STUFF ACHED. More of a that was a tough hill to climb ache than an I think I’m dying one, though. A steady thud-thump sounded directly under Toby’s ear, and it took him a minute to figure out that it was Darius’s heart. He lifted his head to find Darius watching him with something other than his usual glare. The fond warmth of his regard and the little smile tugging at his mouth had Toby grinning.
“Hey, there. We did okay, right? I mean, I think it worked?”
“Ha. You think.” Darius combed a leaf out of Toby’s hair. “Yes. Channeled. Animus-Crystallogen.”
Toby wriggled up Darius’s body, got an oof when he kneed a sensitive spot, and flung his arms around Darius’s neck. “Gods. Thank you, thank you so freaking much. You’re amazing and wonderful and I’m going to freaking live!”
To his astonishment, Darius wrapped long arms around him in return and murmured in his ear, “You’re… amazing. You. Did it.”
“Guess I couldn’t just sit on my unplaceable butt and wait for something to happen.” Toby nuzzled at Darius’s throat, happy to be surrounded by his scent. “It was weird shit. Like I was being turned inside out in pieces. But this wasn’t me doing this. You had to bring me here. You had to show me where the door was.” Toby fought the sudden constriction of his throat. “Without you, I’d be so dead.”
“Toby….”
Darius stroked his back, and something in his voice made Toby raise his head. How could an ice-blue eye exude heat like that? How did that work? He pushed Darius’s hat the rest of the way off his head and, after a quick internal debate, pushed the eye patch off as well. Darius didn’t stop him, which he took as a good sign. Encouragement, even. Too old, too weird, too much his teacher—none of that mattered anymore. It hadn’t mattered for a while now, but he’d been too much of a coward to do anything about it.
He wanted Darius so badly. Wariness had slid over into a hard crush, then into whatever this was. What he did know was that he and Darius understood each other. They felt right together. Toby wriggled to get more of himself on top. So right together.
The soft sound from Darius didn’t seem to be protest. Toby leaned in and kissed his forehead gently, then his scarred cheek and the blank skin where his right eye had once been. He kept his movements slow and careful out of consideration for sore muscles and so Darius would be less liable to balk.
“Toby.” His name was a ragged whisper torn from Darius’s throat.
“Need me to stop?” Toby murmured as he kissed down the unscarred side of Darius’s face.
“Yes… no. Gods.”
Hands on either side of Darius’s shoulders, Toby pushed up far enough for a better view. “Hey. Look at me.” Ah, there’s my griffin glare. “It’s either yes, I want this without waffling or I’m stopping.”
Darius blew out a hard breath. “We shouldn’t.”
“Age doesn’t matter. We’re both adults. The teacher thing? You won’t be that forever. This is more like a half-semester course. What else you got?”
“You’re… beautiful.”
“Well, thanks. I think I’m a bony reed with a skunk stripe, but I appreciate it.” Toby stroked a wild lock of hair from Darius’s forehead. “You think you’re ugly. Just because you have scars.” He traced the white edges of those scars. “Disagree with me all you want, but I think you’re hot. Like ghost pepper, oh my gods, I put too much of that in my chili hot. You earned your scars doing something that should’ve been impossible. You saved Zubayr and a good portion of a city doing it. Those scars? They’re a map of what you’ve accomplished. They’re you and they’re perfect.”
Darius had squeezed his eye shut and clamped his jaw.
“So is that it, then? Or am I missing some great big objection? Or did I read it all wrong and you’re not interested?”
The eye snapped open, glare reprise. “Yes. No.” Darius huffed and raised his head far enough to plant a soft kiss on Toby’s lips where the touch buzzed and tingled. “No. Just… unsure. Of me. Damned… awkward.”
Toby let himself back down to hug Darius tight. “It’s been a long time. Your peopling skills kinda atrophied. But I don’t think that means you forgot how sex works.”
“Ha. Guess not.” Darius’s fingers teased at the waistband of Toby’s jeans, taking experimental tugs at his shirt. “Yes. I… I want you.”
“Thank you, gods of fornication,” Toby breathed out in exaggerated relief as he started to unzip Darius’s jacket. “Not gonna strip anything off you. It’s kinda chilly and neither of us has much over our bones. You’re better than I am on that count.”
“Some.” Wriggling until Toby was sitting on his thighs, Darius had gotten inside Toby’s jacket and shirt before Toby had even started on buttons.
“Whoa! Cold hands! Geeze.”
Darius chuckled but sucked in a quick breath when Toby buried chilled hands in Darius’s armpits. Cold, yeah, but those hands still felt so good on Toby’s skin. Chapped hands that needed some TLC, but gentle hands that stroked in long, firm slides over his ribs and back. Toby scooted closer again to get his hands on Darius’s belt buckle, and Darius lost no time in reclaiming Toby’s lips. While he wasn’t rough, a desperate heat crept into his kisses that Toby completely understood. If it had been a while for him, it must have been years for Darius.
A scar ran from Darius’s right shoulder down his chest to disappear under his waistband. Toby trailed a finger along the line of puckered flesh, heat flushing his face when Darius let out a soft moan. Belt and fly undone, Toby followed the scar to where it ended over his hipbone.
“Toby.”
“Hmm.” Toby gazed in fascination at the dip that pointed toward the meeting of thigh and groin.
“What… are we doing?”
“Really? I mean, I got the impression you were kind of a horndog once. You don’t know what we’re doing?”
Darius let out that lovely deep growl that got right under Toby’s skin. “Specifically. No lube. Too cold. Your… preference.”
“Oh. Got it. Sorry.” Toby kissed under Darius’s earlobe and was rewarded by those hard hands tightening on his ribs. “You feel like a rustic sixty-nine kind of thing? I mean, you can stay on your back and everything. I wouldn’t want to wear you out.”
The growl returned with a vengeance, and Toby found himself suddenly underneath Darius, staring up at the pale spring sky. “Or we can do it this way.”
The aggressive mood didn’t last as Darius offered a crooked smile and a kiss, which got awkward as he also tried to get Toby’s jeans open. With an exasperated huff, Darius broke off the kiss and concentrated on Toby’s recalcitrant zipper. Toby had to bite his lip to prevent smartass remarks about someone being out of practice. Besides, the fumbling was adorable.
A hum of satisfaction finally replaced the disgruntled sounds, and Toby gasped as his erect cock hit the colder air. Is shrinkage a thing without water? Gods, I hope not. Whether it was or not, Darius wasn’t at all put off as he curled over to run his tongue from balls to tip.
“Oooh, that’s perfect.” Toby buried his hands deep in Darius’s tangled hair. “That’s so—holy mother of…!”
Darius looked up without removing his tongue from where it circled the top edge of Toby’s foreskin, his eye crinkled with laugh lines. He rolled back the foreskin and took the head of Toby’s cock in his mouth, sucking hard.
“Shit!” Toby’s hips bucked, and he let Darius’s hair loose to beat both fists against the ground. “You better turn around before you end this way too soon.”
“Ha.” Darius had the nerve to chuckle all the way through turning and carefully maneuvering so he didn’t clock Toby in the head with his knee.
Toby wasted no movements freeing Darius, though he did take a moment to admire his erection. It was a nice fat cock, not a ginormous monster from porn, but big enough he’d have to take his time fucking. The musky, sweaty scent made Toby’s head spin, and he couldn’t help a few licks of Darius’s balls before he closed his mouth around the shaft pointing at his face.
Groans in tandem made a strange counterpoint to the birdsong as Darius got serious and took Toby in to the back of his throat. The vibrations from the moans made Toby squirm, and he knew he didn’t have long at all. Not that they had to come right together, but it would be embarrassing if he couldn’t hold on for thirty seconds.
Slurping and hard breathing replaced most of the talking, though Darius did lift his head long enough to mutter, “Delicious.”
“I swear if you say magically delicious, I’m gonna smack you.”
Darius laughed, his whole body shaking with it, but he returned to sucking Toby’s cock hard. It really wasn’t fair. He did have years of experience on Toby and an incredibly talented tongue. Toby did his best to concentrate. He did. But his own efforts devolved into gasping, writhing, bucking distraction when Darius took him into the tight constriction of his throat.
His sac tightened suddenly, and the strangled wail he let out would’ve been embarrassing if Toby cared. “Holy crap! Dar!”
It was enough warning that Darius could pull back and not choke. He kept his lips wrapped around hard, though, still sucking as Toby shot into the exquisite heat of his mouth. He allowed himself to gasp and flop as Darius pulled spiking aftershocks from him, but as soon as Darius lifted his head, Toby attacked with all he had. Heat flooded through him when Darius had to put his head down on Toby’s thighs, moaning helplessly.
Sometime soon we have to do this naked. Too much was out of easy reach. Toby still slid a hand up to shove it down the back of Darius’s pants and stroke between his cheeks. Awkward? Hell, yes. Totally worth it when Darius took a double handful of Toby’s jeans and muffled a bellow against his thigh. The salty-sweet hit Toby’s tongue half a second later and he swallowed greedily, taking in every drop offered.
Darius shook by the time he’d finished, panting as he swung a leg over, leaned back against the fallen log, and tucked himself back in. With one hand, he motioned toward himself. “C’mere.”
Happy to oblige, Toby scrambled over while putting his own clothes back together. With a contented huff, he collapsed against Darius’s chest. “I think I’m supposed to say something pithy and wonderful here. But my brain just exploded.”
An uninhibited, resonant laugh rose from deep in Darius’s chest. Toby snuggled closer so more of him could feel the rumblings.
“You’re wonderful. That really covers it.”
“Hmm.” Darius kissed the top of his head. “You too. We should…. Zubayr.”
Toby heaved a tragic sigh. “Yeah. Don’t want him to get all worried. Think you’re ready for the hike back up, old griffin?”
“You’ll need to… keep up.”
“That sounded way too much like a challenge. Was it? I’ll run if I have to.”
“Maybe.” Darius helped him up and slung an arm around him. “Rather walk with you.”
“Don’t say too many sweet things to me. You’ll never get rid of me, and you know how annoying I am.”
Darius didn’t have an answer for that, but the smile stayed. Toby figured he couldn’t do better than that. He was going to live. He’d gotten some. And he had someone solid beside him, someone he’d fallen in love with. Not that he would say that yet. Why risk scaring his griffin away? They’d have time now. He’d say it when they were both ready.
They took their time on the way back up the trail. Kind of had to since they both struggled on the steep parts. Rests happened frequently. Still, it only took half an hour to reach the top. Not too shabby.
The sign for the trail was in sight, the edge of the trees marking the parking area just past it, when Darius clutched at his throat and fell to his knees.
“Dar! Gods, what is it?” Toby supported him, desperation clawing up from his stomach. He couldn’t be choking. There was nothing to choke on. What did you do for someone choking on nothing? He lifted his head and screamed, “Zubayr!”
A branch snapped, and then heavy bodies crashed through the underbrush in all directions. That’s not Zubayr. Toby wanted to get up and run, but he couldn’t leave Darius, leaning against him, face turning purple. Strong hands grabbed him, lifting him away.
“No! Darius! He’s dying! Someone do something!”
Toby struggled and kicked, trying to get a good shot at one of the goon’s kneecaps. Quick glimpses showed large men in hunter camouflage, faces he’d never seen before.
“Who the fuck are you people? Let me go!”
“It’s all right, Toby.”
That voice he knew. Oh gods. They caught up with us. “Director Whittaker?”
“Everything’s all right now.” Director Whittaker strolled calmly down the path from the parking lot. “Darius will be fine. One of our Air mages has him in an oxygen-deprived bubble. Once he loses consciousness, he’ll be freed from it. We’ll take care of him, Toby. No need to get so upset.”
Toby stopped struggling, though tears stung his eyes. “You don’t need to do this. I’ve channeled. I’m not a danger anymore. Please, please leave us alone.”
“I’m so sorry, Toby.” Director Whittaker stepped around to stand in front of him, face lined with concern. “We should never have mentioned Valstad, and we should have guessed sooner that you had gone to him. He’s not well, I’m afraid. Hasn’t been since that disaster in Pittsburgh. I don’t know what he told you, but he’s obviously misled you. I can feel your wild magic building up from here. I wish there was more we could do. I truly do.”
A sharp pain shot through Toby’s biceps. He jerked his head around in time to see one of the goons pull an auto injector away. When he turned back, the director had gone fuzzy around the edges. Trying to find where his feet had gone suddenly became far too much effort. He tried, one more time, to reason with them. The only word that made it out was “Darius….”
“You feel responsible for him in some way. I understand.” Director Whittaker nodded. “You’re a good person, Toby. We’ve simply handled this badly, and again, I can only apologize. We’ll take better care of him from now on. I promise.”
Gods, Darius. The last thing his sight latched on to was Darius lying in a heap on the wood-chipped trail, one hand stretched out toward him as if he’d been making one final effort to save them both.