#there's like adultery in this but i dont know how to tag it bc its culturally accepted adultery???

[nikanndros]

The Arranged Marriage AU Part 6 [Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5]

Nikandros is a terrible husband, and so a few days later he gets caught up with some kind of meeting with Theomedes and the other Kyros, thus leaving Laurent to his own devices and without the attention he deserves.

“I can have one of the servants show you the library,” Nikandros offers, apologetically.

“I’ll show you around, Laurent,” Damianos says. “If you wouldn’t mind?”

Laurent is tempted to decline, except Damianos has been good company these past few days, and Laurent is eager to see more of Ios. “Alright,” Laurent says. And then Damianos turns to Nik, as if to gain his permission as well.

Nik is giving Damen a searching look. “If that’s what Laurent wants,” he says finally.

“Just us then,” Damianos says, after Nik has made his exit.

Those words shouldn’t inspire nerves in Laurent, and yet he’s suddenly very self aware. “It looks like it,” he says awkwardly. 

“Do you want to go for a ride?” Damen asks. “I want to show you the cliffs.”

-

The white cliffs of Ios are like nothing Laurent has ever seen before. It is a long way to the ocean from Arles, and Laurent had never been particularly interested in going as a child, when all the important things tended to happen in the capital anyway. Here, after they leave their horses to graze and walk out towards the ocean, Laurent realises that he has been missing something wonderful.

Damianos stands on the edge of the cliff, closes his eyes, and breathes the salty air into his lungs. He is smiling; he looks peacefully happy. The midday sun gives his skin a glow to it that makes him look both like an untouchable beauty, and also someone that needs to be touched to be believed.

“Isn’t it wonderful?” Damianos asks, after his eyes are open again.

“Yes,” Laurent replies honestly.

Damianos steps very close to the edge and looks down. “How high do you think we are?” he asks.

Laurent follows his lead, taking small steps to the edge and cursing his riding boots - that are heeled for stirrups and not precarious cliffs. Looking at the drop, he feels a little dizzy. “Too high,” Laurent says, and the crown prince laughs.

Damianos unpins the top of his chiton, baring his chest, and then reaches for the one at his waist.

“What are you doing?” Laurent says, voice a little louder than intended.

Damianos gives him a smile at his reaction. “I promised I’d teach you how to swim last time we met.”

“You’re taking your clothes off.”

Damianos gives him an amused look. “You’ll have a hard time swimming if you insist on staying fully laced.”

Cultural differences, Laurent thinks, compromise. “Can we take our clothes off closer to the shore at least?”

Damianos laughs. “We can just jump into the water from here.” And then he gestures to the massive fucking cliff face they’re on. The Crown Prince of Akielos is insane. Good to know.

“Absolutely not,” Laurent says.

“Are you scared?”

“Yes!” Laurent replies. “I’m not going to go drown myself just because you goad me into it.”

“I’m jumping in too,” Damianos replies. “I won’t let you drown.”

Laurent looks down again, and then takes a few steps back. “No, thank you.”

Damianos turns to him and then moves in very close. There’s something very earnest in the way that he takes Laurent’s hands and ducks his head so that they are eye to eye. (There is also something very distracting in being this close to the man’s bare chest). “I promise you, the feeling you get from diving off the cliffs is incomparable to anything else. You can’t come to Ios without trying it. And I won’t let any harm come to you.”

Laurent’s heart is beating very fast. “Alright,” he says, before he really thinks about it.

Damianos’ grin is like the sunshine warming them. Laurent’s cheeks must be very flushed by now. “Really?”

“Yes, fine.” He pulls his hands out of Damianos’ and then leans down to take off his boots. When he is flat-footed on the ground, he pauses. “I might need… assistance with my jacket,” he admits. “It laces at the back.”

“Oh,” Damianos says, softly, “Yes.”

He is a prince, and a future king, and yet he doesn’t hesitate to step behind Laurent and take a hold of his laces like a servant. Laurent closes his eyes. Damianos takes his time, gently pulling and stopping to check on what he’s doing every now and then.

“These are very complicated,” Damianos says, still working at it. “They suit you.”

“Because I am also complicated?”

Damianos laughs quietly. “You’re lovely,” he says. “I like you. Even when you are spitting fire. Complicated is a word for it, I suppose, but I think it is more that you are very different to everyone I have ever known.”

Laurent takes a moment before he can speak. “Is that bad?”

“It is very-” Damianos tugs at the laces at Laurent’s waist with a little more force than expected, and Laurent takes an unsteady step back “-good.”

Then he is pushing the jacket off of Laurent’s shoulders and Laurent takes it as his cue to move away from Damianos. He watches the Akielon when he pulls off his undershirt, and sees him looking back. Laurent gets a very bizarre desire to step close to him again. “Get a move on,” Laurent says instead, and the moment ends.

When they are fully undressed, they step back to get a running jump. Damianos takes his hand again. He is very warm.

“Remember to take a breath before you hit the water,” Damianos says.

“Yes, thank you, I think I could figure that one out on my own.”

Damianos laughs, and then he says “Ready?” and his grip tightens. There is no time to answer or think, until they have already jumped from the cliff. Laurent gets a split second moment of regret when he is mid-air, the fear of doing something reckless, but it is exhilarating as the joy of impulsiveness usually is.

Laurent almost forgets to breathe, but he manages to gasp in some air before he is submerged in the shockingly cold water. The ocean is full of salt, and it burns his eyes to much to open them, and he doesn’t know which way is up. The panic almost sets in but then there are arms around his, pulling him up. They break to the surface together.

Laurent gasps. His heart is pounding, and his blood is rushing, and he is probably digging crescents into Damianos’ shoulders with his iron grip on them. And then, unexpectedly, he is laughing. His chest feels like it might explode with the giddy terror of something he has never felt before. When he opens his eyes, Damianos is silently staring at him, hands on Laurent’s waist, and his mouth slightly open as if shocked.

“You are laughing,” he says.

“I could have died!” Laurent breathes, ecstatic. “Let’s do it again.”

-

“What is your relationship with Nik like?” Damianos asks, after they have jumped several more times and while they sit on the grass to wait for the sun to dry them off.

Laurent shrugs. “It is like a marriage,” he says, finally.

“He looks at you a lot.”

“You told me yourself that I am nice to look at.”

Damianos smiles at him. “You are,” he says. “You will be even more of a spectacle if you spend anymore time in the sun.”

Laurent takes that as his cue to get up and start retrieving his clothes. As odd as it is to be outside and naked, Damianos has a quality to him that makes it easy to forget oneself. As if his confidence can wear off upon someone who stands close enough to it. Auguste has a similar quality, he thinks.

“Am I red?” Laurent asks, pulling on his pants. Damianos gives him a long look, enough to make Laurent certain that he is red now at least.

“A little pink cheeked.”

Laurent puts a hand up to his cheek automatically.

“That’s not where I was talking about.” Damianos is grinning at him so Laurent throws the jacket in his hands at the man. It hits Damianos in the face. “Thank you, but I don’t think it will fit me.”

“Make yourself useful,” Laurent says. Putting his undershirt on ruffles his already messy hair. “And assist me.”

Damianos, surprisingly (or perhaps not), complies. He helps Laurent shrug into the jacket and then brushes his hair over one shoulder so that he can stand behind Laurent and start lacing. Laurent realises suddenly that he has miscalculated. Damen is still undressed, and close enough that Laurent can feel the heat emanating from his body.

When he gets to the top, his fingers brush against Laurent’s neck softly, whispers of touch. It feels like an automatic reaction to let himself fall into the gesture, and then unthinkingly he’s resting his weight against Damianos’ chest. Laurent closes his eyes, because somehow that seems easier than moving away as he should. His heart is beating rapidly, or perhaps that is Damianos’ heartbeat pushing against Laurent’s back from how closely pressed they are. Damianos’ hands have dropped to hold his hips. They both stay like that for a very long moment, just breathing.

It has been a matter of days since arriving in Ios, and yet Laurent would be a fool not to realise that he is very attracted to Damianos. He is wonderfully handsome, more handsome even than fairytale Princes - but like a God of old times. He is strong, and good-hearted, and it is so very easy to be drawn to him. Laurent imagines that Damianos has more suitors than he knows what to do with. And then he imagines what Damianos might actually do with said suitors.

Laurent tips his head back against Damianos’ shoulder. He very selfishly wants to be kissed right in this moment, he thinks, and then a second later there is the gentlest caress of lips against his neck. Laurent shudders.

He has never been the kind of person to succumb to his own desires, and yet right now he wants to be. Nikandros has been Laurent’s only proper experience in matters of the flesh, and yet his mind is on anything but his husband right now. Even with his eyes closed, Laurent is very aware that it is the Crown Prince of Akielos who is putting hands (and lips) on him.

Damianos is setting off all the nerves in Laurent’s neck. It is such a soft touch - unlike anything that Laurent has ever felt - that he can’t help but sigh. The hitch in his own breath is what sends Laurent back into reality, in the end. He jumps away from Damianos suddenly, alarmed.

“That is inappropriate,” he says, voice breathless.

What is he doing? As much as he wants to let Damen undress him again, and lie him down on the grass and fuck him right here next to the ocean - it would be catastrophic to do so. What would Nikandros say? Or his father? Or the people of Vere? It is enough that he has been forced to marry an Akielon. If his own country hears that he is a barbarian fucking whore, it will be even harder to go back and see his brother and mother again. What is he doing?

“Alright,” Damen says, sounding a little unsteady. Laurent is grateful that he doesn’t argue or bring up that Laurent was clearly very into what they were just doing. And then he is annoyed with himself for being grateful at basic common decency.

“We should return to the palace.” He pulls on his heeled riding boots with haste, and is then mounting his horse before Damen has even finished fixing the pin in his chiton.

“Laurent,” Damen says. He looks as if he will continue speaking.

“I’ll race you,” Laurent strikes preemptively. He does not want to hear whatever Damen is planning to say. He digs his heels in, and his horse sets off.

[goninhero-blog]

SHIPPING INFO // answer the following for your muse(s) so people know how shipping works on your blog. REPOST. don’t reblog.

WHAT’S YOUR OTP FOR YOUR MUSE?: I love all my ships, and since I’m an OC blog I’ll ship with anyone, canon oc or otherwise.

Main ships are: Oona/Unarishi, Nomiko/Kisei (both muses of @laserguidedanimemun) (Off-Blog ATM) Itoshi/Fukko, and Stanislaw/Nakajima (Both muses of @zmbie) (Off-Blog ATM)  Ships I���ve CONSIDERED between canons and my OCs will be under a cut.

WHAT ARE YOU WILLING TO RP WHEN IT COMES TO SHIPPING?: PRetty muc hanything except adultery bc it makes me uncomfy. 

HOW LARGE DOES THE AGE GAP HAVE TO BE TO MAKE IT UNCOMFORTABLE?: Mmmmm... If one of them is 18. 16 is about as young as I’ll allow (but it’s all SFW), but after 18 its not a huge.. Deal to me???  Its so situational like if a 45 Y.O dates a 33 Y.O I’m not too weirded out but if a 30 Y/O dates a 21 year old???  Idk, it’ts really really... Like... Situational.  OVerall, a four year gap is prety comfrot zone-y

ARE YOU SELECTIVE WHEN SHIPPING?: Ehh, about as picky as I am with writing with regular partners.

HOW FAR DO STEAMY MOMENTS HAVE TO GO BEFORE THEY’RE CONSIDERED NS.FW?: If hands are going going places and someones not wearing pants.

WHO ARE OTHER MUSES YOU SHIP YOUR MUSE WITH?:   I’mma do a cut so you dont have to look at my giant list of ship possibilities bc in a fandom like this the possibilities are.. So many..

DOES ONE HAVE TO ASK TO SHIP WITH YOU?: Yes, simply because It would feel weird to me otherwise.

HOW OFTEN DO YOU LIKE TO SHIP?: All the time?

ARE YOU MULTISHIP?: Absofruitly.

WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE SHIP IN YOUR CURRENT FANDOM?: In canon, its probably a tie between EraserMic and Toshinko.  For my ships?  Oonarishi >:3c

FINALLY, HOW DOES ONE SHIP WITH YOU?: just.. just pop right into my messages and lemme kno.  Add me on discord.  Just.. Just do it pls

tagged by: I TOOK IT

tagging: anyone who wants to ship with me so i can know your rules

and now for my ‘chart of ships that could totally work if they ever occured’

I’ll just give 1-2 of each?

Nomiko + Ojiro b/c his level headedness could be good for her, and she makes a good sparring partner.  And TBH I think Nomiko and Tsuyu would be a good couple.

Fukumi + Iida like I’ve mentioned Fukumi and Izuku and Fukumi and Bakugou before but uhhhhhhh Iida would be??? So good???  Also Fukumi/Ochako would be cute AF.

Stanislaw tbh I just don’t know.  He’s straight and I don’t think any of the girls at Yuuei would really go after him.

Unarishi at this point kinda.... BELONGS to Oona like Idk how id feel shipping him with anyone else... Maybe Tamaki??? 

Itoshi: Tbh in a shipless world Nomiko and Itoshi probably would have been a thing but otherwise he’s kinda tricky to ship too.  It would be HILARIOUS if he and Shinso dated because they look exactly the same.

And Satsuka over on my other blog I’d just... I want her to be happy so anyone really, although i have a few things planned in the event of certain teachers pursuing her