[BL]Hunted by the God of Destruction

"You know," Matteo continued, quieter now, "there's a rumor that… he's the vessel of the Numen God."

Elias stilled.

Not visibly but something in the way he held himself went still, like an internal string had pulled taut. There were always rumors. A god descending into the bloodline of a temple heir, a chosen child, a quiet mouth that carried a divine voice. Every major cult whispered about it eventually. Most of the time, it was projection. Sometimes madness. Rarely truth.

And Victor Numen didn't strike him as a man who shared.

"Well," Elias said, after a beat that ran too smooth to be casual, "the man is terrifying in his own right. But I don't think he's a god, per se."

He shrugged, soft and elegant, the gesture refined by years of being trained how to downplay tension. Like a statement folded between napkin and smile.

"Unless someone told my parents about the meeting," he continued, "they won't bother me."

He reached for his drink, gaze distant now, like he wasn't in the bar anymore but somewhere colder, older, where temple bells used to ring too early in the morning and faith felt like duty carved into bone.

"They don't care anymore," Elias said, voice steady. "My sister's married, with honors, to a dominant alpha selected from the core caste. A child's on the way. From what I've heard."

He took a sip. The burn was clean. Sharp enough to feel real.

"They don't care about me."

Another pause.

"And I care even less about them." He played with his glass. "I thought this is a date, not a therapy session." 

Matteo chuckled softly, not mocking, just enough to break the silence before it turned brittle.

"It is a date," he said, swirling the liquid in his glass like it might reveal the next line. "But I figured it wouldn't hurt to check if you're still emotionally constipated."

Elias huffed, a breath more than a laugh. "Unbelievably so."

"I noticed." Matteo leaned forward a little, forearms resting on the table, eyes catching Elias's without flinching. "But I still asked you out."

"And I still said yes." Elias tilted his head, the ghost of a smile playing at the edge of his mouth. "So maybe we're both idiots."

"Or optimists."

"Same difference."

Matteo raised his glass halfway, eyes gleaming. "Then here's to shared delusions."

Elias clinked his glass against Matteo's with the same grace he used when dismantling a theory—light touch, steady hand, no wasted movement. He didn't drink immediately, just let the contact linger for a breath too long before pulling away.

"I'm warning you now," he murmured, "if this night ends with you trying to save me, I'm walking out."

"I'm off duty," Matteo said, voice low. "Tonight, I'm just here to ruin your taste in whiskey and possibly flirt until you stop pretending you're fine."

Elias finally smiled for real. "Bold of you to assume I ever started pretending."

The rest of the night unfolded like something almost normal.

They talked about music; Matteo liked the kind that sounded like it belonged in a bar fight; Elias preferred instrumentals that made you feel like the world might end slowly. They joked about the academic conferences. Elias loathed about the one time Matteo got stuck undercover in a floral shop for two weeks and nearly developed an allergy to sincerity. Elias told a story about a presentation where the projector caught fire. Matteo told one about his partner's unfortunate burrito incident and a car chase involving three goats and a stolen hearse.

The drinks stayed minimal, Matteo nursed one, and Elias sipped carefully, not because he didn't trust the bar, but because he didn't want anything to dull the strange clarity of the evening.

There was something soft around them now, not quite vulnerability, but the prelude to it. Like neither of them was pretending anymore, just orbiting the same truth and not yet naming it.

Then Matteo leaned back in the booth, watching Elias with a look that wasn't quite playful anymore. Still familiar, still warm, but edged with something steadier. 

"Come with me," he said, voice low. "Not far. Just… my place. Nothing dramatic. No agenda."

Elias didn't answer right away. His fingers brushed the edge of his glass, absently now, eyes flicking once to the window where city lights blurred behind condensation. Then back to Matteo.

"You always ask like I've already said yes."

Matteo smiled. "Have you?"

A breath. A pause.

"Yeah," Elias said, standing. "I have."

—

Outside, the air had thinned with the hour, cool and quiet, the street dipped in gold and shadow. Elias pulled his coat tighter around himself as they stepped onto the pavement, the click of his shoes muffled by the hush of a city holding its breath between night and whatever came after.

Matteo reached into his pocket for keys and stopped.

Across the street, half in shadow and too perfectly parked to be coincidence, a black car sat idle.

It wasn't government. Wasn't police. Wasn't even the slick, nondescript elegance of wealth trying to pretend it wasn't watching.

It was personal.

And Elias knew it before the door even opened.

The shape that stepped out was tall. Older. Wearing a coat that probably cost more than Elias's rent. His hair was shot through with steel and perfectly in place, eyes sharp even under the streetlamps.

Jonathan Clarke.

His father.

Elias went still.

Matteo noticed immediately, his body shifting closer, not quite in front, but near enough to intercept if needed.

"Elias," Jonathan said, his voice smooth and practiced, like a man who had perfected both sermons and threats in the same breath.

Elias's jaw didn't move. Not yet. His spine locked into something still and silent.

"Didn't think you'd come down from the Inner Ring just to watch me date a cop," Elias finally said. Voice quiet. Almost lazy. But Matteo could hear the strain under it.

Lucien didn't smile. "We need to talk. Privately."

"You've had twenty-five years for that," Elias replied. "Most of which you spent pretending I died."

"This isn't about the past," Jonathan said. "It's about what comes next."