#armand and daniel both have hands and a mouth

[smalldicksantiago]

i know we talk about chuck chair armand but have we ever talked about daniel not really being that into it? like all daniel wants is armand and yet he sleeps with these people armand brings back and why? if he doesn't enjoy it, why do it? i think daniel sleeps with these people to please armand because he believes that it's what armand wants but what armand wants is daniel. i think, in some sick twisted way, armand is echoing his relationship with marius.

[ariaste]

If you could sit the vampire polycule/diabolicule down in a row on a sofa to watch one (1) movie with the intent of causing the maximum amount of psychic damage and/or drama, what movie would you pick for them? I'll go first: Moulin Rouge. Hear me out.

Louis is upset because he's a pretentious snob (affectionate) when it comes to Art and he's complaining that it's just a ripoff of the opera La Traviata. He's correct but he doesn't need to say it, he is allergic to camp and he's harshing everyone's vibes with his barely-under-his-breath scoffing.

Daniel is ruefully identifying way too heavily with Ewan McGregor's character. Daniel is sitting here with his mouth firmly shut like, "Nobody call me out for being exactly Like That when I was 20, nobody look at me, nobody read my mind, nobody make eye contact with me, god this is cringe. Look, he's even got the drug use going on." (This is show!canon that we're talking about so thankfully Daniel doesn't have to also cope with the "AND he's embarrassingly into a hot redheaded theater nerd, god just kill me now, nobody Perceive me please" vector of embarrassment). Daniel is also not having a good time with the creepy older men skeeving on this theater nerd sex worker once he thinks the words "Hm, Marius vibes"

Daniel and Louis also feeling kind of mutually overstimulated from how their heightened vampire super-senses are reacting to all of the Colors and Flashing Lights and Whippy Camera Movements etc. They have matching headaches and are feeling slightly nauseated.

Everyone is feeling some degree of slightly triggered, emotionally, about either Paris In General (Daniel), or Niche-Theater Life In Paris (Armand, Louis, Lestat). Big mixed feelings also about tuberculosis, a disease that makes people cough up blood.

Armand and Lestat are profoundly NOT allergic to camp, unlike some people on this wretched sofa. Armand and Lestat cannot be overstimulated by Colors/Flashing Lights/Whippy Camera Movements/etc, bc their vampire neurodivergence goes in the opposite direction. They have not blinked or moved in 90 minutes except to breathlessly clutch each other's hands. Lestat is muttering feverishly under his breath like "armand. armand. armand. is it maybe time for us to found another theater together, do you think???? armand??? what if we just. are you doing anything after this. how much cash do you have on hand right now." his ADHD hyperfixation on a new-old hobby is going BUCK WILD. He has to recreate this except EVEN MORE. Armand is watching Satine Suddenly Die At The End, just like how in all of his silly little plays someone also Suddenly Dies At The End, and he is deciding that this is maybe god's perfect movie. This is the greatest film either of them has ever seen. They think this is Cinema.

Armand and Lestat will have never agreed with each other for so many consecutive minutes as they will when the credits roll and Louis starts monologuing about how much it sucks to the point of VAST OFFENSE AND HURT FEELINGS on Armand and Lestat's part

the whole mess devolves into a screaming fight between the three of them while Daniel both refuses to referee and also won't stop making bitchy comments once he twigs to the fact that nobody else seems to have noticed that he was Going Through Some Cringe Nostalgia. The night is ruined, no one is happy, Louis takes Lestat floating the idea of founding a new theater with Armand since "you clearly don't understand art, LOUIS" as one of Lestat's top five greatest betrayals. Armand is not giving a straight answer about whether he is on board with the theater idea or not, which upsets everyone equally, unlike if he had said yes or no clearly and at least gotten one ally locked down. Louis appeals to Daniel to oppose the theater idea; Daniel does a bad job of doing so because he chronically believes that maybe having some hobbies will Make Armand Worse, which is a thing he's into sexually. Everyone goes to bed mad. The passive-aggression for the next week could be cut with a knife.

[diningwiththeasquiths]

I have this really hot mental image of Louis and Armand seated on opposite sides of (old) Daniel, both their mouths latched onto his neck, drinking deeply, with Daniel's head thrown back in rapture, their hands joining together in between Daniel's legs where they are pleasuring him

[murfpersonalblog]

IWTV S2 Ep7 Musings - Loustat: The Trial (Spoilers)

Imma split my Loustat musings into 3 parts, cuz there's A LOT to unpack. So I'll do the Ep3/4 & Ep5 revisits in the next posts; this is just general/initial Louis & Lestat stuff I wanted to respond to.

They beat the dog snot outta Louis, omg. They nearly snapped his neck! Louis was barely conscious, ofc his memory's spotty.

I LOVE how they're emphasizing the physicality of the Maker-Fledgling bond, first w/ Lou & Madz, now w/ Les. It's ofc all wrapped up in how much Loustat loves e/o, but its also their blood connection thru Amel. (I wonder how Louis Merrick'ing himself in Ep5 affects his connection to Amel if his heart didn't stop, cuz Armand stopped him from burning too much?)

And I love what Jacob said in the Insider, afterwards.

Fear that Lestat's come to exact revenge; excitement (a frisson of both negative & positive emotions, excited to see Les just cuz of the tension of having not seen him in so long, but also having all his nerves & senses tingling cuz of the tense anticipation & not knowing what to expect--hence: fear); fury cuz this whole mess could've been avoided if Les had told them WHY European vampires should be avoided at all costs; and relief cuz Les's' alive, his husband's ok.

But this time Lou KNOWS he's the real deal, cuz he can FEEL it--"it wasn't NOT his hand." And Dream!Stat jumpscare in Dubai, well well well; I thought Lou'd stopped seeing him on that Parisian bench? 👀

Here we effing go, whatever this French bish has to say better be good 🍿🍿🍿

I HATE HIM YOUR HONOR 🤣 Omfg take ONE thing seriously! Not the Roland-Garros, STFU! XD Lestat going off script got the coven like WTF?!

OML 🍿🍿🍿

Well that's not helpful at all--WHICH ONE!?

Les was asleep for the whole 100 years b4 he went to NOLA--but we KNOW this can't be true, cuz Les met Marius after he left Paris❗ SAM (the vamp) has been mouthing the words to this whole script, so I wonder if that's just what Les was TOLD to say, OR! It's what HE told THE COVEN, so they wouldn't know about TWMBK❗❗

NOT LES DOING A PIROUETTE INTO THE EARTH STAHP OMG 😭

THIS GAY QUEEN CAN'T HELP HIMSELF, I CANNOT

Awoke in 1908 & disembarked in humidified daughter of Paris, NOLA--but Les told Lou he was headed for Saint Louis, Missouri. 👀

"And who did you meet there?" DANG this is TENSE--Loustat finally making eye contact for the first time, Les having to see his husband all beat up & sad; as Claudia languishes in the background, as usual.

Not Louis with the cigar 😭

"The ACCUSED," LOL, Santiago had to catch himself--stay dehumanizing the violent evil Black man whydontcha; we see you. And Lestat had to feed him his own lines after derailing everyone with that homophobic soldier's evisceration.

Omg this sounds like every court case b4 they throw the book at a Black man. And the bored unaffected way the white audience just rolls their eyes & shakes their heads & smokes--they DGAF about Lou; they've already decided he ain't ish--A STONING.

LOUIS FACE. This is EXACTLY how folk in the fandom talk about Lou--and it came back with a vengeance during all that Loumand Maitre/Arun crap, as y'all were QUICK to jump on Lou being an evil pimp, even though your fave Daniel literally said that was just kinky roleplay Armand didn't take seriously when ish got REAL.

I thought y'all were just bartering for the "last bouquet of lilies"!?

Oh great, the coven's making Louis look like a perv predator. 🤦‍♀️ And the visual centering of Lou's dastardly mind-control waves like a halo over sweet innocent victim Lestat's blonde head, I CANNOT.

Omfg Louis face, SAME! If this crocodile-crying liar don't take his To Kill A Mockingbird, Central Park Five lookin arse off that stage! 🤬

Omfg Lestat I'm finna kill you myself. Omg this nonsense is too much; I know Lou, speak up, YES! But also, STFU, Les is actually tryna save your life by tearing your reputation to shreds. 😬🤦‍♀️

I loooove this effect when the coven uses the Mind Gift on them. They effed him up so bad his left eye started hemorrhaging. 😭

Armand don't you look away for an INSTANT, don't you even BLINK! You could've prevented this, EFF ALL Y'ALL in this nasty AF Theatre!

This gaslighting is hitting way too close to the way IRL court cases go when the innocent get the book thrown at them for crimes they didn't commit.

This is so painful to watch, but Sam Reid you better werk; the way he was yelling those lines had me shook, oml.

Les knows he's effed up, but what can he do? His eyes are going red; he's gonna cry. (His contacts look different, I thought they said they were gonna stick with purple eyed Les?) "I offered it to him in the church on the altar: My companionship." And Lou nodding along, cuz that was their wedding! 😭💔

I was wondering how these frames would be used. It's about the Ep3 race riots and vampire loneliness, the night Louis left & Claudia was made. But I love the implications, cuz how could humans know ANYTHING about hows vampires feel--which is SO important when they start lying about everything else that went down with how Claudia was made and how it would affect her as a "defective" vamp.

Even the VAMPIRES don't know how other vampires feel, and the capacity they have for enduring--Armand said it over & over to Louis in Ep3 and Madeleine in Ep6. Lestat came closest in S1 when he commented on Claudia's eternally 14-yr old metabolism & needing to eat more than an normal vamp, but beyond that none of them had a effing clue what Claudia was going through. They don't know REAL loneliness, even with her diaries telling them what she thought, not HOW SHE FELT.

(And I'm reminded of what I said here about Gabrielle telling Lestat what her loneliness felt like. I think "vampire loneliness" is different for every vampire; which is precisely why Gab (and Claudia) was able to walk away from her Maker/son & live alone; while Nicky & Louis went crazy.)

Lestat crying blood tears, daaaaang 😥

Kill this dude (but I stan a Loustat ally, LOLOL).

Imma stop here, cuz I've run out of Tumblr's stupid 30-pics per post, and the Ep3/4 revisit that "took all the pieces of Louis life, defiled them, bent them into a Lestat-shaped effigy" is IMO the JUICIEST part, with the most new meat to chew on.

[irisbleufic]

There are now 5 chapters out of an estimated 12 (may change) posted. Set in 1973. One random misdirect during Daniel’s encounter with Louis at Polynesian Mary’s, and the entire night’s events change drastically for Daniel and Armand (and the future changes for everyone). Reckless gremlins, both of them.

Open Your Mouth (2024-10-25)

Test the Theory (2024-10-26)

Twist the Blade (2024-10-27)

Pretend It's Me (2024-10-28)

Trust Without Limits (NEW, 2024-10-30)

TEASER:

“I wouldn’t have guessed you like Westerns,” Daniel teases.  “Or is it the handsome leading man that tempted you to see this when it came out?”

“The genre is, on occasion, narratively innovative,” Armand says, running his thumb over the back of Daniel’s hand.  “This is one such example.”

“The reviews caught your eye, then?”

“They were favorable and peculiar.”

“Which critic got you most fired up?”

“Canby at the New York Times.  He called it, I quote—part ghost story, part revenge Western, more than a little silly, and often quite entertaining in a way that may make you wonder if you lost your good sense.  I would’ve seen it if he’d simply said the part about losing good sense.”

“Because you would’ve wanted to see if that was a good thing or a bad thing?  Because you would’ve wanted to be surprised?”

“Actor-directors make odd decisions when they’re too close to the work.  It’s why I never did both at once.  Eastwood has done admirably.”

[apoptoses]

It’s rare that he gets to see Daniel’s first meal of the day. He’s picked through his memories, he knows that on the Night Island he tends to wake in the afternoon, stumble down to the kitchen to graze. Daniel takes advantage of the ability to call their private chefs in to make him bacon, eggs. Food that sits heavy on his stomach so that he has to wander back to bed to sleep off the rest of the day. After that it doesn’t much matter, Daniel thinks. He’ll get Armand’s blood and that’s enough to hold him over. A cycle of snacking and blood sharing that repeats and repeats and repeats.

“LIsten, we need to make a pact,” Daniel mumbles between bites. “No more west-bound long haul flights. At least not without a couple days between each layover.”

Armand frowns. “Was it so burdensome to fly without me beside you?” 

It had been odd, departing in the evening in the cargo hold, trapped within the box that contained his coffin. Moving backwards through time. To leave in the dark but arrive in the middle of the morning- it creates a certain kind of inertia, he finds. 

Perhaps it’s what they mean when they say ‘jet lagged’. All of that effort to only be in a place for a week and then they’ll be moving on. Tickets to Thailand, to Nepal, to Greece. They wait in Daniel’s bag. More travel, pre-planned, predestined. A time limit on every stop. Armand wonders how exhausted they’ll both be by the end. 

Daniel spears a vegetable on his fork. He shrugs. “I don’t like it. Being without you.”

Without the blood.

This too, Armand recognizes from his youth. The ravenous fits that come between the tastes of blood. He remembers clearly being sixteen and not eating for days after the drinks his master had given him, and then falling upon the table and out eating all of the other boys.

There’s hollows beneath Daniel’s eyes. A sharpness to his cheekbones that hadn’t been there when they’d met, and perhaps that’s a sign of the march of time- he is, after all, creeping up on thirty now; no longer the wide eyed boy Armand had met but a man in his own right. But then-

His spoon clacks against the glass parfait cup. Daniel digs in straight to the bottom where the ice cream is, bypassing the fruit and whipped cream and chocolate sauce. Somewhere near his lap comes the sound of his insides churning. The wet sound of his stomach straining to accommodate that which he hasn’t consumed in- days? Weeks, perhaps. Armand can’t keep track.

He should be doing better than this. He ought to be taking better care of him but Daniel makes it so hard. The world makes it hard, with how anything and everything can catch his fascination. Like right now.

Something bubbles beneath the surface of him. A desire he can’t quite put a name to, a thread he’ll have to pull at until Daniel unwinds and he understands what it is that he seeks. Some unfinished business from the Copley, perhaps. The meal wherein he’d fed Daniel a bit of everything, only to depart before he could see the effect it had upon him.

There’s so much more he understands about Daniel now. And still so much to find out. He’ll never know him intimately enough.

Armand rests his chin on his hand. He takes in the way Daniel’s tongue sticks out the slightest bit when the spoon nears his mouth, the bob of his adam’s apple when he swallows. Daniel licks an errant blob of whipped cream from his upper lip and it leaves his mouth glossy with his saliva.

[AO3]

[danielmolloystits]

glaciers melting in the dead of night (1/1)

Summary:

“All this time, and you haven’t changed a bit.” The words fire from his mouth like gunshots into still air, his lips finally curling into the contemptuous sneer he’s been keeping at bay for the past several minutes. “Still nothing more than an eager black hole. An unremarkable, wanting mess of a man.” What is it like, he wonders, to be so out of control of your own desire? To be such a slave to your own basest impulses? After five hundred years, he’s forgotten the feeling. Suddenly, he is covetous to remember. Daniel’s eyes never stray from his. They didn’t back then, either. “And what’s your point?” “You’re going to show me,” he says finally, and he means it to sound commanding, but the words burst forth from his mouth like a belch or some other embarrassing indecency. It is uncharacteristically uncontrolled of him, though he supposes that’s been happening more and more since Daniel’s reintroduction into their lives. “What it’s like to be like you.” “An impeccable journalist?” “Hungry.”

Pairing: Armand/Daniel (Devil's Minion) WC: ~5,200 Rating: E

Underneath the adrenaline of the chase, Malik tastes of Jäegermeister and cotton candy vape juice. Sweet. Cloying. Armand is grateful the endorphins are there to cloak it somewhat, but as far as meals go, it is altogether disappointing.

A pity, that.

Once he’s drained the last of the tech bro’s syrupy blood, he begins the journey back to his lodgings in the city. It’s a decent trek—the boy knew how to run, at least.

As he walks, he finds himself wondering whether Louis has fumbled the interview in his absence, whether he’s given too much away that he oughtn’t have. It seems irritatingly likely. That’s okay, though: it’s not like Armand doesn’t know how to deal with such foibles.

When he arrives, however, a complication of a different sort awaits him, because he’d have to be a fool not to recognize the rotten energy in the air. The faint trace of anxiety that clings to the both of them.

Odd, he thinks. And inauspicious.

“Welcome back, my love,” Louis says, but his gaze falls a touch shy of Armand’s, instead landing somewhere along the curve of his cheek. “Your dinner was good, I hope?”

“It was palatable.” Armand tosses him a small, close-mouthed smile, before settling next to him on the couch and wrapping his arm around the other man’s shoulders. An outwardly innocent gesture that allows him to feel the subtle way they tense at his touch.

Precisely as he suspected. Their fear is directed at him.

Inauspicious indeed.

Meanwhile, Daniel’s eyes track Armand’s every movement, calculating and cold in their intensity despite his evident nervousness. Something about it sets Armand on edge. The unabashed arrogance of it, perhaps, to think it will do him any good.

“My apologies for interrupting,” he says with feigned benevolence, baring his teeth in an almost-grin in Daniel’s direction. If the human were any less clever, it might even pass for inviting. “Please, continue.”

Daniel hesitates a moment, still studying Armand’s face, but eventually he speaks. “We were just discussing Louis’s hallucinations of Lestat.” His voice is steady, even; taut and straight like a telephone wire. And yet, his heart rate speeds up a fraction. “And how they disappeared.”

Armand knows he isn’t telling the truth. “By all means,” he says anyway, gesturing for them to go on with his free hand. “Do not let me stop you.”

The corner of Daniel’s lips slants upwards slightly, as though Armand is a mere amusement to him. “Wouldn’t dream of it.” He turns his attention to Louis, asking, “So when the two of you made your commitment to each other—that was when you stopped seeing the manifestations?”

“Yes,” Louis confirms, reaching a hand up to squeeze the one that rests atop his shoulder. “I bid him farewell, so I could focus on what was actually in front of me.”

For a second, the journalist’s eyes flash back to Armand, quick enough that a mortal probably wouldn’t be able to see it. “Did you ever miss them?”

Armand swallows roughly at the question, a bitter annoyance creeping up his throat like a large and furry spider. Daniel must be attempting to get a rise out of him again.

How asinine.

For his part, Louis doesn’t seem to notice. “Sometimes,” his paramour answers placidly. Armand’s pinkie twitches, agitated. “The way we always miss the things we’ve let go of. But not once did I regret it.”

“Not once?” Daniel asks, and he’s not even trying to hide how he’s watching Armand’s reactions now. “You just quit him cold turkey, after he haunted you for decades? You never again thought, ‘boy, I sure do wish I could talk to the ghost of my ex-lover right now’?”

“Never,” Louis confirms. Armand finds it to be a shockingly blatant lie.

Daniel catches it as well. “Oh, come on,” he says sarcastically. “Surely you must have at least reminisced about him from time to time. Otherwise those tapes wouldn’t have been so much about him.”

Armand suddenly finds this interview overly tiresome. Actually, that’s not quite right; Armand grew tired of this interview long before it even began. He isn’t sure why he entertained Louis’s inane notion of continuing it in the first place.

It’s well past time he put a stop to it.

“Louis gave you his answer,” he says tersely, the fingers of his right hand gently drumming on his knee. “I believe we’ve wrung enough blood out of that particular stone for one evening.”

“Sore spot for you, I take it?” Daniel smirks at him, an ugly self-satisfaction practically dripping from his pores. As if he thinks he has Armand all figured out. As if he knows anything of what it means to be vicious.

Idiot. He’s no more fearsome than an abused shelter dog, snapping and growling in anticipation of a kick.

“Louis,” Armand says to his partner, although his unblinking stare is fixed directly on the journalist. “Would you give me a moment alone with Daniel? I think I’d like to tell him my side of the story now.”

Louis looks taken aback. “But—”

Armand has neither the time nor the patience for his tedious protests, so he flashes his eyes and silently compels Louis to obey the instruction. Effortlessly, his partner falls silent, his features slackening and his body growing loose-limbed in its compliance. Silently, he exits the living room, his gait made stilted and awkward with the force of the thrall.

“Bit dramatic, don’t you think?” Daniel remarks once he’s gone, raising a single eyebrow.

Armand ignores him. Instead, he asks, “What exactly do you think you’re doing?”

“I’m surprised you don’t already know,” the journalist replies archly. “On account of how you can read my mind.”

“Intruding on your thoughts would be impolite.” Armand’s voice is prim; his body held tight like a coiled spring. It is taking more willpower than he’d care to admit to refrain from scowling. “Besides, yours are rarely worth hearing.”

Somehow, it comes out like an admission.

Daniel’s gaze is unflinching as he asks, “You’re still unable to figure out what makes me so fascinating, then?”

A muscle in Armand’s cheek spasms. “I see,” he says slowly. “So that’s what this is about.”

“Of course that’s what this is about,” Daniel replies, as if it should be obvious. Armand doesn’t much care for his tone. “Did you think we’d never find out? Did you really think yourself so infallible?”

The vampire shoots him a smile that’s all teeth. “Do you think it wise to provoke me, Daniel?”

The man waves a hand dismissively. “You had me on my knees back then, I remember it now. If you wanted me dead, I’d be dead,” he says, affect deadpan and matter-of-fact. “Hell, you could have done one better and gotten your revenge good and proper, tortured me for hours before you finished the job. Which begs the question: why didn’t you?”

A lip curling upwards, an inhale just on the wrong side of too sharp. A mask nearly slipping. “I needed to understand,” Armand answers, after one too many beats have passed. “As I’m sure you now recall.”

“What about me is so fascinating, yes, we’ve already covered that.” Daniel has the gall to sound almost bored with this conversation. “But the thing is, Armand, that you didn’t need me for that, and I clearly didn’t know. Why not ask Louis?”

Because it was crueler to ask you. “Louis didn’t know either. Observing you was the best strategy for gaining information.”

Daniel snorts; a hateful, unattractive sound. “And did you figure it out?”

The vampire says nothing. This, too, feels uncomfortably like an admission.

“Thought so,” Daniel gloats, as though Armand’s non-answer told him all he needed to know. “You wanna know what I think?”

“I’m sure you’ll tell me.”

“I think you do know what he saw in me. I think we both do.” He leans in a touch closer. And it’s amazing, isn’t it? That he’s still meeting Armand’s eye even as the stench of restless nerves pours off of him in waves. “In fact, I’ll bet you knew even then. You just didn’t want to admit it to yourself.”

Briefly, Armand considers that he might kill him after all; he’s sure Louis would get over it. “And what would that be?”

Daniel smiles at him, and it’s a remarkably savage expression on his time-weathered features. “He wanted an opportunity to talk about Lestat. Nothing more, nothing less.” For the most infinitesimal of moments, his vision shifts to fixate on Armand’s mouth before it crawls back upwards. “I think what really troubled you was why you were so fascinated with me.”

And that’s when he notices it: the thin undercurrent of excitement mingling with the journalist’s fear, the uptick in his already-quickened pulse. He’s aroused, Armand realizes, blinking in surprise; somehow, incredibly, Daniel is getting off on his foolish, suicidal goading. On the power he so idiotically believes he’s wielding in this conversation. Armand cocks his head curiously, leaning in a fraction. “You’re enjoying this, are you? This childish taunting?”

Daniel merely shrugs. “What can I say? I love my work.”

Armand’s eyes drop down to analyze his form, from the high hollows of his cheeks to the gentle slope of his shoulders. Down to the way Daniel’s body is tensed in preparation for a fight. Or , he thinks, the realization knocking the wind from his lungs, in preparation for something else entirely.

An emotion akin to disgust floods the pit of Armand’s stomach then, hot and angry and wild in the way it curls around his guts and squeezes. Unbidden, he remembers Daniel offering his body to him all those years ago—in a bid to stay alive, yes, but not without a faint whiff of intrigue palpable even through the surge of panicked pheromones. He remembers, too, puppeteering Daniel’s thin frame without needing to so much as lift a finger.

“All this time, and you haven’t changed a bit.” The words fire from his mouth like gunshots into still air, his lips finally curling into the contemptuous sneer he’s been keeping at bay for the past several minutes. “Still nothing more than an eager black hole. An unremarkable, wanting mess of a man.”

What is it like , he wonders, to be so out of control of your own desire? To be such a slave to your own basest impulses ? After five hundred years, he’s forgotten the feeling. Suddenly, he is covetous to remember.

Daniel’s eyes never stray from his. They didn’t back then, either. “And what’s your point?”

A good question. One Armand is not wholly certain he is capable of answering at this juncture.

“Well?” Daniel prods. His tongue darts out to wet his bottom lip, seemingly without conscious thought; Armand’s gaze falls to track the motion.

“You’re going to show me,” he says finally, and he means it to sound commanding, but the words burst forth from his mouth like a belch or some other embarrassing indecency. It is uncharacteristically uncontrolled of him, though he supposes that’s been happening more and more since Daniel’s reintroduction into their lives. “What it’s like to be like you.”

“An impeccable journalist?”

“Hungry.”

Daniel’s face splits into a broad grin, stretching the smile lines that bracket either side of his mouth like parentheses. He looks so human like this, so bright and radiant and alive. It makes Armand want to ruin him. “I can do that.” As he finishes the sentence, he stands, depositing his laptop into his bag. “Meet me in my room tonight,” he says, turning and walking in the direction of his accommodations.

In a flash, Armand grabs him by the arm to stop him. “I meant for you to show me now.”

But Daniel merely brushes him off and continues moving to leave, as if the vampire is some sort of bothersome insect he doesn’t have time to deal with. A gnat. Without turning around, he says, “What a shame you didn’t ask me to give you what you want, then.”

When Armand hears the muted impact of a door slamming shut a minute later, he can’t help but imagine that it sounds like an invitation.

With Louis still disoriented and tired from the compulsion earlier, Armand is free to spend the time waiting for nightfall pacing the floor of the dining room and remembering. Remembering how terrified Daniel was that fateful evening in 1973. Remembering how brave he was, too, compared to the whimpering, sobbing fools who became dinner each night at the Théâtre des Vampires.

Remembering, with crystalline clarity, the heavy thud of the boy’s knees against the linoleum, how he would have done anything Armand asked if it meant he would survive their encounter.

Daniel Molloy , he thinks, half scornful and half nostalgic . The very picture of desperation.

The instant the sun finally nestles itself beyond the Dubai skyline and out past the horizon, Armand is knocking on the journalist’s door.

He doesn’t answer it immediately, calling out with a request to ‘give him a minute’ before making Armand wait another fifteen. Thankfully, he opens the door after that; any longer and Armand would have abandoned his propriety and entered without permission. Alas, that needn’t come to pass, because soon he is being invited inside the suite his own money purchased.

Although he’s removed his sport coat, Daniel is still dressed in the smart gray button-up he was wearing earlier. He appears to have showered at some point, though, the heavy miasma of masculine aftershave wafting through the doorway as he opens it.

“Ah, you made it,” he greets cheerily. “Glad to see you didn’t get lost.” He gestures for Armand to enter and makes his way over to the four-poster bed.

“The penthouse may be large,” Armand says, his lips quirking upwards a bit, “but it is not that large.”

Daniel sits down on the corner of the mattress. “Don’t be so modest,” he replies breezily, patting the space next to himself in an invitation for Armand to sit beside him. “Come, sit. Let’s establish some ground rules.”

Armand follows the instruction readily, perching delicately next to Daniel on the bed. “Ground rules?”

“Yes. Like number one: I can touch you, but you’re not allowed to touch me.”

“Do you really think I would want to touch you?” Armand asks, voice laced with bemusement. It’s a front, and an unsubtle one at that—a way to distance himself from the intimate request he’s already made of the human.

Daniel sees right through it. “Doesn’t matter if you do. Only matters that you can’t,” he says, unfazed. “But for the record? I do.”

He leans over and brushes the tips of his fingers down Armand’s silk shirt, dragging them lightly over the front until he reaches the bottom. Once he arrives at the hem, he begins to unbutton it—no small feat with shaky hands, but he manages to accomplish the task with relative finesse. The vampire sucks in a sharp inhale at the contact, eyes following the ministrations of Daniel’s fingers as more and more of his own stomach and chest are revealed.

The surprising boldness of the touch nearly startles Armand into jumping, but he forces himself to relax into it; this was what he asked for, after all. He knew the implications. Still, he has the impulse to do something rash. Although he isn’t entirely sure what that would be, if he’s honest. Whether he would wind up biting Daniel or simply bolting.

Daniel is either ignorant to Armand’s internal struggle or utterly indifferent to it. “Rule number two,” he says, like he’s reciting a grocery list from memory, “is that you’re going to do exactly as I say.” The shirt is completely undone now, falling open and baring Armand’s skin to the balmy night air. Daniel slides his hands to either side of the collar, tucking them underneath the fabric to caress the vampire’s shoulders as he pushes it­ off of them.

He’s so warm, Armand thinks belatedly, as he passively allows the garment to be removed. How long has it been since I’ve been warm?

The shirt is soon discarded onto the floor with little fanfare, and Armand would protest the treatment of his expensive clothing if not for the fact that he seems to have forgotten how to speak.

Daniel leans in close, his hot breath ghosting over the shell of Armand’s ear. “Rule number three,” he says, low and sultry in a way the vampire would not have thought him capable of, “is that I’m not going to stop until you tell me to.” Then, he sucks Armand’s earlobe into his mouth, bringing forth a startled gasp from the latter’s throat. Just as quickly as it came, however, the sensation is gone, as Daniel pulls back to whisper once more. “Do you understand?”

Suppressing his every instinct, Armand nods, not feeling particularly capable of doing anything more. It’s utterly shameful: five hundred years of accumulating power only to be reduced to quivering silence by a God damn mortal. And so very quickly, too.

“Excellent,” Daniel says, and although his face is still out of sight, hovering as it is by Armand’s ear, he can practically hear the cocky smile in the man’s voice. “Because I’m not saying them again. Now lie back.”

After this is over, I am going to kill him, Armand decides. Then, before he can move, Daniel is pressing a wet kiss to the skin beneath his ear, his long-dead nerve endings lighting up at the contact. Yes, he thinks. After. For now, however, he complies, scooting backwards on the bed so he can settle in the center of it.

Daniel huffs a breathless laugh. “Such a good little vampire,” he praises, and coming from anyone else Armand would call it a purr. Whatever it is, it sends a humiliating shiver down his spine. “Arms and legs out,” Daniel continues in a lazy drawl, reaching into the drawer of his nightstand and removing tie after tie, each one a marginally different shade of navy blue than the last.

Armand has played this game before, of course he has, albeit not in a long time; there isn’t much of a point, is there, when he can so easily break free. But here, the mere thought of it makes a blistering heat pool in his gut—and whether it’s from the taboo of it all or the implicit trust Daniel is placing in him to obey is unclear. Either way, he rushes to rearrange his limbs into position. An action he would normally be able to perform in a smooth, languid motion manifests here stuttery and graceless, and Daniel snorts at his over-eagerness.

“Are you sure you need me to show you hunger?” he chuckles darkly, picking up Armand’s right wrist in a firm grasp before fastening it to the corresponding post with a practiced knot. “You already seem like you’re gagging for it.”

An involuntary snarl rips from Armand’s throat at that, his features contorting into something garish, savage. Nevertheless, he makes himself stay as motionless as a statue; he is still better than a beast, he reminds himself. He is still better than a mortal.

“Somebody’s grumpy,” Daniel remarks with a low whistle as he moves to Armand’s right ankle. “Must not have gotten your nap today, huh?” Before Armand can voice his indignation, Daniel runs his hand under the hem of his slacks, gliding the tips of his fingers teasingly over Armand’s taut calf muscle. It’s a relatively innocuous touch, all things considered, but in this context it feels intimate, naughty. The words of protest fizzle out on his tongue before they can form.

Once Daniel finishes restraining him, he steps back to admire his handiwork. “Not too shabby for a dying man, eh?”

The mention of Daniel’s imminent mortality brings Armand up short, though he isn’t quite sure why; it’s not as though he weren’t aware. But then, Daniel is climbing onto the bed and straddling Armand at the waist, and whatever he was thinking before is replaced with a maelstrom of conflicting emotions too intense for him to even begin to unpack.

“My hunger.” Daniel places one hand under the vampire’s chin, tilting his face up so he has no choice but to meet his sharp, blue eyes. “Is that what makes me fascinating?” When Armand doesn’t respond, he grips his chin a little harder, leans in a little closer. “Answer me, Armand,” he demands, an undercurrent of something feral in his tone.

He nearly sounds dangerous, Armand thinks to himself. Aloud, he admits to the truth: “I don’t know.” It feels like it’s being dragged out of him against his will, pulled from his throat until he’s choking with the weight of it, even though Daniel possesses no such gift. Even though Daniel is only a man.

“Is it my journalistic talent, then?” Daniel asks lightly, and there’s a distinctive mania in the way he grins down at Armand now. “The ease with which I’ve gotten you to tell me more than you ever intended? Is that what makes me fascinating?”

“I don’t know,” Armand repeats. If he did, he wouldn’t be here, would he? Loathe as he may be to acknowledge that reality.

“Well, then it must be my unflappable composure in the face of danger, right?” He’s leaning in closer, closer, until the tiniest shift of their postures would have their lips meeting. “Is that what makes me fascinating, Armand?”

“I don’t know.”

“No, you don’t,” Daniel agrees. “And that kills you, doesn’t?”

“Yes.”

“Good,” he whispers, and the way his breath fans over Armand’s lips makes him jerk against his restraints. “I hope you never find out.”

Then, he leans up and away from Armand, digging a pocket knife out of his work trousers as he does.

“What are you doing?” Armand asks, and there’s an absurd instant where he’s almost afraid, before he remembers who and what he is.

Daniel doesn’t answer, merely rolling up the sleeve on his left arm so that it’s folded at the elbow. He flicks the knife open and brings it to his own wrist, wincing as it breaks skin, and Armand’s eyes follow his hands with lurid intensity.

He just ate earlier today, and is still plenty full from that mediocre feast. It will be another couple of days at least before he needs to feed again. But God, he’s never wanted to more than he does right now, never craved anything more than to drain this irritating, impossible man.

It is getting harder to keep still with the scent of blood in the air, and the simple act of restraining himself is requiring more of his attention than he would care to admit. And it is a fit of weakness he will never confess to, but he momentarily contemplates using his gift to force his own body into a rigid compliance, to prevent himself from yielding to his more unsavory desires.

In what can only be described as a stroke of unwarranted mercy, Daniel presses the welling cut over Armand’s waiting lips. Happily, gratefully, the vampire runs his tongue over the wound, lapping at it like he hasn’t fed in weeks, months, years. It doesn’t taste good; it is thick with the bitter tinge of illness, of a difficult lifetime spent poisoning the body and mind. And yet, Armand moans as it floods his mouth, impatient to gulp down as much of it as he possibly can, swimming in the need to swallow Daniel whole.

It is a shallow cut, the blood rising to meet his tongue far too slowly for Armand’s liking. Not nearly enough to satisfy, he thinks, though he realizes that this must be the point of the exercise. And, as expected, Daniel does not let him have more than a taste, pulling his wrist away after a pitiful handful of seconds. Armand’s shameless mouth seeks to chase their connection, pulling against the ties that hold him like a needful, wanton thing in an effort to have more of the man.

The journalist chuckles and places a hand on the vampire’s chest to push him back down, and despite his ancient, primal instincts he wills himself to settle. “Good boy,” Daniel praises, grinding his hips down against where Armand has grown hard and wanting. He bites his tongue to smother the plaintive whine that threatens to spill from his throat at the perfect friction of it, allowing himself the singular indulgence of canting his hips delicately into the contact.

“Do you want me to touch you?” the other man asks, writhing so sinfully that Armand wonders whether he is writing out the words to some infernal contract, an eternal agreement to tether their souls together. He thinks perhaps he wouldn’t mind that so much.

“Yes,” he says, and he swears it isn’t begging, that he has more control than such a degrading submission to a mortal would indicate.

Daniel’s grin is full of blunt, human teeth. Armand imagines them sharp and shark-like instead, the teeth of a predator, and finds he quite likes the image of it. In the vision conjured by his mind, Daniel’s eyes mirror his own, and they must; the idea of anyone else turning him a strangely nauseating notion. “Do you want to touch me?”

“Yes,” he admits, because he does, because he doesn’t know how not to say it when the man is on top of him like this. When the rich, heady aroma of his still-bleeding arm is drowning out everything else.

“Too bad,” Daniel says, and oh, the smug look of satisfaction on his face is so very, very obnoxious. Armand wants to eat it. Then, the man is popping the button on his trousers, tugging the zipper down over the enticing bulge that warps the fabric. “But just because I’m feeling nice, I’ll still let you watch.”

Armand nods his agreement, even though he wasn’t asked a question.

Daniel removes himself from his underwear unceremoniously, and Armand rakes his gaze over him, committing the shape of him to memory like one of those photographs Louis loves so much. His cock is already reddened at the tip with his desire, a small pearl of liquid leaking from it like a promise. By all accounts, it is a perfectly average cock; possibly a bit thicker than most, but utterly mundane in its length. Regardless, the sight of it is exquisite to Armand, and he is overcome with a sudden and intense longing to drag his tongue over the salt-stained skin.

At first, Daniel does nothing more than trace his fingertips along the veins that interrupt the smooth, hard flesh, a constant and torturous reminder of the blood pumping just beneath the surface. However, it gives Armand ample opportunity to inhale every hitch in the man’s breath, every stutter in his movements that indicates his enjoyment of his own teasing touches.

“Tell me what you’re thinking about,” Daniel orders, his head thrown back and his eyes screwing shut as he wraps his fingers around his cock properly, his grip firm and steady as he strokes himself.

“Devouring you,” Armand says truthfully, and he’s surprised at how rough his own voice sounds, like it’s been scraped over sandpaper again and again until all that remains of it is a desperate rasp.

“You could, you know,” Daniel tells him, and all trace of mockery has been stripped by the earnestness of his pleasure, leaving nothing but an aching sincerity. “I couldn’t stop you.”

“But would you let me?” Armand’s chest tightens, squeezes, the phantom sensation of a heart skipping a beat that no longer drums beneath his breast. Somehow, the answer to this question feels more important than anything else has ever been.

Daniel hesitates, his hand pausing for a second in its dutiful work. “I might,” he answers finally. “Would you turn me?”

“I might.” Armand smiles, a private expression usually meant only for himself, but which he now finds himself content to share. His eyes seek out Daniel’s, and as the man continues to stroke himself, there is a searing intensity in his gaze that makes Armand’s stomach drop to his knees.

If Daniel doesn’t touch him soon, he worries his lust may incinerate him.

But Daniel doesn’t seem to care, too invested in his own pleasure, and now he’s making these tiny, exquisite little noises—these bestial, gasping things that send the desire growing in Armand into a riotous frenzy. He’s close, Armand can smell it, and it’s impossible to choose which part of Daniel he most wants to watch as his orgasm overtakes him: his face or his cock.

Ultimately, he chooses his face, so he can inscribe upon his mind the way those handsome features twist in rapture, so he never has to forget this moment. When a hot burst of Daniel’s release paints over Armand’s chest, it feels like it might brand him.

Daniel sighs as he works himself through the climax and the ensuing aftershocks, the tremors wracking his body even more violent than those usually caused by his illness. In silence, Armand stares at him, drinking in every last twitch and shiver.

What feels like a lifetime later, Daniel collects himself, the question mark curve of his body once more straightening into an exclamation point. With a cheeky grin, he dips two fingers into the mess by Armand’s nipple, the overly-sensitive contact sending a shudder rippling through him at velocity. Wordlessly, Daniel brings his coated fingers to Armand’s mouth. The way they shake causes him to smear the substance over the seam of Armand’s lips like a gloss.

Slowly, deliberately, he drags his tongue across them, keening as the concentrated flavor of this human firework greets him. It is salty and bitter, as it always is, but it is also more than that: to Armand, it tastes like the memory of whiskey, like how velvet feels when you pet it. It tastes like being alive again.

He nearly comes in his pants; it probably wouldn’t take more than a single intentional touch to finish him off.

But instead, Daniel climbs off of him, off of the bed, until he’s standing not a meter from Armand as he puts himself away and buttons up his pants. Silently, his eyes cut to the door.

“Wait,” Armand exclaims, sharp and needy, fully aware of what the man is intending to do. “Please.”

“You wanted to know what it’s like to be like me, to be hungry,” Daniel says, tone flat and unsympathetic as he starts to move towards the exit.

“I do,” the vampire pleads, a tawdry act of submission unbecoming of a creature of his status. He doesn’t care. “I do.”

“No, you don’t,” Daniel explains, glancing back at him with his hand on the doorknob. “Because let me let you in on a secret.” He grins meanly at Armand as he continues, “There is no satisfaction for a black hole.”

Then, he leaves, with Armand still tied to the bed, hard and leaking and completely, entirely starving. And even though he could easily free himself, could easily bring about his own completion, Armand stays exactly as Daniel left him. He stays like that, in fact, for so long that his limbs begin to cramp.

I’m not going to stop until you tell me to, Daniel had said.

God, Armand hopes that was a promise.

[wormtitty]

Kinktober Day 4: telepathy (armand/daniel + louis)

on AO3 here.

“Having fun, Daniel?” Oh. That's Louis’ voice in his head. He freezes. 

Of course Armand notices. The rhythmic thrusting slows to a gentle grind. “Daniel?” He asks, so polite. 

“I’m fine - keep going, I just.” He cuts himself off as Louis chuckles, low in the depths of his mind. “Um.” 

Armand bends over him until their noses nearly touch, cupping his face in both palms. The movement shifts his cock even deeper inside of him. Daniel swears he can feel it in his fucking throat. 

“Where is your mind, Daniel? You’ve gone elsewhere.” Its - cute. How Armand peers at him like he’s studying his molecular makeup yet caressing the sides of his face as if he’s something precious. 

“Something like that? A crash course on vampire telepathy might be helpful right about now, I think.” 

Armand hums, inquisitive, and brushes a kiss to his forehead. It shouldn't be so endearing, this tenderness and attention from the guy who’s currently eight-inches deep in his guts, but Daniel’s always had crossed wires about this kind of shit, so sue him. 

“He can’t read your mind, Daniel. You going to tell him who you’re talking to while he’s fucking you?” 

I am not talking to you, he projects, or at least he hopes he does. Not on purpose.

Daniel pulls Armand down by the back of his neck and closes the distance between them, licking into his mouth sweetly. He rocks up against him, reminds him how good he’s making Daniel feel before he drops the bomb. 

“It’s - aw, hell - it’s Louis.” A shocked sound reverberates around him, Armand’s and Louis’ joint surprise echoing like a feedback loop. Armand starts to pull away. Daniel grips him tight, doesn’t let him get far. “It’s not like I intended for this to happen, alright? But he’s here and now I don’t -” He cuts himself off with a frustrated groan.

Armand goes corpse-still.

“Pity, I was enjoying myself.” Louis chimes in. Don’t you have your own vampire daddy to bother? Daniel shoots back. “He’s busy, you know, rehearsals at all hours of the night. You know how it is.” 

Daniel does not, in fact, know how it is. Armand seems to be always at his side these days, hovering like an overattentive mother. Making up for lost time, he guesses. 

Speaking of, the vampire above him seems to snap back to life again, blinking rapidly out of his stupor. “Armand?” Daniel runs his hands up and down his flank in broad strokes, as if soothing a spooked horse instead of the centuries-old apex predator that’s currently balls deep inside of him. 

“Let him listen, then.” He sniffs, obviously trying his best to appear unaffected. Daniel sees right through him, but he’d kind of like to get off tonight, so he doesn’t call him on his bluff.

You hear that? Louis hums in his head, confirming. Daniel gets the sense that he’s settling in. Keep the commentary to yourself, at least.

And he does, for a little while. Armand sets about fucking him with renewed fervor, nosing along the line of his neck and mouthing at his jaw wetly. He snaps his hips, mean and punishing and exactly how Daniel likes it. That cock of his brushes against his prostate on every other thrust. He almost forgets about their telepathic visitor.

“He’s big, isn’t he? Makes you feel like you’re split open.” Jesus Christ. Daniel grinds his teeth together, slides a leg up and over Armand’s hip, pulling him closer, closer still. He tries not to think about Louis in his place, fails spectacularly. His traitorous cock jerks, leaking a drop of red, adding to the already sticky mess between his legs. 

“Are you close, Daniel?” He’s panting like a dog, more confused and turned on than he’s been in ages, Armand lighting up his insides like a fucking christmas tree and Louis whispering sweet nothings in his head. For one single second Daniel wishes Louis was actually there, with them, then immediately shoves the thought out of his mind as Armand reaches between them to wrap a hand around his dick.

“Yes, yeah, gonna come, like that - fuck, baby,” he’s babbling, he knows, but he can’t do a damn thing to stop the nonsense from slipping out. 

“Good boy,” Louis’ praise sends a shudder through him, and that’s it, he’s done for. Armand gets one more good thrust in before Daniel clamps down around his cock, spilling hot and wet between their bodies.

[minionsdevil]

Hey! Thought I'd share it here as well (I've talked nonstop about it on bsky)

They watch in unison as Eric just goes, and then Luke speaks, “What do you think?” His face, Assad realizes when he turns to him, is still slightly red. He’s looking at Assad with a small smile, like he’s thinking of something sweet. “About what?” “Armand and Daniel. What I was talking to Eric about before… before.” He shrugs, looks down. Looks back up, redder. “You know. You and us.” One corner of Assad's mouth lifts up, amused. “Armand and Daniel are definitely happening in both timelines.” Reaches behind Luke so he can lean on the counter from elbow to wrist. In this position and angle Luke seems taller than him, and with how they're close, Assad has to look up a little. His hand on the counter slips, the tips of his fingers touch the small of Luke's back. “Me and the both of you? Would require more straightforwardness than this.”  Luke smiles, slow and certain at him, cheeks not having a break from feeling warm.  “Come to the balcony with me,” he moves, taking Assad's hand and pulling. “I want to have a smoke. And then you can tell me how you think our scenes will play out.”

whirlwinds on ao3 — Eric/Assad/Luke, must be logged in to read!

[monstersinthecosmos]

Vamptember Day 13 - Tiara

{puscifer - bullet train to iowa}

tapestries & tile - part i

Warm breeze teases through Marius’s hair as he holds Daniel by the hips, dragging him closer, the hard stone of their balcony digging into his lower back. Half-seated on the ledge, one leg crooked with a foot perched on the baluster. Ahead of him, Daniel breathes a small whimper of pleasure, and behind him is the noise of traffic and static of the ocean. 

They’re both buzzed, from Little Drinks at the night club, one of the songs from the DJ set stuck in Daniel’s head, phantom bass still pulsing in him as he leans in to suck at Marius’s bottom lip.Traces of someone else’s drink on his mouth—whiskey cola, Marius guesses. Something in him recognizes the stickiness of it, knows how sugar tastes to a blood drinker, even if it all tastes of poison to him in the end. Still, the ghost of it there is exciting, leftover evidence of a victim, and it makes Marius tingle. 

80’s night at the club, and the DJ kept sampling all these atrocious old songs. Daniel joked to Marius at one point that they shouldn’t have been excavated, that not everything deserves immortality. But there was some sense of fondness in his voice, dreamy look in his eyes.

Daniel’s arms circle around Marius’s shoulders, and Marius has to open his legs to make space for him as they crush into each other, just breathing for a moment. Marius savors the warmth, the scent of humans stuck to his clothes, letting it wash through him for a beat before going for the throat.

He tastes different than he used to. Healthier with each month that passes, his blood full of the personality that had been lost. Full of feelings, and memories, and he’s so confident with the way he shares it. There’s never a sense of shame afterwards, knowing what Marius may have seen there, just the generous truth of it.

And now.

The heat hits the roof of Marius’s mouth, and he can feel the sludgy echo of the song in Daniel’s head, like the DJ unlocked some memory.

One of the dance clubs on the Night Island—Marius may have been there, he can’t quite be sure, but he knows because Daniel knows. It had a disco ball and checkered floor and Armand had commissioned tacky murals to cover all of the walls. 

Daniel remembers his head was pounding—a little too much to drink, and he had trouble keeping his balance, and the colored lights everywhere were smearing together. Frankie Goes to Hollywood was playing way too loud, and he was too uncoordinated to dance along, but all the humans were fawning over him that night. Girls were touching him and cooing, and kept adjusting the tiara on his head when it would slide down to the side. Ridiculous thing that Armand had forced on him, but he’d been in that perfectly-drunk stage, just a couple hours ago, and had found it funny at the time.

Now he wants to go home.

It’s too loud, and he can’t see Armand. He turns carefully in a circle, afraid he’ll puke if he moves too fast, eyes scanning over all the shiny bodies, errant limbs and sprayed hair, but he’s adrift in the crowd, all alone.

And some girl near him. Her nails bite into Daniel’s forearm and her eyeliner makes her look mean. She frowns at him, so tall in her heels that she gazes down into his face, and his vision doubles as he stares back at her.

“You’re too drunk, princess,” she says. “You’re the birthday girl, you can’t ruin your own party.”

“S’not my birthday,” Daniel slurs, but he doesn’t think she hears him.

“Open your mouth,” she commands.

Daniel wonders if Armand sent her. If she knows something, and who she is, and why she’s here. But he obeys her, anyway, without meaning to. Vision softening as he opens his mouth, unsure what he’s waiting for.

“You’re dehydrated, baby,” she says, and Daniel hadn’t noticed the glass bottle in her free hand. Fancy water that Armand insisted they stock at all the bars. Her nails click against its cool gleaming body as she pours some into his mouth.

Some of it spills on his chin, and he wipes it with the back of his hand. Room spinning as the water hits his stomach. She adjusts his tiara for him, and taps him on the nose.

“Good girl,” she says, and then she’s gone in the crowd.

His head lolls back, and he stares up at the disco ball. And water didn’t help. Just makes him feel more full, makes his stomach slosh uncomfortably. Doesn’t help the spins, and the disco ball doesn’t help either. Makes it worse, actually, but it takes a minute for his brain to catch up, and for him to look away.

Armand is there now, where the girl had been. Right in front of Daniel on the dance floor, with all the colors catching on his unnatural smooth skin.

“You’re too drunk, princess,” he repeats. His face stays expressionless, his voice flat. 

(It always chills Marius, seeing memories like this. Impossible to ignore that he isn’t the lively boy from Venice anymore, impossible not to notice that something happened.)

Daniel rubs a hand over his chest, over the bloom of heartburn in the wake of too many tequila shots. 

“You’re the birthday girl,” Armand mimics again, in the eerie deadpan. His eyebrow quirks as Daniel sways on his feet, and a sarcastic twang wraps itself around his accent as he tries to imitate her. “You can’t ruin your own party.”

“M’gonna be sick,” Daniel mumbles. 

Armand glances up and down Daniel’s body. Tilts his head as if listening. Daniel’s stomach gurgles and he wonders if he can make it to the bathroom in time, can’t actually remember where it is, but Armand’s cold hand is around his forearm before he can figure it out. Mind five steps behind as they weave through the dance floor, stumbling behind without a clue where they’re going.

His ears ring as they cross the threshold into the bathroom, as the door slams shut behind them. The music muffled instantly, and heat turned down. He feels clammy in the cool air, and the mosaic of the tiles blur as he tries to decide which toilet to go for.

It’s empty, he thinks. Can’t be sure. Oddly grimy in here, despite Armand’s standards. But, it usually is by the end of the night. It’ll be good as new by the time they reopen tomorrow. But there’s paper on the floor, and the garbage can is overflowing, and the faint smell of piss makes him wonder about the subtle damp layer across the tiles. 

“Open your mouth,” Armand says. He looks like a teenager from here, gazing up at Daniel, but he’s so freaky in the unforgiving white overhead light. Daniel glances towards the shiny green toilet stalls, mouth watering as his stomach cramps, but Armand has a hand on his shoulder before he can move. He’s too short, he shouldn’t be so strong. Uncanny that Daniel buckles beneath it, sinks straight down to his knees.

Already drunk enough and ready to be sick, but the wetness that soaks into his pants off the floor almost has him gagging. So near the urinals that he can smell the deodorant cake from here, down on the floor, at eye level. They never really work, do they? They just create something new. 

“Open your mouth,” Armand repeats.

The tiara slips as Daniel tilts his head back, catching sharp in his hair so it doesn’t fall. Armand is so tall from here, towering over him. Eyes stormy as he looks down. Daniel opens up, and Armand’s hand grips him tight on the jaw. Enough to hurt, enough that Daniel doesn’t move.

“Good girl,” Armand mumbles, and spits into his mouth. 

Marius swallows, licks over the wounds as they heal, and his whole body shakes with need as he comes up for air. 

[lacefedora]

Ambrosia: Devil's Minion / Armandaniel

I was inspired by THIS POST that provided such a vivid image I had to write it. this ficlet is rated E, sexy bits are under the cut.

-

Daniel doesn't remember biting into his neck, but that moan was going to haunt him the rest of his life. Armand moaning into his ear, panting against it in desperate gasps, each breath coming in time with each slow draw that Daniel took into his mouth. Savoring the blood. He'll never forget the heady burst of flavor. He will make certain of it.

Honey and pineapple Louis had said. He was wrong. It was so much sweeter.

Daniel had been too dazed when Armand had turned it to really taste it. And with Armand immediately taking off Daniel had been desperately depressed he might never taste it again. To get the chance to really imprint it on his memory. He wouldn't miss the chance now.

Armand moves and Daniel latches on tighter. His long fangs sinking deeper, bringing more exquisite, ancient blood to the surface. He hears Armand whimper and Daniel is dimly aware of sharp glass edge nails ripping into his skin. Like Armand is trying to claw him closer, desperate for even more contact than Daniel's teeth in him.

Daniel can't complain; really he wants to do the same. No high he'd ever chased could possibly compare to this. He'd like to split him open and crawl inside to drink from him until he died. This must be what ambrosia had tasted like. That's what it was. Not Honey and Pineapple. Ambrosia. Food only fit for the gods.

"Daniel please." Armand is gasping, the first words he's gotten out since this ordeal started. And they're desperate, thready, devoid of composure. Daniel will do anything to make him sound like that every day... the control freak unraveling, coming apart at the seems. A whole new brand of addiction taking hold in him. Or fuck, maybe this was religious fervor. Divine ecstasy.

Daniel knows what he wants too. He can taste it in his blood, smell it on his skin, feel it in the wanton twitch of hips. He moves his hand to the front of Armand's pants and rubs the deliciously hard cock he finds there. Timing it perfectly to align with the pull of blood from his veins. Armand thrashes bracing himself against the wall to push into the touch.

Armand's next moan is like a church bell, abrupt and resonant. Daniel can feel it echoing around in his brain. Daniel uses his claws well, slicing the button off Armand's pants and pulling down the zipper to shove them down off of him. At long last he wraps his fingers around Armand's cock. They both moan at the contact, though Daniel's is muffled by his mouthful. Fuck he must have almost bitten clean through the skin. Like a rabid dog.

Daniel hesitates, very nearly pulling his teeth free to look Armand in the face. But there's a mad scramble of limbs then Armand is grabbing the back of his neck and holding Daniel firmly in place. Daniel unwinds from his tension and then draws down another gulp of blood. He squeezes Armand's cock… He'd have to get a good look at it later. It feels as pretty as the rest of him. He works him much faster than the slow little drinks he was taking. The contrast drives Armand wild as he suspected and the moans he gives are completely unrehearsed. Needy.

Daniel can feel how hard his own cock is. He's been hard since the moment he sank his teeth into him. But he isn't paying himself any mind at all. It's completely secondary to the way Armand is falling apart pressed against the wall. Daniel shifts his grip and he knows it must be good because Armand jerks in his arms, tearing his flesh further. The renewed gush of blood causes Daniel to push his own cock against Armand's hip, mindlessly seeking friction.

The action causes Armand to give a choked cry that he muffles against Daniel as he comes in glorious hot spirts. The blood gets on both of them. Their shirts and Daniel's arm and hand. Daniel finally releases the bite, pulling back to admire his handy work… it looks much like his neck had looked before it scarred. The comparison doesn't bother him so much as it should. He smiles and the brings up his other hand to bite his thumb and close the wounds.

"Leave them. Let thim heal on their own." Armand insists, the quick as light he has Daniel pinned to the wall instead, dropping to his knees and ripping open his fly. His fangs are out as he swallows Daniel's cock down to the hilt. Daniel doesn't even warn him not to bite. He drops his head against the wall with a thud, moaning. He felt high, but still beautifully lucid. He laughs breathlessly as he winds his clean hand into Armand's hair. The other hand he brings to his mouth, licking it clean with Armand starting to give him by far the messiest blow job he can remember.

Daniel comes when Armand scrapes his teeth over his dick with deliberate intention. All he can taste is Armand's sweet blood in his mouth.

[dykesynthezoid]

*Person who’s fully lost it voice* anyway. Interview with the vampire The Alienist/1890s New York AU.

—

When Daniel woke it was with a pounding headache and a stringent taste in his mouth, which on its own was not at all unfamiliar— it wasn’t until he cracked open bloodshot eyes that he began to panic.

“The hell am I?” he muttered, sounding like death. Purgatory, perhaps? It seemed fitting that purgatory would have so much chintz.

“Benji, would you fetch Mr. Molloy a glass of water?” came a monotonous voice he unfortunately recognized.

Daniel blinked blearily at the consolidating shape of his least favorite Alienist (not that he was partial to any of them), quickly realizing he was collapsed onto an embroidered green silk settee, the fabric both hot and cool under his aching body. Armand was perched on the plush arm down by Daniel’s feet, regarding him cooly.

“You,” Daniel growled.

Armand’s lips twitched. “Yes, me,” he intoned with barely-hidden amusement. “It’s good to see you haven’t suffered any cognitive damage from your little escapade.”

Daniel’s lip curled in disgust, and he made an effort to tug himself up into sitting. He managed, but was rewarded with a wave of dizziness and a tight, awful clenching in his head and stomach.

He must have been bad at hiding it, as Armand seemed to wince. “Yes, you’ll likely be feeling the lingering effects for several hours more. A nasty combination, liquor and chloral hydrate.” He tilted his head. “You were drugged, Mr. Molloy.”

“Yeah, I got that,” Daniel snapped, hand squeezing white on silk fabric.

At that moment, a boy walked into the sitting room carrying a small glass. Daniel recognized him instantly despite his fogged mind, eyes widening.

“Thank you, Benji,” Armand said as the boy pushed the glass into Daniel’s hands without much aplomb. Daniel took it, staring dumbly.

“He was there,” Daniel said, having barely gathered his thoughts by the time Benji had trudged back out of the room, hands in the pockets of his too-big, rolled up trousers. “He came in through the window.”

Armand began to smile in a way that looked disturbingly proud. “Yes, he saved you last night. He’s very resourceful, young Benji.” His strange, amber eyes narrowed as he studied Daniel, tracing his outline. “It’s a good thing he was there, wasn’t it?”

Daniel set the glass down on the nearby end table, not particularly concerned if it left marks on the fine, dark wood. Straightening himself up further, he brought his legs down and set his feet on the floor, facing away from his would-be host. “You had me followed,” he said, simple as that.

“Yes,” Armand admitted, and shrugged. “After the meeting at Louis’s townhouse yesterday, he was concerned you might do something rash. As was I.”

“And Louis was on board with that plan?” Daniel shot back. Armand’s silence and eerily still face were answer enough. Daniel snorted. “I need a cigarette.”

He began to pat his pockets, growing disturbed when he found them empty, but Armand interjected. “I’m afraid Benji may have taken what he felt was a reward for his trouble,” he said. “You understand.”

“Of course,” Daniel bit through gritted teeth. “And my billfold?”

“To his recollection, that was the other boys,” Armand said. He raised an eyebrow. “You have lipstick on your cheek.”

[murfpersonalblog]

I had to pause reading this to scream laugh holler rolling in my grave at @siahatha's new fic & Louis's arm-burning scene--it's SO good! 👏 This is just me fangirling & thinking out loud; it was way too long to put in the comments at AO3.

Four little bars have been burned (and must have burned for a while, Jesus, he sleeps like the dead) into Louis’ forearm, hand, and fingers from where they smoldered in the little bit of light. Lestat must have moved Louis’ hand when he realized. Impulsively (premeditated), Louis slides his hand back into the light, eyes on Lestat. “Absolument pas!/ Absolutely not,” Lestat snarls, wrenching Louis’ hand back into the shadow. It hurts a little, but maybe only because of the burn on his arm.  “Joues avec moi/ play with me,” Louis whines, and he means it. Lestat is overreacting (typical, Louis can only be harmed on Lestat’s terms apparently) and Armand would have gotten it, would have let him burn just a little, and allowed him the grace of repentance.  “I will not,” Lestat works his jaw.... "....What’s wrong with some sexual processing? What’s the difference between a spanking and a little sun?” “....The difference, mon amour, is that I am not Armand. I get what I want, and what I want is my darling safe and sated."

I LOVE the contrast b/t Armand vs Lestat, and the diametrically opposed ways they handle Louis' mental illness--enabling vs enforcing. There's good & bad on both unhealthily toxic sides ofc; pampering & spoiling vs protecting & domineering; and there's a time & a place for both/either--but what really matters most is what LOUIS wants in a husband:

Lestat’s nostrils flare. “Impossible! I wake up to the smell of you burning your arm off, and now I’m being punished with century-old pettiness, for what? Declining to indulge your suicidality through the thin veneer of sado-masochism? Why would I pleasure you with pain when I am so very skilled at pleasuring you with pleasure? No, Louis, I will not burn you with the sun when I can take you into my mouth instead. Now, please, let’s go to coffin so that I may do just that and we can get some fucking sleep.” So there it was. Lestat was the best lay of his life and he wouldn’t let him hurt himself. And brother, Louis does feel warm here in the shadows with Lestat and all his loving firmness. Louis continues to be pleasantly surprised by New Lestat’s patience. He’ll return the blow job. He feels his honey deserves it.  “I think antidepressants would be a more apt metaphor,” Louis says, because he’s not about to just roll over.... Lestat rolls his eyes, actor expressive. “Regardless. A—what is the English?—a pushover! I am not. I will not allow you to hurt yourself and I do not give up. I will always be there to steady your hand.” Lestat tightens his grip on Louis’ arm. “And I will play no more of these games,” Lestat says, ending the discussion, scooping Louis up and carrying him to coffin, where he enjoys feeling weightless as Lestat steps over the coffin room’s threshold.  Later, Louis is being held in the true dark of the coffin, where it smells like Lestat and everything that means to Louis. He smiles, ignoring the sinking feeling. He’s gotten what he wanted. “I love you,” he whispers into the dark.

As pridefully independent & stubborn as Louis is, he still WANTS someone to snatch his hand away and tell him NO and bodily carry him out of the room and put him in a safe cocoon/coffin and hold him close & make everything better.

I'm just reminded of our very first scene with Lou demonstrating to Daniel what vampirism looks like in the sun; and Armand's reaction.

Like, it was wild that Lou even went that far, burning his arm just to prove to Daniel that he's really a vampire; when back in SanFran all he needed to do was flash his fangs & move at super speed.

Lou's chronically suicidal, but burning in the sun isn't the only way to self-destruct; he's BEEN slowly killing himself EVERY DANG DAY.

Armand erroneously thought Lou reading Claudia's diaries & being interviewed was what was gonna send him off the deep end again; but Daniel's proving that Louis NEEDS to face the past & confront his trauma so it can be processed & he can truly start healing--not bury it under the rug & force himself to forget.

Sure, Armand pulled him out of the sun in SanFran, but he had/has been doing LITERALLY NOTHING ELSE to pull Louis out of his continuing spiral; often contributing to Louis' bad practices; or standing back and watching Louis "act out"--these are CRIES FOR HELP; but Armand can't see it; he just judges Louis & resents him in silence. The 100+ drunken/drugged blackout sexcapades eff-off-and-find-me-laters; asking Armand to lobotomize him 3 days after he'd had a terrible mental breakdown; taking on the Dom role when Lou's not even good at it & doesn't enjoy it; squirelling himself away in Dubai eating human food that tastes like glue--it's ALL self-mortification; it's ALL suicide. Louis wants to get OUT, but he needs help that Armand just can't give him.

Sadly, Lestat, for all his flaws & faults, is the one Louis REALLY wants; and (giving the devil his props) he's much better equipped to handle Lou, cuz he's not afraid to bully Louis go head-to-head with him. Fighting is NOT the right way ofc; and Loustat aren't inherently predisposed to fighting at all--they're both actually incredibly sensitive & soft--but the struggles in Loustat's life hardened them & conditioned them to become fighters--nurture versus nature.

Loustat's problem is that they needed to learn how to communicate WITHOUT the crutch of telepathy (which clearly hadn't helped Loumand anyway ); and realize that as companions/husbands, every conversation/connection doesn't actually NEED to be borne of violence--seeing each other as obstacles to be crossed or fights/battles to be won.

One of my favorite lines in a fic is from BlueBloodBruise's Go Fetch God:

He could hear Lestat pacing downstairs, playing music that galloped nowhere, raging at the world with two fists up. If he closed his eyes, Louis could still hear him weep, howling sobs so freighted with grief they reminded Louis of the screams of mating herons.... "What, Louis?! What in God’s rotten hell do you want? You know I can't read your mind!" "You." This is the definition of madness, Louis thinks dimly...trying to convince his murderer to let himself be loved. "I want you to let me in. I want to let you in without being afraid you’ll tear me to pieces, like God would have if he'd peered into my soul when I was mortal. If I fear you, I can’t love you, Lestat. You have to share yourself with me—" "I did! I shared my blood, my home with you, my—" "No. I need you to put your fists down and look at me. Not like some object you created, but like an equal, your hus—" .

They needed to find a balance--as EQUALS. Passivity & cowardice isn't the right way either, and sometimes when you see your loved one doing dangerous stupid ish, you HAVE to step up and stop them; even if they get mad and it causes a fight and they yell & holler that they hate you.

ARMAND NEVER HAD THAT! Armand went from a sheltered childhood in poverty to parents who sold/threw him away; to sex slavery & captivity; to white-savior hero worship living with uber-hedonistic Marius who spoiled him rotten & taught him to mix pain w/ pleasure via BDSM; to 200+ years in a brainwashed Satanic cult of self-loathing & self-mortification (all pain & zero pleasure); to LEADING that Satanic coven & brainwashing others to follow the Great Laws & gaslighting humans to not notice that the calls are coming from inside the house. This is all Armand's ever had.

Louis was his first/only "real" relationship with a normal person (someone not his Maker & not a coven-member). Armand overcorrected all the harsh treatments he got & gave b4, to treat Lou with kid gloves--when really, Lou needed tough love--not someone to "chop his hands off" the way Armand treated Nicki, but someone to really HELP him cuz they UNDERSTAND & love him.

Lou was deeply traumatized by his formative years, too--his baby brother Paul in & out of mental asylums, cast off by Papa DPDL & coddled by their mother Florence; who babied Paul but HATED any signs of LOUIS being ANOTHER "fragile son." Anything "wrong" with Lou he'd need to figure TF out how to get rid of ASAP!

Louis couldn't afford to be mentally unstable, depressed--he needed to buck up & take care of this nasty AF family that hated/resented/didn't understand him. The only one he'd ever connected with was Paul--who committed suicide right in front of him after Louis told him he loved him; only for Lou's own mother to blame him for Paul's death like wtf.

The only one who understood even a fraction of what Lou'd gone through and how Lou operated & what he'd want/need IS LESTAT. Cuz he'd been there, too.

Les grew up dirt poor, but his family dynamic was uncannily similar to the DPDLs; only instead of Paul, Les had Gabrielle. Les saw his mom Gabrielle in Louis, (and Armand KNOWS this; which is why his whole backstory/account of Lesmand in Paris is SUS AF). Louis was SEEN by Lestat--they're kindred spirits; two sides of the same coin--for better and for worse; cuz when Loustat's in sync it's beautiful; but when they clash THEY CLASH. 💀

Loumand has never been in sync; they're only ever on the same page when they're performing/pretending/role-playing. Armand constantly says/does the WRONG thing--

--then victim-blames Louis afterwards; redirecting any and all culpability OFF himself and ONTO LOU (or Claudia, Daniel, Santiago, Tom, Dick and Harry....), as if it's all Louis' fault what happened to him, and not the result of Armand's contributing/mishandling of Louis' PTSD.

As opposed to the way Lestat talks to Louis--

--not focusing Lou's suicide attempt as the result of something Lou did to HIMSELF, but rather something done TO Louis--(mental) illness isn't HIS FAULT; it's something he can get HELP for; and Les loves him and is just waiting for him to be ready to talk to him.

But don't wait too long! At Rue Royale Lestat often sat silently letting all their messes simmer & boil over. What's amazing about fanfics like @siahatha's Alligator Tears (a sequel to Renaissance) is that it gives Loustat the chance to sit down and have those much-needed talks, hard as they are, so they can finally MAKE PEACE and HEAL as a better couple. Lestat also KNOWS Louis, and that's why he can get in Louis' face and ALSO tell him that he's not gonna sit back and let Louis hurt himself--and their relationship--anymore. Lou's anorexia's a symptom of a much more complicated issue (a vegan vampire still grappling with what it means to kill people in order to feed healthily), so that is a delicate matter that will take time for them to negotiate--one of my fave parts of Renaissance is when Loustat's in the blood donor truck--but any self-immolation will be nipped in the bud IMMEDIATELY. 😤👏

[irisbleufic]

There are now 3 chapters posted; no parameters because I don’t know how long this will be. Set in 1973. One random misdirect during Daniel’s encounter with Louis at Polynesian Mary’s, and the entire night’s events change drastically for Daniel and Armand (and the future changes for everyone). Reckless gremlins, both of them.

Open Your Mouth (2024-10-25)

Test the Theory (2024-10-26)

Twist the Blade (NEW, 2024-10-28)

TEASER:

Armand gives [Daniel] an appraising look as soon as they’ve crossed the street.  “How often have you ended up in trouble with the law?”

“It’s okay,” Daniel laughs as they approach the ferry terminal.  “You can ask me how many times I’ve spent the night in jail.  A handful.”

Armand resists the urge to smile, feigning sternness.  “You’re fortunate that I would go to great lengths to ensure your release.”

“Hypnotize the entire police station?” Daniel scoffs.  “That, I’d like to see.”

Armand gives him a perplexed look.  “No, it would take far less than that.”

“Let me get this straight, somehow killing them all would be less?”

“What’s wrong with you?  All it would take is a piece of theater.”

“Oh,” Daniel says, chagrined as Armand buys their tickets.  “A disguise?”

“Yes,” Armand says brightly.  “Wouldn’t I make a convincing lawyer?”

“Sure thing, babe,” Daniel replies, smitten.  “Follow your dreams.”

[covenofthearticulate]

Every day I wish we got more of Louis and Daniel interacting in QOTD like. Last time they saw each other Louis used Daniel as a juice box and was like "you might die idk" and now Daniel's a vampire at the hands of Louis' ex. BUT we did get Armand holding both of them when they pass out and that's probably the best thing to ever happen tbh

NO BUT FORREAL I THINK ABOUT THIS SO MUCH

And this is exactly why post-qotd is one of my favorite eras in canon because it's like— the second Daniel walks into that room by Armand's side, he's immediately clocked, like everyone just gets to watch him go absolutely batshit with all the New Vampire Zoomies, he's just fucking reeling, the world is coming down around them so no one has time to address any of the insane baggage but like... at the same time, Louis and Daniel had to sit there for hours listening to Maharet's story alsjhcfandslj like I NEED to know how many times they made eye contact across the table, how many times Louis got distracted trying to think of what the fuck to even say to either of them, how many times Daniel thought about Louis' fangs in his neck while sitting at that table.

It's just the right combination of like absolutely insane and soul-wrenchingly emotional asdlsjkhdbcnjhbcs because also like!!! there's so many reunions!! it's the first time louis and armand have seen each other in years!!! they left on such sad, bitter terms but clearly still had feelings for one another!! this is the first time marius has spoken to armand in fucking centuries!!

like, they all have so much history and so much to say to each other and I think it's so fucking hysterical that all of these emotional reunions have happening while Daniel essentially just has to stand there behind armand like a little mouth-breathing toddler waiting on his mom LMAO

anyway yeah 10/10 agree we deserved more louis and daniel content in qotd!!!

[radiocurrency]

A snippet from my upcoming Armand x Daniel fic of his turning at the end of 2x08

"What the fu-” 

“I would hope that you aren’t leaving before dinner and the surprise we had prepared.” 

“I kinda thought that offer went out the door with the fuckassery you called a relationship."

Daniel was glad to know he could still move enough to speak. But his gladness was premature as he found Armand suddenly pressed right up against Daniels body, holding his face between his hands. Armand seemed to study Daniels features like he was assessing a rare piece of art he wanted to buy. Daniel wanted to scream and he wanted to moan. Both sounds seem to catch in his throat and he didn’t have time to question the latter before Armand was speaking again. 

“Now, Now. I want to reward you for all your hard work. What did you think you would achieve out of this? Go on to publish another award-winning memoir? Get that third Pulitzner? One final shot at relevance before you die alone, unwanted by even your own children? Would that sense of satisfaction keep you warm in your hospice bed?” 

Daniels throat felt thick and he was acutely aware of the thrumming of the blood in his veins. The corner of Armands mouth turned up in a smirk. 

“Two can lob bombs, Daniel Molloy.”