stasreskon | [ The "Getting to Know You Game" ]

[ The "Getting to Know You Game" ]

Maybe he'd been waiting for Kell specifically, maybe the timing was just especially good. Whatever it was, when Hakkyuu caught sight of the Antari he moved like a shadow, crashing into Kell on the magician's left side to hook his arm effortlessly around Kell's and spin his momentum around with a few carefully placed footsteps to turn them about face and start leading them back the way Kell had come from.

"We need to talk," he said shortly, eyes directly ahead as he lead on, his expression serious though his energy was clearly returned.

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Kell's grunt as Hakkyuu slammed into him was undignified and sudden -- Hakkyuu had knocked what wind there was out of him.

Vaguely alarmed, he hooked his arm with Hakkyuu's and followed him without a word, straight-backed and with a grim expression, mind already running over and over the countless possibilities, everything that might have gone wrong.

He did not ask where they were going.

For some time, Hakkyuu didn't say anything--not while he guided them down the hallway, not when he opened the door of the room he'd been given, not as he brought them both inside, not even as he dragged a small, low table over and then tossed a floor cushion at Kell's chest expecting him to catch it.

Then, he drifted away and pulled up something from behind a clothes chest and set it down on the table--a full, unopened bottle of whiskey.

His serious expression remained, though now with a slight glint in his eyes.

"We're going to play a game."

Kell automatically followed, caught the cushion, and held it to his chest a moment, a frown growing across his face as Hakkyuu began to work on their setup. Dropping the pillow to the floor, he took off his coat to hang it up, then narrowed his eyes at his former master before sitting.

“I have some concerns,” he answered, but in the manner of someone who knew it would be useless to protest the coming chain of events – and deep down, was intrigued.

“Are details forthcoming?”

"You always have concerns," he said as he withdrew his fingers from the throat of the bottle and stepped away to get his own cushion and drop it on the floor.

"And details forthcoming is kinda the idea."

Falling to a short sit, along with a slight wince, Hakkyuu cocked his head to look at Kell over the top of the bottle.

"Let's play Getting to Know You. Rules are simple: we ask each other questions and give each other answers until the bottle is empty."

“You are often someone to be concerned about,” Kell answered without pause, and without rancor. He leaned against the table, plucking at the cuff of the tunic, then beginning to unbutton and roll it up to his elbow.

A smile slowly worked across his face, and he met Hakkyuu’s eyes.

“You first,” he said finally, gesturing to the bottle. “You must have something you want to ask me, to suggest this.”

"Oh, I have plenty I want to ask and never enough time to do it in."

Reaching across for the bottle, Hakkyuu uncorked the top with a well-trained twist of his wrist before leaning in to take a small sniff followed by a brief slight blink. Then, he took the bottle to his lips to take a sip, but paused just before the neck touched. It wasn't a long pause, just enough to let him think about the first night he and Kell had met, how he'd swiped a bottle from a soldier, and how the evening had ended in unexpected liquor-laced kisses.

A small smile tugged his mouth before he finally took a sip and drew a breath in through his teeth.

"Do you have gods in your world? Religions? Belief systems you follow and shape yourselves around?"

Kell’s eyes tracked the bottle, or more accurately, Hakkyuu’s hand, his expression, as Kell rolled his sleeve into place and cuffed it neatly. It was so unconscious it was unlikely he realized he was doing it. The only other person he watched this way was Rhy.

He caught the pause, the thought that did something to Hakkyuu’s eyes, some caught memory. Given the situation it wasn’t difficult to follow the train of thought.

They had come so far since then.

Leaning against the table, Kell placed one elbow on it, in defiance of his upbringing. The thinking furrow appeared between his brows, the one that meant he was attempting to figure out the best way to communicate. It was a common expression on him.

“We don’t have a God, or gods,” he answered, lifting his hand to rub his thumb thoughtfully along his jaw. “In Grey London there is one- but I’ve yet to see any indication of His existence.” His tone was somewhat dismissive, even given all the two of them had seen. “I find it difficult to describe Arnes’… religion, because I do not view it as one. It is a system of beliefs and lessons, centered around magic and the natural world. Prayer is personal mantra, though sailors are far more superstitious than most. Scripture is a collection of stories, where myth blends to reality. People believe in blessings, in curses, but there are none but those structured of magic, and magic is neither good nor evil. It has no thought, no self. It is the blood of our world, the marrow of our bones. We give it shape, but we must never give it soul.”

The worlds had the distinctive ring of a mantra.

Kell paused again, thinking back to the things he’d told Hakkyuu, what must have surely made him curious.

“We do not have a church, not precisely, but we do have what we call priests. These are people who have dedicated their lives to the study and practice of magic, and often they are healers and masters of ceremony. The Sanctuary is a place of peace and balance, learning, growing, and healing. The High Priest, the Aven Essen, serves as an advisor and… close friend of the crown.”

Missing Tieren, Kell stopped, reaching out to wriggle his fingers at the bottle in Hakkyuu’s hand.

“And you? All those gods you use in your curses?”

In something of a mirror to Kell, Hakkyuu also lent his elbow upon the table, but mostly so he could rest his face against his palm and watch the magician as he spoke with a fondness in his eyes and a faint smile upon his lips.

He listened intently, giving slow, small nods as Kell outlined the details and reasons, the histories and the details only discovered by someone who grew up in the world that knew and shaped them to pass it down through voice and script.

A few times his brow furrowed, as if he wasn't expecting something Kell said or was taking a moment to get his mind around the content--things like Grey London having only one God and the talk of priests. It wasn't a necessarily judgemental frown, but it was showed places of pause as he listened.

At Kell's question and the offer of the bottle, Hakkyuu chuckled a little and reached forward.

"The Six human gods of Tyria, yeah. I'd feel bad about that being most of your introduction to them since I'm so often talking about them in terms of tits and ass and worse."

Taking the bottle to his lips, Hakkyuu took a comparatively small sip, pacing himself for what he expected would be a rabbit hole by the time they were done.

"But since the Six left Tyria around two hundred and fifty years ago at least I doubt they'll care if I mention them in terms of cracks when I'm kinda pissed off. Not unless they ended up over here, wouldn't that be a riot."

The wry expression on Hakkyuu's face said he was perhaps unsure of the brand of riot it might be.

"But as the name suggests there are six of them: Dwayna, goddess of healing, air and light; her son Grenth, god of the Underworld after Dhuum, ice and darkness; Melanderu, goddess of earth, growth and nature; Balthazar, god of fire, courage and war; Lyssa, twin goddesses of water, illusion and beauty; and Kormir, successor of the god of secrets Abaddon, though her domain is truth, spirit and order."

Settling back, he took another short sip then rested the bottle back on the table for Kell.

"Story goes the six came to Tyria lead by Dwayna, who in turn brought humans with her to find new lasting peace for whatever shithole we were in first, so we're not local to the world, so they say. They existed in the realm for around three thousand years, during which time Abaddon acted as a conduit between the Mists and Tyria, giving unique magics out to races and beings he felt were worthy.

"But the more magic that was given out, the more the moral races began to war with each other. When the human monarch of the time, King Doric, saw the state of the world and how his people were suffering in these wars, he begged the gods to take back the great magics. They listened. The gods siphoned the magic into the Bloodstone, a huge magical container, and then split it into five pieces that they scattered across the world to slow the outpouring of magic.

"When Abaddon found out what the other gods had done, he was pissed and he went to war with the other gods with his followers the margonites. The conflict corrupted Abaddon and his margonites, turning them cruel and vengeful, until the five other gods were able to imprison him in the Realm of Torment. Soon after this, the other five gods left the moral realm too, the Exodus of the Gods.

"But that was how Nightfall began: Abaddon's attempt to break free and seek vengeance by pushing his forces into the moral realm. He tried and was nearly successful, but collective efforts from the military group the Order of the Sunspears of the southern continent of Elona defeated him. When Abaddon was beaten, his power threatened to spill across Tyria and needed to be contained, so the Spearmarshal Kormir absorbed his power and in doing was transformed from human to goddess and from the patron of secrets to truth."

Puffing out his cheeks briefly, Hakkyuu then pushed a long, slow breath upward out the corner of his mouth and shrugged.

"But like I say, the Six fucked off and have been real quiet since then. Devote folks still think they're comin' back sometime."

With a roll of his eyes and a wave of his hand, Hakkyuu leant back slightly.

"Anyway, that was a long history lesson. How do you give magic a soul?"

It was both the first time Kell had heard Hakkyuu say so much at once, and pace himself while drinking. He'd always had a way of telling stories, of describing things, of speaking with movements, gestures and expressions that gave a life to what he said.

It made Kell want to see his world all the more, to hold onto what details he could. Instead he gave Hakkyuu his full attention, and for the second time since coming to Aallotar, completely forgot about the world outside the room.

It was a struggle to follow some of the details and he felt as though he had more questions. Obviously, there were things that Hakkyuu took for granted, as normal, but Kell would need to ask about them.

He frowned at the question, taking the bottle back and bringing it to his lips thoughtfully. He rubbed the glass against his bottom one, a habit, and sipped.

"You feed it some of yours. Let it into your thoughts, your heart." Kell shook off the beginnings of a shiver. "Life and magic are completely different things, but they are two sides of the same coin. Given a taste, magic lusts for and consumes life. Unchecked it could potentially end it."

He breathed out, slowly. "That was why the elemental spirits disturbed Rhy and I so. Such things, in our world, feed off of magic. They are parasites. They grant tremendous power, but feed on thoughts, on free will, on the self. When Symon asked me to take Chamassa-"

This time, Kell truly did shiver. "I thought him mad. I thought everyone utterly, completely mad. Perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps here, it does not work that way... but in all the worlds I have known, it does."

Kell took another sip, rubbing at his jaw.

"The black stone I told you of- it was a fragment of something like that. Magic with soul, and a hunger for it. Given the change, and enough time, it would have gladly hollowed me out."

He thought of Gen and Parrish, of the reports in the city. The stories of those possessed.

"It would have worn me like skin."

Pulling himself from the fear, Kell passed the bottle back. "How did you and Vrenille meet?" he asked.

"Symon has always been mad," Hakkyuu retorted almost automatically with a slight shake of his head. "And not just for cultural-clash reasons, he's actually insane. Magic isn't altruistic, it's a force no matter what form is comes in. And even if the Servitors aren't actively enemies of their masters and even can care for them, that doesn't mean that they're giving with no consequence."

With a brief upward roll of his eyes, Hakkyuu banished that side contribution to focus on Kell's question.

He was quiet for a few moments and in that time a steady warmth crept into his features, pouring into his sharp edges bs critical stares to make him appear a little younger, a little more wishful, a little more affectionate.

"We met on a wall in Ebonhawke."

There was a pause, like that was all e was going to offer on the matter before he huffed a chuckle and glanced down, his fingertip tapping against the bottle.

"We we're kids. About thirteen or fourteen, give or take--well. He was thirteen, we looked about the same age, seemed like a good enough age to be."

Turning his hand over, Hakkyuu reached up to take the bottle again.

"I was bored and climbed up this shattered wall just to find out what else I'd be able to see from the top of it. And then there he was too, climbing up. I mean, it was my wall, I got there first, but... y'know, he made it up so we could share it. I mean, he had a place to go, an uncle and whatever, but it was just a place, not a home. That was still more than I had."

After swaying the bottle back and forth between his fingers a few times, he took a small sip and pushed it back.

"You told me your powers, your eye, it all happened when you were young and before you came to the palace. Where and what were you doing before that?"

Kell listened, picking out specific words, phrases, things that made sense only in context, and then only partially. Something more clicked into place, and Kell stilled.

He was relieved when Hakkyuu began to speak of Vrenille, but it never left the back of his mind, even as his talked of memory, and a brief, simple interlude as a boy. A few more details of who he was. Of things Hakkyuu had taken and made his own, because he, like Kell, had blank spaces.

That somber feeling followed into Hakkyuu's question, and a stillness settled over Kell's expression before he reached for the bottle. He made himself sip rather than take the long drink he wish he could have, to bolster himself for the telling.

"I don't know," Kell admitted. "I don't remember, and I was encouraged not to ask questions."

Like Hakkyuu, he paused, running his fingers down the side of the bottle, as if that were all he was going to say.

"I'm not sure I ever want to remember. My blood family must have wanted to give me up, or..." Kell trailed off. "Something happened to them."

He took another drink.

"I do not look like the people of Arnes. They're smaller, more muscular, darker-skinned than I am. None of them have red hair. I have the height of Vesk, but not the bulk. The build of Faro, but not the coloring. I am not entirely sure that the world Arnes inhabits is the world I was born in.

"I wondered, of course. Anyone would. But even if I did find the truth, how could I leave? How could I leave Rhy?

"The only thing I have ever remembered was a ship, an ocean, and an old woman. But even then, I cannot say with certainty that it was not simply a dream."

Kell made as if to take another sip, then went silent, pushing the bottle back to Hakkyuu. His fingers flattened onto the table, and he looked at them, rather than at Hakkyuu's face, turning over his thoughts.

"What are you most afraid of?"

As Kell spoke this time, Hakkyuu didn't rush to take the bottle back. He watched the other man closely, his attention fully taken by Kell and the way he spoke about the blank spot in his early history. His brow creased at times as words he'd never heard Kell speak left his lips--Faro, Vesk--and the confession that he wasn't sure he was originally from Arnes at all.

In spite of the somberness with which Kell spoke, on Hakkyuu's face a small smile started to emerge, his fingers lacing together beneath his chin as he looked at Kell like he was holding a little private joke behind his amused lips.

Then Kell's question came and Hakkyuu automatically opened his mouth in impulsive surprise, then snapped it shut with a scowl.

"I'm not afraid of shit," he replied with an unimpressed roll of his eyes, so clear and confident that it was like he really believed it as he reached across to take up the bottle with a snort. The drag he took was longer and deeper, but only compared to what he had been doing during this particular session, not compared to how he usually drank.

With a low hiss through his teeth, he looked away and pushed his chin against his palm, like he was actually done with his answer as he left a long, heavy silence. At least for a while.

"... That's what I want to say. And I'm not afraid of many things, really. But lately, I... I'm afraid of what's going on in my own body, of what's growing inside, what I can't see."

Keeping his stare away, Hakkyuu's jaw tightened.

"I'm afraid I'll never get home, never see the guild again, never see Vrenille-" He could hear the small shake in his voice and took in a deep, frustrated breath to steady and firm it. "Afraid you're gonna be a fucking moron who just gives every last shred of yourself until there's nothing left to get outta this place."

Shaking his head, Hakkyuu felt that was enough on that point.

"Are you pissed at the people who gave you to the crown? Your parents? Do you resent them?"

Edited 2018-01-28 18:10 (UTC)

As Hakkyuu started to smile, Kell fought back a small scowl, giving serious thought to whether he should use to his next question to ask after what was so fucking amusing.

Instead, he settled to listen, knowing immediately that Hakkyuu's offhanded protest was both inaccurate and not the end of his response. It said something of how far they'd come that Kell had asked at all, and had expected Hakkyuu to confide the truth in him.

Kell met him with no words of comfort, no sympathetic look, no reach across the table to solicitously squeeze his hand. Instead he nodded slowly, giving Hakkyuu's fears the recognition they deserved, not discounting nor denying. When he reached for the bottle their fingers touched, and if Kell kept the contact for longer than a breath, then he wasn't going to admit it outright.

The question came as a surprise, and Kell swallowed the immediate urge to deny it, despite the ache in his heart, surprising in its intensity. He pulled the bottle from Hakkyuu's fingers, lifted it to his lips, and seemed to forget to drink.

He looked into the tabletop, the gleaming surface of polished wood, marred with their fingerprints disturbing the high gloss. He drew his nail across it, where it made no sound.

"It would make more sense if I did."

It hung heavy in the air between them, and Kell did not remember to drink.

"I resent the King and Queen, for telling me I was their son, for insisting on it, for raising me as a brother to theirs, and then making it so very fucking clear-" Kell's voice rasped at the edge, but did not quite break. "-that they never truly meant it. But I know what I did to disappoint them."

Kell set his jaw, his lips a grim line.

Sad-eyed little boy.

"I do not know why my parents gave me up."

Kell lifted the bottle to his lips, took and open-throated swallow, and passed it back.

"If you were given the chance to know your parents, your family... would you want to?"

As Kell spoke, Hakkyuu's brow arched slowly and with interest, though he made no move to interrupt or break Kell's trail of thought while he spoke and remained still and unreadable throughout. He didn't even offer an immediate commentary after Kell paused.

He knew there was a lot going on for Kell in relation to his position to the crown, a lot of deeply-woven complications all caught up between love, duty and upbringing, things that Kell would have to work through in time and with his own minds eye no matter what insight Hakkyuu might have as an outsider watching a man he had come to consider family himself.

At Kell's question, there was no pause at all before the answer: "For what? They have no more to do with my life than any stranger does."

His lips curved into a sharp, grim smirk.

"I couldn't walked past the woman who gave birth to me or fucked the guy who knocked her up and I wouldn't know any different or care either way: it makes zero difference."

He waved a hand and then reached for the bottle again.

"You talked more about how much you resent the monarchy who raised you than the people who gave you up, so it sounds like we're not too different there. But it also sounds like you've got more you want to say about the king and queen. Do you resent them because you love them as parents and they don't love you like Rhy, or because you want to love them like parents and one way or another you're denied that?"

Kell listened to the flippant way Hakkyuu spoke of those who shared his blood, and realized with a start that he truly meant it -- he wasn't just posturing, or pushing away the ideas of bonds.

Though at the mention of his father -- and what they might have done -- Kell did flush, freckled cheeks going ruddy as he wondered at the possibility. It would depend on how big Ebonhawke was, but...

It bothered Kell less than he thought it should, and he was secure in that he didn't have to worry about doing the same thing. He rubbed his cheek, at the flush and vague itch of the alcohol starting to get to him, leaving him pleasantly buzzed.

"... I don't know," he admitted, frowning. "I have always cared for them, as they have for me, but I have never loved them as I do Rhy. I have always thought of Rhy as my brother-" a spark, a twinge of guilt, which he forcefully shoved away, "but I had to be reminded to call them mother and father."

Another rub, harder.

"Even as a child, I do not suppose I was easy to love. I was not very affectionate."

But that sounded dangerously close to self-pity, and Kell instinctively backed away from it, even the touch drunk that he was. Instead he frowned to himself, found himself caught on a question he'd wondered after.

"How do you view love, Hakkyuu? What is it, to you?"

There were plenty of time Hakkyuu did and said things just for effect, to see what reactions he'd get for saying or doing something outlandish or scandalous. On this occasion, he really did feel as nonplussed about the prospect of hypothetically fucking his father as he sounded. Kell's flush, therefore, was nice added bonus to him and brought the smirk on his face closer to a display of amusement; it was a nice reaction to see on Kell.

When he spoke of Rhy, Hakkyuu nodded along slowly, understanding in concept even if he couldn't relate fully in practice to the things Kell was expressing. It had become evident to Hakkyuu just how much Rhy meant to Kell and there was very little about his current disclosure that felt especially new or out of keeping with what Kell had shown previously.

The choice then to ask Hakkyuu about love shouldn't have felt so shocking then, but it arrived like a bit of a jolt that was almost insulting on some level. He scowled, one eye in particular tensing with something coming close to a glare.

"You already know that answer, Kell. It's not knowing where the limits to what you'd do for someone really lie."

He gave a short scoff then as he took the bottle to his lips for a deep drink then offered it back to Kell, feeling the nips and crackles of the alcohol starting to move in his veins.

"Did you always think of Rhy as your brother or did it take time to grow?"

Kell raised an eyebrow at the glare, but didn't squirm or back down from Hakkyuu's scowl. Kell considered it a reasonable question. Everyone, when asked, would have a different answer.

"I feel the same."

... but there were more shades of it, weren't there? Brotherly love, and...

Kell frowned to himself again, thinking, taking a shallow drink and swallowing. Everything was pleasantly warm, but he didn't feel off-balance in any way.

"I was unsure of him at first," Kell answered. "But I don't believe it lasted very long. He so instantly accepted me, included me, wanted me around. He was a bit of a brat about it." A twitch, at the edge of Kell's mouth, almost a smile despite himself. "Rhy felt that I was his brother, and I can never remember arguing it."

The smile disappeared, then.

"... once. We fought, once, years past." Kell took another slow drink. "I told him that I did not truly feel like a Maresh. He did not take it well."

A muscle worked in Kell's jaw.

"We have not spoken of it since. Not directly."

He went quiet, working over questions in his mind, and pushed the bottle back to Hakkyuu. "Have you ever said or done something you have regretted?"

Somehow, Hakkyuu hadn't pictured Rhy as the insistent one in the area of extending the position of brother to Kell. It was probably because Hakkyuu had mostly heard Kell's side of things, his affection and protectiveness toward Rhy. Comparatively, while Rhy had seemed equally protective and caring of Kell, in Hakkyuu's eyes there was a brand of idolising of Kell as a concept rather than an independent person that Hakkyuu found hard to shake and wondered if Rhy would grow out of. Hearing that they'd fought in the past over the designation of 'Maresh' and that they hadn't spoken since neither surprised Hakkyuu to hear nor shifted his opinion on Rhy terribly much.

At Kell's question he looked quite thoughtful, like he was trying to decide between being flippant and honest, and if he was honest then what would he say.

After a moment, he sucked in a deep breath over his teeth, lent his hands back to press his palms down against the floor and brace himself as he glanced up.

"Regret doing something and not saying something."

There was a slight pause, then a slight sagging of his shoulders.

"When I left Ebonhawke it was all kind of a flurry--I'd gone outside of the walls looking one way and came back looking another. It scared Vrenille. He told me I should leave. I didn't ask him to come with me. I should have. We didn't see each other for close to ten years and it was really rough when we met again. Shit, I mean, we were lucky to have ever met again."

With a slight shake of his head, Hakkyuu glanced at Kell over his cheekbones.

"How was your first fuck?"

There was so much Hakkyuu did not know about Rhy, had never been in a position to learn, and it was something that Kell tried not to let bother him... it did, anyway. He felt that if he had not been a factor... but this was not the time to dwell on it.

Kell watched the flex of Hakkyuu's throat, tried to imagine Vrenille's eyes, what he must have felt. Abandoned, likely. Without the whole story. Looking into the face of what seemed a different person.

If Hakkyuu had disappeared on him, come back so different, how would he feel? It bothered him that he could not say, but he liked to think he was ask.

With a wry smile, Kell lifted one shoulder. "Uneventful. I did not tell her it was my first, I don't believe she noticed. We were both rather drunk, I was... seventeen or so, and she was very insistent. I would not recognize her if I passed her on the street, which I realize may be disappointing.

"How was yours?"

To Kell's return of the question, Hakkyuu gave a nonchalant kind of shrug himself.

"Not important enough for me to remember the specifics. I had a few different encounters and nothing really concrete enough for me to have one specific encounter feel like the one and only 'first time' for me."

He rolled his eyes upward lightly.

"Didn't really think sex was much to write home about when I was a kid though."

Leaning his head slightly, he gave Kell a sly little grin.

"Would you have let me fuck you the first night we met?"

Kid, Kell mouthed, shaking his head lightly as he leaned forward to swipe the bottle back again, lifted it to his lips -- and coughed, slightly, just as Hakkyuu asked his question.

The flush of the alcohol was already in his cheeks, but it was more from Hakkyuu's smug grin, the flashes of memory as he let his breath out between his teeth in a bit of a hiss.

"Yes," he answered, decisively. No hesitation whatsoever. "And I would have not have regretted it in the morning, except to wish I'd been less drunk."

He smiled then, eyes sharp, and passed the bottle back to him.

"What kinds of people are you attracted to? Men, women? Personality? Something else?"

Kell's attention to the vague age-range Hakkyuu had indicated he'd had his first few sexual encounters didn't register especially highly and instead of giving any specific reply or challenge to Kell's underbreath utterances, he simply smiled. A smile that grew as Kell confirmed what he already knew on some level: that they could have had a very different first night meeting with only a few mild pushes here or there.

Hakkyuu let his fingers lay over Kell's as he returned the bottle, holding his eyeline firmly for a second with a fox-like grin with a flash of teeth before he sat back a little with the bottle to consider the question.

"I dunno. Cute, weird red-heads who look real good when they're thoroughly wrecked?"

The grin spread and showed at the edges of the bottle's throat as he took a mouthful, though he knew that wouldn't really satisfy.

"I like new experiences, so I don't have a single physical type or personality I'm into, it's just... about potential and interest. I'm pretty much exclusively into guys and on the rare occasion I'm into a woman then I'm probably not the kinda person they'd be into," he shrugged with a small grin. "Which is fine, that's the kinda person I have a good drink with either way."

He swayed the bottle back and forth in his fingers a few times thoughtfully.

"I guess I'm into different ways people can be masculine, and that doesn't mean manly or anything--like, Vrenille's not really what I'd consider manly or anything, maybe even kinda really low on the manly scale of things. At least, that's how he's spoken about it sometimes. That he's not... like a man because of what he does but--"

He shook his head.

"I'm rambling. Point is, I'm mostly into guys, stuff that's kinda risky or unexpected or different. It's one of the reasons I like sylvari--never quite sure what's gonna be under the leaves, as it were."

Placing the bottle on the table, he gently pushed it forward with a fingertip.

"What about you? Apart from over-confident jackasses who shove cock down your throat, what's your usual go-to?"

It was half frustration, half frustration, watching Hakkyuu speak and tracking his smirk. Everything from tone to expression to words did say overconfident jackass, and had it been anyone else Kell would have never looked twice at them.

With Hakkyuu, he knew it was all in play, all to tease and rile, and because he knew Kell.

Settling his chin in his hand to listen, Kell felt a warm flush at the tease, gave Hakkyuu a thoroughly flat look that couldn't give lie to the tightness at the corners of his mouth that tried to be a smile.

"I do not have a usual," Kell admitted, thinking over the -- admittedly short -- roster of those he'd been attracted to through the years. "Physically, they have little in common. Male or female does not matter, though I like... assertiveness, and honesty. I have never been attracted to someone meek or hesitant, or given to playing games.

"From the start, you were very..." Kell trailed off, picked up the bottle, took a slow sip. "All of those things."

He let that hang in the air, kept the bottle to his lips, then set it down suddenly. The directness of the question made it clear it was not one that he had only just thought of.

"Have you ever been attracted to someone you did not consider it acceptable to be attracted to? What did you do about it?"

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[ The "Getting to Know You Game" ]

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