
Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/328812.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Rape/Non-Con, Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Once_and_Future_King_Series_-_T._H._White
  Relationship:
      Kay/Wart
  Character:
      Kay_(The_Sword_in_the_Stone), Wart_(The_Sword_in_the_Stone)
  Stats:
      Published: 2004-07-06 Words: 1932
****** The Rare Sweetness of Shared Apples ******
by mayhap
Summary
     Kay is a beast and a bully, but Wart loves him anyway.
Notes
     Elements of dubious consent and (adoptive) incest.
Wart was actually not sleeping yet, but he let Kay shake him awake as if he had
been.
"Wake up, wake up, will you?" Kay's hands stripped away the blankets and shook
him like the hunting party charging through the undergrowth, while Wart
pretended to be limp as a boned fish and snoring soundly. It was a game that
the sleeping party could never hope to win, but continued long beyond the point
where he could realistically be expected to still be sleeping, out of sheer
bloodymindedness. Wart feinted rolling over quite unconcerned as Kay pounded on
his back with his fists.
"You're not sleeping, I can see your eyes winking!" Kay set upon Wart in
earnest now, but still he resisted mightily. He lay as still as a huntsman in
the woods will sometimes do, disciplining every nerve in his body.
It was a venerable game that had no doubt been played so long as there were at
least two people on this earth, one to sleep and the other to awaken him, but
there was an edge to it this evening, like the damp chill of the
castle&#x2019;s bones. Wart was not yet made Kay's squire, as he always knew
that he would be, but he knew now that the time was approaching very soon
indeed when he would be, and then all would be changed. It was not that Kay was
a bad chap, and Wart was sure that if he had to be a squire he would not want
to be anyone else's squire, but he still wanted to be a knight, and those
longings kept welling up whether he wanted them or no. Furthermore, when Kay
had become a grand knight and Wart was his lowly squire, things could not help
but be different. There would be no more jolly give-and-take, there would only
be taking.
Wart did not think it all through like that, of course. He just saw that Kay
was spending less and less time with him, and he grew sulky and snappish. The
more he snapped, the less likely Kay was to ask him to do anything, and the
lonelier he grew, the more Wart sulked. At the present moment he was sulking
with a vengeance.
"You shall wake up, Wart, for I want you."
Kay's voice was fierce and low, and Wart was strongly tempted to open his eyes
right then in order that he might see the expression on Kay's face. To save his
own face, naturally, he pretended he was awakening naturally and of his own
volition, with a stretch and a yawn and two fluttering eyes. Kay was leaning
over him with an intense stare and a set jaw, dramatic in the low yellow
lamplight. Some other emotion washed over his face and changed it when he saw
that Wart's eyes were open, although Wart did not know what it was, and he
didn't think that he had ever seen it before.
"What is it you want, then?" Wart tried to sound sleepy, but he didn't think it
came off very well.
Kay laughed. His laugh was ragged, worn through in patches by nerves. "Just
something you owe me as my squire."
"I'm not your squire yet, am I?" Wart snapped back, automatically, like a
loosed bowstring.
"No, but you will be, so you have to learn."
"Learn what? You haven't said." Wart capitulated as he always did, such that
Kay hadn't actually said a word about his parents in ages, but he was still
surly about it, nevertheless.
"Just something," Kay mumbled. He hung his head a bit, staring at his own hands
and picking at his sleeves, and something about the way he avoided looking at
Wart at all made him realize for the first time in his life that he was naked.
He felt his whole face going warm, and he wanted to pull the sheets back over
himself, but he didn't. For a moment, he was too embarrassed to move.
"Look here, get out of bed," Kay ordered, and Wart tumbled out, self-
consciously. Their heights were of a muchness now, or nearabouts, but Kay was
still a good deal heavier, and not all of the dignity he tried to put about was
wholly derived from his own bluster. Wart came out suddenly in goosebumps, and
not just because the air in the castle was chill.
Kay pushed Wart back onto the bed, now sprawled over it head-first, like an
erring hunter over the quarry. His hands were rough and awkward, and they were
cold.
"What are you doing?" Wart twisted his head around to look. Kay was fumbling
with the laces of his breeches.
"I'm taking my pleasure," Kay growled, "I suppose you are too stupid to know
anything about it, but it is what knights do."
"I never heard anything about it."
"You wouldn't. It's unspoken. It's a tradition passed from knight to knight in
secrecy on pain of death."
"Really?"
"Would you hush?" Kay cuffed Wart about the head and Wart held his tongue. He
kept his eyes fixed on Kay. "And stop looking back at me." Kay demanded
pettishly. Wart pillowed his head on crossed arms and waited. He closed his
eyes, and the whole of his world whittled down to the rasp of rough linen on
the one side, the hot prickle of shame on the other. When he felt Kay&#x2019;s
two hands on his bum, rough and damp with nerves, he shuddered, convulsively,
and he didn&#x2019;t know why. He was familiar with cycles of need and release,
getting it off quickly in order to relax, drawing it out in order to savour the
pleasure, but nothing like the bewilderment of emotions that swamped him as he
hardened at Kay&#x2019;s touch, pressing his groin hungrily against the sheets.
Wart was for the briefest moment reminded of when they were younger and nearly
inseparable and Kay often carried an apple on him. Often he crunched them
noisily for himself and Wart pretended to ignore him, but sometimes he would
cleave the crisp white flesh with his thumbs and give part to his half brother,
and they would share in the sweetness, and spit the seeds at each other. It
seemed to him, though he could not see, that Kay was trying to split him open
with his thumbs, just so.
Wart didn&#x2019;t realize what Kay was trying to do, what he could be looking
for, until he found it. Wart gasped, and jammed his first finger between his
teeth to prevent himself from doing more than that. Kay&#x2019;s fingers were
rough, and awkward, and they hurt, but that was not what made it so difficult
for him to keep from crying out; he was used to covering worse pain with a
stoic face, but unprepared for feelings like this.
He felt Kay pressing up against him, felt the soft hot snub wetness of him and
that strange pleasure that made him shake. He felt Kay&#x2019;s hunger, and his
frustration; he felt pain again as Kay pushed blindly, and hard. He felt his
own teeth sharp on his finger and heard a whimpering noise, more puppy than
boy. He realized, with an agonizing writhe of embarrassment, that that puppy
was himself.
Kay froze. He pulled away, leaving Wart stretched out over the bed, hiding his
red cheeks and his confusion.
Wart waited for Kay to start what he had been doing again, or to say something,
or to in some other way show him what he ought to be thinking, but Kay left him
with nothing but silence. Finally, Wart wriggled and craned his head around to
look, tugging on a quilt to assuage his newfound modesty. Kay stood still, his
breeches still unlaced and forgotten. His head was bowed, uncomfortably, as if
it were unaccustomed.
"You don't have to do this," Kay said, after a moment. His voice was low and
tight, his hands spread in defeat. &#x201C;I lied. I just&#x2026;I just
wanted&#x2026;&#x201D;
Wart heard how close Kay was to sobbing. He was filled with a great tenderness,
as if he were the older, the stronger, the wiser of the two. He saw Kay, saw
the bad and the good alike and loved him for it nonetheless. He rose as Kay
looked ready to bolt from the room, trailing the quilt like a cloak as he did
so.
&#x201C;What if I asked you to?&#x201D; Wart said, very quietly. Kay slowly
tilted his head back to meet Wart&#x2019;s eyes before him. &#x201C;You can try
it again,&#x201D; Wart suggested, scarcely knowing how he dared.
Kay laughed, uncomfortably, still perilously close to tears. He did not move
from where he stood.
Wart reached out one arm and pulled him onto the bed, letting the quilt slip to
the floor. For a moment they were tussling, pure reflex, arms and legs
flailing, and then Kay was on top again, winning out by dint of strength and
weight, just like he always did. His palms pinned down Wart&#x2019;s bare
shoulders and his cock bobbed greedily against Wart&#x2019;s naked thigh. Wart
reached with his left hand and wrapped his fingers around it.
The angle was wrong and his grip was awkward and he hadn&#x2019;t any rhythm to
speak of, and it was perfect, to judge by Kay&#x2019;s low, hungry moan. Wart
had never heard anything so good. He clung fiercely to Kay as Kay rolled off of
him, but Kay wasn&#x2019;t running away; rather, he lay on his side and reached
over to reciprocate, to share the sweetness. And, with the revelatory
conviction of the young who are discovering sex for the first time, Wart knew
that nothing had ever felt so good as Kay&#x2019;s hands, Kay&#x2019;s rough,
thick fingers, when they found his cock.
Kay closed his eyes, and kept them shut; it made him look innocent and young,
incongruously so. Kay&#x2019;s lips were pressed firmly together now, not a
sound escaping them, and Wart knew that the tiny, puppyish sounds that matched
to the syncopated rhythm of their jerking came from him, but he was beyond
embarrassment. He wound his right hand through Kay&#x2019;s straw-straight hair
and tightened the grip of his left as Kay bucked, skittishly, out of control.
Wart felt the mess all over his hand and Kay&#x2019;s breeches and the sheet
that was rucked up underneath them, and he didn&#x2019;t care; he threw his arm
around Kay and pressed up close to him and he was perfectly happy with who he
was, and where he was, even before the fireworks exploded.
For some time they lay still, curled up together in the thoroughly-debauched
bed; perhaps for a space of a minute or more. Kay was, naturally, the first to
break the silence. &#x201C;Aren&#x2019;t you going to clean up the mess you
made?&#x201D;
This was, of course, monstrously unfair, as well as clearly intended as
provocation. Wart felt that he deserved some sort of recognition, perhaps in
the form of a knighthood, for merely responding, &#x201C;It&#x2019;s my bed
you&#x2019;ve ruined, you know. You could just get out of it.&#x201D;
Each ignored the other&#x2019;s suggestion. Wart sat up and looked thoughtfully
down at Kay, who rolled away from the wet spot and stretched out, joining his
hands behind his head. &#x201C;What was it you were going to do with
me?&#x201D; Wart asked, finally.
&#x201C;Can you really be that stupid?&#x201D; Kay snorted derisively.
&#x201C;I thought you said you were going to teach me.&#x201D;
&#x201C;Perhaps I will.&#x201D;
Wart could see that Kay would go no further that night, and so, reluctantly, he
left it at that.
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