[BL]Hunted by the God of Destruction

Victor simply caught the pillow as it slid down his lap and rested his hand on it like a throne accessory. "Well. Progress. You're not throwing furniture yet. "I'll take that as a maybe."

"It was a 'get bent,'" Elias snapped, refusing to look at him.

"But you're still not saying no."

"I am saying no. Loudly. With punctuation."

Victor just smiled. "You're going to have to move in with me tonight anyway. Soulmate status aside."

Elias lowered his hands slowly, eyes narrowed with the kind of exhausted dread that only came from knowing your life was no longer your own.

"Why?"

"Because Ashwin intercepted a courier headed to your dorm with a burn packet and an old-stamped kill order. Your location's compromised. The moment you go back, you die."

Elias stared at him for a beat too long, then dropped heavily onto the edge of the bed like the last threads of logic had finally snapped.

"Oh, perfect," he muttered. "This'll look great on my next therapy intake form: 'Can't return to campus, targeted for divine assassination, also might be soul-bonded to a war criminal with great cheekbones.'"

Victor's voice was calm. "I'm not a war criminal."

"I was being generous."

Victor arched a brow. "This is your coping mechanism?"

Elias stared at him. The pause that followed was not surprise, it was fatigue. He sat down heavily, the movement stiff, one hand coming up to pinch the bridge of his nose.

"I'm just trying to understand," he said, voice muffled behind his fingers, "at what point in the last seventy-two hours I accidentally auditioned to be a main character in a divine tragedy."

Victor didn't blink. "Roughly when you picked up the phone and called me."

Elias dropped his hand. "You didn't even deny it."

"Why would I?"

"Gods." Elias leaned back slightly, eyes narrowing. "You helped me escape. You kept me alive, barely, and talked me through climbing a fence with a dislocated ankle, all while sounding like someone reading the evening news."

His voice dropped, tight and sharp.

"And now you want me to move in. Fuse souls. Act like the divine USB that I apparently am. And maybe, maybe, even go up against the family I ran from ten years ago. After we've met. What? Twice?"

Victor didn't flinch. Didn't even blink. Just rested one hand on the pillow in his lap like a throne accessory and studied Elias like he was already working out the next ten moves on the board.

"You don't believe it," he said, voice low, threaded with something far too controlled to be called frustration, impatience, maybe, but the kind that came after centuries of waiting.

"I can't process it," Elias shot back. "What happens if you're wrong? What if I'm not the special man you think I—"

He didn't finish.

Victor was already standing.

Elias didn't see him rise, just felt the air moving beside him. One hand at the small of his back, firm and unyielding, the other sliding up, fingers brushing the back of his neck in a touch that was somehow both commanding and painfully gentle.

Then Victor kissed him.

Warmth.

That was the first thing Elias registered.

Not the godhood. Not the fear. Just warmth, clean and consuming, with the faint, intoxicating taste of something expensive on Victor's breath, like aged alcohol and his own taste.

Victor kissed like he was teaching Elias to breathe again. Slow at first, deliberate. His lips coaxed, not crushed, mouth moving against Elias's with a precision that left no room for resistance and no space for thought. There was no hesitation, only certainty, the kind of certainty that made people build temples.

Victor tilted his head slightly, deepening the angle, and Elias opened his mouth to him before he realized he'd done it, before he even remembered what he was trying to say.

The slide of Victor's tongue was velvet heat and command, a perfect blend of restraint and hunger. His hand at Elias's back tightened, drawing him closer, anchoring him even as the world around them fell silent.

Then it hit.

Power.

Power surged through him like a storm, something ancient and molten that sank straight into Elias's skin before he could even think of resisting. It traveled through his body, settling in his chest, making him gasp in Victor's mouth. 

His fingers clenched instinctively in the fabric of Victor's coat.

It didn't burn, it etched. It pressed through his bones like heat curling into steel, like threads of lightning pulling godhood through a man who didn't know he could hold it. His whole body went weightless and heavy all at once, every nerve tuned to Victor's touch, every breath warped by something too large to fit in his lungs.

Then it moved back toward Victor, slowly.

Like a tide receding. Like something alive withdrawing its claws with reluctant grace.

Elias didn't realize he was shaking until his knees buckled.

The moment his weight dipped, Victor caught him, effortlessly, one arm slipping around Elias's waist, the other still cradling the back of his neck like he'd known this would happen. Like he'd planned for it.

The kiss didn't break.

Victor didn't allow it.

His mouth stayed firm against Elias's, breathing him in, breathing him back to himself, drawing him closer as the divine energy curled inward again, threading itself into the air between them like it had always belonged there.

Elias was trembling now, from the sheer immensity of what had just passed through him.

His mind felt scorched and silent all at once. Like there was no space left for panic, only sensation.

Only him.

Victor's lips finally pulled away, just enough to let them breathe. Just enough for Elias to feel how close they were. His breath ghosted against Elias's cheek, warm, steady, and entirely unaffected.

And then, with unbearable calm:

"This is way better than I thought," Victor murmured, smug and quiet and clearly far too pleased with himself.

Elias blinked, still not fully upright in his own body, and might have growled if he hadn't been busy staying conscious.

Victor guided him backward with maddening patience, one hand at Elias's elbow, the other steady at the small of his back. It wasn't forceful. It didn't have to be. He moved like someone who knew exactly when resistance would melt into surrender and was content to wait three seconds longer than necessary.

Elias sat down heavily on the edge of the bed, legs too shaky to argue, pride too stubborn to admit it.

"You are an asshole," he said at last, voice hoarse and uneven.

Victor cocked his head, his red eyes shining a bit darker than before, as if he was thinking about that. "Yes," he said simply. "But I'm your asshole now."