Work Text:
The house feels stifling after the argument.
Heavy with it.
Rain rattles softly against the windows overlooking the dark lawn beyond the glass, steady enough now to blur the world outside into shifting shadow and gold. The fireplace crackles low somewhere behind Will, though the heat crawling beneath his skin has very little to do with it.
Hannibal moves through the room, collecting the last traces of the evening with practiced calm. One untouched plate from the dining table. A wine glass. Folded linen between elegant hands.
Will watches him from near the doorway without seeming to realize he’s doing it.
His own thoughts have become intolerably loud.. They have ever since Baltimore.
Ever since Hannibal had looked at him after the scene in the mortuary with that unbearable stillness in his eyes, as though watching something unfold exactly as intended.
Will had not meant to tell him. Not explicitly.
But Hannibal notices everything. The prolonged stare at the blood beneath a victim’s fingernails. The strange calm settling over Will afterward. The unbearable instinct to imagine sharp things afterward in the privacy of Hannibal’s bed, with Hannibal’s hands on him, Hannibal’s mouth against his throat, Hannibal letting him—
Will shuts the thought down viciously.
Across the room, Hannibal folds his cuffs back into place with neat, unhurried movements.
“You’ll work yourself into a headache if you keep grinding your teeth like that,” he says.
Will’s jaw loosens.
Humiliating.
He looks away toward the rain-dark windows instead. “Sorry.”
Hannibal glances at him briefly then returns to fastening the buttons of his coat. The sight lodges unpleasantly somewhere beneath Will’s ribs.
“You’re really going out tonight.”
“I told you I was.” The answer comes smooth and absentminded, attention still fixed mostly on the line of his sleeve.
Will swallows.
Ordinarily, Hannibal would have crossed back toward him by now. Some small touch in passing. Fingers at the back of Will’s neck. A kiss pressed lazily against his mouth while moving through the room. Hannibal touches him constantly when they’re alone together. Possessive without seeming aware of it. Thoughtless in the intimacy of it.
Tonight, however, the space between them remains untouched.
Will tells himself he’s imagining it.
He must be.
Hannibal finishes adjusting his coat and reaches for his gloves from the table near the foyer. The movement finally pulls Will forward on instinct alone. He crosses the room almost unconsciously.
Hannibal looks up as he approaches.
Will stops close enough to feel heat gathered beneath the wool of Hannibal’s coat, close enough to smell cedar and bergamot and the faint lingering traces of wine at the back of Hannibal’s throat.
For a second neither of them speaks. Will’s pulse turns suddenly unruly.
His gaze catches briefly on Hannibal’s mouth before dropping again.
Then he leans in, eyes imploring, movements tentative. Tentative enough that another person might not even recognize it for what it is.
But Hannibal always recognizes.
Usually the response is immediate. A hand sliding around the back of Will’s neck before he can second-guess himself. Teeth briefly against his lower lip. A faint hum of approval breathed into his mouth when Will yields closer without meaning to.
Instead, Hannibal merely pulls one glove smoothly over his hand, leather settling against long fingers.
Will stills. The silence lengthens strangely afterward.
Hannibal’s attention remains fixed on the second glove now, expression unreadable in the golden lamplight of the foyer.
Dread curls low in Will’s stomach. He steps back before he can fully think about doing it. Too quick. The movement catches slightly against the hardwood beneath his boots.
Hannibal glances up then, finally noticing something uncertain flickering across Will’s face, the faint tremor in his hands.
“Will.”
Just his name. Soft. Questioning. Will shakes his head.
Hannibal studies him another moment. Calm eyes. Beautiful eyes. Eyes that have watched men disemboweled without flinching and still somehow manage to look at Will tenderly afterward.
Will suddenly cannot bear them on him.
He turns away first.
Coward.
Behind him, he hears the quiet click of Hannibal fastening the second glove.
“I think,” Hannibal says after a moment, voice smooth again, “it would do you some good to spend the evening apart from me.”
Will’s throat tightens unexpectedly.
Deserved punishment, then.
He nods anyway because he does not trust his own voice.
Hannibal steps closer only long enough to smooth nonexistent lint from Will’s shoulder with precise fingers. The touch barely lasts a second, yet even that fleeting contact feels ruinously insufficient.
“Try to rest,” Hannibal murmurs.
Then he withdraws again before Will can lean unconsciously after him.
The front door opens. Cold air slips briefly through the foyer carrying rainwater and wet earth with it. Will stands motionless in the golden lamplight while Hannibal retrieves his keys.
No kiss. No hand at the back of his neck. Not even the absent affection Hannibal usually gives without thought.
Will keeps his eyes lowered toward the floorboards because he can already feel the pressure gathering behind them.
“Lock up after me,” Hannibal says quietly.
Will nods obediently.
The door closes behind him a moment later with soft finality.
And only then, standing alone in the sudden silence of Hannibal’s house, does Will realize Hannibal had known exactly what he was asking for when he leaned in.
Had seen it.
Understood it.
And chosen not to answer.
Will locks the door three minutes after Hannibal leaves.
Not at once. At once would imply distress. At once would imply he had been standing there listening to the sound of Hannibal’s car pulling away through the rain while something ugly and frightened twisted slowly open beneath his ribs.
So he waits.
Counts the soft ticking of the clock near the staircase. Watches headlights drag gold across the wet windows before disappearing entirely beyond the tree line. Only then does he move.
The lock clicks beneath his hand. The house settles afterward into an unfamiliar kind of silence.
Will stands motionless in the foyer for a moment longer, staring at the dark wood of the door Hannibal had disappeared behind. His own reflection stares faintly back at him in the rain-streaked glass beside it. Pale. Tired. Mouth drawn too tight.
Pathetic.
He exhales sharply through his nose and turns away.
The evening stretches strangely after that. Will attempts normalcy with increasingly poor results.
He cleans the kitchen because Hannibal likes things orderly. Dries dishes that are already dry. Straightens silverware twice. At some point he realizes he has been standing motionless at the sink for nearly fifteen minutes with one hand submerged in cold water.
His thoughts refuse to settle.
That, more than anything, begins frightening him.
Usually there is noise inside him. Too much of it. Imagination and empathy and instinct all colliding endlessly together until Hannibal’s voice cuts cleanly through the center of it like a blade. Tonight there is only the awful, widening echo left behind afterward.
Will dries his hands carefully.
The towel trembles faintly between his fingers.
No kiss.
The thought surfaces with terrible clarity.
Will braces both hands against the kitchen counter and lowers his head.
Don’t.
The warning comes too late. His imagination has already begun assembling.
Hannibal had known what Will wanted when he leaned in. There is no possibility he misunderstood it. Hannibal notices everything. The angle of a glance. A pulse fluttering beneath skin. The shift in breathing before a lie.
He knew.
And he had looked at Will afterward with that terrible composure of his and chosen not to answer. He’d never done that before. If anything, Hannibal’s carefully maintained restraint tended to fracture around Will’s desire to be touched.
Heat crawls sharply up the back of Will’s neck.
The realization curdles almost at once.
Of course.
Of course this would be the thing too far.
Not the violence.
Not the murders.
Not the blood beneath Will’s fingernails after a crime scene while something dark and ravenous turned over happily inside him.
No.
This.
The wanting.
The way Will had started shaking afterward in Hannibal’s bed the first time Hannibal let him hold the knife against his skin. The horrible relief of it. The quiet settling inside his own skull afterward while Hannibal bled lazily beneath his hands and looked at him in awe. With reverence.
Will presses the heels of his palms harder against the countertop.
His breath keeps catching painfully beneath his ribs.
He remembers the look on Hannibal’s face in the foyer with sudden painful clarity. Not cruel. Worse.
Calm.
Indifferent.
Like Will had offered him something embarrassing rather than intimate.
God.
Will squeezes his eyes shut.
“You disgust him.”
The words slip out before he realizes he’s spoken aloud.
The sound of his own voice startles him enough that he laughs once under his breath. Thin. Frayed at the edges.
Rain lashes suddenly harder against the windows.
Will pushes himself away from the counter and moves through the house without direction. Living room. Hallway. Kitchen again. Every room still carries traces of Hannibal.
A half-finished book resting spine-up beside the sofa. His coat no longer hanging near the door. The scent of his cologne lingering faintly in the stairwell.
It leaves something hollowing in Will’s chest.
The house feels wrong without Hannibal inside it.
Too large.
Too quiet.
Will drifts back into the living room and stops beside the sofa without fully meaning to. Hannibal’s book still rests open where he left it earlier, spine bent slightly against the cushion. A pair of reading glasses folded neatly beside it. Careless, by Hannibal’s standards. Comfortable.
Domestic.
The sight leaves him abruptly unsteady.
Because Hannibal had looked comfortable earlier, too.
Comfortable while rejecting him.
Will sits slowly at the edge of the couch and presses the heels of his hands against his eyes until color blooms violently behind them.
Of course Hannibal had noticed.
Will feels sick for ever imagining otherwise.
Hannibal notices everything.
The way Will had gone still the first time Hannibal pressed the blade into his hand. The way his breathing had changed afterward whenever Hannibal touched his wrists. The humiliating reverence of it. The relief. The awful quiet settling over the noise in his skull while heated blood slicked across his fingers and Hannibal watched him with those dark, fathomless eyes.
Not fear.
Never fear.
Always gentle interest.
Until tonight.
Will’s stomach turns. Because maybe Hannibal had only been observing him all this time. Studying him.
Curious the way he is curious about unusual pathology. Rare diseases preserved carefully beneath glass. Something grotesque enough to fascinate until eventually the fascination wears thin beneath the reality of it.
The thought leaves him briefly unable to swallow.
He pictures Hannibal somewhere across Baltimore now beneath the amber lighting and soft classical music, composed as ever, one elegant hand curled around a wine glass while he decides, with perfect calm, that Will has finally become inconvenient to love.
Too emotional.
Too hungry.
Too eager to place ugly things into Hannibal’s beautiful hands and ask him to make them hurt less.
Pathetic.
Will’s looks away sharply.
Even now, some part of him wants Hannibal to walk back through the door and touch him until the feeling stops. The realization twists in his lungs.
No wonder Hannibal looked at him that way.
Will drops his head back against the couch cushion and stares unfocused at the ceiling overhead while rain rattles through the dark outside. His breathing refuses rhythm now, every inhale catching halfway.
He thinks suddenly, vividly, of the first time Hannibal kissed him after seeing him kill.
Will had expected revulsion then too.
Had stood there shaking faintly beneath dripping rainwater and blood while Hannibal approached him with impossible softness, fingertips against his jaw, eyes heated with something that had looked horrifyingly close to devotion.
“Beautiful boy.”
The memory hurts now.
Because perhaps Hannibal had mistaken Will’s darkness for something elegant then. Something controlled. Not this ugly, grasping thing beneath it. Not the neediness of it. The desperate relief Will feels when Hannibal lets him close enough to taste blood from his own skin like communion. A sick animal begging for scraps from its master’s table.
Will laughs again under his breath.
The sound breaks strangely this time.
Not quite laughter anymore.
Outside, the rain has intensified into something steadier, heavier against the windows. Water streaks silver through the glass beneath intermittent washes of passing headlights, each one making Will’s pulse leap painfully before fading back into darkness again.
Not him.
Never him.
The thought loops in endless repetition afterward.
Hannibal is not coming back.
Will presses the heel of his hand harder against his mouth.
His body feels intolerably foreign all at once. Too tight over his bones. Every nerve exposed and humming unpleasantly beneath it. He can feel his own pulse everywhere now; wrists, throat, behind his eyes. Every inhale stalls painfully halfway down, no matter how carefully he tries to steady it.
Pathetic.
He drags his hand downward roughly over his face.
Hannibal had spent months being gentle with him.
Months.
Patient through every ugly, little fracture Will tried hiding from him. The nightmares. The dissociation. The bloodlust curling dark and ugly through his stomach after violence. Hannibal had touched him through all of it, like handling something precious despite the ruin underneath.
And how had Will repaid him?
By wanting more.
Always more.
More touch. More blood. More of Hannibal cut open beneath his hands so the noise inside Will’s skull would finally, finally quiet for a few blessed moments.
His stomach turns hard enough to ache.
God.
No wonder Hannibal left.
His gaze drifts downward eventually toward the knife still resting in his hand. The pearl handle gleams pale beneath the dim living room light. Hannibal designed it for him.
The realization hurts almost as badly as everything else tonight.
Carefully made for Will’s grip. Weighted perfectly. Given freely into his hands with all that terrible fondness in Hannibal’s eyes.
And Will had corrupted even that.
He unsheathes it almost without realizing he’s done so. The soft metallic click cuts cleanly through the silence. Will stares at the blade for a long moment. Thin. Bright. Familiar.
His own reflection stares faintly back at him warped in silver.
Too much.
The words feel endless now.
Too needy. Too emotional.
Too eager to kneel at Hannibal’s feet and ask for impossible things with shaking hands and wet-eyed desperation.
Even Hannibal Lecter, with all his strange appetites and impossible tenderness, had finally reached the limits of what he could stomach.
The thought lands with enough force to leave him momentarily breathless.
Before he fully thinks through the motion, he presses the edge lightly against the inside of his forearm.
The sting arrives first. Then relief. Tiny. Immediate.
Will’s eyes flutter shut.
Oh.
Not enough to truly hurt. Never that. Just enough sensation to interrupt the frantic spiraling tearing through his thoughts. Enough to pin him briefly back inside his own body.
A thin line of red wells slowly beneath the blade.
Will watches the blood bead slowly upward.
Then again.
Another shallow line crossing the first.
His shoulders shake afterward.
Not pleasure. Something uglier. Grief, perhaps.
“I can do better,” he whispers hoarsely to the empty room.
The words fracture into another broken laugh.
Blood moves sluggishly toward his wrist.
Will wipes at it absently with trembling fingers before realizing what he’s doing and stopping short. Hannibal hates carelessness with blood. Hannibal likes precision. Intention. Ritual.
The thought sends another sickening wave of shame through him.
He rises abruptly from the couch and nearly stumbles doing it, dizzy from hours of dread and too little air. The room tilts unpleasantly around him before settling again.
Will makes it halfway down the hallway before stopping.
The house remains silent.
No headlights.
No footsteps outside.
No key turning in the lock.
His imagination fills the void mercilessly.
Hannibal seated somewhere, soft with golden light and opera, while deciding how best to disentangle himself from this. From Will. Perhaps already planning how carefully to do it. Hannibal always preferred elegance, even in cruelty.
The thought carves through him with startling precision
Will slides slowly down the wall until he’s sitting on the floor.
The knife hangs loose from his fingers now, streaked lightly red.
He presses his bleeding forearm hard against his stomach.
“I won’t ask anymore,” he says hoarsely.
The words come wet this time. Unsteady.
“I can stop.”
Another breath shudders out of him.
“You don’t have to keep giving me things.”
His vision blurs.
Will lowers his head against his knees and curls inward tightly around the knife, around the unbearable certainty that he has finally ruined the only gentle thing that has ever truly wanted him.
***
The front door opens shortly after two in the morning.
Hannibal steps inside carrying rain and cold air with him.
The performance had ended nearly an hour earlier. Ordinarily he would not have returned so late after an argument of this nature, but a punctured tire halfway back to Wolf Trap had delayed matters considerably, leaving him standing in cold rain beside the Bentley while Baltimore traffic hissed endlessly past wet pavement.
Irritating.
Now, however, the annoyance fades almost at once beneath something else.
The house is wrong.
Hannibal stills just inside the foyer.
Silent.
His attention shifts methodically across the darkened entryway.
One lamp remains lit in the living room.
The kitchen light still burns beyond the hall.
No music.
No television.
No movement.
“Will?”
No answer.
Hannibal eases the door shut behind himself.
A faint metallic scent lingers beneath the house’s familiar heat.
Blood.
Fresh.
The house resolves suddenly into threat assessment
“Will,” he calls again, more firmly this time as he moves through the foyer.
Still nothing.
Concern crystallizes almost instantly into something far more dangerous.
Not fear, not yet, but it's creeping in close enough to taste.
Hannibal rounds the corner into the hallway and stops.
Will sits on the floor against the wall near the living room entrance, knees drawn tightly toward his chest. One arm wrapped around himself. The other hangs limp across his knee, streaked in drying blood from several shallow cuts crossing the inside of his forearm.
The knife rests loose in his hand.
For one suspended second Hannibal sees nothing except the blood. A thousand ugly possibilities move instinctively through his mind at once. Deeper wounds hidden beneath fabric. An artery opened.
Will already unconscious somewhere deeper in the house
Then Will lifts his head slightly at the sound of footsteps.
His eyes are glassy and unfocused in the dim light. Pupils blown wide enough to nearly erase the blue entirely. His curls cling damply to his forehead where he has evidently been crying hard enough to sweat through it.
Not dead.
Not dying.
Hannibal feels the thought lodge unpleasantly beneath his composure.
“Darling,” he breathes.
Will flinches. The reaction startles Hannibal more than the blood had.
Will’s gaze catches on him with painful slowness, as though recognition itself requires effort now. He looks exhausted. Frightened. Far deeper into dysregulation than Hannibal had anticipated
Hannibal lowers himself carefully into a crouch several feet away. Slowly enough not to startle him further.
Rainwater still clings coldly to the shoulders of his coat. He can feel it soaking gradually through the wool at his knees where they touch the hardwood, though the discomfort barely registers now beneath the awful constriction steadily winding through him
Will’s breathing is wrong.
Too shallow.
Too fast.
Every inhale seems to catch halfway before shuddering unevenly back out again. His skin shines faintly damp beneath the low lamplight, clammy sweat cooling across his throat and temples alike. One dark curl sticks to the corner of his mouth where he must have dragged trembling fingers across it repeatedly.
He looks feverish.
“Hm,” Hannibal murmurs, more to soothe than question. “There you are.”
Will’s gaze flickers uncertainly across Hannibal’s face.
Not tracking properly.
The knife remains hanging loose from his fingers, though not with intention anymore. His grip has slackened enough that the handle shifts dangerously each time another tremor works through his hand.
Blood glistens black-red across the inside of his wrist.
Shallow.
Thank God.
Still, the sight triggers something violent and protective beneath Hannibal’s composure.
Will swallows visibly when Hannibal shifts slightly closer.
Another flinch. Tiny. Barely there at all. Yet Hannibal catches it instantly.
Curious.
Not avoidance, exactly.
Fear.
The realization settles unpleasantly beneath his sternum.
“Will,” he says again, quieter this time.
Will’s lashes flutter hard at the sound of his name. Up close Hannibal can see they’ve clumped together from tears and sweat alike, darkened to nearly black against skin gone bloodless with exhaustion. There are damp tracks still drying unevenly down his cheeks. His bottom lip trembles once before he catches it harshly between his teeth.
The movement feels painfully involuntary, as though he’s trying very hard not to come apart any further in front of Hannibal specifically.
“Darling,” Hannibal says carefully, “give me the knife.”
Will’s fingers tighten instantly around the handle.
Not defensive. Desperate.
The response arrives before thought.
Hannibal stills.
Ah.
His gaze drifts briefly downward then back to Will’s face again. Will watches him through blown pupils, breathing audibly now. His free hand remains pressed hard against his own stomach like he’s holding himself together physically.
“I’m not taking it from you.”
A faint shudder moves through Will’s shoulders.
Rain rattles through the windows somewhere deeper in the house. Neither of them moves.
Then, slowly, Will loosens his grip just enough for Hannibal to slide the knife carefully from his hand. The instant it leaves him, something naked and frightened flashes across Will’s face.
Dread.
Raw enough that Hannibal feels it low in his own throat.
Will’s empty hand curls at once into itself afterward, fingers flexing once against his palm before tucking hard against his chest.
“Hm,” Hannibal hums again.
He folds the blade closed one-handed and sets it carefully beside himself on the floor rather than out of reach. Will watches the motion with terrible intensity.
So interesting.
Hannibal reaches for him then. Not abruptly. Never abruptly with frightened things.
His fingertips brush lightly against the inside of Will’s wrist first, avoiding the cuts. The skin there feels icy despite the sheen of sweat dampening it. Will jerks beneath the contact anyway, breath hitching hard enough to nearly become a sound.
“Hush,” Hannibal murmurs instinctively.
Will’s eyes squeeze shut.
Another tremor passes visibly through him afterward. His head tips forward slightly, curls falling further across his face now while his breathing grows more uneven instead of less.
Not pain, then. At least not entirely.
Hannibal studies him carefully.
Will had clearly been crying for some time before exhaustion overtook whatever precipitated this state. The cuts themselves are shallow enough to suggest interruption rather than intent. Dread wounds. Grounding wounds.
But the fear remains puzzling.
“Mm,” Hannibal murmurs, thumb smoothing once across the clammy inside of Will’s wrist. “What happened to you while I was gone?”
Will makes the smallest sound then.
Not speech, something softer. Wet. Broken somewhere in the middle.
And when Hannibal moves closer still, Will recoils from him and toward him at once, shoulders curling inward while his shaking hands catch instinctively in the front of Hannibal’s coat like he cannot decide whether he’s seeking comfort or bracing for impact.
Hannibal stills beneath the contact.
Will’s fingers twist weakly into rain-damp wool near his ribs, knuckles pale beneath streaks of half-dried blood. The grip lacks strength. Not restraint, either. Instinct alone, perhaps. Something frightened inside Will reaching despite itself.
“Easy,” Hannibal murmurs.
Will bows further inward at the sound of his voice.
His forehead nearly touches Hannibal’s shoulder before he catches himself abruptly and pulls back with visible effort, breath stuttering unevenly through parted lips. Another tremor works through him hard enough that Hannibal feels it transfer through the fabric between them.
Curious.
The fear sharpens rather than settles when comfort is offered.
“Ah-ah, shhh.”
Hannibal slides one hand slowly upward along Will’s forearm, careful around the shallow cuts striping pale skin. None appear deep enough to require stitches. Irritated, likely painful now that adrenaline has begun abandoning him, but survivable.
Still unacceptable.
Will’s lashes flutter rapidly when Hannibal’s thumb brushes the inside of his wrist again. His skin remains unpleasantly cold beneath the clammy sheen of sweat. Hannibal can feel the pulse hammering there, frantic and arrhythmic beneath delicate bone.
“Look at me,” he says quietly.
Will tries, he really tries.
His eyes lift only briefly before dropping again almost at once, unable to hold. Hannibal catches the exact moment Will notices the blood smeared across the front of his coat.
Alarm breaks visibly across his face.
“No,” Hannibal says at once. The word comes sharper than intended.
Will flinches violently anyway. Something unpleasantly sharp moves through Hannibal’s chest.
“Darling.” Softer now. Immediate correction. “No.”
Will’s breathing has gone ragged again. His mouth parts like he means to speak, though nothing emerges except another broken hitch of air. Wet lashes clump further together as fresh tears gather despite obvious effort to suppress them.
Hannibal reaches carefully for his face.
Will freezes, not recoiling this time.
Worse.
Bracing.
The realization settles like ice somewhere deep inside him.
He cups Will’s jaw anyway, thumb smoothing lightly beneath one damp cheekbone. Will shudders beneath the touch hard enough that his teeth click faintly together afterward. His eyes slip shut.
Will makes that wounded little sound again.
Hannibal studies him in silence for several long moments.
The pieces refuse to settle properly yet. He can observe the aftermath clearly enough — dread, self-inflicted wounds, profound emotional dysregulation — but the shape of the catalyst still remains frustratingly beyond reach.
Will’s fear, however, feels unmistakably attached to Hannibal specifically now.
Hannibal hums thoughtfully, fingertips slipping carefully into damp curls near the nape of Will’s neck.
Will folds at once, the reaction instantaneous.
His shoulders slump with visible relief despite the terror still trembling through him. One shaking hand loosens from Hannibal’s coat only to clutch weakly at his wrist instead, pressing unconsciously closer toward the touch like something starving.
Ah.
The movement provokes an almost violent tenderness in him.
“You’ve worked yourself into quite a state,” he murmurs.
Will’s expression pinches sharply.
Not disagreement.
Shame.
Fresh understanding flickers briefly at the edges of Hannibal’s thoughts now before slipping frustratingly away again.
Will’s fingers tighten weakly around his wrist.
Not restraining.
Clinging.
The distinction unsettles Hannibal more than he cares to admit.
Rainwater still dampens the shoulders of his coat, cooling gradually against his skin, yet Will continues pressing instinctively toward the heat of him despite shivering hard enough to make the movement uneven. His forehead dips lower, nearly brushing Hannibal’s collarbone before stopping there uncertainly, as though he no longer trusts himself the right to close the remaining distance.
“Mm,” Hannibal murmurs.
His hand settles more firmly against the nape of Will’s neck.
Immediate reaction.
Will’s breath leaves him in a trembling rush. Not quite a sob. Close enough that Hannibal feels something unpleasantly sharp move beneath his sternum all the same. The tension gathered through Will’s shoulders loosens by imperceptible degrees afterward, his body yielding despite obvious effort not to.
Fragile creature.
Hannibal smooths his thumb slowly through damp curls at the base of his skull. The repetitive motion seems to pull Will further back toward himself with each pass. Not fully. His gaze remains distant and overbright, thoughts still racing visibly behind it, but the dread no longer appears quite so all-consuming.
Curiouser still.
The cuts.
The fear.
The desperate clutching at him now as though Hannibal himself has become some necessary tether.
None of it aligns neatly yet.
Will swallows hard enough that Hannibal feels the motion where his fingers cradle his jaw.
Then, almost inaudibly:
“…Sorry.”
The word barely exists once spoken.
Hannibal’s expression shifts faintly.
“For what?”
Will’s throat works again. His eyes remain lowered stubbornly toward the front of Hannibal’s coat, fixed on the blood staining dark wool there. Shame flickers visibly across his face every time his gaze catches it. One trembling hand lifts halfway between them before stopping short again, fingers curling uselessly inward.
Another apology trying and failing to form.
Hannibal catches the hand carefully before Will can retreat with it entirely. Fresh blood smears across his palm.
Will flinches at the contact.
“No,” Hannibal says this time, careful not to sharpen the word again. “Stop that.”
Will goes very still.
Hannibal turns the injured wrist carefully beneath the low light, examining the shallow cuts striping pale skin. Angled poorly. Uneven pressure. Nothing like the meticulous precision Will usually applies when handling a blade.
Not ritual, then.
Distress.
“You were trembling,” Hannibal murmurs almost absently, more observation than question.
Will’s lashes flutter. Another small shudder works visibly through him afterward.
Hannibal glances up slowly.
Will looks exhausted now that the sharpest edge of dread has begun dulling. Sweat cools against bloodless skin. Tear tracks dry unevenly along flushed cheeks. His lips have gone slightly blue at the edges from hyperventilation and shock alike.
And still he keeps trying not to lean too heavily into Hannibal’s touch. That, more than anything else, begins bothering Hannibal in earnest.
He shifts closer without warning then, one knee sliding against hardwood until the space between them disappears almost entirely. Will startles faintly at first contact before at once softening again despite himself, breath catching hard when Hannibal draws him carefully forward by the nape.
“There,” Hannibal murmurs.
Will folds completely this time.
His forehead settles shakily against Hannibal’s shoulder while his fingers clutch helplessly at the front of Hannibal’s coat again, smearing more blood across already ruined fabric. The sound that leaves him afterward is small and devastated enough that Hannibal closes his eyes briefly against it.
Not physical pain.
Something deeper.
Hannibal can feel it now with uncomfortable clarity, though its source still remains just beyond full comprehension.
Will had not hurt himself to punish Hannibal, nor truly to punish himself.
This feels frighteningly closer to desperation. Like a drowning man clawing for something solid enough to keep hold of his own mind.
Hannibal’s hand stills briefly against the back of Will’s neck, then resumes its slow, grounding rhythm once more.
“Easy, darling,” he says coos.
Will shivers hard at the name.
The reaction moves through him visibly, shoulders tightening before slowly loosening again beneath Hannibal’s hand. His breathing remains uneven against the hollow of Hannibal’s throat, though the frantic edge of it has begun dulling into exhausted little tremors instead.
Hannibal continues stroking slowly through the damp curls at his nape.
Steady.
Measured.
Will responds to consistency more reliably than language when driven this far into himself. Hannibal learned that months ago. During nightmares. Fevers. The occasional dissociative spiral after particularly ugly crime scenes. Pressure and repetition anchor him better than questions ever could.
Still, this feels different.
Deeper somehow.
Will’s fingers twist weakly in the front of Hannibal’s coat each time Hannibal shifts even slightly, as though anticipating disappearance the moment contact breaks.
The realization sits unpleasantly in Hannibal’s stomach.
“You’re freezing,” he murmurs after a moment.
Will shakes his head at once against his shoulder.
Not understanding.
Refusing.
The behavior is profoundly revealing.
“Darling,” he says, voice low and careful, “I need to clean your arm.”
The effect is immediate.
Will goes rigid.
Every muscle locks at once beneath Hannibal’s hands. His fingers tighten convulsively against damp wool while fresh dread flashes violently across his face. He pulls back just enough for Hannibal to properly see it this time: blown pupils, wet lashes, lips parted around suddenly shallow breaths.
“No.”
The word comes out scraped raw.
Hannibal stills.
Will’s gaze drops instantly afterward, shame following so quickly behind the refusal that it nearly eclipses it entirely. “Sorry,” he whispers at once, voice shaking. “Sorry, I just—”
“Hush.”
Will cuts himself off at once.
Not obedience.
More like the abrupt collapse of someone already balancing at the edge of endurance.
Hannibal studies him carefully now.
The blood.
The dread.
The desperate need for proximity followed at once by terror the moment Hannibal attempts to move him or touch the wounds themselves.
The shape of it continues assembling slowly beneath the surface.
Not there yet.
But close.
“You think I’m angry with you,” Hannibal says.
Will recoils so hard it becomes answer enough.
Ah.
Hannibal feels genuine alarm begin threading coldly through his composure then. Not at the cuts themselves. Not even at the state in which he found Will.
At the fear.
The thought settles heavily into place while Will tries unsuccessfully to steady his breathing again. His exhaustion is becoming more obvious now that the sharpest edge of adrenaline has begun abandoning him. He sways faintly where he sits pressed against Hannibal, clammy skin cooling rapidly beneath damp clothing.
Too pale.
Hannibal slides one hand lower against his spine, grounding him more firmly.
“Easy,” he chides gently, “You’re exhausting yourself.”
Will makes another broken little sound against his shoulder.
Then, after several long seconds:
“I didn’t mean to make a mess.”
The words nearly disintegrate halfway through them.
Hannibal closes his eyes briefly.
God.
Blood continues drying darkly across the front of his coat while Will curls tighter inward, visibly trying to make himself smaller even now. As though reducing his own presence might somehow reduce the offense of it.
“You are not upsetting me,” Hannibal says carefully.
Will’s breathing catches hard enough to hurt. Hannibal feels it at once.
Disbelief.
Not dramatic. Not conscious, perhaps. But there all the same beneath the trembling exhaustion overtaking him.
“I need you to listen to me now,” Hannibal demands gently, “Can you do that?”
A hesitant nod brushes shakily against his shoulder.
“Good.”
Hannibal smooths one hand slowly down Will’s back before speaking again.
“I am going to help you stand up.”
Another spike of fear, smaller this time, but still there.
Will’s fingers tighten helplessly in his coat again. Hannibal can practically feel the effort it takes for him not to dread outright at the idea of being moved.
Not moved.
Displaced.
“You’re safe,” Hannibal says, almost absently.
Will’s eyes squeeze shut at once at the words.
Then, barely above a whisper:
“You came back?”
The quiet devastation in the sentence hollows something cleanly out inside Hannibal’s chest.
Not ‘why did you come back’. Not an accusation.
Surprise.
As though Will had already begun teaching himself how to survive the absence. Hannibal’s hand tightens instinctively at the back of his neck.
“Of course I came back.”.
Will shudders.
The reaction is immediate and terrible.
Not relief.
Relief would have settled him.
Instead, his breathing turns ragged again almost at once, shoulders curling further inward while fresh tears spill hot against Hannibal’s collar. One shaking hand fists harder in the front of his coat like he’s trying physically to hold himself together now that the dread has finally found words.
“I’m sorry,” Will whispers suddenly. Then again, rougher this time. “I’m so sorry—I, please, I’m sorry—”
“Will.”
“I know I’m difficult.”
Hannibal feels something cold slide slowly down his spine.
Will keeps going anyway, words tumbling loose now with the desperate momentum of something held back too long.
“I know I ask for too much, I know—” His breath catches violently. “You’re always good to me and I just keep taking things from you—”
“No.”
Hannibal says it at once, firm enough to interrupt.
Will jerks anyway.
Fresh dread flashes over his face at once, shame following close behind it. His apology dies mid-breath while he recoils instinctively from the sharpness in Hannibal’s tone, trying and failing to pull himself smaller against the wall behind him.
“Hush,” Hannibal says again, softer now, thumb moving carefully beneath Will’s jaw. “You misunderstand me.”
But Will is no longer really hearing him. Hannibal can see it happening in real time.
The exhaustion.
The dread.
The runaway momentum of catastrophic thought feeding itself faster than reassurance can reach it.
Will shakes his head hard enough that damp curls cling briefly to wet lashes afterward.
“I didn’t mean to ruin it.”
Ruin what?
The question flickers briefly through Hannibal’s mind before another arrives at once behind it, far uglier.
What exactly has Will convinced himself happened tonight?
“I didn’t mean to make you look at me like that,” Will whispers.
His voice sounds frayed raw now, scraped painfully thin by hours of spiraling dread. He wipes roughly at his face with the heel of his hand only to smear fresh blood across his own cheek in the process. The sight unsettles Hannibal irrationally.
“Darling,” he says carefully.
Will barely seems to register it.
“You’re always so patient with me,” he continues shakily, gaze fixed somewhere near Hannibal’s throat instead of his eyes. “Always touching me and making it quiet and letting me—” His breath stutters badly. “And then I just keep wanting worse things.”
Oh.
The final pieces slide suddenly, horribly into place. Hannibal goes very still.
Will notices at once. Dread detonates fresh across his face.
“No— no, I didn’t mean—” His breathing breaks entirely. “I can stop.”
The words come wet and frantic now, stumbling over each other in their urgency.
“I don’t have to ask for it anymore, I swear, I can be normal about it, I can take less, I know it’s disgusting—”
“It is not disgusting.”
Hannibal means the interruption to soothe.
Instead, Will shrinks away from it like pain.
“No, please,” he says at once, shaking harder now. “Please don’t just say that because you’re trying to calm me down.”
Something inside Hannibal twists sharply at the desperation in the sentence. He reaches instinctively for Will again only for Will to pull away faintly beneath the movement, eyes blown impossibly wide now, every inch of him balancing between clinging and fleeing at once.
“Hannibal,” he whispers raggedly, “I can do better.”
“Hannibal,” he begs again.
The name sounds exhausted now. Worn raw.
His gaze remains fixed downward somewhere near the center of Hannibal’s chest, unable or unwilling to rise any further. Wet lashes cast trembling shadows against bloodless cheeks. His breathing still catches unevenly every few seconds, sharp little hitches he seems incapable of controlling no matter how hard he tries.
Hannibal watches him carefully.
Watches the way Will recoils each time comfort is offered too suddenly.
The way he apologizes before speaking. The way his fingers keep tightening in the fabric of Hannibal’s coat every time Hannibal shifts, terrified of distance even while shrinking from touch.
And slowly, horribly, the shape of it finally settles into place.
Not the cuts or the blood.
The abandonment.
His poor little empath had taken one moment of restraint and transformed it into exile.
Hannibal feels genuine nausea curl unpleasantly beneath his ribs.
Will had leaned toward him in the foyer with all that quiet, vulnerable trust Hannibal had spent months slowly conditioning into him, and Hannibal had denied the instinctive affection Will had come to depend upon without realizing just how deeply it rooted itself into the fragile architecture of Will’s mind.
No wonder he looked terrified now.
Hannibal had not merely withheld comfort. He had withdrawn certainty. And Will, left alone with imagination sharp enough to vivisect itself endlessly, had mistaken the lesson for revulsion.
“You thought I was finished with you,” Hannibal says lowly.
Will’s eyes squeeze shut at once. He doesn’t deny it. The sight tears cleanly through what remains of Hannibal’s composure.
“Oh, precious.”
The words leave him softer than intended.
Will folds further inward at the sound of them, fresh tears spilling helplessly down his face despite obvious humiliation over them. One shaking hand rises halfway toward his mouth before stopping abruptly, fingers curling hard into his own palm instead.
“I know what it is,” he whispers, and his voice barely exists now. “I know how—how wrong it is.”
“No.”
“You shouldn’t have to keep letting me—” His breathing fractures badly. “I just wanted—”
Hannibal watches dread begin climbing him again in real time. The tremors worsening. His pulse fluttering violently beneath clammy skin. Every reassurance only feeding the shame further because Will hears pity where Hannibal intends tenderness.
Words are no longer reaching him.
Hannibal’s gaze drifts slowly toward the knife resting folded beside them on the floor, then back to Will.
Will notices the movement instantly.
Fresh fear flashes across his face before he can hide it.
“There now,” Hannibal murmurs.
Hannibal reaches for the knife slowly enough that Will can follow the motion. His fingers close around the familiar pearl handle while Will watches him with blown pupils and ragged breathing, every muscle visibly taut with dreadful anticipation.
“Hannibal…”
The whisper trembles apart.
Hannibal says nothing.
Instead, he unfolds the blade with a soft metallic click that cuts cleanly through the silence between them.
Will goes utterly still.
Not dread this time.
Attention.
His eyes fix at once on the knife in Hannibal’s hand with terrible intensity.
Ah, there you are.
Hannibal shifts closer again until Will’s knees press lightly against his thigh. Then, without breaking eye contact, he takes Will’s trembling hand carefully between both of his own.
Will inhales sharply.
“H–hannibal—”
“Hush, darling.”
The endearment lands differently this time. Will’s mouth parts around a shaking breath.
Gently, carefully, Hannibal curls Will’s fingers properly around the handle. Grounds the weight of it back into his palm where it belongs. Will’s entire body shudders at once beneath the contact, some frantic edge inside him catching suddenly on familiarity instead of fear.
“There,” Hannibal murmurs.
Then, before Will can begin unraveling again, Hannibal guides the blade slowly across the inside of his own forearm in a shallow line.
Precise.
Controlled.
Blood wells darkly almost at once beneath pale skin.
Will makes a small, broken sound. Not distress. Something far more dangerous.
Hannibal feels the exact moment Will’s breathing changes. Slows.
His eyes fix helplessly on the blood gathering heated across Hannibal’s arm while fresh tears continue slipping soundlessly down his cheeks. The dread does not disappear entirely, but it loosens enough for thought to penetrate again.
Good.
Very carefully, Hannibal drags Will’s fingertips through the blood.
Warmth streaks red across trembling skin.
Will stares at it, breathing unevenly.
“Hannibal…”
His voice breaks around the name.
Hannibal lifts Will’s shaking hand between them and, without looking away from his face, draws his own thumb slowly through the blood gathered along Will’s fingers, then presses it carefully across Will’s lower lip.
The reaction is immediate.
Will’s eyes flutter shut hard enough that more tears escape beneath them. A trembling breath leaves him in something dangerously close to relief while his entire body softens abruptly against the wall behind him, dread finally interrupted by something familiar enough to anchor him.
“Ahh, there you are,” Hannibal says coos softly.
Will’s eyes widen.
Tears continue slipping silently down his face while Hannibal holds his gaze steadily, one hand still curved firm and heated against the nape of his neck. The blood between them has begun drying tacky against skin and fabric alike, dark streaks across Hannibal’s fingers, Will’s mouth, the ruined front of Hannibal’s coat.
Neither of them seems capable of caring.
“You think I endure this despite your pleasure,” Hannibal drawls softly.
Will’s throat works helplessly.
“Hannibal…” he tries again, clinging to the name like a mantra now.
“No, darling. Listen to me.”
Will stills instinctively beneath the tone.
Hannibal studies him for a long moment before lifting Will’s bloodied hand once more between them. Such a beautiful hand. Trembling still from hysteria and weariness alike, yet careful even now around the blade resting loosely against Hannibal’s wrist. Reverent.
Poor thing truly believes himself monstrous for this.
“It pleases me,” Hannibal breathes.
Will freezes.
“To know you trust me enough to unravel in my hands.” Hannibal’s thumb drags slowly through the blood gathered along Will’s knuckles. “To feel your body settle when I bleed for you.” His gaze lowers briefly toward the shallow cut striping his own arm before returning to Will again. “Do you imagine I would permit something I did not enjoy?”
Will stares at him, utterly overwhelmed.
Hannibal can see the conflict moving behind his eyes in real time. The desperate wanting to believe him colliding violently against hours of accumulated shame and distress.
“But I hurt you,” Will whispers.
The devastation in the sentence nearly sounds childlike. Hannibal feels something fierce and unbearably tender move through him at once.
“You soothe me too, Will.”
Will’s breathing falters.
Hannibal shifts closer until their foreheads nearly touch.
“I enjoy your hunger.” The confession leaves him without hesitation now, smooth and honest as breath. “I enjoy watching you come alive beneath my hands.” His fingers tighten subtly at the back of Will’s neck. “And yes, darling, it gives me pleasure knowing mine can quiet your mind.”
Will makes another one of those wounded little sounds.
Not dread this time, something softer. Needier.
His eyes flutter briefly shut.
“There,” Hannibal murmurs. “That’s the truth of it.”
Will shakes his head weakly anyway.
“You shouldn’t.”
The protest sounds fragile now. Exhausted. Crumbling at the edges. Hannibal almost smiles.
“My empath,” he says, almost fondly. “You spend so much time inside the minds of monsters that you’ve forgotten one very important thing.”
Will’s gaze lifts uncertainly toward him again.
Hannibal brushes his thumb once across the smear of blood staining Will’s lower lip.
“I am one too.”
The words settle heavily between them.
Will shivers hard.
Hannibal watches the realization move slowly through him afterward. Not fully accepted yet, but landing all the same. The understanding that Hannibal is not tolerating this darkness in him. Not enduring it out of patience or pity.
The distinction alters something visible behind Will’s eyes.
His grip tightens faintly around Hannibal’s wrist again.
“Hannibal,” he whispers again.
This time, the name sounds less like an apology and more like longing. Hannibal feels absurdly relieved by it.
“There,” he sighs.
A visible shiver moves through Will.
The sound that leaves him afterward barely qualifies as one at all. Small. Unsteady. Almost embarrassed by its own relief.
Hannibal settles more comfortably against the sofa, one arm firm around Will’s waist while the other continues its slow path through damp curls and down the line of his spine.adrenaline abandoning him at last. Will responds to it without seeming aware he’s doing so, each pass of Hannibal’s fingers drawing another degree of tension from his body until he has nearly gone limp against Hannibal’s chest, heavy with relief and lingering shame entangled. Every so often Hannibal still feels tiny aftershocks move through him beneath the fabric of his clothes.
Fragile creature.
Hannibal lowers his mouth briefly to his temple. The touch pulls a faint tremor from Will’s shoulders. Then, after a moment, Will shifts. It’s a small movement.
One hand uncurls uncertainly from where it had gathered weakly in the fabric of Hannibal’s shirt and lifts instead toward Hannibal’s face. The motion looks almost unconscious in its fatigue. Slow enough that Hannibal feels the hesitation threaded through it before contact even arrives.
Will’s fingertips brush lightly along the line of his jaw.
Hannibal lingers motionlessly beneath the touch.
Will studies him for several long seconds afterward, gaze moving over his face with drained concentration. Searching, perhaps. As though trying to reconcile the man holding him now with the one who stood unmoved in the foyer hours earlier.
His thumb brushes once near the corner of Hannibal’s mouth, then Will leans in.
Not fully, scarcely more than an inch, the tired, fragile little inclination born more from instinct than confidence.
And then it happens.
Hannibal watches the memory return behind his eyes.
The foyer. The silence. The absence.
Will stops abruptly.
The change is immediate once noticed. His breath catches unevenly. Shoulders drawing inward again while embarrassment flashes hot across his exhausted face. He begins retreating almost at once, hand slipping weakly from Hannibal’s jaw as though the impulse itself had been a mistake.
“Hannibal, I’m sorr—”
“Let me,” he interrupts.
He catches Will’s wrist carefully before he can fully pull away and guides his hand back against his own face, pressing heated fingers deliberately against his jaw.
“Let me,” he repeats more softly.
Something inside Will visibly gives way at the words.
Hannibal feels it happen beneath his hands, the terrible vigilance loosening all at once, leaving behind only aching want and the exhaustion underneath it.
Before uncertainty can reclaim him again, Hannibal closes the remaining distance himself.
The kiss is slow.
Intentional.
He feels the exact moment Will realizes he is not being indulged out of pity or soothed into silence, but wanted. Truly wanted. Will’s breath shudders apart against his mouth while his fingers tighten weakly at Hannibal’s jaw, not pulling him closer now so much as holding him there, like someone afraid waking might end the dream.
Hannibal kisses him again before the doubt can return.
Then once more. Will melts beneath it with a soft, broken sound that nearly undoes him. He leans into the kiss with growing, fragile trust, allowing Hannibal to guide the pace of it entirely.
A trembling breath leaves him against Hannibal’s mouth while his fingers clutch weakly at Hannibal’s, not pulling now, but anchoring himself there. Hannibal can taste salt from tears still drying at the corners of his lips.
“There,” Hannibal murmurs against his mouth between kisses. “That’s my good boy.”
Will shivers violently at the particular form of praise that Hannibal uses so infrequently with him.
His forehead falls briefly against Hannibal’s as though the effort of staying upright has suddenly become too much. Hannibal gathers him closer automatically, one broad hand spreading heated against the center of his back while Will breathes him in shakily.
“I thought…” Will’s voice catches badly. “I thought maybe you didn’t want me touching you anymore.”
The confession leaves Hannibal abruptly furious with himself. He presses another kiss to Will’s mouth at once, then another against the corner of his lips, slow enough this time that Will cannot mistake eagerness for obligation.
“My darling,” he says, brushing his nose briefly against Will’s temple. “I am quite incapable of wanting less of you.”
Will’s eyes close.
Not quite so tightly this time, not so braced. Simply worn thin beneath the weight of finally being allowed to stop fighting him.
For several long moments Hannibal only holds him there against his chest while rain drifts steadily against the darkened windows beyond the living room. The storm has softened sometime during the night into something quieter. A low silver murmur against glass and distant trees alike. Beneath it lingers the scent of wet earth carried faintly through the old house alongside cedar smoke from the dying fire.
Will breathes it all in shakily.
Hannibal can feel the lingering tremors still moving through him in uneven intervals, though they no longer possess the violent edge from before. Now they seem born mostly of depletion. Adrenaline abandoning him by slow degrees and leaving only exhaustion in its wake.
Poor thing must feel flayed alive.
Hannibal smooths one hand carefully down the center of his back once more before finally drawing away enough to properly look at him.
Will watches him with swollen eyes and blood still drying in dark traces along his mouth and wrist alike. His curls have begun drying unevenly against his forehead, carrying the faint salt-scent of sweat and rainwater and dread. He looks beautiful in the devastating way ruined things sometimes are. The thought arrives with uncomfortable tenderness.
“We should clean you properly,” Hannibal murmurs.
Will’s lashes lower at once at the words.
There it is again. That tiny, instinctive expectation of withdrawal now attached to every transition between them.
Hannibal hates it.
Before Will can apologize for existing a second time, Hannibal rises smoothly from the sofa with him gathered securely against his chest. Will startles faintly at the movement before softening almost at once into the hold, one arm slipping weakly around Hannibal’s shoulders while exhaustion drags heavily at him.
“You don’t have to carry me,” he whispers after a moment.
“And yet.”
The answer draws the faintest fractured breath from Will that nearly resembles laughter.
Good.
Hannibal carries him slowly upstairs through the quiet house while heated lamplight trails soft gold along the walls around them. Will remains tucked close throughout the ascent, forehead resting near Hannibal’s throat while the scent of blood and rainwater and familiar cologne gathers warmly between them.
Possessive little thing.
The bathroom upstairs glows pale beneath low lighting once Hannibal shoulders the door open. Marble. Brass. Clean white linen folded precisely near the sink. The room still carries traces of Will everywhere from previous nights spent here; one of his shirts abandoned near the hamper, dog hair clinging stubbornly to the hem despite Hannibal’s repeated irritation over it.
Domesticity.
The realization brushes unexpectedly heated through him.
Hannibal lowers Will carefully onto the edge of the bathtub. Will sways slightly once seated, exhaustion clearly catching up to him now that the terror has finally loosened its grip. His fingers remain curled absently in the front of Hannibal’s shirt for one lingering second longer before slipping free.
The absence leaves an immediate chill behind it.
Hannibal kneels before him.
Will’s gaze follows the movement sluggishly.
“You’re still trembling,” Hannibal observes.
Will glances away.
“I’m tired.”
“Yes.”
Not merely tired.
Wrung hollow.
Hannibal reaches for the faucet and fills a shallow basin with heated water while steam curls slowly upward into the air carrying the clean mineral scent of heat and soap. Behind him, Will remains very still atop the edge of the bath, watching lowly through heavy-lidded eyes.
The knife still rests loosely in his hand.
Hannibal notices, though he says nothing about it yet.
Instead, he dampens a cloth carefully beneath the heated water before returning to stand between Will’s knees once more. The cloth brushes carefully against Will’s cheek first, cleaning away the thin rust-dark streak where he had smeared blood across himself earlier in the night.
Will’s breath catches.
Not fear now.
Something closer to embarrassment.
“Hannibal—”
“Be still.”
The words emerge low and absentminded, more indulgent than commanding.
Will obeys anyway.
Hannibal cleans him slowly. The corner of his mouth. His jaw. The damp salt tracks left behind by tears.
Each touch seems to pull Will further downward toward sleep and trust alike. His shoulders loosen gradually beneath Hannibal’s hands. His breathing evens. Once or twice, his eyes drift shut entirely while Hannibal tends carefully to the shallow cuts striping his arm.
None deep.
Thank God.
Hannibal presses a final, clean bandage carefully into place before reaching at last toward the knife still resting in Will’s loosened grip.
The reaction is instantaneous. Will’s fingers tighten weakly around the handle.
Hannibal stills.
Will notices the pause and looks suddenly horrified with himself.
“Sorry,” he whispers, trying to release it fast enough that the movement nearly fumbles the blade entirely. “I just—”
“Shh.”
Hannibal closes his hand carefully over Will’s. The knife remains between them.
“You may keep it a moment longer.”
Will goes quiet.
Hannibal watches him carefully then draws the blade slowly from his hand not as confiscation, but ritual. The pearl handle gleams beneath the bathroom light while dried blood darkens the metal in delicate streaks.
Will follows every movement. Hannibal rinses the blade beneath heated water. Crimson unwinds slowly down porcelain.
Neither of them speaks.
The room fills instead with softer things now; the quiet rush of water, the lingering scent of bergamot and steam, the faint unsteady rhythm of Will’s breathing while fatigue finally overtakes the remnants of fear.
When the blade is clean, Hannibal dries it meticulously with one of the white linen cloths.
Then, without ceremony, he steps back toward Will and places it carefully into his palm once more.
Will blinks up at him, startled.
Hannibal folds Will’s fingers carefully around the handle.
“There we are,” he murmurs. “I trust you with it.”
Hannibal brushes his thumb slowly across the fresh bandaging at Will’s wrist.
“You frightened me tonight,” he admits.
Will’s brow creases, a small noise leaving him as he nods, the motion jerky and ashamed.
His gaze drops toward the knife still resting loosely in his hand while exhaustion pulls visibly at the corners of his mouth. Hannibal watches the familiar machinery begin turning behind his eyes again — self-correction, self-reduction, the instinctive urge to become smaller before rejection can arrive.
Fascinating creature.
“I’m sorry,” Will whispers.
Hannibal exhales lowly through his nose.
“Do you know,” he says after a moment, “what disturbed me most when I found you?”
Will shakes his head once.
Hannibal studies him carefully beneath the heated bathroom light. The swollen eyes. The lingering hypervigilance still woven through every movement despite the relative calm settling over him now.
“You were trying to condition yourself out of wanting me.”
Will’s breathing falters. The observation lands with immediate, painful accuracy. Hannibal sees it in the abrupt tension gathering through his shoulders, the slight widening of his eyes before they lower again.
“You had already begun negotiating,” Hannibal continues, “Reducing your desires. Offering smaller and smaller pieces of yourself in exchange for proximity.” His fingers tighten subtly around Will’s wrist. “As though affection from me were a privilege you might lose through excess.”
Will swallows hard, “I thought maybe I pushed too far.”
“You did.”
Will flinches. Hannibal’s gaze softens.
“Not by wanting these things.” His thumb strokes once across the inside of Will’s wrist. “By believing I would abandon you for them.”
The silence between them afterward feels alive.
Beneath it all Hannibal can still smell blood lingering against skin and linen and the faint salt of tears where they keep gathering in the corners of Will’s eyes.
Will looks devastatingly young like this. Drained clean by emotion. Held together now almost entirely by Hannibal’s hands.
“I can ask for less,” Will offers after a long moment.
And there it is.
Hannibal feels something dark and possessive move through his chest at once. Not satisfaction. Something far more intimate.
Because Will is offering sacrifice now. Not manipulation. Not bargaining.
Submission.
The instinctive willingness to carve pieces from himself in order to remain loved. What an extraordinary thing to place in another person’s hands.
Hannibal lifts Will’s chin carefully until those exhausted blue eyes finally meet his again.
“My dearest Will,” he says, almost reverently, “why would I want less?”
Will’s expression falters.
Hannibal watches the confusion move through him with clinical fascination.
“I know what you are asking me for,” Hannibal continues, sliding a hand into Will’s hair. “I know what it does to you when I permit it.” His gaze lowers briefly toward the knife in Will’s hand before returning to his face.
Will’s fingers tighten faintly around the pearl handle. Not defensive, but almost hesitant now, as though uncertain whether he still deserves the comfort of holding it after everything that unfolded downstairs.
The thought leaves a bitter taste in Hannibal’s mouth.
Steam drifts pale through the bathroom around them while Will sits suspended beneath his gaze, exhausted enough that every emotion crossing his face appears slower now, less guarded. Hannibal can still see the remnants of fear lingering there. The lingering expectation that this tenderness must eventually narrow into revulsion if examined too closely.
Poor little empath.
Hannibal brushes his thumb once beneath the dampness gathered at the corner of Will’s eye before speaking again.
“You unravel so beautifully,” he confesses.
Hannibal’s fingers move slowly through his curls, untangling them with absent care while he watches every minute reaction move across Will’s face with quiet fascination.
“Most people spend their lives concealing themselves,” he continues. “Distorting desire into something more acceptable. More palatable.” His mouth softens faintly. “You never truly can.”
Will lowers his gaze almost at once. Hannibal catches the shame returning at once and tilts his chin carefully upward again before it can root itself too deeply.
“No,” he chides, “Do not hide from me now.”
Will frowns, almost in pain, tipping his head to the side beneath the correction.
“You are not frightening to me,” Hannibal continues, voice lowering further now. “Do you understand? I know exactly what lives inside you.” His thumb brushes once across the damp corner of Will’s eye. “And I find it exquisite.”
Will’s lips part slowly.
Hannibal watches the praise settle through him in visible waves, dismantling another fragile layer of the dread still clinging stubbornly beneath his skin.
“My darling,” he murmurs, hand slipping fully into Will’s hair now, soft and possessive there, “there is something almost unbearably beautiful about the way you feel things.” His gaze drifts briefly toward the knife resting in Will’s hand. “The way your entire body answers want before your mind has decided whether it is permitted.”
A faint tremor moves through Will at that. Hannibal continues, more lowly still.
“You reach for what soothes you with such honesty.” His thumb strokes slowly along the line of Will’s jaw. “You reach for me before you realize you’re doing it. At crime scenes. In bed. Half asleep.” His fingers slide lower against the back of Will’s neck, “Even tonight, after convincing yourself I no longer wanted you, you still looked for me first when it became unbearable.”
Will’s eyes flutter shut briefly.
So beautiful, even like this.
“You are not some vulgar thing I indulge despite myself,” he says. “I know you too well for that.” His thumb traces once across the line of Will’s lower lip where the faint taste of blood still lingers. “I know what quiets you. I know what opens you. I know precisely how your mind sounds when it finally stops hurting.”
For a long moment, Will says nothing.
He only sits there beneath Hannibal’s hands with damp lashes resting against flushed cheeks, breathing slow and uneven through the last remnants of exhaustion still pulling at him. The knife remains loose in his grasp now, held almost absently between tired fingers.
Hannibal watches the realization settle through him by increments. That, perhaps, is enough for tonight.
Will’s forehead lowers carefully against Hannibal’s shoulder, all the fight gradually leaving him at once. Hannibal feels it happen in real time; the slow surrender of muscles held taut for too many hours, the trembling easing from his hands, the fragile trust returning piece by piece beneath his touch.
“Always so precious, aren’t you?” Hannibal croons softly into his hair.
Will makes a quiet sound in response, nearly asleep already.
Carefully, he slides the knife from Will’s loosening grip. This time, there is no resistance. Only a faint exhale against the hollow of Hannibal’s throat while exhaustion drags him further downward.
Hannibal folds the blade closed with a soft metallic click before setting it carefully atop the marble counter beside the sink. Not hidden. Within reach.
Always within reach.
Then he gathers Will back into his arms. Will yields at once now, forehead falling against Hannibal’s shoulder while one weak hand curls instinctively into the front of his shirt once more. His breathing has nearly evened out entirely by the time Hannibal carries him from the bathroom, heated lamplight spilling across pale walls as they move through the house.
Rain continues beyond the windows in a low silver hush.
Hannibal lowers him carefully onto the bed before climbing in beside him without hesitation, drawing Will close almost at once beneath the sheets. Will folds toward him instinctively even in his exhaustion, pressing near with unconscious certainty.
Hannibal smooths one hand slowly through his curls while Will drifts steadily toward sleep against his chest, still faintly smelling of soap and rainwater and the lingering metallic trace of blood.
It had taken remarkably little for Will Graham to believe himself abandoned.
The understanding lodges heavily beneath his sternum.
How delicate his empath truly was beneath all that violence.
Hannibal presses one final kiss against damp curls near Will’s temple and tightens his hold fractionally as sleep finally overtakes the man in his arms.
The irony of it settles slowly through him afterward.
Will Graham, who could reconstruct murder from blood spatter and instinct alike. Will Graham, whose mind moved so naturally beside violence that Hannibal had recognized himself reflected there almost at once. Will Graham, who trembled with relief tasting blood from another man’s skin and still possessed the astonishing capacity to believe himself monstrous for it.
And all the while, it had been Hannibal lying beside him.
Hannibal, who had worn civility over brutality so elegantly for decades that entire rooms mistook him for refinement itself while bodies disappeared neatly in his wake.
A vicious creature.
An ancient appetite dressed beautifully.
Yet somehow, Will had spent the evening convinced that he might finally prove too depraved to love. The thought strikes Hannibal with something perilously close to grief.
Slowly, he gathers Will nearer still beneath the sheets until no space remains between them at all. Will sighs softly in his sleep at the pressure, instinctively seeking heat, even unconscious.
Yes, there you are.
Hannibal closes his eyes briefly against the feeling of it, one hand still threaded possessively into his hair.
His poor, exquisite empath.
So terrified of the darkness inside himself.
So utterly unaware of the kind of monster that had already decided to cherish it.