Chapter Text
“No, no, no – no! How often do I need to tell you? Keep your head like this.”
A soft, bitten-off groan halts Kiyan in his tracks. Interesting. It’s curiosity more than anything else that drives him into the shadows of the roof-mounted chimneys as he creeps closer to the great plaza. Humans never think to look up, except when it’s most inconvenient.
The sight that greets him on the plaza would be enough to force the air from Kiyan’s lungs, too, if he were prone to such things. As it stands, he’s still glad for the cover of the buildings, giving him the opportunity to simply observe for a moment.
The groan had brought thoughts of sordid, illicit happenings to mind, but that’s not what he finds. Or rather, it technically isn’t. It’s bordering on mundane, in fact: a painter, easel at an angle to Kiyan’s vantage point, his model draped over the steps of the fountain. The model’s smile appears carved into his skin, though Kiyan can’t tell if it’s the position or the cold, goosebumps littering the vast swathes of exposed skin.
So technically, it’s a slightly unusual but otherwise unremarkable scene. Except that there’s a sensuality to it, something magnetising – not in the model; he is a perfectly ordinary aristocrat, fine-boned and bland and boring. But the painter… he’s noble-born, too, Kiyan would hazard, with a sharply defined nose and cheekbones that look like they could cut. He’s scowling, but if anything, that only accentuates his features, making his dark eyes gleam.
A wave of something ferocious wells up inside Kiyan, a hunger that takes him by surprise. He digs his fingers into the tiled rooftop, carefully breathing through the urge to fling himself off the rooftop and sweep this curious human up and away, to bury his nose in those dark curls.
Stupid instincts.
The model shifts minutely, and the painter’s face twists as he throws his implements down, stride snapping as he moves to reposition the model.
The tile underneath Kiyan’s fingers crumbles before he has consciously parsed the scent wafting up to him.
Arousal.
He unclenches his hand with no little effort. If anything, he’d expected fear, and even attempted to brace himself for that. His nostrils flare. He can’t tell the two men apart, of course, but it’s not mingled arousal. And the painter still looks displeased and preoccupied, which doesn’t necessarily mean anything and shouldn’t matter besides, and yet –
And yet.
Once the model is draped to the painter’s apparent satisfaction, he nods once decisively and returns to his easel. Head cocked, he just regards the model for longer than Kiyan would have had the patience for. As either model or painter, that is.
And just before the painter sets his brush to the canvas again, he glances around, and for one, electrifying moment, actually meets Kiyan’s gaze.
Interesting indeed.
The next time Kiyan sees the painter, he almost doesn’t recognise him. In his defence, the transformation is stark: gone are the simple, comfortable clothes that allow easy movement, replaced by all the proper layers upon layers, armour not against physical monsters but words and expectations so many humans are too weak to bear. But it’s the hands that give him away, stained dark near the nail beds from charcoal and spattered almost imperceptibly with paint. (Gaetan used to have hands like that, before. It’s an unexpected memory, and while it’s not enough to push Kiyan off-balance, it tastes like something heavy for a long moment.)
And his eyes – they’re sharp like a hawk’s when his gaze finds Kiyan, and Kiyan knows he was too far away for a mere human to have recognised him the other day on the rooftop, and yet there’s a fleeting moment of an expression that looks suspiciously close to recognition on the man’s face.
Prince Adrien, the butler had called him. Do princes usually spend their time painting male models in suggestive poses? Kiyan doesn’t know and wouldn’t usually like to know, either, but something about this man – something he cannot quite put his finger on – intrigues him.
Damned humans.
“Dismissed,” Prince Adrien tells the butler before he can so much as get a word out, not to mention proper introductions. Spicy little noble. A smile curls into the corner of Kiyan’s mouth.
“I assume you’re here for the contract?” So the prince doesn’t beat around the bush. Which is almost a shame; he’s pleasant to listen to when he’s not yelling (and, honestly, even then). His voice is cool and cultured like this, and Kiyan has the sudden urge to lick it out of his mouth just to see what it tastes like. Which – what the hell.
It must be a side-effect of his mutagens; the Cat version is volatile at best, and while it’s never manifested quite like this, he’s had similar.
Since pouncing on a prince the way his instincts are telling him to do would only result in Kiyan’s death, he inclines his head instead. The contract had been for a gaggle of drowners, put up next to half a dozen others – for some expensive dye and striking young men to model and a call for a nursemaid – if in much fancier paper and with what Kiyan assumes is the royal seal.
A handful of expressions pass over the prince’s face in quick succession when Kiyan doesn’t actually say anything, before a delicious smirk settles in. “Aren’t you interesting. You’ll do. We can start early tomorrow.”
Kiyan bites down hard on his lip to not tell the nobleman exactly what he thinks of this casual we – Kiyan will be the one going into the sewers, and he’ll be the one taking the credit, thank you very much – or his comment. It’s a lucky thing the prince is pretty, because otherwise, Kiyan would likely have already walked out.
Maybe he should offer to take care of things tonight. But it would be quite a foolish move to turn down food and lodgings, or even lodgings only, and so he inclines his head again.
The prince pulls on a delicate chain, and moments later, the butler reappears. The prince doesn’t actually say anything; he just gestures lazily and turns back to the table. Kiyan peers at it curiously, ignoring the butler beckoning for him. The table is actually pretty boring, though, covered in some boardgame with several different, detailed, carefully handcrafted figures. Kiyan’s seen it before, through the windows of noble manors, and it’s… well. It’s boring, is what it is.
The prince looks up when Kiyan still hasn’t moved several breaths later. Something dangerous is glittering in his face – dangerous, and much more interesting than the board on the table. “Dismissed.”
Kiyan raises one eyebrow as mockingly as he can, but doesn’t say anything. There are things he can get away with, usually, but backtalk seldom is among them.
The prince, damn him, only looks amused before he turns back to his table.
Kiyan gives himself half a breath of glaring and then turns around and closes the distance between him and the butler just a smidge too fast.
It’s only when Kiyan is ushered to rooms that are considerably more comfortable than those usually afforded to witchers, the butler nattering about preparing a tunic in the prince’s favoured colours for the entire walk, that he realises the prince may not have been talking about the drowner contract after all.
Who had been the person looking for male models?
Maybe Kiyan should have paid a little more attention to the notices on the board…