[open] post-imprisonment log

[sterngaze]

WHO: Liem & you!
WHAT: Liem is released from the naughty-Kenoma dungeons
WHERE: The Citadel, possibly Achamoth proper
WHEN: After his release on Firaseri 6th
WARNINGS: References to Liem’s imprisonment, including brainwashing, torture, & self-harm

I. The Wounded Option

[Liem is released from the Citadel’s dungeons without fanfare, staggering from his audience with the Regent back to his own rooms and sequestering himself there to recover from the most immediate after-effects of Dionys’s ministrations—or to at least attempt to. Rest is out of the question; the stings and aches throbbing through him would make sleep a struggle even if he could close his eyes without being transported immediately back into Dionys’s clutches. His mind feels like a sieve, his thoughts slipping away from him like water and leaving him only with the jagged edges of the past ten days. The best he can do is nurse his filthy and abused body while he tries to piece his mind back together.

He spends a lot of time alone over the ensuing days, but the observant or well-informed may have noted his return from the occasional servant delivering food or medicine to his room, or from hearing the sounds of activity within it. The sounds of running water are especially obvious, should one happen to walk past while he’s washing.

But of course, he has to tend to his injuries all over again once he’s stripped off the bandages and washed away the salve. Some of them are easier to reach than others, especially given the lingering pain involved in moving around too much. After bandaging his arms and tending the half-healed cuts and bruises on his chest, a short hiss punctuates his attempts to minister the lashes on his back.

Any knock on his door is meet with a brief silence, followed by the door cracking open and Liem’s dark, tired eyes peering out from it.]

Can I help you?

II. The Insomnia Option

[It doesn’t take all that long for restlessness to lure Liem out from the confines of his rooms. The walls start to creep in on him after just a couple days; the quiet starts to become oppressive. It’s too much like his cell in the depths of the Citadel, and it’s too much like his cell in the cathedral back home. Leaving the barren stone and cold, empty bed behind, he ventures out into the Citadel at large, seeking something to keep him occupied.

a. The middle of the night is a strange time to find anyone in the kitchens, but that’s where Liem is right now, smelling of oranges and cinnamon, his sleeves folded back to the elbows and his head bent over a small pie filled with some kind of soft white cheese. Flour dusts the bruises and half-healed bites on his wrists and forearms as he carefully lays a lattice of dough strips over the top, lifting his eyes from his work only briefly as he hears someone come in.

b. Regardless of how sleepless his nights (and his days) have been, or how residual aches from his injuries still plague his waking hours, Liem still turns to training as something that can occupy him even while he’s only operating at 50% at best. Target practice is something he could do even in his sleep, so the deep shadows beneath his eyes and the lethargy in his movements don’t stop him from finding a target to practise with in the pre-dawn hours when most of the Citadel is still dreaming. Stress and exhaustion have made him jumpy, though; the sound of approaching footsteps filters into his awareness slowly, and then in a rush all at once as he whirls to point his crossbow at whoever just walked in.

c. During the day, Liem mostly keeps out of the way in parts of the Citadel that don’t see much use. There’s a spare room near the top of a tower that stays empty for hours at a time, and it’s here that he can be found curled up on a window seat, gazing out of the narrow window while he scratches at a notebook with a stick of charcoal. Or at least, that’s what he’s been spending much of the afternoon doing, if the formless doodles and patterns scrawled across the pages are any indication. Liem himself isn’t available for comment, leaned as he is against the cool stone wall in the grip of a shallow and uneasy sleep.]

III. Wildcard

[Liem can be found around the Citadel or, later on, even out in Achamoth itself. His inbox is also open for post-imprisonment communion! Feel free to hit me up on plurk at Sporelett or DM me on discord if you want to hash out something else.]

Comments

[sterngaze]

[It’s embarrassingly sentimental for Liem to be charmed by something as simple as being told come to bed with me, but despite the shameless character of their entire evening, as he follows Matt across his bedroom floor, he finds that he is. He is hopelessly charmed: by his invitation, by the desperate and desirous clutch of his hand, by the way he fits against Liem so perfectly even while moving backwards toward the bed. A small, rapt sound escapes him as he adjusts his grip around Matt’s waist, contriving to erase what little space still exists between them, and explores the planes and curves of his back with his other hand.

He’s wrapped around him like a second set of clothes when they come to the moat’s edge, and when Matt’s foot plunges down into it, his entire sense of balance is thrown off. Liem’s eyes fly open as he staggers, squeezing tighter on startled instinct, but stepping forward to regain his balance is exactly the wrong call in this scenario; they both tip away from the bridge and splash right into the moat. Liem finds himself sitting almost hip deep in water, one hand braced against the bottom and the other still clutching at the man whose lap he’s just about ended up in.

He says automatically,] Oh god, I’m so sorry.

[semicharmed]

[ As Matt tumbles back, splashing into the moat and landing flat on his ass, he lets out a noise that can only be classified as a squawk. The impact of his landing hammers through his whole body, making his stump sing with pain. For a moment, he sits there sputtering, sucking in shuddering breaths.

And he starts to laugh. ]

Oh my God. My shoes. [ He uses his right arm to haul himself up to the edge of the moat, where he sits dripping. He flashes Liem a breathless smile. ] Uh--can you help me out of these?

[sterngaze]

[When Matt hauls himself out of the moat, Liem doesn't follow immediately. For the moment he just sits in the water, his shock giving way to soft, breathless laughter at the state they've ended up in. He looks up at Matt, shifting on his throbbing knees to kneel in the water in front of him.]

You have only to ask.

[He lifts one of Matt's booted feet, placing it dripping in his lap, and smiles demurely up at him as his fingers play over the ties of his shoe. No part of him seems to have escaped the splash from their landing; droplets cling even to his lowered lashes and the end of his nose as he regards the other man.]

Still pleased with your choice of companion, even though he dunked you in a moat?

[semicharmed]

[ Matt's missing fingers still sting, but he does his best to breathe through it. It's easier with Liem to focus on: his sweet smile, the drops of water glittering on his eyelashes. Matt's toes curl in his boot, pressing the tip of his shoe into Liem's thigh. ]

I'm over the moon, [ he says, a pleasant murmur. ] That is ... as long as my companion gives me what he promised me.

[ Matt won't sit idle while Liem works on his buckles and laces. His right hand lifts to his shirt, flicking open its buttons with dreamy idleness. He pulls the shirt from his right shoulder, then rolls his left to dislodge it entirely. His chest is bare now, the emerald lotus over his heart fully visible. ]

A thorough accounting.

[sterngaze]

[Liem doesn't bother to hide the slight widening of his smile when Matt presses the tip of his shoe into his thigh. His fingertips slide beneath the cuff of one pant leg to brush briefly against the damp skin of Matt's calf.]

Oh, I'm excellent at accounting.

[It's a sacred duty of any priest of Abadar, after all—and he's always taken his sacred duties very seriously. It wouldn't do to rush.

He works his way diligently through the fastenings of each drenched shoe, easing them free to perch on the moat's water-dappled edge, and peels the waterlogged socks off to lay next to them. Then sliding his hands up Matt's thighs to gently part them, he rises on his knees to lean closer, water pattering back into the most around him as he holds Matt's regard. One hand travels deliberately up to pause at the fastening at his fly.]

Would you like help with this, as well?

[semicharmed]

[ It is ... objectively stupid to find it hot to watch Liem undo his shoes. But Matt loves to see any task done well, and Liem is so methodical as he strips him of boots and socks--as if the process were one of great significance. Matt is fascinated, almost enchanted, to watch his fingers move.

Liem slides his hands up Matt's thighs, and Matt spreads them on a sigh. Liem leans forward, and Matt can't help swaying closer to meet him. As Liem's fingers slide up his thigh, his hips shift, arching slightly under his hand. ]

Please, [ he murmurs. His hand comes to Liem's face again to cup his cheek, to follow the pointed curve of his ear, to slide down the side of his neck. ] I'd rather be touching you.

[ There are quite a few buttons to undo, given the high waist of his trousers, but Liem has shown impressive diligence already. ]

[sterngaze]

[Liem's coy expression grows a little sharper, a little more hungry when Matt shifts his hips beneath his touch. His eyes flicker with the same almost feverish heat they briefly had on the roof in Venera, after he'd left a mark on Matt's neck—and this time, it's very clearly eagerness.]

What a happy coincidence, [he murmurs, leaning slightly into the contact of fingers and palm warming his skin.] I've been wanting you to touch me again.

[His hand moves singly along the buttons marching down from Matt's waistband, flicking each one open with the same precise care with which he'd undone his shoes: the care of a man who should have stopped drinking two cocktails ago and is now concentrating very hard on not fucking up. His other hand slides up Matt's thigh much like its twin, but scrubs up his hip to hook into the side of his waistband as the buttons surrender to his assiduous attention.]

[semicharmed]

[ Matt recognizes that expression.

He can't immediately place it--maybe he's seen it on Liem before, or maybe it's something he dreamed up between the roof in Venera and now. But he recognizes it as a look he likes, one he's been craving from him.

With Liem's blessing, Matt's fingers retrace the path they've just taken. They slide back up Liem's neck, his thumb brushing the hinge of his jaw, then the lobe of his ear. His fingertips trace up the shell; they linger at the pointed tip. Then Matt's fingers card back through his hair, his nails grazing Liem's scalp. They drag gently down the nape of his neck. And he sighs: ]

You're so pretty ...

[ It's pure, artless admiration, something Matt barely registers saying. He's much more absorbed by where Liem's hands are. His hips shift again as Liem's fingers hook in his waistband, a slight change of weight to permit--or encourage--Liem to tug his trousers down more easily. ]

[sterngaze]

[As he works, the sphere of Liem's attention shrinks to a collection of bright, irresistible pinpricks: the fingers brushing his skin and carding through his hair, the coy invitation of Matt's undone trousers, the low sigh of his breath as he shifts his hips to accommodate Liem's efforts. He has no thought left for the tepid moat he's kneeling in, his flushed and slightly waterlogged condition, or anything else other than the man in front of him. Gently turning his head aside, he nuzzles against Matt's wrist, pressing a chaste kiss against the delicate skin there.]

If I started praising your most alluring qualities, [he breathes, hooking his other hand into the waist of his trousers,] I might not ever stop.

[And he eases the rest of Matt's clothes off, pulling them down past his hips and encouraging the soggy fabric down his legs so he can finally plop it into the floor with the rest of his discarded garments. All of them are going to wrinkle like hell if they lie here like this all night, and at the moment Liem barely notices, let alone cares.]

officially nsfw from here

[semicharmed]

[ Liem's nuzzling, his soft kiss, prompt a sudden sigh: oh. Matt lifts his hips to help Liem divest him of the rest of his clothing, and pulls back to sit on the edge of the moat. Apart from his cheek and the stump of his left wrist, his skin is smooth and unmarred, marked only by tattoos: the lotus on his chest, the half-monkey, half-man figure curling over his right hip. A dark band encircling his right wrist. Between his legs, under a thatch of dark hair, his cock has just started to stiffen.

Matt looks down at Liem in the water and realizes with a laugh that somehow, they've managed to get him fully naked while Liem is almost entirely clothed. ]

Never's a pretty long time, [ he notes, amused. He shifts himself back from the lip of the moat, sliding his legs out of the water, and extends his hand to Liem. ] C'mere, you must be--

[ Well, he's always a little cold, isn't he. ]

--wet.