Cain’s. This entire thing felt surprisingly right. “I’m sure I can think of an excuse.”
Cain couldn’t help but snort at that too. He knew how good of a liar Jace was— that was to say, not good.
“Don’t laugh at me! There’s so many possibilities even I can’t fuck it up.”
“At least you’re self-aware,” Cain chuckled, tugging him discreetly around the wall-edges of the tavern to avoid people’s gazes as much as possible. He was pretty sure it didn’t fully work, but at least this way most eyes weren’t on them. Most people were probably too hammered anyway.
“You’re mean,” Jace pouted back. “Look, try this one on for size.”
“I’ll humour you. Go on, then.”
“If anyone asks… hmm. You’re an Eagles spy infiltrating our ranks, and I’m stopping you.”
Cain knew, logically, the excuse made sense. Cain was cloaked and in all black, being dragged off by the hand by a knight, but—
At that moment, as soon as the words left Jace’s lips, Cain wasn’t Cain anymore. Cain was Diego, wearing a skin that didn’t quite fit him, looking up at a man he didn’t deserve who he was going to walk straight into the grave someday. He was an illusion, a walking lie that had moulded itself to feel natural after several years. Jace was in love with a man who didn’t exist.
He was going to doom both of them, and Jace didn’t even know it.
Jace was dead-on with his silly little excuse and didn’t even know it.
There was no way he could, right? Diego— Cain hadn’t been that careless. There was no way sweet, stupid, naive Jace could know. Cain had made sure Jace was oblivious. It was just a spur-of-the-moment lie based on how they both looked. That was all.
Oh, goddesses, Jace didn’t even know. The bitter irony would strangle him someday when he realized.
(If he lived to see that day, Cain thought, and felt sick.)
Someone’s hand shook his shoulder, rough and grounding. “Cain?”
He blinked and found he was still in the tavern, staring blankly up at Jace’s face. His grip on Jace’s hand had gone slack. His body didn’t quite feel like his own, torn halfway between false Cain and all-too-real Diego. All the mirth burning in his chest died like one quickly snuffed candle and left hollowness in its wake.
“Are you okay?” Jace asked, and the soft, concerned words were borderline devastating.
He forced the mask of Cain back on and tried his best to ignore how it didn’t fit quite right.
“Yeah, sorry. Got a bit lost somewhere along the way there.”
“Lost in my eyes?” Jace joked, but the joke was weak and didn’t quite land. Cain fumbled for a suitable response.
“Lost in your terrible excuses, more like,” he scoffed, but his jab felt empty too. “You’re stopping me with your pants off?”
Move on, he pleaded silently. Flirt back. Let it go, please.
And thank whatever divine forces were out there, Jace did.
“By whatever means necessary. I’m a resourceful man.”
That ripped a ragged laugh from Cain’s throat and he shoved at Jace’s arm, unfreezing enough to pull them both out the door of the inn. Slowly, the tension dissapated into nothing. His mask started to feel like it fit properly again. Like Cain was all he was, and this moment was everything he needed it to be.
“Northcliff will remember your heroism, brave knight,” he tossed back. Jace giggled, letting go of his hand in favour of pulling him close by the waist, making them both stumble as they walked down the street. The feeling of his body against Cain’s side was warm and reassuring; it was almost enough for him to forget about earlier altogether.
Jace took a second to respond, perhaps deliberating over something. Then he pulled them both off course, ducking behind the side of the knights’ compound and pulling Cain with him. Cain opened his mouth, about to question what exactly he was doing, but Jace cut him off by shoving him up against the wall with a heavy thump .
“I don’t know about Northcliff,” he said, lazy and nearly smug, before Cain could make an indignant comment. He leaned a little closer, his breath ghosting against Cain’s lips. Fuck , his bedroom eyes were very distracting. “But I’ll make sure you remember.”
Cain swallowed hard. It was astonishing how easily Jace made him feel off-kilter and indecent. Cain was far from a blushing virgin, but damn if Jace didn’t make him feel like one sometimes.
“That was a good line, for once,” he said, breathless, and Jace grinned like a demon.
“Only the best for you.”
He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, whatever, flatterer. I know you better than that. Come here.”
Jace did, eagerly, and their kiss this time was vicious and forceful. Cain slid his hands under Jace’s shirt, rucking the thick material up and gripping tightly at bare skin. He felt Jace gasp into his mouth and shove him harder against the wall. One of Jace’s knees slotted between his legs and he spread them apart further, welcoming Jace closer and closer to him until there was no space left between them at all. He licked into Jace’s mouth, slow and dirty, digging his nails into flesh until it pulled a whine from deep in Jace’s throat. One kiss, then another, and another.
His world became muffled gasps and shuddering bodies. It became the feeling of Jace’s teeth nipping his pierced earlobe, the bites Cain left on his neck in return. All that mattered was the two of them, wrapped so tight they were inseparable, and the way Jace said his name like he was something holy.
Still, even then, the world was just a little wrong.
The name Jace said wasn’t real, the body Jace held tightly to his own had betrayal woven into its very veins. Everything felt like some scene from a novel, desperate and sensual and hurling full-speed towards dramatic-irony-laden tragedy.
“Let me have you?” Jace asked, raw and hungry, as he finally pulled away for long enough to actually get them through the door this time. Cain followed him blindly, needily.
He only responded when they had finally run the short distance to their room, tumbling onto the bed in a mess of fabric and skin and need. It was easier, that way, to pretend that his speech was unsteady because of shock and desire.
“Always,” he lied through his teeth, and pulled Jace in for another kiss.
Maybe if he immersed himself in enough of Jace’s sweetness, it could drown out the bitter poison on the back of his tongue. If he distracted himself enough he could pretend it was fine.
Maybe he could pretend Jace would love him forever, and they weren’t doomed.
He’d gotten good at lying to Jace, after all.
He could learn to lie to himself.