Chapter Text
Something lurches madly in his chest each time he catches Ivar staring. Eyes so large and fierce they command attention.
Look at me.
Desire me.
Love me.
Heahmund has learned to read them. Mostly at the expense of his integrity. No longer is he afraid of their pitiless squint. More often than he might like to admit, Ivar’s azure orbs cloud with hazy sadness and that is when Heahmund’s heart tightens under his ribs.
Where he understands every expression molded on the man’s distinguished face, Ivar studies him in kind. The Viking is fascinated and scrutinizes in unnerving appraisal.
Heahmund has grown accustomed to the feel of Ivar’s raking gaze.
*
“Thank you.”
“For what, Ivar?”
The glow from the candles makes the darkness shrink back into the corners. The hearth adds soft light, the room filtered through orange flames that dance like ghosts in front of them.
“For this kindness.”
Once an enemy, Heahmund now occupies the place next to Ivar. With his brother Ubbe having fled after his defeat and Hvitserk leaving to pursue his own dreams, Ivar was left alone. Surrounded
by his men and shield maidens, sure. But alone in the existential sense. Only someone who has suffered as much as Ivar has could comprehend.
Heahmund proved gracious company and precious counsel. Dare Ivar admit, they have become friends.
Ivar sits with his back perched against the fur-lined wall. His sweat-stiff clothing lies in a heap at the foot of the bed.
“Corinthians teaches to love. Thus, I love. For without love, I am nothing.”
Heahmund dips his elbow into the steamy water until the sting dissipates.
“It’s ready,” he sighs.
“Who are these Corinthians you speak of?”
Heahmund carries the pot, his strong biceps tightening under its weight as he sets it on the ground. Pushing with his foot, he moves it closer to the wooden bedframe.
Wood. Like Christ’s cross.
Am I crucifying myself with my own two hands?
“They were sinful people. Lustful. The Apostle Paul wrote them letters, teaching them of the righteous way to live under the one true God.”
Ivar dismisses the thought with his hand. “They sound more entertaining than this… Paul.”
The bishop wipes sweat from his brow. “Not according to the Church.”
Ivar's eyes shoot up to meet his.
“So you are saying you love even me? A heathen?”
A tangle of words lodges in Heahmund’s throat. He swallows them down in favor of safer confessions.
“I was taught to believe that anyone who did not convert to the Christian faith was unworthy of mercy. Now I am no longer certain of this. I… I love you as my fellow man.”
Heahmund directs his gaze elsewhere. He despises lying to someone’s face.
*
Water trickles from between Heahmund’s long fingers, shimmering like burnished metal against the crackling fire.
“Nobody has done this for me in a long time. Not since I was a boy.”
Heahmund gently wipes Ivar’s rough palms.
“Is it pleasant? Would you like it warmer?”
Drops ripple the calm surface as they fall into the bucket with tender splashes.
Plop.
Plop.
Plop.
“It’s lovely. And the temperature is perfect. Please continue.”
The sound of their breathing competes with the sizzle of burning logs. Heahmund squeezes out the excess moisture before dipping back into the warming bucket.
“Heahmund… “
The priest’s heart pounds faster the closer he edges to him.
He comes to a halt inches from Ivar’s nose, pupils rapt on his generous mouth.
Ivar’s so near they share the same exhale.
“Heahmund.” It’s not a question. It’s a breathless interjection.
“Ivar?” he murmurs.
Goosebumps clothe Ivar’s bare skin. It’s not just from the soft fabric massaging his arms.
It’s the voice. His name is sweeter than honey mead as it dangles off the priest’s lips.
“Can I ask you something, Heahmund?”
Ivar can’t perceive the press of Heahmund’s flesh against his thigh, but his brain registers it.
His sex stirs in turn. Now that he can feel.
“Of course. You can ask me anything. I am at your service.”
Heahmund tenderly scrubs circles into Ivar’s chest, aware of the strength of the muscles beneath. A heat steals into his own cheeks.
Eyes like balls of shattered blue marble bend their gaze. “That is precisely what I want to ask you. Why are you still here, Heahmund? When I became King of Kattegat, I offered you a ship. Your freedom. Many moons have passed and yet you remain.”
Ivar’s calm voice cuts slowly through the pulsing in Heahmund’s head. The priest prefers to focus on that and not on the throbbing in his groin.
“I don’t know. I choose to be here. For now at least. I believe it’s where the Lord wants me to be.”
Ivar arches a questioning eyebrow.
“Do you think your god has abandoned you? Letting you think you belong here among us Heathens?”
He leans forward, teasing the holy man.
Their plush mouths nearly graze.
What was a vague unseeing stillness in Heahmund is now untethered emotion.
He draws air. Ivar’s sea eyes bore into him.
Inflating his lungs, the wild thumping beneath his breast makes him forget to respire.
Almighty Lord, did you pluck pieces of heaven to fashion his eyes?!
Ivar pulls back and winks, an irresistibly devastating grin curling his lips.
“Or is there some other reason? Something else keeping you here? Perhaps someone else that you love?!”
A memory moves in the back of Heahmund’s mind. A conversation he and Ivar shared a few months back. He smiles reminiscently in spite of himself.
“I want to believe there is someone who never lies, cheats or compromises. Who is always noble,” the aspiring king had stated.
“I am the one, Ivar. You can believe in me,” Heahmund had replied.
He had been honest.
He kept his word.
That was the first time he had wondered what he might savor if he sampled Ivar’s lips. How it would feel if his hungry body united sinfully with the youth’s.
A flicker of renewed desire tastes nectarous in his mouth. Heahmund shakes off the shiver.
Sighing into his movement, he trails up Ivar’s neck, leaving a rippling flush of desire in the Viking.
He swipes Ivar’s cheek from apple to jaw with soft brushes, noticing the growing bulge beneath the man’s covering.
Tilting his head to one side, the priest steals a slanted look.
It does not go unnoticed.
“You have yet to answer me, priest.”
Thick, sooty lashes bat. Affection and gentian blue are what color Heahmund’s gaze.
“I have faith in the Almighty. In His plan for me. I do not doubt in His love for me.”
Liar!
Ivar’s expression remains immobile, his amazement hidden by a low breath.
“That is not what I asked, but okay.” Ivar giggles. “And last time I enquired this of you, Heahmund, you didn’t hesitate in your reply. This time you did. Are you questioning your faith, Your Grace?”
Heahmund’s cock twitches. Your Grace.
The urge to go down on his knees and cross himself overwhelms him.
The urge to go down… on Ivar… worshipping him on his knees like he would His Savior…
What blasphemous thoughts invade his mind!
Would I find eternal sanctuary between Ivar’s thighs, if I tasted his flesh and drank of his seed… ?
Oh Heavenly Father!
Deus meus, ex toto corde pænitet me omnium meorum peccatorum, eaque detestor, quia peccando… A voice from his past screams. Not loudly enough.
No prayer of contrition can absolve you of this, Bishop.
*
“I told you not to call me that,” he barely makes out. Heahmund’s voice is coated in the ache of longing.
“You know, Heahmund, I think you secretly love it when I call you that.”
Ivar’s firm mouth curls as if he’s always on the edge of laughter. Not mocking. More coquettish.
“You’re a fool, Viking.” He moves to swab the other cheek and Ivar grabs his wrist with a snarl.
“Bishop! You are fortunate,” he spits. “You’re the only one I allow to speak to me like this. Were you any other person, Heahmund, I would have you killed for using such a tone with me.”
Feeling the raw warmth of Ivar’s fingertips against his skin makes his breath hitch.
“I meant no disrespect, sire. I apologize.”
Ivar’s calloused hand tightens. “You call me sire and yet I am not your King.”
Heahmund swallows hard, truth trapped somewhere where only the gods know to look.
“You are my King.” The throbbing is getting worse.
“As long as I am here, you are. I am under your tutelage. I will respect your title. That much you’ve earned in battle, have you not?”
Ivar stares him down with a flicker of defiance.
“Hrumphf.” Jerking it closer, he guides Heahmund’s trembling hand to his broad chest. His legs may be weak but underneath that ivory flesh his heart is that of a lion’s.
His touch, firm and persuasive, invites more intimacy as it glides down the middle of his glistening stomach.
Desire coils in the pit of Heahmund’s belly. He doesn’t dare look away.
Water from the cloth he’s still clutching seeps down, a rivulet disappearing under the coverlet.
Ivar catches the priest following it with his eyes.
“Curious to see where it went, Your Grace?”
Gasping breaths escape Heahmund’s gaping mouth.
Ivar uses his other hand to raise the fur covering his lap. He throws it to the side.
When Heahmund sees Ivar’s large, uncut sex, swollen and leaking onto the soft flesh of his hip... a long shuddering breath escapes him.
Heavenly Father forgive me my lustful thoughts I am weak I am a sinner I am not worthy of your Divine Mercy…
Ivar encourages. Heahmund’s hand chooses.
It envelopes Ivar’s cock, stiff and hot against his cooler, damp palm. It’s so engorged with blood the veins visibly pulse.
Heahmund increases the pressure. Ivar bites into the corner of his pert mouth.
“What surprises await us, priest,” he mewls.
The cloth moistens his dark pubes, down along the shaft. Trickling the warm liquid to the king’s large, hairy balls is easier than resisting their touch. They roll perfectly between the worn pads of his fingers.
“Why don’t you have a female slave do this for you?” Heahmund stutters.
I’d do this for you. I’ll do this for you for as long as you wish.
“Because I want you to do it,” Ivar states matter-of-factly.
Something drops.
Cock replaces rag.
Heart pounding in his chest, Heathmund fists it properly. He strokes its wide girth up and back, a tantalizing rhythm across the slippery flesh of Ivar’s sex.
The king sibilates something in Norse, head thrown back.
“I’m sure…I’m sure a soft touch… a woman’s touch,” Heahmund pants as he increases pace, “I’m sure it would be more… pleasurable for you.”
Ivar sinks his head, putting his hand under Heahmund’s bearded chin. He searches his upturned face, which is flushed scarlet.
He licks his plump upper lip obscenely.
“Let me decide what’s pleasurable, Bishop.”
*
Ivar pulls him roughly over, on top. Both their weights shift the hay beneath them.
Heahmund’s tongue traces the soft fullness of Ivar’s lips until the king seizes his mouth, forcing his tongue between Heahmund’s teeth. It ravages the sweetness of his cavity.
Oh Heavenly Father… Ivar’s taste is everything Heahmund imagined it to be.
Communion wine for his damned soul.
“Take them off,” Ivar laments the priest’s garments as he pulls his shirt over his head.
The elder moans, hands dropping to undo the ties on his trousers. The patch of sticky emission leaking from his turgid cock has stained the leather.
“May God forgive me but I desire you, Ivar…so badly.”
The Viking cups the priest’s round domes as soon as he’s naked, pressing their needy sexes together.
“Show me. Show me how much you desire me, Your Grace.”
Lips seal, hard and searching. The more Heahmund grinds into Ivar, the more the kiss becomes demanding, savage in its intensity.
They nip. Bite. Suck and hiss.
Heahmund’s mouth leaves his lover’s, traveling down his creamy throat until he reaches Ivar’s heart. His lips pick up on its irregular fluttering.
“Your heart races, sire.” Heahmund looks up from half-lidded eyes, tantalizing the pink buds that stiffen beneath his tongue’s attentions.
Ivar looks back, slightly disoriented.
No one has ever looked at him like this. Not like Ivar is doing right now.
Awe.
Admiration.
Affection.
Arousal.
“If it races, it races for you, Heahmund.”
The priest shifts. Pecks the insides of Ivar’s thighs with coaxing invitation before gently spreading his legs for him.
He drags the rough of his beard against the sensitive flesh of Ivar’s most intimate place as he opens him with tongue and digits.
“Heahmund,” Ivar writhes. “Please take me. Make me yours.”
When Heahmund enters, it’s with a whispered prayer on his lips. His sex sheathed in warmth, the tight hold of Ivar’s muscle around his… it’s inebriating.
Hands splayed at each side of the Viking, the priest beseeches.
“Kiss me, Ivar. Kiss me… “
It’s urgent, as violent and desperate as their movements.
Ivar scratches his claim into Heahmund’s back with each thrust, half-mooned love runes marking his flesh. Only Ivar will ever understand how much this means to him.
Heahmund repays the favor by leaving a crescent moon of his own. A dark bruise rises on Ivar’s shoulder.
Their union is dangerous. Foolhardy. And everything they need.
“Look at me,” Ivar huffs. “Look at me when you spend, Your Grace.”
“Oh God,” Heahmund whimpers shortly after, a single tear rising unbidden at the corner of his lid.
Ivar sucks into his lower lip. One last, deep jab and the priest’s liquid heat fills him in polite spurts.
“That’s it, Heahmund. Let go.”
Heahmund purrs throatily as his quivering hand strokes Ivar into his delectation. He’s begging for release.
"Faster... please... faster... "
When his king finally finishes, screaming “Yes…YES!” his explosion shoots straight, pooling in the valley of his chest.
It’s viscous and perfumes of honey and musk, making Heahmund’s nostrils flare.
The priest angles in, cleaning Ivar once more, this time with his thirsty tongue.
Heahmund’s dark hair sprouts from between Ivar’s fingers as he caresses him sweetly.
“Will you miss me?” Ivar asks.
Heahmund stills, focus returning to the king. He slinks to his side, his cum-stained lips touching Ivar’s.
Feather-light.
With a satisfied sigh, he settles against the Viking.
“What do you mean? I am still here.”
Ivar circles a pattern onto Heahmund’s arm with delicate brushes of his fingertips.
“One day you will leave. You will return to England and leave me here. Alone. And I wonder if you will miss me.”
They fixate each other in sudden ringing silence.
Heahmund hasn’t thought about it. What it would mean to set foot on home soil once more. Not see Ivar nor be at his side. He hasn’t thought about it because he doesn’t wish to give it weight.
Not now.
Not yet.
Maybe not ever.
“Silence is not denial, Heahmund. I think you care for me. I think you stayed because you care for me. I’m not afraid to tell you I care for you. You are welcome to my bed, to my kingdom, to my heart as long as you wish. I would happily take you with me to Valhalla if your god allowed it. Were it for me we would never part.”
Heahmund blinks, a feeling of glorious happiness springing up deep within him.
“I love you, Ivar,” the priest confesses. No other words are needed.
Ivar’s deep laugh reaches his eyes, spreading fine lines outward.
“My Heahmund. My Grace. My Love. Such adventures we will have. We are going to make history. Together."
Ivar gathers him tightly against his chest. Months ago the Bishop might have fiercely resisted the anguished burning of his body and soul for this young man, but that is no more.
He was weak.
Both were lonely. The raw sores of their aching hearts begin to heal from this moment.
Belittled, betrayed, broken. All Ivar ever desired is what Heahmund is now willing to gift him.
Look at me. Desire me. Love me. This is what Ivar begged.
I see you. I want you. I love you. This is what Heahmund’s soul replied.