Work Text:
1847
London, England.
Napoleon Solo is used to things rearranging themselves around him.
He moves through the world like a river, carving his way through it with remarkably little effort. Good looks, among other things, tend to aid one in endeavours such as these, and Solo has plenty where those are concerned.
His curls are black velvet, and his eyes secretive sapphires. His smile is the coy question mark at the end of an innuendo. Not many people are unaffected by his charm.
He looks like a rich man. Dresses with the care of a body who is used to comfort. Though it is nothing but a clever facade.
He is a thief.
One who goes by no name, and gets caught by no man.
He is a master at the game that is imitation. The son of an American immigrant, poor and desolate and half-mad with the dreams of a failed man. He had watched, and learned, while stalking the streets from a young age.
No more.
He has grown from waif to warrior, though the weapon he wields is perhaps a touch unconventional.
His clients would surprise you, if he ever cared to divulge, but he is as learned in the art of keeping secrets as he is at stealing them.
He walks home alone that night, uninterested in the company of another body by his side. Sometimes the feeling of loneliness is a tide that sucks him out to some distant shore, deep within himself. He has no wife, no permanent lover. Though he secretly yearns for something of that sort. Of the bond and trust.
The streets are chill underfoot, stones gleaming with a faint kiss of winter frost. It is a twilit world, caught between waking and slumber. A place where things move in the corners of one’s gaze, and shapes change into shadows that stalk.
Solo is unbothered. He walks the cobbled lane with certainty, royal-blue coat drawn tight against the wind. His hands are tucked into the pockets, protected, warm.
It takes him a long moment before he is aware of the echo. Of footsteps sitting out of sync with his own. Closer. Closer.
Solo does not feel too bothered by such. He passes it off as a fellow traveler who is doing double time.
It is only when he has gone another block when he decides against this assumption. The steps do not falter, tap-tap-tap.
But they do not speed. They hold tempo.
Some stalker perhaps? It would not be the first time. Solo knows that he must bear his attributes as a cross on the odd occasion. It is rare enough that he does not feel too great an anger.
Besides, he has kissed men. Has let men do the same a woman would ask in the dim glow of a sultry bedchamber. He does not particularly favour one sex over another.
Finally, when the steps fail to cease, Solo clenches his jaw and turns, ready to give a savage tirade.
He chokes into silence before he can unleash the words rebounding in his skull.
The man is tall. Taller than Solo, and strong but elegant. His skin is pale, like fresh milk, and the scalloped shells of his pointed ears gleam with a iridescence reminiscent of mother of pearl. His hair is spun gold, and his eyes are like ice; pale and a shade of blue so cold that it makes Solo shudder. And when the man moves, it is with the grace of a shadow, seeping into the cracks to devour what lies beneath.
Solo stumbles back, tasting the pounding of his heart in the cavern of his throat. Whatever this man is, he is not human.
Rumours whisper among people like wind in a graveyard. Murmurs of the hidden folk. The people of the mists. The ageless ones.
Fae.
Faeries.
They linger at the corners of reality, watching from their shadow world. And sometimes, in a rare bout of malice, they snatch one away in their gossamer webs that bite deep like knives. Leaving a fading scent of lilac and viscera.
Solo is not a fool. He knows what this man is. Or rather, what this man is not. Because he is not a man.
The lamps in the street flicker, casting a halo of crooked light around Solo and the slowly advancing man. Around him, stragglers trudge through the gloom. The stars overhead are cold, diamonds on a sea of velvet. No one can see either of them.
Solo bites his tongue and tastes blood. There is a bite in the air.
Power.
Magic.
“Oh fuck,” he rasps, trying to back away, but his legs fail him and the next moment between blinks he is kneeling. He can hear his pulse as it tries to pound out of his skin. Feels the cold wind raise gooseflesh on the back of his neck with a low, languid moan. A sudden urge to laugh takes ahold of him, and he is almost powerless to keep it in. His eyes are burning, hands like pinned butterflies folded in his lap.
“L...look, this must be a misunderstanding,” he tries, throat dry as sand. He knows there is fear thick like a veil in his voice, but feels no shame about that. A body would have to be off their heads not to fear them.
The man halts over him, his form clad in a coat the hue of a granite monolith. He cants his head ever so slightly to the side, and it does not escape Solo that this creature is beautiful. His face is the kind that every artist dreams of capturing; that they will go mad trying to perfect.
He is cut of marble in the moonlight, unmoving.
Everwatching.
Solo feels his words fail him, lost as rain in a drought. He feels raw, cheated. Is he going to die here? On this cold street in the sight of others, and yet outside their perception. He shivers, suddenly chilled.
The fae regards him with those eyes. Its mouth is a line of neutrality, Solo cannot pick out any form of emotion.
“Have I done something to offend you?” he asks in slight desperation. Flinching back as the creature trails those eyes over his kneeling form. Then it slides down, fluid like molten silver, until it crouches opposite him.
Solo is too frozen to move when it slides a shockingly warm hand under his chin and tilts his face up. He swallows, and he can feel it against those fingers. They feel like coals on his skin.
“They were not lying when they spoke of your beauty,” says the fae at last. His voice is tame thunder, deep and rich, and it sparks a flame in Solo’s chest.
Suddenly, he is not sure of his fear any longer. The fingers on his jaw are gentle, the eyes no longer cold, but laced with interest. “Who’s they?” he dares, voice quiet in the silence of the night.
The fae lets out a low laugh, the sounds bringing to mind oak trees swaying in a wind. Solo cannot look away from that face. At last, the man replies, “The two women who put your name forward to me.”
Solo makes a humming noise in his throat. They could be anyone. He cannot be expected to remember everyone who offers him a job. He feels content, even with the hand of danger so close to his heart. “They say anything else?”
“Da,” says the fae, and oh... he’s slavic. How strange. “They say you are good with your hands.”
Solo says nothing, because that could mean many things.
The fae scrutinises him again, fingers tightening slightly. A creeping vine on a trellis meant for roses. And then he lets out a low sound, almost a growl, before he is kissing Solo.
He cannot struggle. His mind has shattered, heat a ladder of forbidden pleasure climbing through his veins. The fae’s lips are soft, warm as a sunrise, and Solo turns himself over wth abandon. A powerful hand snakes up to knot in his curls, drawing his head to the side, their faces a puzzle that resolves itself in the heat of their breath and the bite of tongues and teeth.
He has no air left to call his own when the fae draws back. Their noses brush, air between them hot with panting. And Solo thinks he might just die from the sheer amount of rushing in his ears.
Instead he says, “You want something from me?” And it comes out hoarse, his lip bleeding from the bite of the fae. What he gets in return is a nod. But the hand never moves from his hair. It is near the point of pain, but it sends a shiver of pleasure up Solo’s spine.
“My name is Illya,” says the fae. And his voice drops low, a rumble of smoke over a storm. “I need you to steal something for me.”