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Hua Cheng stares at the sun through the window of the king’s privy chamber, and tries to work out how many hours it’s been since he had the crown prince of Xianle’s cunt on his tongue.
He can still taste him; still feel him, the racing rabbit-thump of his heart, the delicious squirm of his slender body, the softness of his skin, the way his fingers had clenched like vices around the roots of Hua Cheng’s hair.
Thank the gods, he’d thought, arriving back at the barracks after seeing his beloved safely back to bed, for the private sleeping quarters his rank afforded him. He doesn’t think he’s ever cum so hard in his fucking life as he did the moment the door was locked behind him. It had ached - he’d popped a knot, and it had taken over half an hour for the damn thing to go down while he buried his face in the cloak he’d leant to Xie Lian and gnashed the fabric between his teeth, imagining it was the prince’s tender, unclaimed neck.
“General Hua,” says the king, “What’s your opinion on the Yong’An issue?”
Hua Cheng blinks, turning to face the king in surprise. It’s not often that his thoughts are asked for in these meetings. Generally speaking, it’s the older generals, the ones of noble birth who look down their noses at him and furrow their brows whenever he starts talking making the strategic decisions, regardless of their personal experience on the battlefield. Many of these men and women have not seen combat in years, and those few who have have rarely been in the thick of it; have seldom returned with their faces flecked with blood, the stink of intestines on their boots. To them, Hua Cheng is merely an attack dog. Usually, this dynamic irritates him; makes him even more desperate to show his worth, to prove himself, but lately, he is beginning to feel that the whole thing is a fruitless endeavour. It does not matter what he does, he is starting to realise, what victories he wins for Xianle; to the nobles in this room, he will always be nothing more than a thuggish commoner with no place at the table, no matter the lands reluctantly bestowed upon him by the king.
He shrugs, leaning back in his seat. “Your grace, I believe this is a matter of diplomacy more than one of military strategy. I’m not sure what more I can add to the conversation.”
The king nods slowly and looks away. As much as Hua Cheng is sick to the back teeth of these pointless, circuitous meetings, he almost wishes the king would press him again; ask for more.
The answer, after all, seems obvious. Still - it makes Hua Cheng feel nauseous, and he refuses to be the one to supply it.
He needs to write to He Xuan again, he thinks; see what he has learnt in the west. He is beginning, he realises with a sinking feeling, to run out of options. Every day that slips by is another day closer to his beloved being wed to somebody else.
By the time the meeting ends, he feels more despondent than ever. As he leaves the room, he feels the eyes of the king and his advisors on his back, and it takes a not insignificant amount of self-restraint to resist turning around and demanding outright that they tell him he has no place amongst them, to leave the prince alone, to exit the city and never return. He squeezes his hands into fists, and clenches his jaw, and does not look back.
Outside in the courtyard, the sky is dark and swollen with rain. Somewhere in the distance, there is a low, slow rumble of thunder. It matches Hua Cheng’s mood.
He hasn’t been able to speak to the prince since they’d said goodbye that secret, wonderful evening just a few short nights ago. He has seen him since then - glimpsed him in the distance - and the sight of that bright, pretty face, that long, soft hair, those large, sweet eyes always makes his heart stop in his chest. But on every occasion, Xie Lian had been steered away by his attendants; his stupid lug of a bodyguard, his sour-faced servant, his snooty, sneering guoshi.
Hua Cheng hates each and every one of them passionately.
He pauses by the stable block and watches the grooms milling about.
The previous day, the king had instructed Hua Cheng to allow his men to return home. That had surprised him. Hua Cheng had been certain that he was about to be deployed to the furthest reaches of the kingdom once again. But the king had simply said, “No need, not right now,” and spoken no more on the matter.
Hua Cheng suspects they will be called back soon enough, if the situation with Yong’An escalates in the way they all anticipate that it will. Unless the king arranges -
He doesn’t allow himself to continue that thought any further.
The dismissal of his men does mean that Hua Cheng is also free to return home, if he so chooses. The custodianship of Guǐ Shì - or Ghost City, as the rest of the kingdom disparagingly calls it - had been given to him several years prior, along with its main seat, Jílè Fāng, as a reward for his accomplishments as a leader in the army. It was something of a backhanded gift, Hua Cheng thinks. Guǐ Shì was the most ill-omened place in all of Xianle, and it was believed by many of the more stupid members of the populace that Jílè Fāng was cursed.
Hua Cheng lives in the castle whenever he isn’t out on campaign or at the capital, and he is pretty certain he’s never had any supernatural encounters there. The inhabitants of the city are generally looked down upon by the rest of the country as criminal, or at the very least, dubious in nature, though in Hua Cheng’s opinion, his people are merely trying to get along, just like everybody else. His preference is to turn a blind eye to any nefarious activity, and let the place govern itself, for the most part. The inhabitants of the region seem to appreciate this hands-off approach.
At present, however, he has little desire to return to his cursed castle. He must, he knows, remain in the capital; if he leaves now, it is unlikely he will ever have the chance to lay a hand upon his beloved ever again.
He is just thinking that he ought to return to his quarters in the barracks and start working on that letter to He Xuan when suddenly a tremendous racket erupts from somewhere behind him. He turns around, and to his surprise, sees the crown prince’s loud and ill-mannered cousin barrelling across the courtyard, sword in hand, pursued by one of the household guards, who is red-faced and out of breath.
“My lord!” the guard shouts, “Please -”
“Did I not tell you to leave me alone?” Qi Rong snarls. He turns on his heel at some speed, and lunges towards the guard, blade exposed.
It is not a particularly skillful movement - clearly, the young lord is too wound-up to consider form or technique - but the household guard is of advancing years, tired, and somewhat out of shape. And so when the man collapses to the ground, clutching the bleeding slash in his thigh, Hua Cheng is hardly surprised.
Around the courtyard and along the ramparts, stableboys and soldiers alike have paused in their duties to watch, open-mouthed, as Qi Rong swears at the guard and demands once again that he be left alone, before turning away, jamming his blade back into its scabbard. Nobody else seems particularly keen to intervene - Qi Rong is a member of the royal household, after all, as well as being rather ill-tempered and volatile - but Hua Cheng cannot imagine the king or queen will be particularly willing to overlook their nephew’s latest antics now that one of their guards has been publicly maimed, and so he makes the decision to seize the beta, and accept whatever the consequences are.
“Hua Cheng!” Qi Rong spits as the general’s hand closes around his upper arm. “You dog! Release me! I’m ordering you!”
Hua Cheng ignores him, and forcibly turns the young lord back towards the palace.
“Get up,” he says to the household guard, who blinks up at him somewhat pathetically.
“General -”
“General Hua!”
Hua Cheng looks up. Xie Lian is emerging at speed from the palace in pursuit of his cousin, eyes wide, with his idiotic bodyguard close by his side.
In this brief moment of distraction his grip on Qi Rong must loosen, just a fraction, because before he can react, the beta is slipping from his grasp, and, in the resultant struggle, manages to smash the sharp point of one elbow directly into the centre of Hua Cheng’s face.
The pain is hot and sharp and it explodes outwards from his nose, briefly blinding him. He stumbles backwards, hands clawing in the air in an effort to keep hold of Qi Rong, but the young lord is quick, and he has been knocked off-balance, and when his vision clears, the first thing he sees is Qi Rong’s green robes rippling as he vanishes, at considerable speed, through the palace gates.
“General Hua!” says a voice, somewhere close by. “General Hua, are you hurt?”
He blinks, and looks around, and there at his side is Xie Lian, eyes wide with worry.
“I’m fine, your highness,” Hua Cheng says, thickly. He tastes iron in his mouth.
“You’re bleeding!” Xie Lian exclaims. His gentle, slender hands close around Hua Cheng’s arm. “Feng Xin - what are you doing, go after my cousin!”
“But -” Hua Cheng hears Feng Xin say.
“Now!” The prince says, shrilly.
Hua Cheng blinks, and puts a hand up to his face. It’s sore, to be sure, but there are no gushing rivers of blood.
He says, “I can go, your highness,” but Xie Lian shakes his head.
“You will do no such thing,” he says, and tightens his grip on Hua Cheng, as though frightened he might follow Qi Rong’s lead and slip away.
Reluctantly, Feng Xin calls a few men after him, and with one last suspicious look over his shoulder at Hua Cheng, heads away towards the city gates.
“Are you alright?” Xie Lian says, and, looking away from Feng Xin and the other soldiers’ retreating backs, Hua Cheng sees that the prince is talking to the household guard who had been slashed at by his cousin.
“Y-yes, your highness, I - thank you, your highness, I -”
“You’d better go and get that patched up,” Xie Lian says, kindly, and then - at last - he’s peering up at Hua Cheng, forehead furrowed with worry. “You too, General Hua.”
Hua Cheng pats the back of the prince’s hand - a little too intimate and familiar for such a public location, perhaps, but he cannot bear to see that tortured look on his beloved’s pretty face - and says, “This is nothing, your highness. Please don’t worry. It’s my own fault; I ought to have held onto him -”
“No!” Xie Lian says, quickly. “It’s my fault, I called out and distracted you - please, let me - I don’t know where Mu Qing is, he’s much better at this sort of thing than me, but perhaps my guoshi could -”
Hua Cheng has little desire to have Mu Qing’s prissy scowl directed at him, and even less to be subjected to the haughty glare of Mei Nianqing, and so he says, “I can patch this up myself, your highness, in the barracks. It’s really no trouble at all.”
“Oh.” The prince’s hold on his arm slackens a little, and his face falls. “O-oh. I’m sorry, General Hua, I -”
Don’t call me that, Hua Cheng wants to say. Not you. It’s San Lang, for you. You’re different. But he has no idea who is listening in on their conversation, out here in the open with the guards and grooms still dispersing around them. And so instead he says, “But - perhaps you could accompany me to the barracks? I can clean it up there. And then I could escort you to your rooms. Just until your guard returns?” He touches the prince’s hand again, just quickly.
Xie Lian blinks, and then his fingers curl a little more tightly around Hua Cheng’s arm. And he says, “Oh! Y-yes, of course, General Hua. Thank you.”
Thunder rumbles overhead as they make their way towards Hua Cheng’s private quarters, Xie Lian still holding tightly onto his bicep. He smells heavenly, as always. Hua Cheng hopes very much that nobody will go scurrying off to the prince’s parents to rat them out for daring to walk so closely together. If they do, he supposes, he will have to let the king know that it is all Qi Rong’s doing - that if he hadn’t landed such a tremendous blow to Hua Cheng’s face, the sweet prince wouldn’t need to be assisting him like this.
Rain begins to fall steadily around them as they arrive at the barracks.
“Which one?” Xie Lian asks, adjusting his grip on Hua Cheng’s upper arm.
Hua Cheng indicates the officer’s quarters at the end of the first building.
They have almost made it to the door when Yin Yu suddenly emerges out of nowhere. He looks very surprised to see the pair of them together.
“Your highness,” he says, staring at Xie Lian. Then he looks at Hua Cheng. “Sir?”
“He’s hurt!” Xie Lian says, quickly. “My cousin hit him while General Hua was preventing him from escaping the palace…I sent my guard to apprehend him, so - General Hua said he would take me back to my rooms after -” He falls silent. Hua Cheng glances down at him. His face is a little flushed.
Yin Yu looks up at Hua Cheng, then back towards the prince. “I see,” he says. “Your highness, would you like me to escort -”
“That won’t be necessary,” Hua Cheng says, quickly. “This will only take a moment. His highness will be safe with me.” He is suddenly struck by inspiration. “Go into the city. See if you can help his highness’ guard track down his cousin. Ensure no harm comes to him.”
Yin Yu nods slowly. “If you’re sure,” he says. He stares curiously between Hua Cheng and the prince.
“I am.”
“Very well, sir,” Yin Yu says. He hesitates a moment longer. Xie Lian’s grip on Hua Cheng’s bicep tightens. Then, at last, his lieutenant leaves.
Hua Cheng feels the prince exhale and relax at his side.
He unlocks the door to his quarters, and makes his way inside, gently disentangling Xie Lian from his arm as he does so.
“You’d better keep the door open, your highness,” Hua Cheng says. He is unable to resist winking as he says it. “Now - excuse me. This won’t take long.”
He heads into the bathroom, and closes the door behind him, breathing in deeply. The scent of the beautiful unmated omega pressed so close against him is driving him mad, as it always does. But this isn’t like the other night, when it was dark, and the palace and streets were quiet, and Xie Lian was draped in his cloak, anonymous. This is different. It’s daytime, and there are people about, people who have already seen him with the prince, seen the prince clinging to his arm, seen them heading back to the officers' private quarters together, unaccompanied. This is dangerous. He is playing with fire, he knows.
He swallows, and stares at himself in the looking-glass. It’s not a pretty sight. His nose is red and slightly swollen, and there is blood smeared beneath it, across his upper lip, and spotting the collar of his robes. He sighs, and strips off the outer robes, relieved to find that the inner robes seem to have escaped unblemished, before leaning over the bowl of water set out by one of the junior officers for him to wash with that morning, and splashing some of it over his face. It hurts, and he must hiss at the sensation, because immediately from behind the door, he hears Xie Lian call out, “General Hua? Are you alright?”
The prince is in his quarters, he realises, alone and unprotected, with nothing but a thin interior wall and a wooden door separating them. His grip tightens on the edge of the porcelain bowl. He wonders if the omega can smell him in the room, on the bedsheets and the furniture, can tell that he has cum in there, has knotted in there, thinking of Xie Lian and Xie Lian alone.
Xie Lian is all alone right now.
It would be so easy…
He grits his teeth and forces himself to be sensible. Not now, he tells himself. Not yet. Not yet. But soon.
He stands up straight.
“I’m fine, your highness,” he calls, and frowns at himself in the mirror. Gingerly, he touches his nose. It’s sore, but he can’t feel any obvious breaks in the cartilage.
When he comes back out, the prince is standing in the centre of the room, hands clasped, looking anxious.
“Your highness -”
“Let me see it!” Xie Lian demands, and Hua Cheng finds himself unable to protest. He stands still before his prince, watching as Xie Lian’s eyes narrow as he peers up at him.
“It’s not too bad -”
“You’re still bleeding,” Xie Lian says, crestfallen. He presses his lips together tightly, as though thinking. “Sit down.”
There’s nowhere to sit down in the small, spartan room but the bed. With a sense of doom in the pit of his stomach, Hua Cheng obeys.
Xie Lian disappears into the little bathroom, and comes out holding the bowl of water, which he places on the floor at Hua Cheng’s feet. Then he sits down at his side, and abruptly rips a large section of silk from the sleeve of his own robe.
“Your highness -”
“San Lang!” Xie Lian says teasingly, smiling a little. Then he blushes, and looks away as he bends to dip the fabric into the bowl of water. When he sits back upright, his cheeks are still pink. He says, “I’m sorry. If that was too familiar.” He rests his free hand on Hua Cheng’s shoulder, light as a flower petal tossed upon the wind, and reaches up to dab carefully at the crust of blood that’s forming beneath Hua Cheng’s nostrils.
“Ow,” Hua Cheng says. It actually doesn’t hurt that much, but it’s worth seeming like a sensitive weakling for the way Xie Lian shuffles a little closer, and makes a soft, sympathetic noise, full, pretty lips parting slightly as he does so.
Hua Cheng keeps quiet after that, just watching the prince as he carefully cleans away the mess on his face.
“Sorry,” Xie Lian says, after a moment.
“You don't have to do this,” Hua Cheng tells him.
Xie Lian’s gaze flickers up; meets his own. The longing Hua Cheng feels congealing within his stomach is agonising.
“I want to,” the prince says, softly. Their faces are so close. It would take nothing, nothing at all to duck his head, to lean in, to kiss that beautiful mouth.
Hua Cheng swallows the impulse down. He says, “Your highness, I must apologise. I wanted to speak to you, these last few days. I didn’t want you to feel…taken advantage of. Discarded. After…what happened the other night.” It’s something he’s been increasingly desperate to say as each day without speaking to the prince has slipped by. The idea that Xie Lian - his darling, his beloved - might feel used is horrifying to him.
“Oh!” Xie Lian smiles sheepishly as he continues dabbing at Hua Cheng’s nose. “I know you wouldn't do that. You’re a good man, San Lang.”
Hua Cheng is not, by any stretch of the imagination, a good man, but he resists the urge to argue this point.
The omega bites his lower lip. “I’m worried about Mu Qing and Feng Xin, though,” he confesses. “I’m worried they might suspect something. They’re been doing everything they can to keep us apart. Every time I’ve seen you these past few days, they’ve managed to drag me away before I could speak to you. But I…I wanted to see you too.” His hold on Hua Cheng’s shoulder briefly tightens.
Hua Cheng blinks at him stupidly. “You did?” he says.
The prince blushes. “Of course,” he says. “More than anything.”
His scent is overwhelming. Mouthwateringly sweet. Hua Cheng hopes that it clings to his bedsheets for the rest of his life.
Xie Lian drops the piece of silk he’s been using to clean Hua Cheng’s face down to the floor, and leans in to examine his nose once more. “It’s stopped bleeding,” he says. He shifts his weight on the bed. The movement lights a fire beneath Hua Cheng’s thighs; sets his nerves jangling with the knowledge of just how close they are to one another.
Xie Lian inspects his face a moment longer, then the corners of his mouth tip up a little, and before Hua Cheng has time to react, the prince has leaned in and, butterfly-light, pressed a soft, sweet kiss to the tip of his nose. “There,” he says, sitting back a little. His cheeks are still flushed, but his eyes are bright and he’s smiling. “Good as new.”
Hua Cheng stares at him, mouth dry. “Does that help?” he asks.
The omega grins, a little bashful, and tucks his hair back behind one ear. “I think so,” he says. “My mother always used to say it did. You wouldn’t doubt the word of the queen, would you?”
“Of course not,” Hua Cheng says. They stare at one another for a long moment. Then he says, “But…”
Xie Lian sits forwards a little. “But?”
“Well. Your cousin’s elbow is quite the efficient weapon.”
“Oh?”
“Hmm. He got me rather good here as well.” He raises a hand, and points to his cheek. It’s sort of true. Qi Rong’s elbow had only connected with his nose, but the resulting pain has radiated outwards, and now the entire centre of his face is throbbing from the impact.
He watches the prince’s gaze flicker across from his nose to his cheek; watches his lips move silently. The pair of them are close enough for Hua Cheng to see the tremble in Xie Lian’s body as he leans in, trails a fingertip over his skin…then the omega lowers his eyelashes and presses another soft, gentle kiss to the side of Hua Cheng’s face.
Hua Cheng can hear the blood pounding in his own ears. Xie Lian pulls back - but only a little. He whispers, “Anywhere else?”
They’re so close now, Hua Cheng can feel the prince’s breath on his skin. He swallows, and raises a hand again. Points to his lips. “Here,” he says.
Something like relief passes over Xie Lian’s face - and then he leans back in again, and presses their lips together, resting one hand on Hua Cheng’s chest, the other on his shoulder. His touch is feather light and hesitant.
Quickly, before the moment can crumble to dust before him, Hua Cheng reaches out and slides one hand up behind the prince’s head; settles the other on his slender waist. Xie Lian makes a quiet noise into his mouth, and it’s beyond gratifying, how quickly he softens at Hua Cheng’s touch, how beautifully and obediently he responds, how he yields to such gentle pressure, falling deeper and deeper into Hua Cheng’s embrace with each and every passing second.
Something hot and possessive and dangerous roars like a lion within Hua Cheng’s chest. If this were the old days, when humans were little more than beasts - before laws, before borders, before treaties and betrothals and tradition, when alphas and betas and omegas answered to nothing but their own instincts and desires - Hua Cheng might have already pushed the omega down, pulled his legs apart, sunk his teeth into his neck, mounted and fucked him without care for who knew until both were satiated. He digs his fingers into Xie Lian’s robes, and pulls him even closer, until the prince is rising up on his knees then sinking back down again to straddle his lap, and their chests are pressed together, and neither of them is able to draw breath.
“San Lang,” Xie Lian murmurs. Hua Cheng wonders if he even realises he's said it. He wonders if sometimes the prince breathes his name at night, unconsciously, lost in the depths of sleep, and that feeling of wild, possessive hunger threatens to envelop him once again.
Like this, with Xie Lian perched upon his lap, their size difference becomes even starker. Hua Cheng finds he is able to wrap his hands almost completely around the prince’s waist. He imagines wrapping his hands around other areas of Xie Lian's body too - his slender, strong thighs, his delicate wrists, his beautiful white neck - and the blood in his veins heats.
Still - the threat of discovery is not far from his mind. It is not the old days, and as badly as he wants to sink inside the prince and take what both of their bodies are clearly already declaring is his, he must be patient. He cannot throw this all away for a mere moment’s pleasure. Not when there is even the slimmest chance of something so much better just a little further down the road. And it is not like last time, either, when they were enshrouded beneath the cover of darkness and Xie Lian was wearing his cloak, when Hua Cheng had him hidden against the wall beneath his own body in that dark and shadowy narrow little alleyway. Now, they are within the walls of the palace - in the barracks, with guards and stableboys passing by outside, and - somewhere deeper within in the city - Xie Lian’s own cousin running riot.
And so, with a colossal effort, he pulls away from the sweet, tentative kisses Xie Lian is pecking against his lips, and reaches out to cup his chin.
The prince's eyes are wide; his mouth temptingly red as he stares up at Hua Cheng, lips parted and cheeks pinked. “San Lang?” he says.
“We could get caught,” Hua Cheng says quickly. He is not afraid of being caught, per se - he thinks he could withstand any torture, any form of punishment for the crime of having loved the beautiful omega in his lap - but he will not allow kind, gentle Xie Lian to suffer the same fate. He has a plan - a strategy he has been working on tirelessly ever since he first laid eyes on his beloved - and he will not risk everything he has worked towards for a few moments of pleasure, not when so much more is at stake. “Someone could hear us. See us, even.”
“I can be quiet,” Xie Lian says, desperately. Desperation looks good on him, that wicked, greedy voice in the back of Hua Cheng's brain whispers, and he cannot help but think of other situations in which he could provoke his darling into desperation, begging, pleading. “I promise. A-and I closed the door -”
Hua Cheng startles, and looks across the room towards the door. He can’t believe he’d forgotten. How could he have been so careless?
“I’m sorry,” Xie Lian whispers into his throat, and Hua Cheng’s cock twitches at the sensation. “I - I just wanted to see you.” He glances up, his soft cheek brushing against Hua Cheng’s own.
It's tempting to give in to those big, pleading eyes, to the weight of the prince over his hips, to the way his soft fingers curl and tighten in Hua Cheng's robes. Think of the end goal, Hua Cheng reminds himself.
“Just for a moment,” Xie Lian murmurs. He shifts a little in Hua Cheng’s lap and it takes every ounce of the alpha’s strength not to groan at the feeling. “I just - please let me have you. Just for a moment.” His lips catch on the sharp hinge of Hua Cheng’s jaw as he speaks.
Hua Cheng’s remaining threadbear restraint crumbles. He seizes the prince by his hair, and tugs until their mouths are pressed together once more. Xie Lian’s beautiful hands claw at his shoulders as though terrified that at any second he could be torn away. He feels so small in Hua Cheng’s arms, as though he weighs almost nothing, from his tiny waist to his slender, elegant neck and willowy arms and legs. Even his features are delicate; his small, pink mouth, and his upturned nose, and his spun-silk eyelashes. And yet when Hua Cheng holds him, digging his fingers alternately into his arched back and thick cascade of rich, fragrant hair, he feels a weight there, a solidity that speaks to years of martial arts training, of a childhood spent climbing trees and riding horses and running along the walls and roofs of the palace, a furious determination and indomitable spirit, and Hua Cheng loves him for it.
He tightens his grip even more, and Xie Lian whines in response, his lips trembling as he presses closer and closer still, as though he is trying to meld their bodies into one, to melt together or to swallow one another whole. His kisses are inelegant and clumsy; too wet, too much tongue, too many teeth, too eager, Hua Cheng thinks, and the idea just makes him harder: the notion that the prince has never kissed anybody before, that Hua Cheng is his first, that Hua Cheng can be the one to guide him, to teach him, to educate him in the pleasures of the flesh. If he has his way, Xie Lian will never kiss anyone else, he thinks; will never be kissed, or pleasured, filled and fucked and bred by anybody else either.
Carefully, he moves the hand that is currently tangled in the omega’s hair forwards, sliding it across his cheek until he is able to place his thumb beneath Xie Lian’s eye and curl the tips of his fingers around his ear and the corner of his jaw. He pushes gently, slowly detaching his beloved, smiling and stroking his cheek with the pad of his thumb when the prince lets out a soft sob, as though in protest, when they are separated from one another.
“Please,” Xie Lian says, breathlessly.
The prince is always beautiful, but like this, eager and needy and wanting, he is perfect, with his cheeks flushed red, his eyebrows drawn up together, his fingers clutching desperately at Hua Cheng’s own robes. His lips are swollen, parted around a quiet moan of protest, slick and shiny with spit.
Hua Cheng cannot help but touch that fat lower lip with his thumb, revelling in the heat coming off it. Xie Lian’s eyelids flutter closed and his mouth puckers as he presses a trembling, wet kiss against Hua Cheng’s skin.
Fuck, Hua Cheng thinks. The image of the beautiful omega on his knees for him, nestled between his spread legs, face damp with drool and cum as he presses kisses to Hua Cheng’s blown knot erupts into his mind in full, brilliant colour.
“Good boy,” Hua Cheng murmurs, thoughtlessly. “Good. There’s my sweet boy.”
Xie Lian hums, and abandons pecking at Hua Cheng’s thumb for pressing his hot, damp mouth against the alpha’s top lip.
It’s so warm in the dark little room. Hua Cheng vividly imagines wrapping both arms around the prince, rolling him onto his back, ripping his robes apart, sucking marks across his nipples, his stomach, his thighs. His hands slide down Xie Lian’s undulating body, and when he seizes him by the hips and pulls him down, hard, deeper into his lap so that their stomachs are pressed so firmly together there is not a sliver of space between them, the omega lets out a high-pitched whine almost loud enough for Hua Cheng to cease all movement and reconsider what they’re doing.
Almost.
“Eager,” he whispers into the flushed shell of Xie Lian’s ear.
“San Lang -”
“Shh. You need to be quiet, darling, remember? Can you do that?”
Xie Lian nods quickly, eyes wide, face flushed. “Yes,” he says, quietly.“Yes…San Lang, I’m sorry, I -”
Slowly, Hua Cheng brushes the pad of his thumb across the omega’s swollen lips once more. He says, “Do you need my thumb in your mouth again?”
Xie Lian must like this idea, because he shudders in Hua Cheng’s arms, hips jolting sharply. “Ah! Don’t - don’t tease -”
“Shhh,” Hua Cheng murmurs. He strokes the prince’s lip once more, soothingly.
“I’m sorry,” Xie Lian whispers. “It -” He seems to hesitate.
“It what?”
The prince blushes right to the roots of his hair. He whispers, “It just…it feels so good.” He closes his eyes and presses his face into the crook of Hua Cheng’s neck, hiding from his gaze.
Hua Cheng could punch the air in delight. “I know sweetling, I know,” he says, instead. Slowly, cautiously, he begins to move his legs, just a little, just enough to provide the tiniest amount of stimulation between the prince’s trembling thighs. “You needed this, didn’t you?”
Xie Lian’s arms tighten across his shoulders and around his neck. He says, softly, “I - I couldn't stop thinking about…about -” He inhales suddenly, sharply, right next to Hua Cheng’s ear, and his hips push back an inch or so into Hua Cheng’s hands.
“I know, darling,” Hua Cheng tells him, “I know.” He pauses a moment. “Me too.”
“Really?” The prince’s damp lips catch against the exposed skin of his neck. Hua Cheng tightens his grip on Xie Lian’s hips.
“Mmhmm.” He shifts his legs again between the omega’s thighs, and risks pushing his own hips up, just a little. “Is that good?”
Xie Lian nods frantically, his face still hidden against the side of Hua Cheng’s neck.
“Tell me, sweet,” Hua Cheng says. He slides his left hand up Xie Lian’s back to tangle in his hair and tug, just slightly. “Look at me.”
Xie Lian obeys, swaying back under the pressure of Hua Cheng’s hand. He looks gorgeous, with his cheeks flushed and eyes unfocused; even more so than usual. His fingers curl tightly into the front of Hua Cheng’s robes.
“Tell me,” Hua Cheng says again.
“It’s - it’s good,” Xie Lian says, tremulously. “I - please -”
“Did you touch yourself?” Hua Cheng demands. He has to know. Needs to. Is desperate to discover if the omega has been reduced to a naked, flayed nerve of pure animalistic desire, just as he has. “Did you touch yourself, sweet?”
The blush on Xie Lian’s face darkens. “I - I -”
Hua Cheng presses his lips to the warm shell of the prince’s ear. He says, “I did.”
Xie Lian trembles in his lap. “San Lang,” he whines.
“Tell me, darling,” Hua Cheng says.
The prince’s fingertips dig into his shoulders. He whispers, “I couldn't. I - I’m never alone, I -”
“You’re alone now. It’s just me and you.”
“I - I can’t,” Xie Lian breathes. Their bodies are so close together, Hua Cheng can feel the omega’s heart pounding against his own. “I - I don’t know - San Lang -”
Hua Cheng slides both hands back down to the rest on the prince’s hips; squeezes the soft flesh there. “You can,” he murmurs, “Just like this, darling, just like this -”
“I can’t -”
“You can,” Hua Cheng says, into the omega’s temple. “Use my thigh, sweetheart.”
He feels Xie Lian’s hips jerk forwards, perhaps involuntarily, and his cock throbs where it is trapped beneath his robes and trousers. The room is so hot, and the prince smells so sweet.
Xie Lian sobs into his neck. The feeling of his soft, wet mouth, and the round tip of his nose against Hua Cheng’s heated skin lights a fire down his spine; makes his own mouth water and gums ache with the need to bite.
The prince whispers, “It’s too - ah! I need -”
Hua Cheng buries his nose in Xie Lian’s soft hair. “Need me to help you, darling?” he murmurs.
Xie Lian nods rapidly, his lean arms tightening around Hua Cheng’s neck. “Yes,” he says, “Yes, San Lang, pease - please -”
Hua Cheng shifts a little on the mattress, transferring the prince’s weight to the top of his left leg and tucking one of Xie Lian’s knees up between his own thighs. The omega is warm between his legs - more than warm, in truth - hot - and wet too. The clothing between them prevents him from feeling it, the slip and slide of desire pouring forth from the prince’s body, but the air in the room is hot and thick, humid with their shared arousal, and the scent of it is heavy and cloying in his mouth. Cautiously, Hua Cheng slides one palm down the curve of Xie Lian’s backside, letting the tips of his fingers just barely touch that place where his flesh grows hotter and softer, and then, as the prince grinds his hips forwards once more, he slips his hand beneath Xie Lian’s fine white and gold robes, and up the back of his silk-clad thigh.
The trousers he wears are soaked, plastered to each and every slick fold of his cunt.
Xie Lian trembles at the touch.
“So wet,” Hua Cheng says. He bends his head so he can press his mouth to the omega’s neck. “You needed this, didn’t you?”
Xie Lian nods, hips jerking clumsily over the top of Hua Cheng’s thigh. “Y-yes,” he whimpers.
Hua Cheng’s fingers, hidden beneath the prince’s robes, move - just slightly.
“A-ah!”
“Greedy boy,” Hua Cheng murmurs as Xie Lian pushes down even more firmly against him.
“I’m not,” Xie Lian whines. “I’m not!” His protests hold little water; Hua Cheng has no doubt that by now there are damp streaks on his own trousers where the prince has desperately rubbed his hot, hungry cunt.
Taking pity on his beloved, Hua Cheng slides his fingers lower, until his hand engulfs the entirety of Xie Lian’s vulva. He just about has the presence of mind to reflect that, despite his frustrations, it is undoubtedly a good thing that the prince remains clothed; he is not certain that he would be able to resist the urge to fuck his cock up into the warm, wet clutch of his darling’s body, were one, or both of them in an even lesser state of undress. In truth he is not sure that Xie Lian would stop him either.
Besides, there is something delightfully filthy about the slide of silk between them; about the thin layers of material that, now his outer robe is removed and both of Xie Lian’s have been pushed aside, are the only things separating their bodies. The soft, expensive fabric that sticks to the omega’s cunt, now sodden with desire, is slick and soaked beneath his hands. Somehow, the presence of the silk between their bodies, completely saturated with wetness, is more arousing than when the prince’s sweet, damp cunt had been completely bared to him the other night.
This, Hua Cheng thinks, head spinning, heat prickling down his back, feels filthy and debauched in an entirely new way. He feels rabid, almost, made violent by the sheer scope of his desire, by the dark room and the walls closing in around them, by the threat of discovery lurking just outside.
But he must not lose his mind. He curls his fingers in Xie Lian’s hair, massages the prince’s hot, swollen clit with the flat of his other hand.
“There, sweet,” he murmurs, and at the sound of his voice, Xie Lian presses back into the pressure between his legs even more, “Is that better?”
Xie Lian raises his head from Hua Cheng’s shoulder. His cheeks are flushed; eyes wide and unfocused. His lower lip is swollen from being caught between his teeth. Hua Cheng has never seen anything so devastatingly beautiful.
“Mmm,” Xie Lian says.
Their eyes meet. Hua Cheng feels, oddly, just for a moment, like he is going to cry. Then the prince leans in close, and presses their lips together.
The pressure in Hua Cheng’s head lessens a little, and the wild, almost painful heat stabbing outwards from beneath his skin begins to abate somewhat.
They settle into a rhythm together. Xie Lian rocks against Hua Cheng’s upper thigh, breathing soft little gasps into the hot, narrow space between their mouths, his hands trembling on Hua Cheng’s shoulders. Hua Cheng smoothes the pads of his fingers, tucked into the warm, damp silk between the prince’s legs back, just faintly tracing over folds of skin and fabric, not enough to get him off, but just enough to make him shiver.
Xie Lian tucks his face into Hua Cheng’s neck, clumsily humping his hips back and forth in an effort to pleasure his clit. The soft, whimpering sounds he makes set Hua Cheng’s head spinning; make his cock throb where it is caged in beneath the omega’s body. He closes his eyes; inhales the sugar-sweet scent of his beloved deeply. He circles the tips of his fingers where they are trapped between the prince’s thighs. They are wet and slick now. If he pushed forwards, even just a little, he could slide them right into Xie Lian’s needy, willing body, silk and all. The thought makes him groan.
“San Lang,” Xie Lian whispers into his jawbone.
Hua Cheng’s hips jerk upwards, just at the sound of the prince’s voice. He is hot, and hard, and desperate.
“Yes, sweet?” he says, breathlessly.
Xie Lian pushes his cunt against his thigh. Softly, he says, “I can…I can - feel you.” His thigh twitches, pressing up against Hua Cheng’s hidden, aching cock.
The action sends what feels like a bolt of lightning through his stomach and thighs and spine. He grits his teeth, and tries to focus on capturing the prince’s lips again.
Xie Lian nestles into him, his whole body softening as he lets Hua Cheng take control of their embrace, plunder his mouth, nip at his reddened lips. They kiss again, bodies pressed together, for a long moment.
Then Xie Lian whines softly into his mouth, and pulls back a little.
“Can I,” he says, before catching his own lower lip between his teeth.
Hua Cheng blinks, trying to focus, to escape the hot mist that is beginning to envelop him. He looks at the prince.
Xie Lian is staring down between them, at the place where his own thighs are parted over Hua Cheng’s lap. One of his hands is sliding slowly, lightly, down Hua Cheng’s front; over his chest, then lower, to his stomach, then his hips. He is trembling, Hua Cheng realises, but when he looks at his face, the omega’s eyes are bright with interest.
He should say no, Hua Cheng knows. He should take the prince’s hand in his own; tell him that really, they’ve gone too far. That they went too far the other night, when they went out into the city together, and Hua Cheng licked and kissed and rubbed Xie Lian's pussy until he came. He says nothing.
Xie Lian’s hand comes to rest lightly atop the strained bulge at the front of Hua Cheng’s trousers. When he teases the top of it with soft, curious fingers, Hua Cheng almost cums on the spot. Almost cums again when the prince looks back up at him, eyes wide, and whispers, “It’s, um…it’s really big.”
Hua Cheng can’t help it. He kisses Xie Lian once more, the motion sloppy and uncoordinated. The omega doesn’t seem to mind. He hums into Hua Cheng’s mouth; doesn’t fight when Hua Cheng tightens the hand that isn’t hidden beneath Xie Lian’s robes in his scalp. The whole time, his fingers continue to trace the shape of Hua Cheng’s cock where it is pressed between their hips.
“Is that alright?” he whispers.
Hua Cheng’s mouth is watering.
“Mmhmm,” he just about manages to say.
Xie Lian makes a pleased little sound and Hua Cheng almost cums from that alone. He feels like he’s about to burst out of his own skin; hot and restless and itchy in a way he never feels outside of rut. He grits his teeth, tensing the muscles in his legs and core in an effort to remain in control, and takes a tighter grip on the prince’s waist. Xie Lian hums into his neck in pleasure.
In the small, dark room, the smell of the omega’s arousal intensifies.
Hua Cheng increases the pressure of his hand between Xie Lian’s thighs. By now he has soaked completely through the fabric of his trousers; no doubt, Hua Cheng thinks, there will be wet marks across his own clothes when they are done. The hunger in his gut swells. He speeds up the motion of his hand, now rubbing fast and careless across the silk plastered to the prince’s lips and clitoris. Xie Lian makes a desperate, whiny sound and wriggles against him, shifting his weight from resting atop Hua Cheng’s lap to his own knees, straining as though trying to escape. He abandons his play with the hidden bulge of the alpha’s cock and presses his palms against Hua Cheng’s shoulders, his fingers trembling, nails digging in through the fabric.
“S-San Lang,” he moans. It’s music to Hua Cheng’s ears. “Ah! I - I -”
Hua Cheng’s gums itch. The prince’s already mussed robes shift with his squirming. The base of his neck, where his mating gland sits, is open and vulnerable right before the general’s mouth.
So close, he thinks.
But - no. No. He can’t. He mustn’t.
He focuses on the way the omega is struggling in his grasp; moves his hand faster between his legs. The prince is so soaked now he can hear it, can hear the slick damp sounds of need between his thighs.
“So wet,” he breathes, and Xie Lian whines, bucking his cunt back towards Hua Cheng’s cruel, insistent fingers. “So wet, hmm?”
Xie Lian wails into his shoulder.
“Just for me,” Hua Cheng says. He feels drunk, drunk on this beautiful, beguiling omega in his arms. “Were waiting for it, weren’t you? For someone to come and take care of this desperate little cunt.”
“Oh!”
There’s a knock at the door. Hua Cheng’s blood runs cold.
The prince freezes in his lap.
“General Hua?”
Neither of them move. Xie Lian is shaking in his arms. Hua Cheng doesn’t look at him. Doesn’t shift an inch. He can hear his own blood hammering in his head. Xie Lian is terrified. His scent, rank with fear, floods Hua Cheng’s nose. He prays that whoever it is outside can’t smell it through the door.
“General?” says the voice again.
Hua Cheng vaguely recognises it. It’s one of his men, he thinks, though he is in no state to identify exactly which. With the hand not currently sandwiched between his beloved’s thighs, he begins to gently caress the prince’s back in a vain effort to comfort him.
“Maybe he left already,” says a second voice, a little further away. “He was going to escort the prince back to his rooms.”
The first voice says something else. Hua Cheng’s heart is pounding so loudly he cannot hear it.
“We should probably wait for Yin Yu,” says the second.
Hua Cheng and Xie Lian remain completely still. A moment passes, then the sound of footsteps recedes away from the door, and quiet falls once again, only the distant sounds of servants and soldiers in the courtyard audible.
Slowly, Hua Cheng breathes out. He drops his hand from where he was stroking along the prince’s spine down to his waist, and sits back a little.
Xie Lian stares up at him, cheeks flushed, eyes as wide as plates.
“Your highness,” Hua Cheng whispers.
Then, like a flurry of snow in the wind, the prince falls upon him, wrapping both arms around his neck, bucking his hips back against Hua Cheng’s hand.
“Please,” Xie Lian gasps, “Please, San Lang, I need to - please, oh -”
“Your highness,” Hua Cheng says again. The rank scent of fear is completely extinguished, and all that remains is lust, thick and sickly-sweet and heavy.
Xie Lian buries his face in Hua Cheng’s shoulder. “Please!” he whispers. “Please, I need it, I -”
Hua Cheng’s entire body throbs with need. His head is spinning. His gums ache with the need to bite.
The hot mist descends once again, and this time, Hua Cheng cannot hold back. He seizes the prince in his arms and rolls him over, pressing him back against the mattress and caging him in with his arms.
Xie Lian squeals in shock at the sudden movement, but still there is no trace of fear in his scent. He reaches up, burying his hands in Hua Cheng’s hair.
“Kiss me,” he whispers, and Hua Cheng’s heart thumps painfully in his chest. “Kiss me, kiss me, please, please -”
Hua Cheng finds himself unable to resist. With his left hand, he grabs the prince’s slender wrists, pinning them above his head, and with his right, he reaches down between his legs to rub frantically, viciously over the wet spot at the front of the omega’s silken pants, finally visible now Xie Lian is spread out beneath him, his robes all askew and legs parted.
Xie Lian sobs, squirming against the onslaught. The silk is sopping wet and slick between them, and the prince keeps bucking up against him, tightening his thighs around Hua Cheng’s hand. His own cock - painfully wet and hard beneath his own clothing - throbs hot and heavy and insistent where it is pressed up against the top of the omega’s leg. He’s going to knot, he thinks, any second now, and for a moment he can think of nothing else but tearing the fabric separating him from his beloved in two, forcing his sweet, shaking thighs apart and just pushing in -
He moans out loud, and Xie Lian turns his head to look at him, eyes wide and teary.
Then his pretty mouth drops open, and he makes a thin, wavering little noise, pleading and begging, and Hua Cheng doubles down, pumping his hand back and forth so roughly the heel of his palm bumps hard against the omega’s clit. Xie Lian whines again, his back arching up off the bed, and his swollen lips catch on the edge of Hua Cheng’s jaw as he whispers, “S-San Lang, San Lang, please, please, need to feel you -”
His wrists flex and strain beneath Hua Cheng’s palm, and Hua Cheng is unable to hold on to the omega any longer. His elbows hit the bed and Xie Lian’s arms fly up around his shoulders, his fingers digging into his hair. He is nothing more than a creature now, Hua Cheng thinks - not thinks, he isn’t capable of thinking anymore; he is merely aware, simply watching his body go through the motions it was born to do.
Xie Lian pulls him closer, closer, and then their lower bodies are rubbing together, his cock heavy and leaking as he fucks mindlessly into the crease of the prince’s thigh, Xie Lian’s cunt hot and soaked against his hip. And then the prince is making a needy little choked noise into his ear, and his body is spasming, bucking and straining beneath Hua Cheng’s own as though he is trying to escape. He turns his face and whines into the alpha’s neck, shaking and whining as Hua Cheng continues to desperately rut against him, like a dog, like a beast. He is surely mere moments away from tearing the soaked fabric separating them into shreds and hammering into that tight, slick pussy until the prince is fucked full, knotted and pregnant and his, when Xie Lian, red-faced and smelling of satisfaction, drops his head back onto the mattress, and meets his eyes.
“Your highness,” Hua Cheng manages to choke out.
Hands shaking, Xie Lian combs his fingers through Hua Cheng’s hair and pushes it back from his face. Then he looks down between their bodies, at where Hua Cheng is fucking up against him like some loathsome beast. He says, breathlessly, “It’s like you’re actually doing it to me,” and it’s all over.
Hua Cheng hears himself growl, feels his hips stutter and his knot swell as he cums hard against the warm body of the omega beneath him. He feels Xie Lian touch his hair again, combing tender fingers along his scalp, and, once the stars have cleared from his field of vision, he hears him too, murmuring soft, gentle words, words he finds himself totally incapable of discerning, but it’s alright. It’s fine.
Xie Lian is warm and safe and satisfied beneath him, holding him in his arms, saying something sweet and soothing and kind, and when he buries his face in his beloved’s neck, it’s the hardest thing he’s ever had to do to not bite the warm, unmarked flesh pulsing against his lips.
They lay there together for a long moment.
The room stinks of sex.
Xie Lian wriggles a little beneath him.
“San Lang,” he whispers.
Hua Cheng forces himself to pull his face out of the crook of the prince’s neck. He props himself up on his elbows, and looks down at his beloved.
His long, chestnut hair is askew, and his cheeks are pink with pleasure, and he is beaming.
“Your highness?”
Xie Lian squirms a little beneath him. “That was fun,” he says, softly.
Hua Cheng cannot stop himself from grinning.
Xue Lian grins too, and then he laughs, the sound musical and bursting with joy.
Hua Cheng reaches up, and strokes his thumb gently across the prince’s pretty face. He wants to tell him how beautiful he is; how his visage haunts his dreams at night. But when he imagines himself saying so out loud, the words seem redundant; unsuitable for the depth and breadth of what it is he truly wishes to convey.
Xie Lian lets his arms flop back onto the mattress, and Hua Cheng’s hair falls forward into his face. He sits up.
“We’d better get you back to your rooms, your highness,” he says.
The prince sighs heavily, and Hua Cheng offers him a hand, tugging him up into a sitting position.
“I hope Feng Xin found my cousin,” he says. He stands, and blushes scarlet when he sees Hua Cheng is looking at his bared skin, which is deeply endearing. He turns away, and begins re-tying his robes. “I’m sorry, again," he says presently. "About your nose.”
Hua Cheng laughs. “It’s quite alright, your highness,” he says. He gets up from the bed. “I must say, I feel a lot better already.”
Xie Lian goes even redder, pressing his lips together and ducking his head.
It takes a few minutes for them both to make themselves presentable again to the outside world. Hua Cheng finds a spare outer robe folded up in the bottom of a drawer which is not freshly laundered, but is blood-free, thankfully. Xie Lian squints into the looking-glass in the bathroom as he adjusts his hair, carefully re-positioning the various ornaments Hua Cheng had managed to knock out of place with his greedy hands. Whilst he is preoccupied with this, Hua Cheng also digs out a fresh pair of trousers, kicking his now stained pair into the corner of the room. He will be able to wash, he decides, once the prince is safely back in his rooms. His knot is still somewhat swollen, he notes, tender to the touch. He feels hotter than usual too, which is odd - he rarely feels excessively warm or cold, perhaps due to his somewhat underprivileged early life on the streets. Oh, well, he thinks. No sense in pondering over it now.
Outside, the dark clouds have grown even thicker, and rain is pouring down in rods. The barracks and the courtyard are mostly deserted now, save for a few miserable-looking guards patrolling the walls who barely seem to notice them as together they scurry back towards the palace.
Hua Cheng tries once to shield the prince from the downpour with his arm, but Xie Lian shakes his head. “It’s probably a good thing,” he says. “It will, um - wash away the scent.” His cheeks pink a little as he says this.
He’s right, Hua Cheng thinks, and he should be relieved by this realisation, but instead he is left feeling cold and bitter.
They make it out of the barracks and back into the palace unmolested. No guards fall upon him, weapons drawn, to arrest him for his hideous conduct, and none of the servants they pass do anything other than bow low and avert their gaze as the prince passes them by, bestowing them with sweet smiles and little waves.
Feng Xin is nowhere to be seen, and Xie Lian’s awful servant is blessedly absent from his and the prince’s rooms.
“I should wait here,” Hua Cheng tells him, when the prince opens the door and slips inside, giving Hua Cheng one last, soft-eyed look over the shoulder. “Until we can find a guard for you, anyhow.”
“You could come in,” Xie Lian says. He fidgets a little where he stands, shy all of a sudden. “I could make you some tea?”
Hua Cheng hesitates.
“What are you doing here?” says a cold, clear voice.
Hua Cheng turns around quickly.
Mu Qing is standing just a few feet away from them, nose wrinkled and arms folded.
“Mu Qing!” Xie Lian leans out of the doorway, smiling brightly at the horrible omega who is still scowling up at Hua Cheng. “General Hua escorted me back here after Feng Xin went to find my cousin. Did you hear? He ran off into the city!”
“Why are you so wet?” Mu Qing says.
Hua Cheng says, “Have you heard of this phenomenon called rain?”
Mu Qing’s scowl deepens.
“I’m just going to have a bath,” Xie Lian says. “General Hua, would you mind finding a guard for the door?” He smiles up at Hua Cheng, and, hidden from Mu Qing’s field of vision around the corner, touches his hand, just lightly.
Hua Cheng tries not to feel too disappointed. “Of course, your highness,” he says. He bows once, and backs up, letting Mu Qing pass by and enter the prince’s chambers.
Xie Lian inclines his head, still smiling sweetly, and disappears from sight.
Mu Qing turns, and frowns up at Hua Cheng, his dark eyes narrowed and lips pursed unattractively. “I can smell you, you know,” he says.
Hua Cheng’s heart seizes painfully. He stands very still. “I beg your pardon?” he says.
The omega tips his chin up. “You heard me,” he says. “I know exactly what you’re doing, General Hua. I’m not stupid.”
Hua Cheng sniffs. “That’s news to me,” he says.
“Leave him alone,” Mu Qing says. Then he slams the door shut.
Heat envelops Hua Cheng’s spine, and his head begins to ache. He is far too warm now, and beginning to sweat.
The rain outside continues to pour.