Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Lestat was ready for a fresh start. 

Louis’ visit had been intense. The two of them had a lot to say to each other, decades’ worth of silence to make up for. They didn’t get through everything, but they made a start. Lestat hadn’t been surprised when Louis said he needed time, that he didn’t want to rekindle what they had, but he had been heartbroken. But if he was going to win Louis back one day, he had to stop wasting away in his dilapidated old house.

He needed to be Lestat de Lioncourt again, the man that Louis had fallen in love with, not this pathetic shell.

So, a couple of weeks after Louis headed back to Dubai, Lestat packed up his things (his things being his plank and coffin) and moved to London. New Orleans had been home for a long, long time, but it was time to move on. Or at least look like he’d moved on.

He didn’t want to be around Americans anymore. And he certainly didn’t want to be on the Continent. And he didn’t want to learn another new language. And he didn’t want to be too close to Louis or Armand, who he’d heard had settled in LA with his new fledgling.

So London. 

He found himself a nice penthouse with a stellar view of the city. He bought new clothes, to fit in with the era. And, on his third day in town, decided to go to a nightclub. It was what hedonists did these days to meet other hedonists, or so he’d gathered from watching the television back in New Orleans. 

Sure enough, he quickly found a medium sized club with plenty of hot-blooded humans, dancing and kissing and grinding together. It was fun, he was surprised to find, drinking the cheap drinks and watching the humans do their human thing, his eyes scanning the crowd in search of a feast. The air was thick with sexual tension, the racket of desperation in their human heads partly repulsive and partly alluring. 

Lestat had been getting his feel of the place when he spotted a hulking man harassing a young woman across the room. He looked around, and was surprised to find no staff stepping in. The man was ugly in his aggression, and Lestat found it distasteful. He took a step towards them, but out of nowhere a third human barrelled onto the scene, grabbing the almost comically large man by his hair and wrenching his head back before punching him in the solar plexus. Lestat watched with amusement as this scrappy, comparatively tiny man with a snarl on his face started to beat the pulp out of the creep. He was wearing a pink crop-top with a slogan that Lestat couldn’t make out from this distance, and black shorts so short and tight that he wondered how the boy could move so freely. And yet, he was starting a fight with this man, six foot four or more, and winning, by the looks of it. 

The creep’s friends dragged him away, his face bleeding, and the scrappy boy shouted something at them as they went. He turned to the woman who had been being bothered by the creep, and said something to make her laugh. They spoke briefly, and then went back to dancing, the scrappy boy lip-syncing along with the song joyfully as if nothing had happened. The woman and her friends laughed. 

The scrappy boy didn’t seem sexually interested in the women, keeping a more than respectful distance. They danced together for a few songs, and the scrappy boy looked around the room carefully, presumably trying to see what happened to the creep. Lestat straightened up a little, and the boy looked straight at him. Lestat tilted his head to the side alluringly, flashing a charming smile. 

The boy looked away without a second glance. Lestat’s eyebrows furrowed. 

Apparently satisfied that the creep had left, the scrappy boy turned back to the group of women and bid them goodbye. Lestat watched him move towards the smoking area, and Lestat waited a moment before following. His interest was piqued. 

The boy was rolling a cigarette when Lestat came outside. He glanced at Lestat as the door swung shut, and this time he looked a little longer, eyes flicking up and down Lestat’s body. There was interest this time, and the boy leaned his hip casually against the wall. Looking at him more closely, Lestat struggled to place his age. It was difficult with humans anyway, but this one was shorter than most of the other men around him, with soft-looking skin that belied youth, but his beard was thick, and his toned arms were thick with body hair, too. The shorts were even more sinful looking at him now, and Lestat could barely tear his eyes away from the boy’s thighs that looked as though they could bust out from the bottom of the shorts, dusted with lighter body hair there than the dark brown on his face and arms.

“You got a lighter?” The boy asked, and Lestat dug in his pocket, grinning when he produced it. “Cheers.”

“Any time,” Lestat shrugged obligingly. “I saw you in there, with that horrible man.”

“Yeah?” The boy blew out a plume of smoke, looking Lestat up and down again. “And you didn’t think to step your big-bicep-having-ass in there to help?”

Lestat blinked, glancing down at his arms, bare in a tank top. “You didn’t need any help.”

The boy hummed, taking another drag of his cigarette. Lestat pulled out a cigarette of his own, feeling a little out of his depth. Things were different now. People had casual sex all the time. Everyone was trying to seduce. But not this man. Or was he? His mind wasn’t clear.

“What’s your name?” The boy asked after a few moments of silence.

“Lestat de Lioncourt. And you?” 

“Rhydian. You new in town or something?”

Lestat smiled, tilting his head to the side. “How did you know?” 

Rhydian shrugged. “You seem a little… I don’t know. Off. Like you don’t know where to put your feet.”

“This environment is new to me,” Lestat nodded, looking around at the other people having a smoke and a chat. “I’ve been ah, a bit of a shut-in, lately.”

Rhydian nodded, humming again. “We’ve all been there. It’s good, though, to come out and meet people.”

“Yes, yes,” Lestat agreed, blowing out smoke and looking at Rhydian again. His shirt, he finally noticed, said ‘a boy without a pussy is like an angel without wings’. He almost choked on his cigarette. 

Rhydian laughed softly, his eyes heavier when Lestat looked back at his face. “Hadn’t clocked me, huh? You disappointed?” 

“No, not at all,” Lestat insisted. He was pretty sure he knew what the shirt meant, but he couldn’t think of a way to ask without sounding very old. 

“Good.”

“Good?” 

“Yeah,” Rhydian shrugged, leaning a little closer to him. “You’ll do, I guess.” There was a flash of smile, and Lestat felt, for the first time in a long time, like he was the prey about to be devoured. He couldn’t deny it was working for him. 

“I’ll do ?” Lestat challenged, leaning closer too. This part he knew how to do. He reached out to push some of Rhydian’s hair out of his face so he could look in his eyes unimpeded. It was messy from the club, and a little damp at the roots. It smelled heavenly.

“Mmm, you’ll do,” Rhydian confirmed, fingers of his free hand grasping Lestat’s shirt. He pulled him down for a kiss, open-mouthed from the beginning, and Lestat grunted softly. It had been a long time. Rhydian hummed into it, body arching into Lestat’s as he held his cigarette away from them. Lestat pulled back after a moment to kiss down Rhydian’s neck, his hands wandering over the human’s back. Rhydian moaned softly into the night air, his head tipping back. “You’re gonna get us kicked out if you carry on doing that.”

Lestat reluctantly let him go, feeling a little smug. It felt good, he realised, to just kiss someone he wanted without worrying about where it was going to go or who he was going to hurt. He was allowed to have fun with this human, maybe have a nibble, and then go home. He could do whatever he wanted, have whoever he wanted to warm his bed. It made him feel more alive than he’d felt in years.

“Shall we go?” He asked, and Rhydian smirked, glancing at the bouncer, who was watching them intently. 

“Yeah, let’s get out of here.”

Lestat had taken a flat less than five minutes away from the gay district, a nice penthouse with only a few neighbours who actually lived in the building. He and Rhydian agreed to walk. Rhydian smoked another cigarette as they did. They made the usual small talk, where they were from (Rhydian was from somewhere called Wrexham), what they did for work (Rhydian was an illustrator), and how long they’d been single.

“A while,” Lestat answered evasively, smiling faintly. 

Rhydian looked him up and down. “Can I ask you a question that might freak you out?” 

“Oh? That sounds promising. Ask away.”

Lestat sensed it a second before it left Rhydian’s mouth. “Are you a vampire?” 

He narrowed his eyes slightly. Rhydian chuckled, holding up his hands. 

“Look, you wouldn’t be my first, alright? And, well… You’re not very good at blending in, are you?” He craned his neck, tugging his shirt down a little to show Lestat the shiny scar tissue in the perfect shape of a vampire’s bite. Lestat raised an eyebrow. 

“How long have you known?” 

“Since you came out into the smoking area. Your outfit’s cute but it’s something an old guy thinks someone in his thirties wears. But it suits you,” Rhydian assured him. “And then there’s the fact that your name is Lestat de Lioncourt. ”

Lestat wasn’t sure how he felt. Rhydian hadn’t broken pace, so neither did he. “Do you… Go looking for us, or something?” 

“Surprisingly not,” Rhydian shrugged. “But I sleep with enough people that, statistically, it makes sense that I’ve hit three of you.” 

“Three?!” 

Rhydian laughed. “Oh come on, you’re gonna judge my body count?”

Lestat couldn’t help but smile at that. “I suppose not.”

“Does it freak you out? That I know what you are?”

“I wouldn’t use those words. I could kill you in a second if I thought you’d talk.” 

“Yeah,” Rhydian said, like it was sexy. Lestat arched an eyebrow. 

“What, you have some kind of fetish?” He asked, waving his hands.

“No, well… Not for vampires. But…” He looked away for a moment, blowing out a long plume of smoke. “I can’t say that the power trip doesn’t work for me.”

Lestat hummed. “I can see that.” They’d reached his penthouse. “So, what, you’re planning to come upstairs with me, to my spooky vampire lair, not knowing whether I’m planning to drain you dry?”

“Are you?” Rhydian asked, popping out a hip as he tossed the end of his cigarette away.

Lestat smirked at the display of nonchalance, but he could hear Rhydian’s heartbeat ticking up. “I’m not running a suicide service here, sweetness, so if that’s what you’re after I think you’d have more success with-” He was cut off by Rhydian stepping forward and tugging him down into a kiss, biting him on the lip almost hard enough to break the skin. 

“That’s what I thought,” Rhydian whispered against his lips, “so are you gonna take me upstairs and fuck me or not? Your choice.”

Lestat huffed, deliberating whether to send the boy home out of pure contrarianism. But he couldn’t deny that Rhydian had amused him with his thirst for righteous violence, flagrant attraction to danger and palpable hunger for pleasure. What the hell, as the Americans would say? There was no reason for him to say no, he was without entanglement for once in his life. “Get in the elevator,” he muttered, unlocking the door with a flick of his wrist. “I’m not fucking you in my coffin, for the record.”

“Aw, really?” Rhydian fake-pouted, walking backwards towards the elevator. Lestat wanted to bite him and wipe that bratty attitude away. God, he was already mostly hard. 

“You are making things so much worse for yourself,” Lestat warned playfully, forcing himself to keep his human body language in place as he followed Rhydian through the lobby, keenly aware of the 24 hour security cameras watching their every move.

“God, I hope so,” Rhydian teased, backing into the elevator and catching Lestat’s belt to bring him along. “I can’t wait to ride you on your fake bed.”

“Who says I’m letting you into my bedroom?” Lestat growled, reaching out to jab the penthouse button, “maybe I’ll just have you against the door.”

Rhydian moaned softly, sucking his lower lip. “Yeah, that works too.”

“You’d let me do anything I wanted with you, wouldn’t you, Rhydian?” Lestat purred, crowding him against the wall of the elevator. 

“Yeah, probably,” the younger man admitted, looking up at him through his eyelashes. “And I think you’re gonna make me enjoy every second of it.”

“You’re absolutely right,” Lestat snarled into his ear, fangs dropping. Rhydian moaned, unabashedly. 

“The second we get in,” Rhydian muttered, “I want you inside me. Fangs, cock, fingers, I don’t fucking care, Lestat. I swear to God.”

Lestat already had his hand halfway down Rhydian’s sinful little shorts when the elevator slid open onto the corridor leading to his front door. He smirked when he felt how much of a mess Rhydian had already made of his underwear, proud of himself also for successfully guessing what his shirt had meant, and pulled his hand free to push his fingers into the human’s mouth. He lifted him up just enough to march them into his apartment. 

Rhydian gasped, sucking on his fingers hungrily despite Lestat’s nails catching on the side of his tongue. The moment they crossed the threshold, Rhydian spat out his fingers and pulled him down for a kiss by his hair, bloody tongue laving across Lestat’s palate. Lestat moaned softly, greedily tasting the mixture of blood and saliva. Rhydian’s hands were up his shirt, nails scratching his abs. 

“Turn around,” Lestat hissed, fingers struggling to get Rhydian’s shorts off with how frantic he felt. He’d fed last night, but he was hungry in a way he couldn’t have accounted for. Rhydian, mercifully, obeyed, helping Lestat get his shorts down his thighs before turning around and bracing his upper body against the wall, sticking out his ass. “ Merde ,” Lestat muttered when he saw what Rhydian was wearing underneath. There was a scrap of fabric in the front, and two elastic straps framing his ass in the back, offering it up like a prize meal. 

“Inside,” Rhydian insisted.

“I haven’t even shut the door and you’re offering yourself to me.” Lestat pointed out, voice a little awed. 

“Yeah, well… You’re hot or whatever, fuck me with it open if you want.”

Lestat laughed softly. “So that’s it. You put on a show but you’re desperate for it, aren’t you?”

Rhydian squirmed, shooting a heated look over his shoulder. 

“Is it because I could rip out your throat, or is it because I remind you of somebody?” He demanded, kicking the front door shut and opening his leather trousers. 

Rhydian huffed, and Lestat grasped his hair, biting off the length of his nails of his free hand with the ease of someone who’d done it hundreds of times before for this very purpose. He sunk two fingers into Rhydian’s pussy, grinning dangerously as he watched Rhydian’s eyelids flutter with pleasure. 

“Answer me or I won’t fuck you,” he threatened.

“Fine, shit,” Rhydian grunted, pushing back eagerly onto his fingers. “The bite, the both times I’ve had it, and hundred years’ experience combined. Best fucking orgasms I’ve ever had. And you walked over in those fucking clothes and I knew you’d be a good fuck. That good enough for you?”

It wasn’t a lie, but there was something else, something that Rhydian was desperately trying not to think about because he didn’t want to ruin his own mood. Lestat let it lie, hooked his fingers and stroked him from the inside. He didn’t need the man’s tragic backstory. Rhydian melted against the wall. “Good boy.”

“What about you, huh?” Rhydian asked, biting his lip, “I can tell you’re hard up. You wanna sink into this pussy real bad, I know you do.”

“And I will once I’ve made you soak me to the elbow.” Lestat had his own shit to hide, after all.

Rhydian knew that wasn’t an empty promise, and cursed under his breath, eyes falling shut as Lestat started to finger fuck him properly, letting go of his hair but holding his head against the wall. It was filthy, degrading to pin him like this, but Rhydian was being so loud and goddamn responsive that Lestat didn’t need to read his mind to know he was getting off on it. He started to quake with pleasure before two minutes had passed, and Lestat moaned in satisfaction as he felt Rhydian’s first orgasm cling to his fingers.

“Fuck, Lestat,” Rhydian choked, whimpering loudly as his legs shook. “Fuck, please . Please, fuck me.”

“What did I say?”

“I haven’t squirted since-”

“I don’t care,” Lestat growled, and Rhydian whined. “I can wait all night, mon cher.” The nickname jolted him from the moment, the shape of the words in his mouth bringing back everything he didn’t want to be thinking while he was knuckle-deep in someone he’d met less than an hour ago. Why had he called him that? He looked at Rhydian’s round, heart-shaped, pale ass. None of this was like-

“God, you’re gonna make me fucking squirt, you asshole ,” Rhydian gasped, hands banging against the wall in desperation. 

Lestat wrenched himself back from the precipice of misery he’d been inches away from falling into. His fangs had disappeared, and he leaned close to Rhydian, breathing in the scent of human sweat, human cum, the tangible vibration of human blood in his veins. “Good boy. Do it. Go on.”

As if obeying the command, Rhydian clenched down and came so hard that he forced Lestat’s fingers out, gushing with a cry of unhindered release. He sagged against the wall, and Lestat pressed close, his nose in Rhydian’s hair. 

“What you waiting for?” Rhydian asked, pressing his ass back into him. 

Lestat huffed out a laugh. “You need a minute.”

“Try me.”

“Your heart rate is-”

“You promised,” Rhydian grumbled, and Lestat swatted him on the ass. 

“Behave.”

Rhydian muttered something in a language Lestat didn’t understand, but he did relax a little. Lestat smiled to himself. “Shut up.”

“I didn’t say a single word,” Lestat said, the smugness obvious in his voice. 

“You are such a prick.”

“And you just squirted for the first time in… How long… In less than ten minutes’ work. I think you’re into it.”

He could hear Rhydian grinding his teeth together, and his smirk grew into a grin. It was almost cute how badly Rhydian wanted him. It felt good. It made him feel good about himself. “My heart rate low enough for you now?”

“Hmmm…” Lestat brushed his lips over the side of Rhydian’s neck, feeling drunk with power when he felt the human’s heart start racing again.

“I swear to God I’m gonna rip your throat out in a minute.”

“Maybe next time,” Lestat murmured, letting his fangs drop. He couldn’t wait any longer, pulling his cock from his trousers. “Ask for it.”

“ Please ,” Rhydian stressed, going up on his tiptoes to try and offer himself up. “Fuck me, Lestat, please, fuck me and bite me.”

Lestat lined himself up, brushing where Rhydian was wet and relaxed for him. “Again.”

Rhydian snarled. “I am so close to just going the fuck-”

Lestat sunk into him in one smooth motion, almost choking on air as Rhydian squeezed down on him greedily. 

“Fuck,” the both of them spat in unison. Lestat could barely think. He shoved Rhydian further up the wall, pinning him by his wrists and just letting himself fuck the human hard and fast. Rhydian tilted his head to the side, offering his throat, and Lestat sunk his teeth into him. 

He drank Rhydian like he would drink expensive whiskey. Quick, light slurps spaced apart by ragged breaths to savour the smell as much as the taste. Rhydian gave as good as he got, fucking back on Lestat’s cock as much as he could in this position, taking it like he had supernatural powers of his own. Lestat pulled back to nick his own tongue with a fang and planted a long lick to the line of Rhydian’s neck to heal up the wounds. He wanted the human to have plenty of energy for the rest of the night. 

“How do I taste, huh?” Rhydian forced out, looking over his shoulder at him. 

“So-so.”

Rhydian laughed, loopy-sounding. “You’re such, ahh, fuck… A cunt!”

“I don’t know,” Lestat muttered, “you seem to like it given you’re dripping around me like you can’t help it.”

“I’m man enough to admit your cock is… Fuck, Lestat, yes …”

“Is what? Speak up.”

Rhydian ground his teeth together around a moan. “It’s fucking good. So fucking good . Fuck. I want you to cum inside me.”

“You’re from the devil,” Lestat hissed, irritated at how quickly he was getting close. Damn this degenerate boy and his filthy mouth.

“Yeah, yeah, whatever, just don’t stop,” Rhydian panted, sweat slicking his entire upper body now. He pushed back on Lestat’s thrusts as hard as he could, using his hands pinned to the wall as leverage, moaning loudly every time the vampire’s cock shoved fully inside him. 

Lestat rolled his head on his neck, squeezing his eyes shut. He wanted to drink again, but he wanted Rhydian conscious more. God, the boy was so wet, and it had been so long since he’d fucked someone. He couldn’t even remember the last time, and he didn’t care. Rhydian was throttling his length so hard it was like he was trying to wring the cum out of him. Lestat had to remind himself to be gentle where he was holding Rhydian’s wrists in his hand against the wall. 

Suddenly, Rhydian started squirming in Lestat’s hold, trying to pull his wrists free. His insides were quivering, and Lestat leaned in close so his mouth was next to the younger man’s ear. “What do you need, sweet boy?” He murmured, and Rhydian whined in the back of his throat.

“Touch me, I need to cum,” he whispered urgently, “rub my clit, please , I’ll milk your cock so good.” 

Who was Lestat to say no to that? His free hand reached between Rhydian’s delicious thighs and found his clit swollen and hard, bigger than any other Lestat had ever encountered. It was just like a little cock, he thought with a thrill of arousal as he rubbed at the head of it in tight circles. Rhydian keened loudly, thanking him almost hysterically as he fell apart with a scream that broke in two around his vocal register. His pussy squeezed so hard that Lestat couldn’t help himself, shoving in deep, crushing Rhydian to his body as he came harder than he had in decades, his vision all but whiting out for a few glorious moments. 

“God fucking damn,” Rhydian panted, making cut-off pained-pleasure noises in the back of his throat as Lestat came back to himself. He realised he was holding all of the human’s weight, and carefully pulled out, making the both of them moan. They stayed there for a few moments, but Rhydian pushed Lestat back with his hips, and carefully he let the younger man’s wrists go. 

“Can you stand?” Lestat asked, as breathless as the human. 

Rhydian hummed, eyes closed with bliss. “Probably not. Why’d you stop?”

“Should I have not?” Lestat was confused. Did humans no longer have refractory periods?

“I mean, it’s fine,” Rhydian assured him, “but I know you’re a vampire. You could’ve kept going if you wanted.”

Lestat smirked, kissing Rhydian on the top of his head. “You were done, even if I wasn’t.”

“Who said I was done?”

“Me,” Lestat growled, his hands knotting in the other man’s hair and pulling sharply. Rhydian’s eyes fluttered shut, a soft moan bitten back. “Can’t remember the last time I had such a greedy lover. You’d have me use you until sunrise if you could, wouldn’t you?”

Rhydian sucked his lower lip into his mouth, and his eyes opened to look into Lestat’s face. “What could be a better use of my time than getting my guts rearranged by a guy who could snap me like a twig?”

“Good point,” Lestat allowed, smirking a little. “Come, I want a cigarette. You want me to carry you?” 

“I think I’m good,” Rhydian shrugged, wriggling out of Lestat’s grasp. Lestat let him go. The boy’s body language had changed in an instant, and the vampire frowned. Rhydian’s shoulders rounded and he looked around for his clothes even as his knees trembled. 

“I’m not going to eat you, sweetness,” Lestat assured him, “it really is just a cigarette.”

“Oh, I know,” Rhydian answered, scooping up his shorts. “I just, you know… I don’t really hang around after…”

Lestat watched him. Watched him avoid looking at him like the plague, listened to him resolutely think about nothing but calling an Uber as he got redressed. It frustrated him. “I… Do you not want to sit down for a moment?”

“I promise I’m good, I’m gonna get a lift back to mine.”

“Rhydian,” Lestat caught the boy’s wrist, frowning a little. “What’s wrong? Did I say something to upset you?”

The human sighed, a little smile tugging up at the corner of his mouth as he finally looked up into the vampire’s face. “No, Lestat. It’s not you. I just… I don’t like to hang around after a hookup. It’s when people catch feelings, and I just… I don’t do that, regardless of whether the person involved is a human or vampire. This was fun. Fun is all I came here for.”

“To be transparent I fully intended to fuck you again on the sofa,” Lestat answered, trying to keep his tone light. He didn’t want Rhydian to just… Leave before either of them had even gotten fully naked. The thought of him going just like that made him feel anxious. The human looked a little torn at the mention of a possible round two, eyes searching Lestat’s face for something. 

“No,” he decided, pulling away with a little reluctance, “I really should go. Thanks for… It was fun. I’ll go wait downstairs for the car.”

“Rhydian, you can wait here-”

“No,” Rhydian said, more forcefully, “I’m good. I’ll see you around, Lestat.” He didn’t wait for another second before heading for the door, not looking at Lestat as he turned to shut the door behind him.

Lestat hadn’t even pulled his trousers up yet, he was embarrassed to find. He felt lousy, looking at the door as he righted himself. Was that normal? Was it normal to have incredible sex with someone you just met and then have them sweep out of your life before you’d even caught your breath? So much of the fun of the chase for Lestat was the afterglow, when you stretched out luxuriously and talked about pleasure and life and bitched about your problems with someone who didn’t know you. 

After a moment, Lestat went and sat on the sofa to smoke the cigarette he’d been craving alone, his stomach in knots. What had he expected, he asked himself, for Rhydian to fall madly in love with him while hanging off his cock? That wasn’t how the world worked anymore. Sex was worth next to nothing, humans were as casual about it as vampires. Perhaps even more casual, apparently. 

Still, Lestat didn’t like it. He didn’t know how exactly he’d wanted the night to end, but it wasn’t with him morosely smoking alone feeling lonelier than he had before he went out.

Chapter Text

Lestat went back to the club the next night. He told himself it was to score another easy mark, but the truth was he was curious about the human who’d ditched him the night before, and whether he’d appear in the same place again, looking for another encounter. He hung around until 3am, with no Rhydian in sight. He found he wasn’t interested in another human’s attention. The last thing he wanted was another axis-tilting sexual experience with a sledgehammer of coldness to follow. 

He realised as he came out of the club that he had a vague sense of Rhydian, somewhere not too far away. He was not an expert at finding mortals - he was not really an expert at finding vampires, for that matter - but Rhydian’s scent was stuck at the back of his throat. He hadn’t drunk from another human yet. Lestat took off walking in the direction he thought he sensed Rhydian in. He stood out more than the average human - perhaps it was the concentration of synthetic hormones, or maybe Lestat was just enamoured with his scent for whatever reason. Regardless, after fifteen minutes of searching Lestat spotted Rhydian, laughing with a human man on a street corner. He stopped to watch them, snatching a newspaper from where it was sticking out of a bin and pretending to read. 

Rhydian seemed more drunk than he had the night before, unable to walk straight as he dragged the man into a narrow alleyway, out of Lestat’s sight. There weren’t many people around - they were at the edge of Central London, and the people who were around were not dallying around near dark alleyways. Lestat began to move closer, grinding his teeth. If Rhydian had wanted sex so badly, why not go back to the club and find him? Their chemistry had been electric, much better than whatever a random mortal could give him in an alleyway. What was the purpose? Was he trying to make Lestat jealous? Did he somehow know Lestat would sense him? 

Lestat didn’t need to round the corner into the alleyway, he could hear Rhydian’s soft moans on the wind. He paused, hurling the newspaper away. This was ridiculous. Rhydian was just some stupid human kid, not even 35, probably. Why did Lestat care if he was getting fingered in an alleyway? He could have any mortal he wanted. 

And yet, he didn’t move. He stood just around the corner and listened, both fascinated and appalled at how bad the human man was at making Rhydian cum. It was almost embarrassing how long it was taking, he could hear the irritation climbing in the human’s moans. It had been very easy to make him cum, Lestat thought. How useless was this human? He hoped that Rhydian was thinking of him, was thinking about how good Lestat had made him feel. 

“This isn’t working,” Rhydian gritted out eventually, and Lestat smirked. 

“Not my fault,” the human with him grumbled, “been fingering you for ages. Turn around, let me put it in.”

“Absolutely not,” Rhydian insisted, scoffing. “You can’t make me cum, you’re not getting your dick wet. Fuck you. Useless asshole.” 

Lestat heard Rhydian stomping towards where he was hiding, and scarpered across the road, wishing he still had his newspaper. Luckily, Rhydian didn’t notice him, storming off down the street on his mobile phone. He was unsteady on his feet, and Lestat didn’t hesitate for a moment - he started to follow. It was easy. Rhydian was skittish, looking around at regular intervals to see if he was being followed, but Lestat had been doing this for centuries. He grew excited as he stalked the human, bloodlust rising. Did he want to kill Rhydian? Maybe. But he wanted to fuck him again more. He wanted to make it very clear that no mortal lover was going to compare after a dalliance with Lestat de Lioncourt. He wanted Rhydian begging for more, not rushing to the nearest taxi.

Rhydian stopped short in the street, and the hair on Lestat’s arms rose as he heard a very clear thought broadcast from the human’s head.

I know you’re out there. You’re not my first vampire. Fuck off and find someone else to eat.

Lestat was stumped. He had never, not once, known a human who could do that. Humans were easy to read, easy to understand, easy to ignore. But this message boomed in his head so clearly it was like Rhydian was a vampire himself. 

Rhydian started to run, and Lestat growled softly. Stupid human. That was the worst thing you could do when a vampire was on your tail. Still, he had enough decorum not to sprint. He could keep track of Rhydian well enough to let him get ahead a little, let him think himself safe. Soon enough, Rhydian let himself into a sordid-looking block of flats. Lestat floated up the side of it once Rhydian was inside, tilting his head to the side to listen carefully to where the human’s heavy boots were taking him. It didn’t take long to find Rhydian’s flat. Lestat stuck his arm through an open window to unlatch it, and he let himself into the bedroom, dusting off his t-shirt. 

Rhydian was in the bathroom, the shower on, and Lestat decided to make himself comfortable. He switched on the closest lamp. The bedroom was messy but cosy. There were a lot of Halloween decorations, but it was March. The bed was unmade and smelled like all the best parts of Rhydian’s scent. There was a record player on the desk, and Lestat flipped through his collection, struck by how little of it seemed to be from the 21st century. There was no way Rhydian remembered the 1980s, but that decade dominated his music taste. 

Lestat peeled off his shirt and toed off his boots, lying back on the bed. He had no idea if Rhydian knew he was here, and he didn’t care. He’d find out soon enough.

“JESUS FUCKING CHRIST!” Rhydian screeched as he rounded the corner, clad only in a towel. He almost fell over. Lestat blinked at him, unperturbed. “Lestat?! What the FUCK are you doing in my house?!”

“You weren’t very good at running away,” Lestat shrugged, casual as anything.

“That was you following me? What the fuck is wrong with you?! What, you decided to drain me after all or something? Were you stalking me?!”

“Well, yes. I saw you with that waste of oxygen and you seemed drunk, so I followed you.” He pursed his lips. “I was concerned for your safety.” Untrue, but it seemed like the best thing to say.

Rhydian gaped at him, horrified. 

“I thought it was quite romantic,” he shrugged.

“Romantic?!” Rhydian looked like he was about to start yelling, but he stopped himself with visible effort. Lestat saw in his mind that he decided that he was more likely to get out of this alive if he wasn’t shouting. Lestat thought that was very sensible. “Lestat. I’m sure in like, 1583, that sneaking into a cute boy’s bedroom was considered very romantic and sexy, but in 2024, it is considered by most people to be fucking CRAZY .”

“I didn’t know how else to reach you.”

“For what?!”

Lestat pulled out a cigarette, tone casual. “We had fun, didn’t we?”

Rhydian edged towards his wardrobe, and Lestat watched him. “I thought I was clear that I only do one night stands.”

“And how is that working out for you? That idiot in the alley didn’t seem to be half as fun as I was.”

“You win some, you lose some,” Rhydian retorted as he grabbed a pair of boxers, putting them on under his towel. “That doesn’t change the fact that I’m not interested in a relationship with you.”

“Who asked for a relationship ?” Lestat replied, aghast. “Me? With a human ? Now who’s crazy?”

“Jesus Christ, so what do you want ?” 

Lestat thought about it for a moment. “I didn’t like that you walked out on me last night. It was rude.”

“Okay. I’m sorry that it hurt your feelings. Is that what you wanted to hear?”

“Hurt my feelings?” Lestat took a deep drag of his cigarette. “I wouldn’t go that far.”

“You followed me home!”

Lestat supposed that was true. “Look, look, look. I am just trying to understand how you could just leave after the best sex you’ve ever had, and-”

“The best I’ve ever had?” Rhydian actually laughed for a moment, before he stifled it upon seeing the offence on Lestat’s face. “Sorry, I just… Babe, it lasted like fifteen minutes tops.”

“You couldn’t have taken anymore because your orgasm was so strong you almost passed out.”

Rhydian rolled his eyes, dropping the towel. He had underwear on, but he was still damp. Lestat almost got distracted watching a drop of water filter through his chest hair. “Look, I’m gonna be honest with you because, let’s face it, my chances of making it to sunrise are slim to none. I’m sure you were a great fuck in 1729 or whatever, but shit’s moved on since then. Don’t get me wrong, it was good. For a one night stand, it was fantastic. It was, your fingers were…” He shivered a little, and Lestat smirked at the admission. “But, you know, sex isn’t just about huge orgasms. I’ve had scenes that lasted days. So yes, in the grand scheme of quick one night stands, last night was fucking fantastic. But you don’t make top five lovers, I’m afraid to say.”

“You are fucking insane to say that to me, knowing I’ve already tasted your blood and could drain you in a second.” Lestat was pissed off, but also amazed at the sheer audacity. It was almost sexy. 

“Yeah, well, considering you spent the last 24 hours stalking me, it is what it is. You’re gonna kill me whatever I say,” Rhydian scoffed, sitting on the bed next to him. “So I figure I’ll be mean and make you lose a little sleep over not being the sex god you seem to think you are. Give me a cigarette.”

Lestat snorted, and handed the box over. “I didn’t come here with the intention of killing you.”

“And now?”

Lestat looked at him, trying to figure out how he felt about the audacious human. “I’ve never met anyone with quite so potent a death wish as you who wasn’t about to jump off a bridge.”

“I’ve known I was gonna die at the hands of a vampire since I was a kid,” Rhydian muttered, lighting the cigarette and letting the first drag out with a sigh. “The past decade has felt like borrowed time, it was always gonna run out at some point.”

“A kid?” Lestat could feel the tender spot in Rhydian’s mind, something he was protecting, but he couldn’t help himself. He felt kinship, a way to relate to this stupid, impulsive human, and he had to know. “You were… Kept by one of us, weren’t you?” 

Rhydian said nothing for an insufferably long moment, staring out the window. 

Lestat sighed. Fuck. 

“I was in care from the age of seven. Thirteen, I met my first vampire. I don’t know how he got into the foster care system, but uh… Yeah. He could walk in the sun. I didn’t see the sun for almost five years. I don’t know why he let me go. Guess he got off on the fact that I’d always carry the scars.” Rhydian’s voice was empty when he said it.

Lestat was stunned. “But he didn’t try and turn you?”

“I mean, I’m not a vampire. So no. I can’t explain it. I was almost eighteen, and he handed me a bunch of money and told me to leave. I looked over my shoulder a lot the first few years, but I used the money to transition and move here. He never came after me. Probably found another teen girl to make his blood bag.”

It was too close. Lestat got up, putting out his cigarette in the nearest ashtray. He didn’t say anything for a long moment, feeling Rhydian’s eyes on him. “I’m sorry.”

“It was over a decade ago,” he mumbled, shrugging one shoulder. “It is what it is.”

“I’m not going to kill you,” Lestat assured him. Rhydian looked up at him, biting the inside of his cheek. 

“You… You relate, don’t you? Something about what happened to me is familiar to you.”

Lestat looked away. “Did he teach you to read our minds?”

“No. But you’re not exactly hard to read.”

“You were able to transmit a thought into my head, earlier. How?” 

Rhydian sighed, apparently coming to terms with the fact that Lestat was evading his question. He understood that better than most. “Well, the second vampire I met was a little nicer.” He smiled slightly, like he was thinking of someone he still loved. “A lot nicer. He lived in London for a couple of years, and he took care of me. I’d run out of money by then and he rented me this really swanky little place. He’d swing by every week or so, feed, fuck me dumb, and then go on his way. He moved away with his companion one day out of nowhere. I didn’t even know he had a companion until he came to tell me he was leaving. Honestly, that almost fucked me up as much as the first guy. I thought he and I were, you know… I don’t know what you guys would call it, but, you know, I thought I was his favourite, whatever that would mean. But he left, and I never heard from him again. The rent on the place he’d put me in ran out after a few months and I was evicted. But… While he was here, it was a dream. But anyway, he taught me how to warn other vampires off me. I’m surprised it still works, I haven’t done it in a while.” Lestat couldn’t see the vampire in Rhydian’s mind, not really, but he could sense the depth of the love that Rhydian had had, and still nurtured in his heart, for his vampire ex.

“It would’ve been effective if you didn’t immediately run,” he offered, “that really sets our kind off. Best thing to do would’ve been to turn around in the direction you thought I was and stay still. Most vampires would be put off, thinking you were under another’s protection.”

“But not you?” Rhydian asked, rolling his eyes a little. 

“Other vampires already hate my guts, what’s stealing someone’s pet?” Lestat teased, leaning against the wall and looking at the human. 

Rhydian looked right back, all nervousness gone now. He looked at Lestat like they were equals. He liked it. 

“So you got your heart broken by a vampire, and when I came along you assumed I’d do the same, so you ran away from me?” Lestat guessed. Rhydian snorted.

“Oh, no. I run away from everybody, vampire or human. I have my friends, the family I chose, and that’s all the love I need. I don’t do romance, not anymore. Not with vampires, not with humans. I don’t need it. I need sex, but I don’t need romantic love. And it’s worked for me these past few years. I see no reason to change it now. Also, as hot as your threatening vibe is, I can taste the trouble on you.”

Lestat hummed. “So there’s no way I could tempt you to fuck me again?” 

Rhydian laughed, sighing as he looked at Lestat. Really looked at him. The human’s eyes grew more intent as he studied him and the seconds ticked by. “Well…” He lay back, putting out his cigarette and stretching nonchalantly, “I guess you’re here now, and I struck out tonight. And I think I could use the relaxation after being stalked by a freaky French serial killer.”

“Maybe I should hunt down that idiot who couldn’t make you cum, drain him for being so useless.”

Rhydian groaned, his eyebrows furrowing. “I’m going to hell for finding that sexy. Come here, before I change my mind.”

Lestat grinned like the cat that got the cream, and climbed onto the bed, looming over Rhydian to kiss him deeply. “What was that you were saying about last time only taking fifteen minutes?” He asked, mouthing down the human’s neck, “because by my count I have just over two hours until sunrise.”

“And I’m already home so I’ve got nowhere to run this time.”

Lestat chuckled, slipping his hand down Rhydian’s boxers. “It’s very sweet that you think I’d let you do that a second time.”

“I wanna suck your dick.”

“You would benefit from a little patience, mon amoureux,” the vampire said quietly, “you were the one complaining our lovemaking only lasted fifteen minutes.”

Rhydian huffed, licking his lips as Lestat’s fingers circled his clit. “You got me there.”

“Mmmm,” Lestat agreed, eyes heavy with lust, “are you fond of this pair of boxers?” 

“Could take them or leave them,” the human shrugged, gasping with delight when Lestat tore them with a flick of his nails. “Fuck.”

Lestat pulled the scraps of fabric off, kissing Rhydian’s chest. His body hair was luscious, and he breathed it in deeply. He could bathe in the smell. After a long moment of Rhydian squirming under him while his mouth got acquainted with the human’s torso, Lestat sat up, looking around the room for something. He spotted a pair of nail clippers and got up, smirking when Rhydian groaned in frustration. 

“Touch yourself,” Lestat commanded, perching on the desk to trim his nails. For what he had planned, biting them off wouldn’t do. 

Rhydian’s mouth went dry as he saw that Lestat was cutting all of his nails, and his fingers found his t-dick immediately, rubbing left to right and back again, slowly at first. Lestat pretended that he wasn’t watching, but he struggled not to look at Rhydian’s pussy. He’d never seen genitals quite like his - the last time Lestat was having sex with humans, medical transition didn’t exist in the same way it did now. He’d done some reading on it in his coffin before going to sleep that morning. It was unbearably sexy to him, the bigger clit and the testosterone-fuelled sex drive paired with a wet cunt that didn’t need prep in the same way an asshole did. Body hair all over with grabbable hips and the steadfast hygiene that, in his experience, cisgender human men didn’t generally bother with. It was like a dream come true. 

Then, of course, there was the fact that Rhydian loved to moan. That, too, was sadly uncommon with other men. Lestat loved it, loved how loud and needy he was getting just lying there rubbing his dick. Once he finished his nails, satisfied that they were no longer sharp or pointy, he crossed the room to kneel on the bed between Rhydian’s legs. 

“Look how wet you are already,” he murmured, one hand on Rhydian’s thigh pushing it wider, “just from me cutting my nails? You’re so desperate.”

“Yeah, maybe I am,” Rhydian agreed breathlessly, offering Lestat his wet fingers to suck. He leaned forward and took the digits into his mouth, his hand coming up to wrap around the human’s wrist. He tasted so good - different to a woman. It was muskier, saltier, even though he’d just showered. It was maddening. He wanted more. He sucked every trace from Rhydian’s fingers, making him moan and his clit visibly flex. “Fuck, I want that mouth on me. You wanna taste me?”

Lestat pulled back with a satisfied hum, holding eye contact as he lowered his head to Rhydian’s dick, teasing it with his tongue for a moment. “ I’ve been reading all about this ,” he said in Rhydian’s head, sucking it into his mouth gently and making him keen. “ Does it feel good when I suck your dick for you? ”

“Yes,” Rhydian gasped, his fingers at his mouth as he watched Lestat bob his head, lips working over the inch-long clit. “Fuck, am I your first t-boy?”

“ The first one to use hormones ,” Lestat replied telepathically, sucking a little harder and almost purring in satisfaction as it made Rhydian curse and writhe. He was surprised that it was still so sensitive, but all the better.

“God, that’s good,” Rhydian lowered his hands to Lestat’s hair, running through the curly blond strands before taking hold of it, grinding greedily up into his mouth. “Can I fuck your mouth?” 

Lestat moaned in response, nodding with heavy-lidded eyes. Rhydian wasted no time, holding Lestat’s head still and rutting into his mouth, fucking his little dick up against Lestat’s tongue over and over again. He cried out, squeezing his eyes shut with pleasure. Lestat watched hungrily, his cock throbbing against the sheets. “ Use me until you cum ,” he urged in Rhydian’s head, “ I want to see you crumble for me .” He was glad he didn’t need to breathe, because nothing could have let him pull back now. 

“Fuck, I’m close, your fingers, inside, please,” Rhydian sobbed, thighs trembling. Lestat slipped two fingers inside his pussy, helplessly turned on by how wet the human had gotten so quickly. He crooked his fingers, pressing into the spot that had made him squirt before, letting Rhydian grind down into them and up into his mouth the way he needed it. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, Lestat, God, don’t stop,” he begged, body tensing up as his words trailed off into a wrecked-sounding moan. He twitched and squirmed into and away from the stimulation, whimpering softly. “Fuck, I want you to make me cum again, I don’t wanna stop.” 

Lestat sat up, licking his lips. “Then we won’t.” He put his free hand on Rhydian’s lower stomach, eyes burning with lust as he pressed down and rutted his fingers into the human’s g-spot mercilessly. Rhydian yelled in pleasure, thighs shaking. “Look at you, I think you might squirt again for me.”

Rhydian nodded, eyes screwed shut. “Fuck, bite me, bite me, bite me, wanna cum with your fangs in me.”

He didn’t need asking twice. He bit Rhydian in the inner thigh, drinking deeper than he had the night before. There were still traces of alcohol in the blood, and it felt good. Lestat groaned loudly, his hand furiously fucking Rhydian’s pussy now. Sure enough, the human gushed when he came, more than the night before. It soaked the sheets, and Lestat pulled back reluctantly, not wanting to stop but knowing he had to unless he wanted to fuck Rhydian up for the rest of the evening. “Look at this mess you made,” Lestat marvelled, pulling his fingers apart and smirking at the wetness that clung on in strips. He offered Rhydian his fingers, and the human stuck out his tongue for them. Lestat’s dick jumped as he wiped his sticky fingers off on his outstretched tongue. After searing that image into his memory forever, Lestat twisted his wrist and fucking his fingers into Rhydian’s mouth deep. 

Rhydian moaned, eyes bleary with lust. Lestat fucked his fingers in and out like he had just done to the human’s pussy, and Rhydian seemed to love it, sucking them with enthusiasm. Once his fingers were more or less clean, Lestat took his fingers back, wiping the spit off on Rhydian’s face.

“You’re a whore,” Lestat said, his voice as awed as it was horny. Rhydian seemed to possess no qualms about indulging himself in the basest pleasures he could find, and Lestat was intoxicated by it. “You’re a nasty fucking whore.”

Rhydian nodded, smirking a little. “Yeah, and you’re the pervy old man who likes his whores a tenth his age.” He crawled into Lestat’s lap, nipping at his mouth, “luckily for you I’m into older men.”

“I don’t look a day over 30,” Lestat retorted, his hands finding Rhydian’s ass like they belonged there. 

“But on the inside you’re like 603,” Rhydian shrugged, groping Lestat’s pecs, “it’s hot.”

“I’m 262.”

Rhydian laughed. “Yeah, because that’s not old at all.”

“I think I’d like you better with my cock lodged in your throat.”

“Promises, promises,” Rhydian breathed in his ear, nibbling on his neck for a moment before climbing off him and the bed. He settled on his knees next to the bed, looking up at Lestat expectantly.

Lestat grumbled a little, something about Rhydian being incorrigible, though he couldn’t repress his smile as he got up and pulled his trousers and briefs off. He was having fun, this was fun. He liked it, and he liked Rhydian, he realised. He didn’t have time to wonder what that meant, because Rhydian wasted no time in burying his face in Lestat’s crotch, tongue out to meet the length of his dick. Lestat’s eyes rolled back in his head the first time the human sucked him properly, his nose nearly brushing the vampire’s neatly trimmed public hair. He held Rhydian by the hair, sighing in pleasure as he started to move back and forwards on his cock, guiding him at the pace he liked. 

“Cock sucking is in your top three talents, no surprise there,” Lestat teased, smirking down at the human, who was gazing up at him with unguarded want. He couldn’t remember the last time that anybody looked at him like that - with their only agenda being mutual satisfaction. Rhydian didn’t want Lestat for his money or his powers or as a husband or father. He just wanted Lestat as a raw sexual nerve, intent on stimulation, connection and satisfaction. He never wanted it to end. He wanted to be here, getting his dick sucked by Rhydian, for the rest of his life. 

He wanted to make Rhydian his companion. The realisation hit him like a freight train. He wanted to turn this human boy and keep him. But this time, it would be different. They’d just spend eternity feeding and fucking, worrying about nothing but how hard they could make the other cum. Rhydian had no qualms about beating up random men in bars. He’d been turned on by the thought of Lestat killing for him. He would be the perfect vampire. The perfect companion. And this time, Lestat would be fun and easy to be around. He’d teach Rhydian the laws, be honest from the beginning, and they’d spend their days laughing and moaning in pleasure. 

Lestat was just about to start wondering what Louis would think of him turning a new companion when Rhydian pulled off his cock, face like thunder.

“You’re distracted,” he accused, and Lestat bit his lip around a smile. “Stop thinking about anything other than fucking my throat and making me choke on your cum.”

He couldn’t argue with that. Firmly pushing all thoughts of Louis from his head, he let the pleasure build. Rhydian was sucking him hard, and Lestat shuddered thinking of what it’d be like when the human drank his blood. Lestat arched into Rhydian’s mouth, thrusting slow and deep, and the human’s hand went between his legs, his eyes bleary with cock drunkenness. Running his fingers through Rhydian’s hair, Lestat moaned open-mouthed. Rhydian whined needily when Lestat grasped his hair at the scalp and used it to move his mouth at the pace he wanted. 

"I’m gonna cum, I’m gonna cum with your cock in my throat." Rhydian was thinking it over and over in his head, practically yelling it, and Lestat’s cock flexed, falling apart as Rhydian’s moans hit a sweet high pitch. He came down the human’s throat, and he pulled out to let him cough. As soon as Rhydian was done coughing, though, he nuzzled Lestat’s cock, tongue out and desperate. Lestat swore under his breath and gripped Rhydian’s chin. 

“Look at you,” he marvelled, “so gone from sucking cock. You’d let me play with this body any way I wanted, as long as you got my cock in the end.” 

Rhydian nodded, turning his face into Lestat’s touch to suck his thumb. “I want it.”

“Tell me what you want, whore.”

The human shivered. “Want you to fuck me through the mattress.”

Lestat hummed, his cock still hard. “I thought you said I didn’t make the top five lovers. Are you this desperate for just anyone?” 

“No,” Rhydian admitted, irritation and embarrassment clearing away some of the fog in his eyes. Lestat grinned smugly.

“So I am special.”

Rhydian growled under his breath, glaring up at Lestat now. He bit the vampire’s thumb, making Lestat laugh. “You’re so…”

“Be careful how you finish that sentence, slut, it’ll decide what I do next,” Lestat warned, smug as anything.

“You make me feel dirty,” Rhydian admitted, cheeks red, “I like it when you call me names. You’re good at it. Maybe it’s the stupid accent.”

Lestat bent to kiss him, a chuckle brushing Rhydian’s lips. He felt a wave of affection crash into him, and he lifted Rhydian onto the bed, putting him on his back and crawling over him. “So you like it when I tell you how filthy you are, how you behave like a wanton slut?” 

“Yeah,” Rhydian agreed eagerly, clutching at Lestat’s shoulders with his hands while his legs looped around the vampire’s hips. “Please, put it inside.”

“I’ve never met a bossier bottom in my life,” Lestat replied, grasping Rhydian’s thigh and lifting it. “Lucky for you, I want it just as badly as you do.”

Rhydian half-laughed in pleasure as Lestat sank into his wetness, eyes fluttering shut. “Fuck, you feel good like this.”

Lestat let his fangs drop, and Rhydian offered his neck eagerly. He fucked the human slow and hard as he drank from him, both of them letting out loud, joyful noises of pleasure. Rhydian sighed in bliss as he sank into the swoon, Lestat’s cock buried deep inside of him and grinding in and in and in for a few moments. Once Lestat was done, he hummed in bliss and healed the wounds with a quick flick of his tongue against his fang. 

“You’re so wet I could drown in it,” Lestat whispered into Rhydian’s shoulder, “moaning so loud too. You’re the sweetest slut I could ask for. Maybe I should keep you, tie you right here in my bedroom and use you whenever I feel like it.”

“Please,” Rhydian groaned, cunt squeezing him. “Fuck, yes, yes, fuck, please-”

“You want to be owned so badly, don’t you, mon amoureux? Would you like me to keep you?”

“ Yes ,” Rhydian urged.

Lestat growled, biting Rhydian again with blunt teeth. “I want to mark you,” he muttered, “my glorious, filthy whore.”

Rhydian screamed out his orgasm, nails sinking into Lestat’s back, the pain spiralling into pleasure and driving Lestat wild, his hands gripping the headboard as he fucked the human through his orgasm brutally. 

“Don’t stop,” Rhydian gasped, looking up at him with desperation, “use me like a toy.”

He wished he could’ve held on longer, but he was powerless to resist giving himself over to his peak, his body thrilling with wracked waves of pleasure. He filled Rhydian deep, the wood of the headboard splintering under his grip as he threw his head back and groaned. 

The two of them panted open-mouthed, Lestat looking down with a grin. Rhydian’s eyes were screwed shut, his face pinched in pleasure. The vampire drew back carefully, making Rhydian sigh with discomfort. Lestat cupped his face, thumb rubbing across his cheek. He bent to kiss the human’s forehead, cheek and throat. Rhydian opened his eyes, frowning a little as he gazed into Lestat’s face. 

He was closed off again, the moment of intimacy gone. It hurt. 

Rhydian smiled slightly, distantly. “Alright, maybe you make top five now.”

Lestat barked out a laugh, though he felt miserable. “I should think so.”

“I should go piss,” Rhydian mumbled, pushing at Lestat’s shoulder, “UTIs and that.”

“Just one more minute,” Lestat was embarrassed at how needy it came out, but he nuzzled into Rhydian’s cheek, peppering his skin with kisses. “Let me have it, just for a minute.”

Rhydian sighed, his hand stroking Lestat’s arm absently. He wrapped his legs back around Lestat and allowed it, closing his eyes once more. “Okay. Okay.”

Lestat didn’t know why he felt so pathetic. He’d thought, while they were fucking, that they’d made progress. That Rhydian wanted him back, felt something between them. But it was just fantasy, just a sexy thought experiment. Why would Rhydian want a vampire with hundreds of years of baggage as anything other than a fun fuck?

For the moment, though, he pretended that Rhydian cared about him, breathing in his smell and the feel of his warm fingers brushing through his hair. He could feel Rhydian getting more tense as the seconds ticked by, and he reluctantly pulled back once he could bear to. Rhydian didn’t look into his face again, getting up and going to the bathroom, scooping up his underwear as he went. 

Lestat wondered if turning Rhydian would get rid of the awkwardness, or if they’d be stuck in this loop forever - having great sex and then Rhydian shutting down as soon as the orgasm faded? He didn’t think he could cope with it. He’d fall in love with the human if he kept seeing him, he could see it on the horizon. But he was so lonely, and it had been so, so long since he’d had fun like this. He would come back again and again, he knew it. He needed to.

“You’ve got an hour until sunrise,” Rhydian said softly when he came back, wearing joggers now. “You’ll probably need most of that to walk back, unless you wanna call an Uber.”

Lestat didn’t know what to say. He got up and got dressed slowly, not looking at the human.

“I know that this isn’t something you’re accustomed to,” Rhydian offered, “this culture of hookups and casual sex. I mean, fuck, this whole century. And, look, I can’t stress enough, this is a me thing rather than a you thing. And I’d be open to helping you acclimate. Like, if you wanted to go to a club or something. I could introduce you to some friends. This stuff feels lonelier when you don’t have a solid group of friends.”

“I appreciate that,” Lestat nodded, rubbing his arm, “but having human friends tends to make things complicated.”

Rhydian sighed, nodding. “Yeah, I guess so. Well… Unfortunately the only other vampire I know is Louis, and he’s long gone.”

Lestat felt like the floor had fallen out underneath him. “Louis?”

“My ex, that one who looked after me,” Rhydian met Lestat’s eyes, his eyebrows furrowing as he took in the shocked look on the vampire’s face. “Why? Do you know him?”

“Louis was the one who you were in love with? The one who left with his companion? Louis du Lac?”

As the human nodded, Lestat pushed into his mind and saw the memories that Rhydian was recalling, feeling torn in two as he saw Louis, beautiful and mysterious, through the human’s eyes. Louis, swooping in and saving Rhydian from sleeping under a bridge, feeding from him so gently that it gave Rhydian goosebumps, lying with him and laughing and kissing him. Louis turning up one day to announce he was moving to Dubai, Armand standing, menacing, behind him glaring daggers at Rhydian. Louis had loved Rhydian, Lestat could feel it, could see it in the memories of his face. He wondered if Armand had robbed him of the memories or if Louis was out there wondering what happened to his human lover.

“I need to go,” Lestat decided, lacing up his boots hastily. “I’ll… I have to go.”

He climbed out of the window without another word, and Rhydian was left more confused than ever about the eccentric and needy vampire who’d somehow appeared in his life.

Chapter Text

Of course Rhydian was in love with Louis , of all people. Of all the vampires in the world, it had to be the only one alive that Lestat loved. He wondered if it should bring him comfort, that Rhydian would understand the loss that he was still dealing with, or whether he should be jealous or heartbroken that Louis had fallen in love with a human while he had been withering away in anguish at what they’d lost. As he lay down in his coffin, the dawn breaking outside his window, he had no idea what he felt - just that he felt a lot of it.

He dreamed of Louis, as he often did. They were back in New Orleans, in the early days of their relationship judging by Louis’ handsome, pin-striped suit. They were bickering over something that Lestat couldn’t quite place, when suddenly Rhydian jumped on Louis’ back to distract him, legs around his waist and arms around his shoulders. He was a vampire too, his fangs out and teasing against Louis’ neck. It made Louis laugh as his hands grasped Rhydian’s thighs, and his argument with Lestat was forgotten. Rhydian peppered kisses across Louis’ shoulder before raising his head to look fondly at Lestat, reaching for him. Lestat went without hesitation, kissing first Rhydian and then Louis, their argument forgotten. It was easy, warm. Rhydian loved them both, and they loved him. With Rhydian there to balance them, Rue Royale was an oasis of laughter rather than fiery fights that ended with claws in skin. Lestat ached for it.

When he woke up the next evening, he made himself jump when he looked in the mirror and saw the red tear tracks running across his temples. He’d been crying in his sleep. Why had he never thought of it, of finding a second companion for them both, someone that both of them cared about and treasured? Claudia had been a daughter, and she had enriched their lives beyond belief. Maybe she would have felt less alone, too, if she’d had a third parent - someone closer to her own age, perhaps, someone to make them a four instead of a three. Balanced. Why had they never thought of it? 

Louis had been too jealous, he reminded himself. Lestat had been, too. Their experiment with an open relationship had been a disaster, and had driven him into secrecy with Antoinette, though he’d never been so deluded to think he loved her like he loved Louis. She was Louis’ punishment for forsaking him. Lestat had chosen her because she was the one who had bothered him the most. He could admit it 100 years later. No, he told himself, Rhydian would not have fixed their relationship then. Nothing would have. Both of them were terrible to each other - himself still wounded from Nicki’s loss and Louis mourning his family - and they would have been just as terrible to a third partner.

But now? 

Lestat wondered if Louis still cared for Rhydian. He wondered if Armand had forbidden their relationship, or if Louis had been the one who decided to end it. He had Louis’ number now, though he had yet to make use of it. As he got ready to hunt, he debated with himself on whether he should ask. Perhaps he could simply say that he had met Rhydian and had wanted to let Louis know that he was doing okay. It wasn’t a lie, at least not completely.

The doorbell made him jump, and he tutted at himself. What was wrong with him lately? Why did he feel so off-balance? He blamed it on the new century, the weird new world he was finding himself in. It was overwhelming and alien in a way that the 20th century had never felt to him. Perhaps it was the pace of life, the noise. Perhaps it was trying to exist without a companion to ground him. He went to the intercom, sighing when he saw that it was Rhydian waiting downstairs for him to answer. 

“Let me guess, you’re here to talk about Louis,” Lestat said in lieu of greeting, feeling more than a little angry. Rhydian had barely wanted anything to do with him last night, but now that Lestat had reacted badly to the mention of Louis, suddenly he wanted to know. 

“Yes,” Rhydian answered, looking at the camera beseechingly, “but I’m also worried about you, Lestat. Please let me up.”

Rhydian’s mind seemed to suggest he was telling the truth, that he was worried, but then Rhydian had already proved that he could broadcast things to Lestat. Did he believe him? He wanted to, but he wasn’t sure that he did. Nevertheless, he was lonely, and perhaps still wistful at the thought of Rhydian and Louis loving him back, so he pressed the button that would allow the human access through the front door. “I’ll be down in a moment,” he said. He made Rhydian wait for a few minutes, slowly selecting which boots he wanted to pair with his nicely fitted jeans and sleeveless t-shirt before getting in the elevator. 

“You took your time,” Rhydian accused, predictably, and Lestat couldn’t help but smile. Good, he thought, let him squirm a little.

“I need to hunt,” Lestat shrugged, “I haven’t fed properly in two nights.”

Rhydian sighed, his hands on his hips. “Then I guess I’ll walk with you.”

As the two of them set off, Lestat looked out of the corner of his eyes at the human, who was watching his face unrepentantly. “What?”

“Is he dead?” 

“Louis?” Lestat frowned, realisation sinking in. “Oh. No. No, he’s…” Was he fine? Lestat didn’t think he could attest to that for sure. “I saw him a couple of weeks ago.”

Rhydian smacked his arm, his lower lip wobbling. “You’re an asshole.”

“ Merde ! What are you thinking?! I just told you I need the blood!” Lestat ground his teeth together as he rubbed his arm, though it hadn’t hurt so much as shocked him. What kind of idiotic human took a swipe at a vampire who was thirsty? Everything Rhydian did seemed designed to make Lestat want to drain him dry, but he was handsome enough for it to be endearing. It was pissing Lestat off, how much he was letting Rhydian get away with. Any other human he’d encountered in the past 100 years would’ve been red mist on his tongue.

“You acted like you saw a ghost when I said his name!” Rhydian shouted, “what’s wrong with you?! The way you looked, I thought something horrible had happened to him! I thought that… That guy…” Rhydian shuddered, shaking his head. 

“He’s not with Armand anymore. They separated.”

“Good. He gave me the creeps. Weird vibe…”

“I call him the gremlin. And your instincts were right. He is… Monstrueux.”

Rhydian huffed out a laugh, relaxing a little. “Yeah, gremlin sounds about right.” He looked up at Lestat’s face, his eyebrows creased. “So, if Louis is alright, why did you react like that?”

Lestat didn’t say anything for a moment. It must have been a moment too long, because Rhydian’s expression softened in recognition. “Don’t look at me like that.”

“You and Louis?” The human asked sadly. 

“Yes,” Lestat said shortly, clenching his jaw. “I don’t need your pity.”

“Not pity. Empathy.” Rhydian insisted, heat in his tone. He looked away, shaking his head as his eyes glazed over with memory. “I know how he made me feel. Like I was the only person in the world that mattered to him. And I know how easily he let me go. I’m guessing it wasn’t an easy breakup for you, either.”

Lestat sighed. “He killed me.”

“I know the feeling.”

“No, really,” Lestat said drily, hoping it sounded casual. “He betrayed me and cut my throat. I deserved it, I grant, but… Still.”

Rhydian stopped in his tracks. Lestat’s heart sank, pausing too. 

“He told you about me.”

“Yeah.”

Lestat turned to look back at the human, confusion sinking over him at the look on Rhydian’s face. He didn’t look scared, or disgusted. He looked heartbroken. “What… What did he say?”

“You’re the ex-husband. The one he lost in the 1940s,” Rhydian stepped forwards, closer to him, reaching for Lestat’s hand with a sad little smile. “He never said your name, but he spoke fondly of you, and your daughter.”

“He did?” Lestat tried to orient the timeline in his head. Rhydian had said he’d escaped the abusive vampire over a decade before, so Louis and Rhydian must have been together at some point in the past ten years, but not for a couple of years at least. That meant Louis had spoken fondly of him even before all the revelations with Armand and that clever human journalist. How long ago had Louis started to think fondly of him? How much time had they lost to the gremlin?

“Yeah. It was pretty obvious there was a lot, a lot of complicated history. But yeah, he told me about his life in New Orleans. He never said your name, or your daughter’s. He said it was too painful to talk about how it all ended. So I didn’t know how you two left it. He only really told me about the good times. How he wanted a home like that again. I thought,” Rhydian shrugged one shoulder, “I thought at the time that he meant he wanted to build that home with me. But that was just me being a stupid kid. I could never have given him what he wanted, not really. When he turned up with, what was his name? Armand? I thought that was you, the ex-husband, at first. It broke me when Louis said they’d been together 70 years. I thought I was gonna die of it.”

Lestat nodded. “He has that effect on people.”

“Yeah,” Rhydian looked down at their hands. “Super fucking weird that we met, isn’t it? I don’t know how many people’s hearts that beautiful man has broken, but…”

“Not many, I think,” Lestat admitted, “he is not ruled by his appetites as I am. But then, I didn’t know he’d been with anyone other than Armand until yesterday.”

“What are the odds that we were gonna meet, though? With you from New Orleans and me from fucking Wrexham?”

“I’m actually from Auvergne,” Lestat corrected him, smiling a little. “This accent is not fake, mon amoureux.”

Rhydian rolled his eyes with a snort. “Could’ve fooled me. You’re so French it’s like a goddamn caricature.”

Lestat had seen a lot of strange things in his long life that had left him knowing deep in his gut that destiny was a very real and very powerful force. And it meant something that he’d met Rhydian. The odds were just too ridiculous - the two of them, neither of them from London, being here at the same time, in the same club, with Rhydian drawing his attention just at the right moment, the chemistry between the two of them in that smoking area… Both of them wounded from Louis’ love. Both of them still wishing for him, needing him. This was meant to be, Lestat felt, like he felt the blood rushing through Rhydian’s veins. Like he’d felt the night he saw Louis pull that knife on his brother the very moment Lestat passed through his street. Lestat looked into Rhydian’s face, deep in thought. Was this his new start? His second chance? His redemption?

“Ugly faggots!” 

Both Lestat’s and Rhydian’s attention snapped across the road to the drunk man who had shouted at them, pointing aggressively. Lestat narrowed his eyes, lifting his chin defiantly at the rancid human. 

“Fuck off out these streets, you fucking degenerates!” The man continued to shout, disgust on his face. 

“Found your dinner,” Rhydian murmured, tugging on Lestat’s shirt until he looked back at him. He was smiling, something dark glinting in his eyes. “Take him. The world would be better off.”

Lestat stared at him for a moment, uncomprehending. Was Rhydian really telling him to kill this man? Not for the first time, Lestat wondered whether Rhydian was a symptom of some kind of psychotic break; he was long overdue, and he hadn’t considered himself lucky enough to meet someone so deliciously depraved so soon after rejoining the world. “I won’t be long,” he said slowly, his blue eyes searching the human’s expression for a reaction as he made to pull away.

“Hey, don’t make it too quick. He called us ugly . A liar as well as a homophobe,” Rhydian tutted teasingly, going up on his toes to press a kiss to Lestat’s mouth. “Would you let me watch?”

Where the fuck did Louis find this man? Lestat felt almost dizzy with how quick his mood had gone from elated to pissed off to desperately amorous. He was halfway to being in love, he knew, and there was no way on Earth that he was going to let Rhydian slip away now. He tilted his head to the side and grinned. “Of course, mon amoureux, though I admit I’m too ravenous to take my time tonight.”

“Fair enough,” Rhydian shrugged, letting him go. Lestat kissed him hungrily, squeezing his ass, and the bigot across the road started to walk towards them, cursing and screaming abuse at them. Lestat turned around and grabbed the man by the throat, snarling as his fangs dropped. He glanced around, glad to see that the closest humans aside from Rhydian were too far away up the street to see anything other than a struggle. Wrestling the human along with him with no effort at all, Lestat strode down the nearest alley out of sight. 

“Security cameras?” He asked, and Rhydian looked around.

“You’re good.” Rhydian’s voice was heavy - not with fear but with exhilaration. 

Satisfied that he wouldn’t be seen, Lestat turned his full attention to the human, whose face was turning red from lack of oxygen. The vampire let his throat go, grabbing him round the back of the neck instead. 

The man spluttered. “Let go of me, you filthy, disgusting-”

Lestat tore out the man’s throat with his teeth, his vocal chords breaking like strings of cheese as the vampire drank his fill. The adrenaline in his victim’s system was wonderful; he so loved when they were scared or angry before the bite. He slowed down as the human’s heart started to give out, pulling back with a satisfied sigh before unceremoniously dropping the dying corpse to the floor. He turned to see Rhydian watching him intently, his lips slightly parted, eyes blown with desire. 

This was not the first time that he’d watched a vampire kill, that much was clear. Even Louis had been more scared than this the first time he’d seen Lestat kill. What had Louis been up to when he kept this boy? It was hard to imagine that Louis had found a sadistic streak, after all his talk of morality and the sanctity of human life when they’d been together. 

“Feel better?” Rhydian asked, like Lestat had just had a bath after getting cold in the rain. 

“Much,” Lestat confirmed, rubbing off some blood from the corner of his mouth. 

“Is the blood safe?” 

“Safe?” Lestat tilted his head to the side.

Rhydian stepped closer. “As in, would I get sick if I…”

“No…?” The vampire had never been so confused in his life. Did Rhydian want to taste the human?

“Good.” 

Before Lestat could react, Rhydian leapt at him and kissed him tongue-first, licking the drops of blood from his lips before diving in to taste the traces on Lestat’s tongue. His hands were all over Lestat; one hand up his shirt squeezing his pec while the other wrapped round the back of his thigh, kneading the muscle there. Both of them moaned into the kiss.

Lestat pushed Rhydian against the wall, perhaps a little hard, but the human wriggled with arousal, so he assumed it didn’t hurt too much. He shoved his thigh between the human’s legs and grasped his chin, looking him straight in the eye with their faces an inch apart. He pressed his thigh into Rhydian’s cunt, and his eyes fluttered with pleasure. There was blood smeared on the human’s mouth and chin, and it made Lestat’s dick leap in his trousers.

“You liked watching me snatch a man’s life away?” He whispered, and Rhydian nodded, sucking his lower lip into his tongue and grinding down on Lestat’s leg. 

“Yeah…” He moved his hips slowly, riding Lestat’s firm muscle with relish. “He deserved it.”

Lestat grinned. He wanted to choke Rhydian, to tear him in two with his bare hands, and to fuck him so deep that he’d leave bruises on his insides. He snapped his teeth together in Rhydian’s face, but the human didn’t flinch. Only his voice quivered around a moan. He wasn’t scared of Lestat at all, despite what he’d seen. Oh, yes, Lestat thought - he would make a wonderful companion.

“Are you going to rut all over my thigh with a body cooling next to us?” He crooned, and Rhydian nodded, gasping. “I should have known you’d be aroused by this,” Lestat chuckled softly, “maybe that man was right. Maybe you are a degenerate.”

“Yeah,” Rhydian breathed hard his fingers knotted in Lestat’s clothes, “yeah, I’m a dirty faggot. I want your cock inside me so fucking bad. Want it hard and raw. Want your cum in my cunt.”

“No, no, non, mon amoureux, you’re going to reach your peak just like this. Fully clothed, rutting on my leg like a dog.” Lestat growled, and Rhydian clung onto him for dear life, squeezing his eyes shut and digging his nails into Lestat’s arms. “Oh, I don’t think it’s going to take long at all, is it, my filthy little plaything?”

“No,” Rhydian confessed with a whine, “no, I’m getting close.”

Lestat hummed with satisfaction. “Always so desperate, so willing to debase yourself for me in exchange for pleasure.” He turned Rhydian’s head to face the corpse lying next to them. “Look at the man I just killed for you. He’s dead because of you. Does that make your pretty cunt wet?”

“Fuck,” Rhydian spat, looking at the body and then back at Lestat, his heart thundering. “You gonna leave me like that in an alley one day? Used up and empty?” 

Lestat blinked, his lips parting as his heart fractured. “Non. No, no, no,” he answered too quickly, his mind racing for a way to make it sexy, “no… You are going to help me hunt them. Would you like that? Walk around in a slutty little outfit, attracting all the horrible men to shout after you… Leading them right into my jaws. Your greedy cunt dripping as you watch me make them suffer for the crime of hurting pretty boys like you.”

“God, Lestat! Fuck ! Oh God, oh God, fuck…” Rhydian’s hips stuttered, shoving his clit hard on Lestat’s thigh through three layers of clothing. Lestat swore he could feel the small bulge through their clothes. He moaned too loudly, and Lestat clapped his hand over the human’s mouth, which made him wilder, shuddering through his orgasm with his eyes rolled back.

“Be quiet, mon amoureux,” Lestat murmured, dragging his fangs up the column of Rhydian’s throat, too gently to break the skin. “So loud when you take your pleasure. Normally you know I adore it, but under the circumstances…”

Rhydian was slumped against the wall, flushed and bright-eyed, mostly held up by Lestat’s thigh. He sighed happily against the vampire’s palm, his eyes closing in bliss. Lestat replaced his hand with his mouth, kissing the human deeply but slowly. He poured all his relief into the kiss, happiness that he’d found somebody who saw the monster in him and didn’t flinch. For the first time, Rhydian didn’t push him away the moment his orgasm faded, his hands coming up to knot in Lestat’s hair. He kissed back eagerly, his palm moving to cup Lestat’s cheek after a moment. 

“I actually need to breathe,” Rhydian laughed against Lestat’s lips, his thumb brushing his cheekbone. 

Lestat pulled back reluctantly, resting their foreheads together. He wanted to offer the dark gift here and now, just like this, but he also wanted to make it special. He wanted Rhydian to have time to prepare - he’d had a long time to reflect on why Louis had struggled so much despite displaying all the right qualities, and he had wondered if he had sprung it all on Louis too quickly. Louis had gone from not knowing he was a vampire to becoming one in the space of a few nights - in less than a week. Louis had taken to it better than Nicky, who hadn’t been given the choice at all, but Louis had suffered so much still. No, Lestat would give Rhydian time. He’d offer it in a more romantic setting, and give the human time to really think about it. 

It made him more happy than he’d been in decades that Rhydian didn’t push him away, letting Lestat hold him close. He wasn’t running to put space between them, he wasn’t trying to create distance, he was breathing in Lestat’s air like he wanted to stay. After a few moments, though, Lestat straightened up, pulling back slowly to let Rhydian find his feet. 

“We need to clean up,” Lestat said, and Rhydian nodded. 

“What are you thinking?” 

“What would your plan be?” Lestat asked, watching the human consider the question. 

“Well, if the cops get hold of the body they’ll know that was done with teeth instead of a knife,” Rhydian shrugged, “so we need to make sure that the cops don’t find it. Louis was fucking richer than God, so he had a guy for getting rid of bodies. Best options for us are probably the river or a graveyard, right?”

Lestat hummed. “River is usually not a good idea. Bodies float. But I’ve been careful lately, so one body will be no trouble, especially if the fingerprints and such are washed away.”

“Makes sense,” Rhydian agreed. “The Thames it is.”

“Well, luckily for you, I also have, how you say, ‘a guy’, because we would’ve been seen about five hundred times between here and the river. But a good first try, I will give you that. This was a lot easier before, what is it called? CCTV. It was a lot easier before then, I can tell you that.” Lestat sighed dramatically, pulling out his phone.

Rhydian snorted. “What, you were giving me a pop quiz or something?”

“I do not know what makes a quiz pop but yes, I wanted to see how much Louis taught you.”

“Why?”

Lestat, having texted the local fixer the location of the body, smiled. “Why do you think, mon amoureux?”

Rhydian frowned a little, and headed to the mouth of the alleyway. “We should go, shouldn’t we?” 

That confused Lestat. Would Rhydian ever stop confusing him? Surely he must suspect that Lestat was taken with him. It would follow, then, that the dark gift was on offer, would it not? Unless, of course, Louis had refused it for some reason. “Yes, yes. We’ll go back to my place. The night is young, and we have much to discuss.”

Chapter Text

Rhydian was quiet on the way back to the penthouse, and Lestat probed into his mind. He seemed to be wondering what Lestat had meant in quizzing him, if he was more interested in knowing about his relationship with Louis or whether he had his own agenda. Lestat sensed a lot of trepidation, and he didn’t want to scare the younger man off again when they’d made so much progress, so he bit his tongue. 

“Can we order some food when we get there? I didn’t eat much today, I was freaking out about Louis.” Rhydian said after his stomach growled so loudly that Lestat wouldn’t have needed vampiric powers to hear it.

“Of course, mon amoureux, my treat.”

The human smiled at him, though his expression was still a little distracted. “Only fair you get my meal after I chose yours for you.”

“You made a good choice. He was delicious with fear.”

“Yeah? Makes sense that we taste better that way. Guess that’s why vampires like scaring us so much, yeah?”

Lestat shrugged. “Adrenaline is adrenaline. Scared, aroused, excited, they’re all the same.” 

“Huh.”

“I’m guessing that Louis killed in front of you, given your, may I say, délicieux reaction.”

Rhydian laughed. “Not on purpose. He was very polite about his feeding patterns. I only saw him kill once, and he always felt guilty exposing me to it, I think. It was the first time we met. I still think he originally meant to kill me, but it confused him when I clocked him, similar to how I did with you.”

Lestat saw flashes in Rhydian’s mind as the memories floated to the surface. Another man had been harassing Rhydian where he had set up a sleeping bag under a bridge, but this one was worse than the one Lestat had just killed. This one had been beating Rhydian when Louis stepped in, pulling the assailant off him. After beating the man to a pulp, Louis, beautiful as ever with his face flecked with blood, had offered Rhydian sanctuary for the night at his nearby home. Rhydian asked Louis if he was a vampire as he gathered his things, in almost exactly the same way that he had to Lestat. That play had saved his life twice, it seemed. Louis, always glad to connect with a human who might have a chance of understanding him, drained the unconscious man who’d attacked Rhydian, half-famished for whatever reason, and Rhydian had kissed the blood from his mouth in much the same way as he had with Lestat. The rest, Lestat supposed, was history.

“He swung in like a dream,” Rhydian remembered fondly. “He’d never met a human who knew about vampires, at least not one he hadn’t told himself. But no, he only killed in front of me that one time.”

“So that, back there… That was, what? A long-time fantasy come to life?” Lestat asked as they walked. He wanted to understand, and the human’s mind was all fogged up with memories of Louis.

“Something like that, yeah. I was a trans street walker from eighteen to twenty seven, Lestat, I got hit a lot. And worse. I always… I dunno. I’ve always had these dark urges, bad things I wanted to do to the fucked up men who hurt me. I’d love to say it was the vampire who kept me who put it there, but… I’ve always been angry, as long as I can remember. I get in a lot of fights. Well, you saw. Men just piss me off, especially when they’re creeps.”

Lestat hummed. He couldn’t relate to hating men specifically, but the anger? Oh, yes. “Have you killed anyone yourself?”

“What? No. No. I stabbed a guy once, but it was in the leg. He was probably fine.”

“Probably?” 

Rhydian sighed, throwing up his arms in a shrug. “I left him there and got the hell away. Never got arrested for it, so I’m guessing he hobbled to the hospital and didn’t report it. Would’ve been hard to explain the blood and bite marks on his dick, I guess.” 

Lestat winced, which made Rhydian snort. “It sounds to me like your reaction was proportionate to what he did to you.”

“Most people would disagree,” the human said grimly.

“I’ve tortured people for singing out of tune,” Lestat replied casually, opening his front door for the younger man to go before him. 

Rhydian laughed as he walked past into the building. “Oh, come on.”

“I am deadly serious. Louis was there.”

“Yeah?”

“He was very angry about it. He used to drink rats and dogs back then, you know. It was horrible. Affreux.”

Rhydian snorted. “Now I know you’re lying.”

“Oh, he did not tell you about his so-called vegetarian phase?” Lestat wondered what exactly Louis had shared of himself with Rhydian. He was pretty sure he’d said they’d been together for a few years, but it seemed like he knew someone completely different to Lestat’s Louis.

“No,” Rhydian sounded thoughtful, and Lestat wondered if Rhydian was thinking the same thing he was. “Tell me about him. What was he like before he was turned?”

Lestat considered whether he wanted to think about it at that moment. “He was angry, like you. Suffering. Tormented,” he found himself saying, “he hated himself. Blamed himself for every bad thing that happened to his family despite being the very thing holding them afloat.”

“And you saved him.”

“Ah, I do not think that he would put it that way.”

Rhydian put his hand in Lestat’s as the lift slid open onto the corridor leading to the older man’s penthouse. He twined their fingers together. “I think you and him have a lot to talk about next time you see each other.”

“Is that so?” Lestat asked, curiosity almost overwhelming. “What did he say?” 

“I don’t remember the exact words, but the general vibe was that you were the first person who gave him the opportunity to think about what he actually wanted for himself. It was the beginning of his life.” 

Lestat felt his throat grow thick, and he nodded with a tight smile. Louis had thanked him, on his brief visit, for the dark gift - but knowing that he’d felt that way even before knowing the truth about what happened in Paris? That meant so much more. 

Rhydian went up on his toes to kiss him. “I’m sorry. We don’t have to talk about him.”

“It’s… Nice, in a way, you know. To have someone who knows the enchantement, the magic of him. Who understands the hole he leaves in his wake,” Lestat murmured, his hand lifting to cup the human’s face. “I am very glad to have met you, Rhydian.”

“I’m glad I met you, too, Lestat.” He gave Lestat a small smile and tilted his head slightly into his touch. “It’s weird, I can’t lie, knowing you’re my ex’s ex. But also… Kinda typical for queers, innit?”

Lestat laughed, reluctant to admit it, but he knew that Rhydian would get a kick out of it. “I was with the gremlin, very briefly, too. Before I met Louis.”

“No!” Rhydian threw his head back and guffawed, and Lestat rolled his eyes. “The one Louis was with after you? The one he left me for? Did he know?”

“Oh, yeah. Yeah, Louis knew. Armand did too.”

“Fuck, you vamps always have to take it a step further than the rest of us, huh?” 

“When you’re queer and a vampire, you have limited options,” Lestat defended, “besides, I only fucked Armand a handful of times. He was… How would you say… Not my type.”

“Oh, no? Why not?” Rhydian asked, still grinning, “I remember him being annoyingly beautiful.”

“He was, even more so with his clothes off,” Lestat shrugged, “but he was also, how can I put it… trop désespéré. Desperate. So desperate I could taste it on his tongue. And not in a sexy way, in a crazy way. And that is coming from me . I heard him think about which countries might allow two men to marry the second time we lay together. In the 18th century.”

Rhydian grimaced, which made Lestat chuckle. “Fair enough.”

“I suppose I prefer them emotionally unavailable and ravenously libidinous.” 

“Hmmm, yeah that tracks.”

Lestat grasped Rhydian’s ass. “Sound familiar?”

“Maybe,” he allowed, his pupils blowing as Lestat looked into them. “God, you’re making me break all my rules. What’s this, the fourth time in three days I’ve let you fuck me?” 

“I hardly count the alley, I was barely touching you,” Lestat waved away, “besides, why stop when it feels so good for both of us?” 

Rhydian sighed, his eyes searching Lestat’s face even as he let the vampire bring their hips together. His hand met Lestat’s chest and brushed up to his neck. “You’re Louis’ ex-husband. This is going to get messy.”

“Perhaps. Or perhaps he has nothing to do with whatever there is between us. I wanted you for myself before I knew about your history with Louis. I wanted you the second I saw you attack that animal in the nightclub. You wanted me too.”

“For the night, maybe.”

“And now? Why is your heart racing so if you do not want me, mon amoureux?” 

Rhydian bit the inside of his cheek. “My pussy wants you. My head is telling me you’re nothing but trouble.”

“And your heart?” Lestat prompted, his hand searching for the precious organ through Rhydian’s shirt, his palm settling where the human’s pulse was strongest. “What about that, hmm?” 

“I’m not so stupid as to listen to that,” Rhydian said quietly, his eyes dropping to Lestat’s mouth. “I’m a grown man, not a wilting damsel in distress wanting you to save them like some Byronic fantasy.”

Lestat held his chin and forced him to make eye contact. “I don’t mean to save you, Rhydian. I am no hero. I am no Louis. I mean to explore you, to know you, to… Love you.”

“Love me?” Rhydian squirmed a little, but the older man held him fast. “Lestat… I’ve known you for literally three days.”

“We were meant to meet. You feel it as I do. You said as much earlier. The two of us, together, we could fill our days with blood and pleasure and laughter. Hunting, fucking, talking. I would give you anything you want, anything you desire.” It wasn’t as rehearsed as the speech he’d given Louis, but he could tell it was affecting Rhydian from the way the human was looking at him, his eyes wide with barely concealed yearning. 

“Lestat, this is a lot.”

“I know, I know, the dark gift is overwhelming, but-”

“The what?” Rhydian’s face fell. “You want to turn me?”

Lestat was confused. Again. “Of course.”

“Let me go. I swear to God, let me go, right now.” Rhydian sounded panicked, genuinely so, and Lestat released his hold on the younger man’s hips but caught his wrist so he couldn’t go too far. 

“Rhydian, calm yourself. What is wrong?” 

“I would rather die, you hear me?!” Rhydian looked up at him, beseeching. He looked frantic, his eyes bright with tears. “Lestat, I don’t want it. Please let me go.”

It dawned on him that Rhydian was terrified at the concept of being turned into a vampire. “I would not turn you without your consent,” he insisted, irritation creeping in. “You really think I would…?”

“I-” Rhydian sniffed, shaking his head. “I don’t know. For a second, you looked… Please, let me go. I won’t run, I promise, I just… You’re freaking me out.” 

Lestat let his wrist go, and Rhydian brought it close, rubbing it. He burst into tears, turning his back as he started hyperventilating, and Lestat felt his heart fracture. “Rhydian, I am sorry. I thought-”

“Just… I don’t want to be turned, okay? I don’t. I’m sorry. I never, ever should have slept with you that second time. This was stupid. I was playing with fire. I gave you the wrong idea.”

“Rhydian, mon amoureux, speak to me. I do not understand this. Who told you being a vampire was so terrible?” Lestat walked around him to see his face again. Rhydian sniffled, rubbing his tears away. “What caused this reaction?”

“Have you ever-” Rhydian took a deep breath, steeling himself and settling his breathing before meeting Lestat’s eyes. There was unrelenting strength in there, a challenge for Lestat to prove him wrong. “Have you ever met a trans vampire? Even once?” 

Lestat reeled, the issue dawning on him. His mind went somewhere it hadn’t been in hundreds of years. Gabrielle. Gabrielle, and the rending screams they’d let out when they realised that their hair would grow back every sunset for eternity. The way they ran from civilization into the jungle, in part because they could not bear to be perceived as a woman in eternal life. Lestat remembered, and he nodded, his eyes downcast. “I have.”

“And how did it work out for them? Not being able to change your body? Being frozen forever?”

Lestat was silent. He couldn’t meet the human’s eyes.

“Yeah,” Rhydian sniffed, rubbing his wrist still. “That’s what I thought.”

“But… You’re…”

“I’m what? How would testosterone injections work for a goddamned vampire?! For all we know my tits would grow back! I could never, ever, ever risk it. Ever. So I’m telling you right now, I will beg you to kill me before I let you turn me. Kill me now if you have to. If that would be easier, just kill me now. End it. I would welcome it one hundred times before being forced to be a woman again.”

Lestat shook his head. “I meant what I said,” he gritted out, anger flaming in his gut. “I would never force you. Not with the bite, and not with sex. Not with anything. You really think I would? You think I’m like those pigs in the club, on the street?!”

“You are a VAMPIRE! You stalked me and snuck into my house and butchered a man in front of me an hour ago! Excuse ME for not taking for granted that you’d draw the line at RAPE!”

“WELL I WOULD! I DO!” Lestat bellowed, and Rhydian raised his chin, eyes blazing with rage of his own. 

“WELL GOOD!” Rhydian shouted back, his lower lip wobbling but his eyebrows set defiantly. “Good.”

Lestat ground his teeth together. “So, what, were you just going along with everything because you were scared I’d…” The word tasted like filth in his mouth, “force you?”

“God, for such an annoyingly gorgeous man you are such an insecure fucking IDIOT!” Rhydian wheeled around angrily, raking his hands through his hair. “Of course not! Fucking HELL, Lestat! You really think I’d just lie to your face like that?! I THOUGHT you could read minds!”

“YOURS is a confounding MESS!” 

Rhydian yelled in frustration wordlessly, and Lestat clenched his fists. This was not how this was meant to go. He felt like tearing the whole room to pieces. “I have to get out of here.”

“You promised you wouldn’t leave,” Lestat insisted, pointing at him. “You said you wouldn’t.”

“Would you rather I stay here and scream bloody murder at you?”

“YES!” Lestat shouted emphatically, “yes, I would!” He felt his throat close. How embarrassing, he thought to himself, to be so attached to a mortal three days after meeting him.

Rhydian deflated at the older man’s admission, and he looked at Lestat in a way that made him feel naked. He knew that it clicked into place for the human at that moment. Lestat was lonely, and would do anything to not be lonely. The two men stared at each other for several moments, both of their defences down and cast aside for the first time since they’d met. 

“Can you love a human? Properly love one, for real?” Rhydian asked, breaking the silence that had fallen between them.

Lestat’s lips parted in surprise. He didn’t need to think about it. “If it was you? Yes. I think. Could you love a vampire?” 

“I already have.”

“Could you love me ?” Lestat asked, hating how vulnerable his voice sounded. 

Rhydian sucked his lower lip into his mouth. “I need time. I-”

“But could you? In time?”

“Yes,” the human admitted, swiping at a tear as it fell. “Probably. Yeah. Even if you are a stupid, insecure, arrogant, big-dicked-”

Lestat didn’t hear the end of the sentence, because he swept Rhydian up into his arms and kissed him so hard that it had him gasping into his mouth. “No more fighting,” he whispered desperately, “not tonight. I beg you, Rhydian. No more. Just this.”

“Yeah,” Rhydian agreed, clinging to his shirt. “Yeah, okay. Okay.”

Lestat had no idea how any of it was going to work, him with a human, but he didn’t care. All he knew was that Rhydian was his new destiny, the next stage of his life, and he wasn’t going to fight it. He would do better, he would be gentle and kind and not let his temper run away from him. He would work hard to deserve Rhydian’s love, and he would do whatever it took to keep their relationship truly alive, not force it the way he’d done before, with Louis. 

He would do it right this time, he swore to himself as he was shoved onto the bed by his human lover, his hands running reverently over Rhydian’s sides as he climbed into his lap.

“You are so beautiful, my sweetest boy,” Lestat murmured, looking up at Rhydian for once. 

Rhydian rolled his eyes, though his cheeks were pink and he squirmed in his lap, pleased. “Do you ever shut up?” 

“Non,” Lestat answered belligerently before Rhydian grasped his hair and pulled his face into his chest. Lestat tore the human’s shirt open, dragging his lips over his scars, his nipples. “Never.”

“Maybe I should sit on your face then. One way to guarantee no more arguments.” 

The vampire groaned softly at the thought. Rhydian pushed his shoulders back, a wicked grin coming over his face as Lestat lay back willingly. He watched as Rhydian quickly stripped off, his eyes roaming over the pretty skin that now belonged to him. “Please do.”

“You ever bottom?” Rhydian asked, unbuttoning Lestat’s trousers and pulling them down.

Lestat chuckled. “Do you really think, knowing what you know of me, that I would deny myself any form of pleasure?” 

“Noted,” Rhydian was having all kinds of sordid ideas, and Lestat chased them around his imagination with relish. The two of them made eye contact and held it, a feedback loop of desire that had them both panting in moments. “Hands over your head.”

Lestat obeyed without question, licking his lips. He was glad he’d just fed as Rhydian climbed up over him and sat astride his face, leaning so he was pinning Lestat’s hands to the bed before lowering his pussy to Lestat’s mouth. Moaning, the vampire squeezed his eyes shut and dug his tongue through the tacky wetness left over from the alley, squirming without realising it. Rhydian hummed in pleasure, arching. It wasn’t long before Lestat’s tongue was coated in fresh slick, and his mouth caught Rhydian’s dick. 

“Fuck, yes,” Rhydian hissed, freezing and letting Lestat suck. “God, you’re so good at that.”

“ Moan for me, mon amoureux, I want to hear it,” Lestat encouraged in the human’s mind. 

“You’ll take what you’re given,” Rhydian answered breathlessly, a smile evident in his voice. That worked for Lestat. His cock was throbbing. He decided to behave, just this once. “Stick out your tongue,” the human demanded, “I wanna use you.”

“ Feel free ,” Lestat thought enthusiastically, opening his eyes as he opened his mouth, offering Rhydian his tongue to rub on. 

The human, ever greedy for pleasure, rode Lestat’s tongue with no heed for the vampire’s comfort, and it had Lestat dripping bloody pre-cum within moments. He’d give anything to be able to stroke himself, but Rhydian still had his hands in a vice grip, using them as leverage to bounce on his tongue. It was torment, and it was wonderful. A vampire younger than Lestat would struggle to keep his fangs in check, but he was made of sterner stuff. 

“God, I could do this all night,” Rhydian panted, “that mouth is so much better on my cunt than it is talking shit.”

Lestat huffed at that, which made the human laugh and moan at the same time. It made a thrill of happiness warm Lestat’s stomach. Rhydian rode his first orgasm right into a second, groaning Lestat’s name over and over again, letting go of his hands to grip his hair instead. Lestat’s hands went to the human’s thighs, clutching him tighter to his mouth and fucking his tongue in deep, his eyes so dark that the blue could barely be seen. Rhydian writhed, crying out in bliss, and Lestat speared him over and over and over again until he smelled overwhelmed tears on the human’s cheeks. 

“Enough, baby,” Rhydian gasped, tugging on Lestat’s hair for a different reason now, “fuck, baby, it feels so good.”

Lestat liked that. It wasn’t a nickname anyone had given him before. Not many beings had looked at him and thought of him as something that could be that soft and breakable, and certainly none that he had let live. He licked his lips as Rhydian climbed off him, sighing in satisfaction. Rhydian lay down next to him, his chest heaving, and Lestat shifted closer, turning onto his side. 

“Did I make top three yet?” He asked, and Rhydian grinned, patting his arm with a shaky hand. 

“You’re nearly there.”

Lestat hummed, moving closer to press his face into Rhydian’s throat. He smelled good, all sweaty from orgasm. Rhydian’s fingers tangled in his hair. “You taste divine.”

“I’m glad you think so,” the human smiled, scritching his scalp. “Shame I don’t have a strap with me.”

“When you say strap…”

Rhydian smirked, turning a little so they were looking into each other’s eyes, and thought so intently that Lestat couldn’t help but take notice. Rhydian was thinking about a black leather harness he had back at his place, and a thick purple dildo that slotted into it, and he was thinking about teasing Lestat open with it. Lestat swallowed hard. All the hairs on his arms stood on end as Rhydian really thought about what it’d be like to eat him out to start, taking great pains to imagine the desperate sounds he might make. “Please, je le veux, mon amoureux.” Lestat’s voice sounded alien to his own ears, hushed and desperate.

“You lost me,” Rhydian murmured, getting up with his fingers tracing down Lestat’s chest, “I wasn’t very good at French in school.”

Lestat huffed. It felt strange to say it in English. More needy. “I want it,” he gritted out, stomach tensing, and Rhydian smirked. “You understood it just fine,” Lestat realised a moment too late. 

“I made a lucky guess.”

“Maybe I should sit on your face instead.”

“So snippy,” Rhydian cooed, kneeling on the floor in front of him and easing his legs open, “is the big bad dom top vampire feeling exposed?”

Lestat leaned up on his elbows, grinding his teeth. “You madden me. You make me want to…”

“To…?” Rhydian prompted after a moment of silence, holding the back of Lestat’s knee and pushing it back until he was almost folded in half. Lestat could have resisted, of course he could have, but he wanted Rhydian to work him over, badly. He wanted to see his boy dominate, both for carnal and curiosity purposes. 

“Sometimes I want to wring your pretty neck,” Lestat admitted darkly, “watch your slutty smirk melt off in horror.”

Rhydian hummed, finally lowering his head to kiss Lestat’s thighs. “Lucky that I’d like your hands around my throat, I guess.”

Lestat gasped as Rhydian’s teeth sunk into his thigh, his fingers knotting in the bedsheet. “Harder,” he urged, squeezing his eyes shut. Rhydian dug his blunt teeth in with as much pressure as he could, and Lestat moaned deeply when the skin broke, a tiny dribble of blood seeping out from the shallow bite. Lestat wished desperately that Rhydian had fangs, that he could bite and feed from him properly, but alas - no-one was perfect. 

The human licked at his blood, making a satisfied sound at the hit of power. He knew his limits, though, and left the drips alone after a couple of passes, his mouth going instead to Lestat’s hole. “How long’s it been since someone ate you out, baby?” 

Lestat felt the blood he’d drunk earlier rush to his cheeks. “I should be offended that you think I’m some mindless idiot whose only interest is rutting into the nearest hole.”

Rhydian laughed softly. “I don’t know, I haven’t seen a cock dripping so much without being touched in a long time. I smelled it on you a few nights ago. You’re hard up. So tell me, how long’s it been since someone put the great Lestat de Lioncourt on his back?”

Damn him. Damn this imp, this mortal demon who had him so worked up against every hard-earned inch of his better judgement. “Eight-four years,” he confessed, his fangs dropping without him even thinking about it. Louis, of course, was the last who’d had him this way, a lifetime ago.

“Oh, baby,” Rhydian cooed, which made Lestat grind his teeth together and shiver all at once. “No wonder you need it so bad.”

“Rhydian, you’re pushing your luck, mon amoureux…”

“Am I?” Rhydian lifted his head to make eye contact with the vampire, his eyes glinting with predatory hunger but also a clear question - do you want this? It made Lestat burn with desire, and he decided to play along, to let the human dominate him. He told himself he wanted to see Rhydian’s sadistic streak in all its glory, but there was a bigger part of him that desperately wanted to allow a mortal to defile him this way, to talk down to him like he was not a higher being. It amounted almost to blasphemy, and it turned him on. He couldn’t deny that.

“Do you want me to stop?” Rhydian prodded, “I can’t read your mind, baby.”

“No,” Lestat admitted, letting his head flop back down to the pillow, his hips flexing, “non, I… Continue.”

Rhydian stroked his thighs, pressing where the bite was already healing with his thumb cruelly, making Lestat hiss with pleasure-pain. “If you want me to stop, say red. You got that?”

“Yes,” Lestat agreed, swallowing hard. He closed his eyes and tried to relax. It had been a long time, and though he always enjoyed the times he’d been the yielding partner, it always made him feel vulnerable in a way that both terrified and thrilled him. Louis, in particular, had been known to make him scream the place down with equal parts pleasure and delicious humiliation. The memories made him shiver. He wondered if that was where Rhydian got his desperate submissive streak from.

“Good,” Rhydian said softly, wrapping his hand around Lestat’s straining cock, bringing the vampire squarely back to the present, “I’m gonna put my mouth on you now, and if you ask nicely I’ll fuck you with my fingers and make you squirt, how does that sound?” 

The vampire let out a moan at the thought, thrusting shamelessly through Rhydian’s grip. 

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” he said, amused, as he pushed Lestat’s leg higher and leaned in to kiss his hole. At first he just kissed it over and over again, the brushes of his lips enough to drive anyone mad wanting more, but before Lestat got so impatient he voiced it, Rhydian’s tongue joined his lips, rubbing and teasing his rim gently at first and then more firmly. 

“Oh,” Lestat’s eyebrows pinched, his breath coming out shaky. The human knew what he was doing, and suddenly he understood what Rhydian had meant about something being good in the early 20th century not necessarily being as good now. There wasn’t the same tentativeness, the same shame, the same fear that some awful taboo was being broken, as there had been back then. Sometimes that taboo had been arousing, but there was always a weight, a heaviness to this particular act especially. Lestat had gotten over it by the time the 19th century ended, but his other lovers hadn’t - especially Louis, who had been tormented by his goddamned Catholic guilt the entire time they’d been together. But Rhydian felt none of that weight, none of that shame. This was no longer illegal, and it showed in the confidence, in the sureness, in the sheer unadulterated enjoyment that Rhydian took in the act. 

Rhydian moaned into him, and Lestat groaned louder. His fingers went to the human’s head, pulling him in as he let his legs fall open wider. He closed his eyes and let himself bathe in the feeling, in carefully being teased open, the wet pressure, the stretch, the friction. God, he wanted to bite something. Rhydian’s mind was easier to keep track of, too - all his thoughts centred on how much Lestat was enjoying it, and how wet it was making him that Lestat was enjoying it, how much Rhydian regretted not having a strap to fuck him senseless, which made Lestat let out a truly shameless sound. 

“Next time,” he breathed, his chest heaving, “next time, bring it.”

The human pulled back enough to breathe for a moment, a grin evident in his voice. “You got it, baby. You ready for my fingers?” 

“ Yes ,” Lestat nodded, arching closer to Rhydian’s mouth, “yes, mon amoureux, please.”

“Please what, baby?”

“Rhydian…” Lestat would swear that he growled, but it sounded more like a whimper to the human. 

“Consent is sexy, Lestat, I wanna hear you tell me what you want.”

Lestat gritted his teeth, his pride flaring once more and making him feel the all-too familiar burn of irritation. But under it was a desperate, desperate want to please. And, for once in his life, he chose to sink into the latter, shoving away his pride in the service of the new bond he wanted to create with Rhydian. “I want you to fuck me open with your fingers,” he confessed, face bright with blood, “and if you are not inside me in the next 30 seconds, I might have to rip your pretty-”

He didn’t get the chance to finish the sentence, because Rhydian spat on his hole.

“ Rhydian ,” he gasped, mortified but also closer to cumming untouched than he’d been all night. His cock throbbed visibly.

“Oh, you like that, huh?” Rhydian encouraged, rubbing his spit into Lestat’s hole before pushing in his pointer finger. 

“Perhaps,” Lestat answered, voice tight, and Rhydian laughed fondly, which made the vampire relax a little. 

Rhydian leaned in once more, his tongue working to relax Lestat enough for another finger. Lestat looked up towards his bedside drawer, where he knew there was a bottle of barely used lube, and his squirming made Rhydian raise his head, stilling his finger and standing up on his knees to check Lestat’s face.

“You alright, baby?” 

“There’s lube in the-”

“You need lube? I’ve got you covered,” Rhydian smirked, slowly pulling out his finger and dropping it out of Lestat’s sight. The human’s eyes flickered with pleasure as Lestat heard an audible squelch, and when he raised his fingers again, they were covered in slick. Lestat stared at him, mouth open. The slide of Rhydian’s finger was unmistakably easier now, and the idea of him fucking Lestat open with his own arousal was enough to have him biting his own arm to fend off the desire to bite his lover. It didn’t take long for Rhydian to work up to three fingers, dipping into his own slick to keep it comfortable every now and then. 

Lestat had no idea how long Rhydian worked him over. He hadn’t thought the human capable of such patience, and it was maddening. He knew that Rhydian was teasing him on purpose, but he was so overwhelmed he couldn’t find the energy to be angry about it. Every now and then the human would rub him from the inside in just the right spot to make him cry out, and then he’d go back to avoiding it for a few minutes. 

“I can’t take this anymore!” Lestat yelped, eventually, tugging on his own hair, “please, mon amoureux, I am begging you, I need you to let me finish.”

“You can cum whenever you want to, baby, you don’t need my permission.”

This time Lestat went up on his elbows to look down at the human, his chest heaving. “You know what I mean.”

“Have you ever cum untouched before?” Rhydian asked, as casually as if he were asking if Lestat had ever driven a car. 

“Not from fingers,” Lestat gritted out, and Rhydian hummed.

“What was it you said to me the other night when you had me up against the wall? I don’t care,” the human purred, purposefully stroking over his prostate at that moment, “and I can wait all night.”

Lestat cursed himself for those words, but he couldn’t deny that Rhydian had him right where he wanted him. “Maybe I can do it,” he panted, “if you stop being tiresome, pretending not to know what feels good.”

Rhydian stroked his thighs, kissing them with fondness in his eyes like he couldn’t deny Lestat anything he asked for, and wasn’t that something? “Alright, baby, alright. Lie back. I’ve got you.” He slicked his fingers quickly from his own cunt before slipping them back inside, and started slowly fucking Lestat with them, dragging the dextrous pads over his prostate with every deep thrust. He lowered his mouth and started massaging the vampire’s perineum with firm, even strokes of his tongue, his other hand pressing down gently on his lower stomach. It was a triple whammy, and Lestat was overcome after a few thrusts.

“Fuck,” he spat, throwing his head back. Blood tears jumped to his eyes with how intense it got so fast, and his thighs trembled. “Rhydian, Rhydian, Rhydian,” he sobbed with pleasure, back arching as his cock flexed and spurted, his body heaving with aftershocks as Rhydian gently eased up, his mouth settling at the base of Lestat’s cock to lick up the cum pooling there. He panted open-mouthed for a few long minutes, his fingers dropping to stroke Rhydian’s hair. 

“You good?” Rhydian asked, carefully pulling out his fingers. Lestat looked down at him, and there must’ve been some confusion on his face because the human smiled and tilted his head to the side. “What is it?”

“I… I am wondering how…” Lestat sat up a little, his thighs still trembling. “I have known vampires hundreds of years old who could not overcome me the way you just did.”

Rhydian snorted. “Shut up.”

“I mean it,” Lestat insisted, wiping a little blood sweat from his forehead, “I am starting to feel like I have invented you as the perfect man.”

“Oof, falling off that pedestal you’re building me is gonna hurt,” Rhydian winced half-jokingly, which made Lestat chuckle. “I don’t know, I’ve been fucking men almost every night for twenty years. I was paid for it for a solid chunk of time. It’s not that hard. Especially when you don’t have claws.”

“That might help,” Lestat allowed, his eyes narrowing. “How old are you, exactly?”

“Thirty-five. Why? How old did you think I was?” 

“I do not know, that’s why I asked.”

Rhydian hummed, shifting closer until their bodies were pressed together from cheek to hip. “It was nice, seeing you let go like that. It felt like you trusted me with it. I know it wasn’t something you’re used to doing with just anyone.”

“It is not,” Lestat agreed, pressing his lips to Rhydian’s forehead, “but it was… Wonderful. I fear I have yet to offer you anything quite so groundbreaking in your sexual odyssey.”

Rhydian let out what could only be described as a giggle, and he pressed his face into Lestat’s skin, which made Lestat smile despite the insecurity he was feeling. “I have no idea what that even means but I promise you I have enjoyed myself with you plenty. I’d have said it if I hadn’t.”

“Oh I know that, mon amoureux, no-one could fake those shudders of pleasure - what I meant was what I have given you is nothing that you haven’t had before. With… Others.”

“You know what I said about my rules, earlier?” Rhydian asked, pulling back to look Lestat in the eye. He nodded. “I haven’t had the same man twice since Louis. Not one. I have always, always avoided it, as far as I know. I’ve run from every man who’s walked into my life since him. So,” Rhydian sighed, his fingers smoothing Lestat’s cheek, “at risk of inflating your fucking humungous ego, you are very groundbreaking, Lestat de Lioncourt. The most groundbreaking man I’ve ever had in my life. You are the exact kind of psycho that makes me feel like I can just let myself go. I’ve been trying to be normal my whole life. And I don’t know. You make me feel like I don’t have to anymore. That it won’t kill me to be honest about the fact that I am probably a bit of a psychopath. That you and I could be happy being psychopaths together. Even if it might leave a slight body count of scumbags in our wake. No-one’s ever made me feel like that before. Not even Louis. I’ve pretended my whole life, had to be something I’m not with everybody. But not with you.”

Lestat was touched, and the irony was not lost on him that most “normal” people would have been incredibly put off by what Rhydian had just said. “Meeting you is the best thing to happen to me in a century,” he said softly, closing his eyes in bliss. 

The two of them lay in happy silence for several long minutes. Rhydian sighed, and Lestat opened one eye. “The sun’ll be up in a bit. I should let you go to coffin.”

Lestat made no move to let Rhydian get up. “Stay. Sleep in there, with me.”

Rhydian smiled against his skin. “Alright. Alright, baby, I will.”

Chapter Text

Over the next few months, Lestat and Rhydian fell into a loose routine. Lestat would rise at sunset to Rhydian finishing up his work for the day, sitting at the desk with his drawing tablet, eyes trained on the screen. He would practise piano while Rhydian ate something, and then most nights the two of them would go out. Sometimes it was nightclubs, sometimes it was cocktail bars, sometimes it was cinemas.  Sometimes they’d mix it up and bring home a third person to sleep with, sometimes even a fourth. If it was just the two of them, they’d find Lestat a snack on the way home. Rhydian had started taking a more active role in recent weeks, helping tempt bad, nasty men to dark corners for his lover to feast on. When they got home, they’d fuck desperately. And the entire time, they’d talk. Bicker. Laugh. 

“What do you think sets you off the most on those rages of yours?” Rhydian asked him one night, a few minutes after they’d finished their second bout of athletic makeup sex in a week. “I don’t want to trigger you if I can help it, you know? But it’s pretty clear that some things really get to you.”

Lestat thought about it for a moment, embarrassed but pleased that Rhydian cared enough to ask. “I do not like feeling alone. Loneliness… It is my greatest fear. I do not like it when you tell me you want to leave during a fight or make me feel like you want to get away from me.” 

Rhydian leaned up on one elbow, leaning over him and gazing into his eyes. “I wondered if that might be it. Nowadays they call it having an ‘anxious attachment type.’ You feel like if you don’t hold on as tight as you can everyone will leave you. My instinct is always to get myself out of the fight, see. Especially when I’m angry, because I’m always scared I’m going to say something I’d regret,” he explained. “Would it help if, when I needed space, I spent some time reassuring you?”

“But why would you need space?” Lestat asked, his eyebrows furrowing. The human laughed and brushed the creases of his brow with his fingers. 

“Because sometimes I need a little bit of time to decompress and reset my brain. Or see my human friends who don’t know about your whole deal. For me, for my mental health. Means I’m less irritable and overwhelmed. Which means that I’m less likely to bite your head off for no reason.” 

Lestat considered that. “That is… Logical. I suppose.”

“So, when I need that, do you think there are things I could do or say that would make you feel less anxious?” Rhydian asked patiently. His fingers hadn’t left the older man’s face, gently tracing his features. 

“I am not sure,” Lestat admitted, “no-one has ever asked me that before.”

“What if I showered you in kisses and told you I’d miss you?” The human asked, bending to brush his lips against Lestat’s. “What if I sucked your dick real good and let you mark me up?” Lestat inhaled sharply, ever on a hair trigger, and grasped Rhydian’s waist possessively. “What if I told you there’s no other man for me?”

Lestat smiled wryly. “All of the above. I will take all of it.”

“Would it help?”

“I think so,” he confirmed, searching Rhydian’s thoughts and finding nothing but affection. It made him feel… Tranquil. He was glad, at that moment, that Rhydian was not his fledgling. It helped him feel less antsy, knowing what Rhydian was thinking, knowing that the younger man wasn’t putting on airs just to placate him.

It was easy, easier than Lestat had thought, falling in love with a human who he had no hope of turning. Rhydian knew things he didn’t, about the way brains worked and why. He liked to bicker in a fun way but he liked to make peace when things got heated. He was strong, but he was vulnerable. He shared more about his past with the nameless vampire, and in return Lestat explained his own history with Magnus, Nicky, and Gabrielle. They hadn’t fucked that night, the only night they’d stopped at kissing and gone to sleep with all their clothes on. The next evening when Lestat woke up, he was nervous, wondering if he had shared too much, but Rhydian smiled at him like something tender had settled between them. Rhydian liked asking him questions, and he liked learning about his human lover too. He was surprised at how much there was to know, given how short Rhydian’s life had been compared to his own. They spent a lot of their time together, but time apart as well. Lestat found it was pleasant, having time to miss Rhydian without the paralysing fear that the younger man would disappear into the night never to return. He’d taken to writing music again on the nights he was alone.

So when Louis called Lestat out of the blue five months into his new life in London, he was glad that it was on a rare evening where Rhydian had wanted some time to himself. He hesitated, but not for long. There was no world where Lestat would miss Louis’ call. 

“Hello, Lestat,” Louis said, his voice as alluring as ever. Lestat thought his accent had come back, just a little. It made him ache.

“Hello, Louis,” Lestat answered, his insides twisting up with missing him. 

“How’s London?”

“It is good. It… It was the right time for a new start, I think.”

“Yeah. I agree. You deserve one.” 

Lestat felt guilty at that; he wasn’t sure Louis was right. “Was there something you needed?” He asked instead of addressing it. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah, of course. I just… Wanted to check in. See if you were okay. It’s been longer than I meant to be out of touch. I’ve been keeping myself real busy with work, keeping my mind off things. Is it alright that I called?”

“Of course,” Lestat insisted, “you can call whenever you like, and I will answer.” Perhaps it was too honest, but Rhydian had gotten him used to saying what he meant.

Louis let out a soft breath that sounded like a smile. “I have business in London next week. No pressure, but… It’d be nice to catch up in person. If you’d like to.”

“I would,” Lestat replied, fiddling with his nails. “But, Louis, I have to tell you something.” The thought of telling Louis in person about Rhydian made him feel sick. What if Louis got angry? He didn’t want to fight him, not again. Never again. 

“Oh?” Louis sounded as amused as he was curious.

“I met Rhydian. The boy you had an affair with here.”

A pause. “Oh.” 

“In a nightclub. My third night here. I did not know he was yours until-”

Louis sighed, and Lestat stopped talking. “Lestat, he doesn’t belong to me. Is he… Still alive?”

“Yes, yes, of course. He is…” Lestat found he didn’t know how to finish the sentence.

“Irresistible,” Louis suggested, and Lestat hummed. “I bet he fell for you night one.”

Lestat huffed out a half-laugh through his nose. “Hardly. No, he made me work for it.”

“But… You and him?”

“Yes,” Lestat answered, swallowing hard. “I swear I did not do it to hurt you.”

Louis was quiet for a long moment. “I believe you.”

Lestat felt relief flood through him. “Are you… Upset by it?”

“I… Have no right to be.”

“Of course you do,” Lestat replied, his eyebrows furrowing. “I do not know the exact circumstances for your parting from him, but from what I have heard, it sounds as though Armand-”

“ I made the decision to end it, Lestat. It was… I was messing with his life. He deserved better. Someone who could… Armand was just… The catalyst.” Louis sounded miserable, and Lestat felt lousy. “And I was the one who told you that I didn’t want to get back together, yet.”

Lestat’s eyebrow quirked. He didn’t remember that last word being on the end of that sentence when Louis had said it in New Orleans. He said nothing, not trusting himself. He loved Rhydian and the way that the human made him feel, but Louis was his husband. Always would be.

“I appreciate you telling me about Rhydian, being honest,” Louis told him after a moment. “You could’ve hidden it or denied it. I had been tempted to reach out to him, but… It wouldn’t be fair on him, or on you.”

“You loved him very much.” Lestat didn’t say it like a question, and Louis didn’t answer it like one. 

“Maybe… Maybe the three of us could get a drink? Or something. That might be nice. Maybe I could bring Daniel.”

“Daniel?” Lestat felt his face fall.

Louis snorted. “A friend. Nothing more. I assure you. He’s Armand’s new fledgling, but the asshole’s left him high and dry. He’s been staying with me.”

“Oh. That sounds like quite the story. And you know I cannot resist any story that involves Armand’s emotional upheaval.” 

That got a laugh out of him, which made Lestat smile, something anxious loosening in his chest. “Alright, you’ve got a deal. If Rhydian doesn’t want to see me, that’s fine. I’d understand. I’d still like to see you, though.”

“Of course,” Lestat nodded, “I’d like that too.”

“I want us to be in each others’ lives, you know? It seems silly to pretend the other doesn’t exist, given everything we shared for thirty years, right?”

“Right.”

Neither of them said anything for a moment. 

“Right,” Louis sighed, “I should probably go. It’s getting late here.”

“Yes, yes, of course. Sleep well, Louis.”

“Goodnight, Lestat.”

Lestat tossed his phone next to him on the sofa and put his head in his hands. Well, he told himself, it could’ve gone worse. Louis didn’t like his relationship with Rhydian, he could feel it even without being able to hear Louis’ thoughts, but hopefully seeing them together would help Louis not to worry about his intentions with Rhydian too much. He didn’t want Louis to think for one second that this was an Antoinette situation. 

The idea of Rhydian being there, though, of him seeing Louis again, made him feel a little sick. Rhydian was still in love with Louis, he had never denied that. Lestat was still in love with Louis, too. And Louis still cared for Rhydian, it seemed. What if the two of them decided to give it another go? Louis was right - Rhydian was irresistible, and so was Louis. Who would blame them? Certainly not him. 

Right as Lestat was really starting to spiral, he got a message from Rhydian that made his phone buzz so aggressively that he looked down at it. A picture flashed up on screen - a photograph of a cream coloured kitten with big blue eyes lying on its back, its teeth showing like little fangs. Rhydian had captioned it, “this is literally you when you’re sleepy omgggg” with several heart eyes emojis. Lestat snorted. It was so ridiculous that it made his anxiety ease. He had killed tens of thousands of people, but this was how Rhydian saw him. A fluffy little creature. It should be insulting, but he was finding that he liked it. He liked that Rhydian saw him kill almost every night, enjoyed it, found it sexy, but at the same time didn’t let it stop him from seeing Lestat as something lovable - cute, even. It had always been one or the other - a lover who saw him as something breakable, a lover who saw him as a fount of power. Never both, never both at the same time. But Rhydian did. 

Lestat pressed the call button, lying back on the sofa. 

“Hey, baby, what’s up?” Rhydian answered quicker than Lestat had answered Louis’ call, and wasn’t that something? 

“Louis called,” Lestat confessed, “I told him. About us. I… I did not want to hide it from him.”

“Oh, uh… Yeah, no, that was probably the right thing to do. What did he want?” Rhydian sounded surprised, but not annoyed. 

“He is going to be in town next week,” the vampire explained, “he wants to meet up.”

“Oh.” Rhydian took a moment to think about it. “Do you want to?”

Lestat shrugged one shoulder. There was no point in lying. “Yes. Is that… Acceptable?”

“Yeah, of course,” Rhydian answered, a shade too quickly, “he’s your ex husband, I get it.”

“He asked if you would like to come, too.”

Rhydian was quieter for longer this time. “I feel like we should talk about this in person, baby. Is that okay? I can come over, I was just chilling with Annie.”

“I am sorry for interrupting your night,” Lestat said, and he meant it. He felt a little pathetic. He thought about offering to wait until tomorrow, but he knew that he would hate every second between then and now and end up too upset to do anything but shout about it.

“No, no, I’m glad you did. I wouldn’t want you freaking out by yourself. It’s what I’m here for. I’ll be there in like, forty minutes, okay? No thinking until I get there.”

Lestat snorted, rolling his eyes slightly. “Alright, mon amoureux. I will put the kettle on.”

“You’re an angel. Love you, bye.”

That was new. Lestat looked at his phone with shock as the line went dead, wondering if Rhydian had even realised what he said, and if he did, if it had been to distract Lestat from Louis. No, he told himself firmly, closing his eyes and going very still, Rhydian didn’t do that kind of thing. He didn’t play games. He hadn’t for five months, and he would not start now. If Rhydian had a problem with Lestat seeing Louis, he would tell Lestat in a few minutes when he got here.

Lestat told himself that over and over as he bustled around the penthouse, changing out of his ratty pyjamas into slightly less comfortable but more attractive loungewear and putting a teapot of Rhydian’s favourite fruit tea to brew. The human couldn’t get enough of the premium loose leaf that Lestat had bought for him a few weeks ago. It had begun as a tongue in cheek joke about flavouring Rhydian’s blood with the strawberry infusion, but the younger man really liked it, so Lestat had bought more of it. It didn’t affect the taste of his blood at all, it turned out, but it made Rhydian happy. There were several little human touches around the apartment now, since Rhydian usually came here - Lestat had offered to get a coffin for his place, but Rhydian had been worried about landlord inspections. Lestat, in response, had offered to buy his flat for him, but Rhydian had not liked that at all. 

The vampire cringed a little at the memory of that night, one of their worst fights. The next day, Rhydian had returned with flowers and the explanation that he didn’t want Lestat to give him extravagant gifts because of his history as a sex worker. He wanted to feel like Lestat’s equal, not his sugar baby, he had said. That made sense to Lestat, once the concept of a sugar baby had been explained to him - he had had issues of his own with wealth in his first few years rich after struggling to feed his family as a young man. It was one of several things the two of them had had to work out to settle into the easy comfort they were now enjoying. So now Lestat kept his gift-giving to small things, like tea and the horrible cheap takeaway that Rhydian loved. 

They had successfully managed situations where they’d both been angry before, Lestat told himself, they would handle this one. Neither of them was angry, at least not yet. And if one or both of them got angry, they would get over it. They would fuck it out and then talk about it afterwards. It would be fine. 

Rhydian buzzed downstairs, and Lestat smiled slightly. He had a key now, but he still always announced his presence with the bell before he opened the door - said he didn’t want to sneak up on him, as if that were possible. Lestat got up to meet him at the front door, relieved when Rhydian planted a kiss on him as soon as he came in, his arms around Lestat’s neck. 

“Hey,” the younger man said nervously. “You doing okay?”

Lestat shrugged. “A bit in shock. I did not expect to hear from him. It’s been long enough that I thought he had gotten rid of my number.”

“Yeah, I know. It’s been like, what? Six months since you saw him?” Rhydian was looking up at him with concern, his big, pretty brown eyes making Lestat feel calmer already. “Have you eaten tonight?”

“Non, but I am okay. I will feed from you after.”

Rhydian smiled. “Alright. I’d like that.” It was an unspoken agreement, one that they’d used before, that they would not be going to bed angry. “Let’s sit down, yeah?”

Lestat dutifully followed the human to the living room, sighing as he sat down. “I will understand if you do not wish me to see him.”

“I don’t think that’s up to me, baby, you and him have a lot of unfinished business,” Rhydian pointed out, sitting down cross-legged. “If you want to see him, I think you should.”

“But will that upset you?”

Rhydian tilted his head to the side. “I don’t know. Maybe a little. But… Look, I know we don’t talk about the clock-shaped elephant in the room, but I’m not gonna be around forever. And I want you to be happy, always-”

“That will not be a problem for fifty years at least, mon amoureux-” Lestat insisted passionately. He couldn’t think about it without wanting to die.

“But in fifty years, Louis will be there for you. And hopefully he will have gotten his head out of his ass and realised what he’s been missing.”

Lestat felt a huge lump in his throat. “So what, you are going to leave me to him in your will like an old dresser?”

Rhydian sighed, his eyebrows pinching. “No, that’s not… Sorry, it’s coming out wrong. What I mean is that it would be selfish, incredibly selfish of me to insist on you and him being no contact when I can’t give you everything you need.” He shifted closer, his knees pressing to Lestat’s thighs. “Look, the demons in my head are telling me that the second you lay eyes on each other you’re both gonna forget all about me and disappear into the sunset. But I trust you. I trust what we’ve shared in the past few months. So the bottom line is, I am okay with you going to see Louis.”

“Even if I wanted to leave with him, he would not take me, mon amoureux. And…” He hesitated a moment. “I still do not feel right speaking ill of him, but I am somewhat upset at the way that he moved on with his life and left me behind. I do not know if that is fair, but-”

“It is, baby, it’s more than fair,” Rhydian insisted, squeezing the older man’s hand. “You feel what you feel. You had a seventy year depressive fog while he was with Armand racking up millions while you lived in a shack. I’d be pissed too. I mean I am pissed off with him, and we were only together for four years.”

Lestat leaned forward to rest his forehead on Rhydian’s shoulder. “And you do not want to come with me when I see him?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know. The thought is sort of terrifying,” he said softly, running his fingers through Lestat’s hair.

“He wouldn’t hurt you. He loved you.”

“Oh I know that he'd never hurt me, he never laid a hand on me that I didn’t ask for and never would. I just… I don’t know, he was my first love. But the older I get, the more I understand that I was not as important to him as I thought I was at the time. I was convenient, especially now that I know he prefers not to kill. I was a fuckable little blood bag. I get it,” Rhydian’s voice was thick, and he cleared his throat. “I mean, he was always careful with me. He tried to manage my expectations, I think. But he was my whole life . I don’t know, baby. I don’t know if I can look at him without feeling like I’m back there. Nineteen and broken and obsessed with a man who’s nowhere near in love with me. I don’t know if I’m ready to see the confirmation that I didn’t mean anything to him. I was just a whore he enjoyed spending time with. Not a partner.”

“I do not think you’re giving yourself enough credit, mon amoureux. I know Louis, and he sounded heartbroken when I told him we were together,” he told him, and Rhydian giggled, sniffing back tears.

“You are so dense, Lestat,” he told him fondly, “he was heartbroken because you are in a relationship with someone that’s not him. It’s not about me at all.”

Lestat frowned deeply. “I do not think that is true.”

Rhydian rolled his eyes slightly. “You’re a pleb, but… I love you.” 

“I love you too.” Lestat felt like he might swoon. His hands came up to cradle the younger man’s face, Rhydian’s soft beard framed by his fingers, his cheeks a little squashed. He’d never looked sweeter to Lestat. 

“Probably a weird time for me to say it for the first time,” Rhydian admitted, “swear I’m not trying to entrap you or whatever. I mean it. I’ve wanted to say it for a couple of weeks but I felt stupid just saying it out of nowhere. Felt like an anti-climax or something, after you were so patient with me. You’ve given me so much, and I-”

Lestat kissed him softly, holding him as gently as he could without letting go. He didn’t need to read the younger man’s mind to know in his gut that Rhydian meant it, but that didn’t stop him from checking. There was nothing in his brain but nerves - nerves that Lestat would decide to go back to Louis, that Lestat would misunderstand his confession, that Lestat might realise that he could do better - and that was something that he would have to come back to another time, because it was so ridiculous it almost pissed him off and ruined the moment. 

“I want him to see us together,” Lestat said before he could talk himself out of being so honest. “I want him to understand, to see for himself, that we are happy. And I hope that he will be happy for us. I think he will. I think he will understand why we sought refuge in each other. And if he does not… Well… That is something he will have to live with. I am busy, with you. Being in love, with someone who loves me back.”

Rhydian snorted, crawling into Lestat’s lap. “If I didn’t know you better I’d wonder if you wanted to make him jealous.”

“Maybe I do, a little bit.” Lestat confessed, smiling wryly. “Especially now that I hear how he made you feel disposable. You deserved better than that, mon amoureux. So now I want to play the trophy husband and, how you say, serve cunt with you right in his face.”

Rhydian laughed the last of his tears from his eyes. “You are mad, you are.”

“But I make one hell of a trophy, do you not think?”

“The prettiest trophy I’ve ever seen,” the human agreed, his fingers brushing Lestat’s neck. The air grew heavy between them, and the two of them enjoyed it for a moment, smirking at each other. “And hey, worst case scenario I do that trick he taught me and show him everything he’s missing.”

Lestat bit his lip, feeling particularly wicked. “I am not sure that would convince him that you are not a whore, mon amoureux.”

“Oh my God, Lestat !” Rhydian sounded appalled, but he looked just as eager as before. He squirmed a little in the vampire’s lap, and Lestat grinned, showing his fangs. “You are fucking twisted, you know that? Take me to bed, right now.”

“Our relationship in a nutshell, I think,” Lestat mused, lifting the younger man up into his arms to carry him to the bedroom, hands on his ass. Wrapping his legs around Lestat’s waist, Rhydian wasted no time in pulling the older man’s t-shirt to the side to bite him where his neck met his shoulder. The human had developed a real hunger for biting Lestat - something about the vampire being able to take being bitten full force without getting hurt like other humans did. It drove Rhydian crazy, and it felt like the most delicious tease to Lestat. He moaned softly now as the human gnawed at his throat, teeth digging harshly into his skin. One of the worst parts of Rhydian not being a vampire was the lack of fangs, but the human more than made up for it in other areas. 

“I don’t want any fucking foreplay tonight, baby, I want you to split me open so hard it hurts,” Rhydian whispered in his ear, hands down the back of the vampire’s shirt. “I wanna wear your marks when we go meet him.”

“They’d fade by then,” Lestat reminded him, tossing him on the bed with a carefully performed false lack of care. Rhydian bounced a couple of times, right in the centre of the mattress, his delicate head nowhere near anything that he could bump it on, but he looked up at Lestat with a smouldering want. He loved being thrown around like a toy, and Lestat loved making him drip. 

“Guess you’ll have to just mark your territory every day then, just in case,” the younger man countered, reaching up to grab Lestat by the front of his trousers, tugging at the waistband. 

He bit back a moan as Rhydian sat up to mouth at the outline of his cock through the fabric, fingers twisting in his hair to hold him still so he could grind into his cheek. Rhydian panted open-mouthed, tongue out. “There’s my good boy,” Lestat murmured, “I thought you said you did not want any foreplay, mon amoureux. Pretty little head doesn’t know what it wants when my cock’s on offer, does it?”

“No,” Rhydian admitted, “I’ll take whatever you give me, Sir.”

“What a sweet promise,” Lestat sighed, smiling fondly as he pushed his trousers and underwear down over his hips. “Mouth only, mon amoureux. Put those hands behind your back. Can you be a good boy and keep them there?” 

“Yes, Sir,” Rhydian answered, before opening his mouth wide. 

Lestat took a moment to tease, holding Rhydian’s hair with one hand and his cock with the other and keeping the human panting with desperation just out of reach. He loved watching his lover sink into the act of submission, his clever eyes glazing over as he gave himself over to Lestat, body and soul. It never failed to make Lestat feel invincible. The strange irony of his relationship with Rhydian was that he had never tried less to control a partner in his life, yet the human gave himself willingly, joyfully - more so than anyone he’d ever met. It was intoxicating. Lestat was as addicted to it as Rhydian was, and the boy knew it. 

“Please,” Rhydian interrupted his musings, and he realised he’d been tracing the head of his cock across the human’s lower lip and outstretched tongue for just a shade too long. He had kept his hands behind his back, as ordered, and the vampire felt a swell of pride.

“Please what?” Lestat asked, tugging gently at his lover’s hair. 

“Please, Sir,” Rhydian corrected himself, eyelashes fluttering. 

“Good boy.” 

Rhydian whimpered, squirming. Lestat smirked, and let up his grip on the younger man’s hair, letting Rhydian take his cock into his mouth. He bit his lip to stifle a groan as Rhydian took it all the way, his brown eyes wide and filling with tears as his lips met Lestat’s groin. Lestat stroked his hair, making encouraging noises as Rhydian’s throat swallowed around him. He let him control the pace, sighing in pleasure as the human bobbed his head nice and slow. 

“So pretty with a cock in your mouth, Rhydian, look at you,” Lestat cooed, his hand leaving the other man’s hair to stroke his cheek. “You’re getting it so wet. Not that you need any help in that department,” he said casually, “I can taste how wet you’re getting in the air.”

Rhydian moaned like he was the one being pleasured, grinding down on his heel where he was sitting on it. Lestat pulled out of his mouth slowly, leaving him panting. “Fuck…” He wriggled out of his clothes, tossing them aside carelessly, and Lestat chuckled fondly. 

“We have all night.”

“I don’t care,” the human gritted out, turning over onto all fours and sticking his ass in the air, his head and upper chest on the mattress. 

“And if I decided that it would please me to deny you the fucking you so clearly desire?”

Rhydian took a moment to think about it, and Lestat snorted, peeling off his shirt and stepping out of the clothes pooled around his feet. “I would be good. But you never want to be denied. Sir,” he tacked on the end, and Lestat settled on the bed behind him, spanking him not too lightly. “Fuck.”

“What do you say if you want me to stop, slut?” 

“Red, Sir,” Rhydian answered quickly, arching his back. Lestat licked his lips when he saw how wet he was, his thumb pulling his pussy to one side to watch it twitch. He was tempted to bury his face in it, but that would have to wait until after he’d had a drink. Instead, he spanked Rhydian again and lined up, his patience wearing thin. The human moaned deeply as Lestat thrust in quick, pussy twitching maddeningly. “Fuck, please, I need it, Sir,” Rhydian gasped.

“Oh, I know,” Lestat replied, unable to hide how turned on he was in his voice despite his best efforts to sound unaffected. “You always do, do you not? My greedy, insatiable, vexing little whore.” He punctuated each adjective with a brutal thrust, and Rhydian came hard, yelling his pleasure into the sheets. “Already, mon amoureux? Anyone would think I did not fuck you for hours just yesterday.”

“Please don’t stop,” Rhydian panted, grinding back for more as he turned his head to rest his cheek on the mattress, arching his neck invitingly. “Use me, please, use me.”

Lestat didn’t need any more encouragement, pushing in as deep as he could manage and lowering his upper body until he could reach Rhydian’s shoulder. He drank slowly, his hand around the back of the human’s neck to try and hold him still. Rhydian moved his hips in little circles, rolling Lestat’s cock deep inside him and letting the pleasure of it wash over him in waves. After an ecstatic moment, Lestat pulled back with a satisfied hum.

“Don’t heal them,” Rhydian reached back, catching Lestat’s clavicle.

“But-”

“Please don’t heal them, Sir, I want them,” Rhydian begged, and Lestat thought that he was pretty sure that this broke their rule that new games should be discussed before one of them was hanging off the other’s cock, as they’d learned pretty quickly that both he and Rhydian had no self-preservation while bottoming. He was also sure that the wounds weren’t deep enough to bleed for much longer thanks to the awkward angle, so he filed his concerns away to raise later and allowed it, kissing Rhydian’s nape instead. 

“Remind me to punish you later for breaking your own rules,” Lestat murmured in his ear, and Rhydian shivered but giggled like he was drunk. 

“Yes, Sir,” he sighed happily, sagging into the mattress and lifting his ass an inch higher. “Want you. Please, want it harder.”

Lestat straightened up and really laid into him, licking the last traces of blood from his lips as he fucked the human hard and fast until even he was sweating, his hands gripping Rhydian’s hips tight enough to bruise. Rhydian came over and over again, shuddering apart on his cock until he wasn’t even saying words anymore, just garbled groans of appreciation. Lestat’s orgasm was wrenched out of him suddenly by the seemingly endless throttling that Rhydian’s pussy was giving him, so intense that he caught himself about to bite again and dug his fangs into his own arm instead, grunting out his pleasure as he filled Rhydian up to the brim. 

He pulled out quickly afterwards, and Rhydian whined in protest but didn’t argue as Lestat flopped down next to him. The human turned lazily onto his side and shifted closer, his nose brushing Lestat’s chest. They lay together, sweaty and catching their breath, for a long moment. 

“Are you feeling light headed?” Lestat asked, craning his neck to check that Rhydian had stopped bleeding.

“Mmm. A little. Worth it.”

“I’m sure,” the vampire muttered irritably. 

“Shhh, don’t worry. I’m fine.”

“Let me see.”

Rhydian opened one eye and glared playfully at him. “I’m fine, baby. Prom-”

“ Let me see .” Lestat grasped his chin and turned his head up, his grip too tight for the human to resist. He relaxed a little when he saw that Rhydian had, indeed, stopped bleeding.

“Happy?”

Lestat didn’t answer, and Rhydian inched closer until he was half on top of him. 

“I’m sorry. I thought that saying I wanted to wear your marks was more obvious than I guess it was.” He stroked Lestat’s hair back from his face. “I didn’t mean to worry you.”

“I do not like actually injuring you. You are very breakable.”

“I know you don’t,” Rhydian said softly, “I’m sorry I broke our rule. I was feeling…” He hesitated.

“Feeling…?” Lestat prompted after a moment. 

Rhydian bit the inside of his cheek. “I don’t know, desperate? Like I… I wanted you to own me.”

“And my bruising your insides was not sufficient?” Lestat felt confused and a little offended. He wasn’t sure how much harder he could’ve fucked Rhydian without rupturing something important.

“You make me feel crazy.” Rhydian admitted, sucking his lower lip into his mouth. “If you’d asked me to get your name branded on my forehead I would’ve cum forever. I’m kind of obsessed with you.”

“Oh.” That made his cock twitch all over again. 

Rhydian smiled, cheeks pink. “Shut up.”

“ Obsessed with me, you say?” Lestat rolled them over so Rhydian was beneath him. “How obsessed?” 

“Pretty sure I’d let you run me over with your car if you told me I was a good boy while you did it.”

Lestat laughed, charmed. “I would let you run me over too, mon amoureux. I love you.”

“I love you too, Lestat,” Rhydian said tenderly, his thumb brushing the older man’s temple. “You’re everything I want.”

“Batshit crazy with a huge cock?”

Rhydian’s smile turned hungry, his legs falling open so Lestat could slot between them once more. “Precisely.”

Chapter Text

“Maybe I should go before he gets here,” Rhydian muttered, fiddling with a napkin. Lestat could feel the anxiety coming off him in waves, even without the Mind Gift. “I feel like I’m gonna throw up.”

Lestat shifted his chair closer, putting his arm around the younger man’s shoulders. “If you need to leave, mon amoureux, you can. I will not be upset. I’ll come to your place afterwards and tell you what happened, oui?” 

Rhydian’s face was flaming red. “Will you be okay?”

“Of course I will,” Lestat promised, stroking the back of Rhydian’s neck with his thumb, “it is not as if Louis asked me here for a fight. It’s a simple catch up.”

“Oh, I’d know better than that, Lestat.” 

Lestat and Rhydian both froze, looking at each other with wide eyes as they heard the familiar voice behind them. Louis chuckled, and walked round the table to sit opposite them. He looked good, Lestat was devastated to see - even better than he’d looked in New Orleans. He was practically glowing. He was wearing a beautifully fitted deep burgundy shirt with the neck open and a pair of high-waisted pressed russet brown trousers, and he was looking right at Lestat. There was an easy smile on his face as he sat down, and finally looked away from Lestat to Rhydian. 

“I’m glad you’re here, for what it’s worth. I owe you an apology,” Louis told the human, who inhaled sharply. 

Rhydian was quiet for a moment, and Lestat glanced at him. He looked as though he were debating something with himself. “I wish I could say that it’s okay, but I can’t,” he said finally, his eyes on the table. 

“I know. And I… I can try and explain, if it would help.”

“You’re only in town for a night,” Rhydian pointed out, looking up at Lestat with a rueful smile, “and this isn’t about me.”

Lestat was touched. He wasn’t sure what to say, his gaze locked on Rhydian’s for a moment. “W-why don’t we get another round, hmm?”

“Yeah, my treat,” Louis offered, eagerly getting to his feet. “What are you having? A Cosmopolitan? Am I remembering correctly?” His voice was fond, and Rhydian couldn’t help but meet his eyes, surprise smoothing out his brow. 

“Yeah… Thank you.” 

That wasn’t what Rhydian tended to order with him, Lestat noted. As far as he’d known, Rhydian liked an Old Fashioned. Before he could think too deeply on it, Rhydian reached under the table and squeezed his hand as Louis walked away towards the bar. He didn’t have to ask what Lestat wanted, and that made Lestat’s heart skip.

“Are you alright?” Lestat murmured, blue eyes searching Rhydian’s face. 

“Are you?” The human asked drily, and Lestat huffed out a chuckle. 

“Touché.”

“Do you think he can read my mind better than you?” Rhydian asked, the napkin in his hands quietly shredded. 

“I have no idea, mon amoureux. He had four years to attune himself to you, but you are more difficult to read than the average person.” Lestat ran his fingers through the younger man’s hair at the base of his skull, and if Louis was watching, all the better. 

Rhydian nodded. “I’m just… This is weird. It’s weirder than I thought it would be, the two of you in the same room with all this history.”

“If you still want to leave, I will not be upset. And if he is, that is his problem.” 

“That’s the thing,” he sighed, “now I’ve seen him I don’t want to. I want to… God, does he have to be so beautiful ? He’s looking better than I’ve ever seen him. Bastard.”

Lestat snorted. “I know. It is almost rude.”

He thought Louis might have heard that, because his face in profile at the bar smiled and he looked politely away, like he was trying to hide his eavesdropping. Lestat fought the urge to smile. His fledgling had always enjoyed being told how striking he was, and it seemed the decades apart hadn’t made him any less eager to hear it. How was it that it could feel like time was both this huge chasm between them, but at the same moment like none had passed at all? 

“Okay, I just need to relax. It’s not like any of us are gonna die,” Rhydian told himself, crumpling up the napkin into a little ball. “Whatever happens, happens.”

“You and I are still going to go home together, the same as every other night,” Lestat agreed, leaning over to kiss the human’s lips softly. “And tomorrow, it’ll be just like any other day.”

“And we’ll hunt on the way home?”

Lestat smiled. “Yes, I have a feeling I will have some angst to work out.”

“Can’t wait,” Rhydian murmured, tilting his head to the side a little to show off the small bruises just peeking from his shirt. It made Lestat want to bite him again, right here, in front of Louis and all these humans. 

“A dry martini and a cosmopolitan,” Louis recited as he set the drinks down, looking between them for a moment. “So… How are things?”

“I am pleasantly surprised by London,” Lestat said as Louis sat down with his glass of red wine, “I wondered if it was too similar to the homeland, but non, it’s markedly different. Or perhaps it is the new century that is different, I do not know.”

“He’s been particularly taken by the escalators on the Tube,” Rhydian piped up, which made Lestat chuckle. “You should’ve seen him the first time he saw them.”

“In my defence I was not looking at where I was going - we had just gone to see the most sensational production of Carmen, Louis - and I lifted my foot to climb what I thought were normal stairs and the next thing I knew I was being swept up into the air!” 

Rhydian grinned at Lestat, and glanced at Louis. “I don’t think he’d ever screamed like that in his life.”

Louis couldn’t resist laughing at the mental image, though his eyes were still a little sad when he dropped them to the glass he was stroking thoughtfully.

“He would not stop laughing at me, Louis, and I said to him that at some point when he’s least expecting it I’ll swipe him off his feet and lift him -” Lestat’s words died on his lips, and he cleared his throat quietly, glancing at Louis uneasily. 

“So you told him about the Cloud Gift, huh?” Louis asked, trying for casual but sounding a little pained. 

Rhydian looked between the two of them. “I kinda gathered that he could fly when he appeared like magic in my fifth floor flat.”

“Oh?” Louis smiled slightly at that. “He mentioned that you made him work for it, but he didn’t mention any stalking .”

Rhydian snorted. “I made him work for it for all of three days. He didn’t have to work that hard. He was pretty annoyingly irresistible.”

“I’ll drink to that,” Louis laughed, holding his glass to Rhydian, an olive branch stretched across the table. Rhydian lifted his own and touched it to Louis’, their eyes meeting for an electric moment. Lestat took a large gulp of his own drink.

“Alright, alright, let us poke fun of someone else now,” Lestat half-joked, “tell me exactly how Armand looked when you threw him out, Louis, I’ve been waiting six months for the pleasure.”

Louis sat back in his seat, his smile growing a little. “Oh, you know… Disbelieving… Annoyingly blank.”

“I can see it now,” Lestat sighed exaggeratedly happily. “I wish I could have been there to experience it.”

“Me too,” Rhydian agreed, “I hate that guy.”

“He’s sulking, somewhere. Turned Daniel and promised him the world, then just… Disappeared when I sent him the papers to split up our assets. Neither of us have heard from him since.”

Lestat threw up his hands. “Oh well, very sad. How is that Daniel adjusting to vampiric life? Am I right in thinking this is the same Daniel who exposed Armand’s treachery? I should send him flowers.”

“The very one,” Louis confirmed, “I owe him everything. He’s doing well, I think. Adjusted pretty quick. He’s a good friend. I haven’t had one of those in a very long time.”

Lestat felt Rhydian’s sympathy at that, and he felt bad, too. Perhaps he had been wrong to let Louis believe that Armand had saved him in Paris. He had been lonely, in New Orleans, but he also knew how lonely he’d felt during those seven years that he and Louis existed alongside each other while Claudia was in the wind. Being in a loveless marriage was hard, maybe harder than being alone. And 77 years of it?

“Anyway, he’s not my problem anymore,” Louis said, shrugging it off. “I want to hear how you two met, come on. You both know I love a good story.”

Lestat and Rhydian looked at each other, and Lestat gestured for Rhydian to go ahead. “Well,” the human started, “I kinda clocked him immediately. He’s the most vampire-looking motherfucker I’ve ever seen in my life, present company included.”

That made both Louis and Lestat laugh, which made Rhydian sit up a little straighter, pleased. 

“I’d just finished beating up this creep who was feeling up some girl in the club, and I went out for a smoke. I needed a lighter and he was there, looking at me like he wanted to eat me for lunch. But I got the feeling that he was, like, a bit dopey. A bit naive. Like he didn’t know what he was doing there. He looked scandalised when he noticed my slutty club clothes. It was cute.”

“He was wearing a tiny little crop top that said ‘I have a pussy’ on it, for the record, Louis-”

“It did not say that,” Rhydian laughed defensively, “it said ‘a boy without a pussy is like an angel without wings’ and I stand by it. Anyway ,” he stressed as Louis laughed, “I went home with him, and we hooked up, and then he started stalking me, following me home from another hookup and shit. I came out of the shower and there he was-”

“For the record,” Lestat offered, “I was not stalking you, exactly. I went back to the club where we met,” he explained to Louis like he had to justify himself, “and I sensed him close by because I had of course tasted him, and it turned out he was very drunk, having this God awful encounter with some neanderthal who was struggling to please him. And when he stumbled out of the alley he looked as if he was about to fall over, so I followed him home to make sure he was safe.”

Louis snorted, and Lestat’s gaze snapped to him. “Oh come on, Lestat.”

“Right?!” Rhydian was grinning ear to ear. Lestat should have foreseen that they would gang up on him, he mused. That had not been something he’d considered. “I didn’t buy that then and I don’t buy it now.”

“Alright, alright,” Lestat held up his hands, “in the spirit of my turning over a new leaf, I will be honest, I wanted to seduce you again so that I could reinforce that I was not going to be just another idiot you shagged drunkenly.”

“Did you just say shagged ?” Louis’ mouth was hanging open, his eyes sparkling with humour.

“He’s been picking up the slang slowly,” Rhydian said fondly, leaning over to kiss his cheek. “It’s very cute.”

Lestat ducked his head. “I suppose I have started to acclimate, linguistically.”

“It sounds so wrong, but I kind of love it,” Louis mused, sipping his wine. 

“So anyway ,” Lestat couldn’t quite meet Louis’ eyes when he looked at him with that kind of fondness, “I followed him home, and let myself into his flat through an open window. Then what happened, mon amoureux?”

“He was just sitting on my bed topless, smoking a cigarette like a little freak,” Rhydian remembered, rolling his eyes at the memory. “We talked, we fucked, I offered to introduce him to some friends, and he freaked out because I mentioned your name and then scarpered.”

“He had referred to a vampire ex, someone who he’d… Spent a lot of time with. I was shocked when I realised it was you,” Lestat supplied, looking at Louis’ hands where they cupped his wine glass.

“The way he reacted I literally thought you were dead or something,” Rhydian said quietly, before taking a long sip of his own drink. “I went over to his place the next night and we straightened it out, he hunted with me for the first time. He offered me the Dark Gift, and then it was my turn to freak out. But I explained why I didn’t want it, he understood, and that… Was kind of it. We’ve been together ever since. Two little psychos against the world, killing off one creep at a time.”

“Wait, you… Help him? Kill?” Louis asked, looking between the two of them, aghast.

“Yeah, and I like it.” Rhydian replied coolly, tilting his head to the side. “It works for us.”

“I’m not judging,” Louis said, judgmentally, holding up one of his hands peacefully. 

Lestat smiled slightly. He knew Louis would have opinions about Rhydian’s involvement in his feeding habits. “I keep him safe, Louis. He’s never in any danger with me.”

“And you’re happy, selectively killing shitty men?”

“I am,” Lestat confirmed, “yes. After eating rats for so long, I am more comfortable having a slightly restricted diet, though we have enough time apart that if I really crave something else I have the opportunity to indulge it.”

Louis nodded thoughtfully. “That’s good. I’m… It all sounds so easy.”

“We fight,” Rhydian shrugged, “we both still have our tempers. But we both like to talk about ourselves, so we figure the problem out eventually.”

“I have been getting better at communicating.”

“You have,” Rhydian praised, smiling at Lestat proudly. 

“What about the… Monogamy issue?” Louis asked, his polished-off glass put aside. He leaned forwards, resting his elbows on the table. 

Lestat and Rhydian looked at each other, Rhydian’s cheeks glowing pink as they shared a secret look. They had specifically discussed the fact that Rhydian didn’t want to mention their non-monogamy to Louis unless he asked directly. Neither of them had been comfortable overtly lying to his face, but equally he felt a little uneasy throwing that out there while Louis was in rebound mode. Rhydian sighed, and shrugged one shoulder. 

“We bring guests home to share, sometimes,” Lestat explained coyly, “it is a lot more common in this day and age, as I’m sure you know, Louis.”

Louis nodded, his eyes flicking to Rhydian, and Lestat could tell that Louis was trying to read the human’s mind. Rhydian’s cheeks were growing redder by the moment. “Yes, Armand and I had a similar arrangement at times,” he murmured, his eyebrows furrowing just the tiniest bit in the middle at whatever he was seeing in Rhydian’s head. As far as Lestat could tell, it was just jumbled scraps of adventures the two of them had had together over the past few months, but Louis had lived with Armand for a long time, and was likely much more attuned to Rhydian’s strange, jumbled brain than Lestat was. 

“Louis…” Rhydian said quietly, meeting his eyes, and Louis cleared his throat, his own cheeks growing darker. Lestat ground his teeth together. “You have no right to-”

“I’m sorry,” Louis shook his head a little, laughing nervously. “Habit. I apologise.”

“It’s fine,” Rhydian mumbled, “just don’t do it again.” 

Lestat wasn’t sure what to say. What had passed between them? And why was Rhydian necking the last of his drink like that? 

“I’ll get the next round,” the human said, standing up and grabbing all of their empty glasses. “Same again, yeah?” He didn’t wait for a response before going straight to the bar.

“I think I upset him,” Louis said grimly.

“What…?” 

“I was… Trying to figure out if the two of you were…”

Lestat hated not being able to read Louis’ mind. Especially when he acted so strangely. He stared at Louis’ face so hard that the younger man had to meet his eyes. 

“If you had talked about, you know… Inviting me in.”

Lestat raised his eyebrows. “What, just like that? After you left him homeless without a second glance and me-” 

“That’s why I was checking .”

“You should have just asked if you wanted a ménage à trois, Saint Louis,” Lestat said, his voice fake casual, “the answer would have been no, of course, but I could respect the question asked outright over you poking around in my companion’s pretty little head right in front of me.”

“You’re… Companions?” Louis asked, voice small.

Lestat felt flustered. “Well… Yes. We have been together for several months, happily.”

Louis nodded, looking at his hands. “I understand.”

“You were very clear in New Orleans that you thought I should move on.”

“From New Orleans, not…”

Lestat stared at him. Louis looked back at him and got caught there. “This is not fair, Louis. This is cruel.”

“I know. I know . You’re happy. Happier than you were with me.”

“That is not true.”

“It feels true.”

“You…” Lestat felt tears coming to his eyes. “You are vexing .”

“I’m not saying I want to get back together right now,” Louis whispered, leaning across the table, “but… Is there a chance? In the future? At some point?”

Lestat bit the inside of his cheek, glancing over at the bar where Rhydian was standing with his back to them. He felt so guilty he could scream. Here it was, Rhydian’s worst fear, and Lestat was not shutting it down as he probably should be. But he could not lie to Louis, either. He never wanted to lie to Louis again. “Louis, you were my husband and companion for thirty years. You are my fledgling. Our bond is in our blood. It is unbreakable.”

Louis’ expression lifted with hope. 

“But I cannot just forsake Rhydian,” Lestat insisted, “our bond is different, but he… He has worked so hard to love me the way that I am. And he makes me feel…”

Louis cleared his throat, looking away and nodding. “I understand.”

Lestat’s hand crept across the table to brush Louis’ knuckles. “Look at me, please, mon cher.”

Louis met his eyes, his gaze guarded.

“I will always love you, Louis. But I cannot just… Pretend that the last century never happened, and I do not think you can, either. I think you were right, in New Orleans. You are a companion enough for yourself - or at least you could be. When we… Parted… You ran straight into Armand’s arms. I do not wish for us to continue that cycle, hurting each other over and over again. We need time apart, it is true. We need to experience other things. To learn lessons we cannot teach each other.” He brushed his thumb over Louis’ palm. “But we will always return to each other, because you and I are bound together. I will not have forever with Rhydian, because he does not wish it. But you and I will. We will have the rest of time. ”

Louis grasped Lestat’s fingers, squeezing them. “Okay.”

It was not okay, at all. Lestat felt like he’d been crushed under the weight of the ocean. But he pulled his hand away and cleared his throat, looking away from Louis up at Rhydian.

“Did you love him?” Lestat asked, his eyes on his new companion, the tense line of his shoulders as he waited for their drinks. He pulled his hand from Louis’. Rhydian deserved better than both of them. 

“Yes, of course, he was… Like sunshine that didn’t burn.” Louis said softly. “But he didn’t want the gift, and I couldn’t… He got sick, just with the flu. And I got so scared. I just couldn’t do it. He could die any fucking second, and I couldn’t watch, I couldn’t rob him of the normal life he clearly wanted. So I let Armand catch me. Armand had paramours of his own, but I was pretending like I didn’t know back then. He put his foot down, we moved to Dubai. I did not know that Rhydian was left homeless. Armand was supposed to handle it, but I shouldn’t have trusted him. I hadn’t noticed his spiteful streak then. I was stupid. I should have left him years ago. Decades ago.”

“Well, at least you have now,” Rhydian sighed as he arrived back at the table. “Look at it this way, you could’ve been together another century.”

“True,” Louis agreed, glancing furtively at Lestat, who sniffed away the lingering emotion as Rhydian sat down beside him. He shifted closer and put his arm around the back of the human’s chair. 

“Louis was just saying that he didn’t know that you were evicted from that flat,” he said, taking his martini. 

Rhydian looked reluctantly at Louis, one eyebrow raised.

“Armand was in charge of our real estate. He said he would take care of it, but… I didn’t think he would just kick you out. I should have, though. I am sorry. Genuinely. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“I got a few weeks' notice,” Rhydian shrugged, swallowing hard. “Could’ve been worse. I’d been saving up the money you gave me, so I didn’t end up on the street again, luckily.”

“That’s good,” Louis let out a sigh of relief. “I hope you know I would have never done that to you.”

“I learned some important lessons from it,” the human mused, looking into his glass. Lestat noticed he’d bought himself an Old Fashioned. Rhydian hummed as he took a sip, sitting back in his chair. “But how have you been, Louis? Lestat said you’d been busy with work? You still flogging paintings?” Rhydian asked, and Lestat was grateful for the change of topic. 

“Yes, though not nearly as many as I used to a decade ago. I’m a little more choosy now, but I got quite lazy back there for a while, let Armand handle everything. It’s been nice to actually do things for myself again. I got rid of some of my staff, too. I’m actually living my life again, you know? It’s nice. I’d become like a statue or something. If I want to go on a trip, I just go. If I want a new jacket, I just go out to a store. It probably sounds pretty pathetic, but those things are exhilarating to me all over again now.”

“And the new century has so much novelty to offer,” Lestat agreed, “and things are changing so very quickly.”

“Exactly. And more artists than ever. I’ve never been busier. This meeting I’m having tomorrow will be interesting, it’s with a gallery that has some reservations about showing this artist from Hackney called…”

Lestat rubbed Rhydian’s knee under the table as Louis spoke, his fingers tracing the bottom of the younger man’s kneecap. Rhydian squeezed his hand.

“We should do this again,” Rhydian said a couple of hours later, as they all came out of the bar. Lestat was a little surprised to feel the sincerity in his lover’s mind. “Let us know when you’re next in the same timezone as us.”

Louis looked surprised, too. “Yeah, I mean, I can come more or less whenever I want.”

The rest of the evening had passed without incident, with Louis and Rhydian talking about their jobs and Lestat about his music and favourite new discoveries. They’d had a lot to catch up on, and Lestat had enjoyed it once the awkwardness had been dealt with. He was glad that Rhydian felt the same way. It was easier with Rhydian there - the two of them were able to avoid being drawn into discussing the past. It was nice.

“It is quite a long journey from New York, is it not?” Lestat asked.

Louis shrugged. “The flight’s about seven hours. Usually I’d stay in town a few nights, or a week. This was meant to be a brief visit to negotiate with a gallery, but… I could stay a few more days.”

Rhydian and Lestat looked at each other. They both looked willing, so Lestat nodded. 

“Perhaps you could come over for drinks once you are finished with your meeting? I could play you some of the music I’ve been working on.” 

“I would like that,” Louis smiled, hovering a little awkwardly. “Do you… Do the two of you do hugs?” His eyes were on Lestat’s face, and Lestat glanced at Rhydian, who rolled his eyes.

“Of course,” Rhydian answered, nudging Lestat in the side. 

Lestat stepped closer to Louis, his insides molten. The two of them hugged tightly, Lestat’s arms around Louis’ neck as Louis’ arms wound around Lestat’s waist, squeezing hard. Louis’ face was pressed into Lestat’s neck, and Lestat bit his lip when he heard Louis breathe him in deep. He willed himself to stay calm as Louis’ hand stroked his lower back, and pulled away before Louis’ scent could make him feel too crazy. Holding him like that was intoxicating, and part of him wanted to drink from his fledgling again, feel their blood mixing. But they were in the street, and Rhydian was right there. 

The human, however, didn’t seem upset at their lingering hug. In fact, he moved eagerly to hug Louis too, squeezing his eyes shut and tucking his face under the vampire’s jaw. Louis sighed happily as he hugged Rhydian back, rubbing his back too. His face was in Rhydian’s hair, and Lestat noticed Louis taking lungfuls of his scent. He couldn’t blame him; Rhydian did smell good, especially now with a few drinks in him.

Suddenly Lestat couldn’t wait to get home.

“We’ll see you tomorrow, then?” Rhydian asked softly as he pulled back. 

“Yeah, text me the address and I’ll let you know when I finish my meeting,” Louis promised, his hand trailing up Rhydian’s arm before finally letting him go. 

Lestat took Rhydian’s hand, expecting to feel jealous, but he found that more than anything, he felt curious about what it would be like to watch Rhydian and Louis kiss. It was clear that the two of them still had something between them, and it soothed something in Lestat. Perhaps it made him feel less guilty about his own irrepressible feelings for Louis. Perhaps Louis’ wish for a threesome hadn’t been quite so ridiculous and inappropriate as Lestat had thought at the beginning of the night.

He was so glad neither of the men before him could read his mind.

Louis gave a little wave and headed to a black car waiting on the kerb for him, and Lestat and Rhydian started walking to the Tube. Rhydian let out a loud, long sigh, tilting his head back.

“That was… Weirdly easier than I thought it would be.” Rhydian said, looking sidelong at Lestat. “It was kind of nice.”

“It was,” Lestat nodded. “I also enjoyed myself. Though I am surprised you volunteered our company again.”

“I don’t know, he’s just…” Rhydian bit the inside of his cheek. “Please don’t take this as an indication that I love you any less, but…”

“He is magnetic.”

“ Yes ,” Rhydian emphasised, cheeks pink. “Too damn magnetic. I wouldn’t trade you for him, not for a second. But… Seeing the two of you together was nice. Really nice. You make a really, really hot couple.”

Lestat laughed. “I must confess I felt a similar frisson watching the two of you at the end. I did not like it at the beginning, the way he looked at you. But by the end, I could tell that he will respect our relationship.”

“I think so too,” Rhydian smiled. “He was very sweet. It was nice to see him so animated. He was always pretty exhausted when I knew him. He seems so calm. At ease.”

“Do you think we should fuck him?” 

Rhydian sucked his lower lip into his mouth, looking up at Lestat through his eyelashes. “I think it could be really good. But I’d want him to understand that I belong to you , and that that isn’t gonna change.”

“You know me so well,” Lestat groaned quietly, looking around the train. There was one other passenger on their carriage, down the other end. He leaned over to see if there was anyone in the next carriage, and there wasn’t. Dragging Rhydian behind him, he strode into the empty carriage and quickly dropped to his knees. “Would you like me to loan you out to him like a well-used library book, hmm? Stamp you with my teeth and put you right in his lap?”

“Please,” Rhydian whimpered, desperately unbuttoning his trousers and shucking them down just enough to give his lover access. Lestat grinned, letting his fangs drop. He bit Rhydian’s tummy, drinking quickly. There were security cameras, after all, so he needed to make it look like he was just sucking a bruise there. “Fuck, baby, please put your fingers in me.”

“Are you wet enough?” Lestat asked as he lifted his head.

“You know I am,” Rhydian growled, guiding the vampire’s hand into his underwear. 

Lestat moaned softly as he felt Rhydian dripping onto his fingers. “My eager little slut, always ready for me to use him.”

Rhydian squirmed, his hips restlessly twitching as he tried to get Lestat’s fingers in him. “Please, Sir…”

“Are you going to show Louis how completely I own you?” Lestat asked lowly, sinking two fingers into the human.

“Yes, yes, yes Sir, I want him to see,” he nodded, his fingers digging into Lestat’s shoulders. “Want him to watch you take me apart.”

“And you’ll put on such a good show, won’t you?” Lestat goaded, hooking his fingers as he rocked them back and forth. 

Rhydian whined, bouncing a little with his mouth open and eyes screwed shut. “Yes… Yes, fuck, please, please Sir, it feels so good.”

“Good boy,” Lestat murmured, speeding up. “If you want to finish you’ve got 4 minutes until we reach our stop. Otherwise you’re going to have to wait.”

“No, I want you inside me, right now.”

Lestat’s grin widened. “What, right here where anyone could see us? With the security cameras watching?” 

Rhydian shuddered and came on his fingers, and he pulled them out to suck them into his mouth. “Please, baby, please fuck me, I want them to see.”

“Bend over the seat,” Lestat muttered, getting hurriedly to his feet and undoing his belt. The human quickly pushed his trousers down lower and assumed the position, reaching back to spread himself with one hand. Lestat took himself in hand, not wanting to waste time, and lined up. The both of them groaned as he pushed in.

“Don’t wait, just fuck me open,” Rhydian urged, wriggling, and Lestat shoved his face against the dirty window and fucked him hard, gritting his teeth with the aggression of it. They had two minutes maximum, and he knew he wasn’t going to be able to cum that quickly, but he was powerless to deny his companion the opportunity to revel in his debauchery. Rhydian sagged with bliss, moaning softly with every stroke of Lestat’s hips. “Yes, yes, yes, just like that, fuck… Fuck, Sir, yes , harder! Use me, please !” He whispered, undulating his hips enthusiastically in time with Lestat’s thrusts. 

“It is a shame that Louis isn’t here to see you like this,” Lestat muttered into his ear, “I wonder which of us he would be more jealous of. Do you think he would rather ravish you against a filthy window or take my cock where anyone could see?” 

Rhydian came loudly, and Lestat clapped his hand over the human’s mouth to quiet him, which only made him cum harder. Lestat cursed, squeezing his eyes shut to summon the willpower to pull out. “Fuck,” the human moaned, legs trembling. 

“Can you walk?” Lestat asked, half-joking, as he carefully tucked his erection away. They could deal with that once they were home. 

Rhydian pulled up his own trousers, a tired grin on his face. “I think so, yeah. Fuck… We have to do that again sometime.”

“I need to find some kind of establishment where you can exercise these filthy little fantasies of yours before we get arrested or you catch TB from a rat running around here.” 

Rhydian laughed, going up on his tiptoes to give him a kiss. “I know a place or two. But there’s something about you fucking me in dirty public places…”

Lestat snorted, twining their fingers together as the train slowed. “Let’s get home so we can finish what we started.”

“Yes,” Rhydian agreed, hanging giddily off Lestat’s arm, “I feel like you should beat my ass with the crop for making you fuck me on the Tube.”

Lestat threw his head back and laughed. “Again, I will reiterate: you are the bossiest submissive I have ever met in my life.”

“And you love me,” Rhydian beamed, eyes glittering with satisfaction.

“And I love you,” Lestat confirmed as they got on the escalator.

Chapter Text

“So, rule one…” Rhydian prompted as he ran the duster across Lestat’s bookshelves. Lestat abandoned his polishing of the coffee table and came up behind the other man, kissing the top of his head. 

“If the jealousy is not sexy, we stop whatever is happening. Rule two,” Lestat stressed before Rhydian could open his mouth, “no being angry if the other wants to stop-”

“Because something going wrong doesn’t mean that Louis loses all interest in either of us,” Rhydian confirmed, rubbing Lestat’s forearm anxiously, “and neither of us wants to hurt the other.”

“And the last rule,” Lestat murmured into Rhydian’s hair, “no subspace with him until we are both confident that we can both handle the vulnerability.”

“Right.”

Lestat squeezed Rhydian a little tighter. He was nervous, too. It had been searingly arousing, talking about sharing Rhydian with Louis while he was balls deep inside the human and while they’d been talking about their fantasies and coming up with their rules, but neither of them had any idea how Louis would react or how he or Rhydian would react to being skin to skin with him again. “Nothing has to happen tonight, mon amoureux. He is just coming for drinks and to hear some of my music. He will not know any difference if we decide to leave it alone for now, if you are having second thoughts.”

“But I want it,” Rhydian admitted, turning in Lestat’s arms to put his face in his chest, “just my stupid head is telling me it’s gonna end in tears.”

“We are all adults, well versed by now in casual sex. Louis has been in an open relationship for a lifetime. And both he and I are in agreement that we should not be together at this moment. And I feel confident that when, inevitably, I fuck it up in some way, I will be able to be honest with you about it and we will fix it together.”

“I just don’t want my horny ass to break the fragile truce the two of you have going on. What if I accidentally say something that reminds him of Antoinette? I’d feel terrible.”

Lestat took his face in his hands, angling it up so they were looking into each others’ eyes. “You are nothing like Antoinette, mon amoureux. Nothing. Do not worry about that. Louis cares for you, and he is as enamoured with your body as I am. I promise you that the last thing he will be thinking about when you’re sweating and quivering between us is Antoinette.”

“I don’t know… It’s gonna be intense, you two being together again for the first time after everything. Feelings are gonna be flying all over the place,” Rhydian protested. 

“Which is why you are going to be planted firmly between us, as we discussed,” Lestat assured him, “and that is why I insisted that if you feel jealous and it is not sexy, we will stop.” He narrowed his eyes slightly, his fingers taking hold of Rhydian’s chin firmly as he heard a stray thought cross the human’s mind. “There is very little you could do to hurt me, mon amoureux, but if you decide not to tell us you are uncomfortable because you feel guilty for ‘disturbing’ mine and Louis’ reunion… I do not know if I could forgive that. Remember that, I mean it.”

Rhydian nodded, swallowing hard. “I will.”

“I killed Louis’ love by putting my appetites ahead of his comfort and wellbeing, and I will not make that mistake with you. I would rather die all over again.” He hugged Rhydian tightly, tightly enough that the human let out a little groan of pain. Forcing himself to let go of the grim moment, he released the younger man. “Okay?”

“Yeah, okay. I hear you. I promise I’ll speak up if shit goes sideways.”

“And I make you the same promise.”

Rhydian smiled at him, still a little nervous but affirmed in the knowledge that Lestat would look after him regardless of how it went with Louis. “I love you.”

“Je t’aime,” Lestat returned, brightening. “I must be honest with you about one other thing, my darling. Mon amoureux, I do not think, in my heart of hearts, that Louis will be checking whether or not the bookshelves are dusty. So could we not spend the time before he gets here holding each other instead of tormenting ourselves with menial domestic labour?”

“You hate cleaning so much , don’t you?” Rhydian grinned, palming Lestat’s ass. 

“Oui.”

“Such a fucking princess.”

Lestat preened. “Oui.”

Lestat had not had time to think too much about the fact that he was going to be welcoming Louis into his home, the space where he’d rebuilt his life without him, but it hit him like a ton of bricks when Rhydian went to buzz Louis up and Lestat was left alone on the sofa for a few too-long moments.

He looked around, wondering what Louis would think of his apartment. It struck him that he had no art on the walls. That was weird, was it not? Would he be irritated by how many bookshelves stood around with so many books they’d both know Lestat hadn’t read? Was it too different from the home they’d built together? Was it too similar? He tried to look around and imagine what Louis would see, anxiety clawing up his throat. 

“Louis brought us flowers,” Rhydian said fondly, and Lestat turned his head to see his lover holding a bouquet bigger than his head, made up of red and green carnations, with a few white lilies. Behind him was Louis, smiling but a little flushed, and Lestat looked between the flowers and Louis’ face, wondering.

“I asked the florist about old French flower codes, but her knowledge was limited, so… I don’t know how well you know English-”

“The codes are similar, I think,” Lestat felt a little bashful himself. Louis had never gotten him flowers before, and certainly never ones carrying such unabashed meaning.

“Oh? Have you just proposed marriage to him, Louis?” Rhydian teased, smirking at the look on Lestat’s face. 

“No, no,” Louis assured him, “they’re for both of you. The lilies, I’m told, symbolise pure intentions. The green carnations are a symbol of same sex love and admiration.”

“And the red?” Rhydian asked, his eyes soft where they rested on Louis’ face.

“My heart aches for you,” Lestat said quietly, squeezing his own knees. “Very specific. Technically the white lilies mean ‘my love is pure’, but who is counting?”

Louis ducked his head. “That works too.”

Was he dreaming? Was that what was happening?

“That’s so sweet of you, Louis, thank you. I had no idea flowers could say so much. Trust you two gay ass old men to communicate through flowers . They’re so beautiful, too,” Rhydian’s voice was hushed with gratitude. “Baby, do you have a vase?”

Lestat was staring at Louis. Louis was staring back, unguarded and unapologetic. “It is in the study. I will get it,” Lestat volunteered, getting to his feet and making a swift retreat to the other room. 

He closed the door behind him and leaned against it, gently letting his head thump against it. His mind reeled, turning over the significance of each flower in turn. Louis had asked specifically for a flower that represented love between men. Of course, it was easier now to be queer, by an order of magnitude. But the inclusion of it in the bouquet touched Lestat deeply - Louis seemed to be saying, without the words that never came easily to him, that he wasn’t ashamed anymore. That he could hold that part of him now with acceptance instead of fear. Lestat felt himself getting emotional, and he breathed deeply to stave it off. 

The lily, too. Pure intentions, Louis had said. He wasn’t interested in messing with Lestat and Rhydian; he just wanted them in his life. He wanted the three of them to be connected, regardless of what that connection looked like. He wanted them to live in peace, despite everything that had happened. This wasn’t about sex, or revenge, or nostalgia. He was coming to them open, because he missed them. Because he missed Lestat. Pure intentions. A lily. A flower returned from all those years ago, their first night together, when Lestat had stood before him and offered him Miss Lily to encourage the tension between them to snap. Their real meaning, my love is pure - he’d said that he meant that too. Was this the confession that Lestat had waited over a century for? The confession that, despite living together as husbands for three decades, Louis had never let pass his lips? Given so freely, so romantically, just like that?

Tears spilled over when he let himself think about just how much of the bouquet had been made up of red carnations, too. The overwhelming emotion that Louis wanted to communicate. My heart aches for you. It hurt to think about, how much pain he was in, had been in, was still in, missing Louis. Rhydian had brought light back to his life, but underneath the wound had never healed. Rhydian understood that about him, he knew, because Rhydian had unhealable wounds of his own. The knowledge that the pain was mutual between him and Louis, the knowledge that he had been so stupid not to realise that Louis had loved him this whole time, hurt so much that the pain almost eclipsed the bone-deep relief he felt knowing, perhaps for the first time, that he had not been unlovable before he met Rhydian. He had been loved, even at his worst. It was just that Louis couldn’t say it. That was all it was. That was all it ever had been.

How long they had wasted. How much blood they had spilled. How much they had lost, because Lestat was too stupid and too self-absorbed to realise the truth. Claudia… How he had ruined her, sent her marching to her death, all because he’d thought Louis didn’t love him, when Louis had always loved him. The realisation knocked the breath out of him.

“Baby?” 

“Rhydian, I… I need a moment.”

“I pushed him too hard,” Louis said quietly on the other side of the door, “I’ll go. I’m so sorry.”

“No!” Lestat spun around and opened the door, swiping at his cheeks and sniffing back his emotions desperately. Louis and Rhydian both looked alarmed, wearing uncannily similar expressions as they looked at him and then looked at each other. “I just…” He trailed off, waving his hand as if that would give him the words to express what he was feeling. 

“It can wait, if you can’t say it right now,” Rhydian assured him gently, reaching for the hand that was at his side. “It’s okay.”

Louis nodded eagerly. “Yeah, yeah, right. It… Why don’t you come and play for us, huh? Been wondering what your music sounds like now. You were always good at adapting to the times that way.”

Lestat nodded, squeezing Rhydian’s fingers gratefully. They could talk about it later, when Louis had gone home. This time was for the three of them; Louis would have to go back to Dubai soon. “Well… I have been listening to the radio a lot. I have noticed that the women of this era are doing the most interesting things with their art. The men are… Boring.”

“Yeah?” Louis asked, relief melting the tension in his shoulders as Rhydian led Lestat out of the office and back to the living room by the hand. “I’m out of date, for sure. I haven’t been to a concert since… Queen’s last night in Knebworth in ‘86.”

“You were at Knebworth Gardens?! You saw Freddie’s last show?!” Rhydian gasped, eyes wide, and Lestat laughed despite himself. “And you never mentioned it until now?! Lou, come on… It’s like I don’t even know who you are!”

Louis smiled that charming half-smile he did when he was partly smug and partly guilty. “I don’t know, it never came up? I’d heard a rumour that it could be their last tour so I dragged Armand. It was good.”

“It was good ?! Are you hearing this, babe?!”

Lestat nodded, rubbing at his cheeks to make sure the tear tracks were gone. “Rhydian is very passionate about music from that era.”

“Yeah? I don’t remember that about you,” Louis admitted.

Rhydian shrugged one shoulder. “I didn’t have a record player when I knew you, I guess. When I moved into my current place, there was this dingy old record shop down the street and I fancied the guy who worked there, so I ended up buying a lot of records. And they didn’t really have anything post 1990. So-”

Lestat sat at the piano and put his hands to the keys, content to listen to the two most important men in his life converse. It was soothing, and he tried not to think about Claudia. He hadn’t let himself think about her much the past few months. He was realising perhaps that was a mistake. He needed to learn to hold his grief, as Louis had. It had been too long since he worked on Claudia’s songs - he couldn’t remember playing them since he’d moved to London. Part of him wanted to play them now, but he couldn’t take it. Besides, he wasn’t sure if it was fair to spring it on Louis like this. If he was to hear them, Louis should have privacy to do so on his own terms. Instead he practised a couple of his favourite happier songs, one about Rhydian and the other about finding joy in hunting again. He smiled slightly at the memories stirred by the latter, looking forward to hunting once Louis went back to his hotel room. 

“Les?” Louis prompted, and Lestat looked up to see him and Rhydian sitting at a polite distance from each other on the sofa, but just close enough that if Louis really wanted to, he could reach out and touch the human’s knee.

“My apologies, I was lost in thought,” he replied, “what was that?”

“I was asking if you’d recorded anything yet.”

Lestat shrugged. “Not yet. I still feel as though I am a little rusty.”

“You don’t sound rusty to me,” Louis observed, a small, encouraging smile on his face. 

“You’ve basically got a whole album’s worth of songs ready to go,” Rhydian agreed, “and they’re good, baby, really good.”

“I know,” Lestat smirked, flicking his hair over his shoulder, “my artistry is way beyond human standards, naturally, but mine are a little more exacting.”

Rhydian snorted, and Louis grinned. Lestat cleared his throat and straightened his spine. He began to play one of his favourites, a nostalgic happy one about Louis teaching him how to dress during their early courtship that was called ‘ Make Me Up ’. It also happened to be one of Rhydian’s favourites, and he noticed the human excitedly pat Louis’ shoulder when the opening chords rang out from the piano.

“You’re going to love this,” he enthused under his breath, and Louis relaxed into the sofa, arching an eyebrow teasingly when Lestat looked up at him. The sentiment was clear; he wanted to be impressed. Lestat couldn’t really embellish modern music the way he so easily could with jazz, but he played it perfectly, glad that the crying hadn’t ruined his voice so badly that he couldn’t sing to his usual standards. He might have shown off a bit, or a lot, but by the end of the song Louis was misty-eyed and blushing a little, and Rhydian’s eyes were darting between the two of them curiously, his brain loudly wondering if they were going to kiss about it. Lestat wondered the same thing. 

“That was-” Louis cleared his throat quietly, “that was beautiful, Lestat. I… I hadn’t thought about all those shopping sprees in a long time. Things seemed so goddamned hard back then but, truly, they might’ve been the best days of my life. Wandering round New Orleans showing you everything America had to offer.”

Lestat nodded, his heart squeezing. “Back when I could still read your mind. I confess, having grown used to hearing Rhydian, I do miss that.”

“I miss it too,” Louis admitted, smiling wryly, “I think a whole lot of misunderstandings could’ve been avoided if one of us were capable of just saying what we were thinking once or twice.”

Lestat hummed in agreement, glancing at Rhydian. “It makes me feel… A lot less… Terrible. Destructive. I have been so stupid-”

“Hey, no, we’re not doing that,” Louis insisted before Rhydian could say anything, crossing the room to stand over Lestat. “We can’t change what happened, no point in hating ourselves over it. We both fucked up plenty. We’ve been punished enough, don’t you think?”

“He’s right, baby,” Rhydian agreed, “we’re all here together now, the three of us, and I think you know now how much you mean to both of us.”

“How much both of you mean to me,” Louis amended, holding out his hand to Rhydian. Surprised but pleased, Rhydian joined the two vampires at the piano, his hand slipping into Louis’. 

Lestat looked between the two of them, relieved at the intimacy passing between the other two men where they gazed at each other. It made him feel like his love for both of them was okay. It was okay that he still loved Louis, because Rhydian still loved him too. And it was okay that he needed Rhydian in his life, because Louis wanted him there too. He didn’t deserve either of them, and deep down he felt in his gut that it couldn’t last forever, because nothing good in his life ever did. But he was going to grasp it tight while he had it.

“Kiss him,” Lestat requested quietly, and both Louis and Rhydian’s eyes snapped to him. Louis looked like a deer caught in headlights, and Rhydian looked like he was about to drop to his knees and beg for it. Lestat bit his lip. “It is okay. I want you to.”

Louis looked back at Rhydian, his eyebrows raised, and Rhydian had the grace to look shy. Reading the human’s thoughts, though, Louis’ shoulders relaxed. “You… Discussed it.”

“Yeah,” Rhydian admitted. “At length.”

“You almost ripped my head off last night when I-”

“Yes, I am sorry about that,” Lestat smiled, ducking his head. “I thought that you were trying to win Rhydian back.”

Louis’ eyebrows furrowed at that, and he stared uncomprehendingly at Lestat for a moment. Rhydian huffed out a soft laugh. “Lestat… You… Do you really think that I…? Tell me you know what you mean to me.”

Lestat’s breath caught in his throat, and he looked away. Louis kneeled down next to his stool, and cupped Lestat’s cheek, thumb brushing under his eye. Lestat’s eyes darted up to Rhydian, who looked like he was about to cry happy tears, and whose mind was full of hopes for both he and Louis. When Lestat looked back at Louis, he looked serious.

“I need you to hear me, okay?” His voice was wavering a little. “I have always loved you, Lestat. I fell in love with a clueless, adorable French aristocrat who could not dress to save his fucking life, and I married an unhinged , sexy as fuck vampire who punched a hole in my priest’s skull, and I have loved you every fucking minute between then and now, when you’ve been both and neither of those things. Even when it was stupid and destructive for the both of us. I always loved you. I was just… Hurting so much, I’d given you so much, I thought not telling you how I felt would protect me somehow. I don’t know. It doesn’t make sense.”

“It does,” Rhydian chimed in, “your relationship then was so unbalanced, you needed to keep hold of the tiniest bit of power. I get it. And I… I think he does, too. Now.”

Lestat nodded, sniffling back tears. “I should have helped you. All I cared about was sex. I knew you were in pain, I should have-”

“Didn’t I already say none of that?” Louis sighed, bringing their foreheads together. “None of that, now. You just got what you wanted for the past hundred years, damn,” he joked, tilting his head up to kiss Lestat’s forehead, “I love you, Les, always will.”

Lestat wound his arms round Louis’ waist and buried his face in his neck. He felt Rhydian’s fingers brush through his hair as Louis’ arms squeezed him tight. It was perfect, and Lestat froze there, tears streaming into Louis’ shirt, relief and joy and regret swirling in him and combining and separating and combining again. It was like Louis had just pulled out a knife that had been festering in his side for a century, and he had never been more grateful to bleed. It felt cleansing. 

He caught Rhydian’s thoughts, presumably meant for Louis - thank you for telling him that - he needed to hear it out loud so badly. Lestat pulled back, and looked up at Rhydian, who was gazing down at him with the tiniest hint of uncertainty. He pulled the human in for a soft kiss over Louis’ shoulder, cupping the back of his neck with his hand. Louis turned a little so he was facing the two of them, one hand still heavy on Lestat’s waist. When they broke apart, Louis looked between the two of them, his teeth digging into his lower lip. 

“Kiss him,” Rhydian said breathlessly, squirming a little, “like, I’m a little bit jealous, but you two are beautiful together. I want you for each other. So… Kiss him.”

Lestat didn’t need any more encouragement than that, and, leaving his hand holding the back of Rhydian’s neck, leaned in and kissed Louis for the first time in eighty years. Louis moaned softly the moment their lips touched, angling his head to let Lestat kiss him deeper. It was slow, their tongues dragging together in greeting like they never wanted to be apart again, and Lestat was throbbing in moments. 

“Fuck, you two are so gorgeous,” Rhydian whispered, rubbing Lestat’s chest through his shirt, “does he taste as good as you remember, baby?”

Louis reached out blindly for Rhydian with a groan and broke apart from Lestat to kiss him, pulling him in roughly. Lestat’s breath caught in his throat as he watched them, Rhydian immediately melting into Louis, clinging to his biceps as their mouths moved languidly together. 

“He tastes just as addictive as ever, doesn’t he?” Lestat purred, running his hands through both men’s hair, almost guiding the way they made out. Rhydian whimpered, and pushed out of the kiss. 

“I don’t wanna be disrespectful-” Louis mumbled, eyes darting between the other two men. Lestat and Rhydian looked at each other, and Rhydian nodded, tilting his head to the side as Lestat’s fingers pushed his t-shirt down past his collarbone, revealing the marks he’d left there before Louis arrived. Louis’ eyes fell to the base of Rhydian’s neck, his pupils wide as he stared at the mottled bruises there, the bite marks. Lestat heard Rhydian’s heart pick up as he craned his neck even further, and Louis’ upper lip twitched, his eyes darting to Lestat’s as he struggled to keep his fangs in check.

“I-”

“Do you remember what he tastes like, Louis?” Lestat asked, voice low and smooth as lounge jazz, “he thinks of how you’d drink from him often. Always so gentle with him, even when he asked for it harder.”

Louis was looking between the two of them with wide eyes, but the rest of him was very still. “I… Didn’t want to hurt him. He was delicate. Young.”

“But all grown up now. Strong. Thick. Experienced.” Lestat paused as Rhydian whimpered softly, squeezing his thighs together. “And so very masochistic.”

“He was always a masochist,” Louis muttered, “I just… Didn’t wanna corrupt him.”

Rhydian giggled, half nerves and half genuine delight. “That ship had sailed long before you found me, Lou. Bite me. I want you to.”

“And you,” Louis’ eyebrows were a little creased in the middle when Lestat met his eyes, “you’re not gonna… Get upset?”

“Quite the opposite, I assure you,” Lestat breathed, his own fangs coming down. 

Happy with the reassurance, Louis didn’t hesitate, sinking his fangs right over where Lestat had fed on Rhydian the night before. The human gasped, back bowing and eyes fluttering shut. Lestat palmed himself, squeezing the head of his cock through his trousers as he watched Louis drink with relish. It was as he’d always dreamed; Louis taking joy in the act, not hesitating to sate his desires. It was as healing as it was sexy. 

Louis moaned softly as he pulled back, licking his lips. His eyes were warm when they looked at the bleeding punctures in Rhydian’s throat. “Fuck, I missed you,” he whispered, smiling a little as he healed over the marks with a flick of his thumb against his fang.

“Bedroom, now,” Rhydian insisted breathlessly, pulling Louis up to his feet and grabbing a handful of Lestat’s shirt to haul him up too.

The two vampires were hot on his heels as he stumbled to the bedroom, peeling off his shirt as he went. Lestat caught him round the waist and deposited him on the bed, crawling between his legs as he spread them wide. Louis, unsure of where he was expected to go, sat on the edge of the bed, his fingers itching to reach out and undress Lestat. Instead, he pulled off his own cardigan and shirt, eyes glued to the other two men. Rhydian was arching under Lestat already, nails scrabbling up under his tee.

“Louis,” Lestat rasped, looking over his shoulder, “would you prefer to fuck him first or second?”

Louis’ mouth suddenly went very dry, and his eyes fell to the human’s desperate face. I want you to decide , Rhydian insisted in his thoughts, want you both to use me . “Second,” Louis answered, crawling up to sit with his back against the headboard. “I feel like the two of you planned a whole ass show for me.”

Lestat grinned as he sat up to rid himself of his clothes. Louis undressed more slowly, drinking in the sight of the other two practically tearing each others’ clothes off. Once Rhydian’s boxers were tossed over Lestat’s shoulder, both vampires could easily smell how wet he was. 

“We’re so lucky to have such a wanton little slut to share, are we not? So horny that he can’t help but get wet thinking about being the hot little side piece to a married man. You fucking whore.” Lestat’s tone was fond, but Louis shivered at the words even as Rhydian moaned. “How many times have you rubbed yourself raw thinking about the two of us fucking you, hmm?”

“A lot,” Rhydian admitted breathlessly, eyes flicking up towards Louis, “so much. Please, baby, I need it.”

“Need what?” Louis let his hand fall to the bulge in his pants, “tell us, Rhyd, what do you need?”

Rhydian whimpered, arching his back as he looked up at Louis’ clothed erection. “Need your cocks in me. Need you both using me like a shiny new toy.”

“Fuck,” Louis hissed, shifting closer to him. “Yeah?” He unzipped his pants and tugged out his cock, stroking it from root to tip and thumbing off the drop of precum that oozed out. He went to offer it to Rhydian, but Lestat seized his wrist with a soft growl, and Louis looked up at the blond man in time to see him suck the liquid right off his thumb. “Les,” Louis groaned, fingers curling around Lestat’s shoulder to pull him into a frenzied kiss, leaning over Rhydian. 

Rhydian ran his hands over Louis’ legs, shucking down his trousers as far as he could. He took Louis’ cock in his hand and started stroking him, wishing the angle was better so he could suck him. He watched the two men make out, and used his free hand to guide Lestat’s erection to his hole. “You gonna use my cunt while you kiss your husband?”

Lestat moaned in affirmation, easing his hips forward. Louis broke the kiss to watch Lestat sink into Rhydian’s pussy, the younger man’s eyes fluttering shut. He moved around to Rhydian’s side, his fingers exploring his chest as Lestat took hold of Rhydian’s legs to start fucking him properly. 

“You’ve healed up so well,” Louis murmured, marvelling at how light the top surgery scars were. “Look at you, so hairy now. So fucking sexy, sweetheart.”

Rhydian squirmed, leaning up for a kiss, which Louis happily gave him. “He feels so good,” he whispered between kisses, “fills me up so good.”

“Yeah?” Louis reached down to press into the side of Rhydian’s clit, smirking when he found it was still a sensitive spot despite the fact that it had more than doubled in size since the last time he’d touched it. “How many times are you gonna cum for us tonight, hm?”

“His record is fifteen,” Lestat supplied smugly, “he’s so wet, Louis, he feels divine.”

“Please,” Rhydian sobbed, “gonna cum, please, Louis, make me squirt, I need-”

Louis rubbed his hard, straining clit back and forth, the pressure perfect, just how he used to touch him all those years ago, and Rhydian screamed in pleasure, hands flying out to grasp something and landing in the sheets and on Louis’ chest. On the next pull out, his pussy gushed everywhere, soaking Lestat from navel to thigh. 

“Good boy,” Lestat snarled, fucking his cock back in. Louis shoved his wet fingers in Lestat’s mouth, rubbing the taste of Rhydian’s slick into his tongue. Rhydian whined at the sight of it, clenching down on Lestat’s cock all over again. Lestat moaned at the taste, making eye contact with Louis as he started to push his fingers in and out of Lestat’s mouth, careful of his fangs. 

“You should cum inside him so I can taste it,” Louis murmured, making both the other men groan. He smirked, watching Lestat desperately suckle on his fingers as he fucked Rhydian hard and fast. 

“Please,” Rhydian begged, his hand wrapping round Louis’ cock, “please, baby, I need it, need your cum in me.”

“The two of you together are going to kill me, putain,” Lestat gasped, pulling back from Louis’ fingers to focus on fucking Rhydian as hard as he dared to.

“God, I can feel you in my throat ,” Rhydian keened, jerking Louis’ cock into his own face. Louis stopped him quickly, tangling their fingers together instead. He wanted to wait until he was inside Rhydian. 

Lestat pulled Louis in for another kiss as he started to cum, and Rhydian couldn’t help but reach down and rub his t-dick to the image, pussy wringing Lestat’s cum from him. Lestat gasped and moaned into Louis’ mouth, and Louis had to fight the instinct to bite him, growling a little at the vision of Lestat falling apart so thoroughly. The two of them continued to make out, panting and groaning into each others’ mouths, Rhydian watching them and moaning softly as Lestat’s cock twitched in him every time Louis’ tongue did something good.

“Fuck, I gotta fuck him,” Louis hissed, pulling back. “Lie down next to him,” he told Lestat, his tone leaving no room for the other vampire to do anything other than obey. Lestat hummed as he stretched out next to Rhydian, turned on his side to kiss his human partner. Rhydian eagerly licked the taste of Louis from Lestat’s tongue, and Louis settled between the human’s legs to watch for a moment. “You ready for me?” He checked, touching the tip of his cock to Rhydian’s dick.

“Mmmmmnf,” Rhydian confirmed, gasping as Lestat pulled back from their kiss. “Yeah, yeah, come on, Lou, give it to me. And I swear to God, don’t be fucking gentle with me.”

“Oh don’t worry, baby, no chance of that,” Louis admitted, bending over him so he could kiss the human as he nudged inside. Rhydian’s breath hitched, and he reached out for Lestat’s wrist. Louis groaned as he sank inside, eyes fluttering shut as he buried his face in Rhydian’s throat. “Fuck. Forgot how wet you get.”

“You are pushing my cum in so much deeper,” Lestat purred, his hand roaming up Louis’ stomach to tweak his nipples.

“Feels so good,” Rhydian moaned, his legs opening a little wider, thighs meeting his stomach, “does it feel good, Daddy?”

Lestat inhaled sharply, a hint of jealousy rearing in him but quickly being smothered by pure want. Rhydian had never called him Daddy, but looking at Louis now, dark-eyed and intense, he could understand why it came out. To 19 year old Rhydian, Louis had been Daddy, the debauched older man who kept him like a pretty pet in a pretty cage, and it gave Lestat a sick thrill to be watching that regression now. He thought he’d cum when Rhydian whined it again. 

Louis nodded, his eyebrows furrowed. He rolled his hips slowly, one hand on Lestat’s lower stomach and the other rubbing an insistent thumb up and down Rhydian’s clit. “You know it does, sweetheart. Never had a cunt as wet as this.”

Rhydian shivered, eyes boring into Louis’ face. Lestat felt like a pervert watching the two of them, the way they were panting and groaning and working up a sweat together like there was nothing else in the world. His cock was growing hard again, and he wrapped his fingers around it, Louis’ eyes darting to him as he started to stroke. Louis batted his hand away and took over, his grasp tight and unyielding. Lestat’s breath caught in his throat as he massaged his cock, not jerking it, but holding it, his hand flexing and rubbing the underside, as if Lestat was deep inside someone who was cumming over and over. 

“Harder, please, fuck me harder, I need it,” Rhydian whispered, his breath punched out of him with every thrust. “Faster Daddy, please, Daddy-”

Lestat groaned, grabbing Louis’ wrist to slow him down. 

“That’s it, sweetheart, Daddy’s got you,” Louis urged, his thumb pressing harder into Rhydian’s clit, “you gonna cum for me, Rhyd, you gonna cum for Daddy?”

“Fuck,” Lestat whimpered, eyes going wide when Louis, rather than slowing down, started to squeeze him so hard it almost hurt. He wanted to cum so badly, but he couldn’t like this. “Fuck, Louis, please…”

“I’m gonna cum again, Daddy,” Rhydian breathed, arching, his hand reaching out to grab Lestat’s pec, “I’m so close, please…”

Lestat turned his head to see Rhydian looking at him, and the two of them kissed open-mouthed, moaning and whining as their tongues tangled, Rhydian hitting his peak with a loud shriek, biting down on Lestat’s lower lip so hard it bled. Rhydian sucked the blood off as he shuddered through the waves of pleasure, Louis bending to kiss the human and share the scant drops of Lestat’s blood. 

“Good boy,” Louis breathed, still rocking minutely, and Rhydian sighed in pleasure. 

“You can keep going,” Rhydian told him, smiling a little now. 

Louis sucked his lower lip into his mouth, eyes darting between the two men laid out for him. “Actually, I… Do you wanna see Lestat fuck me?”

Rhydian’s breath caught in his throat. Lestat’s mouth made a little ‘o’ shape. They looked at each other, Lestat searching Rhydian’s mind and finding a sliver of doubt overridden ten times over with PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE and the sweetest, doe-eyed expression Lestat had ever seen on him. Lestat was ravenous, especially at the fact that Louis hadn’t asked him if he wanted to fuck Louis. He knew the answer already, knew that Lestat would tear the very Earth in two to fuck him through a mattress again. And Louis had been planning this, that’s why he’d worked up his cock to this aching, leaking mess without letting him cum. His cunning, beautiful fledgling, pursuing what he wanted with single-minded purpose! 

After one last bruising kiss from Rhydian, Lestat sat up and switched places with Louis, his hand running down the younger vampire’s arm as he went. Rhydian sat up on his elbows, leaning over to kiss Louis calm, soft brushes of lips that soon had Louis’ back arching for more. Lestat watched them together for a few minutes, lost in the moment. There was a time when he’d have torn the head clean off any man who so much as had a desirous thought about Louis, and he was relieved that he harboured no animosity to Rhydian seeing them now. 

Louis and Rhydian were putting on a show for him now, he realised, Rhydian’s hand slipping down Louis’ quivering stomach to grasp his cock, still gleaming from Rhydian’s cunt. Louis was running his fingers over Rhydian’s chest, exploring the subtle curves of the pecs he’d had sculpted there, brushing over tight nipples. Lestat shook himself out of his reverie, reaching for Rhydian’s cunt. 

“I think we have all the lubricant we need right here, oui? Our handsome little dispenser,” Lestat teased, wetting his fingers rubbing over Rhydian’s clit and then dipping inside to coat the lengths of his digits.

Rhydian shivered. “Glad I’m useful, baby,” he murmured, his legs parting a little wider. Louis pulled him into another kiss, and another, and then lay down flat, stretching his arms over his head, his eyes turning to Lestat. 

“Come here,” he said softly, and Lestat felt a twist in his stomach that he had no hope of resisting, moving between Louis’ legs and bending to slot their lips together. Louis’ hands went straight to his hair, holding him close, sighing happily as their tongues brushed together. Lestat was almost panting, his cock heavy and stupid between his legs. Louis’ calf brushed his hip, pulling him in, and Lestat’s fingers dropped to his hole, petting there. His breath hitched in his throat as he felt it already wet. 

“Couldn’t help it,” Louis said quietly, “opened myself up in the hotel room before. Was thinking about this, the two of you… Been thinking about it a lot since I found out you were together.”

“We thought about it a lot too,” Rhydian smiled, his fingers playing with himself casually. “Lestat fucked me on the Tube on the way home last night.”

Louis chuckled softly, arching his neck to let Lestat lavish kisses on his throat, “between the two of you -- ahh , baby, that’s good-” Louis moaned, eyelashes fluttering, “surprised you haven’t been arrested for public indecency…”

“Enough talking,” Lestat growled, curling his fingers inside Louis firmly. 

“Mmmmm, I missed that nasty tone,” Louis smirked, biting his lip. “You gonna remind me who I belong to with that big fucking cock of yours?” 

Lestat snarled softly, bracketing Louis’ body with his own as he reached over to wet his fingers with Rhydian’s cunt again, spreading the slick over his cock before fitting it to Louis’ hole. Rhydian moaned along with Louis as he sank inside, both his and Lestat’s attention firmly on Louis’ face. He made the loveliest faces when he was fucked, and Lestat’s insides purred with the knowledge that Rhydian had never seen them before this very moment. 

“Bet he’s stretching you wide, yeah? No way you’ve not tightened back up since leaving the hotel…” Rhydian’s fingers were back inside himself now, the hand closest to Louis feeling his lower stomach, teasing the hair there and rubbing where Lestat would soon be pressing through the flesh. 

“Yeah, he’s big,” Louis agreed, voice tight, “God, Les, it’s so good, come on, I ain’t gonna break, deeper. Force it in me, baby, I need it so bad.” He urged Lestat on with a pull to his shoulders, and Lestat groaned, squeezing his eyes shut. Louis petted his cheek and the back of his neck until he opened his eyes, and the two of them shared a lecherous smile. They’d always had this part down, the two of them equally desperate for each other in this way.

Lestat’s fangs were out. He had no idea when they’d dropped, but he couldn’t bring himself to care, because he was so close to being balls deep in his Saint Louis once more. “Should have used more lube,” Lestat muttered, overwhelmed by how tight Louis was, half-worried about whether he was hurting his lover and half-maddened by the urge to rend him in two, reforge his proper place in Louis’ hole. “Does it hurt?”

“Yeah,” Louis moaned, toes curling, “hurts so good. Can feel you in my guts, baby, it burns so good.”

“Fuck,” Rhydian muttered, his cunt wet enough to hear, fingers drenched now in his own arousal. “You’re taking it so well, Daddy.”

Louis groaned, his hand reaching to tangle in Rhydian’s hair. “Touch Daddy’s cock, sweetheart, that’s it,” he encouraged, tugging on the strands hard enough to make Rhydian whimper and turn onto his side, unrepentantly grinding himself on the side of Louis’ hip, his hand jerking Louis’ cock slowly, just the way he liked it. Louis looked up at Lestat, whose eyes had fallen to the head of Louis’ cock appearing and disappearing in Rhydian’s grasp. 

“You are so beautiful together,” Lestat mumbled, the words running together on account of his fangs, “putain, Louis, my love-”

“Gonna cum in me, Les? Gonna pump me full, yeah? Deep as it’ll go, baby, come on.” 

“Fuck!” Lestat cried, clenching his jaw, “not yet, not yet. Need more.”

Louis squirmed, rocking down and up into Rhydian’s grip needily. “You gonna make me beg in front of Rhydian?” 

Lestat grunted quietly, lip curling. “Louis, I cannot hold it when you speak like-”

“Come on, Les, please,” Louis begged sweetly, sucking his lower lip into his mouth as Lestat looked into his face, “I know you wanna breed me, baby, ‘m so ready for it, come on, please… Please, Les, please…”

“Look how wet he’s getting, baby, he needs it so bad,” Rhydian coaxed, rubbing his thumb over the head of Louis’ cock where red pre-cum was spurting out every time Lestat thrust in particularly hard.

He both loved and hated the way they teamed up against him. Hadn’t he promised to put their needs before his own, he reasoned with himself as he felt his stomach tightening, finally surrendering to the wave of pleasure that he’d been resisting and pushing in deep, balls deep, his palm flat on the centre of Louis’ chest as their foreheads met. He swore softly in French, his eyes rolling back as he came so hard it almost hurt, a pathetic noise escaping him at the end of it.

“Oh, fuck,” Louis whispered, clenching down and arching, “Rhydian, don’t stop, don’t stop, sweetheart, I’m-”

“I know you can feel him throbbing inside you,” Rhydian hissed in Louis’ ear, and that did it - Louis cried out in pleasure, nails digging into Lestat’s shoulder blades. Lestat teased his fangs over Louis’ cheek, down his jaw, and that just turned the cry into a scream, his hole spasming so hard it made Lestat gasp. 

The three men went still, breathing hard. Lestat could feel his and Louis’ hearts slowing together, and Rhydian’s following behind, not quite in time but in a rhythm that turned their simultaneous pounding into a calming harmony. He wondered if Louis felt it too. Lestat rubbed his cheek against Louis’, offering a soft kiss and nose rub before offering one to Rhydian too, who was cuddled into Louis’ side. The three of them sighed happily in unison, which raised a gentle laugh from all three.

There were a few moments of comfortable silence, Lestat still nestled deep in Louis, with none of them wanting to break the spell. 

“Is anyone else a little weirded out by how not-weird that was?” Louis asked, eventually, and Rhydian hummed. Lestat finally pulled out and, with a soft grunt, fell onto his back on Louis’ other side. Rhydian reached for his fingers, and they tangled together over Louis’ tummy. Louis put his hand over their joined ones, squeezing gently.

“I liked it,” Rhydian agreed, his cheek on Louis’ shoulder, “I dunno, I thought it would be more awkward, at least the first time. But it was easy.”

Lestat kissed Louis’ cheek. He wondered if he were laying his affection on too thick, but Louis had both told him he loved him and let him fuck him for the first time in 80 years tonight, so he figured being a little needy was warranted. “There was a time where I could not have imagined sharing Louis with anyone. People, quite literally, died because we could not figure out an open relationship or monogamy. And now…” He waved his free hand in the air a little, “I confess I was a little jealous, but… The relief was bigger. And the hunger, that was… Biggest of all.”

“Mine too,” Rhydian nodded, “I… I think this helped me feel less guilty? Because, I mean, Lestat knows… I was not over you, at all,” he said to Louis, who smiled, “and neither was he, obviously. And now, I don’t know, we don’t really need to feel bad about that anymore. We’re both allowed to still want you, you know?”

Louis hummed in agreement. “I hear you. I mean, obviously, I care about you, but… You know, Lestat and I-”

“Oh, I know, I’m under no illusions that he and I are in any way equal in your eyes,” Rhydian snorted, shifting back ever so slightly. Lestat grasped his fingers harder, not letting him pull away completely. Rhydian rolled his eyes slightly, half-smiling. “It’s okay, Lestat. You two have 8 decades on me. Besides,” he sat up, his fingers slipping through Lestat’s, “I can’t lie, being the hot young thing that two married sexy older men bring in every now and then to play? Literally the dream, so...”

“You are much more than that, mon amoureux,” Lestat insisted, glancing at Louis, who also nodded.

“Yeah, you’re not just a sex toy to either of us. I mean, if you want us to treat you that way for fun, we can do that,” he shrugged, “but he loves you. Adores you, actually, if he let you fuck me. He wasn’t exaggerating when he said people died because we were so jealous of other people. Has he told you about the time he hid in a swamp because some guy I knew when I was a kid wanted to blow me?”

Lestat huffed. “That is an embarrassing story. And it cheapens it. I was afraid you were going to leave me.”

Louis laughed fondly, rubbing Lestat’s tummy. “It’s cute now that it was a century ago,” he assured, and Lestat relented.

“I did hide in a swamp to watch him get his cock sucked by another man, it is true. I was heartbroken, beside myself. So it was a big step, watching the two of you make love. And, clearly, I have grown under Rhydian’s careful tutelage, because, voila! No tears! No rage!”

Rhydian and Louis laughed, both of them looking at him with such love that it made him feel like he was glowing. He was glad they’d all made it here, proud of the improvements he’d made to himself to make it possible. Louis looked up at Rhydian, who was sitting behind him now, and reached out to rub his knee.

“So you see, sweetheart,” Louis insisted, “he needs you. And, contrary to what you may have assumed from the way Armand treated you afterwards, you were the only boy I was looking after the way I was looking after you. You were special. You were calming. I felt like I could have a normal life with you, for a time. And you have no idea how much I needed that. Lestat will tell you, I am very attached to humanity-”

“It is true, I have never known another vampire so in love with humans,” Lestat interrupted, his tone only a smidge judgemental.

“ And ,” Louis continued, playfully glaring at Lestat, “our time together was precious. I’m only sorry that it was cut off so abruptly. I was a coward. I was afraid of watching you get sick or, god forbid, die. I couldn’t take it. I’d already, you know…” He shrugged, trailing off for a moment. He took a breath and sighed. “I’d already lost too much.”

“I get it,” Rhydian shrugged, “and I know it couldn’t have helped that I was so obsessed with you. Looking back, it makes me cringe. I should have worked harder to have a life outside of you.”

Louis huffed out a laugh. “You can’t blame yourself for that, sweetheart. Let’s review - a vulnerable, deeply traumatised young queer man misunderstood and alone, an older vampire looking to make a home, who, I hope you won’t mind me saying, Les, was still hurting from his own past, falling in love with what the young man could represent for him. And not being 100% honest with what he wanted or needed. But…” Louis smiled a little at Lestat, “you know, both those vampires tried their best with what they had at the time, even if it ultimately wasn’t good enough at the time for the young man they’d promised to look after.” Lestat felt shame curling round his throat, but Louis squeezed his hand, chasing it away as quickly as it had come. “But in the end, you know, both vampires grew into men they could be proud of being.”

Rhydian sighed, sitting back on his hands. “Well… When you put it like that…”

“My point is, you could have been perfect, but I was still in the position to take advantage of. So don’t think that the way that you acted was responsible for how things ended up. It was all me,” Louis insisted. “I had to face a lot of hard fucking truths when I was doing that interview with Daniel, and, you know, on reflection, I’ve treated a lot of boys badly over the years. I’m just so glad I met you after I swore off killing.”

“I did a lot of reflection also, in New Orleans. In the coffin, and after. And I think, no disrespect to what you went through with Louis, Rhydian, but… I have many, many more sins to atone for than you do, Louis - ten times over. And I want to.” Lestat said, his voice tight. “I want to, Louis.”

Louis tilted his head to the side, kissing Lestat’s shoulder. “Since when do you believe in sin?”

“I do not care about sinning against god. I only care about sinning against you,” he murmured, “Saint Louis.”

That made Louis laugh fondly. “Sounds like something we could exploit for a sexy little game one of these days.”

Rhydian snorted, and the serious mood was broken for the moment, though Louis’ eyes were soft and gentle as a caress - one that Lestat wasn’t sure that he deserved yet, really, but one he was thankful for, nonetheless. 

“Before we play any more games, I’m gonna need some food,” Rhydian reminded them, getting up to stretch his arms over his head, “you’ll stay the night, Lou?”

Louis nodded, smiling. “I’d love to.”

Lestat felt his soul soar. Could it be this easy, having everything you ever wanted?