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Sorcerers in Suits #1--Lunch Break

The dragon had been a thing of beauty. Killing it made him feel more like a butcher than a hero.  But that was what they did; a job, like any other.

Blue and golden scales armored its back and sides, colorful razors edged with slow poison that attacked the mind before the body.  The leathery belly seemed both rougher and softer than the rest; Jusstin touched it curiously afterwards, intrigued by the glowing citrine hide.

It felt like spined velvet.  He wished he could have a jacket made from it, but that of course was impossible.  For one thing, he hadn’t the power to draw it forth from this world into the next.  For another, Kel always got so excited when they killed something.  Kel slashed the beast to ribbons at the end; even the patch Jusstin stroked was only a couple of hands wide.  The rest was black smoking blood and huge gobbets of acrid meat.

No jacket today, and he needed a new one, dammit!  Well, he tried not to dwell on impossible things anymore.  He was grateful for what he had.  These days, what he had was more than enough.

He turned to the tall blond and smiled a little.   Even mottled with stinking blood, stained up to the armpits with mud and worse things, Kel still took his breath away.  Hair a stream of melted ice-metal, eyes rich chocolate coffee.  Light and dark spun into a combination of sheer wonder.

I’m such a romantic, he thought.

“Let’s fuck,” Kel said breathlessly, grabbing him around the waist.  So much for romance!

He wasn’t sure how fighting together against the Dark had turned into a relationship; sexual yes, but also tender and deep.  Friendship had happened swiftly and would have been enough, but somehow a little extra had occurred without either of them intending it at all. But he wasn’t complaining---not in the least!

“Wash first,” he reminded sternly, pushing away.  He was a bit grubby too.  The last strike, under the dragon’s armpit with the magic dagger known as Stormbringer, had baptized him with poison blood.  If he’d remembered to shove a few empty bottles in his pack, the tar-thick stuff could have been gleaned for its magical properties.  As usual when Kel was the one suggesting the outing, Jusstin had been too rushed to even *bring* a pack.  Ah, well.

Kel stared down at the small dark man hungrily.  “I don’t care about---all right, all right.  You’re a wizard.  Cleaning spell?”

“This scenario we’re both warriors.  You wanted it that way. No magic, no cleaning spell.  We walk to the lake.  Not that far.”

Kel growled, and tried to draw him closer.  He wanted to give in.  Could have given in, so easily.

Instead, he stared back implacably.  Pale blue eyes in a dusky face---curly black hair, a dancer’s body.  He had his own agenda, for himself as a warrior.  Not a tank---a ninja.  -He heard Kel swallow, and smiled to himself.  “We walk to the lake, take a bath.  Then sex.  Agreed?”

Kel wasn’t happy at all.  “We started this as a game, right?  I thought the rules were made to be broken?”   Ah, he was using his soft persuasive voice.  The voice that always worked when he needed a project completed on time.

Jusstin wanted to give in, and badly.  Feel Kel’s teeth in his throat, his mindless hunger after a successful kill.  Instead his long, six-fingered hand came up to press against his lover’s half-armored chest.  “Funny to hear you say that.  These are *my* rules, not yours.  Anyway, I’ve broken some already. If I hadn’t, you’d be beaten up, dead, every bone in your body shattered, dead, too tired to think of sex at all---“

Kel burst into breathless laughter.  Jusstin felt the long, powerful arms envelop him, and automatically raised his face for a kiss.  “And DEAD!” his lover intoned, and they both started laughing.

“D and D,” Juss agreed breathlessly.  “Dead and Depraved.”

They kissed.  It was lengthy as possible, ardent, flickering tongues and gently controlled passion.  Kel drew him close, and he cast the cleaning spell just as he knew he would.  It wasn’t a quick strip-you-clean, more like a warm shower.  Not even a cheat, really; just a rinse.  A harmless rinse.

He managed, in the hot sweet rush that was Kel-determined-to-have-sex, to transport them to a different place.  A place filled with warmth, flowers, waterfalls.  Once he broke the wizard rule in a small thing, to expand the breakage to something further was not so bad.

“I want you to fuck me next time,” Kel whispered when it was over, with another quick kiss.  “Will you?”

“Maybe.”  Actually the thought made Jusstin iron-hard again, giddy, nearly out of control.  “Let’s see what happens.”

“In the real world, I mean,” Kel said, and Juss stalled and stared.  Began to shake his head, concentration unraveling at such an insane suggestion…

Their minds, winding together over the months they came to understand one another, had learned also to recognize danger.  They both knew the instant the disrupting voice came.  They could pull back, adjust their expressions.  Protect what they had.

From that worst of monsters, Reality.

“Jon!----Um, Mr. Kelson?  Lunch break’s almost over.  You know you’ve got a meeting at 1:30, right?”

“Um---yeah.  Thanks, Lynn, I’ll be there.”

Jon Kelson shook his head slightly, then looked up and smiled brightly at his secretary.

She smiled back, then frowned at the small, dark man huddled near her boss at the table in the rather shabby lunchroom.  They’d been sitting together for the whole lunch hour, barely talking and barely eating either, from what she’d noticed.  Peculiar---and disturbing.

Most employees didn’t bother with sack lunches, except for new-hires.  There were plenty of excellent restaurants in the area.  But Mike had always eaten here since he was hired two years ago.  That wasn’t so surprising, he was a social retard.   But now he’d dragged Jon into his World of the Weird!

She really didn’t understand why the president of the company always took lunch with the mail guy, rather than picking up on all the invitations to dine with clients as he used to. In fact, she’d bluntly asked that question once.  Got a startled look, then a sweet quirky smile and the remark, “Well---I like to mess with his head---I mean, I like the way he *thinks*, Lynn.”

Like the way he thinks.  Well, maybe.  The guy had to have something going; no one could like his looks!  Grungy, long-hair freak.  Why she’d taken pity and hired him straight out of rehab, she’d never know.  And she’d never stop regretting it, either.

She’d watched them huddle together over their sandwiches every day, scribbling furiously in a notebook they passed back and forth.  She’d thought it was something to do with work until Mike dropped a scrap of paper on the lunch table as he hurried belatedly back to his cubicle.  She’d not taken it of course, just glanced at it as she went to make coffee.  Much good it did her! The man’s handwriting was clear and precise, partly why she’d hired him.  But the words made no sense.

“Important!…dragons are impervious to magic, only physical strikes take a toll, and only from the strongest warriors.  But there’s a type of poison that affects them, made from the bloodfish that haunt the North of Khesh strangely enough…”

She’d stared at this crazed fragment in bafflement and mild disgust (was the lazy jerk writing a book in his spare time?  Good thing, since his day job was in peril!). Then she noticed the quick scrawl beneath it and things all fell into horrible place.

“Kel---level 65 now, and finds a named elf-bow in a drop.  Lucky bastard.  He may catch me soon if I’m not careful…”

Oh my God, she thought, relief warring with true horror.  They’re not doing drugs together, or sharing office secrets, or involved in some dark plot or nameless relationship she didn’t understand.

In fact, she understood all too well now.

The silly jerks were spending lunch playing Dungeons and Dragons together, like brainless twerps from the ‘80’s.  And she was pretty sure that Mr. Kelson had been suckered into the game somehow, he was like a big kid at times!  But he wouldn’t welcome her interference until his addiction had run its course.

Now, she glanced at her former charity case and grimaced.  He was staring at the top of the lunch table, expressionless to the point of idiocy.  His very pale blue eyes in his lightly scarred face were, well, a little creepy.  “You still helping with the collation for the B of A project, Mike?” she inquired, somewhat brusquely.  “Because frankly, we’re getting behind.”

She couldn’t say much more, with Jon still in the lunchroom.  Standing there, brushing sandwich crumbs from his dark suit and grinning a little as if inviting her to share some joke.  She thought she could cheerfully fire Michael St. Juss for laziness.  Or for no reason at all.  He spooked her out.  But she’d probably get sued for it, just because he was a gimp.

And the boss had a soft spot for him.  Probably, for that same reason, aside from this gaming dementia!  It made her ass ache.  Mike didn’t even bother to dress for an office.  Jeans most of the time.  Disabled or not, he didn’t need to be scruffy!

Michael finally tracked on her, and nodded in his usual absent manner.  “Don’t worry; I’m on it.”  But he took his time, gathering up his trash and depositing it, collecting his cane.  Giving Mr. Kelson a look from under his eyelids that she frankly found disrespectful.  “Next time,” he said firmly.

Mr. Kelson stood up straighter, gave the fellow a stare.  “You’re kidding,” he said, flatly.   His dark eyes stared hotly at the younger man.  Perhaps Mike had finally gone too far and he was about to be canned?

Instead of looking worried, he smiled.  “Promise,” he stated, in a firm voice that Lynn wouldn’t have minded hearing when asking him if the mail sorting would be done by such and such a time.

Apparently it meant something to their boss.  He smiled; that wonderful, incandescent smile that could light up boardrooms and inspire employees.  Including her, dammit to hell.

“What happened to rules, Juss?” he observed, with a wicked sparkle.

Michael St. Juss gave him a sweet smile, then tossed Lynn one too.  A more complex expression, barbed with dislike.  Fair enough, she disliked him too!  But she didn’t much care for his negligent reply to the man who paid his salary!

“Oh, like you said,” he drawled.  “Rules are made to be broken.”