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Furina is still asleep in bed when a knock at his door wakes him with sharp and deliberate raps. He blinks blearily, struggling to take stock of his surroundings, of the myriad of papers strewn across his bed where he fell asleep taking notes on the script for his latest project. His head aches a little, never quite right before his morning coffee, and his visitor resumes their knocking—three more resounding blows in quick succession—before the world falls blessedly silent again. Whoever’s come calling for him, he’d better not keep them waiting much longer.
Before descending to the front door, he pauses to review his appearance in the mirror. At least he’s still dressed in his usual day clothes, an unintended benefit of his over-impassioned approach to his work. It’s not much effort to make himself presentable. He smooths out the wrinkles in his jacket and vest and adjusts the packer held in his shorts until he’s comfortable. Furina’s ribs ache a little, and his chest binding feels tight and stifling after far too many hours wearing it. He knows Nurse Sigewinne would scold him for not minding his health and falling asleep with it still on but reasons a little bit longer won’t hurt. Much. Furina really can’t bring himself to receive his guest without it, the extra shot of confidence it gives him well worth a little more pain.
Furina is grateful for his choice when he opens his front door to find Lord Arlecchino, Fourth of the Fatui Harbingers, gazing down at him—elegant, imperious, deadly.
By rights, Furina should simply shut the door in her face. Furina does not want to be seen in public with a Fatui Harbinger. The mere thought of whispers spreading about a meeting between Fontaine’s wayward former god and one of the Tsaritsa’s most deadly vanguards makes him shudder. But refusing to see her is far worse, an affront to his pride he can’t allow. And what reason does he have to fear her now? The old worries of her plunging a hand into his chest to tear free the Gnosis he relinquished five centuries ago in a lifetime he can’t even remember or her piecing together his precarious, most closely-guarded secret are long since resolved. And so, after glancing around to ensure there’s none about to witness him invite a Fatui Harbinger into his home, Furina grabs the Knave by her lapel and pulls her over the threshold, slamming the door behind him with his shoulder.
Immediately he realizes his mistake, back to the door with the much taller Knave still staring down at him. For a moment Furina freezes, memories of lying prone on the ground, his knees scraped and bloodied and tears welling in his eyes as the woman emerges from the shadows and stands above him flashing through his mind. Inhaling deeply, he wills the painful memories away. That’s in the past—Gnosis long gone, his other half dead by his own hand, the nation saved, what could he possibly have left for this woman to take from him? He’s not trapped. He’s not helpless. He can handle this. With a graceful twirl, Furina extricates himself from the tiny space between the door and the Knave. Just a few feet deeper into his home with someone he once dared not even speak of is no great improvement, but what it gives him is control over the situation and the entirety of his apartment to navigate it.
It’s easy to fall back into his old techniques of entertaining guests. The dance steps come naturally, a path he’s trodden so many times it’s carved a trail in the dance floor that will not fade with time. A bow, graceful and accommodating. A kiss of greeting pressed fleetingly to his guest’s lips. A plea that she join him for tea, clasping her by the arm and beckoning her into his sitting room just off the vestibule. The Knave falls into step beside him almost as naturally as Furina leads, a look of silent bemusement on her sharp, beautiful features. Yet underneath her aloof mask, Furina can sense the cold calculation of a ruthless diplomat and soldier. He knows if he pauses for even a moment, the fragile veneer of control he’s creating will shatter, leaving only a tiny, helpless creature trapped in the jaws of a most clever and merciless beast. So Furina doesn’t stop. He ushers the Knave deeper into his home and gestures for her to sit on his sofa as he prepares a pot of tea. She obeys, still silently studying him.
Minutes pass as Furina prepares the tea and the Knave still does not say a word. It vexes Furina how easily this woman reclaims control of the situation without ever doing a thing, and in his own wordless defiance, he draws out the process of preparing their tea. He allows it to steep just a little too long, its rich and pleasant flavors giving way to a burnt and bitter undertone.
“To what do I owe the pleasure, Lord Arlecchino? Furina finally speaks as he pours a cup of tea for himself and his guest and settles on the couch by her side, their thighs brushing together and making Furina’s bare skin itch.
The Knave accepts the proffered drink and takes a long, deep gulp of the liquid, paying no mind to the heat that should burn her tongue nor displaying any displeasure at a taste unworthy of the abilities of he who was the center of Fontaine’s high society for centuries. “Is it so strange that a diplomat such as myself should wish to convene with the former Hydro Archon?”
“As you say, I am no longer the Hydro Archon and hold no more sway in Fontaine than a common street performer.” He pours another cup of tea for the Knave. “If diplomacy is what you are about, the lift to the Palais Mermonia is just around the corner.”
“You hold no sway in Fontaine? Surely you do not think me fool enough to believe you were nothing but an inconsequential fraud, Lord Furina?” The use of a masculine title he never heard in his days acting as Archon makes Furina’s skin prickle and his mouth run dry. “But worry not. I’m not here to pry into the secrets of the once divine, merely to congratulate you on your upcoming union with the Chief Justice.”
Furina narrows his eyes. “You heard about that?”
“Naturally. Even were it not my duty to stay informed of the happenings in all seven nations, I am Fontainian by birth. You and your Iudex have set our fair nation ablaze with the news. The rumors that you are lovers have circulated for centuries, but none expected this. It will no doubt be the wedding of the millennium.” She lifts her second cup of tea to her lips and takes a small sip. “I must ask, will you return to the Palais Mermonia after your union? This humble abode is no place for the Iudex’s consort.”
Furina bristles at being called Neuvillette’s “consort,” but keeps his face impassive. “The location is convenient and the rent is reasonable.”
“Rent? He couldn’t even buy you a home of your own to do with as you please? He’s left you to the whims of a landlord? I thought the Iudex would do better for his beloved.” Another sip of her tea. Furina might have thought she was hiding a smile, if he didn’t know the Knave to be far too subtle for that.
“Do not speak about Neuvillette like that,” Furina snaps, his face heating up.
“Monsieur Furina,” she continues, ignoring his defense of Neuvillette, “do you know what I find most fascinating about your new place of residence?”
“Tell me.” Furina’s own cup of tea shakes in his trembling hand, so he brings it to his lips to hide the tremors.
“Your new home is just around the corner from where we first met. Did your beloved know this before he selected this apartment for you? Or have you kept what happened between us a secret all this time?” She leans in close, whispering in Furina’s ear. “I can hear your heart pounding in your chest, little dewdrop. Are you that afraid to have me near you again? Or is it perhaps something else.” Furina doesn’t dare move. He thinks, if he moves even a fraction of an inch, her lips might brush against his skin.
“I was never afraid of you,” Furina lies, once again willing away the memories of sleepless nights, vivid nightmares, and the taste of bile as he was sick from anxiety. “The Hydro Archon Focalors accepted every diplomatic meeting with Lord Arlecchino of the Fatui Harbingers, did she not?”
“Oh? Tell me then, Monsieur Furina, why did Focalors tremble so in my presence? Why did Focalors need her Iudex as a chaperone? Could it be that she truly feared being seduced? What say you, Monsieur, for you know her best?”
“Even a pebble can make ripples across the entire pond. It does not make the pebble any less inconsequential.”
The Knave reaches out her hand and draws a finger down Furina’s chest, stopping at his heart. “And yet, long after the ripples have disappeared from the water’s surface, the pebble remains a part of the pond forever.”
Something in Furina breaks at that truth, at the indelible mark this woman left on his soul without ever laying a finger on him. He whips his head around and their noses brush, lips mere inches apart. “A part of me forever, you say?” and he grabs the Knave roughly by the back of her neck, pressing his mouth to hers.
The Knave slips a thigh between Furina’s leg, pressing herself flush against the small bulge at Furina’s groin. He can’t bite back a whimper as the motion makes the carved wooden cock in his shorts shift against his core. At the noise, the Knave only presses against him harder, the whimpers giving way to a crescendo of needy warbles. Furina knows it’s wrong to let her touch him this way, as only Neuvillette ever has. He knows the betrayal would break Neuvillette, rend his heart into two and call rains down upon Fontaine worthy of a third great flood. Yet Furina cannot bear to back down or show weakness to this woman. And after five hundred years of deceit and lies, what is one more secret between them? So he meets the Knave’s hips with his once again.
The Knave brings a hand to the waistband of Furina’s shorts but descends no further. “Do you allow your Iudex to touch you here?” She drums her fingers around the button of Furina’s shorts, setting a merry rhythm against his waist with those strange clawed fingers.
“Yes. On most days the dysphoria is not so bad. And he’s not my Iudex anymore. He’s my—my—” Fiancé, he wants to say, but Furina loses his words in a strangled gasp as the Knave’s teeth sink into his throat.
“He’s your what?” The Knave stares down at him with a saccharine smile, but there isn’t a hint of warmth in her imperious dark eyes.
Furina ignores the question and pulls the Knave by the back of her neck for another kiss, capturing her lower lip between his teeth and biting down hard. Neuvillette might not be his anything for much longer if he knew what Furina was doing right now, but at the moment he’s too determined to show this woman he isn’t afraid of her anymore—and too aroused—to care.
Soon, he’s completely bare on his lower half except for the black bands around his thighs. The Knave slides those down too, slowly, decadently, hands caressing Furina’s thighs in a way that makes him sway on his feet.
The Knave reaches up to unbutton Furina’s vest next, but he bats her hands away, separating the buttons himself. He is about to shrug off his jacket and vest when the sunlight that flows in from the window catches on the surface of his Vision, where it hangs from his waist. Furina frowns and unclips his Vision from its bow. For several long moments, he holds it in his hands, gazing unblinking into the iridescent blue glass. Furina runs a thumb across the Hydro symbol to one of the fang-shaped decorations on the casing and presses down, hissing as the pointed metal digs into his flesh. Several more seconds pass before he sets his Vision face down on the opposite end of the table, shrugs off the rest of his clothes, and turns back to find the Knave fair leering at him. The corners of her mouth are upturned in a restrained smile that’s somehow even more infuriating than a full and shameless grin might be.
“Well? Weren’t you going to fuck me? Isn’t that the real reason you’re here, Lord Harbinger?”
“An astute observation, Monsieur.” The Knave leans right into Furina’s personal space and grasps him by the middle, thumbs caressing his ribs and the bottom hem of his chest binding. “Were you going to remove this?”
Furina frowns. If this was Neuvillette, he wouldn’t mind. He even went swimming recently with his new friends from Musketeer Pictures after their win at the Fontinalia Film Festival, and not a one of them looked at him funny or made any comment at seeing him shirtless. Furina’s getting more comfortable with his body. He really is. But those were people he trusts. People he feels safe with. The Knave is different. He feels drawn to her, yes, as though instead of sinking a hand into him to wrench free the Gnosis, she sunk her claws into his heart and still grips him now, feeling his blood run between her fingers with its every feeble pound. But he’ll never trust her, could never trust her. He cannot make himself so vulnerable around her. So Furina shakes his head, summoning the courage that guided him through countless public appearances. “No. That stays on.”
“Ah. Having second thoughts then, Monsieur Furina?” The Knave’s voice is rich and dripping with contempt.
He shakes his head harshly and grabs hold of her hand. As he guides it between his legs, Furina isn’t sure who he hates more—the Knave for offering him an escape from this or himself for being too stubborn, too damnably attracted to her to take it.
