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The trouble with this ridiculous outfit, Curt is suddenly finding out, is that it has a lot of handholds which someone could use, hypothetically speaking, to drag him backwards into an alleyway. Ridiculous fucking outfit. Ridiculous fucking deep cover. He makes to drive his elbow backwards and then fling his attacker forwards over his shoulder, but is surprised by a familiar hand waving in front of his face.
“Don’t make a scene, love, it’s me,” Owen Carvour hisses in his ear, sounding distinctly amused.
“Owen!” Curt spins and flings his arms around Owen, pulling him close. Owen huffs out a laugh and pats Curt’s shoulder. When Curt can bear to pull back, he drinks in the sight of Owen in front of him for the first time in far too long; his hair’s grown out in the way it does when he goes too long between haircuts, and his jacket is dirtier, but his smile at the sight of Curt is the same.
“Curt,” Owen responds softly, cupping his face in one hand. Then his smile turns smug, in the way it does when he thinks he’s about to be hilarious. “Or should I be calling you Tadius?”
“No,” Curt snaps, so quickly he almost overlaps with Owen speaking. Owen drops his hand and laughs.
“Not a fan of the name?”
“I’m pretty sure my cover identity is supposed to be classified,” Curt says, avoiding the question. He’s supposed to be neutral on the name; it doesn’t matter if he likes or dislikes it, what matters is using it, responding to it, and maintaining cover. All policy aside, he missed Owen saying his name.
“It is.” Owen shrugs. “The only thing I knew was where you were. I asked around for someone with your description, and got the name.”
“You didn’t even know what I was wearing,” Curt says.
Owen smirks. “I was very descriptive.”
Curt really doesn’t want to know. Instead of asking, he glances out of the alleyway, drags them a little further out of view, and kisses Owen. Owen’s hands fall to his hips, pressing warm against him and holding him close. He makes a soft noise against Owen’s lips, a little pathetic sigh that he can’t quite help, and curls his fingers around the line of Owen’s jaw to feel the tension leaching away from them both. It’s good, getting a tangible reminder that neither of them have enjoyed the other’s absence.
When they part, Owen looks down at him. His hands are neatly framing Owen’s face, highlighting his smile as he says, “Miss me?”
“No,” Curt lies, and then shifts the topic. “How’d you get here, anyway?”
“I was in the neighbourhood-”
“-Bullshit you were,” Curt says affectionately.
“I had some free time,” Owen corrects himself, smiling at Curt, “And I decided to drop in. See how you were.”
Curt drops his head against Owen’s shoulder. “Thanks,” he says, a little muffled.
“I missed you,” Owen admits.
“I missed you, too.” When Owen cards a hand through his hair, he slumps against him and exhales properly, relaxing for the first time in weeks. “I hate deep cover,” he says with some finality.
“No, you don’t.”
“No, I don’t,” he agrees, “But I hate the part where I don’t see you.”
“I’m here now.”
Curt nestles his head closer into the curve of Owen’s shoulder, feels the canvas of Owen’s jacket rough against his skin. Owen’s hand is warm and anchoring in his hair, pressing gently against the crown of his head as a persistent reminder of Owen’s presence. In this land of absurd bullshit and pristine assholes, the coarse material is reassuringly real, and Owen himself is always grounding.
“I don’t mean to press,” Owen says tentatively, “Do you know how much longer you’ll be working here?”
“No,” Curt sighs. He might sound a little pathetic, but that’s between him and Owen.
Owen makes a sympathetic noise and presses a kiss to his temple.
“I thought I’d be here for a few weeks, but my last report to Cynthia changed the assignment to ‘stick around, don’t interfere and see what happens’. So.” Curt shrugs.
“I don’t imagine Cynthia said it that politely,” Owen comments.
Curt smiles into his shoulder. “No, it was, uh,” he wracks his brains for the specific wording, “’Sit your dumb ass down, keep your fucking mouth shut and your hands out for once’. I think.” It had been an interesting letter to receive, since Cynthia had adopted the curlicued style that everyone in this fucking place uses, and kept it just as laden with profanity as a typical conversation with her. She probably set a record for the most ornate ‘fuck your mother’ ever written.
“Sounds like her.”
“Mm,” Curt agrees, “I don’t think it’ll be much longer than another couple of weeks, though. Dunno what ‘it’ is, but I’ve got a feeling.”
“I can’t stay as long as that, I’m afraid, but I’m here for a few nights,” Owen says.
“Uh huh?” Curt reels him in for a quick kiss. “Well, you’re really gonna enjoy the benefits of me on a deep cover mission.”
“Yes?” Owen’s hands stay at his waist, and he isn’t so much making eye contact as checking Curt out with a glance at his face for completeness’ sake.
“Lots of complaining.”
Owen drops his head against Curt’s and laughs. “Not enjoying yourself?”
“This mission is turning me into more of a republican than I expected,” Curt says.
“Voting red?” Owen says, raising an eyebrow.
“Not unless Ike makes a lot of sudden U-turns, fuck no. I’m just more against monarchies than anyone has ever been before. Ever.”
“I’ll let Robespierre know you want in on the regicide club,” Owen says.
“You and your history references,” Curt says, rolling his eyes, and then refocuses. “Is it regicide if it’s the prince?”
“Ah, a Tarquinius scenario,” Owen says, looking smug. When Curt glares at him, he just smiles. “Let’s split the difference and say treason.”
“Okay, maybe don’t say that too loudly,” Curt says, dropping his voice a little. He hadn’t necessarily forgotten where he is, it’s just that Owen is distracting. And he’d let his guard down. And yes, he had maybe forgotten that he wasn’t with Owen in his home or something.
“Will it hurt the prince’s feelings?” Owen asks, mock-sympathetic.
“Yeah,” Curt says sarcastically, “The reason you shouldn’t say treason around my boss, the prince, is because he’ll get really sad and I’ll have to wipe away his tears with my favourite handkerchief.”
Owen shrugs. “To be fair, from what I’ve heard…” He trails off before he can point out that it doesn’t seem that unlikely, but Curt gets the message anyway.
“I’m actually considering the possibility now,” Curt admits. It’s alarmingly possible. Except for the bit where he doesn’t have a handkerchief on him, but now he’s going to be looking out for one. A really stupid frilly one. The prince’ll probably love it. Red with gold trim, maybe.
“And?”
“I think I want to stop considering it.”
“I can help with that,” Owen murmurs, and presses a kiss to the corner of his mouth.
Curt laughs. “Shut up,” he says, and pulls Owen in to land a kiss properly on target. He should really decide between wanting to make out with Owen and wanting to talk to him, because trying to do both is mostly ending up with a regularly disrupted conversation and very little progress in the making out department, but it’s an impossible decision to make. He wants to do both all the time. So, naturally, he pulls Owen as close as possible and tries to pack as much as possible into a brief kiss before they can get another half-conversation in. When they part, Owen glances down and looks amused in the ‘Curt’s being embarrassing’ way.
As soon as he realises that the amused look is because of how hard he’s been clutching Owen’s lapels, Curt complains, “God, I miss jackets.”
“Of course,” Owen says sceptically.
“Seriously,” Curt says, “You don’t know suffering until you get home at the end of the day – at ten at night, because this place has never heard of unions – and have to unlace everything you’re wearing. I’d kill for a zip.”
Owen curls a hand around Curt’s hip and smiles. “There’s a line in there somewhere.”
“Don’t say it,” Curt says, and kisses Owen when it looks like he’s going to. It isn’t a particularly effective method of discouraging Owen from his chosen course of action, but he really has missed Owen recently. Even the asshole behaviour, which he is never going to say out loud because Owen will know exactly what he means and make fun of him anyway, because he’s an asshole. On second thoughts, maybe he will tell Owen that.
“I wasn’t sure whether you’d want me to mention the clothes, actually,” Owen says.
Curt looks down briefly at his ensemble for the day. “The pants aren’t bad,” he says optimistically. Owen makes an agreeable sort of humming sound and runs his hand up the lacing on Curt’s thigh.
“Ornate,” he says.
“Yup,” Curt agrees, a little higher pitched than before.
“I can see what you mean by unlacing everything,” Owen says, finding the knot high up against Curt’s hip.
“Yup,” Curt repeats, strained. Owen smiles, and shifts his focus to the doublet.
“Very refined,” he says, and absently plays with one of the slashes at his shoulder.
“You’re mocking me,” Curt complains.
“Not at all,” Owen promises, “If I was mocking you, I’d bring up your resemblance to a portrait of King Charles I that I saw once.”
“Shut up,” Curt groans.
“It’s minimal. Since you aren’t wearing hose.” Curt briefly flicks through his memories of the way the other people here discuss clothes and lands on two definitions of ‘hose’, both of which he’s disinclined to wear. Both of which he’s inclined to make fun of Owen about.
“You wish.”
“No, I think I like this more,” Owen says, and draws his hand gently over the collar of Curt’s shirt. “Black and red works well on you.”
“Thanks,” Curt manages. It’s dumb. Compliments from Owen shouldn’t still make him blush and withdraw, but here he is. Acting like a lovestruck teenager, ears reddened and ducking away from eye contact.
Owen smiles and kisses him again, pressing him gently back against the wall. It feels almost private, with Owen’s body bracketing him in and blocking out everything else, narrowing down their surroundings to just the two of them. He’s warm and comforting and familiar, and he kisses Curt like it’s his only priority in the world. It’s a balm for all the irritation and stress of this mission so far. When Owen splays his hand over the small of Curt’s back to pull them closer together, Curt shivers, and Owen pulls back to smile at him.
“You do look lovely,” he murmurs against Curt’s jaw, and then presses kisses like inked stamps along the line of his neck.
“Okay,” Curt gasps, “We should probably – not do this. Here.”
“You’re telling me this place is going to have a problem with this?” Owen says, raising an eyebrow. It’s a reasonable objection, since they’re apparently all in favour of laced-up trousers and men in tights, but it seems a line has to be drawn somewhere. Even if that line is before sodomy but after capelets, which strike Curt as far worse than allegedly violating the natural order. Curt shrugs and kisses Owen quickly. It starts that way, at least, which is the excuse Curt is going to use to justify yanking Owen in by his lapels again.
“They’re kind of old-fashioned,” he explains when he can spare the breath.
“Old-fashioned?” Owen repeats, then kisses Curt again, trailing over his jaw and back to his mouth.
“I’m pretty sure they still have homosexuality in the penal code as buggery,” Curt says between kisses. This is what he means by not being able to pick between talking to Owen and making out with him, and this is the natural end point: doing both at the same time, kind of badly. Of course, it’s him and Owen, so ‘kind of badly’ is still perfect and wonderful, but still.
Owen pauses in picking at the lacing of his doublet to smirk. “I think you’re getting ahead of yourself,” he says, “Who said anything about buggery?”
Curt stares at him, unimpressed. Owen shrugs and goes back to painstakingly undoing each bow whilst Curt rolls an idea around in his head.
“So,” he says, leaning back against the wall so Owen can have easier access, “You’re here for a couple days?”
“That’s the plan, at least.”
“Got anywhere to stay?”
Owen glances out of the alleyway. “This seems like the sort of place to have a charmingly rustic inn of some kind.” He’s only been here a few hours, if Curt has to guess, and he already sounds sick of it. Cute. He hasn’t seen anything yet.
“Oh, we’re up to our necks in them,” Curt says cheerfully.
“I’m very excited to find out the exchange rate.”
Curt, briefly sidetracked from his plan, frowns. “I’m not actually sure they know what an exchange rate is.”
“Well, that presents a problem.”
“I suppose,” Curt sighs, back on track, “I could put you up for a couple days. I mean, it would be a terrible strain on me, but I’m such a generous guy.” Since he’s passed the opportunity for subtlety a couple miles back, he traces a hand up Owen’s chest.
Owen looks at him sceptically.
“It’ll be a little difficult to sneak you into the palace, at least,” Curt says.
“Since we’re so terrible at stealth,” Owen agrees sarcastically, and then redirects his full focus to Curt. “Palace?”
“Prince’s right-hand man,” Curt says, gesturing to himself, “Stays with the prince. Near the prince. I’m not seducing the prince. He has his own royal suite away from my rooms,” he hastily adds.
“I was so worried,” Owen says drily. Because he thinks he’s so slick, he tangles a hand into Curt’s hair and kisses him as a distraction. Curt lets himself be distracted for a little while.
“Even if that was ever a concern, like ever, it really wouldn’t be one with this guy,” Curt says eventually. Owen looks down at him, looking vaguely amused. And a little dishevelled, which is really distracting.
“Are you not interested in a prince sweeping you off your feet?”
“My dance card’s full already,” Curt sighs, pretending to be sad about it. Owen smiles. “Also I’m pretty sure this guy’s turned me off of all royal fantasies forever.”
“That bad?”
Curt snorts. “He makes me feel smart.”
“Which should be easy,” Owen says loyally. Curt shoots him a look, which Owen returns evenly.
“If you’re gonna insist on missing the point,” Curt says, “He’s a dumbass.”
“Couldn’t pour water out of a boot with the instructions on the heel?”
“You’d have to guide him to the boot and explain how to lift it up.”
Owen chuckles. “My condolences about the way all your dreams of royal romance have clearly been crushed.”
“I’ll just have to comfort myself by dreaming about a tall, dark, and handsome stranger sweeping me off my feet instead,” Curt says cheerfully, about two seconds away from batting his eyelashes at Owen. He’s not holding off because it wouldn’t work, it’s just because he doesn’t want to play all his cards at once. A guy’s gotta have a few spare tricks up his sleeve. Owen laughs again and brushes a kiss against his jaw.
“Well, since you’re inviting me to a palace, would you like to see if we can desecrate a throne?” Owen suggests.
“Would I,” Curt sighs happily, and drags Owen out of the alleyway. “Come on, Lancelot.” Two can play at the historical references game, and he’s going to win. Or at least have fun.
“I’d follow you anywhere, Guinevere,” Owen says, smiling.