Corvo won't admit this even under torture, but he's actually starting to enjoy his morning sparring sessions with Daud. It's a pleasure to spar with someone at his skill level: exhilarating, exhausting in a good way, deadly as it is - Daud's not bothered with niceties, and Corvo's learned more ugly, dirty tricks over the last week than he has in years.
The bruises and minor injuries that Daud inflicts on him everyday also has an unexpected benefit: Corvo feels more... balanced, somehow. He no longer worries constantly about the Heart, or about the minor intricacies of political Court machinations and security matters and the million little details that keep an Empire afloat and running.
They've made little further progress on the problem of the Outsider: the supposed witch in northern Gristol had, as Daud had thought, turned out to be a fake. Daud did seem confident of a breakthrough on Sokolov's rituals and the paint pigment, however. Corvo remains unsettled - it's obvious that their abilities have been diminished, and he supposes that he's... worried, as powerful and as ancient as the Outsider may be. He's beginning to regret not having disposed of the mad old witch when he had the chance.
"Pay attention," Daud growls, and scissors his feet out from under him. Corvo rolls with the fall, growling, and strikes instantly the moment he regains his balance, ramming the hilt of his blade against Daud's wrist. Daud jerks back, and the hilt snaps with a ringing slap against the flat of Daud's upraised blade, cutting a light gash into Corvo's palm.
It stings, but even as Daud grins at him, Corvo shoves back and manages to slam a fist into Daud's stomach. The assassin doubles over with a muffled yelp, and Corvo presses his advantage, jabbing his heel into the back of Daud's knee and sending Daud crashing into the ground. Even as he steps over to disarm Daud, however, Daud rolls onto his back, a shot fired from his wristbow slamming high into Corvo's shoulder.
Daud had aimed to miss - Corvo doesn't doubt that the bolt could have just as quickly have buried itself in his throat. Daud grins at him, his teeth bloodied and bared, and Corvo kicks him in the ribs for his trouble, making him grunt and roll out of range. Grabbing for the bolt, Corvo grits his teeth as he jerks it out of his shoulder, tossing it aside. The wound burns, but he's tasted blood now - he goes after Daud, who's still winded, and it doesn't take long for Corvo to finish the job, disarming Daud with a deft flick of his wrist and sending his blade clattering away.
He points the edge of his blade at Daud's neck, and Daud melodramatically raises his hands palms up in surrender. "We should employ a points system," Daud suggests dryly. "Rather than decide the matter on whoever's left standing."
"I thought we weren't keeping count," Corvo pushes his blade forward, just enough to indent Daud's skin - Daud doesn't even flinch.
"Where's the fun of it without stakes?"
"Were we betting on stakes?"
"I think it's been building up to that for a while," Daud drawls, and he steps back sharply even as he knocks Corvo's blade aside with the back of his leather bracer, lunging over. Corvo snarls, grabbing Daud by his collar and whirling them around, slamming Daud into the wall.
Daud laughs, and he keeps laughing even as blind adrenaline and hatred burn in his blood like the violence buried deep in his soul: Corvo snarls and drags Daud's wrists up to pin them over his head, a thumb jammed into the spring mechanism in the wristbow. "Give," Corvo growls - then he stiffens up with a stifled yelp as Daud merely leans sharply over to bite.
Teeth sink into Corvo's lower lip, and Corvo gulps down a taste of his own copper-bright blood before he's muffling another snarl, dropping his own blade, his free hand hooking up under Daud's throat. Daud chokes, gasps, then starts to laugh all over again, up until Corvo crushes their mouths back together, teeth cutting into lips and the edge of his tongue and now Daud's growling, squirming and jerking against Corvo's grip on his wrists like a cuffed animal.
"Now what?" Daud gasps, when Corvo lets them up for breath, "You don't have the fucking balls."
"Shut up," Corvo snaps, and it's as though they're both maddened by blood and blood-lust - Corvo licks into Daud's mouth as he kisses him, this time, pressed flush against him.
Daud's moan shakes against Corvo's lips and then he's squirming until he gets to rub against Corvo's thigh, all stifled, hungry groans. He jerks again against Corvo's grip, but hisses and stills when Corvo growls and tips his head down to close his teeth high over Daud's neck, under his jaw where his collar won't hide it, just hard enough to draw blood. Daud makes a high and strangled sound that collapses into a gasp as Corvo licks into the new wound he has wrought, and he realizes, dimly, that he's as hard as Daud, that this is getting further too quickly, too far.
"Daud," Corvo hisses, and Daud makes another wounded noise that has the bite of cruel laughter to its tail.
"Knew you didn't have the balls," Daud whispers back, challenging him, and Corvo draws back to glare at him coldly, flushed hot; no one he has ever touched has burned his blood like this.
"But we don't even-"
"Like each other? I can deal." Daud grins, merciless. "What, d'you want flowers and fucking champagne? You never struck me as the sort, Lord Protector. Tell me, did you ever fuck Empress Jessamine-"
"Don't you dare say her name," Corvo snarls, getting his free hand back around Daud's neck and snapping his head back against the wall. "I'll cut your Void-damned throat-"
"The problem with you, Corvo," Daud spits back, "You don't have the stomach for blood, do you? You killed Campbell. That was a good, clean kill. But the rest? You think sending those twins off to the mines without their tongues is better than death? What about Esma Boyle? D'you think any woman wants to be consigned to a life of rape and-"
"You don't know that," Corvo says fiercely, "The Outsider never said - you don't know that-"
Daud twists angrily if futilely against his grip. "I won't be lectured by a man who won't face up to his own fucking decisions."
"You're an assassin and you-"
"I killed Jessamine. Yes. I own up to it. I tried to make amends, damn you, I tried. I've done good by her daughter so far and Void help me, I'll do good by her for the rest of my life. I never knew my father; I grew up as a street brat and a thief who didn't know fuck all about life until the Outsider came to me. So my sense of morality might be fucked, but I know that, and I'm trying to catch up. Satisfied?"
The rage bleeds a little out of Corvo, but not all - he finds he has no verbal answer but to kiss Daud again, to taste blood between them and the death of a woman who had changed the both of them, destroyed them both in different ways. He doesn't dare think of the Heart, buried deep in a velvet box within a safe in his quarters. This, perhaps, is a final betrayal of Jessamine's trust; but Corvo can't - he can't stop.
"Fucking let my hands up, you cocksucking bastard," Daud growls, a touch breathless, though he's grinning again, challenging Corvo. It's insanity that has Corvo kiss Daud again to silence him, to drop his free hand down to his belt, frantically working at the buckle and the laces of his breeches, then Daud's. Daud laughs, harsh and surprised, nipping at Corvo's mouth.
"I swear, if you're going to leave me hanging-"
"You talk too Void-damned much for a man who's about to get what's coming to him."
"Only if you don't put your cock to better use than your mouth," Daud sneers, and Corvo stares, his own to be surprised. "What, never done it before with a man? Was the Empress-"
"First," Corvo clenches the hand he has around Daud's wrists tightly, "Shut the fuck up about her, or I will stab you in the balls. Understand?" At Daud's smirk and nod, he adds, "Secondly, my affairs are not your concern, but if you're really curious, women don't turn my fancy. Satisfied?"
"Huh." Daud arches an eyebrow. "So maybe Thomas was right about question four."
"What are you talking about-" Corvo chokes down into a moan as Daud jerks over to kiss him, and he's hungry and dazed by the time he takes control, turning Daud sharply around, forcing the assassin to brace himself against his elbows on the stone.
Daud has one of Sokolov's elixirs strapped to his belt - it'll do well enough for slick as he does for minor wounds. Daud starts laughing again as Corvo uncorks the vial, his cheek pressed against his gloves and his shoulders shaking, even when Corvo clenches a hand down over Daud's hip and kicks Daud's legs open as far as his shoved-down breeches will let him. He takes a sip, just enough to close his shoulder wound, then he pours some of the vial over his fingers.
Corvo doesn't bother being gentle, especially when Daud merely growls and tries to push back against the fingers that Corvo's pressing into him. He's clean, at least, thank the Void, and clearly impatient - Daud's no stranger to this either, and that's surprising. He's never pegged Daud as the sort who would spread his legs for anyone: but then again, if the entire fiasco of the last few months had proved anything to Corvo, it's that he's a Void-damned poor judge of character.
Daud makes an impatient sound when Corvo manages three fingers, and finally gasps, "Will you get on with it? Some of us have - unfh - Outsider's teeth, are you going to-"
"Shut up," Corvo grunts, though he obliges, pulling away his fingers with a wet pop to slick himself up with what's left of the elixir, then tossing the vial at their feet. When he first presses deep, Daud's groan rattles against his gloves, his fists clenched against the wall, and viciously, Corvo hopes it hurts. He knows it does. His fingers creep down between Daud and the wall, groping, and Daud's groan hitches higher as Corvo gets unsteady, slicked fingers around Daud's heavy cock as he presses deeper into the tight, gritty heat. It's glorious.
Daud starts squirming almost immediately, flashing Corvo the bloodied white of his teeth over his shoulder, his cold eyes wild for once and shocked with lust; Corvo finds himself rolling his hips, experimentally at first, then when Daud curses him in an unintelligible string of words he shifts his weight on the ground and pulls back, just enough that when he snaps his hips back forward Daud jerks up onto the balls of his toes.
"F-uck," Daud gasps, then he growls, "Yes, damn you, that all you've got-" and then Corvo's snarling as he takes what he can, not bothering with Daud's pleasure save for the fist he makes over Daud's cock, driving Daud up against the wall with each heavy thrust.
The scarred side of Daud's face scrapes briefly against the stone but Corvo doesn't slow, not when he has Daud pinned like this and at his mercy. He pours his rage and anger and hatred and grief into this, tangling it filthy with base lust and want and Daud takes it all, shoving back against it, demanding more. They're monsters both, the two of them, the pair of them, and this is why his blood burns in his veins and roars in his ears; in Daud there is but the fractured mirrored nature of Corvo's soul. When Corvo comes, it's with an anguished groan, buried deep, his lips pressed tight against the back of Daud's neck.
"Hey," Daud snaps impatiently, and it's Corvo's turn to chuckle as he obligingly strokes Daud roughly, just enough to make the assassin tense up and hiss as he spills against the cold stone. Corvo pulls back gingerly, cleaning himself up the best he can with a polishing cloth he has in his pouches, but Daud merely tucks himself back in and buckles up, uncomfortable as he has to be. Corvo eyes him uncertainly, and Daud merely arches an eyebrow at him. "Don't you have somewhere else to be, Lord Protector?"
"I-"
"You want some sort of confession?" Daud snorts. "Fine. I still think that you're a sad bastard. Happy?"
"Fuck you," Corvo shakes his head slowly, unable to help the sharp laugh edging up past his throat. "I do think that this isn't what Captain Curnow was thinking of."
"T'was certainly what his niece was thinking of."
"Don't you imply anything about Ca-" Corvo begins, but Daud's already vanished out of sight. He rolls his eyes, exhales, and starts to make his way out of the yard
CREDIT GOES TO TAYWEN THIS IS NOT MEEEEE