The Light Touch
by Talya Firedancer
STANDARD DISCLAIMERS APPLY
Youko Kurama was…well, it wasn’t precisely a dream. He floated in a place of sensation that had definite dreamlike qualities, yet he was absolutely certain it wasn’t a dream. If it was, he wasn’t sure he wanted to wake up.
The fingertip continued to trace lightly over the skin of his chest, pushing aside the fold of his pajama top to slip underneath. A little moan left Kurama’s throat, as he felt lips descend on his own.
Soft but firm, and surprisingly sweet, they grazed over his slightly-parted lips, then settled firmly over his mouth. The light finger encountered one nipple on his chest and began to stroke over it, teasing it up, circling gently.
Kurama’s breath fluttered in his throat, trapped, and he reached up with his mouth to return the kiss.
A soft rush of air poured into his parted lips.
He blinked.
The hand was gone. The lips, too. With a stifled groan he sat up, running a hand through his sleep-disheveled red locks, and looked quickly around the bedroom. Empty. No Hiei.
"Nani?" he mumbled, uncertain if it had been a dream, or if the elusive little youkai really had been there.
He curled back up in bed, eyeing the alarm clock with annoyance. It was at least a good half-hour before he had to officially wake up, but Hiei – or the dream of Hiei, maybe – had done it for him. That’s not all Hiei had done, either. Now he had the raging hard-on of an eighteen-year old boy, and nothing to do with it.
"Damn you, Hiei," Kurama whispered half-heartedly, one hand slipping underneath the sheets. He closed his eyes and remembered those light, almost hesitantly caressing fingers.
He was here. I’m sure of it, Kurama decided as he recalled the all-too-tactile sensation of those sweet lips, and the breath of air right before his departure. He frowned, hand stilling for a moment. Dammit, why did he leave!? Again!
This had been going on for almost two weeks now, ever since the disastrous incident with Botan’s healing salve had led to Hiei reluctantly admitting he did have feelings for Kurama. He had been ecstatic – but Hiei had mostly been avoiding him ever since the revelation.
Avoiding him, except for these uncomfortable morning awakenings.
It was bad enough being a teenage human boy with the hormones and the sex drive to prove it. It was even worse to be a six hundred-plus year old youko in the body of that human, who knew exactly what he wanted, and who he wanted, and...not being able to have him!! Although presumably Hiei wanted him too…
The frustrated youko just bit his lip and repeated what he’d done for the past two weeks.
It was a good thing he’d had the opportunity to wash his sheets every afternoon before 'Kaasan got home; otherwise she might face him with some decidedly embarrassing questions.
"Hi-…Hiei…!" he panted, entire body growing taut for a few glowing seconds, then he relaxed bonelessly into the sheets. He could still feel Hiei’s lips brushing over his, felt the touch that burned like his dark fires as the fingers slipped into his pajama top…
After a few more moments of replaying the butterfly-light caresses in his mind he got up, stripped the bed quickly, and cleaned himself up. It was actually a good thing Hiei had woken him before the alarm, too; it gave him the time he needed to…conceal the evidence. He bit his lip to stifle a grin at that thought.
"Hiei," he sighed, regarding the half-open window forlornly. The curtains fluttered in a light breeze. He was certain that it hadn’t been a dream. But it still felt like one…
He wished again, desperately, that Hiei would just stay for that one instant longer to enable Kurama to grab him. And have his delightfully wicked way with him.
"Maybe tomorrow, Hiei," he said wishfully.
* * *
Kurama walked up the sidewalk past the park, part of his favorite route home, hands shoved deep in his pockets. A little smile played over his lips as he remembered that afternoon two weeks back when Hiei had fallen out of a tree, right into his arms…and then chibi-Hiei the next day wreaking havoc…and licking ice cream off his cheek…
He sighed again.
Would Hiei ever stay long enough for things to get physical? He’d probably end up going blind within the year if things kept up at this rate!
He heard a slight rustle in one of the nearby trees. And…there! A flicker of hauntingly familiar, dark youki.
"Hiei!" Kurama cried out, springing forward as a body began to topple from the tree. My, this isn’t familiar at all…he thought wryly.
He caught Hiei before he hit the pavement and eased him to the ground. It was much worse this time. "Oh gods…oh, Inari-sama…Hiei!" The youkai was a mass of blood and bruises. One of his eyes was swollen shut. The Jagan glared at him malevolently, as Hiei’s breath bubbled from his lips along with a thin line of crimson.
"Hiei!"
What the hell happened to you!?
Kurama wasn’t sure if he should risk the distance to Genkai’s temple, but he knew Hiei could be in danger of dying. He needed more than simple herbs or bandages. He stood, first wrapping Hiei’s body up in his dark cloak, carefully cradling Hiei’s body in his arms, and stepped towards the curb.
"Taxi! TAXI!!"
* * *
"He should be okay, Kurama-san," Yukina assured him as Kurama hovered by the bedside of the still-unconscious youkai. "You got him here in time! I managed to heal most of the really bad damage – internal bleeding, some broken ribs, a few terrible claw marks..."
She trailed off when she saw the stricken look Kurama gave her, and put a hand to her lips. "Gomen, Kurama! How insensitive of me! I just meant to reassure...I mean, he’ll recover from everything. But he should rest for several days first!"
"Knowing Hiei..." Kurama sighed, frustrated.
Yukina gave him a lopsided smile and gathered up some blood-stained cloths, leaving the room.
Kurama frowned down at the still form of the fire demon, breathing easily now, his face no longer that ghastly chalk color. Damn him...why hadn’t he told him something was wrong, two weeks ago after the first incident! He could have been killed!
The half-youko was so wrapped up in self-pitying thoughts of Hiei dead, and him having to avenge the little youkai who’d wrapped himself so thoroughly in Kurama’s thoughts, and of course never getting laid, that he almost didn’t notice the slitted ruby eyes staring up at him.
"Hn."
"Hiei! You’re awake!" Kurama said joyfully, grabbing his hand.
"Hn!" the startled Koorime replied.
Kurama frowned down at him. "What happened to you?" he demanded.
Hiei closed his barely-cracked eyes and pretended to be asleep.
"Oh, no you don’t!" Kurama exclaimed in determination, tugging on Hiei’s hand. "Don’t make me resort to dirty tactics."
A slight snore issued from Hiei’s slightly parted lips.
A wicked grin crossed Kurama’s face. You asked for it, youkai...
He bent and flicked his tongue over Hiei’s top and bottom lips, throwing one gentle arm across Hiei’s body as he settled beside him on the mat, two weeks’ worth of frustration boiling up all at once, and slipped his tongue inside the youkai’s mouth.
Hiei made a startled little noise against his tongue as Kurama started to caress him, then sat bolt upright as he was...grabbed. Quite firmly, but not painfully. Oh, not painfully at all.
"Ch’, stupid fox! Yukina or Genkai could walk in any minute..." Hiei glared malevolently at him, disentangling himself from the amorous fox.
Kurama gave him an artful little shrug and an innocent, but teasing, smile.
Hiei sat on the mat and scowled balefully at his hands.
"Who did it, Hiei?" Kurama persisted. "And why didn’t you tell me when it happened before?"
Hiei’s mouth twitched, but he said nothing.
Kurama sighed and reached for him again.
"All right!" Hiei snarled, batting at his hands. "It was Tartarus." The name was mumbled reluctantly, so low Kurama had to bend forward to catch it.
"Eh?" His eyes widened in shock. He stared at Hiei, who stared defiantly back. Tartarus. What the—Hiei had…with that!? "YOU IDIOT!!"
Tartarus, S-class youkai, professional killer, past his second millennium, general scourge of the Makai...Kurama had heard a lot about him in his six hundred years and more as a youko, and all of it had been BAD. The creature – he couldn’t really be called a man, or anything faintly resembling one – had no conscience, no morals, and he was generally one of the worst bad guys Kurama had never had the misfortune to encounter.
Hiei bristled. "So what?"
"So...so..." Kurama was speechless with fury. "Hiei, you damned well should’ve told me if you were so intent on dying...!"
"It was my business," Hiei snapped curtly, and turned away. He mumbled something under his breath.
"What?" Kurama blinked, leaning towards him, careful not to touch him this time.
"I said... it wasn’t exactly my choice."
"What happened?" he asked the recalcitrant youkai yet again, trying to convey the impression of patient determination.
Hiei glared.
"I stole something," he admitted, his lips starting to turn down in the familiar scowl.
Kurama stared. "From Tartarus!?"
Hiei nodded tightly. "Didn’t know it was his, though."
"Is that what happened when I found you two weeks ago?"
He nodded again, the scowl deepening.
"So why did you...?"
"Because he beat me!" Hiei burst out, angry. "He demanded that if he beat me, the condition would be a fifty-year term of service. Like hell!"
"Oh...Hiei..." Kurama managed, appalled. "So you went back to challenge him again, and..."
Hiei glared at him mutely.
"I think we should probably involve the Urameshi team," he said thoughtfully. "Koenma should be able to bypass this challenge of Tartarus’ if he invokes his, uh, prior claim because of your sentence."
"NO!" Hiei exploded. "What, the fathead and the fool? This is my business!"
Kurama frowned, distressed. Tartarus had beaten him twice. That meant he was irrevocably bound to the creature’s service, unless...
"Hiei. If you won’t let all of us help, at least let me."
Hiei eyed him with a pissed-off little frown. "Hell no."
Kurama sighed, exasperated. "Look, I’ve been your friend for how long now? Since this body was ten? And now you mean more to me than anything else in the world! You can’t not let me help. Besides, I have an idea."
"No."
"Aren’t you even going to let me tell you the idea, first?"
"No."
"Hiei—"
"No."
Kurama was getting angry. "Hiei, you don’t have to protect me, I can definitely take care of myself. And if you think I’m just going to let you go serve Tartarus for fifty years—"
"Dammit, Kurama, I said no!" Hiei exploded. "And I’m not just going to tamely crawl to his feet and serve him, either! I’ll keep fighting him until I—"
"Don’t say it," Kurama interrupted him fiercely, shoving a finger against his lips. Hiei stopped, startled. "Don’t even hint to me that you’d consider a fight to the death." Kurama blinked back pinpricks of hot tears.
"Until I win," Hiei finished against Kurama’s finger, and bit the offending digit gently. "Stupid fox."
Kurama sniffed, a tear escaping the corner of his eye, and Hiei stared at it, fascinated. His brow creased as he leaned forward, watching it trail down Kurama’s cheek.
"Why are you crying?"
"Because I don’t want to lose you," Kurama wiped the tear away irritably, but another one tracked its way down his cheek. "And you’re being so stupid, and so damned stubborn, and you’ve been waking me up for the past two weeks but never staying long enough to do anything more than get me really, really frustrated, and you’re driving me insane, you damned youkai! If you don’t want to be with me just say so! You don't have to try to get yourself killed!"
Hiei rocked back a little from the force of his words, crimson eyes wide with surprise. "Oh."
"Yeah, oh."
The sparkling droplet made its way down his cheek. Resolutely he ignored it.
Tentatively Hiei leaned forward, and licked the tear from his cheek. Kurama almost jerked away, he was that startled. His nerves were more tightly-strung than he’d realized.
"This is really just about me not staying in the morning, isn’t it?" Hiei’s breath tickled against his cheek.
Kurama closed his eyes and leaned into Hiei, putting an arm around him. "Well...I guess it might be," he admitted uncomfortably. "Every morning, you do the same damned thing...you show up without really waking me up and then you start touching me, and kissing me...and you disappear, like you don’t expect me to react!" Another frustrated tear spilled from the corner of his eye.
Hiei was silent. His mouth whispered up Kurama’s cheek, moving over the moisture, and the half-youko shuddered, drawing Hiei closer.
"I..." Hiei hesitated, then drew back a little and kissed him, a light closed-mouth caress. "I suppose I didn’t think, kitsune. I wanted to..."
"Then why didn’t you?" Kurama demanded. "Don’t you...don’t you want me?" Gods, Kurama, you sound pathetic! he scolded himself. But he couldn’t help but feel at least a little forlorn.
Hiei frowned at him. "Of course I do, baka."
"Then why...?"
"Because it would’ve depleted my ki."
"Oohhh..." Kurama exhaled, suddenly assailed with that bright light of understanding. He had been avoiding him because he meant to fight Tartarus again! And had to store up his ki for the battle…! Kurama was suddenly, abruptly, embarrassingly relieved.
Hiei was looking at him with a vaguely amused expression. "You actually thought...?"
Kurama grinned weakly.
Hiei did something very unexpected then. He laughed.
While Kurama was still surprised by that, the fire demon reached up and grabbed the two long sidelocks of red hair that framed his face, taking advantage of their convenience to tug his face forward. "Kitsune no baka," he informed him in no uncertain terms, then kissed him firmly.
Kurama relaxed against him, two weeks of tension suddenly evaporating, but then two weeks of...something else...flared up, coiling in his belly, diffusing throughout his limbs.
He kissed Hiei back, harder, prodding his lips apart then slipping his tongue inside. Hiei exhaled into his mouth, a surprised little huff, then returned the gesture, his tongue moving hesitantly against Kurama’s. An involuntary, needy little noise escaped Kurama’s lips and he pulled Hiei closer.
Hiei shuddered blindly, beginning to respond as Kurama’s hands wandered over his body, then abruptly pulled away, shaking off his clinging hands.
"...Hiei...?" Kurama gasped, blinking and startled and suddenly feeling rejected again. Don’t do this! he wanted to plead, but his pride wouldn’t let him.
"Gomen...we can’t yet, Kurama." Hiei turned away, his mouth firmed into a hard line.
"...Oh..." Kurama returned to himself, and flushed. "At least let me help, Hiei. I have an idea."
Hiei looked as if he would say ‘no’ again, then hesitated. He looked at Kurama searchingly. His mouth twitched. "Have it your way," he grudged.
Kurama smiled with relief.
"Well, if I did have my way it would take a while, and you likely wouldn’t be able to move afterwards..." he couldn’t resist teasing.
"Hn. Stupid fox," Hiei retorted, but there was a gleam in his eye.
* * *
Hiei stared into the depths of his cup and wondered how in the seven circles of hell Kurama had managed to sucker him into allowing him to accompany him. Then he remembered. The damned fox had cried. For some reason, the tears had just done him in.
The toad-ish looking youkai who was their waiter returned with the plates of food, the haunch of birdlike meat still faintly steaming.
"Sir, will there be anything else for you and your wife?"
Hiei sat bolt upright. Wife!?
Kurama beamed over at him.
Hiei opened and closed his mouth.
"No, I think we’re okay," Kurama replied gleefully, still looking at Hiei with that idiotic grin on his face.
Hiei felt like fleeing. He even propped a leg up under him in preparation.
If I get a good running start...
"Don’t even think about it," Kurama said cheerfully, reading his expression. "I’ve got a nice fire demon-loving plant all ready to grab you."
Hiei glared malevolently.
The youkai serving creature looked confused, and moved off.
"So tell me this brilliant plan of yours," Hiei grumbled, sawing off a leg of the bird with his knife.
Kurama looked sheepish. "You’re not going to like it," he warned.
"Just spit it out."
"I’ll challenge Tartarus."
"NANI!?" Hiei shouted, overturning his chair.
Kurama shushed him frantically, as the patrons of the Makai tavern all looked up curiously, eyeing them. Hiei stood rigid, trembling with rage. "Hiei, please don’t make a scene."
Hiei snorted, his nostrils flaring. His jaw muscles worked, but nothing came out. Finally he turned on his heel, uprighted his chair with careful precision, seated himself stiffly, and only then did he allow himself to look back at Kurama.
"You. Are. Joking," he chewed out each word and spat them at Kurama.
"No, I’m not," Kurama replied calmly, picking up his drink.
"That is your plan!?" he demanded, keeping his temper under strict control.
Kurama gave him a slight smile. "Hai."
"I won’t allow it!" he burst out explosively.
Kurama’s smile turned dangerous. "You’re not in a position to allow or disallow anything," he replied coolly.
Hiei blinked. And gritted his teeth.
Finally, after wrestling with his temper for a long moment and swigging down the entire shot of burning, searing green Makai liquor, he returned his contemplation to Kurama’s watchful features.
"You’d better have more of a plan than that, or I won’t be able to scrape up enough of your remains to take home to your ningen mother," Hiei said bluntly.
Kurama’s smile definitely had a devilish edge, now.
"Don’t worry."
* * *
Don’t worry!
The half-youko’s confident words echoed in his mind as he bounced off the turf for the n-th time. Don’t worry? What was I thinking!?
Tartarus roared in triumph as Kurama hit the ground and rolled, wincing as rocks dug into his already-sore spots, and created new ones. The mountain-like creature moved forward surprisingly fast, clawed hands reaching out to grab Kurama and the youko moved even faster, dodging the brutal swipes, flipping over him, and pulling out some rose seeds from his hair.
He had found Tartarus easily enough; the immense youkai had staked a claim to a rather large piece of the Makai. Rather than go to all the inconvenience of building and maintaining a palace or fortress, the creature elected to prowl his grounds like the territorial demon he was. Kurama wondered why Tartarus wanted Hiei for a servant, anyway. He didn’t seem to need any retainers or servants.
Kurama had issued his challenge simply enough.
Then Tartarus had proceeded to kick the crap out of him.
He spat blood onto the ground and faced off with the giant creature once more. Tartarus gave him a wide, toothy grin, each tooth about the size of a large dinner plate, then lumbered forward, mockingly slow. Kurama snarled and cast out his handful of seeds.
"Fuuka Enjubin!" he shouted hoarsely, and a razor-edged whirlwind of sharp rose petals sprang up around the creature. At the same time he threw down one of his most vicious plants, growing it behind Tartarus.
Tartarus let out a guffaw of bellowing laughter, brushing aside the slicing edges of the rose whirlwind like motes of dust, and reached for Kurama.
The fox jumped back, narrowing his eyes.
The demon plant exploded upwards, swelling into immensity, its monstrous tendrils wrapping around Tartarus and squeezing with bone-crushing force. Tartarus roared in pain and whirled around, grasping at the thorned tentacles that twined him in a deadly embrace.
Kurama grinned and fanned his hands, encouraging the plant to squeeze harder.
His plan had been fairly simple. Hiei had been beaten twice, so was officially bound to Tartarus’ service...unless someone beat Tartarus. So he decided to challenge Tartarus for Hiei.
So far so good, only so far Tartarus had been winning.
Well, that was okay...
After all, he’d only planned on doing enough damage for Hiei to be able to challenge him after Kurama went down, and hopefully finish him off with the Kokuryuuha...
And that was his plan.
But gods, Hiei would be pissed.
Tartarus roared furiously again, shaking the nearby trees with the force of his affronted cry. He seized the demon plant by its roots, rocklike muscles bulging, and ripped it out by the roots.
Kurama gasped, and turned to leap away again.
He was jerked back as a hand seized his hair, and he cried out involuntarily as he fell, one aching mass of pain, his scalp now throbbing in time with the rest of his sluggish body.
"Now I’ve got you," Tartarus rumbled in his gravelly voice. "Foolish ningen. How dare you even think to challenge me?"
His voice was...changing. It rolled into smooth, deep tones.
Kurama twisted uneasily in Tartarus’ grip, and caught a glimpse of the youkai who had caught him. He gasped again, as he saw the naked gleaming bulk of the shapechanged creature, a gorgeously-sculpted tower of flesh that rivaled his youko self for masculine perfection. He felt a momentary irrational stab of jealousy.
Then fury surged up inside him as he realized, seeing Tartarus’ other form, precisely why the creature wanted Hiei for his "servant."
"Now you, too, are mine," Tartarus declared triumphantly, raking long fingers across Kurama’s cheek.
He winced away from the contact as the sharp nails left light red furrows on his fair skin.
"KURAMA!" He could’ve heard Hiei’s startled shout halfway across the Makai. Oh good...Hiei had finally gotten here...
He had left Hiei still curled up asleep in bed that morning – after just sleeping, nothing else, in each others’ arms – and had gone to seek out his opponent by himself. He’d known Hiei would inevitably follow, but hopefully he would either have defeated Tartarus, unlikely as he knew that to be, or he had weakened the youkai enough for Hiei to finish him off. Of course, Hiei might kill him for not telling him...
Tartarus jerked his head back painfully. "You wanted him?"
Kurama didn’t make a sound, tears of pain escaping his eyes.
"You’ll never have him now," the youkai hissed, bending over to bite at Kurama’s neck, tongue rasping over the exposed column of his throat, sinking his teeth in and drawing blood.
He heard Hiei’s shout thundering in his ears, thrumming in his veins, before the world exploded and everything went mercifully dark.
* * *
"KURAMA!" Hiei shouted, anger reaching up to consume him completely as he saw Tartarus, in man-shaped form, bending over his fox.
The S-class youkai looked up, surprised, then a wide grin encompassed his features as he saw Hiei. He jerked Kurama’s hair, pulling his head back to expose the slim white line of his neck, saying something to the kitsune that he couldn’t quite hear. Then Tartarus leaned down, and bit Kurama.
Marked him. Claimed him.
His fox.
A throttled exclamation of rage left his lips, and Hiei’s power exploded forth. The bandages on his right arm began to smoke and seethe, and he launched himself at the upstart creature who dared to touch his fox, knocking Tartarus away from Kurama but not before the youkai managed to clip the kitsune a hard blow to the head, sending him sprawling away, unconscious. He attacked Tartarus, katana flashing in the sunlight, moving in a series of swift strikes until something connected hard with his wrist and his katana flew from his hand. Hiei cursed as Tartarus pressed his advantage, kicking and punching at him in a volley of lightning blows that Hiei sidestepped or avoided.
"He’s mine, now," Tartarus taunted, facing him with a vicious curving smile. He tossed back gleaming dark green hair and licked his lips suggestively. "As are you."
Hiei snarled and threw himself at Tartarus.
Tartarus laughed, not even bothering to dodge the fiery blows Hiei struck at him with, then scored a punch squarely on his jaw.
Hiei tumbled back, his mind blank with shock.
He shook his head, frowning, and glanced over at Kurama. The youko was still out from Tartarus’ blow, and he growled, scrambling to his feet and attacking with a blade of dark fire, slicing at the sleekly-muscled man form of the maddening creature.
Tartarus didn’t even flinch as the fiery blade glanced off his shoulder, even though it drew a thin line of blood. His disturbing grin merely widened.
He threw himself forward again and again, striking out with the Jaou Ensatsu Ken, and then Tartarus caught the dark flaring blade in his hands, grinning at him like a madman, and Hiei faltered, shutting down the intense flames as he felt something clutching at the edge of his youki.
It was like Tartarus was absorbing power from the contact, not being hurt by it one bit. Hiei swiftly replayed their last two fights in his mind. Even when he had released the Kokuryuuha, Tartarus had still been standing in the end, completely unharmed – more powerful? Certainly not less.
The fire demon lashed out experimentally, hands surrounded with pulsing dark fire. Tartarus caught his fist and grinned into his face, as Hiei gasped at feeling his power being...drawn, sucked from his body.
He was right. Throwing youki at Tartarus only increased his powers.
Hiei wrenched away from the malicious creature, stumbling as Tartarus struck at him with a foot sweep, and leapt away, into the trees, trying to ponder what to do about this sudden revelation. He cursed himself for a fool. He fancied himself the great warrior, yet he hadn't realized the true nature of Tartarus' power until now.
"Come back to play, little fire demon," Tartarus called out mockingly, that annoying note of huge amusement still present in his voice, his unseen smile. "Or maybe I’ll just have to content myself with this beautiful ningen..."
Hiei snarled soundlessly, but didn’t move.
Tartarus drew his strength from battle ki, absorbing it and turning it against...
Battle ki.
His eyes widened.
"Kurama!"
He blurred into action, moving faster than Tartarus was capable, scooping the unconscious fox into his arms and darting back into the safety of the trees. Safe, for now.
He was just glad Kurama was unconscious, because he sure wouldn’t have liked what Hiei was going to do next.
Tartarus spotted the slight, rigidly upright form of the Koorime and his grin eclipsed his face. "Ah, so you’ve decided to come back for more," he purred, approaching.
A look of confusion crossed his features as Hiei remained unmoving.
"What, did I bleed all the fight out of you?" Tartarus grinned viciously.
"Just don’t hurt Kurama," Hiei bit out, looking up at the much taller youkai. "Let him go."
Tartarus’s grin widened. "Not a chance," he replied, snapping forward to seize Hiei in his arms.
Hiei remained limp, unstruggling, like a rag doll. Tartarus frowned and shook him a little, annoyed by his passivity, then his smile reappeared and he bent to take Hiei’s lips roughly with his own, crushing them under his mouth, worrying savagely at his bottom lip. One hand moved over his body in a painful, pincher-like grip.
The fire demon was unresisting, but he didn’t respond, either.
Tartarus wrenched his head away from the smaller youkai’s, the beginnings of a snarl forming on his face. "Fight, damn you."
A faint smile curled up the edges of Hiei’s mouth. "Fuck you."
"No, that honor will be mine," was Tartarus’ rejoinder, and he grabbed Hiei hard, tearing at his clothes. Hiei’s body was rocked with the movement, but he made no move to stop the hulking youkai. Tartarus’s face twisted with rage, and he cracked an open palm across the smaller youkai’s face.
Hiei staggered, then pulled himself upright, his entire body loose and relaxed.
"Damn you!" Tartarus raged, and he hit him again. And again. Again. Again. His hands throbbed with strangely familiar dark fire. He rained down blow after blow on the unresisting fire demon. Hiei fell to his knees, a thick trickle of blood painting the side of his mouth.
Tartarus blinked, staring at his hands. He’d been so focused on Hiei, he’d barely realized...
Hiei pushed himself upright, eyes burning into Tartarus’ wide sea-green orbs. Then he suddenly flashed him a wide grin, fangs gleaming. "You just expended all that hard-stolen battle ki, didn’t you?"
Tartarus staggered back, shocked by Hiei’s insight.
"I don’t know what you’re talking about," he declared icily. His shoulders swelled, and his voice began to grow thick as he started to transform into his mountainous, invulnerable form... "Pitiful youkai, what did I want with you for a servant anyhow...I’ll kill you, and take your pretty red-headed lover..."
Hiei growled deep in his throat, and lunged swifter than thought for his katana, rolling and scooping it up, turning to stab at Tartarus before he managed the transition from his man-shape to the unstoppable hulking creature he’d been before.
Tartarus was drained of all his stolen battle ki, and his form was still shifting and melding before Hiei’s eyes as he turned back. The creature was caught in the difficult transformation, mouth gaping open and frozen wide, as a spurt of blood gushed forth.
His half-scaled fingers fumbled at the katana, clutched around the razor-edged blade buried deep in his heart, slicing the still-soft flesh and dropping hissing ichor onto the turf below.
Hiei eyed him expressionlessly.
"How?" Tartarus managed to gasp, as Hiei unsheathed the blade from his dying flesh.
"You fed off my battle ki," Hiei responded in a contemptuous snort. "As long as I could manage to deprive you of that, it only followed that you would be vulnerable without your stolen ki...in man-form."
Tartarus coughed weakly, the sound suspiciously resembling a dry chuckle. He crumpled to the ground.
Hiei placed the edge of the blade against his throat. He knew it was still possible for Tartarus to finish the transition if he left him now, and ignore the wounds in his invulnerable form.
"Do you yield?" he demanded.
"I yield," Tartarus let the words fall from his slack lips quietly, bitterly.
"If you ever bother me or Kurama again, I will kill you," he warned. "I know your secret now."
Tartarus coughed again. "Then take him now, and never return." His sea-green eyes glittered up at Hiei, full of hatred.
"Gladly," Hiei snapped. He turned on his heel, and left Tartarus behind in the clearing to live or die.
* * *
Youko Kurama was…well, it wasn’t precisely a dream. He frowned a little, wriggling and very deliberately not opening his eyes as he sensed that same light, maddening pressure that had tormented him so, for the past two weeks.
There were fingers moving over his chest, stroking him lightly, teasing at his sensitive skin, and then a hand pushed open the fold of his pajama top. He heard a little click at the same time he felt a sharp little tug, and couldn’t help blinking as he heard another noise...the ping of his button, flying across the room to hit the wall.
"Hiei!" he complained, opening his eyes as a mouth pressed against the bare skin of his chest.
Hiei’s crimson eyes were heavy-lidded as the youkai looked up at him. "Hnnm?"
Kurama decided he’d never really liked this top, anyway.
He reached out for Hiei, enormously pleased when this time, the youkai didn’t flit away. He pulled the fire demon taut against his body and kissed him thoroughly, taking his face in both hands. Kurama writhed against Hiei’s hands, whose light teasing touches were awakening a storm of delicious agony in his body, and kissed him harder, reaching out to caress him in response, pulling a startled, pleased groan from his lover.
This time, Hiei’s touch didn’t leave him to wonder at a dream, or vague reality. It kindled the raging reflex that it had before...
And there was plenty Kurama had to do with it.