Under the Influence

Laughter,
wreathed in fragrant steam.

Günter tugged
at the bloodstained lapel of his robe and pouted while Wolfram, his mouth
spitting defensive threats, shepherded Yuri out the door. Murata followed with
an apologetic shrug, leaving Gwendal alone with Günter and Conrart,
the sake bottle sitting in rapidly melting bowl of
ice between them. “That’s not the way you
drink it,” Yuri had protested, “It’s
supposed to be warm,” and Conrart had patted him indulgently and shooed him
away. Günter near a naked Yuri, always a risky business, the
bleeding nose inevitable. But now, with the distraction of his beloved
king gone, Günter tied up his hair and licked the sweat from his upper lip.

“What? What?”
he said, crossing his legs with an oddly feminine movement.
Gwendal just shook his head.

“Has it ever
occurred to you that you make His Majesty uncomfortable?” asked Conrart and
Günter smiled.

“Has it ever
occurred to you that His Majesty could turn me into a bloody smear at the
bottom of a very large crater?” he replied. Conrart raised his eyebrows and toasted
his former teacher and Gwendal, seeing how comfortable the two were class=GramE>together, found himself wondering if they’d ever had sex.
The bathhouse was extremely hot and the three of them drank liberally from a
water pitcher and in Conrart and Gwendal’s
case, from a sake bottle as well.

“You make a
fool of yourself,” said Gwendal with more than usual bluntness, but Günter
shrugged it away.

“I have no
pride,” he said, which was a lie because Günter was a proud man and downright
vain as well. “Gwendal, you’re so rough on His Majesty at times. You’d be
smitten too, if only you’d take that rod out of your backside.” Conrart snorted
and choked. Gwendal helpfully thumped his brother’s back.

“I do not have
a rod up my backside. I just take life seriously.”

Günter turned,
produced a small ceramic bottle and a small ceramic cup. Removing the stopper
resulted in the smell of fermented apples, oddly subdued by the steam. class=SpellE>Scumble; it had to be kept away from metal as it tended to
dissolve it, and was Günter’s liquor of choice on the rare occasions he drank.
It never failed to puzzle Gwendal why Günter, the epitome of refinement, drank
something that peasants made from windfall apples and anything else that couldn’t
run away fast enough, and drank everyone else under the table while he was at
it. Before Gwendal could protest a liberal amount was splashed into his sake
bowl. “It’ll make a man out of you,” Günter’s voice was heavy with irony and
innuendo that he would never, ever use in front of Yuri.

Gwendal,
conscious of his brother’s daring grin, took a deep breath and knocked the class=SpellE>scumble back in a single gulp. It burned its way down into
his stomach, back up his spine, danced through his brainstem and blacked out
his vision. When he came to he found himself slung between the two men as they
dragged him to the door, opened it, and ignoring his strangled cry of, “Wait!”
dumped him unceremoniously into a snowdrift. They stripped off their robes and
jumped in after him, Conrart whooping and then yelping as Günter rubbed a
handful of snow into his hair.

“You are,”
Gwendal announced to no one in particular, “Shamelessly immature.” He buried
his burning face in the snow and growled in protest when strong hands picked
him up by the scruff of his neck and hauled him upright and back into the
bathhouse. “At least put your robes back on,” he begged as the door slammed
shut behind them. He was ignored.

More class=SpellE>scumble was pressed into his hands and he eyed it with
misgiving as Günter, taunt arse framed beautifully by the national underwear,
slipped gracefully into the sauna. Strands of silver hair floated on the
surface of the water and Gwendal sipped cautiously at the liquid. Conrart
lounged on the bench, watching Günter out of the corner of his eye. He blinked
innocently when Gwendal looked at him but Gwendal wasn’t fooled.

“I- I class=SpellE>c’n she you,” glowered Gwendal,
but the trademark scowl didn’t work so well when he couldn’t focus his eyes.
Conrart just snorted and took a swig straight from the sake bottle. “class=SpellE>Y’need t’be careful,” he
continued, and Conrart finished off the sake and went looking for the class=SpellE>scumble bottle.

“Looking for
this?” drawled Günter, waving a languid hand, scumble
sloshing gently as he shook the bottle. Conrart made a grab for it but Günter
was too quick. Finally Conrart gave up, stretched out on the bench and panted,
sweated beading across his scarred and naked skin. Gwendal swallowed and
averted his eyes.

“What’s the
matter?”

“Nothing.style='font-family:"Garamond","serif"'> He tugged the robe tighter around
himself. The sake bowl was plucked from his numb
fingers and he looked up to see Conrart licking up the last remaining droplets
with a very pink tongue. Gwendal groaned and closed his eyes. When he opened
them again he realised that he must had passed out, however briefly, because
Günter and Conrart were sticky and entwined together on the bench across from
his.

Gwendal
started. His heavy limbs moved of their own accord and one failing arm knocked
over the water pitcher, straight onto the coals. A great gush of steam filled
the room and when it settled, Conrart and Günter were sitting primly side by
side, looking as though butter wouldn’t melt in their mouths. Gwendal didn’t
believe them for a second. He stood up, stumbled towards the door and threw it
open.  The sunlight reflecting off the
snow almost blinded him and he shut his eyes, dove straight into a snowdrift.
This time the cold shocked him to something approaching sober and he picked
himself up, wiped his face with his hands.

“class=SpellE>Gweeeeeendalllll,” whined Günter from the doorway. “You’re
letting all the warm air out.” Conrart appeared behind Günter, grinning and
shaking the scumble bottle enticingly. It didn’t even
occur to Gwendal to leave so instead he stalked back inside, shut the door
behind him.

“You’re making
spectacles of yourselves,” he told them.

“You need to
relax more,” Günter replied, pouring out scumble for
himself and Conrart. Gwendal declined with a grunt and a wave of his hand.
Conrart gulped down his and swayed, only to be caught by his brother and lowered
gently to a bench. They say side by side and watched with grudging admiration
as Günter polished off the rest of the scumble
without so much as a shudder. “Just like my grandmother used to make,” he said
with a hiccup.

“Your
grandmother made this stuff?” asked
Gwendal with a kind of fascinated horror. “What kind of woman was she?”

“Hell with an
axe.” Tears appeared in Günter’s lovely eyes. “You know, she always said that
swords were for weaklings. Axes I was never good with, but swords just feel so
right. And no matter how good I am it always feels like I’m letting her down
somehow...”

“Oh, for the
love of...” Gwendal grunted in exasperation, held out his hand. Günter took it
happily, sat down beside him and reached out over Gwendal’s
lap for Conrart. Conrart lent over, Gwendal lent
back, watched his brother and the king’s advisor share a lingering kiss. A hand
slipped, went down between his legs and he groaned, a sound that held at least
as much resignation as pleasure and Günter broke the kiss, turned his head, bit
Gwendal on the jaw with very sharp teeth. The hand between his legs pinched,
then stroked in apology. Günter kissed him on the mouth, Conrart on the
shoulder and Gwendal closed his eyes knowing that the consequences would be
dire and for once, not caring at all.

style='font-family:"Garamond","serif"'>END

style='font-family:"Garamond","serif"'>(Written for the kkm_challenge
LiveJournal community, Round #4.)style='mso-bidi-font-weight:normal'>style='font-family:"Garamond","serif"'>