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The candles flicker madly as soon as they enter, the flames guttering and flickering in a mad dance of golden sparks. Gu Mang recognizes it for what it is - a tell, just like the quiet tightening of grip, the drum of knuckles on wood. He turns, taking a step, then two, reaching out and burying his face into the crook of Mo Xi's neck. Wrapping his arms around his back. He can feel Mo Xi tucking his face against the top of his head, curving against his hair like a sunflower's stem.
Gu Mang inhales, deeply, pressing himself closer as if there's any space left between their bodies. He rests in the circle of his embrace, indulgence rising like dawn inside his chest. Glimmering gold, as soft as the honey-jasmine sweetness of Mo Xi's skin. Mo Xi shifts again to hold him better, then sighs in a tectonic sort of shudder. "Shixiong… "
Gu Mang makes himself pull back, tone filled with a false affront he has to try hard to keep from slipping. "Tsk. What are you supposed to call me now that I've married you?"
Mo Xi's eyes widen so fast it makes him look like a startled kitten, features further softened by the hair sliding out of his wedding styling. Gu Mang had slipped his guan off on the way here, limbs and hair both loosened by celebratory wine - the first of which had been from the matched nuptial goblets, gleaming in the light. He can still feel where they'd interlocked their arms, ringing through him like a phantom touch, like the giddy realization that dawns upon him all over again, even now. They're married, truly married with all three bows, bound by the oath of a crossed-cup toast.
Gu Mang grins at him, wide and squinty, his vision going blurry at the edges and the reds of their room bleeding into each other. Their bed is a beacon of crimson, a beckoning done in scarlet mirrored across their courtyard, from the gardens to the ancestral halls. Mo Xi is still silent, looking down. "Hmm?” Gu Mang prods. "Still haven't made up your mind?"
"What about fujun? Zhangfu?" He plops himself down on the edge of the bed, his limbs all ease despite the rich weight of his robes. "What do you think, xiao-niangzi?" When not even niangzi gets him a reaction, Gu Mang looks up.
"Wait," is all Mo Xi says. He walks to the bedside table in silence, pouring a shallow cup of wine. The slim spout gleams in the golden lamplight, its sinuous curve drawing the eye to the well collecting within the ceramic. One, and then two, a matched set from the markets of Linyi. They're of simple make, a far cry from the calculated precision of the imperial kilns. So far from the capital, this home of theirs.
Before Gu Mang can ask, Mo Xi picks one up in both hands and turns toward him with eyes slightly downcast, the precise amount of deference accorded to a spouse. "A toast, to my," there's a near-stumble to his voice, "husband."
Gu Mang stills, the word resounding through him like a plucked string. They'd done the bows and the toasts, all the requisite little rites that had once seemed impossible, doomed to be whispered only in the dark, beneath the weight of covers that kept them hidden. This isn't a formal part of the wedding rites. There's no reason for Mo Xi to offer him a cup of wine like this, a show of deference done for an audience of one. But Mo Xi's eyes meet his and Gu Mang realizes, his heart a syncopated beat of raindrops falling paired.
This isn't traditional.
But this, too, is ceremony.
Gu Mang stands and takes it with both hands, made quietly self-conscious by the weight of Mo Xi's regard. It settles over his shoulders like a coat still warm with his body heat, tucked around him the way an embrace curves around his limbs.
He brings the cup to his lips, letting the wine settle over his tongue and the fragrance fill his mouth. He swallows, feeling Mo Xi's eyes on his skin like a physical touch, the tension growing nearly unbearable before he flicks a look at his face and suddenly. He stills, frozen, caught in a spiderweb of spun sugar.
Gu Mang thinks, nonsensically, that this must be how moths feel when their wings brush flame. He's barely opened his mouth before Mo Xi pulls him close and dips his head, wine spilling sweet between their mouths. He’s held there, hand firm against the back of his head, keeping him pressed close until all he knows is this, the slide of lips and tongue and gasping breath, enveloped by the warmth of Mo Xi’s bulk.
There's not enough air in his lungs by the time Mo Xi finally pulls back, Gu Mang blinking up at him, dizzied. He swallows and wipes at his lips with the back of his hand, both of them staring stupidly with the same senseless adoration. "Husband," he whispers, hushed with awe, for the simple pleasure of tasting the syllables in his mouth. Mine, he thinks, but doesn't say out loud.
Gu Mang smiles through the haze of tears mirrored in Mo Xi’s eyes, those ridiculous lashes made wet and spiky. Their hands have entwined without his knowing, Mo Xi’s thumb rubbing familiar circles into his skin.
Gu Mang tiptoes up to press their foreheads together, animal instinct to nuzzle. Pulls back, taking in the sight of Mo Xi with his cheeks flushed and his eyes bright, robes a glorious scarlet against the paleness of his skin. There's a faint curve to his mouth, spit-slick and kissed red. He's so beautiful it makes mischief fizz in his veins. Gu Mang tilts his head to whisper into the shell of Mo Xi's ear, making sure to keep the rasp in his voice. "Take me to bed, sweetheart."
Mo Xi moves with an alacrity that makes him snicker, a helpful cover for his own hitch of breath. Gu Mang grins, mad and reckless as he arches his back into Mo Xi's grip, relishing the ache as he's dragged close and held down, the heat of him like flame licking against bared skin.
"So hasty, is it that you see me and can't resist? Hm? Gege is so handsome you can't help it?" His back hits the bed with a thump.
"If you know the answer, why ask?" Mo Xi still sounds steady as he makes short work of Gu Mang's clothes. Gu Mang squirms a little, revelling in his soft, dark-eyed regard, in the dry humor he gets to have in these dew-leaf doses. His hands roam up around Mo Xi's shoulders, his chest, finding the fastenings of his robes and undoing them like they’re racing, like it’s another competition they both can win. It's not fair, how many layers he wears. Gu Mang's already been stripped down to his last, the silky underrobe slipping from his chest to pool at his elbows.
"Noo," he complains, "I wanted to hear you say it!"
Mo Xi pauses. Gu Mang fully expects a "mn”, or maybe no verbal reply at all, but what really results is Mo Xi dipping his head until his lips brush against the shell of his ear. "Yes," he murmurs, breath hot as a brand. "Gege is so handsome I can't help myself."
Gu Mang's capacity for thought dies a quick and honorable death. "I," he pants. No more is forthcoming. His head is still spinning like a children's top, hurtling out of his control as gege seems to echo in his ears.
It always hits him like the burn of cheap shaodaozi wine, the way Mo Xi gets with him, with him alone. Heat pounding in his veins and making him feel loose-limbed, like the world’s going blurry at the edges and he could do anything, get away with anything, step into his space and put his rough hands all over what should be too precious, too pristine for him - Mo Xi the crowning jewel of their generation, a prodigy hewn in cut-glass crystal and the sharpest planes of obsidian.
Somehow, this is his - he is his, his to keep, the untouchable alpine flower who goes soft-eyed and sleepy with Gu Mang’s hands in his hair, his head in his lap. It makes him feel feral, filling his head with thoughts of how the slim pale length of his neck would look ringed in bites, the imprints of his teeth dappled in fading red-purples alongside the scars he’d left, so long ago. He should’ve gotten a veil. Mo Xi would wear it, if he asked, and blush so pretty at the implication - Gu Mang’s torn between the instinct to keep him hidden, all to himself, and to flaunt that he gets to have him, two urges equally strong and equally irrational.
He wraps his arms around Mo Xi's neck and kisses him to spare them both from talking, licking into his mouth the way he likes it, sweet and familiar. Mo Xi holds him close, possessive like a child over their favourite toy, the span of his hand traveling down his back in a whispery brush of callus against faded scars. He settles with a proprietary grasp on the curve of Gu Mang's hip, pressing a thumb into the crease of leg and thigh. Pulling him closer.
He likes kissing, loves how Mo Xi's mouth reddens and bruises against his, to touch for the sake of it, nothing else. Slick and hot, interspersed with breath he can’t quite catch. Gu Mang pulls back just to breathe and watches the spit stretch between their lips like cut lotus-root, shining silver in the dim light. He grins, tonguing at a canine. Gu Mang nudges himself upright, straddling him, and reaches out just to cup Mo Xi’s face in his palms, meeting those eyes blown as dark as his must be and telling him, “I like you so much, my royal highness. I really, really, do.” He laughs, drawn-out and throaty, smug with a glittering sort of gladness. And then he shrugs off even that last layer of silk, which had clung so loyally to his limbs.
There’s a half-moment of silence and then suddenly the world flips, the breath whooshing out of his lungs as Mo Xi pins him down. He twists, acting like he's trying to escape just to feel Mo Xi's hands dig into his hips hard enough to bruise, just for the simple pleasure of getting to see the marks tomorrow. It's good, so good, the flex of raw physicality, strength where he'd had none for far too long. They're properly matched again - in a real tussle, he wins five times out of ten, a number settled with weeks of sparring, the two of them clashing full tilt with every trick they knew and ending only when they were both tired enough to call for a draw. He wraps his arms around Mo Xi's neck and bucks up, grinding against that familiar hardness just to hear his breath hitch, to make him bite back a moan and tighten his grip.
Two fingers push into him, slick, the quickness of it betraying Mo Xi's impatience despite how little it shows elsewhere. Gu Mang doesn't care, hard and aching, so giddy with desire he can't breathe past the urgency that feels like it's lighting him up from the inside out. "Hurry up, I want," he rasps, nearly incoherent already. "Haah, right there, harder - " Gu Mang clings to him, ankles hooking around his back, dick pulsing wet against his stomach. Obedient as ever, Mo Xi does what he asks. It makes him tense and shudder, head flung back against the bedding. Mo Xi doesn't waste time, pressing deep and crooking his fingers just to watch Gu Mang cry out. "Ah, ah, ah!"
His mouth feels slack, numbed, hanging open on an inhale that never seems to make it into his lungs. Gu Mang wants to talk , to babble as stream of filth until he's fucked silent and delirious, but, really, what does it matter when Mo Xi will know what he wants no matter what comes out of his mouth? He just twists again, bucking up against him just to let out some of the tension building and coiling in his belly, the prickling sort of embarrassment that comes from being known so well, so thoroughly. All he can do is moan, low and senseless.
By the time Mo Xi slips another one inside he's too far gone to be anything but shameless, shoving down on his fingers in an effort to goad him harder. He wants, so madly he's almost dizzy with it, craving the mindlessness he gets from being shoved down and filled up. "I'm fine, I can take it, give it to me already - "
Those fingers twist and press hard inside him, rubbing him almost cruelly. Gu Mang's targeted whining breaks apart into a broken, genuine moan, tears pricking the corners of his eyes as Mo Xi refuses to stop . "Too much, s-slow down, ah, ah," he trails off, beyond words.
His hips twist away against his will in a futile attempt to avoid it, an animal instinct to get away from the jaws around its neck. Mo Xi keeps him caged and easily pinned, leaving Gu Mang no choice but to shiver, robbed of thought and left to gasp at the relentless, punishing rhythm, begging again in one more attempt no matter how his voice tries to crack. "P-Please, I…" He mumbles, embarrassed and a little plaintive, avoiding his eyes. "I'm going to come…"
He can feel the way that affects Mo Xi, but not enough. "You will," he's told, matter-of-fact like it's common knowledge, of course he will, no matter if he tries to resist. Gu Mang tries to kick him, a bounce of his heel against his back. Mo Xi brings a hand up to his hair, petting him soothingly like a creature to be appeased, a wild fanged thing of scratching, impatient claws. Mo Xi is too calm - like this, it’s basically an invitation to goad him, to overwhelm him until all that vaunted self-control falls to pieces and he takes it out on Gu Mang alone. He switches gears immediately.
"Shidi, shidi," he says, tilting his head and making his eyes as liquid and pleading as possible. If he blinks hard he could probably squeeze out a tear. "Don't you wanna fuck me properly?" He clenches down on his fingers, the redoubled fullness affecting him more than he thought. The tremble in his voice is all real as he asks,"Won't you make me come on your cock -"
Mo Xi pulls his fingers out and Gu Mang tastes victory.
"See, Shixiong can take it, hurry up,” he whines, but Mo Xi just swipes up more salve and shoves his fingers back in, at least four now, the stretch enough to make his eyes water. Again, he can't do anything to avoid the onslaught, legs kept apart and around Mo Xi's narrow waist. "Wait, hah, I didn’t mean," he says, cheeks heating.
"You said properly," Mo Xi replies, as if to punctuate the horrible curl of his fingers, Gu Mang tensing in reflex at the dangerous rasp of his voice. He wants to say something before he's cut off by the brush of lips against his ear. "I liked how wet you were," Mo Xi whispers, ragged with arousal. "Before."
Gu Mang chokes on his inhale. Only part of his indignation is feigned, a bristle of temper quickly soothed beneath the terrible confidence of Mo Xi's hands. There's a blush in his lover - husband's - cheeks but his eyes are dark and intent, watching him with all the feverish hunger of a man long-starved. All the uncontrolled fervor Gu Mang wants written out in his pupils; he can see the cords standing out in his neck, the ferocity he's keeping barely restrained, reflex well-trained. Placated, he surrenders just a little, no longer bothering to resist. Mo Xi nips at his ear and gets a bitten-off noise that sounds desperate even to Gu Mang. "But I want you now," he tries, one last time, belly coiling tight.
"Mn," Mo Xi replies. "I'll give you everything you want." It's punctuated with a twist of his fingers that's so helplessly filthy Gu Mang can't do anything but twitch and clench, entire body tightening up as he shudders in the circle of his arms and spills without even a warning. But Mo Xi doesn't stop, just carries on with his fingers pressing inside him even as Gu Mang trembles with oversensitivity, hiccuping between breaths as the aftershocks spark through him, leaving him a squirming mess. His legs are shaking, kept apart by Mo Xi's hips, leaving him no avenue of escape. It's not fair - he's so sensitive, already, and just after orgasm he whimpers at every touch, which is of course why Mo Xi kisses his way down past his collarbones and wraps his lips around his nipple, pinching and tugging at the other. "Ah," he cries out, undone. "Ah, you can't, it's too soon, I-ah," he's desperate, thrashing. Gu Mang can't think, caught between where he's still clenching around Mo Xi's fingers and the twin points of stimulation at his chest, too overwhelmed to tell if it's pain or pleasure. He wants , so badly, but having is a different matter entirely. Gu Mang isn't used to having, to be given good things and told to keep them, the luxury of pleasure that came without fear. He sobs.
Finally, Mo Xi relents, letting Gu Mang ease down from his hiccuping cries. Mo Xi occupies himself with mouthing along his neck, one hand stroking down his side as if he were a spooked horse that needed to be soothed. He rests for a while just like that, tears drying on his cheeks. As soon as he trusts himself to speak without cracking Gu Mang pulls at Mo Xi. "Now?"
Mo Xi bends to kiss him, very quickly. Gu Mang braces himself as Mo Xi lines himself up, the blunt head pressing up against where he's already wet and open, dripping.
He gasps when it breaches him but is quickly rendered silent - there's always that last few inches he can't ever manage on the first go, like it'd never fit without a slow rocking ease - but Mo Xi drives himself home in one hard thrust, hips pressed flush against his ass And then he pulls out, leaving only the tip to stretch his rim before he shoves back him even harder, accompanied by the flthy slap of skin on skin. Gu Mang can't say anything, can't even think as he's fucked and stuffed so full he can't even breathe. It's too much, too soon but he doesn't even have the breath to beg, only bitten-off moans as he's driven bodily into the bedding with every pounding thrust. He splays his legs wider but it doesn't seem to ease anything, the change in angle sending sparks through his nerves. There's no space left in him, too small and too tight.
Gu Mang sobs breathlessly and they sound almost like words, like yes, harder, I want more, please please - he wants to feel ravaged by tomorrow, so sore and bruised he can't walk without stumbling, the sight of it enough to make Mo Xi drag him into bed and keep him there, shove him back on his cock while he's still wet from last night and kiss him when he cries, helpless. Instead, Mo Xi slows down, shorter rocking thrusts that let him catch his breath long enough to moan, low and satisfied.
"Good?" Mo Xi asks, sounding gratifying wrecked. He's panting above him, eyes feverish. Gu Mang reaches up with one trembling hand to cup his cheek.
"So good, r-really good, I - " He squirms at the prod of Mo Xi's fingertips at where they're joined, his rim so swollen and oversensitive already. Gu Mang whimpers, wondering if he'd put them in, stretch him even further - but Mo Xi just touches him, almost curiously, the pads of his fingers sliding over slick, tender skin. Assessing.
"See?" He brings them up to his face, showing Gu Mang the shine of slick. "You're so wet, Shixiong."
"Fuck," he swears, head falling back against the bed. It jolts him enough he feels it down where he's still stuffed full, where he's so wet he can hear it squelching when Mo Xi picks up the pace again and all he can do is whine.
It's too much, no matter how much time Mo Xi had spent on opening him up it doesn't hold a candle to this, every last inch fucked deep into him where he's kept, pinned down in their wedding bed. His thoughts crash into each other and burn, immolated in the same flame he's in.
"Is this deep enough? Hard enough?" Gu Mang can hear himself babbling words but he doesn't quite know what he's saying, only that it makes Mo Xi take him harder and harder until he's scrabbling desperately for something to hold onto, fingers clutching at the sheets until they're held in a warm and familiar grip. Gu Mang arches his back and it seems to go deeper, like Mo Xi's leaving bruises even inside him. He wants it, wants to be marked up all over - wants to wake up filthy and covered in the proof of how hard he was fucked, how well. Gu Mang digs his nails into Mo Xi's back, clawing down to mark him in return.
He moans, flat and involuntary, guttural like the staccato pounding of his heart. There's no lilt to it, no affectations of tone and voice tailored to inflame Mo Xi's temper - he doesn't have the capacity to even try, whining low and helpless in his throat like the core of him has been cracked open and left to drip out. His lips are parted, wet. Gu Mang wonders if he's drooling, how debauched he looks, eyes glazed with the sheen of tears. He can feel Mo Xi pressing a kiss to his tearstained cheek, a gentleness completely at odds with the vicious snap of his hips.
And then he realizes it was a warning, before he changes the angle enough that every thrust rubs hard over where he's sensitive, so accurate and so cruel. Tears stream grom his eyes and fall as he shakes, trembling, clinging to Mo Xi for something to hold as he's taken apart and left to sob. He really can't, it's too much, he can't take it -
"You can," Mo Xi murmurs, soft like he's coaxing a wild bird. "Feel it, here." He grabs one of Gu Mang's grasping hands and makes him feel his abdomen, at the bulge of his belly beneath the muscle drawn taut. Gu Mang shakes his head no, every part of him stretched out on the fuck of Mo Xi inside him, so full he can't even think, as if he were nothing but sensation, a toy for the young master's pleasure. He's too sensitive, he's going to pass out, he can't breathe - only hiccuping, cut off moans, whining low in the back of his throat.
Gu Mang tries, pathetically, to twist away just to get the shortest break but Mo Xi just drags him bodily back onto his cock with a snarl, pinning him down beneath his weight and expanse of chest until he's not even capable of writhing away, denied any movement at all to avoid every snap of his hips, each thrust scraping right over his prostate and reducing him to panicked tears, You're going to break me, I can't anymore, shidi, shidi, slow down I -
Gu Mang can feel him brush a kiss against his parted lips and wants to tell him off - where'd all his courtly manners go, since when was he such a menace - and then abruptly he remembers.
"Husband," he cries, as much plea as it is just to say the word. "I can't - I'm going to - "
He's suddenly pulled into his lap, seated upright in a shift that stuffs him so full he can't do anything but shiver, slumping down limply against Mo Xi and giving up on making any token protest, legs splayed so wide he couldn't move if he tried. He wraps his arms around Mo Xi's neck to keep himself there, attempting to catch his breath. Mo Xi runs a hand soothingly down his back, murmuring quiet against his ear. "Still okay?" He nods, shakily.
It's so deep, so much - Gu Mang feels himself trembling around his cock, muscles trying to clench in long rippling waves that do nothing to ease the stretch, how full and overwhelming it is inside him as those familiar hands touch him, all over, like Mo Xi wants to have all of him at once, to devour him without leaving a scrap of blood or bone. Mo Xi's working his lips down his neck, Gu Mang can't catch more than a few syllables, husband one of them. He shudders, magnifying the ache.
It is a reprieve of sorts, left to spasm weakly where he's fucked so deep he feels his breath coming short. Gu Mang gasps, vision a crystal mess through his own tears. Squirming only works himself deeper but he can't stop himself from trying, writhing in Mo Xi's lap, in his hold. Trying to get away, knowing he'll only stop if he asks him to and really means it, knowing he won't ask for anything but more. Gu Mang knows he's still crying from the brush of Mo Xi's lips at the corners of his eyes, his temples, his cheeks - tasting the salt of them as he shudders, just barely catching his breath, enough to regain some clarity of thought.
Until Mo Xi's hand slides down to wrap around his dick.
The sight of his elegant scholar's hands pumping up and down around him while he's stuffed so full he can't even breathe---he can't form the words in his mouth but he grabs for Mo Xi's hand and tugs it up, he'll know what it means, what he wants - and oh there's that familiar pressure around his neck, cutting off his air, the careful press of Mo Xi's fingers the only collar he'd ever wear again - Gu Mang nearly blacks out when he comes, spasming and clenching and effectively dragging Mo Xi down alongside him, a shaky inhale the only warning he gets before he cries out loud from the brutal fuck he gets, hips clamped down hard to make him take those last few thrusts, deep enough to bruise, each merciless drag of friction bringing fresh tears to his eyes. Blind with pleasure, he bites the juncture of Mo Xi's neck, the same instinct he's had ever since they were young - to muffle his cries by dining his teeth into the one causing it. Gu Mang can feel more than hear his groan as Mo Xi pulses out inside him
The sudden slick wetness inside him makes it better , so much better he shudders hard and clenches again despite the ache, the waves rolling through him until it's just one long note of shivering oversensitivity. The room is silent but for their ragged breath, Mo Xi easing out of him with exquisite care. He whines at the emptiness anyway, then at the warm drip of it leaking out of his hole. Gu Mang slumps onto his side, sated.
Mo Xi likes him so much when he's like this, when he's been worn out and exhausted past the point of endurance, when all he can do is lie in the circle of his arms with his nerves humming like a plucked qin string. Mind blank, Gu Mang feels his lips brushing against the side of his neck, contentment radiating from him in tandem with the warmth of his body. He presses closer, Mo Xi nosing against his face and so obviously thrilled with the state of affairs it puts Gu Mang in mind of a dog nudging a treasured bone into place. The thought makes him smile, tired as he is. His whole body is boneless and half-melted, caramel pooling in the stallkeeper's mold.
He brings a hand up to poke at Mo Xi's hair, mindless and silly. Mo Xi gives him a questioning glance, a tilted head and a flick of the eyes that Gu Mang nevertheless replies to. "Looking for puppy ears," he explains. He tilts his head for a kiss that he gets, and smiles against the press of Mo Xi's lips.
Gu Mang's too sore and worn out to do anything but drowse, eyes slipping closed. Languor settles over him like the blanket Mo Xi pulls up, letting him nestle into the warmth of his side. He falls asleep knowing he'd wake to the noontime sun, to his beloved’s embrace, their days stretching out before him in endless spools of honeyed peace.
After all, the final bow was to each other.