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We only learn as much as we are able to believe.

“Another useful thing I inherited from my father,” Dominic joked. “The only time I used to be well dressed was when Paul used to pick all my clothes... I've learned to stick with black and sometimes, very rarely, I'm adventurous and wear something blue.” The only shame was that the green and orange feathers of his birds were entirely lost on him.

“Don't worry, they bite very hard if you hurt them.” One of the birds hopped on the finger, taking a little care with her claws. She watched Neil, a little wary, but apparently willing to humour both of them. At least Dominic realised that whipping out the pictures of them as fluffy little balls would have been embarrassing to them all. He had one in his wallet. They were, quite simply, some of the most important things in his life.

It must have looked ridiculous to the waiter delivering their drinks. Two grown men playing with little birds in a restaurant. The most common familiars were still domestic cats and dogs, and maybe snakes for people who wanted to be 'special'. Still, a bowl of water arrived as requested. Looked like there would be no need to make a fuss. Good.
 
"Well, at least Paul was good for something," Neil said. "Although I rather like you in black. It gives you an edge." He grinned at the other male, shifting as a bird hopped onto his finger. Cute. Neil pulled her closer very carefully, studying her. "I've never had a bird," he said. "I had a dog when I was a kid, but... I don't know, I've never had time for pets. They would get lonely, given how much time I spend in the office. I tried fish once, but kept forgetting to feed them." Neil petted the bird very gently, using one finger. He really was scared of accidentally damaging her.

"Your water's here," he said, sliding the finger she was perched on closer to the bowl. He took a sip of his own water, then looked over at Dominic and cleared his throat. "I take it they have a much longer lifespan than an average bird?"
 
"They will live at least as long as I will. We are linked, sort of." It was complicated, and not even Dominic was very certain of what familiars did. Some chose to live on long after their users passed. Dominic's vagueness showed that he was not sure he should even share his knowledge of the subject.

"Oh, these bite my ears if they are bored or hungry... You can't forget them," Dominic replied with a grin. "I used to have ear piercings, but they kept pulling on them and using them to climb my head." No wonder his ears were covered with lines of faint scars. He relaxed slightly when the bird left Neil, but the care the man had taken was reassuring. "They also sit on my face if I try to sleep too long past dawn." If they ever sat on Neil's face, it would be a sign that they had managed to domesticate him too.
 
Neil nodded - that was as he'd thought. It wouldn't do to have your familiar up and die on you. "I did wonder about the scars," he said, taking a sip of something harder. Dominic may not be allowed to drink, but Neil needed something to loosen up a little, get out of work mode and into play. And he definitely wanted this to be play. "Hah, pretty much like having kids, then. 'Daddy, daddy, wake up'." Neil laughed, looking over at Dominic. He shifted, brushing the other man's knee under the table.

"What made you decide you wanted two?" he asked. "You spoke before like you had a great deal of trouble hatching them. Was that already part of your contract, or was there something else?" He was curious, now.
 
Telling Neil that it was just because they had short attention spans would ruin the mystique.

“It was a challenge my grandmother set me. To hatch a two-yolked egg. Normally, they just wouldn't be born, but she asked me to work out how to hatch them anyway. She thought it was valuable to teach me to understand how to keep life going... After all that effort, I couldn't just not keep them. They were so ugly when they were born, I thought I did something wrong. But they got fluffier eventually.” Oh, those lovely days of not sleeping and feeding them at hourly intervals, and sweltering because the room had to be kept warm. It really was like having children. “We knew that they would have some power, but we arranged the contract when they were fully grown.”

As he talked, he reached down and laid a hand on Neil's knee, just placing it there, because he could. He stroked it lightly through the cloth.

“Some people see it as too much effort to have a familiar. None of my brothers do, but I like having someone else's opinion on my spells. We've never been more than a few rooms apart...” Dominic mused, frowning at that sudden realisation. He had never thought about it that way. They were never out of earshot, at least. "I don't know. I don't know how it is to live otherwise," he concluded. "What happened to your dog?"
 
"If you spend that much time and energy on something, it seems a shame not to keep it - or them," Neil agreed, nodding his head. He might have asked another question, but he was thoroughly distracted by the hand on his knee. He shifted a little, pressing into it rather than moving away, gazing at Dominic from across the table. "I can see why it would seem like too much effort," he said. "But companionship and someone - or something - to give you a fresh point of view is invaluable."

Neil slid a hand under the table, casually covering Dominic's hand with his own. Rather than pushing the other away, or stopping him, he guided the other man's hand upward, smirking across the table at him. "Nothing too depressing - he died of old age while I was away at college. I still regret that I wasn't able to be there when they put her down, but I was in the middle of some exams," he said. "And it would have been cruel to extend her life just so I could be there - her kidneys were failing."
 
As if he was not now caressing as far up Neil's thigh as he could reach, he nodded in response to the words. “The sort of death nothing can prevent.” Accepting the inevitability of dying was necessary for all practitioners of death magic. To Dominic, only the dying part was painful and horrible. What came afterwards was peaceful and quiet. He would know.

“What did you study? What was it like?” Well, he had to ask. Having never gone to school, Dominic had ended up with only the minimum formal qualifications. To him tests tended to be practical, and often deadly dangerous. “I'm horrible at written exams.” To be entirely honest, he was terrible at writing in general. His spelling was dire, and he had a very vague sense of grammar. He always palmed off reports onto someone else for a good reason. When he actually had to write something, it tended to end up being surreptitiously laughed at by half the department.

"Budge up closer," he added. He couldn't reach any higher without bending over the table, and he wasn't going to fo that.
 
"Aye, she lived to a good age, and she had a happy life. You can't really ask for more than that. After that, I was too busy to get another dog. I would like one, though, I think." The companionship would be nice, but he really did spend far too much time at work for that to be a viable option. "I studied criminology - no surprise there. It was nice. It was like... easing into the real world, being on your own without all the responsibilities of being an adult. And in that we're similar - I was always better at practical things. But I wanted to be a detective, so I worked hard."

Neil looked over at Dominic. He knew exactly what the request was for - but after encouraging the other to molest him at the dinner table, he could hardly say no. After a short pause, he did was he was told and budged up closer. He caressed Dominic's knuckles with his thumb before letting the other man's hand go, letting Dominic take the lead and do as he liked, his thigh flexing under the other man's hand.
 
“You know, after living with these, I always think that pets are really, really stupid.” Normal animals were just not as intelligent, and hence a little boring. “I can pet them for half an hour, but then what? They're not going to tell me anything interesting.”

“I didn't have that much choice about joining the force, actually. They twisted my arm a bit. Said that they would put on record all my small infractions unless I accepted the job. So I did.” That would explain why sometimes he was entirely lacking in enthusiasm over the job. “I always wanted to be a golem artificer. Not much demand for spirit and bone golems though.” It was a legal grey-area to boot, so not a viable career.

If he stretched out his fingers, he could just brush Neil's crotch with his fingers. Damn the size of the table.
 
"Mmmm... there's something to be said for keeping something less smart than you around, though. Something that adores you unconditionally," Neil said, losing his focus slightly at where that hand was venturing. He parted his legs under the table, squirming in his seat. His eyes slipped closed for a brief moment before Dominic started talking again, interrupting his enjoyment. "Oh, right. Yes, I knew you weren't exactly part of it out of the goodness of your heart. Can you just-" He bit at his lower lip, then scooted forward a little, sinking down in his seat, slouching in the least inconspicuous way he possibly could in an effort to get Dominic to go a little higher.

"I pretty much always wanted to be a detective. I wanted to be... ah... stupid things when I was a kid. You know, astronaut, that kind of thing." He shivered. If this kept up, he was going to have to sit through dinner with a boner.
 
“When I was a kid, I wanted to be immortal,” Dominic said lightly. “But then, as I learned more, I worked out that even if it was possible, it would be so depressing to watch everyone else die. To stand still while the rest of the world moves would be a terrible fate.” It was probably not the time for metaphysics, judging by the sudden fall in the sophistication of Neil's sentences.

“You keep twitching,” he observed. “If you can't keep still, I'm going to have to stop. It would be so awkward if we got caught... Well, if you got caught. I'm totally not doing anything.” As casually as possible, he pulled his chair in a little more. He ran his finger along the line of Neil's cock. What an odd headrush, to feel it harden. To do this in public. To make someone squirm like that with just a single finger and such a light touch. “I have to say that I did wonder what it would be like to go into space. There are no dead there. Would it be horrible or just very quiet?”
 
"Yes," Neil said. It would be an absolutely terrible fate. One that he wouldn't wish upon anyone. Except he was far too distracted to voice that point of view right now. "Could never understand why... people wanted that," he said. He looked away at the reprimand, trying to get himself under control. Unfortunately, the way Dominic ran a finger lightly over the hardening line of his cock made Neil twitch hard.

"Sorry," he said. "Don't stop, I'll try harder." He parted his legs further, enjoying the tightness of his jeans, feeling his cock harden further at the thrill of doing this in public. He liked it as much as Dominic did, welcomed it. Some part of him liked this kind of control game very much. "I don't know what it would be like," he mumbled. "Different to you than me." He took a sip of his whiskey and coke and looked over at Dominic, his pupils slightly dilated.
 
Dominic grinned diabolically. His own self-control was perfect here. Being turned on was nothing compared to the time he stuck a knife through his hand to fuel a spell. So much easier to behave as if there was nothing at all going on in his own pants. Though, he did suppose, it must help that no one was poking him there.

“I would never have thought you were like this when I first met you.” Most of his boyfriends had been very tame, and this was not a side of himself that Dominic had explored much. There was something in him that wondered what it would be like to fully control someone's soul... If this harmless little game was this fun. It was the same part that drank in the left over essence of murder scenes. It was not a comfortable thought, and he leant back a little.
 
It was all Neil could do not to whine out a complaint when Dominic leaned back. He slouched a little further, trying to tempt the other man into continuing, sending a beseeching look over at Dominic. "Jones," he said, then paused. They were well past last names. "Dominic. I want-" He was interrupted by the arrival of food. Neil straightened up, trying not to look too guilty. He squirmed a little, waiting for the waiter to disappear before he reached down and adjusted himself.

"A lot of people make assumptions. I'm a big, grumpy fucker. Not many people would think I'm like this. Don't get to see it, either." He was starving, but he'd have gladly skipped dinner if it meant they could go back and fuck, he was that horny. "I didn't think you'd be like this, either," he said, picking up his knife and fork. He poked at his steak. After ascertaining that it was suitably rare, he started to eat.
 
It was impossible not to laugh as the waiter walked away absolutely none the wiser. Nothing could quite wipe away the feeling of self-satisfaction of having reduced Neil to almost begging. Hearing his name said like that... Damn that waiter for coming just then. He would have loved to hear what Neil was about to say.

Water from a wet wing did get him out of his little reverie, as well as the birds stealing pieces of salad off his plate. He cut up a tomato into tiny pieces for them while shaking his thoughts into order.

“Nice steak,” Dominic said finally, after trying a bite. He might have liked it slightly more burnt, but it really was tasty. Definitely back to ordinary conversation. It beat saying that he wanted fuck Neil over the table, certainly.
 
"They can have some of my salad, if they like," Neil said, then paused. "I should try and get used to addressing you directly, huh?" he asked, looking at the birds. "I'm not a big fan of salad." He waved down in its general direction. "Um, feel free," he added. The main part of Neil's meal would consist of the steak, the onion rings and the potatoes, and he dug in with great pleasure.

"It is a nice steak," he said, looking over at Dominic, his gaze a little darker than usual, his pupils still a little dilated. Under the table, he was still hard. "That's why I brought you here. You can pick the place next time." There would be a next time, then - so far, Neil had found the experience agreeable. Though when they went back to his place, that would be the crunch. If Dominic was good in bed, it would seal the deal.
 
The birds had a liking for cucumbers and tomatoes, which they promptly stole. They were beginning to warm to Neil, at least a little bit. They did not like Neil as much as Dominic did, of course. Non-users were always a little suspect to them, but they were not going to mess this up, just like Dominic pretended not to notice when they decided to chat up other birds. Sometimes they all felt a little sulky at possible additions to their little flock, but it worked well enough most of the time. Lovebirds could be demanding and territorial, after all.

"Ah, the next time," Dominic mused between bites. No one had ever complained about his performance in bed, so he did not worry about later. The anticipation was a pleasant warmth in his stomach, however. Absolutely nothing to do with how good the food was.

"Oh, stop that. That's not good for you," he said, dragging a chip out of a beak and putting it into his own mouth. "You'll get too fat to fly." Obviously hoping he wasn't paying enough attention, but Dominic could watch them, eat, and hook his ankle around Neil's leg, caressing it casually. So not doing anything.
 
"Do they usually get into food they're not supposed to?" Neil asked, grinning. Okay, he had to admit - they were cute. Cute little flying balls of fluff that got into everything and ate things they shouldn't and messed up Dominic's hair. And that could also probably kill him if they really, really wanted to. Neil wasn't going to think about that too hard. Instead, he focused on the way Dominic was teasing him under the table.

Neil shifted and cleared his throat. He didn't move his leg away - he just let Dominic, watching him from the other side of the table as he ate. "When did you realise you're gay?" he asked. "Or... well, that you like men."
 
"Oh, they're very annoying like that. They like eating cooked and sweet things, but it's not healthy for them, and they already got pancakes today." A bit like the days Dominic spent subsisting on ice cream and baked goods. Some spells took a lot out of him - and left him strangely hungry for days.

"Hmm, I never thought about it much really. Not until someone dared me to kiss a boy. Then, I guess I realised more than other people thought I should." He shrugged. "And when I moved away from home I went to some gay clubs, just because my tutor didn't give me a curfew. I went batshit for a month, then he told me to pull myself together. It was a pretty good time. You." Order, not a question.
 
"Must have been a relief to go from your dad to being able to do whatever you wanted. For a month, anyway," Neil said, smiling over at Dominic. He paused. "I suppose I kind of always knew. I mean, I was always attracted to boys. I tried dating girls for a while, when I was about fifteen, but I always knew, really. Since I had a crush on Batman and all." He snorted, finishing his steak and taking a sip of his drink.

"I first kissed a boy when I was sixteen. I was pretty eager for more, so I first had sex when I was sixteen, too." He smiled. "No looking back. At first, my dad kind of had a problem with it - he was a cop, you know. But he got over it. I've never really had a bad relationship with my parents."
 
"That must have been nice." Dominic was naturally jealous of anyone who actually had good relationships with their families. The only person he had been close to was his grandmother, and she had died when he was eighteen. "After my father... Died? Killed himself? We're not sure..." It had been a disquieting funeral. "Last time we all talked together was to bury him. We warded the tomb, so nothing could possess his body, and then we all went our separate ways." Necromancers did not stop serving as gateways when they died. Only when even the dust had dissipated did it become impossible for them to be possessed.

"I first did it with my tutor. It's frowned upon, of course." A violation of the student-teacher relationship. It was not something Dominic had ever mentioned before, to anyone. "There are things necromancers can do to each other that no one else can."
 
"I'm sorry to hear about your father," Neil said. That was probably tough - not knowing whether your father had died or killed himself. Neil was curious, but he hardly wanted to pry - if Dominic wanted to volunteer more information, he would. Neil was going to leave that alone. Instead, he chose to focus on the whole student-teacher relationship thing. He raised his eyebrows and looked over at Dominic.

"Oh? Who instigated that?" he asked, taking another sip of his drink. He shifted, getting comfortable, a touch of the devil in his expression. "Do I want to know what things necromancers can do to each other, or would it weird me out?"
 
"It was... A mutual realisation. Some spells we worked together let us know too much about each other's mental state." A mutual realisation, yes, but Dominic best remembered being slammed against the wall straight afterwards, being kissed while his teacher's eyes were still dark with power. He was skirting around it. "A little bit of it was a crush, I guess. He seemed so powerful and clever then. I guess I let him?" It was a curious way to turn it around. "I was shy, and it seemed the easiest way to get what I wanted." Which, arguably, was not entirely the physical part.

"It would freak you out," Dominic said, unable to prevent himself from smirking. "Let's just say that before we start, we need a ward-circle of blood." Easiest way of avoiding unwanted attention from both the living and the dead.
 
That was interesting. Neil wondered what it would be like to suddenly know, without a doubt, that someone returned your attraction. He thought about it, finishing his whiskey and coke as he looked over at Dominic. Neil nodded. "I remember I had a crush on my professor, once," he said. "He just seemed so clever and in control." Neil shook his head and smiled at Dominic.

Anything with ward-circles of blood would probably definitely freak him out, but Neil hadn't become a detective for kicks - he was a naturally curious man. 'You're better off not knowing' had never been an answer to anything, as far as he was concerned. "I probably don't want to know, but I'm curious," he said. "Go on. I promise not to freak out, even if I make faces."
 
Did Neil really want to know? Especially with most people's distinct distaste for necromancy... Dominic wasn't sure how much he wanted to censor.

"Within the circle, we do not need to control our power. Do you even know what necromancy is? Control of the spirit's energy, whose manifestation is the soul." It went without saying that there were people with very small and boring ones. To Dominic, those people, however physically beautiful, always seemed terribly dull. "We can choose to manifest in either world. When we do in this one, spells are wordless, and we can choose to feel the same as someone else. Pain and pleasure are the same thing. We cannot tell the difference." Kisses and cuts both did equally well. It was probably why some people had the vaguest sense of right and wrong.
 
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