Title: The Fortune Teller
By: Caryn OBrian
Pairing: Gil/Nick
Rating: NC-17
Summary: This was written for a kink community. It has blood play, wax play, general BDSM and angst. You've been warned. Gil's POV.

***

Nick will never understand how much you appreciate this -- these hours that he claims you're practicing your "art." No -- you know better. You're still a sad old man, as dried up on the inside as the bugs stuck to your wall, who needs this push beyond the laws of civility to get an ordinary thrill.

So you carve your name into his back, let the blood well, settle, then add wax and mix. He gives long drawn out whimpers and sighs, such a good boy you tell him. His cries are songs worthy of any opera, running arpeggios of goose bumps up and down your spine.

But it isn't enough -- it's never enough. So you add your own essence into the elixir, jerking off hard while pinching him, or running your nails down the scores he bravely took for you, making him moan and weep while you cast streaks across his abused skin. You can almost see the pattern now -- can almost see what your future will bring as he shifts unsatisfied under your caress, not coming undone unless at your word, which at the end, you do give, even though the picture isn't complete.

Yet -- you don't really need this practice, this "art" to know what lays ahead of you as you untie him, soothe his wounds, bring him back up into normal space. As you bathe him and worship him, love this skin he's let you paint on, this canvass he's become.

Your future hasn't changed even though he's moved in, settled like a worn chamois cloth around your heart. You'll still die bitter, friendless, and alone.

It's in the stars.

***